II.

Life and Work

Life

Gabriel Marcel was born in Paris in 1889, the city where he also died in 1973. Marcel

was the only child of Henri and Laure Marcel. His father was a French diplomat to Sweden and

was committed to educating his son through frequent travel across Europe. The death of his

mother, in 1893 when Gabriel was not quite four years old left an indelible impression on

him. He was raised primarily by his mother’s sister, whom his father married two years after

Laure’s passing, and though “Auntie” loved her nephew and gave him the best formal

education, Gabriel loathed the structure of the classroom, and became excited about the

intellectual life only after entering Sorbonne, from which he graduated in 1910.

Marcel received his degree in philosophy from the Sorbonne in 1910 and married

professor Jacqueline Boegner in 1919. Together they adopted a son, Jean. Marcel lived

and taught for a time in Switzerland, where he began writing his Metaphysical Journal

(1927). The journal reflects a movement away from traditional academic philosophy and

was influenced by Sören Kirkegaard, in whom Marcel was deeply interested. In some

ways, the book is overlooked in serious examinations of Marcel. Another publication

from Marcel's diaries was Being and Having (1935).

French philosopher Gabriel Marcel (1889-1973) described man's place in the

world in terms of such fundamental human experiences as relationships, love, fidelity,

hope, and faith. His brand of existentialism was said to be largely unknown in the

English-speaking world, where it was mistakenly associated with that of Jean Paul

Sartre. Marcel's view of the human condition was that "beings" are beset by tension,
contradiction and ambiguity. He was also interested in life's religious dimension and was

considered the first French existentialist philosopher.

Marcel was among the astonishing generation of French intellectuals and artists

born between roughly 1890 and 1910 that included Sartre, Levinas, de Beauvoir,

Kojève, Lacan, Camus, Merleau-Ponty, Ionesco, Artaud, and Bataille. Like many of

them, Marcel was both highly prolific and committed to producing work that could

maintain its intellectual rigor while engaging a wide audience. In addition to more than a

dozen major philosophical works, Marcel wrote over thirty dramatic pieces, scores of

essays of criticism, and a number of musical compositions. However, while he was

admired by the philosophical luminaries of his milieu and has always enjoyed a circle of

devoted followers, Marcel is among the least celebrated and studied members of this

illustrious set.

He was a French philosopher, playwright, and Christian thinker. He has often

been referred to as a “Christian existentialist,” although he preferred to be known as a

“Neo-Socratic” or “Christian Socratic” thinker. Although he wrote roughly thirty plays and

earned his livelihood mostly as a writer, critic, and editor, he is best known for his

philosophical work. His style of philosophy was intentionally unsystematic and personal,

preferring the way of concrete, descriptive analysis to formal argumentation or logical

demonstration. He considered reality to be an “ontological mystery” which one could

only come to “know” through an unsystematic, participatory way of reflecting as

opposed to the impersonal mode of scientific abstraction. In investigating various

existential themes, Marcel’s work centered upon issues concerning the individual
person, freedom, and human dignity. He was particularly critical of modern social

institutions and technology for their dehumanizing effects upon individuals.

Marcel's treatment of the being of each individual person as a mystery brought

forth a more humble view of the self, which paradoxically makes the self available to

others for genuine inter-subjective relations, where each subject can acquire a true,

dignified self. According to Marcel, the presence of being people thus experience

becomes open to "the transcendent," and the phenomenon of "hope" consists in it. His

existentialist approach to God is not "a distinct apprehension of God as someone other"

(Marcel 1964, 167). Rather, it shows a descriptive yet profound path to experience God.

After the war, Marcel taught at a number of secondary schools, and throughout

his life he would often teach in stints at universities, such as the University of Aberdeen

in Scotland, the Sorbonne in Paris, and Harvard University. Primarily, however, Marcel

earned his income as a playwright, editor, and critic. He worked as a drama critic for

various literary journals and served as an editor for Plon, the major French Catholic

publisher. Though Marcel would become better known for his philosophical work than

his plays, he was often surprised and frustrated that his plays received so little attention.

Also, the idea of dialogue, which was of primary importance in his philosophy, held a

practical as well as theoretical place in Marcel’s life. For many years, he hosted “Friday

evenings,” a weekly discussion group through which he met and influenced important

young French philosophers, like Jean Wahl, Paul Ricoeur, Emmanuel Levinas, and

Jean-Paul Sartre.
 In 1929, Marcel converted to Catholicism at the age of forty. Although raised as

an atheist, his thought throughout his thirties had turned in a more religious direction.

But it was not until the French Catholic writer Francois Mauriac posed the question to

him, “But after all, why are you not one of us?” that Marcel converted. He never

intended to be an "Catholic" philosopher representing the Church, and his way of

philosophical pursuit continued. But the notions of “call” and “response” would become

important themes in Marcel’s later work. In 1949-1950, Marcel gave the Gifford

Lectures, which was later published as The Mystery of Being (1951), and in 1961-1962

he gave the William James Lectures at Harvard, which was published as The Existential

Background of Human Dignity (1963). Marcel’s other major philosophical contributions

include Being and Having, Man Against Mass Society, Homo Viator, Creative Fidelity,

and Tragic Wisdom and Beyond. Marcel died October 8, 1973, in Paris.

