Typology of philosophical worldviews: pantheism and its varieties

Nizhnikov Sergei Anatolyevich ORCID: 0000-0002-3456-2445 Doctor of Philosophy Professor, Department of History of Philosophy, Peoples' Friendship University of Russia named after Patrice Lumumba (RUDN University) 6 Miklukho-Maklaya str., Moscow, 117198, Russia nizhnikov-sa@rudn.ru Other publications by this author     Martseva Anna Vladimirovna ORCID: 0000-0002-6461-8139 PhD in Philosophy Assistant professor, Department of History of Philosophy, Peoples’ Friendship University of Russia named after Patrice Lumumba (RUDN University) 6 Miklukho-Maklaya str., Moscow, 117198, Russia martseva-av@rudn.ru

Lagunov Aleksey Aleksandrovich ORCID: 0000-0002-8498-6449 Doctor of Philosophy Professor, Department of Philosophy and Ethnology, North Caucasus Federal University 355017, Russia, Stavropol Territory, Stavropol, Pushkin str., 1 emaillag@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Introduction

When analyzing the naturalistic worldview ^[1], the authors came to the conclusion that within its framework it is impossible to logically consistently and evidently present matter as the only ontological source of existence of all things (materialism), establish the cause of movement, formulate a coherent theodicy, justify morality and humanism. It turned out that metaphysics and speculation as a pure theory — despite their criticism in positivism and materialism — cannot be dispensed with, just as one cannot do without the concept of the One or the Absolute, which can receive different names in metaphysical concepts (Genesis in Parmenides and M. Heidegger, the idea of the Good in Plato, Nus in Aristotle, The One among the Neoplatonists, the Substance of B. Spinoza, etc.).

Naturalism, in principle, is unable to understand or justify anything spiritual — semantic, speculative, valuable; concepts such as the Absolute, eternity, soul, spirit are initially denied, but without them, conscious and moral life is impossible — neither man nor society. The spiritual and intellectual development of man and society naturally led to the birth and formulation of the metaphysical monistic category of the Absolute in philosophy and God in theistic religions. Philosophy, in search of the original, necessarily comes to a single source of everything — arche, and religious consciousness to monotheism, while they complement each other. As A. V. Semushkin writes: "... the idea of philosophical monotheism is not as alien to the Greek consciousness as it may seem at first glance. Never being official, it has always been the subject of an intellectual cult of philosophers, starting from the earliest times of historical Greece" ^{[2, pp. 111-112]}. In fact, both religion and philosophy are two sides of a single process, two forms of cognition of the Absolute, which converge at the top of knowledge: Plato's idea of Goodness is divine, Aristotle calls his prime mover God, who is perfect and experiences bliss, G. Hegel has the same subject of philosophy and religion, the difference is only in the methods of his cognition, M. Heidegger He himself had a negative attitude towards theology, and through his work he gave rise to a new round of its development.

Naturalism not only does not solve spiritual and corresponding intellectual problems, it does not even realize the need for such a solution, it does not even see the problems themselves. Man here is often just a continuation of the development of nature. An attempt is being made to derive its sociality and spirituality from ideas about the development of biological organisms, animals, etc. However, this is impossible, and sophistic statements are easily exposed if we think consistently and factually. For example, the absence of the concept of a single source of existence destroys the possibility of constructing any logic for further solving fundamental philosophical problems. The concept of matter is unable to take the place of the One, either ontologically or epistemologically, and if there is no Absolute, then how is theodicy possible? No way. However, naturalism is not puzzled by the solution of this problem, because it does not realize it, does not reach it. He is superficial, takes a person only as a biological species, although he can talk about his sociality (Marxism), but, again, is not able to justify it, because sociality cannot be derived from nature, from work and other characteristics, which themselves are the result of the same social relations. Sociality and morality are the product of the transcendence of the natural biological, and not the result of the successive development of the latter. However, in the modern world, it is naturalism that celebrates victory, since modern man has an "atrophied metaphysical instinct" (A.V. Semushkin), he is focused only on empirical knowledge and sensual pleasures, lives in a bourgeois consumer society, realizing his attitudes and ideas (Erich Fromm).

