How Olódùmarè is effectively God

The problem with religious syncretism is its approach from opposites, even based on the same presupposition; which is wrong, trying to preserve religious structures in their purity, not in their functionality. For essentialism it is corruption, and for relativism it is an indiscriminate mixture of unrelated elements; and both positions assume that religions are definite phenomena, not functional systems in continuous adjustment.

But it is this continuous adjustment what gives consistency to the religious phenomenon, as its existential function; which is to regulate the relations of the concrete person with reality, in the reflection of its formal determinations. Hence, syncretism is precisely the development of this phenomenon, as an adjustment of this relationship; whose function is then ontological —and therefore structural—, relating functions of that reality, including the religious person.

So this is not a question of concrete religious identities, but of those functions of reality, conventionally represented; and where, for example, the Abrahamic God is not a figure essentially distinct from other supreme divinities. The difference would then lie not in their metaphysical nature, but in their different representations by the culture; and whose differences are in fact functional, marking that difference of their respective representations.

In that same example, the God of the Judeo-Christian tradition develops in highly institutionalized cultures; where representation fulfills a regulative function of the political and economic order, not merely existential. On the other hand, Olódùmarè belongs to a cosmology where this function is not representable, invokable or personified; that is, it is not subject to representation, because its culture has not developed that conventional institutionalization; so that their representation admits non-conceptual figures, and therefore alien to the logic of human hierarchies.

This contrast, however, is not an absolute opposition to Western rationality, but a functional difference; since this representation is not exclusive to Greek rationalism, but a consequence of its institutionality. In Mesopotamia and Egypt, religion already contracted from its double function, of infra and super-structural, to super-structural; with the political tension on the figure of the prince-priest, in which the former assumes the administration of trade and tribute.

From this transition arises the need for a conventional representation, which allows the management of the divine; in that super-structural function in which it organizes the instituted order, with culture as a transcendent identity. In this context, the equivalence between principles of different traditions is not ignorance or reductionism; rather, it is a structural operation, in which functions are translated, from one hermeneutical spectrum to another; and where hermeneutics is precisely cosmology, as a reflection of the transcendent determinations of the real.

What is thus at stake is not identity nor the names, but the function they fulfill in the cosmological system; in which Olódùmarè is "the vastness that knows the mystery", and God "the creative principle that orders the world". The equivalence does not lie in their respective attributes, but in their position in the ontological structure of culture; and in which syncretism does not fuse Olódùmarè with God out of naivety, but out of structural necessity; since what is at stake is to sustain a cosmology, whose very function is in fact existential and not religious; because the function of religion is existential, as that regulation of the relationships in which reality structures itself.

Thus, syncretism is not a symbolic negotiation, but a structure of survival, which resolves the function of the divine; and it can be said that the critics of syncretism respond even to that determination that they deny, in their representation; since, they must recognize that reductive representation of the divinity as of absolute value, not only epistemic. Thus, syncretism must be understood as an ontological reflection, of functional equivalences, that preserves religious structures; and does this subsuming them in other forms, for their validity lies in the functions they fulfill, organizing the relationships with the reality.

Against modern thought

The idea that modern capitalism arises from English industrialism, eludes its origin and support by the culture; which had been expanding since the discovery of the so-called New World, flooding the market with sumptuary objects. This expansion, prior to the technological revolution, would determine the consumption habits, stimulating industrialization[1]; as a culture that is not only consumerist, but also dependent on that consumerism, in the artificiality of its economic organization.

As a culture, with its own political expression, this would be what distorts the modern understanding of culture; already in crisis due to its own hermeneutical contradiction, with the political specialization of its middle class, as an intellectual. Neither capitalism nor the bourgeoisie would be then a modern phenomenon, defining the West culture since ancient times; when the expansion of Phoenician trade —outside its own regulatory framework— reshaped the Greek political stratification.

It will be the intellectual specialization of this middle class, with modern commercialism, what will provoke the crisis; and this comes from the political —not economic— conflicts of the transition to the late Middle Ages, with the Carolingian Renaissance. That Carolingian renaissance would in fact be an extension of the Merovingian, but lacking a middle class to become a cultural expression; that only appears with Louis VI in the twelfth century, in his strategy against the expansion of the Angevin empire; and that is why it takes its reference from that Carolingian period, as the closest instance of its political legitimacy[2].

Then, Modernity, with the fall of Granada and the discovery of the New World, would not be an original renaissance; but a reordering of the old one, explaining the postmodern persistence of the feudal political structure; including the tying to the gleba (land), by which citizens cannot move freely between countries. All this implies that modern thought —from Descartes to Kant, Hegel and Marx— develops as a political fiction; hermeneutically conditioned by its economic dependence, on both the aristocracy and the crown that funds it; explaining the period as a progressive disorder, rather than as a cultural order properly speaking.

Hence, the crisis in which Modernity culminates in the nineteenth century is not exactly political but anthropological; surpassing in this that of the Roman Empire —which survived in the Byzantine— and that of archaic Greece; to resolve itself in a postmodernity, which only marks the establishment of a new order, like that of the Germans in Rome. To understand this phenomenon, it is then necessary to overcome its determination, which is hermeneutical; not economic, because the economy only makes possible its historical realization as a political expression, but does not determine it.

