Logical analysis of the text Camus A. "Rebellious Man"

"The Rebellious Man" is a multi-layered work, difficult to understand and interpret. Briefly, we can say this: Camus seeks to understand how a person and humanity become capable of murders, wars, through what ideas and concepts their justification is carried out.

Camus recalls the results he achieved in the philosophy of the absurd. Since humanity has become adept at both condemning and defending ("when necessary, inevitable", etc.) wars and murders, it should be recognized that the existing ethics does not provide an unambiguous, logically justified solution to the problem. The rejection of suicide in the philosophy of the absurd indirectly testified that arguments could also be made against murder. But the question still remained unanswered. Now, in The Rebel Man, he was on the agenda. Starting from the philosophy of the absurd, Camus argues, we have come to the conclusion that "the first and only evidence" that is given in the experience of the absurd is rebellion.

"The Rebellious Man" is the first theme of Camus' work under consideration. "This is a man who says no. But in denying he does not renounce: he is a man who says yes with his very first act." The rebellion of a Roman slave who suddenly refused to obey his master, the suicide of Russian terrorists in hard labor out of protest against bullying of fellow soldiers are examples from the analysis of which Camus concludes: “In the experience of the absurd, suffering is individual. In a rebellious breakthrough, it acquires the character of a collective existence. It becomes a common undertaking... The evil experienced by one person becomes a plague that infects all.In our daily trials, rebellion plays the same role that the "cogito" plays in the order of thought: rebellion is the first evidence.But this evidence draws the individual out of his loneliness, it is that common which underlies the first value for all people.I rebel, therefore we exist"".

Camus analyzes the question of "metaphysical rebellion". "Metaphysical rebellion is a man's rebellion against his destiny and the entire universe. This rebellion is metaphysical, because it disputes the ultimate goals of man and the universe." The meaning of metaphysical rebellion is great. At first, rebellion does not encroach on the elimination of God. It's just a "talk on an equal footing". "But this is not about courtly conversation. This is about controversy, inspired by the desire to prevail." Camus traces the stages of metaphysical rebellion - the tendencies gradually emerging in philosophy to "equate" man with God. Then Camus follows an analysis of those forms of rebellion and those "research" of rebellion, which are analyzed using the examples of the work of the Marquis de Sade, Dostoevsky (he is recognized as one of the best researchers of the "rebellious spirit"), Nietzsche, and surrealist poetry. The main content of the book is an analysis of those forms of rebellion that in the 19th and 20th centuries. turned into devastating revolutions. Camus approaches the "historical revolt" neither as a historian nor as a philosopher of history. He is most interested in what mindsets and ideas pushed (and are pushing) people to regicide, revolutionary unrest, terror, wars, mass destruction of foreigners and fellow tribesmen. Philosophical and socio-political ideas are credited with a truly decisive role in these processes. The philosophy of Hegel and the Hegelians, in a word, varieties of "German ideology" both on German and "Germanized" Russian soil of the 19th century. are carefully studied as the ideological prerequisites for destructive revolutionary uprisings. Special attention is paid to Belinsky, Herzen, Russian nihilists of the 60s, anarchist theorist Bakunin, Narodnik Nechaev. The chapter "Pickling Killers" dissects the history and ideology of Russian terrorism in the 19th and 20th centuries. Marxism is also analyzed, including its perception on Russian soil. "Rebellion and Revolution" - this theme remains for Camus pivotal throughout his analysis. The connection between the overthrow of principles, the revolutionary upheaval of foundations, and the annihilation of people seems to the author of The Rebellious Man undoubted. "The revolution in the realm of principles kills God in the person of his vicar. The revolution of the 20th century kills what remains of the divine in the principles themselves, and thus sanctifies historical nihilism."

Camus sees similarities between fascism and communism, although he takes into account the differences between them. But there is a similarity, and it stems ultimately from a false philosophy of history, from a call to revolt. "Fascism wanted to institute the advent of the Nietzschean superman. And immediately realized that if God exists, he can be anyone and anything, but above all - the master of death. If a person wants to become God, he must appropriate to himself the right to life and death of others "But, having become a supplier of corpses and subhumans, he himself turned not into God, but into a subhuman, into a vile servant of death. The rational revolution, in turn, seeks to realize the all-man predicted by Marx. But it is worth accepting the logic of history in all its totality, as it will lead the revolution against her own lofty passion, will begin to cripple the person more and more, and in the end she herself will turn into an objective crime.

Despite the harsh criticism of rebellion and revolution, Camus pays tribute to rebellion and revolutionism, since they are generated by the human lot. And therefore, despite the greatest risk and danger, rebelliousness must go through self-criticism and self-restraint. "... The revolutionary spirit of Europe can, for the first and last time, reflect on its principles, ask itself what kind of deviation pushes it towards terrorism and war, and together with the goals of rebellion, gain loyalty to itself." The closing pages of The Rebel Man are hardly convincing. Having brilliantly debunked the rebellious, revolutionary, nihilistic consciousness and action, Camus tried to convince his reader that "true rebellion" and "new revolutionaryism" are possible, free from destructive consequences. And yet, faith in a person who has taken upon himself "the risk and difficulties of freedom", more precisely, faith in millions of singles, "whose creations and works daily deny the boundaries and former mirages of history" - this is what the outstanding writer and outstanding philosopher Albert Camus.