Main philosophical ideas

As a philosopher, Marcel has often been referred to as a “Christian existentialist.”

He repudiated the term “existentialist,” however, largely due to the fact that

existentialism as a philosophical movement was associated primarily with the atheistic

and voluntaristic thought of Jean-Paul Sartre. For this reason Marcel preferred to be

known as a “Neo-Socratic” or “Christian Socratic” thinker. Nevertheless, like other

‘philosophers of existence’ (Martin Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, Sartre), Marcel was

preoccupied by certain existential themes that centered upon the human person

(existent). These themes included the uniqueness of the individual, human freedom,

and the ethical relations of inter-subjectivity.

Critique of technology

As with other existential thinkers, Marcel critiqued various aspects of modern

society. He was particularly critical of technology for its dehumanizing effects, in treating

human beings as mere objects or things. For example, the economic idea of “human

resources” treats individual persons as mere “assets” or “liabilities” to be bought and

sold. Also, while he recognized the benefits of technology in developing new vaccines

and new means of mass production in the necessities of food, shelter, and clothing,

Marcel warned of a "technological mindset." This mindset thinks of the natural world

merely as something to be manipulated and exploited, rather than as something to

engage or participate in. Moreover, this technological mindset is often applied to oneself

as well. One can view oneself only in terms of the various functions one performs. One

is a banker, a lawyer, a carpenter, or a plumber. One is a husband, a wife, a member of

the local Country Club or the First Presbyterian Church. Although there is of course a

legitimate place for performing these functions, Marcel was worried that one can see

one’s self only in terms of these functions. What is ignored, according to Marcel, is the

fundamental dignity of each individual person, a kind of mysterious worth at the center

of each human being which cannot be easily summed up or defined. This, in turn, leads

to the sense of the mystery of being itself, or what Marcel called the

“ontological mystery.”

Problem and mystery

Marcel distinguished between two ways of attaining knowledge. The first was to

consider it as a problem. This is the approach taken by science, in which the scientist
tries to understand something through the method of abstraction. This approach is

taken both by empirical or natural scientists (through the use of techniques such as

statistics or other mathematical formulations) as well as philosophical science.

Regardless, the thing under investigation is treated in terms of its general nature. For

example, in inquiring about a human being, one simply knows what is general or

common to all human beings. Moreover, in treating the subject of inquiry as a problem,

the investigator uses a method of impersonal argumentation or formal demonstration to

“prove” the theory. This kind of analysis in which one dissects, abstracts, and separates,

Marcel called primary reflection.

But for Marcel there was a form of secondary reflection. This kind of reflection

approaches the subject not as a problem but as a mystery, and doing so it unites rather

than separates. Similar to the method of phenomenology, Marcel’s secondary reflection

approaches the subject through a concrete descriptive analysis. Marcel, however,

rejected the more formal or systematic method of phenomenology developed

by Edmund Husserl and instead employed a more natural or personal kind of reflection.

In doing this, he often turned to everyday examples. In this way, he tried to reveal the

basic structures of human experience by describing the implicit or hidden aspects or

meanings which are often concealed or overlooked. In fact, one of his former

students, Paul Ricoeur, recalled how during the seminars held in his home, Marcel

would not allow students to elaborate or criticize a particular text until they had

introduced the topic via their own concrete experience. Marcel also avoided the use of

technical terminology and preferred a more natural and ordinary language, which he

considered to be more vital and alive.

 One reason Marcel’s way of thinking is called Socratic is that, for him, philosophy

is viewed as a constant questioning. No technical method can ever conquer this

mystery of reality. Rather, one has to participate in it by engaging and so questioning it

with one’s entire being. For this reason, Marcel did not write systematic treatises, but

wrote in different forms such as philosophical diaries, which were filled with fragments,

personal reflections, self-questionings, and various stops and starts. Again, like

Socrates, Marcel viewed philosophy as an open-ended dialogue with both others and

oneself. But given this absence of a systematic method he was frequently criticized for

lacking philosophical rigor. Defenders of Marcel will respond, though, that the

unsystematic approach is the very key to opening the door to the ontological mystery.

Marcel the playwright

Throughout his life, Marcel continued his work as a playwright and drama critic.

Through his plays Marcel explored various human situations in all their intensity and

complexity. A common theme in his dramatic works was the interpersonal dynamics in

family situations where tensions emerged due to the struggle between carrying out

one’s duties while striving to fulfill personal aspirations. Far from being divorced from his

philosophical work, the ideas expressed in his plays were closely connected to his

theoretical work. In fact, some themes which first found expression in dramatic form

would years later, after much reflection, be taken up in philosophical form. Finally,

Marcel was an accomplished musician and composer. He believed it was music, in fact,

which above all could tap into and express this ontological mystery.
Work

Ethics, inter-subjectivity, and hope

One of Marcel’s greatest philosophical contributions in employing his descriptive,

personal style of analysis was in the realm of ethics and inter-subjectivity. According to

him, when one treats the being of another as a mystery, one does so with a sense of

humility ("ontological humility") by which to be able to see the fundamental dignity of the

other. This leads to abandonment of one's self, dynamic openness, "disponibilité"