Hence, any renewal of the structure will come always from its popular base, ethnically defined in an identity; because this identity is what provides them with the referents of their needs, as existential instead of political. This will reshape that hermeneutic, in its political framework as an order in disintegration, due to its dysfunctionality; but without its determination, given that marginality for which it had resorted to his identity, rather than to political convention.

None of this can be understood by modern thought, as dialectic and not trialectic, creating an epistemological loop; for which it can understand history, but not its determination, which is transhistorical, as a condition of reality. Hence this insufficiency, from which all its projections are contradictory but in dichotomies, not trichotomies; because of its incomprehension of the transhistorical nature of the real, structured in its immanence, not in its transcendence.

---

[1] . It refers not only to gold and silver, which facilitated mercantilism by flooding the markets, but also to consumer goods, such as tobacco, alcohol and sugar, which are not as important to existence as English wool, which they displace.

[2] . It refers to the formation of cities under royal protection—with a bureaucratic structure—within fiefs under Angevin jurisdiction; referring to the entity formed by the County of Anjou and the Duchies of Aquitaine and Normandy, owned by the English crown. It’s from this function that is understood the pseudo-aristocratic character of the middle class; because its functional displacement of that aristocracy, providing the State with the new capital of ideology, with its of its intellectual specialization.

Stories with ache, a critical review

Warriors Editions has presented the title Stories with ache, a trilogy of short stories by black Cuban authors; in what seems a naïve effort, attempting to overcome the lack of will for effective integration in Cuban culture; but which, more than that, is the proof of a reality in its own consistency, apart from that lack of will. Thus, as a preamble, this editorial effort may seem socially vindictive, or even be objectively so; but beyond that —vindictive or not— it shows the sufficiency of an incredible culture, condemned to the margins.

Politically, the vindictive scope of this anthology is secondary, because its value lies precisely in its marginality; from which it can reflect on reality, beyond those conventions of the political, in a different scope, as existential. This would have always been the proper meaning of art, at least from that conflictive modernity that confronts it with Reason; but in a dichotomy in which it progressively lost ground, in the face of the crude advance of that conventionalism.

That is another discussion, which helps to put this wonderful anthology in context, but that is also secondary; because what matters here is the reality boiling in these stories, invisible in the falsehood of our political culture. That is also another discussion, just as secondary, but which also helps to contextualize the need for these stories; which with better and worse luck aspired to the realization of their authors, at a time when art itself is declining.

Above all, these are authors who have worked, loved and written stories that were invisible until today; but which now serves as an index and handbook, to navigate the parallel history of black culture in Cuba. This is what makes it necessary, even if against the evolution in which art is already declining of so much conventionalism; because that culture requires its own expression, which could even explain the shortcomings in which the one that covers it fails.

With a prologue of deserved density, this compilation refers to the darkened roots of Cuban black literature; in the tension between Martín Morúa Delgado and Cirilo Villaverde, which perpetuates the whiteness of Cuban negrismo; and in this, it refers to the presence of the black in national literature, with Salvador Golomón in Mirror of resilience. There are many reasons to believe and disbelieve the foundational character of Mirror of resilience in national literature; above all of them —and in both senses— is the moment in which it is known, at the mid-nineteenth century; when the founding myth of the nation is shaped, adjusting the past to legitimize the projection of the future.

Since then, the Negro has always been presented as a passive object of national culture, even if heroic; which is just a political fiction of literature, which does not express that effective reality of cultural miscegenation. That is what makes this anthology pertinent, not precisely as a vindication, which is always unnecessary and effective; but as an access to a reality hidden in its own scope, which that is there, in its own sufficiency, for everyone.

This cosmology, withdrawn and profoundly existential, is what explains the life of the nation, expressed in its culture; and it is the one in these stories, deloused from the profuse editorial activity that characterizes these times. None of them attests to an era, but to a reality, which in its parallelism adjusts the visible one, giving it perspective; and it is good that this work is brought together, as a basis to establish the true canon of national literature.

Welcome Back to Blackness

The conflict that Captain General O'Donnell faced in Cuba was not one of effective rebellion, but of cultural blackening; as a danger emanating from the recent Haitian republic, providing a paradigm political for black Cubans. This does not translate into dangerous uprisings, which the geography of the country would have allowed to control easily; but the formation of an enlightened focus in Santiago de Cuba, which would hinder the primacy of the white sacrocracy.

It is no coincidence that the Independents of Color rose up in Santiago, nor the Haitian ascendancy of their leaders; nor that this was also the ascendancy of Rómulo Lachatañeré, the black anthropologist who questioned Ortiz. Santiago de Cuba was undoubtedly a focus of new hermeneutics, arising from the conflicts between Haitians and Dominicans; who landed there with their problems, even of identity, immersed themselves in their discussions, foreign to Havana.

