Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
When morality evaporates
When morality evaporates
Jul 1, 2025 2:41 AM

When Tzvetan Todorov died on Feb. 7, the Bulgarian/French philosopher and literary critic was lamented only in certain intellectual ghettoes. To the men and women eulogizing Todorov in these circles, he was feted properly if not stingily, which is most unfortunate. Finite word counts are a harsh mistress when a fellow writer endeavors to create a fully realized portrait of his or her subject.

Todorov leaves behind a body of historical and moral philosophy that connects the dots between the great European humanist writers prior to the Marxist experiments of the 20th century – Comte, Montaigne, Montesquieu, for example – and such documentarians of Nazi and Soviet evils as Elie Wiesel, Primo Levi and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Unlike the listed documentarians, Todorov never suffered the deprivations of the Soviet gulags or Nazi concentration camps. He did, however, endure the suppression of individual freedom until he was 24 years old, the age he emigrated from Soviet-satellite Bulgaria to France more than 50 years ago.

Why then should we celebrate Todorov’s plishments? What distinguishes Todorov’s works on the totalitarian experiments of the past 100 years is his focus on the moral witness by those denied fundamental dignities in the Soviet camps and German lagers. Some of these men and women silently and not so silently protested the yoke of oppression for the benefit of those other than themselves and immediate family and close friends. As Todorov noted in Facing the Extreme: Moral Life in the Concentration Camps (1996):

There are various perspectives from which the accounts of life in the camps can be read. One can ponder the precise chain of events that led to the creation of the camps and then to their extinction; one can debate the political significance of the camps; on can extract sociological or psychological lessons from them. Yet even though I cannot ignore those perspectives altogether, I would like to take a different approach. I want to look at the camps from the perspective of moral life and … concern myself with individual destinies rather than numbers and dates. But already I hear an objection: Wasn’t that question settled a long time ago? Haven’t we learned only too well the sad and simple truth the camps revealed, namely, that in extreme situations all traces of moral life evaporate as men e beasts locked in a merciless struggle for survival?

Todorov quotes Tadeusz Borowski’s takeaway from Auschwitz: “[M]orality, national solidarity, patriotism and the ideals of freedom, justice and human dignity had all slid off man like a rotten rag…. There is no crime that a man will mit in order to save himself.” Todorov finds similar themes in Varlam Shalamov’s Kolyma Tales, which recounts stories inspired by the author’s 17 years of incarceration in the infamous Soviet gulag.

“When the survival instinct totally dominates moral life, one loses a sense passion for the suffering of others and no longer offers the help one normally would,” writes Todorov. “Rather than aid the next person, one might instead further his decline if it meant relief from one’s own suffering.” Certainly, Todorov admits, there’s enough evidence to support this thesis. But, he adds: “If an individual’s every action is determined by the orders of those above him and the need to survive, then he has no freedom left at all; no longer can he truly exercise his will and choose one behavior over another. And where there is no choice, there is also no place for any kind of moral life whatsoever.”

However, Todorov’s research details a king’s ransom of choices among prisoners – often refuting those prisoners’ own claims. Dr. Ena Weiss was an Austrian confined at Auschwitz who told another inmate she placed her own needs “first, second, and third. Then nothing. Then myself again – and then all the others.” Like Humphrey Bogart’s Rick Blaine in Casablanca – “I stick my neck out for nobody” – Weiss overstated her self-preservation dramatically. Just as Bogart’s anti-hero eventually reveals himself as a champion of the World War II underground freedom fighters, Weiss assisted “tens, indeed hundreds of other prisoners.”

Other examples abound to support Todorov’s conclusion. Father Maximilian Kolbe was canonized after he gave his own life in return for the life of a father and husband while imprisoned in Auschwitz. In Voices from the Gulag (1999), Todorov adopts the first-person narrative style of Studs Terkel, transcribing stories told by Bulgarian gulag survivors. Had Terkel read these reminiscences, however, he might have loosened his fondness for socialism significantly. In her own words, Lilyana Princheva recounts some of her experiences as a prisoner for nearly six years in Belene and Bosna:

When I think about all that can be said regarding the truly awful conditions at these camps…. At Bosna, we actually lived in a stable. We worked like beasts of burden in the fields. We were constantly humiliated, and the clothes we were given were no less humiliating: they were old, tattered army fatigues. We worked from morning to night, under the blazing sun of summer and in the paralyzing cold of winter.

Despite these conditions, Princheva explained:

We survived, however, because we kept our humanity – and did so despite their best effort to persuade us, day in, day out, and around the clock, that we were useless, that we were vermin and a danger to society. They humiliated us and tried to sap our ability to think for ourselves. In our ranks were anarchists, Trotskyites, Agrarians, and those who refused all labels and Party affiliations. In this intolerable atmosphere of daily hardship and hard and pointless labor, we were saved by that aspiration shared by all human beings – namely, the desire for dignity, humanity, and goodness.

[Another] example of the power of the human spirit … For example, we all agreed that whenever a package arrived, we would give it to whomever was ill. Though starving, we wouldn’t allow ourselves to eat a single thing from the package. It was for our rade.

Unfortunately, Princheva goes on to relate that the camps often succeeded in dehumanizing many other prisoners. Many, but not all – and perhaps not even the majority of the incarcerated as Todorov reminds his readers again and again.

