Totalitarianism and Political Religion: An Intellectual History

313 Pages·2012·2.33 MB·English

by  A. James Gregor

Stanford University Press Stanford, California
©2012 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University. All rights reserved.
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Publication Data Gregor, A. James (Anthony James), author.
Totalitarianism and political religion : an intellectual history / A. James Gregor.
pages cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8047-8130-5 (Cloth : alk. paper) ISBN 978-0-8047-8368-2 (e-book) 1. Totalitarianism—
History. 2. Fascism—History. 3. National socialism. 4. Religion and politics—History. I. Title.
JC480.G745 2012
320.53—dc23
2011036780
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free, archival-quality paper Typeset at Stanford University
Press in 10/13 Minion
Totalitarianism and Political Religion
An Intellectual History
A. JAMES GREGOR
STANFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Stanford, California
This book is dedicated to DR. JAMES L. SIMONS, BRIAN CAIN, and MARK ST. LEZIN,
whose humanity and skill helped postpone the inevitable long enough to allow its
appearance.
Acknowledgments
In the fragmented, self-absorbed, and sometimes alienated academic world of the
inexact sciences, we often overlook the reality that we are products of all the
efforts of an incalculable number of influences, among them those who taught
us, those who argued with us, and those tentative scholars we taught over the
years. There is not space enough to individually cite all those who contributed to
the work before the reader. It is perhaps enough to call up the generic memory of
those good teachers at Columbia University—Earnest Nagel, and Arthur Danto
among them—together with all those students who, over half a century, helped
me sharpen my cognitive skills. My gratitude must be more specific when I
allude to the content of my exposition. Then, I am obliged to refer to that critical
tribe of professionals, contenders, and clarifiers from whom I have learned so
much and who have influenced my intellectual life to the degree that traces of
their work can be found everywhere in my own. Renzo De Felice, Ernst Nolte,
and Richard Pipes must be counted among them. And there was Sidney Hook,
Anthony James Joes, and Augusto Del Noce, together with Giuseppe Prezzolini,
Ludovico Incisa di Camerana, Ugo Spirito, and Hervé Cavallera. They all
assisted me in my effort to understand the ideas that shaped the world in which I
have lived. After half a century of study and application, I have arrived at some
tentative conclusions. Those that are plausible are the products of those good
persons who instructed me by their works and their counsel. I am solely
responsible for those ideas that are flawed.
Finally, I owe a special debt to the professionalism and thoughtfulness of
Norris Pope, who shepherded the manuscript through the publication process,
from its selection to its final appearance. To my wife, Professor Maria Hsia
Chang, I am grateful for all kinds of good things: her advice and patience—and
for the presence of all those special creatures that give so much meaning to our
lives.
Contents
Cover
Copyright
Preface
1. Introduction
2. Hegelians after Hegel
3. Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx: History as Religion
4. Leninism: Revolution as Religion
5. Fascism: The Antecedents
6. Fascism: The State as Religion
7. The Religiopolitical Background of National Socialism
8. National Socialism: Race as Religion
9. Consolidation and Decay
10. Conclusions and Speculations
Index
Preface
The twentieth was perhaps the most destructive century in human history.
Certainly, more lives and property were consumed through willful human
agency during those years than in any other comparable period of time. Human
beings killed each other, and destroyed things, with such serious application that
the entire century bore a nightmare quality. Millions upon millions perished.
Entire cities disappeared—and whole continents seemed shaken. At the end,
millions of broken human beings returned to shattered homes—and only few
really could remember what it had been all about. We were told it was all
madness—as though that might serve as explanation. In fact, the tragedy
deserves more of an accounting than that.
Surely it was a time of madness, but the unnumbered dead of the past
century deserve something more than that simple affirmation. The work before
the reader attempts to provide something of an interpretive story of that doleful
time—its beliefs, its passions, and its temper. Amid all the other factors that
contributed to the tragedy, there was a kind of creedal ferocity that made every
exchange a matter of existential importance. The twentieth century was host to
systems of doctrinal conviction that made unorthodox belief a capital affront,
made conflict mortal, and all enterprise sacrificial. Such belief systems were
predicated on moral persuasions so intense and inflexible that they could tolerate
only an absolute unanimity of opinion within their sphere of influence. Nor was
unanimity expected only in opinions held. Entire categories of human beings—
conceived somehow “alien”—were condemned to destruction because of some
indelible deficiency—membership in some offending economic class, or as
product of a blighted biological provenance. Communities so circumstanced
became jealous of their homogeneity, their infrangible unity. In such an
environment, thought became “ideological,” so that any opposition, no matter
how temporary or trivial, appeared to threaten the extirpation of a faith, an insult
to an entire manner of life.
The century saw the emergence of governments that charged themselves
with the responsibility of governing lives in such fashion as to leave little to
personal choice. Life was seen as willing service, implicit duty, spontaneous
