3.1. For a racial morality
In order to posit the nuts and bolts of a racial morality,
Teilhard de Chardin is faced with a problem: How can the peoples of the earth
achieve harmony unless they first agree upon the basis of their union? And how
can they find the ardour and courage to perform their duty, once perceived, if
they do not feel some attraction to it? He wonders:
L..] there is a grave uncertainty to be resolved. The
future, I have said, depends on the courage and resourcefulness which men
display in overcoming the forces of isolationism, even of repulsion, which seem
to drive them apart rather than draw them together. How is the drawing together
to be accomplished? How shall we so contrive matters that the human mass merges
in a single whole, instead of ceaselessly scattering in
dust?'
A priori, in Teilhard de Chardin's opinion, there
seems to be two methods, two possible roads in order to build up this
collectivisation of mankind.2 The first is a process of
tightening-up in response to external pressures. The human mass, because it is
in a state of continuous additive growth, in number and inter-connections, on
the confined surface of this planet, must automatically become more and more
firmly concentrated upon itself. To this impressive process of natural
compression there may well be added the artificial constraint imposed by a
stronger human group upon a weaker; we have only to look around us at the
present time, nowadays, to see how this idea is seeking, indeed rushing towards
its realisation. Many countries still behave as masters over others. What is
the '08' all about? Why is it that some countries for example, have the right
to own the atomic bomb and not others?
I Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, The Future of
Man, New York, I964, p. 76. 2 Id.
Yet, there is another way. This is that, prompted by some
favouring influence, the elements of mankind should succeed in making effective
a profound force of mutual attraction, deeper and more powerful than the
surface repulsion which causes them to diverge, forced upon one another by the
dimensions and mechanics of the earth, men will purposefully bring to life a
common soul in this vast body. And so, the two possible roads are the
following: "unification by external or by internal force? Compulsion or
Unanimity?"'
In his days, Teilhard de Chardin experienced the destruction
of war and for him, war expressed the tension and the interior dislocation of
mankind shaken to its roots as it stood at the crossroads, faced by the need to
decide upon its future.
3.1.1. Unity in unanimity
Instead of humanity to unite through compulsion, since unity
imposes itself, the collectivisation of mankind being an unavoidable process,
it must unite in total freedom. Learning from the miseries of the past with the
world wars, for example, humans must unite in a unanimous spirit. The road to
be followed therefore is the road of freedom; we are supposed to engage in the
process of totalisation consciously and freely. In effect, Teilhard de Chardin
declares:
In my view the road to be followed is clearly revealed by
the teaching of all the past. We can progress only by uniting: this, as we have
seen, is the law of life. But unification through coercion leads only to a
superficial pseudo-unity. It may establish a mechanism, but it does not achieve
any fundamental synthesis; and in consequence it engenders no growth of
consciousness. It materialises, in short, instead of spiritualising. Only
unification through unanimity is biologically valid. This alone can work the
miracle of causing heightened personality to emerge from the forces of
collectivity. It alone represents a genuine extension of the psychogenesis that
gave us birth. Therefore it is inwardly that we must come together, and in
entire freedom.2
I Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Op. cit., p.
77. 2 Id.
The Teilhardian view here reminds us of the Stoic notion of
freedom. In fact, happiness consists in obeying nature, living like the gods,
living according to the spark of divinity in us, living according to reason. As
such, man's happiness consists in following without restraint the prescriptions
of Nature. In a determined world, the stoic is still free. He is free to follow
nature or not to do so. Like a dog tied behind the chariot, man is supposed to
choose to run step by step, following the cadence of the chariot, in all
freedom in order to find satisfaction behind the chariot, instead of resisting
and ending up being dragged by force. The process of totalisation imposes
itself to us and our happiness consists in uniting in all freedom, in all
unanimity in order to avoid being yanked by coercion.
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