Albert Camus.
Rebellious man
Content
Introduction
I. Rebellious Man
II Metaphysical Revolt
Sons of Cain
Absolute negation
Writer
Rebel dandies
Refusal to save
Absolute approval
The only one
Nietzsche and Nihelism
Rebellious poetry
Lautreamont and mediocrity
Surrealism and revolution
Nihilism and history
III Historical rebellion
Regicide
New Gospel
King's execution
The Religion of Virtue
Terror
deicide
Individual terrorism
Rejection of virtue
Three Possessed
Picky Killers
Shigalevshchina
State terrorism and irrational terror
State terrorism and rational terror
Bourgeois prophecies
Revolutionary prophecies
The collapse of the prophecies
Last kingdom
Totality and Judgment
Revolt and revolution
IV. Riot and art
Romance and rebellion
Riot and style
Creativity and revolution
V. Noon Thought
Riot and murder
Nihilistic murder
Historic assassination
Measure and immensity
Midday Thought
On the other side of nihilism
Comments and editorial notes
I
MAN REBEL
What is a rebellious person? This is a person who says “no.” But, denying, he does not renounce: this is a person who already says “yes” with his first action. A slave who has been fulfilling his master’s orders all his life suddenly considers the last of them unacceptable What is the content of his "no"?
“No” can, for example, mean: “I have endured too long”, “so far - so be it, but then enough will be enough”, “you are going too far” and also: “there is a limit that I cannot cross for you let" Generally speaking, this "no" asserts the existence of a boundary. The same idea of ​​the limit is found in the feeling of the rebel that the other "takes too much upon himself", extends his rights beyond the border, beyond which lies the area of ​​sovereign rights, which puts up an obstacle to any encroachment on them. Thus, the impulse to revolt is rooted both in a strong protest against any interference that is perceived as unacceptable, and in the vague conviction of the rebel that he is right, or rather, in his conviction that he "has the right to do such and such" . Rebellion does not occur if there is no such feeling of being right. That is why the rebellious slave says both "yes" and "no" at the same time. Together with the mentioned boundary, he affirms everything that he does not clearly feel in himself and wants to preserve. He stubbornly proves that there is something "worthwhile" in him and that it needs to be protected. To the order that enslaves him, he opposes a kind of right to endure oppression only to the extent that he himself sets.
Together with the repulsion of the alien in any rebellion, a complete identification of a person with a certain side of his being immediately occurs. Here, in a hidden way, a value judgment comes into play, and, moreover, so thorough that it helps the rebel to withstand the dangers. Until now, he had at least remained silent, sinking into despair, forced to endure any conditions, even if he considered them deeply unfair. Since the oppressed is silent, people assume that he does not reason and does not want anything, and in some cases he really does not want anything anymore. Despair, like absurdity, judges and desires everything in general and nothing in particular. Silence conveys it well. But as soon as the oppressed speaks, even if he says "no", it means that he desires and judges. The rebel makes a roundabout. He walked, driven by the whip of the owner. And now she stands face to face with him. The rebel opposes everything that is valuable to him, everything that is not. Not every value causes rebellion, but every rebellious movement tacitly presupposes some value. About the value of this case is it about?
In a rebellious impulse, a consciousness, albeit unclear, is born: a sudden vivid feeling that there is something in a person with which he can identify himself at least for a while. Until now, the slave has not really felt this identity. Before his rebellion, he suffered from all kinds of oppression. It often happened that he meekly carried out orders much more outrageous than the last one that caused the riot. The slave patiently accepted these orders; in the depths of his soul, he may have rejected them, but since he was silent, it means that he lived his daily worries, not yet realizing his rights. Having lost patience, he now begins to impatiently reject everything that he put up with before. This impulse almost always has the opposite effect. Rejecting the humiliating command of his master, the slave at the same time rejects slavery as such. Step by step, rebellion takes him much further than simple defiance. He even crosses the line he set for the enemy, now demanding that he be treated as an equal. What formerly was man's stubborn resistance becomes the whole man who identifies himself with resistance and is reduced to it. That part of his being, to which he demanded respect, is now dearer to him than anything, dearer even to life itself, it becomes the highest good for the rebel. Until then, a slave who lived by everyday compromises, in an instant ("because how else...") falls into irreconcilability - "all or nothing." Consciousness arises with rebellion.
This consciousness combines the still rather vague "everything" and "nothing", suggesting that a person can be sacrificed for the sake of "everything". The rebel wants to be either "everything", completely identifying himself with the good that he suddenly realized, and demanding that in his face people recognize and welcome this good, or "nothing", that is, to be defeated by a superior force. Going to the end, the rebel is ready for the last lawlessness, which is death, if he is deprived of that only sacred gift, which, for example, freedom can become for him. It is better to die standing than to live on your knees*.
According to many recognized authors, value "most often represents a transition from fact to law, from the desired to the desired (usually through the desired by all)"1. As I have already shown, in rebellion there is an obvious transition to the right. And similarly, the transition from the formula "it would be necessary for this to exist" to the formula "I want it to be so." But, perhaps even more important, we are talking about the transition from the individual to the good that has now become universal. Contrary to popular belief about rebellion, the appearance of the slogan "All or nothing" proves that rebellion, even born in the depths of a purely individual, casts doubt on the very concept of an individual. If an individual is ready to die and, under certain circumstances, accepts death in his rebellious impulse, he thereby shows that he is sacrificing himself in the name of a good that, in his opinion, means more than his own destiny. If a rebel is ready to perish in order not to lose the right he defends, then this means that he values ​​this right more than himself. Therefore, he acts in the name of a value, albeit still obscure, which, he feels, unites him with all other people. Evidently the affirmation implicit in every rebellious action extends to something that transcends the individual insofar as this something relieves him of his supposed loneliness and gives him reason to act. But now it is important to note that this pre-existing value, given before any action, comes into conflict with purely historical philosophical teachings, according to which value is won (if it can be won at all) only as a result of action. The analysis of rebellion leads at least to the conjecture that human nature really exists, according to the ideas of the ancient Greeks and contrary to the postulates modern philosophy*. Why rebel if there is nothing permanent in yourself worthy of being preserved? If a slave rises, it is for the good of all living. After all, he believes that, in the existing order of things, he denies something that is inherent not only to him, but which is that common in which all people, and even the one who insulted and oppressed a slave, have a pre-prepared community.
This conclusion is supported by two observations. First of all, it should be noted that, in its essence, the rebellious impulse is not an egoistic spiritual movement. No doubt, it can be caused by selfish reasons. But people rise up not only against oppression, but also against lies. Moreover, at first, the selfish rebel in the very depths of his soul values ​​\u200b\u200bnothing, because he puts everything at stake. Of course, the rebel demands respect for himself, but only to the extent that he identifies himself with the natural human community.
Let us also note that it is by no means only the oppressed himself who becomes a rebel. Rebellion can also be raised by those who are shocked by the spectacle of oppression of which another has become a victim. In this case, he identifies himself with this oppressed. And here it is necessary to clarify that we are not talking about psychological identification, not about self-deception, when a person imagines that they insult him. It happens, on the contrary, that we are not able to calmly watch how others are subjected to those insults that we ourselves would endure without protesting. An example of this most noble movement of the human soul is suicide out of protest, which Russian terrorists decided to do in hard labor when their comrades were flogged. It is not about a sense of community of interests. After all, we may consider outrageous injustice even in relation to our opponents. Here there is only an identification of destinies and joining one of the parties. Thus, the individual in itself is not at all the value that he intends to protect. This value is made up of all people in general. In rebellion, a person, overcoming his limitations, draws closer to others, and from this point of view, human solidarity has a metaphysical character. It is simply about solidarity born in shackles.
The positive aspect of the value implied by all rebellion can be clarified by comparing it with the purely negative concept of malice, as Scheler defines it. Indeed, a rebellious impulse is something more than an act of protest in the strongest sense of the word. Anger is beautifully defined by Scheler as self-poisoning, as a destructive secretion of prolonged impotence, occurring in a closed vessel. Rebellion, on the contrary, breaks life and helps to go beyond it. He turns stagnant waters into raging waves. Scheler himself emphasizes the passive nature of anger, noting what a great place it occupies in the spiritual world of a woman, whose fate is to be an object of desire and possession. The source of rebellion, on the contrary, is an overabundance of energy and a thirst for activity. Scheler is right when he says that bitterness is brightly colored by envy. But they envy what they don't have. The rebel defends himself as he is. He demands not only the good that he does not possess or that he can be deprived of. He seeks recognition of what is already in him and which he himself in almost all cases has recognized as more significant than the object of probable envy. Riot is not realistic. According to Scheler, the bitterness of a strong soul turns into careerism, and that of a weak one into bitterness. But in any case, it is about becoming not what you are. Anger is always directed against its bearer. The rebellious person, on the contrary, in his first impulse protests against encroachments on himself, as he is. He fights for the integrity of his personality. At first, he seeks not so much to gain the upper hand as to make him respect himself.
Finally, bitterness seems to revel in advance on the torment it would like to inflict on its object. Nietzsche and Scheler are right in seeing a fine example of this feeling in that passage of Tertullian in which he informs the readers that it will be the greatest delight of the blessed inhabitants of paradise to see the Roman emperors writhing in the flames of hell. Such is the delight of respectable inhabitants who love the spectacle of the death penalty. The rebel, on the contrary, is fundamentally limited to protesting against humiliation, not wanting them for anyone else, and is ready to endure torment, but only not to allow anything offensive to the individual.
In this case, it is not clear why Scheler completely identifies the rebellious spirit and bitterness. His critique of animosity in humanitarianism (which he treats as a form of unchristian love for people) could be applied to some vague form of humanitarian idealism or the technique of terror. But this criticism misses the mark as far as the rebellion of man against his destiny, the impulse that raises him to the defense of the dignity inherent in everyone, is concerned. Scheler wants to show that humanitarianism goes hand in hand with hatred of the world. They love humanity as a whole so as not to love anyone in particular. In some cases this is true, and Scheler becomes clearer when you take into account that humanitarianism for him is represented by Bentham and Rousseau. But the attachment of a person to a person can arise due to something other than an arithmetic calculation of interests or trust in human nature (however, purely theoretical). The utilitarians and educator Emil* are opposed, for example, by the logic embodied by Dostoevsky in the image of Ivan Karamazov, who begins with a rebellious impulse and ends with a metaphysical uprising. Scheler, being familiar with Dostoyevsky's novel, summarizes the concept thus: "There is not enough love in the world to waste it on anything other than a person." Even if such a summary were true, the bottomless desperation that is felt behind it deserves something better than scorn. But, in fact, it does not convey the tragic nature of the Karamazov rebellion. The drama of Ivan Karamazov, on the contrary, consists in an overabundance of love, not knowing whom to pour out on. Since this love is not used, and God is denied, the decision arises to bestow it on a person in the name of noble compassion.
However, as follows from our analysis, in the rebellious movement some abstract ideal is chosen not out of mental poverty and not for the sake of fruitless protest. In a person, one must see that which cannot be reduced to an idea, that warmth of the soul, which is destined for existence and for nothing else. Does this mean that no rebellion carries bitterness and envy? No, it does not, and we know this very well in our unkind age. But we must consider the concept of anger in its broadest sense, because otherwise we risk distorting it, and then we can say that rebellion completely overcomes anger. If in Wuthering Heights Heathcliff prefers his love to God and asks to send him to hell, only to unite with his beloved there, then here it is not only his humiliated youth that speaks, but also the painful experience of his whole life. Meister Eckhart felt the same impulse when, in a startling fit of heresy, he declared that he preferred hell with Jesus to heaven without him. And here is the same impulse of love. So, contrary to Scheler, I strongly insist on the passionate creative impulse of rebellion, which distinguishes it from bitterness. Seemingly negative because it creates nothing, rebellion is actually deeply positive because it reveals in a person that which is always worth fighting for.
But aren't both rebellion and the value it carries relative? The reasons for the rebellion seem to have changed with the epochs and civilizations. It is obvious that a Hindu pariah, an Inca warrior, a native from Central Africa, or a member of the first Christian communities had different ideas about rebellion. It can even be argued with high probability that in these specific cases the concept of rebellion does not make sense. However, the ancient Greek slave, the serf, the Renaissance condottiere, the Regency Parisian bourgeois, the Russian intellectual of the 1900s, and the modern worker, diverging in their understanding of the causes of the rebellion, would unanimously recognize its legitimacy. In other words, we can assume that the problem of rebellion has a certain meaning only within the framework of Western thought. One can speak even more precisely, noting, together with Max Scheler, that the rebellious spirit found expression with difficulty in societies where inequality was too great (as in the Hindu castes), or, conversely, in those societies where there was absolute equality (certain primitive tribes) . In society, a rebellious spirit can arise only in those social groups where theoretical equality hides huge actual inequality. And this means that the problem of rebellion only makes sense in our Western society. In such a case, it would be difficult to resist the temptation to assert that this problem is connected with the development of individualism, if previous reflections had not alerted us to such a conclusion.
From Scheler's remark, one can clearly deduce only that in our Western societies, thanks to the theory of political freedom in human soul a lofty conception of man takes root, and that, as a result of the practical use of this freedom, dissatisfaction with one's position grows correspondingly. Actual freedom develops more slowly than man's ideas about freedom. From this observation, only the following can be deduced: rebellion is the work of a person who is aware, firmly knowing his rights. But nothing gives us reason to speak only of the rights of the individual. On the contrary, it is highly probable that, thanks to the solidarity already mentioned, the human race becomes more and more fully aware of itself in the course of its history. Indeed, the problem of rebellion does not arise among the Incas or pariahs, since it was solved for them by tradition: even before they could raise the question of rebellion, the answer to it was already given in the concept of the sacred. In the sacred world there is no problem of rebellion, just as there are no real problems at all, since all answers are given once and for all. Here the place of metaphysics is occupied by myth. There are no questions, there are only answers and endless comments to them, which can be metaphysical. But when a person has not yet entered the sphere of the sacred, or has already left it, he is questioning and rebelling, and he questions and rebels in order to enter this sphere or leave it. A rebellious person is a person who lives before or after the sacred, demanding a human order, in which the answers will be human, that is, reasonably formulated. From this moment on, every question, every word is a rebellion, while in the sacralized world every word is an act of grace. It could thus be shown that for human spirit only two universes are available - the universe of the sacred (or, to use the language of Christianity, the universe of grace)4 and the universe of rebellion. The disappearance of one means the emergence of the other, although this may come in puzzling forms. And here we again meet with the formula "All or nothing". The urgency of the problem of rebellion is determined solely by the fact that today entire societies seek to isolate themselves from the sacred. We live in a desacralized history. Of course, man is not reduced to rebellion. But today's history with its strife forces us to recognize that rebellion is one of the essential dimensions of man. It is our historical reality. And we need not to run away from it, but to find our values ​​in it. But is it possible, staying outside the sphere of the sacred and its absolute values, to acquire a rule of life behavior? - such is the question posed by the rebellion.
