Milan Machovec

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Milan Machovec lecturer at Charles University in Prague March 23, 1999

Milan Machovec (born August 23, 1925 in Prague , † January 15, 2003 there ) was a Czech philosopher .

As a reform-oriented professor of Marxism, he was the pioneer of the Prague Spring and persecuted by the state after its suppression. Machovec was a prominent exponent of the dialogue between Marxism and Christianity. After the fall of communism , he underwent complete rehabilitation and became a revered figure of integration in the reorientation. Since 2000 he has been the holder of the Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk Order , one of the highest honors in the Czech Republic.

Life

As the son of a high school teacher, Machovec experienced a Catholic socialization. His attitude that denomination is not as important as morality was mainly conveyed to him through his mother.

After graduating from high school in 1944, he worked briefly as a vocational school teacher in Brandeis . In the spring of 1945 he began studying philosophy and classical philology at Charles University in Prague . Milan Machovec also turned to Marxism against the background of experiences under the Nazi dictatorship. From 1948 to 1950 he did his military service. He then became an assistant at Prague University and, immediately after his habilitation in 1953, was appointed professor of dialectical materialism and Marxism-Leninism . In this position he achieved international renown. He converted the “Seminar for Marxist Criticism of Religion and History of Religion” at Charles University into a “dialogical seminar” in which philosophers like Erich Fromm but also theologians like Karl Rahner participated as guests. He was a regular discussion partner for philosophers and theologians all over the world, but especially in Germany, probably also because he was fluent in German. Eventually Machovec became one of the masterminds of the “Prague Spring”.

After the crushing of the "Prague Spring", he was in 1970 by the University of Prague relegated , placed under state monitoring and exposed to various repressions. He essentially earned his living as an organist in a Catholic church. Nevertheless, he signed Charter 77 and was banned from practicing his profession. This deprived him of all material livelihoods. According to an interrogation officer, he should feed himself from garbage cans. His entire social environment was put under pressure and threatened, his works confiscated and destroyed. Nevertheless, students kept coming to him and holding secret "housing seminars" with him.

In order not to drag his wife and children into misery, he separated from them and from then on lived in a miserable one-room apartment. For his livelihood he had to rely on secret support, which he passed on to other dissidents . Among other things, he received support from theologians around Horst Georg Pöhlmann in West Germany , but above all from the priest of a Catholic parish in Prague.

After the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989, he was rehabilitated and reinstated in a chair at Charles University. In 1993 he officially retired, but remained active.

During his persecution, he was also deprived of proper medical care, so that his health would have required the greatest possible protection. Nevertheless, he actively re-entered academic work and participated in various ways in the disputes of the newly organized state. As a constantly critical spirit, there were also conflicts with the new authorities. He died with great honor, especially from the younger generation. At his funeral the Auxiliary Bishop of Prague spoke the Our Father (at his request).

His son, Martin Machovec (* 1956, Dr. Phil) works as a translator.

Act

Throughout his life he searched for the possibilities of a humanization of the world, which is why he became a sharp critic of the real existing socialism . In addition to Marx , it was above all Aristotle , Kant and the Christian message that stimulated him again and again.

He always sought dialogue with philosophies and religions. His presence at the symposium “Society and Ethical Values” organized by the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Vatican in Budapest in 1986 , at which there was an intense debate with Konrad Feiereis , significantly promoted the Christian-Marxist dialogue. As a Marxist, he was always benevolent but also demanding of Christianity. In God he saw “the sum total of the deepest human experiences and longings” and felt closer to believing Christians than atheists who know no transcendence . Machovec accused parts of contemporary Christian theology of abandoning their real, valuable concerns in an attempt to ingratiate themselves with modernity .

In his probably best-known book Jesus for Atheists , which was initially published in German, he comes to the following statement:

"The teaching of Jesus set the world on fire not because of any superiority of the theoretical program, but because he himself was identical with this program".

This apparently became the model for the atheist Marxist. In order that he exemplified Christian virtues such as truthfulness, simplicity and humanity, Milan Machovec became a positive challenge for Christians.

At the end of his life he turned to the threats posed by the ecological consequences of human activity and the problem of eroding values.

(Note: In his first German-language publications, his name sometimes appears incorrectly written as "Machoveč".)

Selection of works (German)

  • Marxism and Dialectical Theology . Barth , Bonhoeffer and Hromádka from an atheist-communist perspective. EVZ, Zurich 1965 (Original title: O tak zvané dialektické teologii současného protestantismu . Translated by Dorothea Neumärker).
  • Thomas Garrigue Masaryk . Graz / Vienna / Cologne 1969 (with an afterword by Friedrich Weigend-Abendroth).
  • About the meaning of human life . In: Rombach Collection, new series . tape 12 . Rombach, Freiburg in Breisgau 1971 (original title: Smysl lidského života . Translated by Karl Held).
  • Jesus for atheists. With a foreword by Helmut Gollwitzer . 1st edition. Kreuz, Stuttgart / Berlin 1972, ISBN 3-7831-0387-8 (Original title: Ježíš pro moderního člověka . Translated by Paul Kruntorad).
  • Milan Machovec, Herbert A. Gornitz [Gornik], Horst Georg Pöhlmann: Marxists and Christians, brothers or opponents? In: Gütersloher Taschenbücher Siebenstern . tape 287 . Gütersloh 1978, ISBN 3-579-03687-4 (With a foreword by Horst Georg Pöhlmann ).
  • The return to wisdom, philosophy in the face of the abyss . Kreuz , Stuttgart 1988, ISBN 3-7831-0903-5 .
  • Milan Machovec, Horst Georg Pöhlmann: Is there a God? An atheist and a Christian in the debate . In: Gütersloher Taschenbücher Siebenstern . tape 1294 . Gütersloher Verlagshaus Mohn , Gütersloh 1990, ISBN 3-579-01294-0 .
  • The question of God as a question of man . In: Forum St. Stephan . tape 11 . Tyrolia, Innsbruck / Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-7022-2248-0 ( autobiography ).
  • Homeland Indo-Europe . The life of our ancestors based on a comparison of individual languages. In: Gerhard Loettel, Wilhelm Zauner (Hrsg.): Forum St. Stephan . tape 13 . Wagner, Linz 2002, ISBN 3-9500891-9-5 (original title: Indoevropané v pravlasti . Translated by Gerhard Loettel).
  • Gerhard Loettel, Wilhelm Zauner (ed.): The meaning of human existence . Tyrolia, Innsbruck / Vienna 2004, ISBN 978-3-7022-2575-9 (original title: Smysl lidské existence .).

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ DNB 103709207
  2. ^ Renata Erich: Catholic-Marxist Dialogue in Budapest . In: Orientation , Vol. 50 (1986), pp. 228-231.
  3. ↑ Title view of: «Jesus for Atheists». In: amazon.de. Retrieved December 25, 2009 .
personal data
SURNAME Machovec, Milan
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Czechoslovak philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH August 23, 1925
PLACE OF BIRTH Prague
DATE OF DEATH January 15, 2003
Place of death Prague