However, the Absolute cannot be eliminated if we want to explain the origin of the world and solve other fundamental philosophical problems. This category is metaphysical, speculative — that's why we enter the sphere of metaphysical thinking, because the Absolute, by definition and logically, is speculative and supersubstantial. All metaphysically minded philosophers will agree with this. But if we delve into these constructions, we will meet with an internal division in their camp, which is of a fundamental nature. First of all, it is expressed in the difference between pantheism and transcendentism: in the first, the Absolute is somehow ontologically connected with the world, up to identification with it, in the second, it is entirely beyond it, acts as a Creator, and not just a demiurge, ordering the matter that belongs to it (pantheism).

             The species diversity of pantheism

As it has been shown, speculation in search of the fundamental basis of existence necessarily comes to a single beginning. Polytheistic thinking tries to complete pluralism into a kind of unity — to single out the main deity-concept: philosophy just begins with the realization of this monism and goes towards monotheism, contributes to its formation. It was for this that many ancient philosophers were persecuted, since their reflections did not fit into the polytheistic worldview. Pantheism completes the building of polytheism, but does not exclude it, as we see in the example of Neoplatonism, the classical system of pantheism.

Pantheism identifies the Absolute with nature, or thinks of it in close connection with it, however, this connection, in turn, can be different, and here we can distinguish several types of pantheism, first of all, logically rising from its naturalistic form to "mystical" or panentheism ^{[3, p. 32]}, which approaches to transcendence, but is not able to grow into it:

1. Naturalistic pantheism. His classic version is Spinozism: "... I consider God," writes B. Spinoza in a letter to Heinrich Oldenburg, "the immanent (as they say) cause of all things, and not transcendent (transcens)" ^{[4, p. 546]}. This kind of pantheism actually identifies the Absolute with nature (God in nature) and stands closest to naturalism, and may evolve towards it.

2. Mystical pantheism or panentheism (the term was introduced by Karl Krause in 1828) ^{[5, p. 66]}, thinking of nature in God ("everything in God", from Greek. , p?n — "everything", , en — "in" and , The?s - —God"). In our opinion, F. was the most vivid and profound exponent of it. Schelling. His predecessors were John Eriugena, Meister Eckhart and Nicholas of Cusa. In Russia, this is the tradition of unity from V. Solovyov to S. L. Frank, who himself called his system panentheistic ^[6].

Other modifications of pantheism can also be distinguished:

3. Dialectical (dynamic) pantheism. This is how the Russian thinker Lev Lopatin defined the philosophy of Georg Hegel.

4. We would also highlight a fourth type, the existential pantheism of Martin Heidegger.

The last two types of pantheism take the form of panentheism, so they can also be considered as subspecies of the second, "mystical pantheism".

Of course, Heidegger himself, for example, would never have agreed with such a characterization, some philosophers generally deny the certainty of such categories as pantheism and transcendentalism, nevertheless they are universal and no philosophical concept claiming to solve ideological problems can avoid this classification. To clarify the ideological orientation of a philosophical concept, it is necessary to take its fundamental category, its "Absolute" and determine its ontological status; at the same time, we will see that this status will inevitably be either naturalistic, pantheistic, or transcendent. Heidegger's concept of being, despite its characterization as transcendence, is not transcendent.

