Jünger on Hesiod
We’ve devolved into the Iron Age, and the Stone Age is still with us in places.
This is a translation of sections 60, 61, 62, 63, 67 and 68 of Ernst Jünger’s Al Muro del Tempo (At the Time Wall), originally published in German as An der Zeitmauer (1959). Italian translation by Alvise LaRocca and Agnese Grieco (Adelphi Edizioni, Milano, 2000).
Jünger contrasts Hesiod’s ancient division of the Earth’s epochs (the Gold, Silver, Bronze and Iron Ages) with the epochs of modern science (the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages). He suggests that in Hesiod’s scheme, vitality decreases through successive epochs (decadence), while in the scientific scheme, vitality grows through successive epochs (progress). Jünger also recognises the parallel between Hesiod’s epochs and the Indian concept of the yugas as a four-fold cycle of immense periods of time.
60
The division made by the ancients into the ages of gold, silver, bronze and iron does not refer to metals in a material sense. Rather, it is similar to the way in which alchemists and astrologers speak of metals: the properties are virtues of being. Even today we say that "silence is golden, speech is silver."
In this division, we are ultimately dealing with the four seasons of a global epoch whose strength is waning. Gold here is the divine.
In every form, gold remains
to the extent that its substance is gold:
Nothing of the divine fades
in what proceeds from it
(Śańkara)
The Brahmin also knows of similar immense ages of the world, separated from one another by a partial end of the world. Each has its own dawn and its own dusk. Each has its own Olympus, its own new humanity.
When our science divides history and prehistory - up to the first appearance of man - into the Stone, Bronze and Iron Ages, it refers to these materials in the strict sense, and only secondarily to the degrees of civilisation associated with their use. The perspectives that we can identify here are of a historical-evolutionary type, characterised by the succession of ages whose strength is gradually increasing. "Late" here indicates growth, and not diminution as in the Bible and in Hesiod.
Upon closer examination, however, certain coincidences cannot escape us. We have linked the ideal of the Nordic man to the Aenean age, a mythical definition of that period which the historian calls the Bronze Age. It is the age in which myth became the dominant reality, the age in which myth determined man's action and thought.
This reality remains an indelible memory, in Homeric songs and the sagas, but it has no counterpart on the political level. It is no coincidence that the models of the powers defeated in the Second World War came from the Bronze Age and the early Iron Age: the Nordic man, the ancient Roman, the Japanese samurai. That they had no chance of winning corresponds to the fundamental law by which a myth cannot be reactivated: it can rend the vault of history like a volcanic eruption, but it cannot give life to a new universal reality.
This fundamental law accounts for a number of specific observations: for example, the fact that war can no longer be waged between peoples nor by kings, nor even according to the rules of the duel. War thus loses its mythical-heroic ethos, while its deeper distinctive traits, such as dedication and pain, remain. This law also explains why the heroic holder of power has ceased to appear credible as a leader and as a father. As in the case of Napoleon, he must present himself in the guise of a dux, as someone who liberates energy. His model is the eternal youth of mythical times. Therefore, he cannot grow old. His legitimacy is insufficient in the face of the "assembly of the peoples". This was already the background to the Homeric heroes.
Now, if we can link Hesiod’s Aenean Age to our Bronze Age, we might also ask whether a similar link exists to his Golden Age. This age, Hesiod's most ancient, could be considered the most ancient age according to our scientific worldview, that is, our Stone Age. We have in fact traced the Golden Age, or what historical man believed to be such, to locations where Stone Age civilisations have survived to the present day. That the voyages of Cook and Forster in the South Seas had an influence on the French Revolution and on its understanding of man is well known. That the two events were simultaneous is as little a coincidence as the fact that fundamental concepts passed from the world of the South Seas peoples into our psychology; or that other simultaneity, by which very ancient caves of Stone Age man have come to light precisely in our own day. Such findings, such ways of their coming to light, do not arise from nothing.
