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SCHELLINGS SHADOW
Alexander Bilda
To cite this article: Alexander Bilda (2016) SCHELLINGS SHADOW, Angelaki, 21:4, 111-120, DOI:
10.1080/0969725X.2016.1229441
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0969725X.2016.1229441
ANGELAKI
journal of the theoretical humanities
volume 21 number 4 december 2016
alexander bilda
SCHELLINGS SHADOW
merleau-pontys late
concept of nature
immensely. In a last step, I will examine
exactly how Merleau-Ponty overcomes these
vague differences by returning to what Schelling
seems to have vanquished in his Spa tphilosophie art.
The term barbaric principle, which is what
most evidently links Schelling and MerleauPonty, comes from Schellings drafts of The
Ages of the World. Similar to MerleauPontys employment of it cited above, this
term sought to denote what philosophy, as
science, has not yet incorporated or, even
more, what philosophy suppresses. While
Kantian idealism did as Schelling thinks
indeed accomplish its highest scientic form
ISSN 0969-725X print/ISSN 1469-2899 online/16/040111-10 2016 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis
Group
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0969725X.2016.1229441
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schellings shadow
in Fichte, Schelling laments that Fichtes idealism also foregrounds the other side of the
picture, namely the annihilation of nature
(Stuttgarter 445).2 The results of Fichtes philosophy, according to Schelling, are fatal for
the understanding of God, the world, the
human being and society in its entirety. In
speaking of the dening features of this
modern worldview, Schelling remarks that the
[] world that is still just an image, indeed,
an image of an image, a nothing of nothing, a
shadow of a shadow. These are people who
are nothing but images, just dreams of
shadows. This is a people that, in the goodnatured endeavor toward so-called Enlightenment, really arrived at the dissolution of
everything in itself into thoughts. But,
along with the darkness, they lost all might
and that (let the right word stand here) barbaric principle that, when overcome but not
annihilated, is the foundation of all greatness
and beauty. (Ages, third version 106)3
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however, that Schelling has long since overcome
Fichtes approach. Fichtes I is no longer relevant. This root goes deeper than the relation
between I and not-I. Transcendental idealism
is an epiphenomenon of idealism generally,
i.e., idealism in all of its possible forms,
which, regardless of its form, per Schelling,
always annihilates reality. Rather, Schelling is
confronted with the difculty of describing the
transition from a pre-objective being to a construction of being through consciousness a
task to which his Spatphilosophie attends.
It is not hard to imagine that these difculties
in Merleau-Pontys interpretation of Schelling
are based on the way he initially encountered
Schelling. The philological perspective helps
here. Throughout his lectures, Merleau-Ponty
relies on Karl Jasperss book on Schelling
from 1955, Schelling: Groe und Verha ngnis,
as well as Karl Lowiths famous book on
Nietzsche, Nietzsches Philosophie der ewigen
Wiederkehr des Gleichen, which was published
in a second edition one year later and that contains an enormously extended passage on Schelling. By looking closer at the key notion of the
barbaric principle, one is surprised to nd
that Lowith and Jaspers work with exactly the
same passage of the Sa mmtliche Werke cited
above. It is not just this passage rather than
the one from Manfred Schroters edition of
Schellings collected works or a similar passage
from Schellings dialogue, Clara4 that
Merleau-Ponty cites, but Merleau-Ponty also
makes use of Lowiths very paraphrases.5
Further discussion of this point would take us
too far aeld, although it would be intriguing
to work out how Jaspers and Lowith if not
Merleau-Ponty himself are connected to Heideggers thoughts on Schelling; Heidegger
offered a number of courses on Schelling and
exerted a huge inuence on French philosophy
in these years, although at this point none of
his work on Schelling had yet been published.6
What is, at any rate, of the greatest signicance
is Merleau-Pontys refusal to grant recognition
to Walter Schulzs book that was published at
this time (1955). Schulz, unlike Jaspers or
Lowith, argues strongly in favour of Schellings
Spatphilosophie. A by-product of that
113
schellings shadow
Merleau-Ponty does not differentiate between
Schellings notion of nature in 1800 and the later
concept in The Ages of the World developed
between 1811 and 1815 and beyond; rather, he
always makes use of Schelling to solve the problems of a transcendental philosophy that is
reducible to subjectivism. But, in fact, the
problem of what happens to Naturphilosophie
in Schellings development is thereby not
solved. Merleau-Pontys (probably unintentional) attempt to carve out the productive
nature of Schellings early philosophy from
transcendental consciousness is promising,
because it allows one to establish continuity at
a point in Schellings philosophical development where one usually identies the biggest
rupture, the one between the earlier Identitatsphilosophie or Naturphilosophie and the later
Ontotheologie.9 At the same time, this
interpretation disguises a strategy of MerleauPontys. It should be the task of a completed
phenomenology to reveal those types of being
beneath our idealizations and objectications
that remain when the exuberant effort, to subjugate everything to the rules of consciousness,
is limited (Merleau-Ponty, Signs 180; translation altered). But this task reveals a
problem: how should barbarian and wild
being (Visible 102, 121) be integrated into a
phenomenology that cannot leave its viewpoint
in order to describe things as depicted by consciousness? Schelling and Merleau-Ponty are
trying to deal with the same problem: while it
is a challenge for Schelling to connect metaphysics to the human being, Merleau-Ponty,
arguing from the other direction, has to
explain the transition from human consciousness to a realm that is not accessible for it.