The reference is strong, with an Antenor Firmin who challenges the founder of French anthropology in France; and a Joseph Janvier who rescues the discipline to its own value on humanity, from its ethnological reductions. Black tension is strong in Cuba, with the West threatened on two fronts, not only the one at the East; there is also that of the trade with Louisiana, to where fled Haitians and French, mixed in their disagreements.

Descarga gratis

Meanwhile in Cuba, the most that can be done is to launch that dove of intellectual flight of miscegenation; which is postulated as pure logical necessity, but of difficult reality in this fiction of political syncretism. In short, miscegenation is not only an abstract and conventional category, but also conditioned by its subordination; while people behave like blacks or whites —no emulates— relatively but also firmly.

Mestizaje cannot access the intricacies of politics, which reacts angrily every time the rule is broken; that is what the bourgeoisie did not forgive Batista, justifying the violence against him as revolutionary. Behind Batista was the broad wing of black conservatism, which had bourgeois aspirations in its proletarian character; and that was unthinkable, like that constant threat emanating from the Caribbean, until the revolution was able to control it.

That is what René Depestre's work consists of, with a title as illustrative as Welcome and Goodbye to Negritude; but so meticulous that it collects and organizes even his own political shortcomings, with which he dissolves the movement. This book by Depestre emulates the dissolution of the Niagara Movement, by W.E.B. Du Bois, in North America; subordinating all possible American blackness to the political strategy of liberalism, which is ideological and white.

Depestre's critique focuses on the culturalism of the movement, as a futile effort to establish a new ontology; not seeing that it was a matter of recovering the original ontology of black ancestry, adequating the defects of the Western one. He could not understand it —as it cannot yet be understood— because the problem is not only ontological; it is in fact hermeneutical, because that dependence of Marxism on the Idealist tradition from which it evolves, even as its expression; and whose transcendentalism derives to the historical, trying to resolve some immanentism for its lacks, but unsuccessfully.

Blackness still offers that capacity for renewal for the whole of the West, which stubbornly refuses to do so; not because it is perverse but childish in its stubbornness, given that insufficiency in which it cannot understand its shortcoming. The New Black Thought, by reorganizing the phenomenon, can make up for this lack, which is hermeneutical; and that due to the enlightened excess of modernity, has precipitated its entire civilization into entropy; which is not serious, if after all there is Haiti, ready with its own enlightenment, welcoming Negritude again.

Carlos Martiel and the actuality of Slavery bondage

There should be no doubt about the religious edge nature of art, but religion is no longer a cultural reference; reduced to its mere political function, in contradiction to the historical transcendentalism of modern Idealism. That is why this nature of art goes unnoticed, with the distortion of the anthropological structure of society; which, no longer determined by culture but by politics, resolves its ideological character in this projection of art.

That is important, because in this religious edge nature, art becomes a pseudo-religious function; providing in this a hermeneutical structure (ideology), for that political determination of society. In this sense, art assumes the reflexive-discursive function of mystical traditions in religion; with an emphasis on the discursive, channeling this ideological rather than reflexive function, with its ethical referents; but also with reflective scopes, in this mystical character that it provides in its spiritual exaltation.

On the face of it, that order is already inverted as part of this distortion of society's determination; which is not resolved in culture itself —as an existential praxis— but in politics, with this effect. That is why, as a mystical sublimation of discourse, art no longer contradicts the institutional function of discourse; contrary to the pre-modern tradition on which it is based, and in which mysticism continually subverted this institutionality.

This is again important, as the dialectical loop in which society loses its capacity for renewal; by justifying, rather than adapting its institutionality, in the hermeneutical function of this historical transcendentalism. It is here that the contradiction is serious, as seen in the extreme cases of social marginalization; which segmented into conceptual abstractions, such as intersectionality, it cannot comprehend the individual.

The serious thing here is that the individual is the ontological basis of society, resolved in its existential praxis; which —thus disappeared— causes the stagnation of the whole structure, already doomed to an accelerated entropy. As an example, see the case of performances in plastic art, with their openly discursive projection; which, by recreating itself in the drama of an original experience, prevents its overcoming as practical.

The example would be in cases such as that of Carlos Martiel and his treatment of racism, which is always political; as it does not refer to an existential experience, but only recreates that of slavery in the black historical past. Martiel, to explain the example, does not contextualize the phenomenon as historical, but only morally; so that in the end it is decontextualized, in the same Manichean tradition of moral institutionalism; which born in Christianity, subverts its own anthropology as soteriological, with the political function of ideology.

Martiel thus reproduces the impact of the mystics on the Christian tradition, with its metaphysical drama; but, as we have seen, not in the anthropological function with which this mystique subverted tradition; made in the updating of that soteriological character of the experience he proposed, against institutional political pressure; but rather confirms and justify —as transcendental— that institutionality, with its moral transcendence. In fact, Martiel's work —as a postmodernist in general— requires a massive and systematic subsidy; which would already corrupt him, in that supposedly unconventional nature, with a political compromise.

