In philosophy there is the concept of the hermeneutic circle. It goes back in meaning to the ideas of Schleiermacher, then to Dilthey, and is further developed by Heidegger and Gadamer. The essence is that cognition presupposes knowledge of both the whole and its parts. But initially man is not given either of these. Moreover, it is impossible to know the part without the whole, and the whole does not exist without parts (otherwise why is it whole and whole relative to what?). This apparent impasse is solved in the following way. It all starts with approximation. Let us have an approximation of the part and the whole. Two Rorschach stains. And we begin carefully and without hasty conclusions to relate them to each other. One approximation with another, again and again, until they, influencing each other and correcting the vagueness of both, acquire clearer outlines. This is the hermeneutic circle, the circular repetitive movements around the core in order to describe the structure of both the periphery and the center. That is, both the whole and the part are cognized in the process of their circular correlation, moving from approximation to clarity.
Heidegger used this method repeatedly, posing the same question ad infinitum and revolving around the ever elusive center and the blurring periphery.
One has to be careful here in trying to formalize the method. It is easy to miss the subtle philosophical move of grasping what is whole and what is part. Hermeneutics is built on Aristotle and is deeply related to phenomenology (as Dilthey discovered when he became acquainted with Husserl’s ideas). Once we interpret the whole and the part outside of Aristotelian ontology (e.g., through atomism or materialism), all is lost. Therefore, hermeneutic practice requires a special philosophical culture.
Let us apply the principle of the hermeneutic circle to Victory. Victory in the war with the West in Ukraine is an end and a means. The exclusivity of the significance of (this) Victory in Russian history makes us consider the current Russian statehood as a tool, as a method. That is, the modern Russian Federation is a part of the Victory, its condition. Victory is where the future begins. The past and present are only prolegomena to the future. And Aristotle again: the main cause is the target cause, causa finalis. Victory in Ukraine is the entelechy of Russian political history, it is what everything else was for. From Vladimir Krasnaya Solnyshko to Victory, from Kiev to Kiev.
Victory is more than the Russian Federation in its entirety, because Victory is the essence of Russia in its totality. The Russian Federation is only a part of the Victory. Victory is the whole. It is the fate and finale, the triumph.
To achieve Victory, it is necessary to adjust the Russian Federation to it. This is happening now. And it is happening both correctly and incorrectly. It is right when we see the Victory as a goal and a whole, and the Russian Federation itself—as a means and a part, as a separate moment of our political history. It is wrong when we proceed from the Russian Federation as a whole and absolutize the status quo, taking the true whole of Russian history out of the brackets. One moment of political history is exorbitantly inflated and overshadows the being of Russia (the whole). As we move from wrong to right, Victory is coming to us. We bring it closer to us. This is the hermeneutics of war.
Right means rebuilding the state for Victory, and when it ceases to be a part and becomes everything, the state, on the contrary, ceases to be everything and an end in itself and becomes a means and a path to Victory, then something new will be built—the State of Victory. Then we will win.
And here, further, there will come a new hermeneutic turn. Victory will be the foundation of a new Russian statehood. Only a new Russia can win, and it is it that will erupt after the Victory. Now the Victory itself will become part of the future, a moment of the whole. The new statehood will be an even more integral phenomenon, a new nucleus and absolute center.
In other words, Victory is a bridge between the past (including the present, which is rapidly deteriorating and receding into the past) and the future. And the more the Victory is realized, the more Russian time itself will become.
The Russian Federation is not fully Russia. It is a part of Russia—in time and in space. Victory in Ukraine should turn the part into a whole, to make Russia Russia in the full sense of the term. And it is not only about territories, population, strategy and geopolitics. It is about the hermeneutic circle of all Russian history. This is the solution to the metaphysical problem of Russian destiny.
This article appears through the kind courtesy of Geopolitika.
Featured: For Faith, Tsar and Fatherland, by Dmitry Shmarin, ca. 1990s.