The "Stone Age" is not only a temporal concept, but also a morphological one. The Stone Age belongs to the present, not only on the ethnographic level, but also on the individual level. Spengler was correct in maintaining that "the Neanderthal man" can be found in every mass meeting. The only annoying thing is the polemical reference, which does injustice to both sides. Compared to our own age, the Stone Age was probably a golden age. It is probable that people felt infinitely happier, even more secure. There were neither polis nor politics.
Even authors who have a civilised horror for the "primitive" admit it, the same horror that eighteenth-century travellers felt, and Darwin himself, when faced with the inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego. Thus writes the Epicurean Lucretius Carus in his didactic poem De Rerum Natura (On the nature of things), after having drawn a dark picture of the first men, defenceless in the face of the elements and wild animals:
But many thousands of men under arms
were not then sent to the slaughter in a single day,
nor did the sea with its turbulent waves
break the ship and the men on the rocks …
The bold art of sailing was unknown then.
This passage is noteworthy in itself because it already takes this perspective into consideration.
61
It is well known that the natives of Hawaii initially welcomed Cook in a friendly manner and that the massacre began only when his crew violated a taboo. In general, every encounter between historical man and Stone Age man ends unfavourably for us. It begins with the breaking of taboos and ends with extermination. The great voyages of exploration are among our most exciting, but also our darkest adventures; and if the coloured peoples do not have the best opinion of us, we cannot be surprised.
Let us return briefly to Neanderthal man: to rely on the cranial index to measure the degree of civilization is as wrong as to rely on the level of soap consumption. In this way we end up introducing criteria of measurement that belong to zoology. The spirit inhabits man in his entirety, and not only his head; furthermore, the brain can become a parasitic organ. The true distinguishing feature of civilization lies not in the level of consciousness, but in unconscious harmony, in the security of a lifelong dream within a framework of ups and downs. Song and art demonstrate this.
62
Hesiod tells of times when great abundance reigned, when one day's work was enough to obtain a year's harvest. From this point of view, too, the Stone Age is the one that comes closest to the Golden Age. The reason does not lie in the smaller number of men, which allows each individual to enjoy a larger portion of the gifts of the earth. The smallness of the population fits into the image of that age, just as a population of billions of human beings fits into the image of ours. Nor does the reason lie in a better climate, which brings with it fertility. We can certainly think of plants like the breadfruit tree of Polynesia, capable of feeding an entire family, the banana tree, Musa paradisiaca, whose fruits were called Adam's figs or Paradise figs by the first explorers, or even corn, with its enormous ears. Testimony of a more luxuriant wealth, they, like branches in an ancient garden, grow beyond the surrounding wall, entering into our time. Not only that, we must also consider the immense herds on the edges of the great glaciers, where there were no forests. They too cross the threshold into our present: they are the great herds of bison in the North American prairies, the herds of reindeer in the tundra, the immense quantity of birds in the Arctic mountains; the great river currents where salmon swim back to back are well suited to this.
Here too, the encounter with historical man has led to extermination. And the reason does not lie in the fact that he has better weapons at his disposal, since the dodo and the Arctic sea cow were exterminated by ship's crews with simple club blows. The truth is that man considers the animal starting from another nomos and in the light of another, more petty economy - a proof, again, of spiritual impoverishment.
It is probable that hunting, according to our understanding and as it was practised in the subsequent magical and heroic age, was still unknown to the man of those primitive times. This will be evident by comparing the images that have come down to us, for example the "hall of images" of Altamira and the friezes depicting the king of Assur who sets out to hunt the lion in his war chariot. With the appearance of the heroic man, hunting takes on a different meaning. It becomes a privilege, a chivalric profession, that regalia described by Ortega in his beautiful Meditations on Hunting.
