Examples of Interpretation
of History
Man has been invested with free will, unlike matter which has no freedom, but is subjected to the laws of nature.
The interpretation of history is an independent subject in itself. However, to the best of my understanding, the many books written on the subject do not offer a comprehensible interpretation of human history.
The most prominent name on this subject is probably that of Karl Marx (d. 1883). By applying Newton’s laws of nature to human history, Marx gave a material interpretation of history which we may call historical materialism. But this interpretation of history was rejected by scholars right away. Man has been invested with free will, unlike matter which has no freedom, but is subjected to the laws of nature. In such a case applying the law of one to the other is simply based on conjecture which has no locus standi.
The events of the First World War were a practical test for this Marxist ideology, and it failed at this very first experiment. Vladimir Lenin, the famous communist leader, founded the communist International (Comintern) in 1919. Based on the Marxist ideology, workers of the whole world were on one side while the capitalists of the world were on the other side. In 1939, when World War II broke out, all the heads of the countries involved in this war belonged to the bourgeoisie. As per the Marxist theory, it was assumed that the working class of those countries would not side with or support the bourgeoisie, rather they would side with the working class of the world, but this did not happen. In each country the working class sided with the ruling bourgeoisie of their respective countries, thus putting an end to the theory of historical materialism or dialectical materialism in this very first experiment.
Similarly, many other scholars have also attempted to present an interpretation of history but in practice they too succumbed to confusion. Professor H. Butterfield of Cambridge is a case in point in this regard. He has written a 146-page book on the subject titled “The Whig Interpretation of History”, published in 1931 in London. The book seeks to give a moral interpretation of the whole of history in the light of a universal moral code. However, the author himself admits to the fact that such an interpretation was not possible in view of the practical situation prevailing in society.
We find another example in the writings of George Bernard Shaw, a renowned British writer. His drama ‘Man and Superman’ is an attempt to present an interpretation of history in the light of the supposed evolutionary theory.
The bottom line of Shaw’s interpretation is that according to the law of compulsive evolution, man has been continually travelling from the human state to superhuman state. But this theory is just an imaginary story, having no scientific standing.
