by Ken Coates
Sex, Reproduction and Guilt: The stress on celibacy in the philosophies of salvation, whether religious or secular, points to the importance of sexuality in the reproduction of the species and the bondage of man to nature. Not surprisingly, the sexual impulse and the intense pleasure in the act of coitus, though momentary, represent the most direct and powerful manifestation of the will-to-life. For what is involved here is no less than the continuation of the species for which nature has programmed us. And it is the blind urge to exist and to propagate that stupefies us into accepting the illusion that to be a human individual is worthwhile (Janaway 1999, 1). Thus something that ought not to be continues its existence driven by the will-to-life. Put differently man’s life takes the form of a ‘compulsory service that he is in duty bound to carry out. ‘But who has contracted this debt? His begetter, in the enjoyment of sexual pleasure’. Because ‘the one has enjoyed this pleasure, the other must live, suffer and die’ (Schopenhauer 1969, V.II, 568).
In spite of the importance, indeed centrality, of sex in our lives Schopenhauer finds a conspiracy of silence around it. It is ever-present in our lives yet never mentioned. And philosophers too with rare exceptions have ignored the phenomenon altogether. Indeed sexuality in general, and the genitals and sexual intercourse in particular, are associated with shame and guilt. Thus we find that the act through which the will affirms itself and humans come into existence is one of which people are ashamed of and ‘which therefore they carefully conceal; in fact if they are caught in the act, they are as alarmed as if they had been detected in a crime’ ( 569). Upon cool reflection we often think of coitus ‘with repugnance, and in an exalted mood with disgust’ (569). Why, wonders Schopenhauer, this guilt and shame at this strongest expression of the will-to-life? Clearly if our existence was a ‘gift of goodness’, a praiseworthy and commendable state, the act that perpetrates it would have had a different complexion. On the other hand if it was a wrongdoing, an error, a false step as it were to which we were compelled by blind will then we should feel exactly as we do about this act, i.e. with guilt and shame. ‘No wonder not only coitus but the body parts that serve procreation are treated with shame’ ( 570). And it is significant of nature’s symbolism that the individual makes his entry in this world ‘through the portal of the sex organs’ ( 571).
Romantic love, which creates the illusion of being something sublime and exalted, is at bottom but a ruse of nature to bring men and women together for the purpose of reproduction and the continuation of the species. For the ‘consummation’ of love requires the physical union of the two lovers and in the child born they see their love sealed physically as it were. But there is more to it than that. We find that the glances of these lovers ‘meet longingly’ yet ever so ‘secretly, fearfully and stealthily’. Why? Because in their heart of hearts they realize that they ‘are the traitors who seek to perpetuate the whole want and drudgery, which would otherwise speedily reach an end; this they wish to frustrate, as others like them have frustrated it before’ (Schopenhauer 1977, V.III, 375).
Denial of the Will and Liberation: Not surprisingly Schopenhauer comes to the conclusion that ‘We have not to be pleased but rather sorry about the existence of the world, that its non-existence would be preferable to its existence: that it is something which at bottom ought not to be’ (Janaway 1999a, 332). Clearly the pain and suffering and other negative states of being that humans and other living beings are subjected to, including that which they inflict on each other, and the ultimate futility of existence are what leads Schopenhauer to the above conclusion. The problem then is how it might be brought to an end, i.e. how to escape from the bondage of the will and all that it entails. Schopenhauer is not altogether pessimistic about our prospect of salvation. Not unlike Brahmanism and Buddhism he too believes that knowledge is the key to our liberation from existence. What is required is the denial of the will-to-life.
However, nature has implanted a strong will-to-life in us which stubbornly resists denial. And the less developed their intellect and consciousness the more are people beholden to the will. Thus the ‘lower a man stands in an intellectual regard’ the less is existence itself a problem for him; ‘everything, how it is and that it is, appears to him rather a matter of course’ (Schopenhauer 1977, V. 1., 360). His intellect remains ‘perfectly true to its original destiny’ which is to serve the will. It thus remains ‘closely bound up with world and nature, as an integral part of them’. (360). However even for those few who have been able to see through the veil of Maya, so to speak, and have grasped the true nature of existence denial of the will-to-life presents a formidable challenge. Consciousness and intellect have to wage a constant battle against the natural pull of the will ( 505-6). Nonetheless liberation can only come through the denial of the will.
But how can this be achieved? It is asceticism and the renunciation of all desires and striving that can lead to the renunciation of the will. The highest expression of such willlessness is to be found among saints and other noble souls who attain to a state of holiness. History as well as art provides us with many examples of such individuals who may be Christians, Hindus or Buddhists, i.e. belong to religions of salvation, or have no religious affiliation whatsoever. What they have in common is that state of mind in which renunciation of the will becomes possible. The route to this is through knowledge which may be abstract and philosophical or intuitive and spiritual. In either case it involves an understanding which sees through the surface reality or the phenomenal view of things and grasps the essence of existence as a blind force of will, a force that dominates the life of all creatures. The process of enlightenment might begin with the loosening of the sense of egoism and individuation which form an integral part of the will. The result is a realization that the same will-to-life is present in all creatures. Echoing Lord Krishna in the Gita ( see Ch. 1 above) Schopenhauer writes that a man ‘who recognizes in all beings his own inmost and true self, must also regard the infinite sufferings of all beings as his own and takes on himself the pain of the whole world’ ( 489). He is no longer concerned with the changing joys and sorrows of his own person. Rather having seen ‘through the principle of individuation, all lies equally near him. He knows the whole, comprehends its nature, and finds that it consists in a constant passing away, vain striving, inward conflict, and continual suffering (489)’. After such knowledge why should he assert life any more through acts of will? Unlike those still in thrall of egoism and individuation, which provide them with motives for volition he has none. His knowledge of the whole, the nature of the thing-in-itself, ‘becomes a quieter of all and every volition’ (489). The will turns away from life and shudders at the pleasures it recognizes as the assertion of life. He ‘now attains to the state of voluntary renunciation, resignation, true indifference, and perfect willlessness’ ( 490). He desires no sensual gratification and denies the sexual impulse totally. He disowns this nature which appears in him already expressed through his body.
Thus ‘Voluntary and complete chastity is the first step in asceticism or the denial of the will to live.’ Quite apart from renouncing sensual pleasure this act is important in that it denies ‘the assertion of the will which extends beyond the individual life’ through procreation and ensures that with the life of the body the will also ceases ( 491). Asceticism also involves voluntary and intentional poverty, the giving away of possessions and resources, as a means of mortifying the will ‘so that the satisfaction of the wishes, the sweet of life, shall not again arouse the will, against which self-knowledge has conceived such a horror’( 493). Although the ascetic’s bodily existence, as the manifestation of the will, shall continue the individual will nourish the body sparingly lest its vigor and well-being ignites the will. He will accept all insults and wrongs returning good for evil. He will break down the will through constant privation and suffering so that when death comes it will merely put an end to a weak residue of the manifestation of the will which has long since perished through free-denial of it
self (493). Such is Schopenhauer’s view of the denial of the will to live, the thorny path to achieve liberation.
Schopenhauer compares the state of willlessness of such a person with the feeling when aesthetic pleasure, the enjoyment of the beautiful, silences our will temporarily and lifts us above all wishes and cares of the world. As he puts it ‘we become, as it were, freed from ourselves’ (504). This temporary state of liberation and tranquility is enjoyed continually by the individual who ‘after many bitter struggles with his own nature’ has at last overcome the will-to-life. In Schopenhauer’s lyrical prose, he ‘continues to exist only as a pure, knowing being, the undimmed mirror of the world. Nothing can trouble him more, nothing can move him, for he has cut all the thousand cords of will which hold us bound to the world’ (504-5). ‘Life and its forms now pass before him as a fleeting illusion, as a light morning dream before half-waking eyes, the real world already shining through it so that it can no longer deceive; and like this morning dream, they finally vanish altogether without any violent transition’ (505). In many ways this is reminiscent of Buddhist nirvana or Hindu moksha experienced in this life.
This path to liberation is arrived at through knowledge - intuitive or otherwise - about the world as suffering. There is however another way in which the will-to-life is negated and that is through suffering inflicted by fate. It is through extreme suffering experienced personally rather than through knowledge that results in resignation and the virtual extinction of the will. This, Schopenhauer believes, is the more common way to willlessness than the path of knowledge. For the latter not only involves identification with the world’s sufferings but going beyond it. And only in a few cases is this knowledge sufficient to bring about the denial of the will. Why? Because even with an individual ‘who approaches this point’ the blandishments of the will are ever present and act as a ‘constant hindrance to the denial of the will, and a constant temptation to the renewed assertion of it’. Hence in most cases the will must be broken by great personal suffering ‘before its self-conquest appears’ (507).
It is only ‘when suffering assumes the form of pure knowledge, and then this knowledge, as a quieter of the will , produces true resignation’ that it can be the path to salvation’ (397). Indeed true salvation, ‘deliverance from life and suffering, cannot even be imagined without complete denial of the will. Till then, everyone is nothing but this will itself’ (397). The difference between the two routes to salvation lies not in the end state, which is identical, but how it is arrived at, i.e. through knowledge of the sufferings of the world or through personal experience of suffering.
Rejection of Suicide: Significantly enough, Schopenhauer rejects suicide as a path to the denial of the will. Talking of suicide in general he claims that far from denial it is in fact an affirmation of life. For what suicide involves is not turning against the will to live but rather expressing some great disappointment or dissatisfaction with life. The people who commit suicide will life. They desire pleasure and happiness, but find that their own life has not given them what they wanted and therefore choose to end it. This is indirectly an affirmation of the will. The same could be said about people who seek to escape pain and suffering by ending their life.
