6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 1/18GeorgLukcs1949ExistentialismWritten:1949Translator:HenryF.MinsSource:Marxism and Human Liberation: Essays on History, Culture andRevolution by Georg Lukacs,DellPublishingCo.,1973Transcribed:HarrisonFlussformarxists.org,February2008.Toutsepassecommesilemonde,lhommeetlhommedanslemondenarrivaientaraliserquunDieumanqu.Sartre,LEtre et le nantThere is no reasonable doubt that existentialism will soon become thepredominant philosophical current among bourgeois intellectuals. This state ofaffairs has been long in the making. Ever since the publication of Heideggers Seinund Zeittheavantgardeintellectualshaveseeninexistentialismthephilosophyofourtimes.InGermany,Jaspersundertooktocommunicatetheprinciplesofthenewphilosophytobroadersectionsoftheeducatedpublic.Duringthewarandsinceitsend, the tide of existentialism rolled over the entire Western cultural field, and theleading German existentialists and their precursor, Husserl, have made greatconquests in France and in America not only in the United States but in LatinAmericaaswell.In1943thebasicworkofwesternexistentialismappeared,Sartresbig book cited above and since then existentialism has been pressing forwardirresistibly, through philosophical debates, special periodicals (Les Tempsmodernes),novels,anddramas.1.MethodasAttitudeIsallthisapassingfadperhapsonewhichmaylastafewyears?Orisitreallyanepochmaking new philosophy? The answer depends on how accurately the newphilosophy reflects reality, and how adequately it deals with the crucial humanquestionwithwhichtheageisfaced.6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 2/18An epochmaking philosophy has never yet arisen without a really originalmethod. This was so for all the great philosophers of the past, Plato and Aristotle,Descartes and Spinoza, Kant and Hegel. What is the originality of existentialismsmethod?Thequestionisnotsettledbyreferringtothefactthatexistentialismisanoffshoot of Husserls philosophy. It is important to note that modernphenomenology is one of the numerous philosophical methods which seek to riseabovebothidealismandmaterialismbydiscoveringaphilosophicalthirdway,bymaking intuition the true source of knowledge. From Nietzsche through Mach andAvenariustoBergsonandbeyond,themassofbourgeoisphilosophygoesthisway.Husserlsintuitionofessence(Wesensschau)isbutonestrandofthedevelopment.This would not in itself be a decisive argument against the phenomenologicalmethod. If we are to arrive at a correct judgment, we must first understand thephilosophical and topical significance of the third way, as well as the place andfunctionofintuitionintheknowingprocess.Is there any room for a third way besides idealism and materialism? If weconsider this question seriously, as the great philosophers of the past did, and notwithfashionablephrases,therecanbeonlyoneanswer,No.Forwhenwelookatthe relations which can exist between being and consciousness we see clearly thatonly two positions are possible: either being is primary (materialism), orconsciousness is primary (idealism). Or, to put it another way, the fundamentalprinciple of materialism is the independence of being from consciousness ofidealism, the dependence of being on consciousness. The fashionable philosophersoftodayestablishacorrelationbetweenbeingandconsciousnessasabasisfortheirthirdway:thereisnobeingwithoutconsciousnessandnoconsciousnesswithoutbeing. But the first assertion produces only a variant of idealism: theacknowledgmentofthedependenceofbeingonconsciousness.It was the grim reality of the imperialist period that forced the philosophicalthirdwayonbourgeoisthinking:foronlyinbecalmed,untroubledtimescanmenholdthemselvestobethoroughgoingidealists.WhensomestudentsbrokeFichteswindows over a college quarrel Goethe said, smiling: This is a very disagreeableway to take cognizance of the reality of the external world. The imperialist epochgave us such windowbreaking on a worldwide scale. Downright philosophicalidealismgentlyfadedout.Apartfromsomeminorprofessorialphilosophers,anyonewhodeclareshimselfanidealisttodayfeelshopelessaboutapplyinghisphilosophytoreality(Valery,Benda,etc.).6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 3/18Theabandonmentoftheolddownrightidealismhadbeenanticipatedeveninthemiddle of the last century by pettybourgeois asceticism. Ever since Nietzsche, thebody(Leib)hasplayedaleadingroleinbourgeoisphilosophy.Thenewphilosophyneeds formulas which recognize the primary reality of the body and the joys anddangers of bodily existence, without, however, making any concessions tomaterialism. For at the same time materialism was becoming the worldview of therevolutionary proletariat. That made a position such as Gassendi and Hobbes lookimpossible for bourgeois thinkers. Although the method of idealism had beendiscreditedbytherealitiesofthetime,itsconclusionswereheldindispensable.Thisexplains the need for the third way in the bourgeois world of the imperialistperiod.Thephenomenologicalmethod,especiallyafterHusserl,believesithasdiscovereda way of knowing which exhibits the essence of objective reality without goingbeyondthehumanoreventheindividualconsciousness.Theintuitionofessenceisa sort of intuitive introspection, but is not psychologically oriented. It inquiresratherwhatsortofobjectsthethoughtprocessposits,andwhatkindofintentionalacts are involved. It was still relatively easy for Husserl to operate with theseconcepts, because he was concerned exclusively with questions of pure logic, i.e.,pure acts and objects of thought. The question became more complex as Schelertook up problems of ethics and sociology, and Heidegger and Sartre broached theultimate questions of philosophy. The need of the times which drove them in thisdirection was so compelling that it silenced all gnosiological doubts as to whetherthemethodwasadequatetoobjectivereality.Even when the phenomenologists dealt with crucial questions of social actuality,they put off the theory of knowledge and asserted that the phenomenologicalmethodsuspendsorbracketsthequestionwhethertheintentionalobjectsarereal.The method was thus freed from any knowledge of reality. Once during the FirstWorldWarSchelervisitedmeinHeidelberg,andwehadaninformingconversationon this subject. Scheler maintained that phenomenology was a universal methodwhich could have anything for its intentional object. For example, he explained,phenomenological researches could be made about the devil only the question ofthe devils reality would first have to be bracketed. Certainly, I answered. andwhen when you are finished with the phenomenological picture of the devil, youopenthebracketsandthedevilinpersonisstandingbeforeyou.Schelerlaughed,shruggedhisshoulders,andmadenoreply.Thearbitrarinessofthemethodisseenespeciallywhenthequestionisraised:Is6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 4/18whatphenomenologicalintuitionfindsactuallyreal?Whatrightdoesthatintuitionhavetospeakoftherealityofitsobject?ForDiltheysintuition,thecolorfulnessandthe uniqueness of historical situations are the reality for Bergsons, it is the flowitself,theduration(dure),thatdissolvesthepetrifiedformsofordinarylifewhilefor Husserls, the acts in which individual objects are meant constitute reality objectswhichhetreatsasisolatedunits,withhardcontourslikestatuary.Althoughmutuallyexclusive,theseintuitionswereabletodwelltogetherinrelativepeace.These interpretations of reality stem from factors even more concrete than thesocial need for a third way. It is a general tendency of the imperialist period toregard social relationships as secondary circumstances which do not concern theessence of man. The intuition of essence takes the immediate givenness of innerexperience as its starting point, which it regards as unconditioned and primary,never looking into its character and preconditions, and proceeds thence to its finalabstractvision,divorcedfromreality.Suchintuitions,underthesocialconditionsof the time, could easily abstract from all social actuality while keeping theappearanceofutterobjectivityandrigor.Inthiswaytherearosethelogicalmythofaworld(insplendidaccordwiththeattitudeofbourgeoisintellectuals)independentof consciousness, although its structure and characteristics are said to bedeterminedbytheindividualconsciousness.lt is impossible here to give a detailed critique of the phenomenological method.We shall therefore merely analyze in summary fashion an example of the way it isapplied.WehavechosenthebookofSzilasi,thewellknownstudentofHusserlandHeidegger,[1] partly because Szilasi is an earnest thinker who aims at scientificobjectivity, not a cynical fabricator of myths like Scheler and partly because theelementary form of the example is well suited to a brief treatment. Szilasi takes ashis instance the copresence (Miteinandersein) at his lecture of his hearers andhimself. Describing the essence of the situation, he finds that the hall lies beforehim, the benches, in a word, the external world: This space with its variouslyworked boards is a lecture hall only because we understand this mass of woodenobjects as such, and we do understand it so because from the outset we mean it assomething presupposed in our common task namely, lecturing and listening.Fromwhichheconcludes,Itisthewayofbeingtogetherthatdetermineswhatthethingis.Let us consider the result of this intuition of essence from the methodologicalpoint of view. First, it is a primitive abstraction when Szilasi speaks of variouslyworked boards, and not of desks, benches, etc. But this is methodologically6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 5/18essential,forifheshouldconcedethatthelecturehallisequallyadaptedtoholdingphilological, legal, and other lectures, what would be left of the magical potency oftheintentionalexperience,whichissupposedtomaketheobjectwhatitis?However, what the analysis omits is still more important. The hall is in Zurich,and the time is the 1940s. The fact that Szilasi could deliver a lecture precisely inZurich has the most diverse social preconditions. For instance, before HitlersseizureofpowerSzilasigavehislecturesinFreiburgafter1933theywerenolongerpermitted,infactthelecturerhadtoleaveGermanybecausehispersonalsafetywasthreatened. Why is all this missing from the intuition of copresence? It belongsthereatleastasmuchasdotheworkedboards.But let us return to the boards. The fact that boards are used in a certain way tomakedesksandbenchespresupposesacertainstageofdevelopmentofindustryandof society. Again, the fact that the boards and the ball as a whole are in a certaincondition (is there coal for heating, or glass in the windows?) is inseparablyconnected with other social events and structures. But phenomenological method,excludingallsocialelementsfromitsanalysis,confrontsconsciousnesswithachaosof things (and men) which only individual subjectivity can articulate and objectify.Here we have the wellpublicized phenomenological objectivity, the third way,whichturnsouttobeonlyarevivalofneoKantianism.Phenomenology and the ontology deriving from it only seem to go beyond thegnosiological solipsism of subjective idealism. A formally new formulation of thequestionreinstatesontologicalidealism.Itisnoaccidentthat(justasfortyyearsagotheMachistsreproachedoneanotherforidealism,eachrecognizingonlyhimselfasthe discoverer of the philosophical third way) today the