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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 August 2011
In 1936 Teilhard de Chardin summarized in the short space of a few paragraphs the broad lines of his whole life's work. The passage deserves to be quoted in its entirety, since it is perhaps the clearest statement of the triple direction taken by his thought in its search for unity in the Christian life.
1 Quelques réflections sur la conversion du monde (1936), pp. 6–7. References to unpublished writings cannot always be accurate due to differences in pagination between various typed or mimeographed copies.
2 Comment je vois (1948), p. 25.
3 Le phénomène humain (1938–1940), Oeuvres de Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, I (Paris, 1955), 22.Google Scholar [Eng. trans., The Phenomenon of Man (London, 1959), 30.Google Scholar] Hereafter cited as PH.
4 On the influence of paleontology on Teilhard's thinking, see L'Avenir de I'homme vu par un paléontologiste, 1941, Oeuvres, V (Paris, 1959), 85–100.Google Scholar Confer also Claude Cuénot's biography, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (Paris, 1958), pp. 33–59.Google Scholar On the Christian outlook on evolution see Bruno de Solages, “La pensée chrétienne face à l'évolution,” Bulletin de littérature ecclésiastique 48 (1947), ciii–cxvi.Google Scholar [Eng. trans., “Christianity and Evolution,” Cross Currents 1 (1951), 26–37.]Google Scholar
5 PH, 49–50 [Eng. trans., 53] The originality of the method outlined in this passage has been analyzed at length by d'Armagnac, Christian, S.J., “Philosophie de la nature et méthode chez le Père Teilhard de Chardin,” Archives de Philosophie 20 (1957), 5–41.Google Scholar See also Boné, Edouard, S.J., “Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.,” Revue des questions scientifiques 127 (1956), 90–104.Google Scholar Note that the word “phenomenology” in Teilhard's sense of “generalized physics” or “hyperphysics” has a totally different meaning from the same word as applied to the philosophical methodology elaborated by Edmond Husserl and Martin Heidegger in Germany and by Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Paul Ricoeur in France. On this point Teilhard was explicit: “My phenomenology is not that of Husserl and Merleau-Ponty.” (Letter of April 11, 1953, in Cuénot, Teilhard de Chardin, p. 311.)
6 Le phénomène humain, 1930, Oeuvres, III (Paris, 1957), 228–29.Google Scholar
7 PH, 53, note 1. [Eng. trans., 57, note 1.] Olivier Rabut, O.P., has noted that this use of “consciousness” corresponds to Aristotle's “immanence,” which he saw to be present in all living things. Dialogue avec Teilhard de Chardin (Paris, 1958), p. 40.Google Scholar [Eng. trans., Dialogue with Teilhard de Chardin (London, 1961), p. 38.]Google Scholar
8 Ewing, J. Franklin, “The Human Phenomenon,” Theological Studies 22 (1961), 94.CrossRefGoogle Scholar On this search for unity, see Comment je crois (1934), p. 7.
9 There is an unfortunate rendering of psychique as “physical” in the official English translation of PH, page 64 (page 62 in the French).
10 PH, 78. [Eng. trans., 78.] For Teilhard the genesis of life on earth belongs to the category of absolutely unique events which, once happened, are never repeated. See ibid., 100–07. [Eng. trans., 96–102.] See also Le groupe zoologique humain (1949; Paris, 1956), p. 5.Google Scholar Hereafter cited as GZ.
11 PH, 199. [Eng. trans., 180–81.] “Orthogenesis” is the biological term for the law of controlled complication. “My considered opinion is that the word is essential and indispensable for singling out and affirming the manifest property of living matter to form a system in which terms succeed each other experimentally, following the constantly increasing values of centro-complexity.” (Ibid., 114, note 1. [Eng. trans., 108, note 1.]) On the opinion of modern science regarding the relation of psychism to organic complexity, see Dr. Chauchard, Paul, L'Etre humain selon Teilhard de Chardin (Paris, 1959), pp. 57–102.Google Scholar
12 PH, 186, note 1. [Eng. trans., 169, note 1.] The same point is made by Teilhard regarding scientific knowledge of monogenism, i.e., the origin of the human race from a single couple. “The problem of monogenism in the strict sense of the word … seems to elude science as such by its very nature. At those depths of time when hominization took place, the movements of a unique couple are positively ungraspable … Accordingly one can say that there is room in this interval for anything that a trans-experimental source of knowledge might demand.” (Ibid., 206, note 1. [Eng. trans., 186, note 1.]) Fossil data either proving or disproving monogenism can never be found precisely because the first tentative expressions of a species mutation are the weakest and vanish quickly. Only the gradually improving forms grow to full maturity and so have the strength to survive as fossils. This phenomenon is known as the “suppression of peduncles.” See ibid., 128–30. [Eng. trans., 120–22.]
13 Le paradoxe transformiste (1925), Oeuvres, III, 142, note 1; Note sur les modes de l'action de Dieu dans l'univers (1920), p. 4. See also PH, 79. [Eng. trans., 79]: “Seen from the outside and materially, the best we can say at the moment is that life properly speaking begins with the cell.” What Teilhard is affirming here is a concomitance (“seen from the outside and materially”) not a total reproduction. Confer the principle enunciated in Que faut-il penser du transformisme? (1930), Oeuvres, III, 216: “In transformism the scientific plane (of experimental succession in time) and the philosophical plane (of ultimate causality) are not to be confused.” On this question see the excellent treatment of Russel, John L., S.J., “The Phenomenon of Man,” The Heythrop Journal 2 (1961), 4–5.Google Scholar
14 PH, 184. [Eng. trans., 167–68.]
15 Ibid., 188. [Eng. trans., 171.]
16 Mon univers (1924), p. 14; Le milieu divin (1927), Oeuvres, IV (Paris, 1957), 173.Google Scholar [Eng. trans., The Divine Milieu (London, 1960), 129.];Google Scholar La crise présente (1937), published as “Sauvons l'humanité,” in Cahiers Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, III (Paris, 1962), 78.Google Scholar See also Esquisse d'un Univers Personnel (1936), Oeuvres, VI (Paris, 1962), 69–114.Google Scholar Teilhard twice uses the English phrase “a personalistic universe,” once in 1936 as a gloss on the title of Esquisse d'un Univers Personnel, and once in 1944 as a subtitle at the start of Introduction à la vie chrétienne.
17 Le phénomène humain (1930), Oeuvres, III, 231; PH, 202–03. [Eng. trans., 183.]
18 PH, 244, 247. [Eng. trans., 221, 223.] See also La formation de la “Noosphere” (1947), Oeuvres, V, 201–31; GZ, 129–62; Du cosmos à la cosmogénèse (1951), Oeuvres, VII (Paris, 1963), 261–77.Google Scholar
19 PH, 265. [Eng. trans., 239.]
20 To avoid confusion we should note two points regarding Teilhard's use of this image. First, he uses it uniquely to describe that stage of the evolutionary process which began with the emergence of homo sapiens and the crossing of the threshold of reflection. It is never used to describe the evolutionary process as such. For this his favorite image is that of a cone, the lower part of which extends itself indefinitely, while the upper part converges toward a point. (Confer Le cône du temps [1942], Oeuvres, V, 111–17.) Secondly, the zone of convergence after the equator is out of all chronological proportion when applied to man. “By analogy with other living layers its duration should certainly run into millions of years.” (PH, 212, with diagram. [Eng. trans., 192.])
21 PH, 288. [Eng. trans., 259.] See also Les singularités de l'espèce humaine (1955), Oeuvres, II (Paris, 1956), 322–37; La structure phylétique du groupe humain (1951), Oeuvres, II, 217; PH, 265–71. [Eng. trans., 239–44.] A common expression used by Teilhard to express the same idea is the “totalization” of humanity upon itself. See Le rebondissement humain de l'évolution (1948), Oeuvres, V, 253. Also GZ, 132–34.Google Scholar
22 PH, 287, 289, 291, 292. [Eng. trans., 259, 260, 261, 263.]; La crise présente (1937), in Cahiers, III, 78. See also the lengthy analysis of Teilhard's personalism in Lubac, Henri de, S.J., La pensée religieuse du Père Teilhard de Chardin (Paris, 1962), pp. 201–14.Google Scholar The phrase “union differentiates” is frequent in Teilhard. For example, Comment je crois (1934), p. 16, note 1; L'Energie humaine (1937), Oeuvres, VI, 179.
23 Super-humanité, super-Christ, super-charité (1943), p. 1, note 1.
24 PH, 279. [Eng. trans., 251.] “In some way the men of the future will form but a single consciousness.” (Mon univers [1924], 56). See the lengthy treatment in Les singularités de l'espèce humaine (1955), Oeuvres, II, 338–66, esp. 354.
