The Egoist
A Critical Review of the Philosophy of Max Stirner
The Egoist
The 19th-century German philosopher Max Stirner is simultaneously perhaps one of the most remarkable and overlooked philosophers in modern Western thought. His central work, The Ego and its Own, stands as a pioneering book expounding his philosophy of egoism, an ethical philosophy that places individual interests at the center of all moral considerations. In an era where philosophers were attempting to construct new value systems in the twilight Old Regime of Europe, Stirner endorsed the liberation of the individual from all such “fixed ideas” altogether, regarding them as mere constructs that he calls “spooks”. At first glance, one may conclude that Max Stirner is best classified as a champion of individual freedom, and to a point, he is. However, for this post-Hegelian thinker, freedom is less of a goal and more of a bridge. Rather, freedom is a necessary precondition for the ultimate end of “owning” oneself. It is only through this repossession of individuality that a person can truly live according to their true will.
The Ego and its Own
Throughout Stirner’s Ego and its Own, Stirner exorcises these spooks one by one, until there is nothing left but the unfettered individual ego. He also meticulously criticizes his Young Hegelian contemporaries and their efforts to restructure society. In fact, he rejects the legitimacy of society itself, because to him, “society” is a form of social organization that demands the subordination of individuals against their own egoistic interests. Instead, he calls for “unions” which he defines as preferable associations whereby individuals may join and quit according to their shifting interests.
Although relatively unknown today, Stirner was an influential thinker in his own time, and a persistent nuisance to many of his contemporaries. He is considered a forerunner of postmodernism and psychoanalytic theory, and the themes of anarchism and moral nihilism that pervade the page of his works cement him as an often unacknowledged, yet influential figure in these schools of thought.
The Progression of Life to Egoism
Stirner kicks off The Ego and its Own with a ‘history’ of the human spirit toward egoism, beginning with the ancient civilization and ending with the modern man of the 19th century. Starting with the ancient Greeks, Stirner follows the psychological path of mankind (specifically Europeans) from corporal and natural beings to mind and soul-oriented organisms. Stirner credits this progression to Socrates and Christianity, two developments in human thought that drew the human consciousness away from the physical real world, and toward an abstract spiritual world of his own creation.
Taken literally, this synopsis smacks of the reductionist speculation and Eurocentricity commonplace in the Hegelian historical analysis of Stirner’s day. At the very least, it constitutes a hypothesis for further historical research, and cannot be viewed as a mature and complete interpretation of the past. Yet, in large part, that is the point. Part of Stirner’s intention for such an account is to parody the Hegelian method, a move that foreshadows the extensive criticism of his Hegelian counterparts in the following chapters. Here, Stirner takes a subtle dig against his Hegelian counterparts, whom he will directly attack in the following pages.
Stirner’s “history” is more accurately a metaphor for individual psychological growth throughout a person’s life. Stirner points out that small children begin life focused on the physical world and untethered by any “sacred” ideas. Soon, however, the spooks move in, and kids integrate them into their psyche, taking on a spiritual, idealistic posture in life. Stirner argues that this phase, one of youthful idealism and dissociation with the natural world, is the current condition of mankind. Placed in the context of human history, Stirner believes that Christianity has pulled humanity so far from our carnal roots that European humans no longer put any real stock in it, viewing it as temporal and illusory, and instead viewing the spiritual world as real and eternal. This, according to Stirner, is far afield from the final phase achievable by humanity, the realization of egoism. It is also an outrageously backward understanding of reality that only the adoption of egoism can fix.
Stirner argues that the final advancement for humanity is to finally rid itself of the legions of “spooks” it has conjured up for itself over time. Not only does he view this as a necessary step for human evolution, but also as a common advance in the individual lifespan, pointing out that older adults tend to shed their youthful idealism as they advance in age. “Spooks”, to Stirner, are, after all, impediments to human quality of life. In fact, he holds that the most successful of our species are also the freest of them. Egoists, according to Stirner, rule the world, and the only ones formidable enough to rival them are –other egoists.
Stirner Guts Ideology
From here, Stirner submits the vast pantheon of “fixed ideas” of our past and present-day to rigorous philosophical inquiry. In this respect, he hardly leaves a stone unturned. Stirner, of course, vigorously attacks the usual targets of intellectual inquisition, such as religion, the state, capitalism, etc. Yet, he also questions less common topics, such as the sanctity of the family and the law itself. Stirner is, in fact, so critical of respect for legal statutes that his philosophy equates to a form of “illegalism”, which justifies and even encourages law-breaking behavior and social deviance as a means of advancing personal interests. Stirner rejects the moral double standard implicit in the acceptance of law and the hypocrisy of the state, stating, “The state practices “violence”, the individual must not do so. The State’s behavior is violence, and calls its violence “law”; that of the individual, “crime.”[1]
Additionally, he asserts that movements popularly believed to have freed people from bondage, such as the rise of democracy and the Protestant Reformation, have, in truth, only made their slavery more entrenched than ever. To Stirner, the republican revolutions of earlier decades only replaced the relatively limited powers of the monarchy with the absolute power of the “sovereign nation”. The new era of government, according to Striner, merely constitutes a “new monarchy” of “a thousand little lords”, which is “a thousand times severer, stricter, and more consistent.”[2] as Stirner calls it, is “ While the conventional viewpoint was, and still is, that republican revolutions was an improvement because it wrested power from the king and gave it to the people, Stirner writes that such a change simply replaced the relatively weak monarch with more numerous overlords backed by legal statutes that oppressed the individual to a far greater degree than any imposed by any monarchy.