existentialists makesimilar accusations against one another. So Sartre complains of Husserl andHeidegger, two men he otherwise prizes highly. Husserl, in his opinion, has notgone beyond Kant and he criticizes Heidegger as follows: The character beingtogether [copresence, Mitsein] introduced by Heidegger is a character of theisolated ego. Hence it does not lead beyond solipsism. Therefore we shall searchSein und Zeit in vain for a position beyond both idealism and realism [meaningmaterialism]. An analysis of Sartres philosophy will show us that he can be taxedwith the offense for which he condemns Husserl and Heidegger. Heideggersphilosophy existence (Dasein) does not mean objective being (Sein) proper, buthuman existence, i.e., a being aware of existence. In some places Sartre, who hasmore interest than his predecessors in the emotional and practical relation of manto nature, spells out the complete dependence of nature on man s consciousness.6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 6/18Whenspeakingofdevastation,hedeniesthatitexistsinnatureitself,inwhichonlychanges take place. And even this expression is inadequate, for in order that thischangingtosomethingelse may be posited, a witness is needed who somehow orotherpreservesthepastwithinhimselfandisabletocompareitwiththepresentinitsnolongerform.Andinanotherplacehesays:Thefullmoondoesnotdenotethe future, except when we observe the waxing moon in the world which revealsitself in human actuality: the future comes into the world by way of humanexistence.This purely idealistic tendency is heightened in Sartre by the fact that his way ofhandling problems compels him to study concrete questions of coexistence(Mitsein) even more frequently than Heidegger. He meets the difficulty partly bychoosinglooselyconnectedmanifestationsofcopresencethatcanbereferredwithsomeplausibilitytotheinnerexperiencesoftheego(arendezvousatacaf,atripinthesubway).Butwhenactualsocialactivityisinvolved(labor,classconsciousness),he makes a methodological salto mortale and declares that the experiences of therelevant intuitions of essence are of psychological and not of ontological character.The reason for this is the secret of the initiate, those to whom the intuition ofessence is granted. It is therefore no accident that when Sartre tests the relation ofman to his fellow man he recognizes only the following relations as ontologicallyessential, that is, as elements of reality in itself: love, speech, masochism,indifference,longing,hate,andsadism.(EventheorderofthecategoriesisSartres.)AnythingbeyondthisinMiteinandersein,thecategoriesofcollectivelifetogether,ofworking together, of fighting in a common cause, is for Sartre, as we have seen, acategory of consciousness (psychological) and not a really existent category(ontological).When all this is applied to actual cases, the result is banal Philistinecommonplaces. In his popular book Sartre takes up the question of how far he canhaveconfidenceinhisfreelyactingcomrades.Answer:AsfarasIhaveimmediatepersonal knowledge of them, to count on the unity and will of the party is just likecountingonthestreetcartocomeontime,andonthetrainnottojumpthetracks.But I cannot count on men that I do not know, banking on human goodness ormans interest in the common good, for it is a given datum that man is free andthere is no such thing as a human nature on which I can count. Apart from theinvolvedterminology,anypettybourgeois,shrinkingfrompublicaffairs,could,anddoes,sayasmuch.6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 7/182.TheMythofNothingnessIlestabsurdequenoussommesns,ilestabsurdequenousmourrons.Sartre,LEtreetlenantItwouldbeanerrortoassumethatsuchanabstractnarrowingofreality,suchanidealist distortion of the problem of reality, by intelligent and experienced men isintentional deceit. On the contrary, those inner experiences which constitute theattituderevealedintheintuitionoftheWesensschau,anditscontent,areassincereand spontaneous as possible. But that does not make them objectively correct.Indeed this spontaneity, by betraying its immediate uncritical attitude toward thebasicphenomenon,createsthefalseconsciousness:fetishism.Fetishismsignifies,inbrief, that the relations among human beings which function by means of objectsare reflected in human consciousness immediately as things, because of thestructure of capitalist economy. They become objects or things, fetishes in whichmencrystallizetheirsocialrelationships,assavagesdotheirrelationshipstonatureandforsavagesthelawsofnaturalrelationsarejustasimpenetrableasthelawsofthecapitalistsystemofeconomyaretothemenoftheworldoftoday.Likesavages,modern men pray to the fetishes they themselves have made, bow down to them,and sacrifice to them (e.g., the fetish of money). Human relations, as Marx says,acquireaspectralobjectivity.Thesocialexistenceofmanbecomesariddleinhisimmediate experience, even though objectively he is a social being first andforemost,despiteallimmediateappearancestothecontrary.It is not our aim nor our task to treat of the problem of fetish making: to do sowould require a systematic development of the whole structure of capitalist societyand the forms of false consciousness arising out of it. I shall merely point out themostimportantquestionswhichhavehaddecisiveinfluenceonthedevelopmentofexistentialism.The first is lifes losing its meaning. Man loses the center, weight, andconnectedness of his own life, a fact life itself compels him to realize. Thephenomenon has been known for a long time. Ibsen, in Peer Gynt, puts it into astriking little scene. The aging Peer Gynt is peeling off the layers of an