25 Super-humanité, super-Christ, super-charité (1943), p. 2. Emphasis added. On this hypothetical nature of evolutionary convergence see de Lubac, Pensée religieuse …, pp. 250–62, and d'Armagnac, Christian, “La pensée du Père Teilhard de Chardin comme apologétique moderne,” Nouvelle Revue Théologique 84 (1962), 604, 613.Google Scholar
26 PH, 258. [Eng. trans., 233–34.]
27 Letter of January 1, 1954, in Cuénot, Teilhard de Chardin, p. 482.
28 PH, 316. [Eng. trans., 284.]
29 Mon univers (1924), p. 20. See L'Union créatrice (1917), p. 15: his theory is a “philosophy of the universe conceived as a consequence of the knowledge of the Mystical Body.” Teilhard explains at length this theory of “Creative Union” in Comment je vois (1948), pp. 17–21; Christianisme et Évolution (1945), pp. 3–5; Mon univers (1924), pp. 3–19; L'Union créatrice, passim.
30 Comment je crois (1934), p. 2. “Faith in the world, … faith in spirit, … faith in immortality, … faith in personality.” (Ibid., pp. 3, 6, 10, 13.) See also Quelques réflections sur la conversion du monde (1936), pp. 2–3.
31 PH, 238, 243. [Eng. trans., 215, 219.]
32 Ibid., 255, 257. [Eng. trans., 230–31, 233.] See also GZ, 140–44; de Lubac, pp. 150–66
33 PH, 253. [Eng. trans., 228–29.]
34 Ibid., 254. [Eng. trans., 229–30.] Italics are in the French text.
35 Ibid., 254, 259- [Eng. trans., 230, 234.]
36 Ibid., 285. [Eng. trans., 257.] There have been several efforts to link the thought of Teilhard with that of Karl Marx, most notably that of the French Garaudy, Marxist Roger in Perspectives de l'homme, Existentialisme, Pensée Catholique, Marxisme (Paris, 1961), pp. 170–23.Google Scholar This large subject cannot be treated at present, but it should be clearly noted that Teilhard was poles apart from a deterministic view of history. For him man has in no sense lost control of his destiny on earth. On the contrary, it is man who is master of evolution, not viceversa, and this by reason of his freedom. See the excellent critique of Garaudy by Morel, George, S.J., “Karl Marx et le P. Teilhard de Chardin,” Études 304 (1960), 80–87.Google Scholar
37 Teilhard has developed at some length the role in his system of thought of what he calls “the sexual sense.” “The mutual attraction of the sexes is so fundamental a fact that any explanation of the world which does not succeed in incorporating it structurally as an essential part of its edifice, is virtually condemned.” (Esquisse d'un univers personnel [1936], Oeuvres, VI, 91.) Besides the lengthy treatment in Esquisse, there is also that of L'Évolution de la chasteté (1934). See also La Lutte contre la multitude (1917), p. 10; L'Union créatrice (1917), pp. 12–14; Note pour servir à l'évangelization des demps nouveaux (1919), pp. 5–6.
38 PH, 295–96. [Eng. trans., 266–67.] On “amorization” and a fuller analysis of the meaning of love in this cosmic sense, see L'Énergie humaine (1937), Oeuvres, VI, 180–98, and Esquisse d'un univers personnel (1936), Oeuvres, VI, 101–05.
39 PH, 297–98. [Eng. trans., 267–68.]
40 GZ, 162. Emphasis added to “real.”
41 PH 299–300. [Eng. trans., 269–70.] In a letter of October 18, 1940, Teilhard said of the war: “… the root of the evil is not in the apparent conflicts, but very far away from them, it seems, in the inner fact that men have despaired of God's personality.” (Lettres de voyage [Paris, 1961], p. 262.Google Scholar [Eng. trans., Letters from a Traveller (London, 1962), p. 269.])Google Scholar See also Comment concevoir at espérer que se réalise sur terre l'unanimisation humaine? (1950), Oeuvres, V, 373.
42 L'Esprit de la Terre (1931), Oeuvres, VI, 53. See Teilhard's earlier analysis of the problem of action in PH, 251–59. [Eng. trans., 227–34.]
43 PH, 301. [Eng. trans., 270–71.] The study of Olivier Rabut manages to convey the false impression that in Teilhard's mind the real Omega is somehow the product of natural evolution. He fails to distinguish clearly between the Omega of Teilhard's initial hypothesis of probability, which would indeed be the product of natural evolution, and the real Omega of his second hypothesis, which is already in existence and consequently transcends the evolutionary process. (Dialogue …, pp. 101ff. [Eng. trans., pp. 115ff.])
44 “Tout tient par en haut.” (Mon univers [1924], p. 16.) An indication of the coherence and consistency of Teilhard's thought is the fact that these same words are used, though without the terseness, both at the beginning and the end of The Phenomenon of Man. See PH, 37 and 301. [Eng. trans., 43 and 271.]
