Apology of Human Existence vs “Ideal Homicide”: S.L. Frank’s Anthropological Project.
- DOI
- 10.5922/0207-6918-2023-1-3
- Pages
- 52-70
Abstract
The emergence of S. L. Frank’s philosophy cannot be understood without clarifying his attitude to Immanuel Kant. Following the early representatives of the theory of cognition of his time who undertook to understand Kant in order to go beyond him (W. Windelband) and their warning against turning Kant’s philosophy into a dogma and allowing for diverse interpretations of Kant (P. Natorp), Frank saw Kant not as a critic and “destroyer” of metaphysics, but as a thinker who laid the foundations of a new metaphysical synthesis. He set himself the task of “transforming” the Kantian philosophy into a new metaphysical system proceeding from the foundational principles of critical thinking. As a result, he managed to overcome the abstract concept of the human being characteristic of Neo-Kantians to put the concrete human in the absolute horizon of being at the focus of philosophical investigations. In his metaphysics anthropology begins to play a system-forming and meaning-forming role, and onto-epistemological reasoning is used as a methodology for revealing the specificities of the human being. Here, too, Frank follows Kant who in his Logic defined the question “What is man?” as the fundamental question of philosophy. Frank’s three books, The Object of Knowledge (1915), Man’s Soul (1915), and The Spiritual Foundations of Society (1930) demonstrate that a metaphysical interpretation of Kantian critique is possible and may turn out to be the foundation of raising and solving topical philosophical problems.
Reference
Boobbyer, P., 1995. S. L. Frank: The Life and Work of a Russian Philosopher, 1877-1950. Athens: Ohio University Press.
Coreth, E., 1954. Kant — nach 150 Jahren. Wort und Wahrheit, 9, pp. 620-625.
Coreth, E., 1956. Grundfragen des menschlichen Daseins. Innsbruck & München: Tyrolia Verlag.
Coreth, E., 1969. Was ist philosophische Anthropologie? Zeitschrift für katholische Theologie, 91, pp. 252-273.
Coreth, E., 1973. Was ist der Mensch? Grundzüge einer philosophischen Anthropologie. Innsbruck & Wien & München: Tyrolia Verlag.
Frank, S. L., 1912. On Philosophical Intuition. Russkaya mysl’ [Russian Thought], 3, sec. 3, pp. 31-35. (In Rus.)
Frank, S. L., 1915. Russian Book about Fichte. Russkaya mysl’ [Russian Thought], 5, sec. 3, pp. 31-35. (In Rus.)
Frank, S., 1924/1925. Wesen und Richtlinien der russischen Philosophie. Der Gral, 1924-1925, 19(8), pp. 384-394.
Frank, S. L., 1928a. Max Scheler (Obituary). Put’ [The Way], 13, pp. 83-86. (In Rus.)
Frank, S., 1928b. Erkenntnis und Sein. 1. Das Transzendenzproblem. Logos, 17(1), pp. 165-195.
Frank, S., 1929a. Erkenntnis und Sein. 2. Die metalogischen Grundlagen der begrifflichen Erkenntnis. Logos, 18(1), pp. 231-261.
Frank, S., 1929b. Zur Metaphysik der Seele. (Das Problem der philosophischen Anthropologie). Kant-Studien, 34(3-4), pp. 351-373.
Frank, S. L., 1983. The Unknowable. An Ontological Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion. Translated by B. Jakim. Athens, Ohio & London: Ohio University Press.
Frank, S. L., 1987. The Spiritual Foundations of Society. An Introduction to Social Philosophy. Translated by B. Jakim. Athens, Ohio & London: Ohio University Press.
Frank, S. L., 1990. Fr. Nietzsche and the Ethics of ‘Love of the Distant’. In: S. L. Frank, 1990. Sochineniya [Works]. Moscow: “Pravda”, pp. 9-64. (In Rus.)
Frank, S. L., 1992. The Ethics of Nihilism. In: Intelligenciya. Vlast’. Narod. Moscow: Nauka, pp. 164-207.
Frank, S.L., 1993a. Man’s Soul: An Introductory Essay in Philosophical Psychology. Translated by B. Jakim, Foreword by P. Swoboda. Athens: Ohio University Press.
Frank, S. L., 1993b. Vvedenie v filosofiyu v szhatom izlozhenii [Introduction to Philosophy in a Concise Form]. Moscow: ABRIS-KNIGA, 1993. (In Rus.)
Frank, S. L., 1995. Predmet znaniya [The Object of Knowledge]. In: S. L. Frank, 1995. Predmet znaniya. Dusha cheloveka [The Object of Knowledge. Man’s Soul]. St. Petersburg: Nauka, pp. 37-416. (In Rus.)
Frank, S. L., 2006. German Idealism: From Kant to Schopenhauer. Lectures, 1910/1911. In: S. L. Frank, 2006. Saratovskij tekst [Saratov Text]. Saratov: Saratov University Press, pp. 112-168. (In Rus.)
Kant, I., 1992. The Jäsche Logic. In: I. Kant, 1992. Lectures on Logic. Translated and edited by J. M. Young. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, pp. 521-630.
Kanzian, C., 2005. Transzendentale Metaphysik (Ein Überblick zur ersten Orientierung). Leseraum, Innsbruck: Universität Innsbruck. Available at: https://www.uibk.ac.at/theol/leseraum/texte/590.html [accessed 26 June 2022].
Maréchal, J., 1922—1947. Le point de départ de la métaphysique : en 5 volumes. Paris: Alcan et al.
Natorp, P., 1912. Kant und die Marburger Schule. Kant-Studien, 17(3), pp. 193-221.
Nazarova, O., 2017. Das Problem der Wiedergeburt und Neubegründung der Metaphysik am Beispiel der christlichen philosophischen Traditionen: der russischen religiösen Philosophie (Simon L. Frank) und der deutschsprachigen neuscholastischen Philosophie (Emerich Coreth). München: UTZ.
Windelband, W., 1903. Präludien. Aufsätze und Reden zur Einleitung in die Philosophie. Zweite vermehrte Auflage. Tübingen & Leipzig: J. C. B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck).