The impact of Johann Gottfried Herder upon Slavic Nationalism in the late 1800s cannot be underestimated. He has been "acclaimed the spiritual father of the Slav national revival"⁽¹⁾ by many authors and his theories on nationalism have been appropriated by historians, linguists, poets and other scholars. These appropriations usually were only partial however and used for particular political and economic gain. This paper will examine Herder's view on nationalism in general, Slavic nationalism in particular and the impact these had upon the Slavic countries and individuals within them.

There were two major themes to Herder's theory on nationalism. Those of Volk and Humanitat. The Volk were a group of people who possessed a sense of collective identity based upon language, symbols, customs and "certain mutual understandings of right and fairness."⁽²⁾ The Volk were an ethnic, not a racial, community as Herder believed that all races were equal and any sort of domination of one race by another was anathema to him. Two elements made up the Volk, the Bourgeoisie majority and the intellectual minority. The aristocracy and the peasants were viewed as being outside of the Volk. Each of the groups of Volk possessed its own Volkgeist. This was a "set of customs and a life style, a way of perceiving and behaving that [was] of value solely because it [was unique]."⁽³⁾ The main function of the Community then was to foster individuality, self-expression and self-development within the society/culture. Humanitat is a harder concept to qualify, and in fact Herder never defines the term exactly in his writings. The term is "an act of faith, a moral and religious conviction about man's social destiny."⁽⁴⁾ It is a belief in cultural self-determination/nationalism that allows all cultures the right to exist as equals without malice towards one another. The is no room in Herder's system for cultural superiority over others, it is a "human brotherhood, and not Deutschland uber Alles."⁽⁵⁾

The key to the system was a belief in the superiority of cooperation over the subordination of others. One could only achieve the fullest development in collaboration with others. Nations should thus develop their own capacities (artistic, political et cetera) and at the same time appreciate those of others much as Rousseau taught that a child should develop all of his faculties and then be sympathetic to others when grown to adulthood.⁽⁶⁾ Herder wanted to transform the world from one of mechanical dynastic states to one of organic nation-states based upon self-determination. This would create a "loose association of autonomous states, cooperating in matters of common interest on a basis of equal partnership, irrespective of size, economic development and other individual differences, without a common political authority or formal agreements to bind them."⁽⁷⁾ The common interest and common purpose would moderate nationalist tendencies, an argument for a kind of inter-dependence. In order to contribute anything to humanity, nationalities must develop their own particular culture, especially in the areas of language and literature. The final justification of national existence lay in the national groups contribution to humanity at large. This ran counter to the imposition of modern civilization's uniform patterns of behaviour, and instead, was for the varied original cultures whose patterns came from their individual needs. Culture was indeed a universal phenomena but Herder did not believe in a universal standardized culture. The whole system then stressed the need for balance and integral wholeness much as Voltaire believed in the totality of human aspirations. The split with Voltaire came with his idea of cultural monism.⁽⁸⁾ Herder's nationalism was, in essence, a humanitarian one and not the narrow idealism of the 19^th century. To him "national glory [was] a great seducer"⁽⁹⁾ and national pride was "ridiculous, preposterous [and] pernicious [...] the most harmful disease in history."⁽¹⁰⁾ Herder was absolutely against national exclusiveness. He believed that nations should:

learn, learn incessantly from and with the others until all have comprehended the difficult lesson: No nationality has been solely designated by God as the chosen people on earth; above all we must seek the truth and cultivate the garden of the common good. Hence no nationality of Europe may separate itself sharply, and foolishly say, 'With us alone, with us dwells all wisdom.'⁽¹¹⁾

For this reason Herder had nothing but scorn for historical figures such as Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar and Charlemagne whom he viewed as villains of the highest order for their attempts to crush other cultures and impose their own upon the defeated peoples. Plurality and diversity were the key elements of cultural life with individual languages being the most vital source of a people's collective consciousness.