We have already had the opportunity to note a certain indefinite value that is born at the limit beyond which the uprising takes place. Now it is time to ask ourselves if this value is found in modern forms of rebellious thought and rebellious action, and if so, to clarify its content. But before continuing the discussion, we note that the basis of this value is rebellion as such. The solidarity of people is determined by a rebellious impulse, and this, in turn, finds its justification only in their complicity. Therefore, we have the right to declare that any rebellion that allows itself to deny or destroy human solidarity ceases to be rebellions because of this and in fact coincides with a deadening conciliation. In the same way, devoid of holiness, human solidarity finds life only at the level of rebellion. Thus, the real drama of rebellious thought manifests itself. In order to live, a person must rebel, but his rebellion should not violate the boundaries opened by the rebel in himself, the boundaries beyond which people, united, begin their true being. Rebellious thought cannot do without memory; it is characterized by constant tension. Following her in her creations and actions, we must always ask whether she remains true to her original nobility or, out of fatigue and madness, she forgot about him - in the drunkenness of tyranny or servility.
In the meantime, here is the first result that the rebellious spirit has achieved thanks to reflection, imbued with absurdity and a sense of the obvious barrenness of the world. In the experience of the absurd, suffering is individual. In a rebellious impulse, it realizes itself as a collective. It turns out to be a common lot. The first achievement of a mind bound by estrangement is the understanding that it shares this estrangement with all people and that human reality suffers in its entirety from isolation, estrangement in relation to itself and to the world. Evil experienced by one person becomes a plague that infects everyone. In our daily trials, rebellion plays the same role that the "cogito" plays in the order of thought; rebellion is the first evidence. But this evidence brings the individual out of his loneliness, it is the common thing that underlies the first value for all people. I rebel, therefore we exist.
1 Lalande. Vocabuiaire philosophique.
2 The community of victims is a phenomenon of the same order as the community of the victim and the executioner. But the executioner does not know about it.
3 L "homme du ressentiment *.
4 Of course, the rise of Christianity is marked by metaphysical rebellion, but the resurrection of Christ, the heralding of his second coming and the Kingdom of God, understood as the promise of eternal life, are the answers that make rebellion unnecessary.
ABSOLUTE STATEMENT
As soon as a person subjects God to a moral assessment, he kills God in himself. But then what is morality based on? God is denied in the name of justice, but is it possible to understand the idea of ​​justice outside the idea of ​​God. Are we then in an absurd situation? This is the absurdity that Nietzsche encountered. In order to more truly overcome it, he brings it to the limit: morality is the last hypostasis of God; it must be destroyed in order to be rebuilt. God then no longer exists, and he is no longer the guarantor of our existence; man must decide to act in order to be.
THE ONLY ONE
Already Stirner wanted to crush, following God himself, every idea of ​​God in human consciousness. But, in contrast to Nietzsche, his nihilism is self-satisfied. Stirner chuckles at the dead end, while Nietzsche throws himself at the walls. Since 1845, when The One and His Property was published, Stirner has been clearing the way. The man who attended the circle "Free" together with the left Young Hegelians (among whom was Marx), settled scores not only with the Almighty, but also with Feuerbach's Man, with the Hegelian Spirit and its historical incarnation - the State. According to Stirner, all these idols are generated by the same "Mongolism", faith in eternal ideas. It is not surprising that he wrote: "Nothing - that's what I built my business on." Of course, sin is "Mongolian torment", but such is the set of laws to which we are slaves. God is an enemy, in his blasphemy Stirner crosses all boundaries ("digest the Holy Gifts - and you will be delivered from them!"). But God is only one of the alienated forms of my "I", or rather, of what I am. Socrates, Jesus, Descartes, Hegel, all the prophets and philosophers did nothing but invent new ways to alienate what I am, that very “I”, which Stirner invariably distinguished from the absolute “I” of Fichte, reducing the former to the most particular transient content. . "There are no names for him", he is the One.
For Stirner, universal history before the birth of Christ is only a centuries-old attempt to idealize reality. This effort is expressed in the ideas and rituals of purification inherent in the ancients. With the advent of Jesus, the goal is achieved and another effort arises, aimed, on the contrary, at the realization of the ideal. Purification is followed by a passion for incarnation that ravages the world more and more as socialism, the successor of Christ, expands its power. Universal is nothing but a centuries-old encroachment of history on a unique beginning, which is me, a living, concrete, all-conquering beginning, which sought to subdue the yoke of such successive abstractions as God, the state, society, humanity. For Stirner, philanthropy is a hoax. atheistic philosophical teachings, the top of which is the cult of the state and man, are nothing more than "theological rebellions." "Our atheists," says Stirner, "are really pious people." In fact, throughout history there has been only one cult - the cult of eternity. This cult is a lie. Only the only one is true, the enemy of the eternal and of everything that does not serve the will of the only one to rule.
Beginning with Stirner, the denial that inspires revolt buries all affirmations beneath it. It discards the surrogates of the divine with which it litters moral consciousness. "The beyond outside us has been destroyed," says Stirner, "but the other side within us has become a new heaven." Even the revolution, and above all the revolution, is hateful to this rebel. To be a revolutionary, one must also believe in something where there is nothing to believe in. "When the reaction came after the (French) revolution, it became clear what the Revolution really was." To serve humanity slavishly is no better than to serve God. In the end, the brotherhood "occurs among the Communists only for Sundays". On the rest of the week, the brothers become slaves. For Stirner, there is only one freedom - "my power" and only one truth - "the radiant selfishness of the stars."

