subject: Rationalist Interpretation Of History [print this page] Since the beginning of the New Age Christian historiosophia was subjected to critical reinterpretation. The typical XVII century. pantheistic identification of God and nature turned worldview shock modern European man feel like a speck in an infinite universe, the subordination of the living human being with its needs and objectives of an impersonal, objective reason. For a long time denied the possibility of rationality of scientific knowledge of history, considering the latter as a realm of chance and arbitrariness, violence and confusion, alienation and lack of freedom of man. The denial of history in the culture of the Enlightenment (XVIII of France.) Facilitated the emergence of the idea of revolution as a leap from the "history" in the "nature", from the realm of compulsion and irrationality in the realm of reason and freedom. But in sharp contrast the practical results of the French Revolution with the utopian projects of the future allowed to rehabilitate the "history" to make it a subject of scientific and philosophical analysis.
The starting point of a rationalist (the world - historical) conception of history is a romantic cult of the "great personality" (Schiller, Fichte, Schlegel, W. Scott), who found the later philosophical and theoretical basis and a systematic form of expression in the philosophy of history, Hegel and Marx's historical materialism.
The relationship of the spiritual and natural in the historical process is the basic problem of the rationalist conception of history, offering two extreme solutions, as were Hegel's philosophy of history and historical materialism of Marx. But in fact, and in another case, the core of this concept remain valid, and the differences, despite their depth, are still private. And Hegel and Marx are at the point of view, that history is universal, there are general in nature and objective laws. History passes through three stages. Hegel is - Eastern (Asian), Greco-Roman (ancient) and Germany's (European) world. Marx in the Preface to the Critique of Political Economy - Asian, ancient, feudal and capitalist formations, and in the preparation of the manuscript of "Capital" - pre-capitalist, capitalist and post-capitalist society. For both thinkers characterized the thesis that the most important social institution is the state: as an existence of a moral idea (Hegel) or as a politico-legal superstructure on the economic basis (Marx). What unites them is also the interpretation of historical knowledge - part of it, they include a section relating to the study of the facts of history and theoretical and methodological section: philosophy (Hegel), or sociology (Marx).
