The Longing for Myth in Germany: Religion and Aesthetic Culture from Romanticism to Nietzsche / Edition 1

by George S. Williamson

Overview

Since the dawn of Romanticism, artists and intellectuals in Germany have maintained an abiding interest in the gods and myths of antiquity while calling for a new mythology suitable to the modern age. In this study, George S. Williamson examines the factors that gave rise to this distinct and profound longing for myth. In doing so, he demonstrates the entanglement of aesthetic and philosophical ambitions in Germany with some of the major religious conflicts of the nineteenth century.

Through readings of key intellectuals ranging from Herder and Schelling to Wagner and Nietzsche, Williamson highlights three crucial factors in the emergence of the German engagement with myth: the tradition of Philhellenist neohumanism, a critique of contemporary aesthetic and public life as dominated by private interests, and a rejection of the Bible by many Protestant scholars as the product of a foreign, "Oriental" culture. According to Williamson, the discourse on myth in Germany remained bound up with problems of Protestant theology and confessional conflict through the nineteenth century and beyond.

A compelling adventure in intellectual history, this study uncovers the foundations of Germany's fascination with myth and its enduring cultural legacy.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780226899466
Publisher:	University of Chicago Press
Publication date:	07/01/2004
Edition description:	1
Pages:	376
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

George Williamson is an assistant professor of history at the University of Alabama.

Read an Excerpt

THE LONGING FOR MYTH IN GERMANY
Religion and Aesthetic Culture from Romanticism to Nietzsche

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By George S. Williamson
The University of Chicago Press
Copyright © 2004 The University of Chicago
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-226-89946-6

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Chapter One
Theophany and Revolution: The Romantics Turn to Myth

In the spring of 1796, at the age of twenty-one, Friedrich Schelling left his native Württemberg to see the world. Although he had just completed five years of theological training at the Tübingen Stift (seminary), he had no intention of becoming a clergyman. Instead, with several publications to his name, Schelling was well on his way to establishing himself as one of the brightest philosophical minds in Germany. That did not guarantee him an income, however, and so he had accepted a tutoring position secured for him by his father, Josef, a respected pastor and Old Testament scholar. Schelling would accompany two young barons, Hermann and Wilhelm von Riedsel, from Stuttgart to Leipzig in order to oversee their university education. Their guardian had sweetened the offer with the promise of trips to France and England; only later did he add that these excursions would not occur unless France restored the Bourbon monarchy and made peace with Great Britain.

Now, as he set off on his tour, Schelling headed for destinations that by the late eighteenth century had already become German landmarks. He reveled in Heidelberg's "Romantic" scenery, especially the castle ruins that surveyed the Neckar River ("paradise before you, destruction and wilderness behind you"). He visited Mannheim and its famous Antiquities Chamber, where he gazed at plaster copies of the Medicis' Venus, the Vatican's Apollo, and the Laocoön. But he was also confronted by more disturbing sights-razed buildings, broken battlements, dead horses-caused by four years of war between France and the Austrian-Prussian coalition. Much of this fighting had occurred up and down the Rhine River. "For the first time ... I greeted this river, which recently-perhaps as the future border of the two halves of our Europe-has become so noteworthy." Schelling's political sympathies were clear, for only republican France could unite the European continent.

The trip also led to Schelling's first encounters with a social world beyond the university and the church. A child of the Bildungsbürgertum, Schelling harbored deep prejudices against other classes. When his brother Karl briefly considered a career in business, Schelling warned his parents that Karl would soon think of nothing but "self-interest and profit." After much prodding from his older brother, Karl switched to an academic career in medicine. Schelling also expressed distaste for the manners and customs of the aristocracy: French spoken at the dinner table, meals served to the hostess first and the guests last. Based on a brief stay in the Landgraviate of Hesse-Darmstadt, he concluded that the aristocracy fostered ignorance, laziness, and drunkenness. "In general one observes everywhere here the same thing that one can observe in all states where an aristocratic sensibility is dominant-contempt for all thorough scholarship, an insurmountable horror of all exertion, complete slackening of all spiritual powers, etc."