onion, andplayfullycomparesthesinglelayerswiththeperiodsofhislife,hopingattheendtocometothecoreoftheonionandthecoreofhisownpersonality.Butlayerfollowslayer,periodafterperiodoflifeandnocoreisfound.6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 8/18Everyonewhomthisexperiencehastouchedfacesthequestion:Howcanmylifebecomemeaningful?Themanwholivesinthefetishmakingworlddoesnotseethatevery life is rich, full, and meaningful to the extent that it is consciously linked inhuman relations with other lives. The isolated egoistic man who lives only forhimself lives in an impoverished world. His experiences approach threateninglyclose to the unessential and begin to merge into nothingness the more exclusivelytheyarehisalone,andturnedsolelyinward.Themanofthefetishizedworld,whocancurehisdisgustwiththeworldonlyinintoxication, seeks, like the morphine addict, to find a way out by heightening theintensity of the intoxicant rather than by a way of life that has no need ofintoxication. He is not aware that the loss of communal life, the degradation anddehumanizationofcollectiveworkasaresultofcapitalistdivisionoflabor,andtheseverance of human relations from social activity have stupefied him. He does notseethis,andgoesfurtherandfurtheralongthefatalpath,whichtendstobecomeasubjectiveneed.Forincapitalistsocietypubliclife,work,andthesystemofhumanrelationsareunderthespelloffetishmaking,reificationanddehumanization.Onlyrevolt against the actual foundations, as we can see in many authors of the time,leads to a clearer appreciation of these foundations, and thence to a new socialperspective.Escapeintoinwardnessisatragiccomicalblindalley.As long as the pillars of capitalist society seemed unshakable, say up to the firstworld war, the socalled avantgarde danced with the fetishes of their inner life.Some writers, it is true, saw the approach of the inevitable catastrophe (Ibsen,Tolstoy, Thomas Mann, etc.). The gaudy carnival, often with a ghastly tone fromtragic incidental music, went on uninterrupted. The philosophy of Simmel andBergson and much of the literature of the time show exactly where things wereheading.Many a good writer and keen thinker saw through the intoxication of carnival tothefactthatthefetishizedegohadlostitsessence.Buttheywentnofurtherthantosketch tragic or tragicomic perspectives behind the garish whirl. The fetishizedbasesoflifeseemedsobeyondquestionthattheyescapedstudy,letalonecriticism.If there were doubts, they were like the doubt of the Hindu who questioned theaccepted doctrine that the world rests on a huge elephant he asked modestly onwhattheelephantrestedandwhentolditrestedonahugetortoise,hewenthiswaycontented.Mindwassoformedbyfetishthinkingthatwhenthefirstworldwarandthe subsequent series of crises called the very possibility of human existence intoquestion, giving a new tinge to every idea, and when the carnival of isolated6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 9/18individualismgavewaytoitsAshWednesday,therewasstillvirtuallynochangeinthewaythatphilosophicalquestionswereasked.Yettheaimanddirectionofthequestforessencedidchange.TheexistentialismofHeideggerandJaspersisproof.Theexperiencewhichunderliesthisphilosophyiseasily stated: man stands face to face with nothingness or nonbeing. Thefundamental relation of man to the world is the situation of visvis de rien.There is nothing particularly original in this. Ever since Poe, perhaps the first todescribe the situation and the corresponding attitude, modern literature has dweltupon the tragic fate which drives a man to the edge of the abyss. As examples wemaymentionthesituationofRaskolnikovafterthemurder,andtheroadtosuicideof Svidrigailov or Stavrogin. What is involved here? A characteristic tragic form ofdevelopment, arising out of presentday life. A great writer weaves these tragicdestinies, which are as vivid and positive as were the tragedies of Oedipus andHamletintheirday.The originality of Heidegger is that he takes just such situations as typical andmakes them his starting point. With the help of the complicated method ofphenomenology, he lodges the entire problem in the fetishized structure of thebourgeois mind, in the dreary hopeless nihilism and pessimism of the intellectualsof the interval between the two world wars. The first fetish is the concept ofnothingness. In Heidegger as in Sartre, this is the central problem of reality, ofontology. In Heidegger nothingness is an ontological datum on a level withexistenceinSartreitisonlyonefactorinexistence,whichneverthelessentersintoallthemanifestationsofbeing.Averyspecializedphilosophicaldissertationwouldberequiredtoshowthechainsofthought,sometimesquitefalse,sometimesobviouslysophistical,bywhichSartreseekstojustifyhistheoryofnegativejudgment.Itistruethat,foreveryNowhichexpressesaparticularjudgment,thereisapositivelyexistingsituation.Butitisonlyidolizing of subjective attitudes that gives nothingness the semblance of reality.When I inquire, for instance, what the laws of the solar system are, I have notpositedanynegativebeing,suchasSartreenvisages.Themeaningofmyquestionissimply that I lack knowledge. The answer may be put in either positive or negativeform, but the same positive reality is indicated in either case. Only sophistry couldinfer the existence of nonbeing. The nothingness which fascinates recentphilosophers is a myth of declining capitalist society. While previously it wasindividuals(thoughsociallytypicalones)likeStavroginandSvidrigailovthathadtoface nothingness, today it is a whole system that has reached this chimerical6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 10/18outlook. For Heidegger and Sartre life itself is the state of being cast