The essential difference between denial of the will and its affirmation through suicide is that whereas the former involves shunning the pleasures of life the latter involves shunning its sorrows. Personal escape from pain and suffering, even in the extreme form of self-destruction, does not amount to denial of the will. Salvation cannot be achieved without having the knowledge or understanding about the nature of the will to live and a conscious renunciation of this will with all that it entails. Suicide does not meet this condition for the suicide has not conquered ‘his own nature’. And further the suicide merely denies ‘the individual, not the species….it is a quite futile and foolish act, for the thing-in-itself remains unaffected by it’ (Schopenhauer 1969, V.1, 399). But what, we may ask, of metaphysical suicide? For arguably if I come to understand the true nature of phenomenal existence, i.e. as the outward manifestation of a blind will to live which involves endless striving and suffering without any ultimate aim or purpose and of which I am a part, it is almost a moral obligation on my part to dissociate myself from it. And what better way to do this than to commit suicide and end this individual manifestation of the will? But this is not a line of argument that Schopenhauer would accept. Although he does not discuss metaphysical suicide per se it would seem that the same argument applies here as to suicide in general. Thus it could be construed as an act of egoism which seeks to end the phenomenal manifestation of the will without really expelling from within the will to live and attaining true willlessness.
It seems that Schopenhauer’s notion of the denial of the will demands that we continue our bodily existence while at the same time denying the will. This requires complete freedom from egoism, the practice of asceticism, self-mortification, celibacy and the like. The goal seems to be to attain a state of knowledge and consciousness while denying all willing. What remains is only a weak residue of life which disappears with death. Schopenhauer emphasizes that this is not like other deaths because here ‘the inner nature itself is abolished’ (Schopenhauer 1977, V.1, 494). Schopenhauer scholars such as Dale Jacquette have noted his ‘enigmatic remark’ in this connection, viz. “what everyone wills in his innermost being, that must he be; and what everyone is, is just what he wills.”(quoted in Janaway 1999a, 308). This is reminiscent of Buddhism and Brahmanism where there is an insistence on being free of all desires and attaining an inner detachment from the world. Failing this one cannot achieve liberation and will be reborn. Presumably for the same reason suicide is not a permanent way out of existence for one’s inner soul has not been free of attachment to the world and therefore rebirth will follow.
However the main difference between the Schopenhauerian notion of salvation, i.e. the denial of the will to live, and these religious conceptions of moksha and nirvana is that the two latter are based on belief in the cycle of rebirths from which liberation is sought. This requires a total freedom and inner liberation from the world which comes through a form of gnosis arrived at through a long drawn process of asceticism and associated practices. Schopenhauer’s secular philosophy does not involve belief in rebirth or the existence of a ‘soul’ distinct from the body. Yet his notion of salvation seems to suggest a quasi-religious inner freedom from willing arrived at through a somewhat similar process. What also remains unclear is why in a secular context ‘abstract’ knowledge about the nature of the will and the decision to end one’s phenomenal existence should not be a legitimate way of denying the will to live. Schopenhauer scholars have of course noted the rather over-subtle and seemingly contradictory aspects of his conception of the self as well as the will, both of which are involved in the denial of the will to live (see e.g. Jacquette 1999, 306-10; Janaway 1999a, 335-40).
Summary and Comments: Schopenhauer’s view of existence may be said to be broadly similar to that of Brahmanism and Buddhism. In common with these religions Schopenhauer finds human existence to be an ‘evil’ – full of pain and suffering, ending in death and with no aim or purpose other than its own perpetuation. He relates life’s suffering to his metaphysics of will – a blind urge or will to live which drives all living beings including humans to survive and reproduce themselves. The ensuing struggle for existence pits individuals of the same species against one another as well as one group or species against another resulting in conflict, violence, pain and suffering. In common with Brahmanism and Buddhism, Schopenhauer too believes that human willing and striving, in short desires, is endless and can never be satisfied. Thus through these innate drives a pointless existence, with its pain and suffering and insatiable striving, is perpetuated. An important insight of Schopenhauer is that life thrives on devouring other lives. In the animal world, whether on land or in the sea killing and eating other living beings goes on quite openly. In the human world the killing
is systematic and relentless but hidden from view. Nonetheless humans systematically kill and eat animals, fish, plants and other forms of living things in order to survive. In this sense killing and inflicting suffering is intrinsic to life. The cruelty involved in existence is most clearly evident in the state of nature but in the human world too history and everyday living provides ample evidence of the same phenomenon. Although good also exists it is marginal and weak compared with the ferocious and dominating presence of evil in its multifarious forms. Moreover for Schopenhauer the very presence of evil condemns existence and no evil act can be undone by any previous or subsequent good action.
Comparing humans with animals Schopenhauer finds that while the former are capable of enjoying many refined pleasures they are also subject to more pain and suffering. For example humans are aware of the finitude of life, of inevitable aging and decay and the painful and protracted wait for death which comes as the end. It is above all one’s eventual death and disappearance that underlies the vanity of existence. However the will to live implanted within us creates an innate bias in favor of survival and reproduction. But moral sensitivity and an impartial view of what we are and what our lives entail should make it quite obvious that life in general and human life in particular is a kind of aberration, an error which ought not to be. In common with Brahmanism and Buddhism Schopenhauer believes that real knowledge about the nature of the world, a world driven by the blind and insatiable will to live, is the key to emancipation from existence.