Uniformity was not a true unity for Herder. It was not a natural thing, and eventually, all people would rebel against any attempts at uniformity that sublimated individual cultures and societies, no matter the cost to themselves. This did not, however, make him a revolutionary. Herder believed in a more evolutionary system of change. Change that was gradual, natural and reasonable. This despite his obvious dislike of the aristocracy whom he viewed as the "very embodiment of human stupidity."⁽¹²⁾

It was these very elites whom Herder envisioned as lording over the Slavic peoples in Central and Eastern Europe and Russia. His knowledge of the Slavic people was fairly limited however. He only knew first hand of the Baltic Slavs and for the rest he depended upon "somewhat primitivistically coloured travel reports (especially of Russia)."⁽¹³⁾ The Russian Empire was, in his time, the major check on Prussian imperialist designs in the East which may account for some of his pro-Russian beliefs as he was ardently against imperialism. Herder idealized Russia and felt that increased Russian nationalism would eventually lead to emancipation of all the Slavic peoples. This ran counter to the history of Russian domination over the Slavs, because of which it may be argued that the "mild and ineffective"⁽¹⁴⁾ Joseph II of the Hapsburgs may have been a better leader for the Slavs than Catherine II of Russia. There was a mix of two beliefs, that of Slavic paritcularist nationalism and that of Pan-Slavic nationalism under Russian leadership which underlay a fundamental belief in the eventual Slavic accession to a position of dominance in Europe.

The Slavs were not seen as warriors or adventurers by Herder, but instead as settlers who had merely settled on land others had relinquished. They were agrarian and good traders. The Slavs, to Herder, were "liberal, hospitable to excess, lovers of pastoral freedom, but submissive and obedient, enemies to spoil and rapine."⁽¹⁵⁾ These qualities made them a people who were easily oppressed by later conquerors. They were also "never ambitious of sovereignty, had among them no princes addicted to war, and thought little of paying tribute, so they could but enjoy their lands in peace."⁽¹⁶⁾ This was, of course, a highly romanticized version of Slavic history which, in reality, was no less bloody then the histories of the rest of the European peoples. This view gave Herder a very sympathetic outlook towards the Slavs:

It was unfortunate for these people, that their love of quiet and domestic industry was incompatible with any permanent military establishment, though they were not defective in valour in the heat of resistance: unfortunate that their situation brought them so near to the Germans on the on side, and on the other left them exposed to the attacks of the Tartars from the East, from whom, particularly from the [Mongols], they had much to suffer, and much they patiently bore.⁽¹⁷⁾

These people were still being oppressed in Herder's time and he felt that they would rise up from their oppressed state and reinvigorate their culture. If legislation and politics, and not just military spirit, promoted industry and commerce in the regions where the Slavs dwelled, then these "once industrious and happy people, will at length awake from their long and heavy slumber, shake off the chains of slavery, enjoy the possession of their delightful lands from the Adriatic Sea to the Carpathian Mountains, from the Don to the Muldasu, and celebrate on them their ancient festivals of peaceful trade and industry."⁽¹⁸⁾ Herder made a direct call for the Slavs who had "sunk so low to rise from their long, enervating sleep and reinstate their forgotten history and folklore."⁽¹⁹⁾ He extolled the historic Slavic heroes such as Alexander the Good, Stephen the Great and Michael the Brave and thus glorified the Slavic spirit.

The ideals espoused by Herder were eagerly seized upon by the Slavic minorities in the Austro-Hungarian Empire which were just beginning their campaign for emancipation. Many consider Herder's work "one of the major forces that led to the break-up of the Danube Monarchy" ⁽²⁰⁾(the Hapsburgs). If this is a slight exaggeration, it still cannot be disputed that "the beginning of the definite opposition of the Slavs to the non-national state [was] inspired by the writings of Herder."⁽²¹⁾

The concept of nationalism was eagerly grabbed onto (the Volk), unfortunately the more humanistic side was not held onto with the same fervor (the Humanitat). The era of Romanticism served the patriotic visions of the Slavs well. The Slavs pictured themselves as Herder did: democratic, peaceful and industrious versus the commonly held view of the militaristic Germans. They were encouraged by thinkers such as Rousseau who prompted the Polish people to cherish their particular national customs.⁽²²⁾

The Czechs were the first to be effected by Herder's concepts of national self-determination as well as the first to realize its socio-cultural and democratic implications. Czech leaders began to devote themselves to a Czech cultural revival which would be the ground work for further, future, reforms. The Slovak interpretation was a more expansive one and more Pan-Slavic in nature with a desire for unification of all peoples of Slavic stock into one large nation-state . There was an influence on these as well as Poland, Serbia, Croatia and the Ukraine to collect folk songs and to study folk lore. Herder's writings were used by Slavs in Austria to resist the use of the German language and literature and gave impetus to the collection of folk literature in Russia where the messianic and revolutionary themes of a Slavic world reinstated by Russia found a particular resonance..

