[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":-1},["ShallowReactive",2],{"archetype-name-map":3,"thinker-ernest-renan":100,"$fyR5W9wMQi2b5_Uc39axTgb1YJbmFLAIMoYrZxoCX5Nw":214},[4,7,10,13,16,19,22,25,28,31,34,37,40,43,46,49,52,55,58,61,64,67,70,73,76,79,82,85,88,91,94,97],{"slug":5,"name":6},"anarcho-capitalist","Anarcho-Capitalist",{"slug":8,"name":9},"establishment-progressive","Establishment Progressive",{"slug":11,"name":12},"progressive-activist","Progressive Activist",{"slug":14,"name":15},"techno-progressive","Techno-Progressive",{"slug":17,"name":18},"patriotic-progressive","Patriotic Progressive",{"slug":20,"name":21},"conservative-democrat","Conservative Democrat",{"slug":23,"name":24},"moderate-conservative","Moderate Conservative",{"slug":26,"name":27},"reform-conservative","Reform Conservative",{"slug":29,"name":30},"religious-conservative","Religious Conservative",{"slug":32,"name":33},"traditionalist","Traditionalist",{"slug":35,"name":36},"national-populist","National Populist",{"slug":38,"name":39},"left-nationalist","Left Nationalist",{"slug":41,"name":42},"moderate-liberal","Moderate Liberal",{"slug":44,"name":45},"pragmatic-centrist","Pragmatic Centrist",{"slug":47,"name":48},"authoritarian-left","Authoritarian Left",{"slug":50,"name":51},"authoritarian-right","Authoritarian Right",{"slug":53,"name":54},"welfare-nationalist","Welfare Nationalist",{"slug":56,"name":57},"democratic-socialist","Democratic Socialist",{"slug":59,"name":60},"christian-socialist","Christian Socialist",{"slug":62,"name":63},"market-socialist","Market Socialist",{"slug":65,"name":66},"trad-socialist","Trad Socialist",{"slug":68,"name":69},"civil-libertarian","Civil Libertarian",{"slug":71,"name":72},"compassionate-libertarian","Compassionate Libertarian",{"slug":74,"name":75},"left-libertarian","Left Libertarian",{"slug":77,"name":78},"traditional-libertarian","Traditional Libertarian",{"slug":80,"name":81},"classical-liberal","Classical Liberal",{"slug":83,"name":84},"social-liberal","Social Liberal",{"slug":86,"name":87},"national-conservative","National Conservative",{"slug":89,"name":90},"neoconservative","Neoconservative",{"slug":92,"name":93},"techno-authoritarian","Techno-Authoritarian",{"slug":95,"name":96},"market-liberal","Market Liberal",{"slug":98,"name":99},"independent-thinker","Independent Thinker",{"thinker":101,"archetypes":113,"traditions":114,"traditionLinks":134,"homeOut":135,"homeIn":144,"works":145,"homeTradition":117,"siblings":159},{"id":102,"slug":103,"name":104,"one_line":105,"bio":106,"birth_year":107,"death_year":108,"nationality":109,"primary_role":110,"era":111,"portrait_url":112,"figure_class":112},1226,"ernest-renan","Ernest Renan","The seminarian turned philologist who wrote a human Life of Jesus, and defined a nation as a daily plebiscite rather than a fact of race or language.","Ernest Renan trained for the priesthood, lost his faith over the historical criticism of scripture rather than over doctrine, and became the most controversial writer in France with the Life of Jesus in 1863. The book treats the Gospels as documents of their period, removes the miracles, and presents an incomparable man rather than a divine one. It sold enormously, cost him his chair at the Collège de France for seven years, and made him the emblem of everything the church was fighting.\n\nHis lecture of 1882, What is a Nation?, is the more durable work and the reason he belongs in political thought. The question was not academic: Germany had annexed Alsace-Lorraine in 1871 on the ground that its inhabitants were German by race and language, and Renan is answering that argument — Treitschke and Mommsen had made it explicitly. He goes through the candidates and rejects them all. Race is not it, since every European nation is a mixture and the philology of races has no relation to political nationality. Language is not it: Switzerland has three and is one nation, the Americas share theirs with Britain and are not. Religion is not it, nor geography, nor dynastic interest, nor material advantage, which would make a nation a customs union.