As a result, to continue with the example, the black person will never be able to overcome his past as a slave; as the modern Christian can never escape the supposed but institutional blackmail of his liberation by Christ; which is supposed, since in reality it would occur at the individual level, by their consciousness, not institutionally. In this case, the black people is affiliated as a principle to an ideology, which spreads its protective mantle over him; that is to say, he loses the power of his own political expression, which is individual as practical and existential.

El Monte (the wild) or the Igbo example for black American political contradictions I

In some accounts, Igbo means wild —signifying forest and woods—, so they are the people of the wild; with their rejection of the so-called civilized conventions, although their own culture is politically exemplar. This is what primitive African oppressive political systems had, different from those the westerns; the ability of the people to leave and star again by their own, creating a new society from the scratch of mere living.

This is then how Igbo people organized their society, based in economical relationships but not as political determinations; which keep dissociated of economic power, and linked to age, as a gerontocracy nucleated in the family. That’s why the system was able to regulate their political development, avoiding those western sclerosis of Modernity; at least ‘till that same modernity overpowered them, since the weakness of this model is its military disorganization.

Still the system is so efficient, that allows its immediate reparation, as long as people find a way back to the wild; that means, if only people are willing to leave the accommodation of civilized society, and start from the ground. This Igbo culture is especially interesting, because it allows the understanding of African anthropologic structures; and in this sense, humanity evolves cellularly, splitting societies when their overgrowth makes them sclerotic in their determinations.

Because of this, deities are of an ambiguous nature hard to understand, but which is not even necessary at all; because reality is what is at stake —and it’s always concrete and immediate in its functionality—, no matter if human or divine. Which makes African culture so different from the western, which always depend on universalities and abstractions; leading to development as precious as disastrous, like that of Western philosophy, specifically its modern Idealism.

That explains the flexibility and adaptability of the Igbo pantheon, which is only and organization of reality; subjected to the constant adaptation of the nature it manifests in, with the specialized interpretation that adequate culture to reality. Thus here lies the importance of the medicine men —root workers and curanderos— as the priesthood, rather than philosophers; responsible for the interpretation of this entanglement of determinations, and so organizing them in an intelligible sense.

What’s curious here is that this is how pantheons evolved in human history, even those of Western civilizations; and not only with the fusion of religions but even in its internal development, as in the case from Atonism to Christianity and Islan. This is then what shows the resilience of human nature, over the sclerotic decadence of its western structures; as the true consistence of humanity, based on its own reality and not on the idea they have of themselves.

The difference is in the beginning, where Igbo culture insists on splitting while West cultures insists in the overgrowth; to the point where it can no longer overcome its own entropy, after that moment of its splendor that was modernity. This is then what happens with Modernity, with society becoming postmodern and thus starting its declining; with this example of United States as the New Rome, in a position no other power has been before in the West.

Everything has been a just development, between these two splendors of Rome in antiquity and the United States in postmodernity; and so the new developments would lie in the cultural group that holds the functions of German at the moment of Rome decadence. This would be the case of black people, as the ones stablishing their own determinations to survive the crumbling of the structure; but for which they need to do nothing else than preserve their own ancestrallity, because it’s the only source of sense for the new reality; and other than that would be the extension of the same crumbling structure, dragging us in its agony.

Black people on political contradictions II

Capitalism is a joke for black people, because its economy is based on power consumption rather than of production; and that means that blacks have not chance on it, due to that bad start without that power of consumption. That’s what makes blacks dependent of society, but being socialism equally a joke due to its ideological nature; that forces people to feudal clientelism, with politicians who never fulfill their promises, because then they would lose the source of legitimacy.

This doesn’t mean that black people don’t have a space in politics, but that we need to put that power to a real use; like forcing society out of that fake confrontation of Capitalism Vs Socialism, which always use black people as clients. Black people can and should force society back to its industrialism, shrinking economy to production instead of consumption; so we could build our own possibilities through economy, based in our human sufficiency rather than in the constrictions of political protections.

The problem with this is its political dissonance, as out of that fake contradiction Capitalism and Socialism; that turning capital to ideology, dries human sufficiency to collectivism, through that political dependency. It doesn’t matter if that dependency is directly political like in socialism, or indirectly as in capitalism; in this last case it’s still political, through economic dependence of government, and so its allegiance to liberalism; and in both cases results in the same inability for political sufficiency, subjecting persons to political corporatism.

As the main problem is the economy, the best example here is the neoliberal overgrowth of corporate capitalism; which is the socialist economy, as governmental capitalism, modeled by Lenin to sustain its proletariat dictatorship. The problem is that this corporatism is what reduces individuality to clientelism, thus to the abstraction of social class; so the solution would be to retort to basic industrialism, with the growth of a small and middle bourgeoisie from that middle class.

The fake solution is the promotion of that middle class as a false small bourgeoisie, with the small and middle enterprises; which still depends on the services from those corporations, from financial services to supply and utilities; just taking from their shoulders the task of management and direct supply to society, but not allowing the individual resilience of the small bourgeoisie. So a real solution would lie in politicians able to shrink back to real industrialism, based on production rather than consumption; that means real money, as when industrialization began, not just services that tie people to financial institutions.

