Understanding History
English Essay on "Understanding History"
History is meaningless without a philosophy of history. It is nothing more than the flotsam and jetsam of a shipwreck. Philosophy, provides a compass to find our way through the tangled, intertwined paths and bypaths which the society takes in its onward march.
Men make history. But, before they make history, they are made by history. Men are creators of circumstances as much as they are creation of circumstances. Two factors are essential for the making of history: objective and subjective. The objective factor consists of the conditions and circumstances, the economic, political and social environment in which individuals find themselves at a particular moment of history.educationsight.blogspot.com The subjective factor consists of human thinking, and action. The objective and subjective factors are dialectically interlinked i.e. they act and react upon each other. For an historic event, both the factors are equally important. The conditions must be mature for it to come to pass, but it will not happen by itself. This is crude determinism.
Men must grasp these conditions, and act to bring forth the event from the womb of history. Herein comes the role of a great man. Great men are not so much begetters as the midwives of history. What they bring forth is mothered by the conditions and circumstances summed up by Hegel in the world “zeitgeist” i.e. the spirit of the age.
The world-shattering deed is possible only when the conditions are ripe for it. Delivery may be forced, but the child must be ready to enter the world. A great man is an expression, a representative, and an instrument of historical forces on whose currents he rides to his place in history.
Owing to the specific qualities of their minds and characters, great man can change the specific features of events but they cannot change their basic and general trend. Under the shattering blow of historic forces, a cube, a sphere and a cylinder, all are beaten into flat surface.
Bismarck, the maker of modern Germany, sensed his own insignificance and exclaimed: “The best a statesman can do is to listen to the rustle of God’s mantle through history and try to catch the hem of it for a few steps.” Kissinger puts it this way: “Leadership is not something you do just as a job. There must be a clear call, a special spirit that hinds great men to their times.”
Great men do not so much make history, as history makes great men. A great men one whose time has come i.e. conditions have matured for his appearance. H understands the historic trend and emerges as its symbol.
If a man is born before his time or, in Ghalib’s words, he is bulbul-i-gulshan-i-naafrida (the nightingale of an un-created garden), he will end as a tragic hero or may re-emerge on the stage of history as an inspiring icon later on in the fullness of time.
Since the French Revolution (1789), the masses have been playing an ever-increasing role in the making of history. In order to be successful, a leader must represent the hopes, aspiration and yearnings of the masses. Once the people are in motion under his leadership, he can perform miracles. The dynamics of modern history depends on the onward march of the serried ranks of the masses.
But the question arises whether the march of history is linear i.e. if marches along a line always in a forward direction. Or does it more in a circle i.e. history repeats itself?
Mankind is not so fortunate as to always move ahead without any setback. Nor is mankind doomed to go round and round. History moves along a spiral: two steps forward, one step backward.
This is how the marvelous yet mysterious curve of spiral traces itself and is to be found in the heaven in the shape of a nebula, or in the head of a sun-flower or in the horn of a deer. All great movements have a spiral-like evolution, They start off with a tiny spark. They gather momentum so that a spark sets a prairie on fire.
But every movement has it dull, stagnant and dreary moments, when nothing seems to happen but when imperceptible forces, of history continue to operate. Sometimes these periods are short, sometimes long. Between 1905 and 1917 there is a gap of 12 years before the revolution bursts forth. Between Syed Ahmad Shaheed and emergence of Pakistan there is a gap of 100 years.
Those who know the working of history, keep their heads cool, and their hearts warm with the faith that the spiral may be in one of its downward trend, that sooner or later the spiral may rise again. If the movement has the force of history behind it, it emerges triumphant after an apparent reversal. History is neither linear nor circular. History is spiral-like, going two steps forward, one step. backward but always re-emerging on a higher plane. We are living in an era of which Dickens says: “It is the worst it is the best of times.”
Gyorgy Lukacs, the great Hungarian philosopher, says: “Blessed are the ages for which the starry heavens are the map of roads which can be travelled, and whose roads are illuminated by the light of stars. Everything is new for them and yet familiar, adventurous and yet their own property. The world is wide, and yet is like their own home, for the fire which burns in the soul is of the same nature as the stars. They are sharply separated the world and the ego, the light and the fire and yet they will never be eternal strangers to one another; for the fire is the soul of every light and every sire clothes itself in light.
Let me sum up the philosophy of history. According to Hegel, history is the Redevelopment of Spirit in Time, as nature is the development of Idea in Space. Amid the ceaseless change of events and conditions in history, spirit is realising its freedom, both as the efficient principle of its activation and as the final term of the grand movement of the historical process. The means which weltgeist (world-spirit) uses to achieve its goal are the actions of men. But philosophy arrives too late i.e. history takes place, only then we philosophy about it. Hegel puts it in an unforgettable statement: “The owl of Minerva begins its flight when dusk is falling.” Let’ us read Gyorgy Lukacs and Hegel at the same time, and fine the way for our country which may lead to peace, democracy and prosperity.