In turn, Schelling found himself the object of suspicion and distrust. A baroness in Heilbronn worried aloud about the politics of young tutors, who seemed eager to infect their charges with French revolutionary propaganda. Schelling brushed off these comments with a laugh but found it rather more troublesome when Berlin's most influential Aufklärer, Friedrich Nicolai, publicly lambasted him as a philosophical crank (Querkopf) and warned against the corrupting effect of idealism on Germany's youth. Nonetheless, Schelling retained his employers' confidence; indeed, the boys' guardians seemed eager to suppress all signs of aristocratic pretension in the youths by exposing them to a talented young academic. For his part, Schelling believed that he belonged to an ascendant class, whose superior talent and education would eventually overcome the dominance of the aristocracy.

At the end of April 1796 the party reached Leipzig, where Schelling began the comprehensive study of physics, chemistry, and medicine that would form the foundation of his Naturphilosophie. He also continued to oversee the barons' education, accompanying them to lectures and joining them on excursions outside the city. It was one such excursion that brought Schelling to the remarkable English garden of Wörlitz. The park was the creation of Prince Leopold Friedrich Franz of Anhalt-Dessau, a devotee of Rousseau and the English "back-to-nature" movement. Franz had traveled throughout Europe in order to gather ideas and impressions for his project: to Britain, where he viewed the landscapes of Stourhead and Kew Gardens; to Italy, where he hired Johann Jacob Winckelmann to tutor him in art history; and to France, where he discussed philosophy with Jean-Jacques Rousseau. Construction on the park had begun in 1764 and would be largely complete by 1800. By that time, Wörlitz had become the subject of numerous travel accounts and a favorite destination for tourists.

A visitor to Wörlitz was expected not simply to enjoy its sights but to undergo a kind of initiation. The garden opened with a labyrinth, which contained various signs urging the wanderer to maintain courage and watch out for danger. This led into a small tunnel, which opened finally onto a clearing that was called the "Elysian fields." In a letter to his parents, Schelling described the site as a "round place overshadowed by high elms and planted with acacias and plane trees, where one perceives no sound-all is quiet-and where one would gladly forget life's worries if they did not violently pursue one. In fact, this is the one thing that reminds the traveler that he is not yet in the true Elysium." Schelling marveled at the other sections of Wörlitz, which were separated by a series of lakes, ponds, and canals. Near the water stood statues of bathing nymphs and naiads, fauns, and other mythological beings. Paths through the garden opened suddenly onto antique temples, dedicated to deities like Apollo, Flora, and Venus. To the visitor walking these grounds for the first time, Wörlitz offered new and unexpected delights around every corner.

The selection of buildings and monuments at Wörlitz was not restricted to classical antiquity; a Jewish synagogue, a Chinese teahouse, a Gothic house, and a Christian church all dotted the landscape. In addition, the interior of a Pantheon suggested the origins of Greek art from the soil of Egypt: "below stand the mute Egyptian deities," Schelling commented, "above, nearer heaven-in purer light-the gods of Greece." All of these buildings seemed to culminate in a final structure. "Far across the water-beyond the ocean as it were-rises the Temple of the Night with terrifying majesty." A dark spiral staircase led up to a tower constructed of black stone. At night, sparks and flames spewed forth from its top, giving the impression of a volcano or, as Schelling suggested, the fiery meal of the night goddess. Deep in the heart of the structure lay her shrine, completely black save the ceiling, where constellations glowed. "You can easily imagine how much pleasure I had during this visit," Schelling wrote later. "We stayed ... two days. They were among the most enjoyable of my life."

In many respects, the English garden at Wörlitz embodied the tastes and sentiments of late Enlightenment classicism. Over the course of the eighteenth century the English fascination with the primitive and the archaic had spread to Germany, where it spurred a reaction against French neoclassical and Baroque styles of art. For the archaeologist Winckelmann, Greek (as opposed to Roman) art embodied the free, natural, and uninhibited life of the polis. The statues of the Greek gods reflected a timeless archetype of beauty already present in the bodies of the Greeks themselves. Such ideas were reinforced by Christoph Martin Wieland, who found in antiquity a well-developed harmony between the needs of the body and the needs of the mind. In his novel Agathon (1766-67), he portrayed the education of a young Greek man who undergoes a series of trials before being initiated into the mysteries of Pythagoras. Such notions fed the late eighteenth century's zeal for pedagogy while shaping Prince Franz's fantasy landscape at Wörlitz.