In the case of the Protestant Reformation, Stirner opposes the popular conception that Luther’s movement negated the hierarchy established by the Catholic Church, writing instead that this Reformation strengthened it, for two reasons. First, the breaking of Rome’s religious sovereignty allowed the multitudes of states, small and large, to take on the role of the head of their domestic churches and impose Christianity upon its people, “against the egoists”. He also pointed out that Protestantism’s philosophies expanded the realm of spirituality and religiousness in human life. In the first case, Lutherism sought to find the sanctity in things previously considered secular and profane, while Calvinists moved to root out any and every trace of impurity in human life.[3] In short, the Reformation renewed enthusiasm for advancing spirituality against the carnal ego, backed by the focused strength of multitudes of regional and local governments. Some of these assertions could be interpreted as obnoxiously contrarian in nature, yet Stirner’s logical justifications for these viewpoints are well-grounded and persuasive.
The Assault of Contemporary Liberals
Stirner also turns a critical eye toward the progressive intellectual currents embodied by left Hegelian philosophers of his day, all of which were then considered elements of liberalism. Dividing them up into political, social, and humanitarian liberals, Stirner lines up their “sacred” axioms and strikes them down one by one. First, he refutes political liberals who uphold the virtue of “natural rights”. He argues that the concept of human rights is just another spook and that the “rights” of his day were simply “bourgeois rights” that could only be enjoyed at the pleasure of the state that supported them. This is where Stirner’s “might makes right” leanings emerge the clearest because in this case, it is the state that has the power over the individual to decide what “rights” he may and may not have. Furthermore, these decisions can be extended or revoked without the consent of the individual at any time. Such “rights” according to Stirner, are nothing more than grants, prerogatives and privileges. Only that which can be secured by own’s owen power, according to Stirner, can truly be considered theirs. This includes “rights” themselves.
In his attacks against social liberals, he rejects the notion that man finds his worth in labor. He criticizes the notion that one must find their dignity by labor and contribution to society and calls the very virtue of labor itself into question. Stirner’s opposition to society is articulated to great length in this section. He argues against these social liberals –the branch of liberalism swiftly evolving into socialism –for its assertion that individuals find their worth as a part of the greater whole, the state. According to these communistic liberals, property should be held in common, and that individual realizes his worth in the labor and contributions he makes toward his society. According to Stirner, this model of society is a terrible manifestation, since “Neither command nor property is left to the individual”.[4] The Communist state, thus, delivers to its citizens nothing but burdens on behalf of each other.[5] This is, of course, naturally antagonistic to the individual.
Finally, he rebukes humanitarian liberals –or humanists as we call them today – who argue that man is inherently of worth, and the highest anyone can aspire to is to be man himself. Thus, this brand of liberal demands that the best aim of any man is tto contribute to the welfare of others. This lacks the rigid formalization of social liberalism, but retains the “fixed idea” of brotherly love and service to one another. Stirner flatly denounces this criterion of value as well, arguing that being man is the very least we can be because it is precisely what we are. According to Stirner, these liberals can only uphold man by comparing them to another construct defined by those who reject their dictums, the “un-man”. He criticizes Ludwig Feuerbach’s widely praised treatise, The Essence of Christianity¸ because, in Stirner’s view, while it successfully analyzed God as an externalization, Feuerbach replaced the deity with man. He simply “humanized the divine”.[6] Humane liberalism, seen in this light, inverts the old adage, “God is love” to “Love is God/ sacred”.It aims to negate self-will and make every thought, opinion, and goal impersonal. Stirner firmly rejects this, declaring that the best anyone can be is the “unique”, the individual, the egoist. After all, according to Stirner, an individual is not man, but a man.
Union of Egoists?
The difficulty with Max Stirner’s egoism as laid out in The Ego and its Own arises when this ethical philosophy reaches the point where it must justify itself in the political realm. Throughout Stirner’s book, he staunchly condemns any collective human organization following along the lines of a society in favor of those operating as unions. For Stirner, unions, unlike societies, are voluntary associations that are much better suited for egoistic lifestyles. While this anarchistic approach suffices to be at least theoretically desirable, Stirner does not make a serious attempt to convince readers that such a system is viable. As an egoist, he probably doesn’t even care. In all, Stirner’s political application of his egoistic philosophy is perhaps the weakest part of his philosophy. It seems to highlight egoism’s underdevelopment and plausible impotence as a universally applied philosophy.