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"Rebellious Man"

"Rebel Man" is the story of the idea of ​​rebellion - metaphysical and political - against the injustice of the human lot. If the first question of The Myth of Sisyphus was the question of the permissibility of suicide, then this work begins with the question of the justice of murder. People at all times killed each other - this is the truth of the fact. The one who kills in a fit of passion is brought to justice, sometimes sent to the guillotine. But today, the real threat is not these criminal loners, but government officials who send millions of people to death in cold blood, justifying massacres in the interests of the nation, state security, human progress, and the logic of history.

The man of the 20th century found himself in the face of totalitarian ideologies that serve as a justification for murder. Even Pascal in his "Provincial Letters" was indignant at the casuistry of the Jesuits, who allowed murder contrary to the Christian commandment. Of course, all churches blessed wars, executed heretics, but every Christian still knew that “Thou shalt not kill” is inscribed on the tablets, that murder is the gravest sin. On the tablets of our age it is written: "Kill." Camus in The Man in Revolt traces the genealogy of this maxim of modern ideology. The problem is that these ideologies themselves were born from the idea of ​​rebellion, which was transformed into a nihilist "everything is permitted."

Camus believed that the starting point of his philosophy remained the same - this is an absurdity that calls into question all values. Absurdity, in his opinion, forbids not only suicide, but also murder, since the destruction of one's own kind means an attack on the unique source of meaning, which is the meaning of each person. However, the absurd setting of the "Myth of Sisyphus" does not result in a rebellion that asserts the self-worth of the other. The rebellion there gave the price of individual life - it is "the struggle of the intellect with a reality that surpasses it", "a spectacle of human pride", "refusal of reconciliation". The fight against the "plague" then is no more justified than the Don Juanism or the bloody willfulness of Caligula. In the future, Camus changes the very content of the concepts of “absurdity” and “rebellion”, since it is no longer an individualistic rebellion that is born out of it, but a demand for human solidarity, a common sense of existence for all people. The rebel rises from his knees, says “no” to the oppressor, draws a line that from now on must be reckoned with by those who considered themselves masters. The renunciation of the slave lot simultaneously affirms the freedom, equality and human dignity of everyone. However, the rebellious slave can cross this limit himself, he wants to become a master, and the rebellion turns into a bloody dictatorship. In the past, according to Camus, the revolutionary movement "never really broke away from its moral, evangelical and idealistic roots." Today the political rebellion has united with the metaphysical, which has liberated modern man from all values, and therefore it results in tyranny. In itself, the metaphysical rebellion also has a justification, while the rebellion against the heavenly omnipotent Demiurge means a refusal to reconcile with one's destiny, the affirmation of the dignity of earthly existence. It turns into a denial of all values ​​and results in brutal self-will, when the rebel himself becomes a “man-god”, who inherits from the deity he rejected everything that he so hated - absolutism, claims to the last and final truth (“truth is one, there are many delusions”), providentialism, omniscience, the words "make them in." This degenerate Prometheus is ready to drive into the earthly paradise by force, and at the slightest resistance he is ready to arrange such terror, in comparison with which the fires of the Inquisition seem like child's play.

This connection of the metaphysical rebellion with the historical one was mediated by the "German ideology". At the height of his work on The Rebellious Man, Camus said that "the evil geniuses of Europe bear the names of philosophers: their names are Hegel, Marx and Nietzsche ... We live in their Europe, in a Europe created by them." Despite the obvious differences in the views of these thinkers (as well as Feuerbach, Stirner), Camus combines them into a "German ideology" that gave rise to modern nihilism.

To understand the reasons why these thinkers were included in a number of "evil geniuses", it is necessary, firstly, to recall the socio-political situation, and secondly, to understand from what angle their theories are considered.

Camus wrote The Rebellious Man in 1950, when the Stalinist system seemed to have reached its apogee of power, and Marxist teachings had turned into state ideology. AT Eastern Europe there were political trials, information about millions of prisoners came from the USSR; as soon as this system spread to China, the war in Korea began - at any moment it could break out in Europe. The political views of Camus changed by the end of the 40s, he no longer thinks about the revolution, since tens of millions of victims would have to pay for it in Europe (if not the death of all mankind in the world war). Gradual reforms are needed - Camus remained a supporter of socialism, he equally highly placed the activities of trade unions, Scandinavian social democracy and "libertarian socialism". In both cases, socialists seek to free a living person, and do not call for sacrificing the lives of several generations for the sake of some kind of earthly paradise. Such a sacrifice does not bring closer, but moves away the "kingdom of man" - by eliminating freedom, planting totalitarian regimes, there is no access to it.

Camus admits many inaccuracies in interpreting the views of Hegel and Marx, but the vision of the classics is quite understandable. He considers precisely those of their ideas that were included in the Stalinist "canon", propagated as the only true teaching, used to justify bureaucratic centralism and "leaderism". In addition, he argues with Merleau-Ponty and Sartre, who undertook to justify totalitarianism with the help of Hegel's "Phenomenology of the Spirit", the doctrine of the "totality of history". History ceases to be the teacher of life, it becomes an elusive idol to which more and more sacrifices are made. Transcendental values ​​are dissolved in historical development, the laws of economics themselves draw humanity to heaven on earth, but at the same time they require the destruction of all who oppose them.

In his essay "The Rebellious Man", reflecting on his time as the time of the triumph of the absurd, Camus writes: "We live in an era of masterfully executed criminal plans." The previous era, in his opinion, differs from the current one in that “previously, atrocity was lonely, like a cry, and now it is as universal as science. Just yesterday prosecuted, today crime has become law.” The philosopher notes: “In modern times, when evil intent dresses up in the robes of innocence, according to the terrible perversion characteristic of our era, it is innocence that is forced to justify itself.” At the same time, the boundary between false and true is blurred, and the rules are dictated by force. Under these conditions, people are divided "not into righteous and sinners, but into masters and slaves." Camus believed that our world is dominated by the spirit of nihilism. Awareness of the imperfection of the world gives rise to rebellion, the purpose of which is the transformation of life. The time of the domination of nihilism forms a rebellious person.

According to Camus, rebellion is not an unnatural state, but quite natural. In his opinion, “in order to live, a person must rebel,” but this must be done without being distracted from the initially put forward noble goals. The thinker emphasizes that in the experience of the absurd, suffering has an individual character, while in a rebellious impulse it becomes collective. Moreover, “the evil experienced by one person becomes a plague that infects everyone.”

In an imperfect world, rebellion is a means of preventing the decline of society and its ossification and decay. “I rebel, therefore we exist,” writes the philosopher. He considers rebellion here as an indispensable attribute of human existence, uniting the individual with other people. The result of the rebellion is a new rebellion. The oppressed, having turned into oppressors, by their behavior prepare a new revolt of those whom they turn into the oppressed.