But if Wörlitz reflected eighteenth-century attitudes toward classical antiquity and its myths, it also served to distinguish that era from what followed. For Wieland or Prince Franz, the experience of the ancient gods was a kind of aesthetic idyll, with no direct connection to the wider world. Over the next few years, however, the Jena Romantics would develop a vision of mythology that was at once more political, more religious, and more ambitious than anything seen in the Aufklärung. The key figure in this effort would be Schelling, who placed the longing for myth at the heart of his philosophical system. Drawing on the ideas of his fellow Romantics, from older contemporaries like Herder, Schiller, Goethe, and Karl Philipp Moritz, and from his own theological training, Schelling articulated an ideal of a "new mythology," in other words a system of natural symbols and narratives that would provide the basis for a unified aesthetic, religious, and public life, while overcoming the fragmentation and divisions of modern Christian society. This idea of a "new mythology" would exercise a powerful influence on German Romantic culture and offer a resource for later generations of intellectuals seeking an alternative to the positivist and historicist trends of the nineteenth century.

The early Romantic turn to "myth" has been debated extensively over the past two centuries. For many commentators, it represents the thin edge of an emerging aesthetic ideology that served to distract intellectuals from the political and social issues of their day while buttressing their status as hierophants of a religion of art. On this interpretation, Romanticism was an essentially conservative or apolitical movement, which diverted the energies of the French Revolution into the by-channels of cultural life. Other scholars, however, stress the emancipatory and democratic dimensions of Romanticism, especially in its earliest phase of 1796-1800. In calling for a "new mythology," they argue, Schelling and Friedrich Schlegel sought to address a legitimation crisis in modern society and to prepare the ground for a public life that would foster genuine individuality. Most recently, scholars influenced by poststructuralism have focused on the irony and paradox at the heart of much Romantic thought. In their view, early Romanticism was neither a utopian nor a systematic project but sought instead to demystify the pretensions of philosophy to any kind of totality.

The wide range in scholarly opinion about Romanticism reflects not only the divergent methodologies (and ideologies) of its interpreters but also long-standing disagreements about which writers should be included in the Romantic canon, the exact temporal parameters of this movement, and its relationship to the religious, cultural, and scholarly institutions of the eighteenth century. Those who have interpreted Romanticism as either a revolutionary movement or as a precursor to deconstruction have often based their claims on a limited range of texts (typically those written by Friedrich Schlegel and Novalis), as well as a narrow time frame (beginning around 1796 and ending no later than 1800). Yet to define Romanticism in this way is to overlook or ignore the later evolution of Romantic thought, as it spread beyond Jena and Berlin to shape such early nineteenth-century phenomena as nationalism, liberal Protestantism, and conservative Catholicism. Here it was the writings and lectures of August Wilhelm Schlegel and Schelling, rather than those of Friedrich Schlegel or Novalis, that exercised the predominant influence.

The shift in focus suggested here does not entail a return to older interpretations of Romanticism, which have often treated the turn to myth as an illegitimate incursion of religious discourse onto the previously secular fields of philosophy and aesthetics, which was motivated by political conservativism or merely the wish to appropriate the label "sacred" in a competitive literary market. Without discounting the role of politics and the public sphere, this chapter focuses on how the Romantic notion of a "new mythology" addressed long-standing problems in Aufklärung theology concerning biblical revelation, religious liturgy, and the nature of God. For Schelling, as for other early Romantic writers, such a mythology offered a nonbiblical source of sacred symbolism and narrative, which had the potential to rejuvenate aesthetic and religious life and overcome the divisions of modern society.