It’s true that Podorov in his later years made ments drawing false equivalencies between the activities of Islamic terrorists and Western military actions deployed against them. While unfortunate, considering the breadth of his knowledge concerning the evils of totalitarianism, such statements are only footnotes to Todorov’s greater plishments.

One thing is for certain and that is Communism and Fascism weren’t defeated by the scolding of Western politicians. It was undermined when it collapsed of its own weight, expedited by such voices as Weisel, Levi and Solzhenitsyn who witnessed its crimes and everyday horrors. Perhaps as well it monplace displays of the moral qualities of kindness, caring and recognition of each others’ dignity by the inmates in the gulags and concentration camps that helped doom such lamentable locations of human misery to the dustbin of recent history. Much of Todorov’s body of work makes a pelling argument that morality is a powerful weapon against the enemies of human freedom.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
Explainer: What you should know about the 2018 partial government shutdown
What just happened? On Friday the federal government entered a partial shutdown after the Senate failed to pass a spending bill that includes border wall funding. President Trump refuses to sign any additional funding that does not include $5.1 billion in additional money to pay for an extension of the border wall, allowing him to fulfill his primary campaign promise. What is a partial government shutdown? A government shutdown occurs either when Congress fails to pass funding bills or when...
Joy for the world: The true source of our economic witness
As the culture around us continues to move farther into post-Christian territory, the Christian response has often taken the shape of heavy-handed strategy or top-down mobilization. The goal: to win the culture back! In our economic activity, we focus on starting “Christian businesses” or “social enterprises” and using our profits and salaries to fund “kingdom endeavors.” In our political action, we opt for politicians who share specific religious beliefs, hoping they will somehow set the world to rights. In the...
Criminal justice reform: What is it and why does it matter?
On Tuesday, the U.S. Senate voted 87-12 to pass the First Step Act. If enacted, the legislation would provide some reform of prisons and sentencing at the federal level. The most significant changes would be the implementation of incentives for prisoners to engage in “evidence-based recidivism reduction programs” and increased judicial discretion in sentencing. The bill now goes to the House for a vote, where it is expected to pass, and President Donald Trump said he would sign it into...
Gilet jaunes and the issue of intergenerational justice
France’s “yellow vest” protesters oppose the nation’s crushing carbon taxes on fossil fuels, but a deeper issue stoking discontent remains unexplored. Without addressing that issue, President Emmanuel Macron’s concessions to the gilet jaunes protesters “will certainly not resolve France’s underlying economic problems,” writes Professor Philip Booth in a new essay for Religion& LibertyTransatlantic titled, “Gilet jaune: the uprising of a generation.” Arguably, we are beginning to see the results of the disastrous decisions to set up “pay-as-you-go” pension and healthcare...
5 Facts about Christmas
Christmas is the most widely observed cultural holiday in the world. Here are five factsyou should know about the memoration of the birth of Jesus: 1. No one knows what day or month Jesus was born (though some scholars speculate that it was in September). The earliest evidence for the observance of December 25 as the birthday of Christappears in the Philocalian posed in Rome in 336. 2. Despite the impression given by many nativity plays andChristmascarols, the Bible doesn’t...
Is the UK facing massive child poverty?
Charles Dickens wrote in Oliver Twist that “very sage, very deep” British leaders “established the rule that all poor people should have the alternative … of being starved by a gradual process in the [poor]house, or by a quick one out of it.” If one were to believe a recent UN report on poverty, the fate of the poor remains Dickensian. Orrather, Hobbesian, as UN Special Rapporteur PhilipAlston quoted the philosopher’s ubiquitous description of life as “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish,...
UK govt to investigate global Christian persecution
As the Westcontinues to celebrate the 12 days of Christmas which extend into the New Year,some 215 million Christiansworldwide face violence or repression. On the day after Christmas, the Britishgovernment launched a review of Christian persecution in “key countries” –especially in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa – and to seek ways the UK canhelp those who are suffering. Christianity is on the“verge of extinction in its birthplace,” saidForeign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, who ordered the report. “So often the persecution...
Criminal justice reform: What does economics have to say?
This is part two of a series on criminal justice reform. Read part one here. For many, crime and criminal justice are not obvious economic issues, despite their effects on public budgets due to the cost of courts, policing, investigating crimes, and much more. Private efforts impose significant costs, as well, whether from house alarms, flood lights, or door locks, not to mention the costs incurred by victims. But costs such as these are not the primary source of economic...
Teaching The Gulag Archipelago to American college students
In December, the PowerBlog is marking the centenary of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s birth (Dec. 11, 1918) “Why didn’t they tell us this? I never heard this from my teachers.” That’s the late Edward E. Ericson Jr., Solzhenitsyn scholar and Calvin College professor, describing a typical reaction in his classroom when his students first encountered Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago. The video that follows below was found in the Acton archives. It is from the raw interview recording that ultimately was edited...
What you can do this coming new year to increase economic freedom
When we think of the concept “economic freedom” we often think about essential liberties and the factors that make them possible (e.g., free markets, the rule of law, and property rights). But for Christians economic freedom is not an end unto itself but the means for freeing our resources to use in ways that God intends. Being free of the bonds of economic statism is therefore useless if we use our liberty to enslave ourselves. As Kevin DeYoung asks, Do...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved