2. The Economy of the Old Testament
We must here, for a moment, jump from the "Law" to the "Prophets", since at this point already we reveal the secret of unique domestic economy in heaven and on earth. In the Old Testament, too — where the law, man, still is a school-master of the unique (Galatians 3:24)—the history of the kingdom of the unique follows a wise plan fixed from eternity. Everything has been foreseen and preordained in order that the unique could appear in the world, when the time had come3 to redeem holy people from their holiness.
The first book, "A Man's Life", is also called the "Book of Genesis", because it contains in embryo the entire domestic economy of the unique, because it gives us a prototype of the whole subsequent development up to the moment when the time comes for the end of the world. The entire unique history revolves round three stages: child, youth and man, who return "in various transformations" and in ever widening circles until, finally, the entire history of the world of things and the world of the spirit is reduced to "child, youth and man". Everywhere we shall find nothing but disguised "child, youth and man", just as we already discovered in them three disguised categories.
We spoke above of the German philosophical conception of history. Here, in Saint Max, we find a brilliant example of it. The speculative idea, the abstract conception, is made the driving force of history, and history is thereby turned into the mere history of philosophy. But even the latter is not conceived as, according to existing sources, it actually took place — not to mention how it evolved under the influence of real historical relations — but as it was understood and described by recent German philosophers, in particular Hegel and Feuerbach. And from these descriptions again only that was selected which could be adapted to the given end, and which came into the hands of our saint by tradition. Thus, history becomes a mere history of illusory ideas, a history of spirits and ghosts, while the real, empirical history that forms the basis of this ghostly history is only utilised to provide bodies for these ghosts; from it are borrowed the names required to clothe these ghosts with the appearance of reality. In making this experiment our saint frequently forgets his role and writes an undisguised ghost-story.
In his case we find this method of making history in its most naive, most classic simplicity. Three simple categories — realism, idealism and absolute negativity (here named "egoism") as the unity of the two — which we have already encountered in the shape of the child, youth and man, are made the basis of all history and are embellished with various historical signboards; together with their modest suite of auxiliary categories they form the content of all the allegedly historical phases which are trotted out. Saint Max once again reveals here his boundless faith by pushing to greater extremes than any of his predecessors faith in the speculative content of history dished up by German philosophers. In this solemn and tedious construction of history, therefore, all that matters is to find a pompous series of resounding names for three categories that are so hackneyed that they no longer dare to show themselves publicly under their own names. Our anointed author could perfectly well have passed from the "man" (p. 20) immediately to the "ego" (p. 201) or better still to the "unique" (p. 485); but that would have been too simple. Moreover, the strong competition among the German speculative philosophers makes it the duty of each new competitor to offer an ear-splitting historical advertisement for his commodity.
"The force of true development", to use Dottore Graziands words, "proceeds most forcibly" in the following "transformations": Basis:
I. Realism. II. Idealism. III. The negative unity of the two. "One" (p. 485), First nomenclature:
I. Child, dependent on things (realism). II. Youth, dependent on ideas (idealism). III. Man—(as the negative unity)
expressed positively:
the owner of ideas and things expressed negatively:
free from ideas and things Second, historical nomenclature: I. Negro (realism, child). II. Mongol (idealism, youth). III. Caucasian (negative unity of realism and idealism, man). Third, most general nomenclature:
I. Realistic egoist (egoist in the ordinary sense)—child, Negro. II. Idealist egoist (devotee)—youth, Mongol. III. True egoist (the unique)—man, Caucasian. Fourth, historical nomenclature. Repetition of the preceding stages within the category of the Caucasian.
(egoism)
I. The Ancients. Negroid Caucasians — childish men — pagans— dependent on things — realists — the world.
Transition (child penetrating behind the "things of this world"): Sophists, Sceptics, etc.
II. The Moderns. Mongoloid Caucasians — youthful men — Christians — dependent on ideas — idealists — spirit.
1. Pure history of spirits,3 Christianity as spirit. "The spirit." 2. Impure history of spirits. Spirit in relation to others. "The
Possessed". A. Purely impure history of spirits.
a) The apparition, the ghost, the spirit in the Negroid
state, as thing-like spirit and spiritual thing — objective being for the Christian, spirit as child. b) The whimsy, the fixed idea, the spirit in the Mongolian condition, as spiritual in the spirit, determination in consciousness, conceptual being in the Christian— spirit as youth. B. Impurely impure (historical) history of spirits.
a) Catholicism — Middle Ages (the Negro, child, real-
ism, etc.). b) Protestantism — modern times in modern times— (Mongol, youth, idealism, etc.). Within Protestantism it is possible to make further subdivisions, for example:
a.) English philosophy — realism, child, Negro.
ß) German philosophy — idealism, youth, Mongol. 3. The Hierarchy—negative unity of the two within the Mongoloid-Caucasian point of view. Such unity appears where historical relations are changed into actually existing relations or where opposites are presented as existing side by side. Here, therefore, we have two co-existing stages: A. The "uneducated,b (evil ones, bourgeois, egoists in the ordinary sense) = Negroes, children, Catholics, realists, etc. B. The "educated" (good ones, citoyens, devotees, priests, etc.) = Mongols, youths, Protestants, idealists.
