Annals of Philosophy, Social and Human Disciplines (Dec 2011)
Nichifor Crainic and the interwar “New Spirituality”
Abstract
After long periods in which there was more assimilating from other cultures, rather than creating, Romanian culture has experienced, in the interwar period, also the phase corresponding to the creation of important spiritual values. In that time, if we use a Lucian Blaga’s phrase, there was a real “ontological mutation” in the field of culture. Unrests, attitudes, propositions of cultural directions, whether, judged now, were providing solutions or just stimulating the environment of thinking, illustrate today the desire of men of culture of that time to produce values through which the Romanian spirit had to spread, through its contribution, in the universal spirit. But how could this happen? Everything that was done until then had to be left behind, forgotten? Or what had been forgotten was worth to be restored? Which was the undisputed landmark? What kind of spirituality was fundamental for it? The traditional one or the European one? Nichifor Crainic in his essay “Spirituality”, in a first phase, and then, in the same year 1929, the investigation from Tiparniţa literară, and seven years later Constantin Rădulescu-Motru in “Românismul, catehismul unei noi spiritualităţi” emphasize the meaning of the concept of “Spirituality”, and in addition the great number of meanings of the term “new spirituality”.