This is what the system will not allow, as a whole corporate organization, integrating politicians and big finances; turning postmodern societies into a kind of neo-feudalism, that just doesn’t allow the growth of individuality as contrary to clients. It should be remembered that this false contradiction of modern politics was created by the push of those financial elites; acting corporately in the support of Monarchy against traditional aristocracy, which supplied the military as capital; and to which they substitute, supplying that capital, turning it from military to financial nature, as the ability of government to govern.

So a real solution for black people is to look locally, resisting the push to integrate a category as client of a corporate trust; this would allow us to survive the crumbling of the whole system, doomed by its political sclerosis, due to its corporate overgrowth. Again, this doesn’t mean that black people shouldn’t or couldn’t participate in politics, but that we need to play it defensively; growing our own kind of politician rather than accepting whomever that now traditional aristocracy sell us as black leader; because like that earlier bourgeoisie of the financial elite, they will sell us in their own lust for power, which is only natural.

Georgina Herrera on Cuban’s Language Day

Miguel de Cervantes was born on April 23, 1547, and William Shakespeare was born on the same date, but in 1564; because both of them, this date is recognized as the day of the Spanish and English languages, which reach their maturity with the work of the latter. This points to the undeniable transcendence of these men, because it is in literature that language is organized and matured; as an external support, which enhances reflection as existential, as a peculiar understanding of the world.

On that same date but in 1936, Georgina Herrera was born in Jovellanos (Cuba), giving a similar value to poetry; not yet to language, which has matured since Cervantes, allowing this other maturation of poetry in Cuba; but to this poetry, which is peculiar because it renews the instrumentality of language for reflection as existential. It is, therefore, an event of similar significance, although the proximity somewhat clouds this scope of hers; because it will be in this instrumentality that culture achieves its best integration, as specifically Cuban.

Namely, as a reflection of reality, culture is a network of relations as chaotic as the former; but now —different from the former— with a sense on its own, because of the peculiarity in which it is carried out, even more as Cuban. In fact, Cuba is the critical point at which Western culture bubbles, unable to materialize due to its innumerable contradictions; which can only be reconciled in a functional integration, starting from a given and progressive understanding of reality.

This progression is what language would provide, as well as its own development and maturity, given in its functionality; and this is what would reside in its ability to reflect the real, in a poetic structure that unveils the meaning of life. This is what recognises the transcendence of art and literature, explaining the scope of Cervantes and Shakespeare; such as Georgina Herrera, whose poetics constricts the formal nonsense of Cuban literature to its existential function.

We should remember that Cuban literature has been distorted by political determinism since nineteenth century; when pseudo-realist symbolism prevails over the nascent national costumeries[1], provoking the bitter critique of the real. This is the drama that unfolds from Cirilio Villaverde and Morúa Delgado, and extends throughout the national novelistic; but unresolved, because the novel —distinct from poetry— is too susceptible to the author's interference.

For this reason, the Cuban novel can only expose these contradictions, but not solve them as poetry can; and this not for its own sake or in fact, but to the extent that this poetry escapes that same political determinism. Herrera does this, as the link that unites the two periods of splendor and decadence of Cuban culture; emerging as a power that sums up the first, to materialize itself through all difficulties in the second. The undeniable transcendence of Cervantes and Shakespeare is given by their immanence, no less undeniable; Georgina Herrera's remains to be seen, but like that lies in this existential —not political— nature of her poetry.

In all three cases, it is the durability that guarantees the functionality of the form, already excellent in its own value; in the latter case, because of that stubborn existentiality that denses it, beyond the political flourish and even the beautiful phrase. Herrera's poetry establishes a hermeneutic from which to reflect on the existence of the nation in its culture, that is its value; and it is functional, fulfilling Morúa's claim to Villaverde, with that effective integration of the political margin into its existentiality; not as a black —although because her blackness— nor as a woman —although because her femininity— but in her extreme humanity.

---

[1] . It refers to “Costumbrismo” as a literary stile, based in the description of social costumes with similar sense to the Critical Realism of French modern literature.

The Morúa’s Enigma, an introduction

El enigma Morúa Delgado is not limited to the historical problems surrounding this character, but goes within his reach; thus, it is more of an anthropological analysis of the historical determinations of politics in Cuba than of this politics in itself. Even in this sense, treating Cuba as the specific context in which Morúa Delgado relates to the Western culture; so it is also an anthropology of than Western culture, expressed in the political contradictions of its development.

That is why, for example, he compares —in appendices— the development produced by the Greek political singularity; but not in relation to the latest political processes in the West, but to their parallel in another exceptionality, African. The book is full of these contrasts, as the one proposing an understanding of history other than dialectics; with an introduction to trialectics, as proper to reality, which in turn would be the nature of the historical.

That is why, despite not being a long book, it gives the impression of being digressive, in its thematic expansion; with appendices as dense —sometimes denser— than the body of the book, trying to break down their topical implications. In this sense, it can be a book as difficult as the subject, struggling to establish an audience of its own; for postulating against the conventional understanding of history, it is as specialized as that very convention.