intonothingness.Existentialismconsistentlyproclaimsthatnothingcanbeknownbyman.Itdoesnotchallengescienceingeneralitdoesnotraiseskepticalobjectionstoitspracticalortechnicaluses.Itmerelydeniesthatthereisasciencewhichhastherighttosayanythingabouttheoneessentialquestion:therelationoftheindividualtolife.Thisis the alleged superiority of existentialism to the old philosophy. Existentialphilosophy, Jaspers says, would be lost immediately if it started believingagain that it knew what man is. This radical ignorance on principle, which isstressedbyHeideggerandSartre,isoneofthemainreasonsfortheoverwhelminginfluenceofexistentialism.Menwhohavenoprospectsthemselvesfindconsolationinthedoctrinethatlifeingeneralhasnoprospectstooffer.Here existentialism flows into the modern current of irrationalism. Thephenomenologicalandontologicalmethodseems,itistrue,tostandinboldcontrastto the ordinary irrationalist tendencies. Are not the former rigorously scientific,and was not Husserl a supporter of the most fanatical of logicians, Bolzano andBrentano?Butevenasuperficialstudyofthemethodatoncedisclosesitslinkswiththe masters of irrationalism, Dilthey and Bergson. And when Heidegger renewedKierkegaardsefforts,thetiebecameevencloser.This connection is more than an accidental convergence of two methods. Themore phenomenology is transformed into the method of existentialism, the morethe underlying irrationality of the individual and of being becomes the centralobject,andthecloserbecomesitsaffinitytoirrationalcurrentsofthetime.Beingismeaningless, uncaused, unnecessary. Being is by definition the originallyfortuitous, says Sartre. If nothingness comes to exist by the magic ofexistentialism,existenceismadenegative.Existenceiswhatmanlacks.Thehumanbeing, says Heidegger, knows what he is only from existence, i.e., from his ownpotentialities, whether he becomes the one he is, or not. Is mans becomingauthenticornot?Wehaveseenthatintheleadingtrendsofmodernphilosophythisquestionhasanantisocialcharacter.Usingthefamiliarmethod,Heideggersubjectsmans everyday life to phenomenological analysis. The life of man is a coexistenceand at the same time a beingintheworld. This being also has its fetish namely,one. In German, subjectless sentences begin with man (one): One writes,Onedoes.Heidegger,makingmyths,erectsthiswordintoanontologicalexistentin order to express philosophically what seems to him to be the function of societyand social life viz., to turn man away from himself, to make him unauthentic, to6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 11/18prevent him from being himself. The manifestation of one in daily life is chatter,curiosity, ambiguity, falling. To follow the path of ones own existence, accordingtoHeidegger,onemusttaketheroadtodeath,hisowndeathonemustliveinsucha way that his death does not come upon him as a brute fact breaking in on himfrom without, but as his own. Actual existence can find its crowning achievementonlyinsuchapersonaldemise.Thecompletecapriciousnessandsubjectivismoftheontology, concealed behind a show of objectivity, come to light once more. As aconfession of a citizen of the 1920s, Heideggers way of thinking is not withoutinterest.Sein und Zeit is at least as absorbing reading as Clines novel, Journeyto the End of the Night. But the former, like the latter, is merely a document ofthedayshowinghowaclassfeltandthought,andnotanontologicaldisclosureofultimatetruth.Itisonlybecausethisbookissowellsuitedtotheemotionalworldoftodays intellectuals that the arbitrariness of its pseudoargumentation is notexposed.Thecontrastofabstractdeathtomeaninglesslifeisformanymentodayanimplicitaxiom.Butitsufficestoglanceatthemodeofthoughtofoldertimes,beforecollapse started, to realize that this attitude toward death is not the ontologicalcharacter of being but a transitory phenomenon. Spinoza said: The free manthinksofanythingbuthisdeathhiswisdomisnotdeathbutponderingonlife.Jaspers and Sartre are less radical than Heidegger in this respect, although theirthoughtisnotthelessconditionedbytimeandclass.Sartreflatlyrejectstheconceptofspecificorpersonaldeathasacategoryofexistentialism.InJaspers,thephantomofonedoesnotappearformallyinsucharadicallymystifyingform,butonlyasthetotality of the nameless powers ruling life (that is, essentially, social life once moreobjectivized in a fetish). He contents himself with assigning man, once he hasacquiredhisessenceandbeguntolivehisownprivateexistence,strictlytothepathsofprivatelife.InGenevarecentlyJaspersdevelopedthethesisthatnothinggoodoressentialcancomeofpoliticalorsocialactivity:thesalvationofmanispossibleonlywhen every one passionately concerns himself exclusively with his own existenceandinrelationswithotherindividualsoflikepersuasion.Here the labors of the philosophical mountain have only produced a drearyPhilistine mouse. Ernst Bloch, the well known German antifascist writer (whosebook appeared in 1935), said of Heideggers death theory (from which Jasperspersonalmoralityisobtainedsimplybytheadditionofwater):Takingeternaldeathas goal makes mans existing social situation a matter of such indifference that itmight as well remain capitalistic. The assertion of death as absolute fate and soledestination has the same significance for todays counterrevolution as formerly the6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 12/18consolationofthehereafterhad.Thiskeenobservationcastslighttooonthereasonwhy the popularity of existentialism is growing not only among snobs but alsoamongreactionarywriters.3.FreedominaFetishizedWorldandtheFetishofFreedomJeconstruisluniverselenmechoisissant.Sartre:LExistentialismeestunhurnanisme.Existentialism is the philosophy not only of death but also of abstract freedom.This is the most important reason for