Jacob Burckhardt, Swiss Philosopher of History—100th
Anniversary of His Death 1897 By Bertil Haggman,
FORCE & FREEDOM: REFLECTIONS ON
HISTORY (1943) by Jacob Burkhardt
A Few Reflections and Notes
Jacob Burckhardt's Weltgeschichtliche
Betrachtungen were translated and published in English in the 1940s. The
original version in German was published post-humously.
The book is based on lectures by
Burckhardt in 1868 and 1871. The first four chapters are an ‘Introduction to
the ‘Study of History’. It deals with the historical process and the three main
forces that shape a civilization: State, Religion and Culture.
The establishment of a state or a religion
is often the result of the displacement of a previous power that has become
corrupt or decadent. It is often based on ideals to set up a new order. But the
new order has to maintain itself in power. Therefore power in the end has a
corrosive action on humanity. The role of the state is therefore to check
factions, who want to gain power by the means of force, and to maintain a sense
of security and continuity.
Religions, so Burckhardt, are the
expression of human nature's eternal and indestructable meta-physical
need. Religion is also a constant which seeks to maintain a stable and
perdurable state of a civilization.
Change is the essence of history. Thus
culture is the most important element of a civilization:
“Culture may be defined as the sum total
of those mental developments which take place spontaneously and lay no claim to
universal or compulsive authority….Its total external form…as distinguished
from the State and Religion, is society in its broadest sense.” (p.140).
In a chapter on crisis of history JB
discusses the accelerated movement of the process of history. It is when
developments that normally take centuries pass by in a few months or even a few
days.
Several parts of this section of the book
is a warning to our time as JB has often been described as a prophetic
philosopher of history. No doubt he saw in the 19th century the omens of coming
‘tremendous national wars’ (p.292), and an escalating concern for moneymaking
and self-interest. JB's popularity in Britain and the United States to a great
extent comes from his warnings of a coming struggle between freedom and the all
powerful State as experienced in the struggle agains the totalitarian forces of
fascism, national socialism and marxism-leninism.
Another important section in Force &
Freedom, that on fortune and misfortune in history, deals with interpretation
of history. Our study of the past must be free of egoism, ulterior motives and
vain assumptions of superiority. Moral progress is relevant to the life of the
individual and not to whole epochs. If, even in bygone times, men gave their
lives for each other, we have not progressed since.
JB was critical of progress. His insight
that power never yet improved a man made him well aware that progress is an
ephemeral ideal based rather on wishful thinking than on actuality. He thus
rejected an approach to history based on political events as such or study of
powerful individuals. No doubt there are crucial developments in history that
influence all subsequent periods but it is wrong to see progress in such events
and deduce continuos improvements from them.
Greetings
Dear Mr Haggman, very interested to read your post here! And if you are indeed the same Bertil Haggman with whom I corresponded in the late 1990's about Julius Van Payer's Arctic canvasses, I would be grateful if you could get in touch with me, as I have some questions about them!
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