However, this difficulty is inescapable, even if it means postponing in time the impact of the book; because it is precisely another step in the development of a New Black Thought, like another tradition. Especially important in this sense, then, it seeks to correct the anthropological axis of national culture; moving it from his founding myth to a more practical understanding of these historical determinations.

Morúa Delgado, in short, was the one who postulated a pragmatic and non-moral argument against the autonomic solution; which thus allows for a more realistic establishment of the independence culture, and thus a more functional of these determinations. That’s why its importance is anthropological rather than political, even if its expression is inevitably political; and this in turn as a contradiction, which explains the instability of the republic, leading to its constant implosion.

Another interesting aspect of this approach to Morúa, is based on its same anthropological nature; which in this understanding of history, places it at one of the trico and non-dichotomous extremes of contradiction. The other two extremes would be that of Estenoz —overshadowing the angular function of Ivonet— and Juan Gualberto Gómez; and beyond them, those of Fidel Castro and Toussaint L'Overture, narrowing the Caribbean and displacing the centrality of José Martí.

It is therefore a complex vision of a phenomenon, that is already very complex, without reducing it in its determinations; and hence its contradiction, of avoiding conventional specialization, but with its own specialty, as emerging. Its index of complementary readings, apart from the direct bibliography, is just as apparently random and contradictory; but imposing with it its own object, on the transcendent determination of the real and its comprehension.

This is what makes this book so extremely complex, in that functional centrality of Morúa Delgado; as an elusive topic in current discussions of history and politics, which also now extends to philosophy. Hence the cardinal function of these appendices on Hegel's inconsistencies in relation to dialectics, for example; starting from the same contradiction about the Dasein, which he himself lacked, given his cultural hyper-specialization.

This is the contradiction correctable by black culture in its emergence, but distancing itself from all conventionality; even if through that thick thicket of true marronage, outside the domestic realm of academia. That’s why this approach aims to solve the so-called black problem, but undoing its artificiality; which is why this personality of Morúa Delgado is so central to the history of Cuba, as its capital correction.

This edition is accompanied by  that of Morúa's own Political Essay,  from which his anthropology is extracted; as that understanding of the ontological determinations of the Cuban, at the basis of a true national tradition of thought. With the subtitle of Cuba and the Race of Color, this essay by Morúa is one of his most and worst cited sources; with biased readings, which dissolve into specific data the scope of his very original systematization of the racial problem.

El reino de este mundo: Crítica desde la nueva antropología del Caribe

Esta tiene la virtud de ser la mejor novela sobre la revolución haitiana, pero también de ser perversa en su distorsión; ya que, gracias a su literatura excelente consigue una reflexión de lo real, pero distorsionado. Esto se debería a esa capacidad reflexiva del arte, de fijar hermenéuticamente la determinación existencial de la realidad; que aquí perpetúa el bucle dialéctico de lo histórico, en el dilema existencial de su protagonista, con su falsa dicotomía.

Hay que enfatizar el afrancesamiento intelectualista del autor, que funda su estilo en el realismo crítico como maravilloso; no en la eficacia trascendental de lo mágico, y que es lo que lo distingue de la literatura Latinoamericana. Esto es importante, porque imprime en su literatura la función discursiva del simbolismo antes que una capacidad reflexiva; con su consiguiente sobre distorsión de lo real, no ya con la parcialidad de su interpretación, sino también con su pretensión política.

De ahí que resulte una racionalización de la realidad, antes que en un intento de comprensión efectiva de eso real; como si siguiera la máxima de la oncena tesis contra Feuerbach, que no era una tesis sino una mera interjección. Esto es lo que deviene el escepticismo positivo de Ti ’Noel, por el que renuncia a lo mágico como fuente de su ontología; que es de hecho lo que resuelve la práctica religiosa en su función super estructural, fijando el espectro hermenéutico de la cultura.

Esa distorsión es propia de la Modernidad, y Carpentier es apenas la moderación de su decadencia postmoderna; todavía la suya es la generación de los primeros epígonos, cuya vanidad se sacia en puestos diplomáticos y cátedras universitarias. No saben que, deviniendo en canon, son así ya convencionales, en función de vigilancia conservadora, no reflexiva; por eso su excelencia literaria es mayormente discursiva, incluso cuando —como literatura— retiene algo de la capacidad reflexiva original.

Tampoco un escritor es una pieza inamovible, por más canónico que sea, y Carpentier está entre los mejores; y la diferencia que media de El siglo de las luces a La consagración de la primavera, es la misma entre Viaje a la semilla y El reino de este mundo. La perversión viene en su reducción maligna del proceso haitiano al imperio de burlas de Henry Christophe; ignorando su base trágica en la epopeya de Loverture, que la explicaría en su propio sentido y objetividad.

Esta perversión es comprensible, si obedece a la de Carpentier, como decadencia del ilustracionismo moderno; que en su afrancesamiento duplica su perversión, al perpetuar ese canon del escritor en que decae Occidente. Tan es así que —por ejemplo— el protagonismo de Ti ‘Noel es oscurecido por la banalidad de las aventuras de Paulina Bonaparte; y hasta la función operativa de MacKandal se reduce a esa fanfarria de lo maravilloso, sin detenerse en la humanidad que lo sostiene.