the popularity of Sartres forms ofexistentialism andalthough it may sound paradoxicalthe reactionary side ofexistentialismspresentinfluenceishereconcealed.Heidegger,asweknow,sawtheway to existences becoming essential and real only in a life directed toward deathSartres shrewd comments put an end to the specious probativeness of Heideggersexposition. This contradiction between Sartre and Heidegger is an expression notmerely of the divergent attitudes of French and German intellectuals toward thecentral problems of life, but also of the changed times. Heideggers basic bookappeared in 1927, on the eve of the new world crisis, in the oppressed murkyatmospherebeforethefasciststormandtheeffectBlochdescribedwasthegeneralstate of intellectuals. We do not know when Sartres book appeared the nominaldateis1943thatis,whenliberationfromfascismwasalreadyinsightandwhen,just because of the decadelong rule of fascism, the longing for freedom was thedeepest feeling of the intellectuals of all Europe, especially of countries where theyhad grown up in democratic traditions. The inner experience above all, in theWestern countries was one of freedom in general, abstractly, without analysis ordifferentiation,inbrieffreedomasmyth,whichpreciselybecauseofitsformlessnesswasabletouniteunderitsflagallenemiesoffascism,who(whatevertheirpointofview)hatedtheiroriginortheirgoal.Onlyonethingmatteredtothesemen,tosayNotofascism.ThelessspecifictheNowas,thebetteritexpressedthefeelingofactuality. The abstract No and its pendant, abstract freedom, were to many mentheexactexpressionofthemythoftheresistance.WeshallseethatSartresnotionoffreedomismostabstract.Thisenablesustounderstandwhythesenseofthetimeexaltedexistentialismandyieldedtoitasadequatephilosophyoftheday.However, fascism collapsed, and the construction and reenforcement ofdemocracy and free life engaged the public opinion of every country as its firstconcern. Every serious argument, from politics to Weltanschauung, revolves now6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 13/18aroundthequestionofwhatthedemocracyandfreedomshouldbewhichmankindisbuildingontheruinsoffascistdestruction.Existentialismhaskeptitspopularityunderthesechangedcircumstancesindeed,it would seem that it is now for the first time to be sure, in Sartres formulation,notHeideggersontheroadtoworldconquest.Onedecisivefactorhereisthefactthatexistentialismgivesthenotionoffreedomacentralplaceinitsphilosophy.Buttodayfreedomisnolongeramyth.Thestrivingsforfreedomhavebecomeconcrete,more and more concrete every day. Violent disputes over the interpretation offreedom and democracy have split the supporters of the various schools intoantagonisticcamps.Undersuchcircumstanceshowisitpossiblethatexistentialism,withitsrigid,abstractconceptionoffreedom,shouldbecomeaworldwidetrend?Ormore precisely, whom, and how, does existentialism carry conviction as aphilosophy of freedom? To answer this central question, we must come to closergripswithSartresconceptoffreedom.Accordingtohim,freedomisabasicfactofhumanexistence.Werepresent,saysSartre,freedomwhichchooses,butwecouldnotchoosetobefree.Wearedoomedtofreedom.Wearethrownintofreedom(HeideggersGeworfenheit).Not choosing, however, is just as much choice as choosing is avoiding action isactiontoo.EverywhereSartrestressesthisroleoffreedom,fromthemostprimitivefactsofeverydaylifetotheultimatequestionsofmetaphysics.WhenItakepartinagroup excursion, get tired, am weighed down by my pack, and so forth, I am facedwith the fact of free choice, and must decide whether I will go on with mycompanions or throw off my burden and sit down by the roadside. From thisproblem the way leads to the final, most abstract problems of human existence inthe plans or projects in which man concretizes his free decision and free choice(projet, projeter isoneofthemostimportantnotionsofSartrestheoryoffreedom)thereliesthecontentoftheultimateideal,thelastproject:God.InSartreswords:Thebasicplanofhumanrealityisbestillustratedbythefactthatmanisthebeingwhose plan it is to become God. . . . Being a man is equivalent to being engaged inbecomingGod.AndthephilosophicalcontentofthisidealofGodistheattainmentofthatstageofexistencewhichtheoldphilosophydenotedascausa sui.Sartresnotionoffreedomisextremelybroadandindeterminate,lackingspecificcriteria. Choice, the essence of freedom, consists for him in the act of choosingoneself. The constant danger lurking here is that we could become other than weare. And here there is no moral compass or plumb line. For instance, cowardice6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 14/18stemsfromfreechoicejustasmuchascouragedoes.MyfearisfreeandattestsmyfreedomIhavecastallmyfreedomintomyfearandchosenmyselfascowardlyinsuch and such circumstances in other circumstances I might exist as courageousand put my freedom into courage. With respect to freedom, no ideal has anyprecedence.SinceforSartreallhumanexistenceisfreebydefinition,hisnotionoffreedomisevenmoreindefinitethanthatofHeidegger.Heideggercoulddifferentiatebetweenthe free and the unfree. For him, that man is free who programmatically livestoward his own death unfree and unauthentic, he who, forgetting his own death,livesnotasaselfbutinthecrowd.Sartrerejectsthiscriterion,aswehaveseen.HealsorejectssuchahierarchyofmoralvaluesasSchelerhadconceived,aswellasanyconnection of free choice with mans past, viz., the principle of continuity andconsistencyofpersonality.Finally,hedeniestheKantianformaldistinctionbetweenfreeandunfreeacts.Heseems,itistrue,tobesomewhatfrightenedbythisindeterminateness.Inhispopular pamphlet he says, Nothing can be good for us which is not good foreveryone,andinanotherplace:Atthe