According to Camus, “there is one law in this world - the law of force, and it is inspired by the will to power”, which can be implemented through violence.

Reflecting on the possibilities of using violence in revolt, Camus was not a supporter of non-violence, since, in his opinion, "absolute non-violence passively justifies slavery and its horrors." But at the same time, he was not a supporter of excessive violence. The thinker believed that "these two concepts need self-restraint for the sake of their own fruitfulness."

Camus differs from a simple rebellion by a metaphysical rebellion, which is a "revolt of man against the whole universe." Such rebellion is metaphysical because it challenges the ultimate goals of humans and the universe. In the ordinary rebellion, the slave protests against oppression, "the metaphysical rebel rebels against the lot prepared for him as a representative of the human race." In metaphysical rebellion, the formula "I rebel, therefore we exist," characteristic of ordinary rebellion, changes to the formula "I rebel, therefore we are alone."

The logical consequence of metaphysical rebellion is revolution. At the same time, the difference between a rebellion and a revolution is that “... a rebellion kills only people, while a revolution destroys both people and principles at the same time.” According to Camus, the history of mankind has known only riots, but there have not yet been revolutions. He believed that “if a true revolution had taken place only once, then history would no longer exist. There would be blissful unity and calm death.”

The limit of the metaphysical rebellion is, according to Camus, the metaphysical revolution, during which the great inquisitors become the head of the world. The idea of ​​the possibility of the appearance of the Grand Inquisitor was borrowed by A. Camus from F. M. Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov. The Grand Inquisitors establish the kingdom of heaven on earth. They can do what God couldn't do. The kingdom of heaven on earth as the embodiment of universal happiness is possible "not thanks to the complete freedom of choice between good and evil, but thanks to power over the world and its unification."

Developing this idea on the basis of the analysis of the representations of F. Nietzsche about the nature of freedom, A. Camus comes to the conclusion that “the absolute power of the law is not freedom, but absolute freedom from law is no greater freedom. Empowerment does not give freedom, but lack of opportunity is slavery. But anarchy is also slavery. Freedom exists only in a world where both the possible and the impossible are clearly defined.” However, "today's world, apparently, can only be a world of masters and slaves." Camus was sure that “domination is a dead end. Since the master can in no way give up dominion and become a slave, the eternal fate of masters is to live unsatisfied or be killed. The role of the master in history comes down only to reviving the slave consciousness, the only one that creates history. According to the philosopher, "what is called history is only a series of long-term efforts undertaken for the sake of gaining true freedom." In other words, “... history is the history of labor and rebellion” of people striving for freedom and justice, which, according to Camus, are connected. He believed that it was impossible to choose one without the other. The philosopher emphasizes: “If someone deprives you of bread, he thereby deprives you of freedom. But if your freedom is taken away, then be sure that your bread is also under threat, because it no longer depends on you and your struggle, but on the whim of the owner.

He considers bourgeois freedom an invention. According to Albert Camus, "freedom is the cause of the oppressed, and its traditional defenders have always been people from the oppressed people."

Analyzing the prospects of human existence in history, Camus comes to a disappointing conclusion. In his opinion, there is nothing left for a person in history but “to live in it ... adapting to the topic of the day, that is, either to lie or to remain silent.”

In his ethical views, Camus proceeded from the fact that the realization of freedom must be based on realistic morality, since moral nihilism is destructive.

Formulating his moral position, Albert Camus wrote in his Notebooks: “We must serve justice, because our existence is unfair, we must multiply, cultivate happiness and joy, because our world is unhappy.”

The philosopher believed that wealth is not necessary to achieve happiness. He was against achieving individual happiness by bringing misfortune to others. According to Camus, "Man's greatest merit is to live in solitude and obscurity."

The aesthetic in the work of the philosopher serves as an expression of the ethical. Art for him is a means of discovering and describing the disturbing phenomena of life. It, from his point of view, can serve to improve society, as it is able to interfere with the course of life.

Albert Camus is one of the most famous philosophers and writers, whose theories have found their way into many practical programs and emerging ideologies. Camus's works were reprinted several times during the author's lifetime and gained incredible popularity in certain circles. In 1957, the prose writer was awarded the Nobel Prize for his literary achievements.

The Rebellious Man, despite its impressive length, is in its structure more of an essay than a treatise describing the historical predisposition of man to any kind of rebellion and opposition.

Taking as a basis the concepts of Epicurus, Lucretius, Hegel, Breton and Nietzsche, Camus derives on their basis his own theory of human freedom.

The work has gained quite a lot of fame in circles of people who are adherents of existentialism and its varieties.

Biography

Albert Camus was born on November 7, 1913 in Algeria to an Alsatian and a Spaniard. Since childhood, in preschool age, Camus was forced to carry out the most miscellaneous work to help the family survive. The work of a handyman was poorly paid, and therefore the mother decides to send her son to primary school. Camus shows an amazing thirst for knowledge and demonstrates remarkable abilities. Teachers note Albert's innate talent and convince his mother to allow his son to continue his studies. Louis Germain, one of the teachers at the school where Camus studied, not only personally prepared him for the entrance lyceum exams, but also helped the boy financially, securing a scholarship for Albert and paying his current expenses from his own pocket.

early years

In 1932, Albert Camus entered the University of Algiers, where he paid great attention to the study of theoretical psychology and philosophy, and also became a listener of lectures on cultural studies, aesthetics and history. The knowledge gained prompted the young philosopher to create his own works in diary form. In his diaries, Camus recorded personal observations, analyzes of various philosophical concepts, along the way trying to develop their own based on them.

The young Camus did not bypass politics either, having managed to be an active member of several political parties. However, by 1937 he was finally disappointed in pseudo-diversity political views and accepts for itself the installation that a person will everywhere be only himself, regardless of ideological, racial or gender differences.

Philosophy

Albert Camus in "The Rebellious Man" defined himself as a thinker, not attributing his beliefs to any of the existing philosophical concepts. In part, the writer's philosophy is still depressive, but the writer himself considered this to be the result of a long illness and a difficult childhood and in no way connected this with the modern fashionable tendencies in an educated society towards artificial melancholy and spiritual decline.

Camus accepts the “global absurdity” as a given, not looking for ways to get rid of it in his works. In The Rebellious Man, Camus briefly outlines the theory of the meaninglessness of many human actions, which only complicate his already short and not very joyful life.

Book writing

Returning to Paris in the winter of 1950, Camus settled in his old apartment, trying to put his own views on human psychology in order. The former fragmentary concept, previously used by the writer, no longer satisfied him. Camus wanted something more than just analysis, he wanted to find out the hidden, subconscious causes of various types of human behavior. By early February 1950, Camus was ready to put his still-forming views on paper. Having drawn up a detailed plan, in which he often made adjustments, the writer set to work.

The philosophy of Camus in "The Rebellious Man" wore brightly pronounced character existentialism. The writer for a long time did not dare to admit this side of his convictions, nevertheless positioning the essay being written as “neo-existentialism”.

In March 1951, Albert Camus finished work on the draft text of the book. After several months of refinement, the philosopher decides to publish some of the chapters in journals in order to assess the reaction of the thinking sections of society to his new work. The success of the chapters on Friedrich Nietzsche and Lautreamont was so overwhelming that Camus immediately takes the full text of the essay to the Gallimard publishing house.

What is this book about?

The philosopher believes that rebellion is a natural reaction to the strangeness and absurdity of being, caused by a strong concentration of these phenomena in the life of an individual. Awakening, the subconscious activates the self-consciousness of a person, which leads to his desire to change reality.

An analysis of Camus' "Rebel Man" shows that the goal of a rebellion is not destruction, but the creation of a new one, changing the existing order for the better, turning chaos into an orderly, understandable human mind system.

Main idea

Developing the concept of rebellion in the human mind, the philosopher identifies three types of resistance that occur in the human subconscious.

• metaphysical rebellion. In The Man in Revolt, Camus compares this kind of resistance to the enmity between a slave and a master. Despite the hatred of the master, the slave not only recognizes his existence, but also agrees with the social role assigned to him, which already makes him a loser. Metaphysical rebellion is an individual rebellion, a personal rebellion of each person against society.
• Historic rebellion. This type includes absolutely all the prerequisites for uprisings, the purpose of which was to establish freedom and justice. Historical rebellion is very similar to the moral requirements and voice of the conscience of each person. In The Man in Revolt, Camus expresses the position of a man who also brings about such a rebellion by the mere fact of writing this essay.
• Riot in art. This kind of resistance is considered by Camus as a kind of complete freedom of self-expression of a person within certain "allowed" limits. On the one hand, creative vision denies reality, but on the other hand, it only transforms it into a form acceptable to the creator, since a person cannot create something that has never been in the global consciousness.

Looking at summary“The Rebellious Man” by Albert Camus, it can be said with confidence that the only main idea of ​​​​the work was only the thesis that any rebellion is useless due to too much effort expended on it, as well as an incredibly short duration human life.

Criticism

In order to protect his work from meaningless or malicious criticism, Camus repeatedly noticed in the text of the essay that he was not a real, professional philosopher, but in fact, he simply published a book of reasoning about human psychology.

The bulk of criticism from colleagues in the pen fell on those chapters of Camus's work, where he described conceptual analysis. Philosophers believed that Albert did not give precise definitions of various psychological phenomena, and even more so inaccurately describes the concepts of thinkers of the past, changing the quotes of ancient speakers in his favor, adjusting them to his own views on the theory of human freedom.

However, despite the large number of inaccuracies and flaws in Camus' book "The Rebellious Man", critics noted the innovation of thought, the uniqueness of the author's concept and a detailed analysis of the nature of human resistance.

Philosophers who identify themselves with the traditional, academic school noted the high intuitiveness of Camus' reasoning, which often lacks logical justification.

Confession

The popularity of "The Rebellious Man" by Camus was not at all what the author expected. It turned out that for most young people who are fond of philosophy, the book has become not a kind of encyclopedia of human feelings, but rather a fashionable attribute, indicating that the owner belongs to a special caste of existentialist intellectuals, who were characterized by depressive moods.

The "rebellious man" Camus gave rise to the subculture of existentialism, giving food for thought to thousands of young people who recognized Albert as their leader and gathered in special cafes where the ceiling and walls were hung with black cloth. Cafés like these served exclusively as a haven for the adherents of the “depressive philosophy of alienation.” The author himself spoke contemptuously of young people who spend their lives in meaningless sad thoughts instead of accepting the surrounding reality and learning to live in it.

In Russia

"The Rebellious Man" by Camus was published by several Russian publishing houses at once in the late eighties. Along with the works of many other Western philosophers, the works of Albert Camus were warmly received by domestic culturologists and psychologists.

Edition "A. Camus "The Rebellious Man" (M., 1990), which became the most popular publication of the philosopher in Russian, included not only his essays, but also part of diary entries and full texts of notebooks of the period 1951-1959.