The seed-beds of this new nationalism were the universities where dreams of national redemption were told by poets, writers and philosophers. There was a massive increase in the use of local dialects in folk literature, translations, popular dramas, histories, cultural institutions and native operas.⁽²³⁾ This was coupled with a call for the use of national languages in public life, the courts, in education, administration, et cetera. There was, however, a real oscillation between paticularist nationalism and Pan-Slavism. This all culminated in the 1848 revolutions where patriotism went head-to-head against constitutionalism and lost. It was not all for nothing though, as the "glorious failures"⁽²⁴⁾ of the 1848-49 revolutions exerted a 'spell' on future generations of nationalists.

A large number of very influential Slavic individuals were inspired by Herder's writings, including poets, writers, linguists/philologists, historians and politicians. Among the poets were the Slovak Jan Kollar who wrote Daughter of Slava in which he prophesied a messianic resurrection of the Slavic peoples to a position of world leadership and glory. He preached the Slavophile ideas in Herder's writings and it formed the basis of his gospel. Slavic unification would fulfill their destiny as leaders of Europe discarding the 'decaying' Teutons and Latins. He also wrote two volumes of Slovak folk songs. The Polish poet Mickiewicz called folk songs the "memory of the people"⁽²⁵⁾ and made Poland the symbol of suffering humanity in his works.

Among the writers who were influenced by Herder were Francis Ladislaw Celakovsky, who was an enthusiastic disciple who published a collection of folk songs from all of the Slavic peoples believing Herder's idea that folk poetry was the true spirit of nationality. The Slovak writer Paul Josef Safarik also published a folk song collection, and together with Jan Kollar they wrote on the common Slavic heritage and the reasons for unification of all the Slavic people. The Russian writer, Casimer Brodzinski, wrote on the connection between literature and nationality taking Herder as a starting point.

The Czech philologists Josef Dobrovsky and Josef Jungmann spent their lives attempting to purify the Czech language of Germanic influences and Dobrovsky translated parts of Herder's works. Another Czech, Vaclav Durych, translated Herder's chapter on Slavic nationalism, and soon thereafter it was further translated into Slovak, Polish, Croat and Ukranian. A Serb linguist, Bartholomew Kopitar, was inspired to write his Grammatik der slavischen Sprache in Krain, Karntzen und Steiermark which was a pioneer work in the development of the Serbian literary language.

The Czech historian, Francis Palansky, viewed Herder as " the apostle of humanity"⁽²⁶⁾ and was a potent force in stimulating Bohemian national consciousness. He learned from Herder that history was an effective means to stimulate patriotism and went on to become one of the greatest Slavic historians. At the June 1848 Slav Congress a Manifesto was adopted that was couched in terms almost identical to the ones used by Herder in his Outline of a Philosophy of the History of Man. The chief architect of the document was Palasky.

Two sides of the perpetual Russian debate on political orientation, used Herder as well. The Russian 'Westerners', such as Belinsky and Herzen, as well as the Russian 'Slavophiles, represented by men such as Komyakov and Kireyovski, all were inspired by the idea of Western civilization being rejuvenated by the Slavs under Russian leadership. Both sides of the debate believed, as did Herder, in a Russia that was "⁽²⁷⁾fresh, resourceful, unspoilt [which had a] native genius" and the ability to regenerate itself and the whole of the Slavic world with it.

The emphasis on language and history led to many of the newly invigorated Slavic movements being dominated by these, and other, poets, writers, linguists and historians including the Magyar, Kolcsey, the Slovak, Stur and the Pole, Lelewel. Perhaps Herder's greatest influence was on the Czech, Thomas G. Masaryk.

Probably the only true disciples of Herder were Masaryk, Palacky and the Italian, Mazzini, who all sincerely strove to further the causes of Volk and Humanitat. Masaryk, the father of modern day Czechoslovakia, rejected Hegel's political organism and the Romancists as well, but shared Herder's view on social development and political activity. He was against the idea of power or force being the essence of government. Masaryk saw the state as a community of "similar individuals" who came together due to a "psychological need."⁽²⁸⁾ This need was the basis for the Volk, a feeling of belonging together and thus forming a distinct group on the basis of a common language, literature and cultural traditions. Political development was viewed as a "conscious forming of people, the fashioning and imaginative molding of actual life."⁽²⁹⁾ Progress was to be achieved through tenacious and piecemeal improvements which would achieve lasting change, unlike revolutionary change which was fleeting. The role of the political leaders was to discover and further the many social and cultural values to give a direction to society, therefore a system of service and not of dominance. The state was seen by Masaryk as inherently flawed as the human beings who created it and live within it. There were a number of other similarities that Masaryk shared with Herder including a natural dislike of metaphysics, institutions and instincts (which he saw as moral chaos). They shared a desire to eliminate certain dualisms such as those of mind and matter, reason and feeling, and subjectivism and objectivism. The influences were thus very great upon Masaryk as well as the numerous other Slavic scholars of the age.

