Maritain, Jacques

Maritain, Jacques (zhäk märētăN`), 1882–1973, French Neo-Thomist philosopher. He was educated at the Sorbonne and the Univ. of Heidelberg and was much influenced by the philosophy of Henri Bergson. He was originally Protestant, but became a Roman Catholic through association with Léon Bloy and devoted himself to the study of Thomism and its application to all aspects of modern life. Maritain opposed what he regarded as the modern tendency to disown the proper function of reason; he valued philosophy highly and posed the "metaphysics of existence," the study of being, as the highest type of human intellectual activity. He urged Christian involvement in secular affairs, a view that greatly influenced members of the Second Vatican Council. Maritain was French ambassador to the Vatican (1945–48) and taught in France and the United States. His works include The Degrees of Knowledge (1932, tr. 1937); True Humanism (1936, tr. 1938); Art and Scholasticism (1920, tr. 1929); Man and the State (1951); On the Use of Philosophy (1961); and The Peasant of the Garonne (1966, tr. 1968).

Bibliography

See studies by J. W. Evans, ed. (1963) and J. W. Hanke (1973).

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Maritain, Jacques

(born Nov. 18, 1882, Paris, France—died April 28, 1973, Toulouse) French philosopher. Reared a Protestant, he converted to Roman Catholicism in 1906. His thought, which is based on Aristotelianism and Thomism, incorporates ideas of other Classical and modern philosophers and draws upon anthropology, sociology, and psychology. Among the dominant themes in his work are: that science, philosophy, poetry, and mysticism are among many legitimate ways of knowing reality; that the individual person transcends the political community; that natural law expresses not only what is natural in the world but also what is known naturally by human beings; that moral philosophy must take into account other branches of human knowledge; and that people holding different beliefs must cooperate in the formation and maintenance of salutary political institutions. Among his major works are Art and Scholasticism (1920), The Degrees of Knowledge (1932), Art and Poetry (1935), Man and the State (1951), and Moral Philosophy (1960).

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Maritain, Jacques 

Born Nov. 18, 1882, in Paris; died Apr. 29, 1973, in Toulouse. French philosopher. Representative of neo-Thomism.

Maritain was educated at the Henry IV Lycee and at the Sorbonne. He was a student of H. Bergson. In 1906 he converted to Catholicism. He was a professor at the Catholic Institute in Paris (from 1914), the Institute of Medieval Studies in Toronto (from 1933), Princeton University (1941-42), and Columbia University (1941-44). In 1945-48 he served as French ambassador to the Vatican. In 1948-53 he was a professor and after 1953 professor emeritus at Princeton University.

Maritain considered the entire development of the philosophy of the modern period to be a decline and degeneration of philosophic thought. In his view the work of Luther, Descartes, and Rousseau represented the triumph of subjectivism and arbitrariness in the spheres of faith, thought, and feeling, which led to moral and social chaos. Maritain believed that chaos could be overcome by returning to medieval “clarity” and suprapersonal objectivity. Opposing the intuitivism of Bergson, Maritain sought to reconcile “grace and nature, faith and reason, theology and philosophy” (De Bergson a Thomas d’Aquin, Paris, 1947, p. 133). According to Maritain, science has its own object—the created world—but “above” this natural world there exists a higher, supernatural world.

In New York, Maritain initiated a series of publications dealing with problems of “political philosophy” (Civilization), which included works criticizing modern capitalism and bourgeois democracy from positions of “Christian democracy” and “humanism,” but refuting the socialist transformation of society. Maritain is also known for his works in art and pedagogy.

WORKS

Antimoderne. Paris, 1922.
Science et sagesse. Paris, 1935.
Humanisme intégral. Paris, 1936.
Christianisme et démocratic. New York, 1943.
Trois Réformateurs. Paris, 1947.
Art et scolastique. Paris, 1947.
Réflexions sur l’Amerique. Paris, 1958.
Pour Une Philosophic de l’education. Paris, 1959.
La Philosophic morale. Paris, 1960.
La Philosophic dans la cite. Paris, 1960.
Dieu et la permission du ma I. Paris, 1963.
L’Intuition creatrice dans l’art et dans la poesie. Paris, 1966.

REFERENCES

Kuznetsov, V. N. Frantsuzskaia burzhuaznaia filosofiia 20 v. Moscow, 1970. Pages 173-201.
Jaroszewski, T. M. Lichnost’ i obshchestvo. Moscow, 1973. (Translated from Polish.)
Rossi, E. II pensiero politico di J. Maritain. Milan, 1956.
Simonsen, V. L. L’Esthetique de J. Maritain. Copenhagen, 1956.
Gallagher, D., and I. Gallagher. The Achievement of Jacques and Raissa Maritain: A Bibliography (1906-1961). New York, 1962.
Forni, G. La filosofia del/a storia nelpensiero politico di Jacques Maritain. Bologna [1965].
Fecher, Ch. A. The Philosophy of J. Maritain. New York, 1969.

T. A. SAKHAROVA