In the German original Geistergeschichte, that is, "ghost-story" (Geister—ghosts or spirits; Geschichte—story or history). In this volume, however, it has usually been rendered as "history of spirits" to bring out more clearly the connection with the words that precede or follow it.— Ed.
Here and later the authors ironically use Berlin dialect words for uneducated (Unjebildete) and educated (Jebildete).—Ed.
These two stages exist side by side and hence it follows "easily" that the "educated" rule over the "uneducated"—this is the hierarchy. In the further course of historical development there arises then
the non-Hegelian from the "uneducated", the Hegelian from the "educated",(1) from which it follows that the Hegelians rule over the non-Hegelians. In this way Stirner converts the speculative notion of the domination of the speculative idea in history into the notion of the domination of the speculative philosophers themselves. The view of history hitherto held by him — the domination of the idea — becomes in the hierarchy a relation actually existing at present; it becomes the world domination of ideologists. This shows how deeply Stirner has plunged into speculation. This domination of the speculative philosophers and ideologists is finally developing, "for the time has come" for it, into the following, concluding nomenclature: a) Political liberalism, dependent on things, independent of persons — realism, child, Negro, the ancient, apparition, Catholicism, the "uneducated", masterless. b) Social liberalism, independent of things, dependent on the spirit, without object — idealism, youth, Mongol, the modern, whimsy, Protestantism, the "educated", propertyless. c) Humane liberalism, masterless and propertyless, that is godless, for God is simultaneously the supreme master and the supreme possession, hierarchy — negative unity in the sphere of liberalism and, as such, domination over the world of things and thoughts; at the same time the perfect egoist in the abolition of egoism — the perfect hierarchy. At the same time, it forms the Transition (youth penetrating behind the world of thoughts) to
III. the ''ego"—i.e., the perfect Christian, the perfect man, the Caucasian Caucasian and true egoist, who — just as the Christian became spirit through the supersession of the ancient world — becomes a corporeal being3 through the dissolution of the realm of spirits, by entering, sine beneficio deliberandi et inventarii, into the inheritance of idealism, the youth, the Mongol, the modern, the Christian, the possessed, the whimsical, the Protestant, the "educated", the Hegelian and the humane liberal. NB. 1. "At times" Feuerbachian and other categories, such as reason, the heart, etc., may be also "included episodically", should a suitable occasion arise, to heighten the colour of the picture and to produce new effects. It goes without saying that these, too, are only new disguises of the ever present idealism and realism.
2. The very pious Saint Max, Jacques le bonhomme, has nothing real and mundane to say about real mundane history, except that under the name of "nature", the "world of things", the "world of the child", etc., he ahvays opposes it to consciousness, as an object of speculation of the latter, as a world which, in spite of its continual annihilation, continues to exist in a mystical darkness, in order to reappear on every convenient occasion — probably because children and Negroes continue to exist, and hence also their world, the so-called world of things, "easily" continues to exist. Concerning such historical and non-historical constructions, good old Hegel wrote with regard to Schelling — the model for all constructors — that one can say the following in this context:
"It is no more difficult to handle the instrument of this monotonous formalism than a painter's palette which has onlv two colours, say black" (realistic, childish, Negroid, etc.) "and yellow"(2) (idealist, youthful, Mongolian, etc.), "in order to use the former to paint a surface when something historical" (the "world of things") "is required, and the latter when a landscape" ("heaven", spirit, holiness, etc.) "is needed" (Phänomenologie, p. 39).
"Ordinary consciousness" has even more pointedly ridiculed constructions of this kind in the following song:
The master sent out John
And told him to cut the hay; But John did not cut the hay Nor did he come back home.
Then the master sent out the dog And told him to bite John; But the dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out the stick And told it to beat the dog; But the stick did not beat the dog, The dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out fire And told it to burn the stick; But the fire did not burn the stick, The stick did not beat the dog, The dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out water And told it to put out the fire; But the water did not put out the fire, The fire did not burn the stick, The stick did not beat the dog, The dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out the ox And told it to drink the water; But the ox did not drink the water, The water did not put out the fire, The fire did not burn the stick, The stick did not beat the dog, The dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out the butcher And told him to slaughter the ox; But the butcher did not slaughter the ox, The ox did not drink the water, The water did not put out the fire, The fire did not burn the stick, The stick did not beat the dog, The dog did not bite John, John did not cut the hay And they did not come back home.
Then the master sent out the hangman And told him to hang the butcher; The hangman did hang the butcher, The butcher slaughtered the ox, The ox drank the water, The water put out the fire. The fire burnt the stick, The stick beat the dog, The dog bit John, John cut the hay, And they all came back home.(3) We shall now see with what "virtuosity of thought" and with what schoolboyish material Jacques le bonhomme elaborates on this scheme.