/lit/ - Literature

Capital T Traditionalism, like Marxism, is not actually a philosophy of history at all, but a political ideology that uses history like a tool, as a foundation for political aims. It is contemptuous of real history and has no desire to reach its true essence.

Can one be both a philosopher and a historian? The philosopher speculates on truths and ideals that transcend time and space, while the historian judges the expressions of each historical period separately and independently. It was quite acceptable in the age of Hegel and Herder, when the field of history was in its infancy, to conceive of a priori philosophical systems and smother history underneath them. But in the age post-Ranke it is the height of charlatanry. He who philosophizes about history after Ranke is, or at least should be, shackled by the most basic assumption of Ranke's revolutionary method: that each historical epoch must be judged independently and that every system of belief is shaped by its historical environment. When one attempts to expand the Hegelian philosophy beyond the scope of Western Europe, or Traditionalism to account for the possibility of cultural originality, they swiftly disintegrate. Like Marxism, Traditionalism has nothing but myopic criticism to give of the modern age and consequently has nothing meaningful to say about it. As Ranke says, history is the arch-nemesis of the philosopher.

The general is reached through examination of the particular. A philosophy of history attempting to employ Ranke's method must be formulated a posteriori, in which history is allowed to speak its mind and the philosopher listens and observes accordingly. This is the view that every thought of a human being is incomprehensible without its historical context. It would seem impossible then for the philosopher of history to actually be a philosopher since nothing is really "true" only the forms of consciousness that predominate in a particular age.

But this is not the case. Awareness of the contextual nature of truth brings with it awareness of the Heraclitean aspect of history which in its essence is one of ultimate and pure Becoming. An a posteriori philosophy of history therefore demands a philosophy of ultimate and pure Becoming. The dynamic and continual shaping and reshaping of human consciousness through time is the eternal law. There is nothing that exists outside consciousness, which constitutes reality itself. Human thought is the constant that illuminates the world and creates living forms out of that which is dead.

Being is that which every historical culture aims itself towards, but what constitutes Being as a particular culture conceives of it is relegated to particular belief systems which are observably fluid and drift over the centuries. There can be no absolute Being, only the contextual and particular. According to this view even Being falls under the domain of pure Becoming in the fluid motion of the world and the dynamic totality of human history.