Hunting is in this sense something more than a pastime reserved for kings, a pastime often, and up to our times, intended to occupy their days. It is the memory of times when everyone was a king and a hunter. The introduction of the horse and the chariot, especially livestock breeding and agriculture, contributed to reducing the original right to hunt. It is at this point that we begin to speak of "damage caused by wild animals". Myth is interwoven with descriptions of great hunting adventures, such as those of Meleager and Atalanta, together with the battles that accompanied them. Heracles, the first prince of all, is also a powerful hunter without equal. Some territories are the exclusive reserve of the prince and only he is allowed to hunt certain animals. It was probably at that time that the area inhabited by the lion, which then still included Europe and Asia, began to shrink. Only in our era does the extermination of the lion in North Africa begin.
Hunting must have originally been something different, about which we can now only speculate. Ethnography provides some clues, and we can expect further clarification from the ever-increasing number of cave finds, the interpretation of which is being refined. Before it became a royal affair, hunting was a right of the land, safeguarded by magical formulas. Not only the killing of an animal, but also the felling of a tree required compensation, and implied the offering of sacrifices. Even what we now call Ice Age art was essentially part of such magical practices. The fact that the chosen caves were not inhabited by the hunters, like the Bushmen, Lapps and American Indians today, is an indication of this. We can also presume that the animal was venerated as a power embodying the spirit of the earth. That there were a considerable number of taboos to be respected is still reflected today in hunting rights and customs, as well as in the superstitions of hunters.
63
Hunting, fishing, gathering whatever grows spontaneously: this is how we can imagine that primitive abundance was drawn upon. Herding and agriculture are signs of the reduction of this abundance, either because food is decreasing or because the number of those who consume it is increasing. Previously unknown forms of coercion thus make their appearance and the first boundaries also appear. The nomos of the shepherd and the farmer is different from that of the hunter on the hunt for game.
The story of Cain, the farmer who kills the shepherd Abel, may at first sight appear disconcerting. And yet it makes sense, because there is an original affinity between borders and war, and the farmer is a more severe guardian of the frontiers than the shepherd who leads the flocks. The latter has fewer ties, has a wider radius of action on the territory. He knows directions rather than borders. Abraham says to Lot: "Let there be no strife between me and you, between my shepherds and your shepherds, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Separate yourself from me, I pray you. If you turn to the left, I will go to the right; and if you turn to the right, I will go to the left" (Genesis 13:8, 9).
So there is still freedom of choice between right and left. The hunter is even freer. That is why he is the first to give in when freedom begins to be restricted. The sequence is this: the Herero who raises cattle drives out the Bushman, the settler who cultivates the land drives out the Herero. The original hunter, however, did not do the same with his game. This is why the land has protected him for millennia.
From the original affinity between borders and war, conclusions can be drawn that are also valid for our time, such as, for example, the fact that in order to radically reduce the danger of conflict, it is first necessary to weaken the very idea of borders. A simple denial is not sufficient for this purpose. A new concept of the homeland must be developed, which may not so much recall that of the hunter - it is clear -, but rather that which was prevalent in the Golden Age.
Here also lies one of the meanings of the blood tribute, offered not to the frontiers, but to the land. It opens up barriers beyond which both the image of the people and the cultivation and exploitation of the territory are transformed. Technology must also be framed In this context, as a form and starting point of a new spiritualisation of the land at the end of historical time, of the Iron Age.
67
Caution is called for in the use of the term "magical," not only with respect to the term itself, but also because it is used as a convenient cover term for a confusion of phenomena which, however, have little or nothing to do with each other. We use it here in a generic sense, to indicate an earthly force that cannot be further explained, whose counterpart in the physical world is electricity. As far as possible, we should use the expression "earth spirit" in its place. In the strict sense, the earth spirit becomes magical only when it returns. We then see it coagulate, crystallise, and harden as in the first cities, the cities of the Silver Age.
The spirit of the earth is not sacred; it does not dwell within privileged and closed spaces. Rather, we can imagine that it condenses and manifests itself in certain places, or even in certain men, just as electrical energy can make certain parts of a material luminous, for example the top of a ship's mast in St. Elmo's fire.
