The Philosophy of History

The Philosophy of HistoryTo borrow a phrase from Goethe, 'all it takes to make a name for oneself is to know the Goethe topic,' but in reality, I think of my Goethe topic as a passport into the psyche of Goethe. As the Great German Novelist himself knew, history is the substance of human existence and, if we can learn to pay attention to the period at which we are living, and those before us, we become much more aware of what is going on with the world we live in.Goethe's first book, The Philosophy of History, traces Goethe's philosophy of the past, beginning with the 'Gesta Regum' - the First Book of the German History. Even though his philosophy of history has little relevance to present-day events in which we are involved, we are capable of looking back to this historical period and tracing its journey through the mind of the author. This process begins with the simple act of looking at the title of the first Goethe book.To borrow a word from Simon Schama, Goethe wrote in his phil osophy of history as if we were the narrator to a story, telling the story through the narrator's voice. It is hard to imagine that Goethe wrote any other way; his voice was the most expressive of any German author and all of this in spite of his being the exact opposite of a raconteur.Of course Goethe wrote as if he were a 'history' writer; no one would mistake him for Samuel Butler. He used the short, accessible prose of Middle High German to write down his thoughts about the past in a succinct, casual manner. His translation of Plato's Timaeus becomes the inspiration for his philosophical side.In fact Goethe was probably one of the first Europeans to look to the Ancient Greeks for guidance, as in his 'Vita Stirnzel' (or Treatise on Air). His translation of Aristotle's Politics is also an influence on his writings on politics.In his philosophy of history, Goethe also uses the famous Greek 'imagination' in tracing back the theme of his novels: Nietzsche's works such as The Genealog y of Morals, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Twilight of the Idols, and The Antichrist. With his translations of Homer, Virgil, Cicero, Aristotle, and others, Goethe found ways to bring back the Greek into our day to day lives. It is no accident that his books were called 'Philosophy of History.'In his own life, Goethe found time to follow the philosophy of history through his life as well. He learned to read, write, and speak in that philosophy of history that can be traced from Greece to the present. In his famous 'Address to the German Nation,' in which he dedicated a part of his speech to the German people, he gave a history of the German nation that includes the successive waves of German history, and the numerous generations of Germans that have passed before him.So while he may not have been the best academic theologian, or perhaps the best American historian, he has managed to make his philosophy of history on his own. It is only by paying attention to what has gone before us that w e can find our place in the scheme of things, and Goethe provided a clear and direct outline.