sametimethatIwillmyownfreedomitismydutytowillthefreedomofothers.IcannotsetmyownfreedomasgoalunlessIalsosetthatofothersasmygoal.Thissoundsveryfine.ButinSartreitisonlyaneclectic insertion into existentialism, of the moral principles of the EnlightenmentandtheKantianphilosophy.Kantdidnotsucceedinestablishingobjectivemoralityby generalizing subjectivity. The young Hegel, in a sharp critique, showed thisfailure. However, Kants generalization still stands in intimate connection with thefirst principles of his social philosophy in Sartre, this generalization is an eclecticcompromise with traditional philosophical opinion, contradicting his ontologicalposition.Inhiscapitalworkhedoesnotmaketheseconcessions.Truetohisbasicthought,ontological solipsism, the content and goal of the free act are meaningful andexplicable only from the point of view of the subject. Here Sartre still states a viewopposite to that of his popular brochure: Respect for the freedom of ones fellowmanisidlechatter:evenifwecouldsoplanthatwehonoredthisfreedom,suchanattitudewouldbeaviolationofthefreedomwhichweweresobusyrespecting.Inthe same place he illustrates this conception by a very concrete example: When Ibring about tolerance among my fellow men I have forcibly hurled them into atolerant world. In so doing I have in principle taken away their free capacity forcourageousresistance,forperseverance,forselftesting,whichtheywouldhavehad6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 15/18theopportunityofdevelopinginsomeworldofintolerance.Thiscynicalviewthattherearenounfreeactshassignificantresemblancetotheviewthattherearenofreeacts.WhileevenHeideggerknewthatwecanspeakofafree act only if man is capable of being coerced as well, Sartre does not know this.Like the determinist, Sartre reduces human phenomena to one level. Butdeterminism is at least a system, verifiable in part, whereas Sartres free acts are adisconnected,fortuitousconglomeration.What is the legitimate factor in Sartre? Without question, the emphasis on theindividuals decision, whose importance was undervalued alike by bourgeoisdeterminismandbyvulgarMarxism.Allsocialactivityismadeupoftheactionsofindividuals, and no matter how decisive the economic basis may be in thesedecisions,itseffectsarefeltonlyinthelongrun,asEngelssooftenstresses.Thismeans that there is always a concrete area of free choice for the individual, whichdoes not conflict with the feet that history has its general and necessary trends ofdevelopment. The mere existence of political parties proves the reality of this area.The main directions of development can be foreseen but, as Engels stressed, itwould be idle pedantry to try to foretell from the laws of evolution whether in agivencasePeterorPaulwillindividuallydecidethiswayorthat,voteforthispartyortheother,andsoforth.Thenecessityofevolutionisalwayseffectedbymeansofinternal and external contingencies. It would be a service to science to show theirsignificanceandstudytheirplaceandrole,ifatthesametimetheirmethodologicalmeaning in the whole dialectical process were more precisely determined thanformerly.Inthissensearolewhichshouldnotbeunderestimatedattachestomoralproblems and questions of freedom and individual decision in the total dialecticalknowledgeofsocialdevelopment.Sartre, to be sure, does exactly the opposite. We have seen that, as has beenfashionable for decades, he denies necessary development and even developmentitself. Even in the case of individuals he divorces decision situations from the past.He denies any genuine connection of the individual with society. He construes theindividualsworldascompletelydifferentfromthatofhisfellowmen.Thenotionoffreedomthusobtainedisfatalisticandstrainedinamechanicalwayitthuslosesallmeaning.Ifwelookatitalittlemoreclosely,ithasvirtuallynoconnectionwiththeactual moral concept of freedom. It says no more than what Engels said in anoccasional remark namely, that there is no human activity in which individualconsciousnesscouldnotplayapart.6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 16/18Obviously Sartre himself sees the difficulty of his notion of freedom. But heremainsfaithfultohismethod,andbusieshimselfwithbalancingoneoverstrainedand meaningless conception against another: freedom against responsibility, thelatter being for Sartre just as universal and unconditionally valid as the concept offreedom. If I choose to join the army instead of to die or suffer dishonor, that isequivalenttotakingtheentireresponsibilityforthiswar.Here again the formallogical overstraining of a relative truthfactor leads to thetheoretical and practical annihilation of the concept in question. For so rigid aformulationofresponsibilityisidenticalwithcompleteirresponsibility.Wedidnotneed to be politicians or Marxists to see that. A master of the psychology ofdepths, Dostoevsky, often said that extreme rigid forcing of moral principles andmoraldecisionsgenerallyhasnoinfluenceonmensactions.Theysweepoverhead,andthemenwhoactonthemhaveweakermoralguidancethanwouldbethecaseifthey had no principles at all. In the shadow of the rigorous pitiless feeling ofresponsibility, extending to the point of suicide, it is easy to commit one villainyafteranotherwithfrivolouscynicism.Sartreseessomethingofallthis,butwithoutdrawinganyconclusionsfromit.Sohe weaves fetishes and myths around the problem he vaguely discerns, andconcludes with the trivial phrase: Any one who in anguish (angoisse has been adecisive category of existentialism since the Kierkegaardian Reception) realizesthathisconditionoflifeisthatofbeingthrownintoaresponsibilitywhichleadstocomplete isolation: that man knows no more remorse, regret, or selfjustification.Just as the sublime is but a