Word: solzhenitsyn
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...beyond the obvious, the defensive kneejerk refusal to listen to Solzhenisyn, there is another reason why a Western audience--whether in Cambridge or Ohio--had such trouble hearing. Solzhenitsyn, after all, is profoundly a man of Eastern culture, and his ideas simply do not mesh with the mental and philosophical constructs of the West...
...Solzhenitsyn argues that the West's spiritual decline began during the Renaissance, when the currents of humanism started to give modern man a sense of autonomy from any higher forces above him. The Renaissance, he says, ended the Middle Age's complete repression of man's physical nature. "Then, however," Solzhenitsyn adds, "we turned our backs on the Spirit and embraced all that is material with excessive and unwarranted zeal...
...What Solzhenitsyn seeks is a return to aspects of man's spiritual nature, or, as he says variously, "things higher, warmer and purer," "the Superior Spirit," or the "Supreme Complete Entity." He wants some higher principle which will help guide individuals to achieve their human potential. Western materialism which he believes promotes only weakness and mediocrity, has no place in his scheme of things...
...Solzhenitsyn in turn has a deep religious faith in a Truth operating in the political system. The humanist Western mind, however, finds it impossible to accept this trust, because it believes that any political "Truth" can only be a working hypothesis, defined by those who happen to be in political or economic power at the time. Such a Truth carries with it the roots of oppression...
...West accepts the situation that Solzhenitsyn criticizes--the lack of courageous, independent decision-making, the absence of strong leadership and moral certitude--precisely because it prefers to muddle along as democratically, and with as much respect for the unorthodox, as possible. Again, while Solzhenitsyn denounces the uncontrolled power of the Western press to distribute superficial and misleading information hastily, the West cannot see this point; it speaks out instead for a press that is as independent as possible. Alternate visions of reality, it knows, depend on alternative sets of data, on the free exchange of information, on diversity...