Lanza del Vasto’s Philosophy of Knoweldge. A New Narrative of the History of Western Philosophy

Lanza del Vasto (1901-1981; LdV) graduated in Philosophy from the University of Pisa in 1928. Later, as the founder of Gandhian communities around the world, he was an "outdoor" philosopher. Three of his writings define two dimensions of human knowledge (author's italics in all original texts): "The divine character of intelligence is marked by the notions of Infinity and Perfection [of organization]..." (LdV 1950, p. 58; see also p. 447; unfortunately, LdV banished the word "organization" from his vocabulary because it seemed to him a mechanistic notion). In 1954 he wrote even more clearly: “And knowledge, although fallen [due to original sin], retains the two marks of its divine dignity…/ And one is Unity [i.e., the best result of an organization]./ The other is [the search for the] Infinity./ Every operation and every affirmation of Knowledge is not without them. From them Knowledge draws its value. However, they are never objects of knowledge; the first is prior to the known, while the second remains beyond it. It cannot be said of either Unity or the Infinite that they are known.” (LdV 1993, p. 18) Even more clearly: “What is true of Creation [which produces an organization from nothing] is also true of the Infinity. Both are truths that impose themselves on reason, because the opposite relationship is impossible. They do not derive from the senses, nor from experience, nor from reasoning, but impose themselves on reason. However... they are not possessed and understood by the intellect, but it is the intellect that is possessed and understood by them." (Lanza del Vasto 1968, p. 39). In summary, LdV identified two fundamental categories for human knowledge: respectively, the organization of a totality into a system and the striving toward an infinitely distant end. They are much more general than Kant’s categories, space and time. These categories can also be recognized in his writings: 1) his M.D. thesis; he starts from the concept of infinity and then two typical notions that represent an organization, body and space (LdV 1928, pp. 7-18). 2) Two prayers of his own invention for his communities. The morning prayer begins with "God of the [infinite search] for Truth" and ends with an invocation to obey "His law [of Unity]." The evening prayer invites everyone to organize a circle "around a fire" and ends with an invocation to raise the prayer, like sparks of fire "at the address of the Eternal," i.e. toward the infinity. 3) The category characterizing the first Beast of Revelation 13, a tension to an absolute infinity (LdV 1959, p. 28). The second Beast is represented by the machine, whose basic notion is an organization. 4) The notions resulting from the socio-political analysis of (LdV 1959, chap.s 3-4): four scourges, four sovereignties, four regimes; all are reducible to the four couples of choices on two dichotomies that he suggests on them and that can be traced back to the notions of infinity and organization. 5) We note that the two dichotomies of "organization" and "infinity" are mutually independent; therefore, they can consistently be intersected. In the final revisions of his doctoral thesis, LdV resumes his viewpoint through a graph in which two dichotomies intersect to form a compass rose, precisely the graph that represents the application of the two dichotomies of human knowledge (LdV 1971, p. 180). Unable to resolve the dilemmas of actual or potential infinity, of law and freedom by reason alone, Leibniz called them "labyrinths." If, however, we recognize that they are irresolvable through reason alone and are therefore a matter of choice, then we see them as dichotomies that disentangle each of Lanza del Vasto's dimensions (law and freedom are a subjective representation of an organization, which in the case of a theory is either axiomatic-deductive or problem-oriented). Confirmation comes from the analysis of Newton's paradigm in th