Background
Rondel, Maurice was born in 1861 in Dijon, France.
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Maurice Rondel
Edit Profilemetaphysician philosopher of action theoloUan
Education
École Normale Supérieure.
Career
1895-1896, University of Lille. 1896— “ • University of Aix-en-Provence. J^in publications: ) L Action, essai d'une critique de la vie, et d’une science de la pratique, Paris: Alcan. Republished as remiers Écrits, Paris: PUF, 1950. (1893) De Vinculo Substantiali et de Substantia composita apud Leibnitium, Paris: Alcan. (1896) ‘Lettre sur les exigences de la pensée contemporaine en matière d’apologétique’, Annales de Philosophie Chrétienne-, republished with ‘Histoire et dogme’, Paris: PUF, 1951. (1904) ‘Histoire et dogme’, La Quinzaine: 1-90. (1922) Le Procès de l'intelligence, Paris: Bloud et Gay. ( 1928) L'Itinéraire philosophique de Maurice Blondel, Paris: Spes. (1930) Une Énigme historique, le vinculum substantiale d’après Leibniz, Paris: Beauchesne. (1932) ‘Le Problème de la philosophie catholique’, Cahiers de la Nouvelle Journée XX. (1934) La Pensée, 2 vols, Paris: Alcan. (1935) L’Être et les Êtres, Paris: Alcan. (1936-1937) L’Action, 2 vols, Paris: Alcan. (1939) Lutte pour la civilisation et philosophie de ta paix, Paris: Flammarion. (1944-1946) La Philosophie et l’esprit chrétien, 2 vols, Paris: PUF. (1950) Exigences philosophiques du christianisme, Paris: PUF.
Views
With some features in common with later existentialism, the so-called philosophy of action was a quasi-phenomenological approach to a philosophy of concrete experience and moral behaviour based on an analysis of willing and doing that emphasized the ultimate unattainability of the object willed. Blondel’s initial aim had been to develop a philosophy of religion, in the sense of religious feeling and living rather than of religious dogmatic systems. In his view human action only made sense if directed towards a transcendent God, an argument not however presented as a proof of God’s existence—he hoped rather to offer a critique of religious systems in terms of their ability to make sense of human action. The larger works of the 1930s and 1940s were an attempt to expand the earlier views into a more comprehensive metaphysics, including an account of reason and an ontology claiming to avoid idealism. Although a committed Catholic Blondel advocated an open approach to apologetics involving dialogue with non-believers Léon Brunschvicg and resolute opposition to the more authoritarian neoscholastic approaches then in vogue, a policy carried out under the editorship of Labcrthonnière by the Annales de Philosophie Chrétienne, which he owned from 1905 to 1913 when it was put on the Index. He played a major role in the modernist crisis of early twentiethcentury Catholicism. He held a weak version of the ontological argument for God’s existence. Recently many Catholics have become attracted to his alternative to officially sponsored neoscholasticism.