sacrifice, and selfless toil—and politics the infallible guide to it all. There were
special books, written by special authors—that were to be venerated. There were
Leaders, chosen by God or History—or both as one—who were Saviors, and
Prophets, and All Seeing Sages. There were unitary political parties that were
repositories of impeccable truth, sure science, and intuitive verities. There were
guardians of it all—“vanguards,” and “hierarchies,” and “central committees,”
all equipped with answers to all the questions that have puzzled human beings
since the beginnings of consciousness. And there were “New Men” who would
people a redeemed creation.
In war and peace these political systems demanded more of their subjects
than any other system of government in human memory. In war, there was a
ferocity and an ardor rarely experienced. Millions gave themselves over to
combat without reserve. Whole populations continued to fight when everything
was lost. We have identified those systems so typified by a variety of names—as
“dictatorships,” as “despotisms,” as “totalitarianisms,” and sometimes, when
passions somewhat abated, as “administered societies.” Whatever the names
given, there was something in such systems that was unique—that sometimes
did not register among those who saw in them something “regenerative.” That
something was alive with a kind of fervor we have almost always identified with
religion, spontaneous or institutional.
That is what this work has chosen to address: that clutch of ideas, identified
as “political religion” that animates the systems considered. The presence of a
political religion among all the other variables that shape events explains neither
the history of those systems nor that of the twentieth century. The argument here
is that the discussion of the role of political religion in such systems contributes
to our general understanding of the complex period under consideration. The
twentieth century was the product of so many contributing factors that no single
insight could pretend to account for it all. The contention here is that a collection
of beliefs, that share properties with the religions with which we have been
familiar, operated in the twentieth century to make the contest of ideas and the
challenge of arms more ferocious and destructive than they might otherwise
have been.
We shall be concerned here with the history of such ideas. It cannot be an
exhaustive history. That would exceed both the capacity of the author and the
patience of the reader. Neither can it be a “true” account of the ideas of any of
the authors to whom reference is made. It is not at all clear what the “truth” of
any of the ideas of a political theorist might be—so many of their ideas defy any
known process of confirmation. At best, what is attempted is to show that
revolutionary leaders have referred to the work of political theorists and have
drawn from that work certain implications. It is left to others to attempt to
explain how and why ideas make human beings behave as they do—or in what
circumstances such ideas become effective.
The work before the reader will attempt to deliver an account of the ideas
that inspired many in the twentieth century, convincing them to live, to labor, to
sacrifice, to obey, and to fight and die in their service. It will attempt to give
dimension to the terrible tragedy of the twentieth century. It will be an account
of secular faiths, bearing many names. It will speak of Marxism-Leninisms, of
Fascism, and of National Socialism. Many have dealt with these ideologies as
having the qualities of religion. It is hoped that this work contributes something
to that important discussion.
A. James Gregor
Berkeley, California
CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
The State is based on religion. . . . It is only when religion is made the foundation that the practice of
righteousness attains stability, and that the fulfillment of duty is secured. It is in religion that what is
deepest in man, the conscience, first feels that it lies under an absolute obligation, and has the
certain knowledge of this obligation; therefore the State must rest on religion. . . . In this aspect,
religion stands in the closest connection with the political principle.
1
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Since time immemorial, thinkers have acknowledged, directly or indirectly,
explicitly or implicitly, an intimate relationship between religion and politics.
The relationship has not been characterized to everyone’s satisfaction, but few
have denied that it exists. Preliterate societies have rarely, if ever, attempted to
consistently distinguish the sacred from the politically profane—and the fact is
that the sacred and the political overlap in intricate fashion in the least, as well as
in the most, advanced communities. In tribal societies, as in pharaonic Egypt and
Imperial Rome, rulers were cloaked in the trappings of divinity. In modern
times, the industrializing Japanese chose to imagine their emperors as linearly
descended from the sun god.
Among contemporary social scientists, there is easy talk of “civil religions,”
and “sacralized politics,” by virtue of which politics in industrial democracies is
imbued with some of the features of faith. Belief in the sacred is invoked to
render business transactions more reliable, institutions more just, witnesses more
truthful, and children more obedient. Belief in the divine prompts citizens to
conform their conduct to public law, moral sanction, and collective conscience.
Faith prompts individuals to sacrifice in the service of the community. Public
ceremonies often take on the properties of worship, and things—flags, songs,
and offices—become invested with special significance, requiring unusual
deference and respect.
Although sometimes intricate and often inscrutable, the relationship between
faith and politics in industrialized democracies is generally functional in