45 PH, 301, 341. [Eng. trans., 271, 307.] On the transcendence of Omega see L'Esprit de la terre (1931), Oeuvres, VI, 52–57. Teilhard himself felt that he was giving here a valid proof from reason for the existence of God (Vie et Planètes [1945], Oeuvres, V, 153, note 1), but not all critics agree. For opposing views, see de Lubac, Pensée religieuse …, pp. 253–63, and Rabut, Dialogue … pp. 101–15 [Eng. trans., 115–34.]
46 Comment je vois (1948), p. 14.
47 Panthéisme et Christianisme (1923), p. 8.
48 PH, 323. [Eng. trans., 290.]
49 Le Dieu de l'Évolution (1953), p. 3. This is the precise point which Teilhard criticized most in the philosophy of Henri Bergson. “By the mere fact that one sees in universal becoming a pattern of convergence, one eliminates the Bergsonian idea of a vital thrust without finality, a vis a tergo. A dynamism such as his allows indeed for a center of divergence at its starting point, but I do not see how it would produce a fusion of the elements which it drives before it.” (L'Union créatrice [1917], p. 5.) Nevertheless, as we know from Le Coeur de la matière (1950), pp. 8f., the reading of Bergson before the first world war was a strong catalyst for Teilhard's first intuitions on the relationship between matter, energy and spirit.
50 Les directions et les conditions de l'avenir (1948), Oeuvres, V, 304; Le Christique (1955), P. 7.
51 Mon Univers (1924), p. 19.
52 See texts cited above in footnotes 1 and 34.
53 Letter of September 23, 1947, in Lettres de Voyage, p. 290. [Eng. trans., pp. 294–95.]
54 Hérédité sociale et progrès (1938), Oeuvres, V, 51.
55 Le Christique (1955), p. 7; Super-humanité, super-Christ, super-charité (1943) P. 9; L'Energie humaine (1937), Oeuvres, VI, 192.
56 PH, 343, note 1. [Eng. trans., 308, note 2.] The official English translation is negligent here in rendering the French.
57 Les directions et les conditions de l'avenir (1948), Oeuvres, V, 305. The words in brackets were added by Teilhard in a footnote to the word “condition.”
58 de Lubac, Pensée religieuse …, p. 100. See the excellent treatment of Teilhard's confrontation of these two sources of knowledge in d'Armagnac, “La pensée du Père Teilhard …,” pp. 603–04.
59 PH, 332, note 1. [Eng. trans., 298, note 1.] Italics are in the French text.
60 Ma position intellectuelle (1948), published as “La pensée du P. Teilhard de Chardin par lui-même,” Les Études Philosophiques 10 (1955), 581.Google Scholar Emphasis added.
61 Science et Christ (1921), pp. 9, 11.
62 Ma position intellectuelle (1948), in Les Études Philosophiques 10 (1955), 581.Google Scholar
63 Comment je vois (1948), p. 1. See also Barrière de la mort et co-réflection (1955), Oeuvres, VII, 426–29, on the relation of science to Revelation.
64 On this orientation of Teilhard's thought see Crespy, George, La Pensée théologique de Teilhard de Chardin (Paris, 1961), p. 63.Google Scholar
65 Note sur le progrès (1920), Oeuvres, V, 34–35.
68 Comment je crois (1934), p. 23, note 2.
67 Comment je vois (1948), p. 16. The words in brackets were added by Teilhard in a footnote to the word “necessary.” See also his remark that same year in Trois choses que je vois, p. 4: “The point of human maturation” is “a condition (not indeed sufficient and decisive but necessary)” for “the point of the Parousia of Christ.”
68 Comment je vois (1948), p. 25.
69 Letter of January 1, 1951, in Cuénot, Teilhard de Chardin, p. 330, note 3.
70 Le Christique (1955), p. 8.
71 PH, 330–31. [Eng. trans., 297.]
72 See texts cited above in footnotes 28 and 30. The three strata of which we are here speaking should not be confused with the three directions of Teilhard's thought indicated in the text cited in footnote one. It will be readily seen that the first direction indicated in that text includes the first two strata now under discussion.
73 The word is Julian Huxley's and is used in his perceptive Introduction to the English edition of The Phenomenon of Man, page 18. Huxley sees quite clearly (page 19) that a personal Omega cannot legitimately be postulated from scientific data, since on the strict level of phenomena there is no basis for “personifying the non-personal elements of reality.” On the other hand, he does not seem willing to admit the central importance of love and freedom in Teilhard's explanation of evolution, both of which are key concepts in his “psychological act of faith.”
74 PH, 328 [Eng. trans., 294]: “Doubtless I should never have ventured to envisage the latter [i.e., Omega] or formulate the hypothesis rationally if, in my consciousness as a believer, I had not found not only its speculative model but also its living reality.”
75 Comment je vois (1948), p. 23.