Heidegger tried to distance himself from the characterization of his philosophical worldview, "hiding" behind the concept of a "fundamental ontology" of an existential type. However, as we noted earlier, it is impossible to avoid ideological certainty, and we would characterize Heidegger's doctrine of being as mystical pantheism. So, as a result of his "soaring" between being and being (the term used by S. L. Frank), the philosopher formulates the following conclusion: "Being itself, it means: the cash of cash, i.e. the two-syllabic nature of these two in their monosyllabic nature" ^{[7, p. 277]}. Heidegger's being turns out to be two-syllabic, and in order to understand it, it is necessary to "see manifestation as the essence of existence in its essential origin" ^{[8, p. 69]}. Being and being are in a kind of panentheistic connection. Heidegger's reflections on Nothingness and horror as one of the main existentials are known. Fr. Jacobi, criticizing Heidegger's predecessors, expressed the following thought: "... every thinker who has lost faith in God in his research will find only Nothing — which no one can love..." ^{[9, p. 557]}. If the result of transcendence to the Transcendent is grace, then Heidegger's transcendence is characterized by horror. And this is not accidental, because his being is Nothing, an abyss, looking into which causes a corresponding state.

It is precisely on the difference between the concepts of transcendence and the transcendent that the difference between panentheism and transcendentalism is based. Transcendence is a borderline concept, it means standing on the border of existence in the "lumen of being" (Heidegger), standing that does not imply a step forward necessary to break the ontological connection with existence and recognize the transcendent. This is the Kantian tradition, which neither Heidegger in Germany nor, for example, M. Mamardashvili in the USSR followed. The worldview of the transcendent type recognizes the transcendent as an ontological category and carries out transcendence to it, relies on it, which can be defined as spiritual cognition. If there is no transcendence, but only transcendence, Heidegger's Nothingness, then transcendence is also impossible, radical transcending of existence is impossible. Transcendence is possible only by relying on the transcendent, therefore, when, say, J.P. Sartre asserts that his "existentialism is humanism," he gives wishful thinking. Humanism and morality are the result of real transcendence, but atheistic existentialism has no transcendence, without which it is impossible to substantiate these concepts.

             Pantheism in the History of Philosophy

However, let's focus in more detail on the ideological and philosophical problems that have arisen within the framework of pantheism and consider how it solves them and whether it is able to solve them.

Of course, unlike naturalism, which suffers a complete fiasco in answering fundamental philosophical questions, pantheism is more effective: it realizes the need to rise from being to being, from a variety of phenomena to their single source. Let us turn again in our analysis to ancient thought, in which pantheistic concepts begin to receive a philosophical justification. The hylozoistic pantheism of the early Ionian natural philosophers is understandable and there are no questions about it, since the later problems of the cause of movement, theodicy, freedom, and morality could not yet arise there. It is necessary not to fall out of the fusis-nature, not to fall away from the Logos, to restore the original unity — thus all problems were solved. However, awareness of the specifics of society and man, their irreducibility to nature, gradually grew, and more and more questions appeared that required adequate answers from philosophers.

In connection with pantheism, let us consider, in our opinion, the most interesting figure of the pre-Socratic period, who already realized the need to analyze the fate of man in the face of fusis-nature. This is Empedocles. It was he who sought to build the first expanded system of pantheism, to answer the question of the unity and development of being (to combine the Heraclitic flow with the immobile being of Parmenides), to correlate it with the fate of the human soul — in fact, posed existential and soteriological questions, as far as possible within the framework of ancient culture. He is the "creator of religious and moral metaphysics" ^{[2, p. 52]}; his cosmogenesis coincides with theo- and anthropogenesis, his one, Sphairos, undergoes metamorphoses within itself in accordance with the victory of either Love or Enmity. The God of Empedocles, according to A.V. Semushkin, is a "developing substance": "... he cannot create things without turning into them himself; he does not create things and does not sculpt them from matter, but disintegrates into them, germinates into them himself" ^{[2, p. 113]}. It can be said that Empedocles, by virtue of his natural philosophical ideas, still associated with hylozoism, has his own version of pantheism — the genotheistic (the germination of God into the world). The enmity within Sphairos throws him out of balance and the original blissful unity disintegrates into multiplicity, triggering the process of cosmogenesis. Although Sphairos is presented as a "victim of an external hostile force", however, there is nothing else besides him, and Hostility and Love nest in him. For pantheism, A. F. notes. Losev, it is necessary to "remove evil from the bowels of the Deity himself", because "pantheism naturally has to be a hierarchical system" ^{[10, p. 875]}. This is a fundamental point, the Achilles heel of any pantheism: evil is rooted in itself, and here is the main ontological problem, which cannot be solved within the framework of pantheism. Let's explain this thesis.