114
bilda
pave the way for a new consciousness (95;
translation altered), thereby continuing the
project of his youth, namely the project of a
new mythology (with the difference that
what was postulated in his earlier philosophy
as an external change is now drawn into an
inner development inscribed by the action of
man himself).
To illustrate this Schelling turns to a biblical
passage, Daniel 2.3135, which he reinterprets
in his lectures, held in 184243, Grounding of
Positive Philosophy:
The entire edice of human affairs is comparable to that image the king of Babylon saw in
his dream: his head was of ne gold, his
breast and arms were of silver, his belly and
loin of bronze, his thigh of iron, but his
feet were part iron and part clay, which
were then crushed and mixed together with
iron, clay, bronze, silver, and gold, and
became like chaff on the summer threshing
oors, which the wind scattered so that one
could no longer nd them anywhere. If one
could ever extract all that is metaphysical
from the state and public life, then they too
would fall apart in the same way. True metaphysics is honor, it is virtue; true metaphysics is not only religion, but also respect for
the law and love of ones land [] Human
affairs do not allow themselves to be governed by mathematics, physics, natural
history (I revere these sciences highly), or
even poetry and art. The true understanding
of the world is provided by precisely the right
metaphysics, which for this very reason has
from time immemorial been called the royal
science. (107)
It is quite obvious that Schelling places metaphysics at the centre of philosophy, the sciences
and the world. Also, questions concerning the
role of ethics in Schellings work might nd
some kind of answer here. Nevertheless, it is
the appearance of art and society which most
illuminates our discussion of the relation
between Schelling and Merleau-Ponty, since
Merleau-Ponty took the notion of the barbarian
principle from a passage where this principle
was depicted explicitly as the fundament of
society, without which society becomes a
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schellings shadow
unprethinkable being is not possible anymore.
Moreover, the option of acquiring an objectication of nature through art has disappeared.
After 1800, art never again receives such a
high status in Schellings philosophy.
Merleau-Ponty, in a prolic manner, combines two concepts of Schellings philosophy.
Closer to his phenomenological account is the
transcendental philosophy of the early Schelling
that tries to sublate everything within transcendental consciousness. But the very late works of
Merleau-Ponty especially elaborate an ontology
of wild being that as the article on Husserl
has already shown is guided by Schellings
Spa tphilosophie. One could say that, on the
one hand, Merleau-Ponty follows the transcendental philosophy of Schelling by leading his
phenomenology into the realm of art, while,
on the other hand, he trusts art, especially the
art of Cezanne, to mediate between the absent
and the present, the invisible and the visible,
to explain presence from its negativity.
This reference to Schellings late philosophy,
then, which is rooted in metaphysics rather than
art, is not as surprising as one might think,
given that as early as 1947, in his paper The
Metaphysical in Man, Merleau-Ponty rmly
pledges to reactivate metaphysics invoking it
in opposition to the ubiquitous scientism of
the twentieth century in order to restore the
original transcendence and strangeness (Metaphysical 97) of the ostensible neutral objects of
our sciences. In Schelling, Merleau-Ponty nds
an ally, one who advocates for metaphysics as
a necessary science that legitimizes the empirical sciences.
Ironically, Eye and Mind, of all works, does
not contain any direct indication of Schellings
presence and neither do the drafts of The
Visible and the Invisible. However, in the
loose working notes to this work, which was
his last, we nd yet another reference to the barbaric principle. The space Merleau-Ponty allots
to the barbaric principle is tantamount to the
space it has in his philosophy. The barbaric
principle hides in the back and thence unfolds
its power through the subsequent arrangements
that surpass it. Note the working note of
November 1960, which reads as follows:
116
bilda
interpretations of the world and classical dichotomies may be overcome cannot be answered denitively in this essay. Psychology, perhaps more
than other methods, threatens to objectify
subjective patterns of interpretation. While
Schelling was able to argue on a theological
basis for the retrieval of the liveliness of primordial structures in a scientic way, MerleauPonty employed a new psychology that sought
to ascertain the ontological fundament of
phenomenology.