\n\nWhat remains is a spiritual principle with two parts, one in the past and one in the present: a rich legacy of memories held in common, and present consent, the will to continue to live together and to make the most of the inheritance received. A nation is a daily plebiscite, as the individual's existence is a perpetual affirmation of life.\n\nHe adds the observation the lecture is most quoted for now: forgetting, and even historical error, is essential to the creation of a nation, and the progress of historical study is often a danger to nationality, because every nation was founded on violence its members must agree not to remember.\n\nThe formulation gave civic nationalism its charter and remains the standard alternative to ethnic accounts, though Renan's own writings on Semitic peoples contain material that sits badly beside it.",1823,1892,"French","writer","19th Century",null,[],[115,122,128],{"is_primary":116,"traditions":117},false,{"id":118,"name":119,"slug":120,"short_description":121},58,"History of Ideas","history-of-ideas","The intellectual tradition of studying past thinkers in their historical context, attempting to understand the inner logic of their worldviews.",{"is_primary":116,"traditions":123},{"id":124,"name":125,"slug":126,"short_description":127},479,"Nationalism","nationalism","The principle that humanity divides into nations, that each is entitled to govern itself, and that political and national boundaries should coincide.",{"is_primary":116,"traditions":129},{"id":130,"name":131,"slug":132,"short_description":133},158,"Political Theology","political-theology","The tradition of reflecting systematically on the relationship between religious concepts and political authority, and on how theological categories underlie ostensibly secular political thought.",[],[136,141],{"relation_type":137,"traditions":138},"reacts_against",{"name":139,"slug":140},"Philosophy of History","philosophy-of-history",{"relation_type":142,"traditions":143},"descends_from",{"name":139,"slug":140},[],[146,153],{"title":147,"year":148,"year_display":149,"description":150,"kind":151,"sort_order":152},"What is a Nation?",1882,"1882","Not race, language, religion or geography, but a common inheritance of memory and present consent — a daily plebiscite.","work",1,{"title":154,"year":155,"year_display":156,"description":157,"kind":151,"sort_order":158},"Life of Jesus",1863,"1863","Treats the Gospels as documents of their period and presents an incomparable man rather than a divine one; cost him his chair for seven years.",2,[160,164,168,172,176,177,181,185,189,193,197,201,205,208,211],{"name":161,"slug":162,"birth_year":163},"René Descartes","rene-descartes",1596,{"name":165,"slug":166,"birth_year":167},"Giambattista Vico","giambattista-vico",1668,{"name":169,"slug":170,"birth_year":171},"Friedrich Schleiermacher","friedrich-schleiermacher",1768,{"name":173,"slug":174,"birth_year":175},"Friedrich Carl von Savigny","friedrich-carl-von-savigny",1779,{"name":104,"slug":103,"birth_year":107},{"name":178,"slug":179,"birth_year":180},"Lord Acton","lord-acton",1834,{"name":182,"slug":183,"birth_year":184},"Max Weber","max-weber",1864,{"name":186,"slug":187,"birth_year":188},"Leo Strauss","leo-strauss",1899,{"name":190,"slug":191,"birth_year":192},"Isaiah Berlin","isaiah-berlin",1909,{"name":194,"slug":195,"birth_year":196},"E.P. Thompson","e-p-thompson",1924,{"name":198,"slug":199,"birth_year":200},"Michel Foucault","michel-foucault",1926,{"name":202,"slug":203,"birth_year":204},"Timothy Snyder","timothy-snyder",1969,{"name":206,"slug":207,"birth_year":112},"Eric Hobsbawm","eric-hobsbawm",{"name":209,"slug":210,"birth_year":112},"Tony Judt","tony-judt",{"name":212,"slug":213,"birth_year":112},"Leszek Kołakowski","leszek-koakowski",{"cards":215,"influenced":222,"shapedBy":223,"outbound":224},[216],{"slug":217,"name":218,"type":219,"strength":220,"description":221},"heinrich-von-treitschke","Heinrich von Treitschke","opposed","foundational","What is a Nation? answers the German case for annexing Alsace-Lorraine on grounds of race and language, which Treitschke and Mommsen had made explicitly.",[],[],0]