The absolute is by definition absolute, i.e. it must have the whole set of excellent qualities, because if it lacks something, it will not be able to be absolute, self-sufficient, complete, perfect, omnipotent, etc. This is the basis for the ontological proof of the existence of God. If there is evil in him, then he is not perfect, there is a "crack" in his being. This leads to the conclusion that the pantheistic Absolute is not absolute, i.e. it is not an Absolute at all. Pantheism is wishful thinking. If naturalism directly denies the Absolute, but cunningly replaces it with matter, then pantheism, recognizing the Absolute, is devoid of sincerity and clarity in its reasoning, trying in every possible way to hide the "crack", obscure it with all sorts of logical tricks: from naturalism it evolves to panentheistic mysticism.

In the history of Modern European philosophy, we see a worldview involution from medieval transcendentalism through pantheism to naturalism ^[11]. However, the Hegelian progressive model dominates the prevailing methodology of understanding the historical and philosophical process - it represents the main channel of the development of New European philosophy, its German thinker worked out most carefully and dialectically expressed in his system of absolute idealism. This understanding is considered in fact indisputable and is taught in higher educational institutions. P. P. Gaidenko writes that "Hegel combined the naturalistic pantheism of Spinoza ("substance") and the mystical pantheism of Fichte ("Subject"), freeing the latter from the remnants of the transcendent" ^{[12, p. 102]}. G. Florovsky and P. Gaidenko deeply criticized pantheism, progressivism, "cunning of reason" and rationalism of the German classical philosophy, having shown that impersonalism and amoralism were the result of these attitudes ^{[12, pp. 102-103]}, these are the inevitable consequences of the impossibility of constructing a theodicy within the framework of pantheism. So G. Florovsky writes: "And the most amazing thing is the insensitivity to evil. The physical evil struck the imagination more than the moral evil… Evil was resolved into imperfection, this is already a renunciation of ethical categories. And it even turned into an eternally necessary pole of existence, at a moment of harmony and completeness... The doctrine of the fall had a cosmological rather than an ethical meaning. And in it, evil was introduced into the plan of the formation of the world. All these are antique features again..." ^{[13, p. 419]}.

 Thus, the most astute philosophers disagreed with Hegel. These include M. Heidegger, and in Russian philosophy there are many names, from V. Solovyov to G. Florovsky, A. F. Losev and P. Gaidenko. This is how A. F. formulates his involutional understanding. Losev: "If for the Middle Ages God is a super-being and a super-fact, for the Renaissance He is only a fact, for Enlightenment He is a conditional idea, for Kant He is a necessary subjective idea... From the Renaissance to Kant, the first and necessary part of the Satanic project of attacking God was done. Two centuries of persistent struggle finally led to the fact that God ceased to be a being and turned into only an idea.

..One more step, and man himself will be declared god, but this step was taken not by Kant, but by Fichte, romantics and Feuerbach" ^{[14, pp. 261-262]}.

However, for some reason, pantheist philosophers tried in every possible way to dissociate themselves from pantheism as something "bad" and in every possible way to emphasize their commitment to Christianity: whether this was obliged by the dominance of religious ideology, which was still strong at that time, or whether this was due to an intuitive understanding of the impasse of pantheistic methodology, one can only assume. Hegel in Germany, and V. Solovyov in Russia, and many others "swore" to Christianity. On this occasion, there was even a "dispute about spinozism" in Germany and Russia (between E. Trubetskoy and L. Lopatin about the legacy of V. Solovyov) ^{[15, pp. 170-183]}. We can also note the difference in the interpretations of the work of Meister Eckhart and Nikolai Kuzansky by A. Losev and P. Gaidenko: if Losev has Eckhart as a pantheist, then Gaidenko, on the contrary, is a Kuzan (?).