Merleau-Ponty sticks to a form of phenomenological argumentation originating from consciousness. But the transition to nature,
corporeity and esh that is implied here can
essentially not outrun the radically pre-conscious. Even if the pre-conscious and consciousness pervade one another, their mutual
disclosure is limited to a sphere that never
discloses the other in its entirety. Similarly,
Schelling has the problem of scientically conducting what he proposed through speculation
while not being caught in anthropomorphisms,
a reproach with which he was often confronted.
The placelessness, which is the result of a philosophy that leaves the sphere of knowledge, is
only substantialized through the factuality of
historical reality. This quod of history cannot
be removed; man always has to position
himself back into a place. Merleau-Ponty opts
for the same factuality. Corporeity itself is an
il y a, an original given, which irrefutably
exists, but it is also the case that this ubiquitous
corporeity is placeless. Unfortunately, space
does not permit further elaboration on this
aspect. However, it should be clear that this
placelessness of corporeity is shown through
art: art for Merleau-Ponty is similar to what
ekstasis is for Schelling and it is rescued
through a texture of being. Merleau-Ponty
adds: The eye lives in this texture as a man
in his house (Eye 127). Ontology and
phenomenology form a close union. But it is
hard for Merleau-Ponty to shake off the theological inheritance of that ontology or ontophenomenology (especially when it strives to
remain of principal importance to philosophy).
Schelling, for his part, seems to have shaken
off art.
117
disclosure statement
No potential conict of interest was reported by
the author.
notes
1 I have slightly altered the translation. More accurately the French principe barbare translates literally into barbaric principle (instead of
barbarous source). This term implies the
meaning of source, which is employed in the
English translation, as well as the more abstract
philosophical meaning that refers to a beginning
that determines and rules what follows. Cf. Signes
20128, 225.
2 Todschlag der Natur. The German term
Todschlag refers to the juridical context of homicide, although in this case man is slaughtering
schellings shadow
nature. In comparison to murder, Todschlag
does not refer to the conscious plan of killing
somebody but rather the result of hostile action.
Cf. Tittmann 2: 2933.
3 Cf. Schelling, Die Weltalter. Bruchstck. (Aus dem
handschriftlichen Nachla) 195344, 342f. Cf. also
Schelling, Die Weltalter. Fragmente. In den Urfassungen von 1811 und 1813 51. Another translation is
given by Merleau-Ponty in Nature 290f. Cf., for
further elaborations on Merleau-Pontys reference,
note 5 in this article.
4 One finds there a beautiful and illuminating
passage on the barbaric principle that even Jason
Wirth and Patrick Burkes book fails to take into
account:
It seems, Clara said, that man is in this way
like a work of art. Here, too, what is delicate
or spiritual receives its highest worth only by
asserting its nature through mixing with a
conflicting, even barbaric, element. The
greatest beauty comes about only when gentleness masters strength. (Clara 77)
The huge debate on the year Schelling could have
written this dialogue should consider just this
quote, as the original hypothesis of Schellings son
Friedrich August Schelling is still today very likely.
He places the dialogue in the years 1816 to 1817,
which is very close to the drafts of The Ages of
the World that also contain the passages that name
the barbaric principle. Cf. K.F.A. Schelling,
Vorwort des Herausgebers, Smmtliche Werke
I/9, V.
5 Merleau-Pontys citation of the barbaric principle on page 38 of Nature does not come from
the early versions of The Ages of the World, which
Manfred Schrter published in 1946, but he takes
the quote from Schellings Smmtliche Werke
(cf. n. 4). Probably the concept became familiar
to Merleau-Ponty via Jaspers as well as Lwith,
who themselves quote the barbaric principle as
found in the Reclam edition that was much more
accessible to them than the edition of the same
text that Schellings son provides. Cf. Schelling,
Die Weltalter [1912] 222f. Cf. Jaspers 231; Lwith
(2nd ed.) 154. In the first edition, Lwith deals
with Schelling in one paragraph. This was then
extended to a couple of pages in the second
edition. Cf. Lwith (1st ed.) 129. It seems that
Robert Valliers opinion, that there was a fault in
Lwith that the French editor reproduced, needs
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Alexander Bilda
Philosophisches Seminar
Albert-Ludwigs-Universitat Freiburg
Platz der Universitat 3
79085 Freiburg
Germany
E-mail:
alexander.bilda@philosophie.unifreiburg.de