step from the ridiculous, so a certain kind of moralsublimityisonlyastepfromfrivolityandcynicism.ItwasnecessaryforustoelaboratethussharplyonthebankruptcyoftheSartreanconceptoffreedombecausethisispreciselythekeytothewidespreadeffectivenessof the doctrine in certain circles. Such an abstract, forced, totally vacuous andirrationalizedconceptionoffreedomandresponsibility,thehaughtyscornforsocialviewpointsandpubliclifeusedtodefendtheontologicalintegrityoftheindividualall adequately rounds out the myth of nothingness, especially for the requirementsof snobs: for they must be particularly impressed with the mixture of cruelly strictprinciple with cynical looseness of action and moral nihilism. But in addition thisconceptionoffreedomgivesacertainsectionofintellectuals,alwaysinclinedtowardextreme individualism, an ideological support and justification for refusing theunfolding and building of democracy. There have been writers who, callingthemselves democrats, under took to defend the rights of the black market and of6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 17/18the sabotaging and swindling capitalist, all in the name of individual freedom, andwhocarriedtheprinciplesofarthatroomisfoundforthefreedomofreactionandfascism responsibility has been the slogan in whose name the attempt was firstmade to block the registration of the new owners land and later to call for theirreturn.Sartresabstractandstrainedconceptionoffreedomandresponsibilitywasjustwhattheseforcescoulduse.Sartres hooks do not give us the impression that he exactly desires to be theideologist of these groups and certainly there are genuine and sincere democratsamonghisFrenchsupporters.Butlargescalefashionspaylittleheedtotheinternalintentions of their authors. The various currents of society have their ownideological requirements, and say with Moliere, je prends mon bien o je letrouve.So,notonlysnobbishnessbutreactiontoomanagestocookitsbrothatthefireofexistentialism.Thisisonemorereasonforustopointoutthattheacquisitionof existentialism is no Promethean deed, no theft of celestial fire, but rather thecommonplace action of using the lighted cigarette of a chance passerby to lightonesown.This is no accident, but follows from the very nature of the phenomenologicalmethodandfromtheontologywhichgrowsoutofit.Themethodisfarfrombeingas original as its apostles would like to believe. For, no matter how arbitrary thetransitionmaybefrombracketedrealitytoallegedlygenuineobjectivereality,themere possibility of the transition still has its philosophical roots, though this pointnever is consciously formulated by the ontologists. This basis is essentially that ofthe dominant theory of knowledge in the nineteenth century namely, the Kantian.Kantsclearformulationhadthecogencyworthyofaseriousphilosopher:existencedoes not signify enrichment of the content of objectivity, and hence not formalenrichmenteitherthecontentofthethoughtofdollarisexactlythesameasthatofthe real dollar. The existence of the object means neither novelty nor enrichment,whether with respect to content or to structure of the concept. Clearly, therefore,when the ontologists bracket the thoughtof object and then clear the brackets,theytacitlyassumethisKantianconception.The notion appears quite obvious the only thing wrong with it is that it is nottrue. The Kantian idealism unconsciously borrowed from mechanical materialismtheidentityofthestructureandcontentofthethoughtofandtheactualobject.Thereal dialectic of objective reality, however, shows at every step that existenceenriches the thoughtof object with elements which are conceptually new withrespecttocontentandstructure.Thisconsequencefollowsnotonlyfromthevirtual6/3/2015 ExistentialismbyGeorgLukcs1949https://www.marxists.org/archive/lukacs/works/1949/existentialism.htm 18/18infinityofeveryactualobject,asaresultofwhichthemostcompletethoughtisonlyan approximation, i.e. the object of ontology is even in principle richer in contentand therefore of richer, more complicated structure than the phenomenologicalobjectofmereconsciousness.AndthisisaconsequenceaswelloftheextensionallyandintensionallyinfiniteVerflochtenheit (interrelatedness)ofrealobjects,inwhichthereciprocalactionoftheirrelationschangestheobjectsfunctionsandthenreactson their objectivity. In this context mere existence, the brute fact, becomes undercertain circumstances one of the characters and changes the concept of objectivity,with respect to content and structure. Let us consider the theory of money, tocontinue with Kants example. So long as we speak of money as a medium ofcirculation, we might still assume that thoughtof money is identical with realmoney(althoughweshouldbewrongevenhere).Buttheveryconceptofmoneyasamedium of payment implies existence there is present in this case a conceptualdifference between the thoughtof dollar and the real one, a difference whichconstitutes a new category. Only the actual dollar, in ones possession, can be ameansofpayment.Moneyinitselfisnotenoughwemusthave ittoo.Modern ontology bypasses these considerations, not unintentionally. Theisolating intuition of the isolated individual in this connection it is immaterialwhetherhisinterestisdirectedtowardtheobject,fixedinitsrigidity,ortowardthechangefulnessofthoughtliftseveryobjectoutofthecomplexandlivingfabricofits existence, functions, relations, interactions, etc., dissolving it out of the real,living,movingtotality.Theoriginalachievementofphenomenologyandontologyinthisfieldconsistsmerelyinthefactthatitdogmaticallyidentifiesrealitywiththeobjectivityithasthusobtained.Forthem,objectivityandobjectiverealitymeanoneandthesamething.1.Wissenschaft als Philosophie,Zurich,1945.GeorgLukcsArchive