(availability), and "creative fidelity" to others. This way, Marcel called for a greater

responsibility to others, but not merely through the traditional notion of doing good

deeds, but primarily by being humbly present or open to others, again with one’s whole

being. Through this availability, a dynamic and creative encounter happens between

people, in which they “make contact.” One's relationship to others, which develops this

way, actually helps one to acquire a true self and is open to "the transcendent" which is

not beyond experience but within experience. It is a moment of holiness. Marcel's

description of how different individual beings can authentically relate to one another to

experience the transcendent is perhaps something we need to realize for peace in

society today. Marcel, in fact, did not merely write about this phenomenon

of disponibilité but practiced it as well. Many have noted the aura of self-prensence he

displayed in both his public lectures and personal interactions with others.

Being and Having

According to Gabriel Marcel, humans have two kinds of relationship with the

existence: “being” and “having”; that make fundamental differences in understanding the
world. “Having” is used for referring to, e.g., “having an idea” and even ones’ own ideas,

describing them in a concrete manner. In “having”, we are dealing with “primary

thought” and an “I” and a “he” relation, which Marcel puts it against “I” and “thou”

relation. In the latter, we are dealing with “being”. Meeting someone who is known as

“he” means that we have relationship with him in such a way that he, as an object, is

separate from us; the case is different when we meet someone as “thou”. In this

relationship, we deal with “secondary thought” and it can be understood through

participation and our living experience. Love, hope, fidelity and availability are

categorized under “being” which is manifested in the existence of human. At the same

time, these two kinds of existence are connected to each other: “being” and “having” are

two levels of existence; "being" shows itself in different methods and “having” is the

manifestation of “being”. In the modern age, the realm of “having” has been expanded

and Marcel proposed two kinds of existence to return the expansion of the realm of

“being”, i.e. human authentic experience. In this article the important question is: what is

the relation between “having” and “being”? To answer this question, at first we should

describe “having” and “being”.

Existentialism

This is a philosophical theory that emphasizes on the existence of man as a

determinant to his own essence in terms of development. It holds that humans define

their own meaning in life, and try to make rational decisions despite their existence. It is

therefore opposed to any doctrine that views human beings as the manifestation of an

absolute or an infinite substance. It is a philosophy of living, liberation, freedom, human

existence and a diagnosis of human condition. Existence precedes essence, absurdity,

facticity, authenticity, anguish, dread, despair and the other characterizes existentialism.

It is a philosophy that emerged as a rescue to bring man to his original position, to

restore him from his lost dignity and give him control. It is one of the models of

philosophy which advocates for a life of commitment which gives focus and sense of

direction to one’s life.

Creative Fidelity

For Marcel, to exist only as body is to exist problematically. To

exist existentially is to exist as a thinking, emotive, being, dependent upon the human

creative impulse. He believed that, “As soon as there is creation, we are in the realm of

being,” and also that, “There is no sense using the word ‘being’ except where creation is

in view,” (PGM xiii). The person who is given in a situation to creative development

experiences life qualitatively at a higher mode of being than those for whom

experiences are another facet of their functionality. Marcel argues that, “A really alive

person is not merely someone who has a taste for life, but somebody who spreads that

taste, showering it, as it were, around him; and a person who is really alive in this way

has, quite apart from any tangible achievements of his, something essentially creative

about him,” (VI, 139). This is not to say of course, that the creative impulse is

measurable by what we produce. Whereas works of art most explicitly express creative

energy, inasmuch as we give ourselves to each other, acts of love, admiration, and

friendship also describe the creative act. In fact, participation with others is initiated

through acts of feeling which not only allow the subject to experience the body as his

own, but which enable him to respond to others as embodied, sensing, creative,
participative beings as well. To feel is a mode of participation, a creative act which

draws the subject closer to an experience of the self as a being-among-beings, although

higher degrees of participation are achieved by one whose acts demonstrate a

commitment to that experience. So, to create is to reject the reduction of the self to the

level of abstraction of object, “The denial of the more than human by the less than

human,”
II. DISCUSSION

Introduction

In 1942 Gabriel Marcel found the best formulation of hope to be "I hope in thee

for us"; his choice of expression was still the same in 1964. His approach to hope, as to

all philosophical issues, is that of - to use the label he preferred - a neo-socratic; if we

use the label of others, we call him a Christian existentialist. With Marcel our intent is

the same as that governing exploration of Bloch and Kant, to lift out and set forth those

aspects of his thought bearing on hope. This chapter is long, but such length seems

needed both in order to respect the exceptionally close connections between Marcel's

analyses, the experiences that give rise to them, and the general framework of his

thought, and in order to sift out and distinguish, for this essay's purposes, reflections

bearing on ultimate hope and especially on fundamental hope. The chapter contains

hints of the ontological models operative in Marcel, but, in general, issues of ontology

and of theism are held over to Part III. Marcel's thought on hope has a substantial

consistency. It has been one of his central themes from the 1930s to the 1960s. His two

most important treatments of the topic are the essays "Sketch of a Phenomenology and

a Metaphysic of Hope" (1942), and "Desire and Hope" (1963), though hope is discussed

in many of his works. It is crucial at the outset to recall one of Marcel's cardinal

principles: human experiences are not simply hetero- or homogeneous, not simply

capable of being grouped into certain families or areas; they have depth, or, in his

terms, they can be found in diluted form and in forms more highly purified or saturated.