Es por esto que la revolución haitiana pervive en el imaginario como una cuestión racial, incomprensible en la brutalidad; pero explicable en la sublimación moral y seudo religiosa del falso humanismo ilustrado, con sus utopías. En vez de eso, esta es sólo la contradicción del colonialismo moderno, separando a negros y blancos en bandos contrarios; pero sólo por la perversión imperial del republicanismo, que termina traicionándose a sí mismo como imperialista.

Esta otra comprensión permitiría —o hasta exigiría— plantearse la naturaleza real del capitalismo moderno; como sólo una abstracción conceptual, que —como el socialismo— distorsiona la funcionalidad de la economía industrial. Carpentier sirve así al propósito comunista que lo alimentaba, encausando la cuestión racial como de clase; a lo que se redujo en su oficialismo, desde aquel fresco asombro de Los pasos perdidos y la sublimación de Sofía.

El complejo proceso de la revolución haitiana I

Ejemplo del complejo proceso revolucionario de Haití, es sin dudas la ejecución del general Moïse por Loverture; tratándose no ya de su sobrino adoptivo, lo que es banal a estas alturas, sino de uno de sus más prestigiosos oficiales. Moïse encabezó una rebelión general, demostrando que Loverture ya no era una figura popular, distanciado en el poder; tratándose de un dictador —bien que benévolo y relativamente ilustrado— preocupado por la geopolítica de Napoleón, por sobre los conflictos internos del país.

Puede recordarse aquí el controvertido ascenso de Napoleón, como primer cónsul de la república y no emperador; cuyo autoritarismo nadie esperaba entonces que deviniera imperial, en Santo Domingo lo que se resolvía era el imperialismo francés. Lo lógico entonces —no importa si inesperado— era que se postulara como emperador en algún momento, dado ese autoritarismo; siendo este el tipo de incongruencia lo que mantiene en alerta las alarmas de Loverture, dadas las posibilidades de que se traicionara la república, y con ella sus principios.

Pero esta contradicción confunde también al generalato haitiano, que no está al tanto de la geopolítica europea; y al que Napoleón confunde más aún, con un acercamiento ambiguo y doble estrategias, que incluían a los hijos de Loverture. Como ejemplo de esto, Napoleón mantenía a los hijos de Toussaint en Francia, con la excusa de su educación; pero como rehenes en realidad, a los que devuelve a su padre como parte de su estrategia, en un juego de chantaje político[1].

El alzamiento del general Moïse es tan sorprendente, que se le suele achacar a las tensiones raciales en Haití; lo que es relativamente cierto, dada la capacidad de negociación de Loverture, que protegía a los bancos; causando comprensibles y crecientes recelos entre los negros, por el temor de un regreso al régimen esclavista. Pero el general Moïse era veterano en esta política de Toussaint y podía comprenderla, aún con disgusto; razón por la que no llegaba al mimetismo social de Christophe y Desalines, en una suerte de equilibrio y moderación política.

Esa ejecución parece entonces un intento, como el del mismo Loverture, por regular la sublevación popular; que esta vez sería contra el propio Toussaint, contenida por la dirección de Moïse, como la de la colonia por Loverture. Como diferencia, la estrategia de Moïses no lidiaba con la política internacional de Napoleón, sino con la local de Toussaint; y como a este respecto a aquel, sólo le preocuparía el estado de cosas dentro del país, no internacionalmente.

La ejecución del general Moïse será entonces el preámbulo de la de Louverture, e inevitable como aquella[2]; en ese sentido trágico de la determinación tricotómica de lo real, por el abismo que profundiza a lo histórico como dialéctico. La muerte de Moïse aísla más aún a Loverture, cuyo ascendiente militar pierde la humanidad del lazo trascendente entre ellos; quedando sólo la trinidad perfecta pero rígida, de Loverture, Christophe y Desalines en el destino de Haití.

Lo que ocurre aquí explica el problema del reduccionismo dialéctico, relacionando problemas por su apariencia; como la cláusula en la Constitución sobre la esclavitud, y el confinamiento en las plantaciones, ambos por Toussaint. La primera estipulaba la liberación de los esclavos desembarcados, pues su propósito era la provisión de mano de obra y no su explotación[3]; la segunda no era constitucional sino un edicto militar, como resultado directo de la insurrección de Moïse; y no estaba relacionada con la primera, sino que era un esfuerzo de control poblacional, con el fin de evitar otra insurrección como aquella[4].

De este modo, se concluye que el proceso revolucionario de Haití no fue uno sólo que se desarrollara linealmente; sino que fueron una serie de sucesos, intrínsecamente relacionados entre sí pero funcionalmente distintos; y en cuya divergencia funcionaba a su vez como otro desarrollo final, que sólo cobra sentido con la independencia. Esto significa entonces que la independencia haitiana no fue nunca un objetivo, sino el resultado de una fatalidad trágica; determinada a demás por las contradicciones francesas —no haitianas—, comenzando por las manipulaciones de Napoleón.