Even the spirit of the earth can return: in men and institutions; cults, works of art, cities and landscapes can take on a magical character. The return of the magical has in common with the return of the mythical the fact that it produces weakened figures, even less credible; moreover, when terms like "credible" appear, the magical force is already in itself weakened.
The essence of magical forces makes their action more invisible, but also more tenacious than that of mythical and historical forces. This explains the longevity of certain peoples and the rigidity of others. One might think that, in this case, the earth has preserved reserves of its ancient power to shape species. We may suppose, therefore, that magical powers can gain ground to an unpredictable extent when catastrophes threaten man, as a being belonging not only to the history of the world but also to the history of the earth, that is, as a species. Such powers can also burst forth in technology. Matter and bios are indivisible on the plane of magic.
In the individual, not only the mythical element is constantly alive, but also the magical one, which, in exceptional circumstances, gives rise to significant phenomena: intuition for the world of nature and for distant things, the ability to procure immediate healing and the gift of prophecy - the ability to know what the earth wants.
68
Only briefly does Hesiod address the Silver Age, calling it the weakening of the Golden Age. However, happier, healthier and richer than those of today, the men of that age continue to live a blissful chthonic existence.
In our context, the Silver Age is conceived as a place of return of the spirit of the earth that magically becomes a solid thing - in landscapes, in objects or in the human person. The Silver Age can fail, in which case the primordial history, the Golden Age, can be directly succeeded by the Aenean Age, or mythical age.
Consequently, the foundation of cities can have both magical and heroic origins, it can be linked to both a temple and a fortress. In this way, two essential forms of power are created. From this moment on, spiritual ancestors stand alongside natural ones, genealogy knows not only the bond of blood, but also adoption. There is the temple to the hero and the Holy Sepulchre.
The Silver Age has a magmatic character, in the process of solidifying. The magical culture that it produces is almost spared from the assault of time, it changes little until the moment of sunset. The priestly castes know their great season. Now the formula, even that of prayer, becomes coercive; it substitutes for the inexpressible.
Magical forces can also insinuate themselves into technology, which offers them a good substrate, and harden it. Particular caution is needed here. Hieronymus Bosch recognized such possibilities early on. In The Thousand and One Nights the fairy tale, which by its very nature belongs to the spirit of the earth and is the artistic form of the Golden Age, is captured by magic. In many places the timeless hardening, the coercive power of the formula, is clearly manifest.
Notes
Adi Shankara was an 8th century AD Indian Vedic scholar and teacher of Advaita Vedanta. He is known for an analogy in which a multiplicity of forms (eg gold jewellery or clay pots) derive from a single, undifferentiated and unchanging source (eg gold or clay).
A dux was a Roman military leader, roughly equivalent in rank to a general.
Australian readers will need no explanations regarding Captain James Cook. Johann Reinhold Forster (1729 –1798) was a German pastor, and ornithologist who accompanied Cook on his second Pacific voyage.
Meleager was a mythological Greek hero famed as the host of the Calydonian boar hunt in the epic tradition that was reworked by Homer. He is also mentioned as one of the Argonauts.
Atalanta was a mythological Greek heroine also primarily known from the tales of the Calydonian boar hunt and the Argonauts.
Heracles was a divine hero in Greek mythology, the son of Zeus and the greatest of the Greek heroes and a champion of the Olympian order against chthonic monsters. In Rome and the modern West, he is known as Hercules.
The Herero are a Bantu ethnic group inhabiting parts of Southern Africa. Unlike most Bantu, who are primarily subsistence farmers, the Herero are traditionally pastoralists who make a living tending livestock. Many Herero were displaced during the 1904-1908 genocide committed by the German Empire.
Nomos is the body of ethics and law governing human behaviour, a kind of “world-view” that defines ways of interacting with the world. The term is used most notably by Plato and Carl Schmitt.
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