In a similar vein, he finds for philosophy an important difference between the full and the

empty, between that which is what it ought to be and that which is devoid of both
meaning and value. In this essay's study of Marcel, "full hope" will be, in general, that

hope which is more truly . The principal writings of Marcel important for philosophical

analysis of hope, and the abbreviations this essay uses to refer to these, "I have written

on another occasion that, provided it is taken in its metaphysical and not its physical

sense, the distinction between the full and the empty seems to me more fundamental

than that between the one and the many . Life in a world centered on function is liable to

despair because in reality this world is empty, it rings hollow." J. J. Godfrey, A

Philosophy of Human Hope Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Dordrecht 1987 104 what hope

is at its best; further sophistication of this notion appears as the study proceeds.

Captivity, despair, desire, and hope The situation of those held prisoner in World War I

not only engaged Marcel's efforts at that time, but became a seminal experience for his

reflection. He came to hold that the experience of the prisoner is paradigm for the

human condition.The structure of captivity is found also in human illness. Indeed,

captivity and illness form two of the central human experiences that demand

philosophical reflection, and illness that is terminal is the subject of some of Marcel's

most acute reflections. There are many forms of captivity, of being in some kind of

bondage or trap, but the structure of any time of trial is the same, whether it be one's

own interior trial or one like that of the prisoner of war. There is impossibility: I cannot

get free; I am unable to think, to write; I cannot be with my loved ones; I am unable to

walk. What we have here are not just constraints in some sense external to my personal

core; In addition, that which characterizes all the situations we are evoking at the

moment, is that they invariably imply the impossibility, not necessarily of moving or even

of acting in a manner which is relatively free, but of rising to a certain fullness of life,
which may be in the realms of sensation or even of thought in the strict sense of the

word. Another chief characteristic of such captivity is my own involvement: we have to

do here with matters where much that involves myself is at stake, where the outcome is

truly taken to heart. In contrast to such involvement are those issues in which I take no

risk, in which I am essentially a spectator, in which I do not share the struggle. My hope

for release from captivity of any sort is quite different from my hoping for a team to win

while I congratulate myself that I have nothing wagered on the outcome. The hopes

which are Marcel's concern are those which may arise out of an experience of captivity.

The less one's life is experienced as involving trial and captivity, the less room there is

for either hope or despair. In fact, there can be hope only where there can also be

despair: "The truth is that there can strictly speaking be no hope except where the

temptation to despair exists. Hope is the act by which this temptation is actively or

victoriously overcome. Captivity tempts to despair.

Fear and desire are anticipatory and focused respectively on the object of fear or

desire. To desire is “to desire that X” and to fear is “to fear that X.” Optimism exists in

the domain of fear and desire because it imagines and anticipates a favourable

outcome. However, the essence of hope is not “to hope that X”, but merely “to hope…”

The person who hopes does not accept the current situation as final; however, neither

does she imagine or anticipate the circumstance that would deliver her from her plight,

rather she merely hopes for deliverance. The more hope transcends any anticipation of

the form that deliverance would take, the less it is open to the objection that, in many

cases, the hoped-for deliverance does not take place. If I desire that my disease be

cured by a given surgical procedure, it is very possible that my desire might be

thwarted. However, if I simply maintain myself in hope, no specific event (or absence of

event) need shake me from this hope.

This does not mean, however, that hope is inert or passive. Hope is not stoicism.

Stoicism is merely the resignation of a solitary consciousness. Hope is neither resigned,

nor solitary. “Hope consists in asserting that there is at the heart of being, beyond all

data, beyond all inventories and all calculations, a mysterious principle which is in

connivance with me” (Marcel, 1995). While hope is patient and expectant, it remains

active; and as such it might be characterized as an “active patience.” The assertion

contained in hope reveals a kinship with willing rather than desiring. “Inert hope” would

be an oxymoron.

No doubt the solitary consciousness can achieve resignation [stoicism], but it

may well be here that this word actually means nothing but spiritual fatigue. For hope,

which is just the opposite of resignation, something more is required. There can be no

hope that does not constitute itself through a we and for a we. I would be tempted to say

that all hope is at the bottom choral. (Marcel 1973, p. 143)

It should be no surprise that “speaking metaphysically, the only genuine hope is

hope in what does not depend on ourselves, hope springing from humility and not from

pride” (Marcel 1995, p. 32). And here is found yet another aspect of the withering that

takes place as a result of indisponibilité in general and pride in particular. The same

arrogance that keeps the proud person from communion with her fellows keeps her

from hope. .
Body

This example points to the dialectical engagement of despair and hope where

there is hope there is always the possibility of despair, and only where there is the

possibility of despair can we respond with hope. Despair, says Marcel, is equivalent to

saying that there is nothing in the whole of reality to which I can extend credit, nothing

worthwhile. “Despair is possible in any form, at any moment and to any degree, and this

betrayal may seem to be counseled, if not forced upon us, by the very structure of the

world we live in” (Marcel, 1995). Hope is the affirmation that is the response to this

denial. Where despair denies that anything, in reality, is worthy of credit, hope affirms

that reality will ultimately prove worthy of an infinite credit, the complete engagement,

and disposal of myself.

