Philosophy & Religion. Unamuno, Life 6.8
Unamuno
continues discussing the insoluble, tragic conflict he discovers
between head and heart, reason and life, philosophy and religion.
Filosofía
y religión son enemigas entre sí, y por ser enemigas se necesitan
una a otra. Ni hay religión sin alguna base filosófica, ni
filosofía sin raíces religiosas; cada una vive de su contraria. La
historia de la filosofía es, en rigor, una historia de la religión.
Y los ataques que a la religión se dirigen desde un punto de vista
presunto científico o filosófico, no son sino ataques desde otro
adverso punto de vista religioso. «La colisión que ocurre entre la
ciencia natural y la religión cristiana no lo es, en realidad, sino
entre el instinto de la religión natural, fundido en la observación
natural científica, y el valor de la concepción cristiana del
universo, que asegura al espíritu su preeminencia en el mundo
natural todo», dice Ritschl (Rechtfertigung
und Versöhnung,
III, cap. 4.º, § 28). Ahora, que ese instinto es el instinto mismo
de racionalidad. Y el idealismo crítico de Kant es de origen
religioso, y para salvar a la religión es para lo que franqueó Kant
los límites de la razón después de haberla en cierto modo disuelto
en escepticismo. El sistema de antítesis, contradicciones y
antinomias sobre que construyó Hegel su idealismo absoluto, tiene su
raíz y germen en Kant mismo, y esa raíz es una raíz irracional.
Ya
veremos más adelante, al tratar de la fe, cómo ésta no es en su
esencia sino cosa de voluntad, no de razón, como creer es querer
creer, y creer en Dios ante todo y sobre todo es querer que le haya.
Y así, creer en la inmortalidad del alma es querer que el alma sea
inmortal, pero quererlo con tanta fuerza que esta querencia,
atropellando a la razón, pasa sobre ella. Mas no sin represalia.
Philosophy
and religion are committed enemies, and as such each has need of the
other. No religion exists without some philosophical foundation, nor
is there any philosophy without roots in religion. Each lives off the
proceeds of the other. The history of philosophy is, in rigorous
terms, a history of religion. And attacks mounted against religion
from positions nominally scientific or philosophical are actually
coming from religious outlooks opposed to the one being attacked. As
Ritschl says: “The collision between natural science and the
Christian religion is not what it seems. Rather, it is really a
conflict between the instinct of natural religion, which is
founded in the scientific observation of nature, and the Christian
conception of the universe, which values spirit above all the natural
world” (Justification & Atonement, 3.4.28).
The instinct invoked here is the very same that engages our rational
faculties. Kant's critical idealism originates from religion, and it
was with the purpose of saving religion that Kant recognized fixed
limits for reason after setting her in some measure free, adrift in
the unbounded sea of skepticism that is her native abode (†). The
system of antithesis, contradiction, and paradox that Hegel made the
basis for his absolute idealism has its root and seed in Kant, and
that root is irrational.
We
shall see later, when we come to discuss faith, that she is
essentially an expression of will, not of reason—as
believing is wanting to believe, and belief in God is before and
above all else a desire to believe that divinity exists. And thus, to
believe in the immortality of the soul is to desire that the soul be
immortal. This desire is so strong that it rides reason down: rides
her down, and tramples her in the dust. But not without
repercussions.
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(†) Unamuno consistently reads Kant as a secular Lutheran, who uses philosophy
to justify an outlook on the world originally crafted to express
Protestant faith (rather than philosophical skepticism).