Men make history. But, before they make history, they are made by history. Men are creators of circumstances as much as they are creation of circumstances. Two factors are essential for the making of history: objective and subjective. The objective factor consists of the conditions and circumstances, the economic, political and social environment in which individuals find themselves at a particular moment of history.educationsight.blogspot.com The subjective factor consists of human thinking, and action. The objective and subjective factors are dialectically interlinked i.e. they act and react upon each other. For an historic event, both the factors are equally important. The conditions must be mature for it to come to pass, but it will not happen by itself. This is crude determinism.
Men must grasp these conditions, and act to bring forth the event from the womb of history. Herein comes the role of a great man. Great men are not so much begetters as the midwives of history. What they bring forth is mothered by the conditions and circumstances summed up by Hegel in the world “zeitgeist” i.e. the spirit of the age.
The world-shattering deed is possible only when the conditions are ripe for it. Delivery may be forced, but the child must be ready to enter the world. A great man is an expression, a representative, and an instrument of historical forces on whose currents he rides to his place in history.
Owing to the specific qualities of their minds and characters, great man can change the specific features of events but they cannot change their basic and general trend. Under the shattering blow of historic forces, a cube, a sphere and a cylinder, all are beaten into flat surface.
Bismarck, the maker of modern Germany, sensed his own insignificance and exclaimed: “The best a statesman can do is to listen to the rustle of God’s mantle through history and try to catch the hem of it for a few steps.” Kissinger puts it this way: “Leadership is not something you do just as a job. There must be a clear call, a special spirit that hinds great men to their times.”
Great men do not so much make history, as history makes great men. A great men one whose time has come i.e. conditions have matured for his appearance. H understands the historic trend and emerges as its symbol.
If a man is born before his time or, in Ghalib’s words, he is bulbul-i-gulshan-i-naafrida (the nightingale of an un-created garden), he will end as a tragic hero or may re-emerge on the stage of history as an inspiring icon later on in the fullness of time.
Since the French Revolution (1789), the masses have been playing an ever-increasing role in the making of history. In order to be successful, a leader must represent the hopes, aspiration and yearnings of the masses. Once the people are in motion under his leadership, he can perform miracles. The dynamics of modern history depends on the onward march of the serried ranks of the masses.
But the question arises whether the march of history is linear i.e. if marches along a line always in a forward direction. Or does it more in a circle i.e. history repeats itself?
Mankind is not so fortunate as to always move ahead without any setback. Nor is mankind doomed to go round and round. History moves along a spiral: two steps forward, one step backward.
This is how the marvelous yet mysterious curve of spiral traces itself and is to be found in the heaven in the shape of a nebula, or in the head of a sun-flower or in the horn of a deer. All great movements have a spiral-like evolution, They start off with a tiny spark. They gather momentum so that a spark sets a prairie on fire.
But every movement has it dull, stagnant and dreary moments, when nothing seems to happen but when imperceptible forces, of history continue to operate. Sometimes these periods are short, sometimes long. Between 1905 and 1917 there is a gap of 12 years before the revolution bursts forth. Between Syed Ahmad Shaheed and emergence of Pakistan there is a gap of 100 years.
Those who know the working of history, keep their heads cool, and their hearts warm with the faith that the spiral may be in one of its downward trend, that sooner or later the spiral may rise again. If the movement has the force of history behind it, it emerges triumphant after an apparent reversal. History is neither linear nor circular. History is spiral-like, going two steps forward, one step. backward but always re-emerging on a higher plane. We are living in an era of which Dickens says: “It is the worst it is the best of times.”
Gyorgy Lukacs, the great Hungarian philosopher, says: “Blessed are the ages for which the starry heavens are the map of roads which can be travelled, and whose roads are illuminated by the light of stars. Everything is new for them and yet familiar, adventurous and yet their own property. The world is wide, and yet is like their own home, for the fire which burns in the soul is of the same nature as the stars. They are sharply separated the world and the ego, the light and the fire and yet they will never be eternal strangers to one another; for the fire is the soul of every light and every sire clothes itself in light.
Let me sum up the philosophy of history. According to Hegel, history is the Redevelopment of Spirit in Time, as nature is the development of Idea in Space. Amid the ceaseless change of events and conditions in history, spirit is realising its freedom, both as the efficient principle of its activation and as the final term of the grand movement of the historical process. The means which weltgeist (world-spirit) uses to achieve its goal are the actions of men. But philosophy arrives too late i.e. history takes place, only then we philosophy about it. Hegel puts it in an unforgettable statement: “The owl of Minerva begins its flight when dusk is falling.” Let’ us read Gyorgy Lukacs and Hegel at the same time, and fine the way for our country which may lead to peace, democracy and prosperity.
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