N. A. Berdyaev also, on the one hand, was clearly aware of the unacceptability of pantheism when he wrote: "There is something strange and mysterious about this aversion to Christianity. A person of our era is especially willing to become a pantheist if the religious need has not completely died out in him. Pantheism and pantheistic mysticism get along with positivism, atheism, Marxism, and any modern teaching. Only Christian theism does not get along with anything, and modernity does not accept it. Modern man thinks that under pantheism his personality is preserved, humanity is recognized as of great importance, freedom, like other good things, remains with him, but under Christianity the personality is enslaved, and freedom disappears, and humanity is humiliated. What a strange aberration! In fact, it's just the opposite" ^{[16, p. 34]}. In the work "Spirit and Reality" Berdyaev writes that "pantheism is essentially worldly and generated by thought and concept" ^{[17, p. 433]}. However, at the same time, in another of his works he writes something else: "Our natural world is a sinful world and in its sinfulness it is not divine. But true peace is peace in God. Panentheism best expresses the relationship between God and the world. Pantheism is a lie, but there is some truth in it, and it is expressed in panentheism. Panentheism only expresses the state of the transformed world. The world, humanity, and cosmic life are fundamentally divine, not extra-divine, and Divine energies operate in them. Creation is surmountable. The nothingness with which creation is connected is surmountable. The created world can be deified" ^{[18, p. 168]}.

Conclusion

It should be noted with regret that even major philosophers allowed terminological ambiguity and confusion in their own judgments. We can find this not only in Berdyaev (as well as in Hegel and Schelling), they were not uncommon in many other Russian metaphysicians. P. P. Gaidenko correctly noted that the Russian Silver Age is related to the Renaissance not only by the unprecedented development of arts and philosophy, but also by the "weakening of the sense of sinfulness", "the spread of pantheism, mysticism, hermeticism and gnosticism" ^{[12, p. 332]}. Thus, John Meyendorff writes: "It seems to me that Vladimir Solovyov and his entire group mistook German idealism for philosophy and somewhere unconsciously capitulated to it without any evil intentions" ^{[19, p. 48]}. If V. Solovyov was dependent on Hegel and Schelling, then Berdyaev's idols were German mystics: Eckhart, Boehme, etc.

However, in our opinion, the most interesting figure, and somewhat neglected in this regard, is Schelling. He set the task of justifying pantheism in his work "Philosophical Studies on the essence of human Freedom and related subjects" (1809) and, having reached the limits of mystical pantheism, failed, provoking deserved criticism from Hegel. Schelling initially praised Spinoza's system, but then, realizing the impossibility of justifying freedom within its framework, set out to modernize it, in fact creating a system of panentheism with a strong gnostic stream. And here, again, not only the problem of the justification of freedom, but also the theodicy turned out to be insoluble. Schelling's last thought, about the Absolute as an identity in the form of "absolute indifference" (where "all cats are gray", — Hegel), does not stand up to criticism. Nevertheless, Schelling, in turn, "infected" V. Solovyov with pantheism (although P. P. Gaidenko, quoting A. Kozhev and agreeing with him that the model for Solovyov is almost exclusively Schelling, to which Solovyov's metaphysical ideas go back, at the same time notes that "it would be a vain effort to look for this Solovyov's name is in his writings: he mentions him in passing only in his book on the history of philosophy" ^{[12, p. 91]}), who developed the concept of unity, which had a huge impact on the subsequent development of metaphysical thought in Russia, which received a panentheistic coloring from this, up to S. L. Frank, who himself called his philosophical system Panentheism, but at the same time considered himself a Christian philosopher.

Thus, Russian metaphysical thought, which developed in line with the philosophy of unity, could not overcome the pantheistic tendency, which it perceived from German classical philosophy, from Schelling and Hegel, although it tried in every possible way to expand and deepen it. Orthodox philosophers, such as V. V. Zenkovsky, G. V. Florovsky, V. N. Lossky, and others, who proceeded from a theistic—transcendental type of worldview, turned out to be free from this trend. But this is the subject of the next special study.