Herder's writings legitimized national pride but to an extent that would probably have appalled him were he alive today. In many ways he was very prophetic as his ideas of the irreducible culture held sway until the last decade. The belief that people will sooner or later rebel against uniformity has been shown by the Slavic people in the former Soviet Union and the former Yugoslavia and elsewhere. It is unfortunate that Herder could not prove his Utopian ideal of all ethnic groups living together without conflict and equally unfortunate that only half of his system was appropriated to further economic and racial nationalisms. In spite of this his influence upon the Slavic nationalities cannot be ignored. He was acclaimed, after all, as the "spiritual father of the Slav national revival."⁽³⁰⁾

Barnard, F.M. Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965.

Barnard, F.M.(ed.) Johann Gottfried Herder On Social and Political Culture, Cambridge: Cambridge, 1969.

Baranrd, F.M. Self-Direction and Political Legitmacy: Rousseau to Herder, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988.

Clark, Robert T. Jr. Herder: His Life and Thought, LA: University of California, 1955.

Ergang, Robert Reinhold Herder and the Foundation of German Nationalism, NY: Columbia, 1931.

Gardels, Nathan Two Concepts of Nationalism: An Interview with Isaiah Berlin, NY Review of Books, 21^st November 1991.

Herder, Johann Gottfried Outlines of a Philosophy of the History of Man, NY: Bergman, 1800.

McEachren, F. The Life and Philosophy of Johann Gottfried Herder, Oxford; Clarendon, 1939.

Okey, Robin Eastern Europe 1740-1985: Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed., London: Hutchinson, 1986.

1. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.172.

2. F.M. Barnard Self-Determination and Political Legitimacy: Rousseau and Herder. Oxford: Clarendon, 1988, p.224.

3. Nathan Gardels Two Concepts of Nationalism: An Interview with Isaiah Berlin, NY Review of Books, November 21^st 1991, p.19.

4. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.87.

5. Robert Reinhold Ergang Herder and the Foundations of German Nationalism, NY: Columbia, 1931, p.263.

6. F. McEachran The Life and Philosophy of Johann Gottfried Herder, Oxford: Clarendon, 1939, p.83.

7. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.107.

8. F.M. Barnard Self-Determination and Political Legitimacy: Rousseau and Herder, Oxford: Clarendon, 1988, p.222.

9. Robert Reinhold Ergang Herder and the Foundations of German Nationalism, NY: Columbia, 1931, p.264.

10. Ibid., p.264.

11. Ibid., p.265. Italics his.

12. F.M Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.75.

13. Robert T. Clark Jr. Herder: His Life and Thought, LA: University of California, 1955, p.336.

14. Ibid., p.337.

15. J.G. Herder Outline of a Philosophy of the History of Man, NY: Bergman, 1800, p.483.

16. Ibid., p.483.

17. Ibid., p.483.

18. J.G. Herder Outline of a Philosophy of the History of Man, NY: Bergman, 1800, p.483.

19. Robin Okey Eastern Europe 1740-1985: Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed., London: Hutchinson, 1986, p.77.

20. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.174.

21. Robert Reinhold Ergang Herder and the Foundations of German Nationalism, NY: Columbia, 1931, p.257.

22. Robin Okey Eastern Europe 1740-1985: From Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed, London: Hutchinson, 1986, p.77.

23. Robin Okey Eastern Europe 1740-1985: From Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed, London: Hutchinson, 1986, p.80.

24. Ibid., p.94.

25. Robin Okey Eastern Europe 1740-1985: Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed, London; Hutchinson, 1986, p.77.

26. Robin Okey Eastern Europe 1740-1985: From Feudalism to communism 2^nd ed, London: Hutchinson, 1986, p.77.

27. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.173.

28. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.175.

29. Ibid., p.175.

30. F.M. Barnard Herder's Social and Political Thought: From Enlightenment to Nationalism, Oxford: Clarendon, 1965, p.172.