Thus there is a dialectical relationship between hope and despair. We can

respond to despair with hope, and within hope, there is always the possibility of despair.

To despair is to say there is nothing worthwhile in the world: “Despair is possible in any

form, at any moment and to any degree, and this betrayal may seem to be counseled, if

not forced upon us, by the very structure of the world we live in.” Hope is an affirmative

response to despair. Hope affirms that your creative fidelity, your work, your concern,

your love, and your life, all ultimately matter.

Hope guarantees fidelity by defeating despair—it gives us the strength to

continually create—but it is not the same as optimism. Optimism, like fear or desire,

imagines or anticipates a favourable or unfavourable outcome. We “desire that x” or

“fear that x.” Hope is different. We don’t hope that x, we simply hope. Hope rejects the
current situation as final, but it doesn’t anticipate a specific result that will deliver us from

our plight. Hope transcends anticipating a specific form of our deliverance it is a vague

hoping. My desires can be thwarted, but if I maintain hope no outcome will shake me

from hoping. It is the very non-specificity of hoping that gives hope its power.

Yet hope is not passive; it is not resignation or acceptance. Instead, “Hope

consists in asserting that there is at the heart of being, beyond all data, beyond all

inventories and all calculations, a mysterious principle which is in connivance with

me.”2 This implies that hope is an active willing, not a surrender. And hope is a willing, a

wanting, not only for ourselves but for others. “There can be no hope that does not

constitute itself through a we and for a we. I would be tempted to say that all hope is at

the bottom choral.” For genuine hope we cannot depend completely upon ourselves it

derives from humility, not pride.

Gabriel Marcel’s Ethics of Hope “responds to the need for an existentialist ethics

based on Marcel’s philosophy of presence…”. Author Jill Hernandez argues that

Marcel’s existentialism is one that is essentially moral, and that this moral core is tied to

the fact that the perspective of the Other functions as the basis for moral decision

making in Marcel’s work .

Chapter one outlines the nature of the “problematic man,” the person

characterized by the desire to possess rather than the desire to be. The author

connects the problematic not only to a functional way of being in the world, but also to a

commitment to materialism. Her aim is to suggest that this commitment to materialism is

the source, or perhaps a source, of moral evil in the world . When we become obsessed
with objects, slaves to things, it degrades our ability to be moral agents. The

problematic and functionalized way of existing is connected to the state of despair.

Faced with death the death of God and, ultimately, our own death a world comprised of

only thing is, the author suggest following Marcel, a world devoid of meaning. If others

and, ultimately, we are nothing more than complex objects, organic machines for

performing a variety of functions, then the value of persons ceases when they are no

longer able to perform their functions. It is because “unavailability creates relationships

of function rather than value, [that] Marcel equates indisponibilité with a crippling moral

evil”. In the face of death and despair we cannot derive meaning from things, and can

only be saved by what the author intriguingly calls the “relational turn”: “The most

mysterious aspect of our being is our propensity to love, and it is love that can foster

hope because love attempts to transcend death” .

Chapter two focuses on the implications of the “death of God” and its relation to

moral life, problematic life, and materialism. Hernandez outlines Marcel’s engagement

with three different atheists: Nietzsche, Sartre, and Camus. Nietzsche’s atheism is

grounded in a deep appreciation of the loss represented by the death of God. Sartre, in

contrast, is someone for whom God was never significant, and so he remained oblivious

to his own role in the death of God and insensitive to the existential significance of the

Nietzschean proclamation. For Camus, in contrast to Nietzsche and Sartre, the death of

God was deeply intertwined with the problem of evil, particularly as evident in the

suffering of children. In a sense, Camus shares some of Marcel’s concern for the Other.

This third engagement weighs heavily on Marcel, for whom the problem of evil is a

genuine existential problem. The problem of evil, in turn, can lead people to a sort of
spiritual numbness or death, a “lived atheism” based not on propositions about God’s

(non)existence, but rather on lived experience. If the death of God leaves us with

insolvable difficulties, whether we are atheists or theists, redemption is nevertheless

possible in inter-subjectivity, through which we may break from problematic materialism

and salvage “a meaningful existence tied to community and evidenced in a life of hope”.

Chapter three bridges the discussion of moral and the account of personal and

communal crises in the later chapters through a discussion of hope. Hope, the author

argues, is distinguished by two significant criteria. First, it is “choral”; that is to say, hope

always involves others and constitutes itself “through a we and for a we”.

Second, hope is distinct from “mere wishing” and is related to “creating

possibilities” that “an agent can bring about.” Thus, hope combats despair by actively

creating options for the subject.

Chapter four develops an intriguing account of the role of technology in

materialism, disconnection, and problematicity. Technology itself is morally and

existentially benign, or perhaps neutral. However, there is a tendency for technology to

lead to materialism and even idolatry. It can also lead people to hide from or escape the

reality of relationships with other people and with non-human entities like the

environment, and in so doing devalue them. This argument puts Marcel in dialogue with

a lively contemporary debate about the nature, promise, and dangers of technology.

Hernandez argues that, for Marcel, technology is only a tool. Our focus should rather be

on an ethical life of virtue, expressed in fidelity and availability (disponibilité) to others,

and in hope.
 Chapter five continues the engaging work of chapter four by applying Marcel’s

ethics to global crises such as war, civil injustices, and unemployment. Professor

Hernandez demonstrates that the ethical life, on Marcel’s view, must be socially and

politically engaged. The philosopher is called upon to create possibilities that foster

change and hope in the world. Applied to social or global crises, this has to do with

preserving a place for human value that will, in turn, allay fear and encourage people to

act creatively. Overall, Gabriel Marcel’s Ethics of Hope is a competent contribution to

scholarship on a figure whose sadly ignored work could shed considerable light on a

number of contemporary philosophical debates. Perhaps its most welcome contribution

is the perceptive way in which it links Marcel’s philosophy of presence, availability, and

hope to “applied” issues such astechnology, civil rights, poverty and unemployment, and

war. As Professor Hernandez notes, Marcel’s own thinking was in a sense

fundamentally normative. Connecting the theoretical arguments of philosophy to these

concrete ethical issues is certainly something worth pursuing and definitely something

squarely in the spirit of Marcel’s own thinking; Professor Hernandez’s efforts in

advancing this engagement will no doubt be welcome. There are issues that could do

with further clarification. For example, despite the engagement with the concrete, we

never get a solid sense of what Marcel’s philosophy enjoins us, as humans or as

philosophers, to do. What exactly does it mean to “create possibilities”? Are these

existential possibilities, or concrete possibilities? In what sense can the subject or agent

bring these possibilities about, especially possibilities of the latter sort? The ability of

hope to “create possibilities” is a central theme of the work, but the text is not always

clear on these issues. How should the philosopher respond to the various ethical crises
Hernandez engages? What does it mean to “deny, as forcibly as possible”, to “actively

sympathize”, to “take an active stand” to “refocus political and social debate back to

values”, or to “remind people of the experiences that are left behind in memories”.Near

the very end of the book Hernandez suggests the philosopher might “promote activity in

the community in which she lives engaging with students, fostering dialogue,

participating in nongovernmental secular and religious groups\. However, while this is a

welcome, if brief, clarification, it doesn’t sound too different from the way in which many

contemporary philosophers do in fact behave: talking to students, writing op-ed pieces,

participating in academic, social, and religious venues. One might suggest that

contemporary philosophers could more fully embrace Marcel’s call to disponibilité,

presence, fidelity, and hope; but since those are ways of being to which all persons are

called, they don’t seem to suggest anything particular about how philosophers should

concretely proceed in their social and political lives. It may be the case that Marcel’s

social thought is not a full social philosophy, but one might hope for a bit more detail in

this regard. The introduction to the book promises to show that “Marcel’s theoretical

ethics are relevant to contemporary analytic ethics”, but it never fully delivers on this

count. As my own training is largely continental, I may have missed more subtle

references; however, there are few explicit and no sustained engagements with

contemporary analytic philosophy. Three examples, each very brief, include a

discussion of Stephen Darwall’s ethics of welfare, the fact that analytic ethics has

traditionally had difficulty establishing how others could be the seat of the moral

permissibility of actions, and the mention of Amartya Sen’s work on global welfare.
Conclusion

Finally, Marcel analyzed the phenomenon of hope. Like other existential thinkers,

Marcel made the distinction between fear and dread, where fear is being afraid of some

particular thing or object, while dread is the basic existential anxiety or angst one feels

apart from fearing any specific thing. Dread, then, is one of the fundamental ways of

relating to the world. In a similar contrast, Marcel distinguished between desire and

hope. Desire is when one wants or seeks; some particular thing or object. Hope,

however, is an open-ended expectation in which one anticipates without knowing

exactly what it is he is waiting or hoping for. It is here that Marcel’s analyses take a

specifically religious, and even Christian, form, in that such hope, he believes, is not

something one can dictate or create by oneself alone. Rather, it is a grace which one

receives. In his own words, "the only genuine hope is hope in what does not depend on

ourselves, hope springing from humility and not from pride" (Marcel, 1995).

Optimism As an Expectation About the Future

I begin with optimism, a concept closely related to hope. The American Heritage

Dictionary defines optimism as: “A tendency to expect the best possible outcome …”

Optimists believe that things will improve, while pessimists believe that things will get

worse. So optimism is a dispositional attitude which reflects an expectation that future

conditions will work out for the best. I reject such optimism because I don’t expect good

outcomes, or believe that things will get better in the future.

Optimism As an Attitude in the Present

The Merriam-Webster dictionary offers another meaning of optimism: “an

inclination to put the most favorable construction upon actions and events …” So

optimism in this sense refers, not to expectations about the future, but to an attitude that

we have in the present. This is the kind of optimism that sees the glass as half-full

rather than half-empty, or looks on the bright side of life. Optimism as a positive attitude

is generally beneficial you tend to be happier seeing the glass half full while

expectations for the future set us up for disappointment. I recommend this attitudinal

optimism, as long as it excludes expectations.

Hope As an Expectation About the Future

The American Heritage Dictionary offers this definition of hope: “To wish for

something with expectation of its fulfillment. To look forward to with confidence or

expectation.” Here again the emphasis is on future expectations. And I reject such hope

because I don’t expect or anticipate that my wishes will come true.

Hope As an Attitude in the Present That Motivates Action

But hope, like optimism, can also refer to an attitude we have in the present; a

kind of hope illuminated by contrasting it with its opposite despair. When I despair, I no

longer care; I just give up because my actions feel like they don’t matter. Why take the

test if I’m sure I’m going to fail? Why play the match if I’m sure I’m going to lose? Why

fight for truth and justice if they can’t be realized?

 But hope is the opposite. Hope entails caring, acting, and striving. To hope is to

reject despair to care although it might not matter; to act in the face of the unknown; to

express fidelity to our comrades; and to not give up. I don’t know if my actions will

improve my life or better the world, but I can choose to hope, care, act, and strive

without expecting success. So this hope isn’t about future expectations; it’s an attitude

which informs my present. And it’s not about resignation or acceptance. Instead, hope is

the wellspring for the cares and concerns which manifest themselves in action.

The Difference Between Optimism and Hope

The key difference between optimism and hope is that optimism even if devoid of

expectations usually relies on a belief that a desirable outcome is probable, whereas

hope is independent of probability assessments. I may hope for outcomes that are very

unlikely, but it is hard to be optimistic in such cases. Put another way, attitudinal hope

conquers despair similar to how optimism bests pessimism. So attitudinal hopefulness

is a stronger version of attitudinal optimism because despair is more devastating than

pessimism.

Hope Is an Attitude That Makes My Life Better

But what is the point of all this hoping, caring, acting, and striving if we don’t

know if we will succeed? One answer is that an attitude of hoping and caring that leads

to action is inherently good. Consider the joy we take in playing games, solving puzzles,

or writing blog posts, even if such actions may be objectively pointless. Such actions are
a form of playing. We often do these things, not for any future rewards, but because we

want to, as we find doing them fulfilling.

But devoid of hope, in the grip of despair, we wouldn’t even try to play the game

or solve the puzzle or write the blog, and we would miss the inherent joy such actions

might bring. Moreover, if I despair, I won’t enjoy my life as much as if I had adopted a

hopeful attitude. So there is also a pragmatic reason for adopting a hopeful attitude it

makes my life go better; it helps me live well; it makes me happier. So hope is both

inherently and instrumentally good for us.

Attitudinal hopefulness rejects despair and leads to caring and acting. I adopt attitudinal

hopefulness because it spurs action and makes my life better. I recommend such hope.

Hope As Wishing Without Expectations

Yet hope is more than simply an attitude we adopt in the present; hope also

entails having certain desires, dreams, wants or wishes for the future. (This is the

fundamental distinction between the act of hoping and the objects of our hopes.) Now I

have already rejected such hopes if they include the idea of expectations. But I can

have hopes, desires, dreams, wishes, or wants without any sense that they will be

fulfilled. In this sense, there is nothing intellectually objectionable about having hopes

and dreams so long as there is a realistic possibility that they can be fulfilled. However,

this hopeful wishing is not faith. I don’t believe or expect that my wishes will come true,

although I imagine that they could, and I’m not hoping for something that’s impossible.
Hope As Wishing Leads to Action

Attitudinal hope in the present moment rejects despair, makes our lives better,

and spurs action. But so too can hope as wishing without expectation motivate action.

Wishful hoping provides the impetus for acting to fulfill those hopes, which in turn makes

the fulfillment of those hopes more likely.

This connection between hopeful wishing and action is easy to see. For example,

suppose I hope to be a lawyer. If for some reason this is impossible, then it is counter-

productive to have this false hope. But if nothing prevents me from becoming a lawyer,

then the desire to be one motivates me to act toward that end. So hoping like this is not

a false hope, as long as my hopes are realistic. In short, my hopes and dreams give me

reasons to act.

Wishful hopefulness also rejects despair and motivates action. I recommend this hope.

What Do I Hope For?

What then are the objects of my hopes? They are relatively vague or

indeterminate. I hope that something better will emerge, that things will work out for the

best, that my life and universal life are meaningful, that truth, goodness, and beauty

matter, that justice ultimately prevails, and that the world can be improved. In short, I

hope that somehow it all makes sense, even though philosophical nihilism constantly

beckons.
What Is the Source of This Hope?

I don’t know the exact sources of these hopes, but I feel them with an ineffable

fervency. To best explain, I wax poetically. Maybe the source of these hopes is some

cosmic longing within me, or perhaps what I call me is just misnomer for the longing of

some cosmic consciousness. Perhaps, as the French existentialist Gabriel Marcel put it,

“Hope consists in asserting that there is at the heart of being, beyond all data, beyond

all inventories and all calculations, a mysterious principle which is in connivance with

me.”

These poetic descriptions are a bit metaphysically speculative for my tastes. I’d

prefer to say this hoping emanates from biological and cultural sources. Our biological

drives to survive and reproduce, combined with the emergence of consciousness and

culture, steer us toward hoping and acting. Having hope benefitted our ancestors, made

their lives go better, and aided their survival. In short, we are the descendants of those

who hoped.

Losing Hope

Still, any of us can lose our hopeful attitude; we can give in to despair. And that’s

because hope and despair exist in a dialectical relationship. We can respond to despair

with hope, and within hope, there is always the possibility of despair. To despair is to

say there is nothing worthwhile in the world; to hope is to affirm that your concerns, your

actions, your love, and your life, all matter.

 Still, it is easy from the safety of my study, with an adequate supply of life’s

necessities, to opine about the value of hope. No doubt some people are in hopeless

situations. Perhaps they are starving, fleeing violence, in endless pain, or in solitary

confinement. For them hope is no salve, and their lives possibly pointless. These

hopeless situations should make us all weep.

But notice what hope recommends, at least for those of us lucky enough to have

our basic needs met. We are called upon to forgo acceptance and resignation and to try

to improve the world. Be sympathetic, but also act! We may not succeed, but we can

try. For hope is better than despair and, even if we all ultimately face the abyss, we can

meet it no better
III. POSITION

We agree with Marcel’s work entitled, Metaphysic of Hope in three main reasons;

Hope is one of the most important thing that an individual must possess because if you

have hope you’ll become stronger person and you won’t give up easily. And another,

having hope can motivate those people in the times of despair.

Second, Marcel’s reasoning hope can motivate or encouraged us when

hardships and struggles come. Marcel’s concept of hope is to overcome problems in our

life. And we will going to use hope when it comes to trials and even insecurities in real

life situations.

Third, the difference between hope and faith with the dreams that will be

achieved and the expectations are clear and recognize well. In this world, Hope still

remains strong on human needs, it’s like a single candle during the night, it gives light

for us to continue on and find the way out of the darkness. This light of hope burns so

strongly in the hearts of some. Hope is all we need to keep living.

Finally, we will say this about hope, and I think Marcel would agree. Hope helps

us to brave the struggle of life while keeping alive the possibility that we will create a

better and more meaningful reality. In this sense hope is an attitude we have in the

present that motivates us to act; it does not imply passivity or resignation. Hope is most

precious Hope is a state of mind, not of the world.

Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, and orientation of the

heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced, and is anchored

somewhere beyond its horizons. Hope is not the same as joy but rather an ability to

work for something because it is good. ~ Vaclav Havel.

IV. REFERENCES

Godfrey, J. (2019). Gabriel Marcel: I Hope in Thee for Us. Retrieved September 15,

2019 from https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-009-3499-3_13

Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosphy. (2017). Retrieved September 14, 2019 from

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/marcel/ intro

New World Encyclopedia. (2017). Gabriel Marcel. Retrieved September 13, 2019 from

https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Gabriel_Marcel

YourDictionary. (2019). Gabriel Marcel Facts. Retrieved September 15, 2019 from

https://biography.yourdictionary.com/gabriel-marcel

Hernandez, J. (2012). Gabriel Marcel’s Ethics of Hope, God and Virtue. Retrieved

September 15, 2019 from https://ndpr.nd.edu/news/gabriel-marcel-s-ethics-of-

hope-evil-god-and-virtue/?fbclid=IwAR2bz5GIAEBtis0jV89y5c3HCC3-

d9PjAkOn0gAaF3B9okfvo51VUsQ2f4U

Mohamadi, A. (n.d.). Gabriel Marcel on the Relation between “Having” and “Being”.

Retrieved September 15, 2019 from

http://philosophy.mofidu.ac.ir/article_29671_en.html

Ogundele, A. (2019). An Essay on Gabriel Marcel’s Existentialism. Retrieved

September 13, 2019 from

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327535350_An_Essay_on_Gabriel_Ma

rcel's_Existentialism
Reason and Meaning. (2014). Gabriel on Creativity of Hope. Retrieved September 16,

2019 from https://reasonandmeaning.com/2014/04/16/marcel-on-

hope/?fbclid=IwAR2lgA6mHdeTGoxg5ntD2nSj3R5qaDErS1FRTlk6qhR_CMqkS

5y8D_4BHM
 Republic of the Philippines
Department of Education
Region 1
School Division Office I Pangasinan Lingayen
BAYAMBANG NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL

SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL

An Exposition of Gabriel
Marcel’s Metaphysics of Hope
An Apology

Presented to: Presented by:

_________________________ Hanif Hadji Jamil

Kristian Ramirez
_________________________
Alyssa Bautista
_________________________
Eunice Benitez

Alwarith Hashim

Rodante Colisao

Alyssa Juan