To understand how Schelling arrived at these views, it will be necessary to survey the varied contexts of Protestant intellectual life in the late eighteenth century. This chapter begins by examining developments in Protestant theology, focusing on the development of biblical criticism and its implications for Christian thought and practice. It turns next to the tradition of Philhellenist neohumanism, showing how an idealized image of Greece-created in certain respects as a counter-image to Christianity-shaped attitudes among intellectuals toward the function of myth in ancient society. After detailing Schelling's turn from theology to philosophical idealism during his years at the Tübingen Stift, the chapter considers the religious thought of the Jena Romantics. The final section examines the proposals by Schelling and Friedrich Schlegel for a "new mythology," focusing in particular on Schelling's 1802-3 lectures on the philosophy of art. What follows, however, is not an in-depth explication of idealist philosophy but rather a broader analysis that uses Schelling's early life and career to reconstruct the historical situation in which a discourse on myth rose to prominence in Germany and became a key factor in debates over aesthetics, religion, and the public sphere.

Rereading the Biblical Narrative

In his pathbreaking study of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century hermeneutics, the theologian Hans Frei argued that the three centuries after the Reformation witnessed a gradual "eclipse of biblical narrative" within German Protestant theology. According to Frei, Martin Luther and Jean Calvin constructed their theologies on the premise that the Bible offered a literal and self-sufficient narrative of humanity's creation, fall, and ultimate redemption through Christ. The coherence of this narrative and the unity of the biblical canon were secured through the use of what was known as "figural interpretation." Figural interpretation assumed that the Bible revealed a divine plan, such that one event could foreshadow another event without losing its own significance. The resulting "biblical narrative" incorporated not only the Old and New Testaments but also the contemporary religious community in its scheme of universal history. As a result, Protestant believers were able to place themselves within a story that had begun among the ancient Hebrews, turned on Christ's birth and Resurrection, and pointed forward to a coming Kingdom of God. No recourse to historical scholarship or to church tradition was necessary to understand this sacred history, for its meaning was conveyed directly in the words of the Bible.

(Continues...)

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Introduction
1. Theophany and Revolution: The Romantics Turn to Myth
2. The Construction of a National Mythology:
The Romantic and Vormärz Eras
3. Olympus under Siege: Creuzer's Symbolik and The Politics of the Restoration
4. From Scriptual Revelation to Messianic Myth:
The Bible in Vormärz
5. Richard Wagner and Revolutionary Humanism
6. Myth and Monotheism in the Unification Era, 1850-1880
Nietzsche's Kulturkampf
Epilogue
Notes
Selected Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

"From Schelling andf Friedrich Schlegel to Wagner and Nietzsche, Williamson travels a long, difficult road. Along the way, he expertly puts his discussion into intellectual contexts. . . . There is no match for the clarity, competence, insight, and ultimately patience evinced in this important history of the discourse of myth in nineteenth-century Germany."

Journal of Modern History - Peter Fritzsche

"An outstanding contribution to the fields of religious and intellectual history."

German Studies Review - Clifton Ganyard

"The subtlety and range of Williamson's study makes it essential reading for cultural historians of modern Germany."

Central European History - Matthew Levinger

"A finely researched, lucidly composed, and highly engaging work of intellectual history. Both students and seasoned scholars will learn something from every chapter, gaining new insights into material that seemed familiar. . . . Williamson succeeds admirably in his endeavour to resuscitate myth as a central concern for Germany in the nineteenth century, and he connects it convincingly with the religious and aesthetic culture of that era."

MLR - Robert C. Holub

"Williamson has presented the scholarly expert as well as the inquiring lay person with a thoughtful, comprehensive, and inspiring study. . . . The scholarship is thorough and impressive, and the reading is smooth. His book should soon become required reading for anyone interested in the subject of myth, in religious debates in Germany, and in nineteenth-century German culture in general."

Southern Humanities Review - Anke Finger

"This comprehensive and sophisticated work could easily serve as a textbook for an ambitious . . . college course on nineteenth-century intellectual history. Comfortable discussing Edward Said, Theodor Adorno, Sanskrit, clssical music, fairy tales, revolutionary politics, Biblical studies, Greek and Nordic deities, Williamson weaves a rich tapestry that details the breadth of intellectual life in Germany."

German History - David Imhoof