---

[1] . Cf: C.LR. Los jacobinos negros, p 302

[2] . Curiosamente, el día de la ejecución del general Moïse fue el mismo en que partió de Francia la expedición de Leclerc contra Loverture. Cf: IBID, p 285.

[3] . CF: IBID, p 265

[4] . CF: IBID, p 279

Los jacobinos negros, C.L.R. James

Ver en Amazon

Este es un libro capital, que explica la primera revolución de independencia en América, luego de la norteamericana; especialmente importante en esto, porque envuelve la enormidad del mundo latino, en su contraste con el anglo sajón. El libro tiene además el ritmo trepidante de la novela histórica, porque así de compleja y tumultuosa es la realidad que describe; superando en sutilezas y profundidad la más atrevida y surrealista de las ficciones, porque es como un primer momento de la creación.

Tan intensa es su comprensión de la realidad, que esquiva la justificación de los héroes, y los presenta en su humanidad; con lo que arroja luces sobre esos incomprensibles pasajes de todos estos procesos, deteniéndose en la naturaleza de los mismos. De paso, el autor expone la personalidad de Toussaint de Loverture, el más controvertido y complejo de estos héroes; cuya pasión es la historia misma que se desenvuelve hasta hoy día, que el autor vincula —eficaz en su ingenuidad— a Fidel Castro, lo que merece otro tratamiento.

Este libro deja claro cómo la revolución haitiana no fue un producto separado de la francesa, sino su expresión; resquebrajando las débiles estructuras políticas de la colonia, como el mundo en formación que era antes que la mera continuidad. No hay que confundirse, la revolución haitiana y la francesa, difieren en carácter —no en alcance— por su circunstancia; por eso una es expresión de la otra, pero a la misma vez que su extensión, si bien discontinua, en esa doble función de todo lo real.

Ver artículo

El libro también recuerda que tanto los sucesos en Francia como en Haití son super complejos, por su diversidad política; que no sólo opone un club de Massiac[1] al de los Jacobinos, sino que revela además las tensiones de sus respectivos extremos. Quizás la mejor parte, que impulsa ese ritmo trepidante, es la estricta sucesión de hechos y su concatenación minuciosa; narrando las líneas de tiempo de todo lo que ocurre, tanto en Francia como en Haití —todavía Santo Domingo—.

El libro es especialmente importante para los cubanos, por lo que significa esa revolución en el horizonte nacional; desde la ferocidad del Capitán General O’Donnell al levantamiento de los Independientes de Color, su masacre y consecuencias. Tal es esa importancia, que ocupa gran parte del ensayo de Martín Morúa Delgado sobre la integración racial en Cuba[2]; y que puede ser mejor comprendido no sólo por su propia traducción de la biografía de Loverture[3], sino también con este otro título.

La revolución haitiana es tan importante que figura en la dialéctica hegeliana, como la francesa en el marxismo; pero inexplorada en su dimensión antropológica, sus repercusiones son ontológicas, en la comprensión de la historia. Hegel comprendió en definitiva la referencia haitiana —de segunda mano además— desde su propia hermenéutica; que preestablecida ya desde Kant, adaptó el suceso particular de la revolución haitiana a su concepto universal, por ello insuficiente.

Esa complejidad es la que asoma en este libro, explicando así la naturaleza trialéctica y no dialéctica de la realidad; porque responde a tensiones tricotómicas y no dicotómicas, permitiendo por fin la superación de las limitaciones filosóficas modernas. Esa otra materia de lo histórico —que es la filosofía— es lo que puede extraerse de este libro, que es así una referencia capital; porque trascendiendo la función ideológica, permite por fin estos nuevos desarrollos, que exponen por fin la novedad del Nuevo mundo.

---

[1] . A los conocidos clubes de los Jacobinos (republicanos) y los Feuillants (realistas), se unía el de los Massiac, que representaba a los colonos de las Indias Occidentales; como los Jacobinos toman su nombre del antiguo convento de Saint Jacob, los Feuillants lo tomaban del antiguo monasterio de las Frondas, y los del Massiac lo tomaban del hotel Massiac, en el que se reunían.

[2] . Primer acercamiento sistemático y minucioso, de valor incluso antropológico, a la estructura social cubana desde el punto de vista racial; con énfasis en estas diferencias estructurales, entre la sociedad haitiana y la cubana, para explicar la improcedencia de un tratamiento equivalente. El ensayo de Morúa podría de hecho ser un precedente para mover el eje hermenéutico de la antropología cubana, desde la perspectiva de la burguesía blanca criolla —Lidia Cabrera, Fernando Ortiz, Alejo Carpentier— a una más efectiva; que siendo de hecho integracionista, no se detenga en el negro como un objeto más o menos curioso, sino como sujeto activo en su singularidad etnológica.

[3] . Se trata de The Life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, The Negro Patriot of Hayti: Comprising an Account of the Struggle for Liberty in the Island, and a Sketch of Its History to the Present Period. Por John R. Beard. // CF: Edición electrónica.