A Step in the Road
Stirner’s contributions to philosophy are valued advancements in individualist thought. His thorough examination and critique of sacred values and institutions across time and cultures, and his deft explanation of egoist philosophy shook the grounds of German intellectual thought prominent in his day. Bruno Bauer, in particular, found Stirner’s thought unsettling and vigorously denounced it. Karl Marx also found in Max Stirner a despicable yet significant adversary, referring to him derisively as “Saint Max”, as he extensively tore into the egoist’s philosophy in his work, The German Ideology.[7] Stirner’s egoism even carried its mark into contemporary Russia, as shown in Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment, where Raskolnikov’s mother cries out to her woebegone son, fearfully asking him if he is an egoist.[8]
And yet, the name of Max Stirner is seldom invoked in philosophical talks. He is hardly ever mentioned in academic circles, and his philosophy is rarely the subject of philosophical conversations among the interested laity. While Stirner’s ideas are echoed in the words of many prominent intellectuals following him, he is rarely, if ever, credited as an influence. Why?
It is, perhaps, that Stirner’s philosophy came at the wrong time to gain sustained support. As mentioned before, Stirner’s egoism arrived when religious belief and other traditional hallmarks were, flagging, but still firmly rooted in German culture. Moreover, German nationalism and patriotism were steadily on the rise, as Germans were already anticipating the unification of Germany. Furthermore, Stirner’s maverick treatise failed to gain a following or directly inspire other thinkers in his own time. Instead, it was overshadowed and obscured by the Hegelian paradigms backed and developed by the eminent academics of Germany. Despite savagely criticizing these prevailing views, his philosophy was swept into the riptides beneath the advancing currents of conservatism, liberalism, socialism, and humanism.
Stirner’s philosophy also lacked a certain degree of empirical backing, as it arrived too early to benefit from some of the emerging sciences and philosophies that came shortly afterward. Charles Darwin’s breakthrough theory of evolution may have reinforced Stirner’s emphasis on the egoistic need for power and could have also provided key scientific insight for Stirner to develop his theory in this respect. Advances in psychoanalysis pioneered by William James, Sigmund Freud, and Carl Jung may have also influenced Stirner’s conception of the ego and provided him with a means of incorporating a deeper psychological aspect into his thought.
Lastly, Stirner’s egoism, which reveled in the absence of divine purpose or sacred meaning in the world, fell into obscurity before it could clash with later philosophers who strove to overcome the very nihilism in which Stirner’s egoism thrives. Thinkers such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Soren Kierkegaard, and Friedrich Nietzsche all contributed to creating the philosophy that became Existentialism, a school of thought dedicated to creating meaning in an intrinsically meaningless universe. Compared to the profound attitudes and solutions endorsed by these later philosophers –none of whom credit Stirner as an influence—, Stirner’s advice to “live it out” comes off as vague and in need of further development.
Stirner’s lack of influence could also be linked to his inconsistent philosophical appeal, due to some of his less well-done chapters. His aforementioned preface, where he provides a shoddy exposition of history, is easily misinterpreted as a real attempt to describe historical processes, rather than lampooning Hegelian philosophy in the process of describing individual intellectual growth throughout life. Additionally, Stirner’s excerpt which categorizes intellectual growth on terms of negroid, Chinese, and Caucasian, is a racist analogy that fails to consider the true complexities of the respective peoples which he classifies in his bizarre ranking system. While the metaphor for expanding upon human intellectual evolution is there, few 21st century readers would enjoy the dumpster-dive into this section to find it. So, while Stirner’s ideas as espoused in Ego and its Own are, on the whole, worth serious consideration, these fumbles are hard to ignore.
Conclusion
Max Stirner may reside in the background of his more prominent colleagues, but he is no philosopher worth ignoring. His unapologetic egoism, backed by volleys of relentless iconoclasm and ruthless examination of all things held dear throughout history, remains relevant to this day. Immersed in an intellectual milieu focused on the collective whole in society, Stirner stood alone in his assertion of a thoroughly individualist paradigm.
Max Stirner’s philosophy, and his way of thinking, are just as relevant today as it was in his time. Despite the fears of a large-scale descent into nihilism expressed by contemporary thinkers in Stirner’s time, global civilization is far from relinquishing its “spooks”. Around the world, religions still hold strong. An array of secular ideologies has emerged to accompany them. Today, mankind hosts an array of sacred beliefs, from old-fashioned religious faith to secular political, economic, and social ideologies raised to the status of holy dogma. Every one of them has the potential to seize upon anyone at any time and take power over them. Stirner’s egoist skepticism provides a defense against such would-be possessions. As it is stated in the preface to The Ego and its Own, “Stirner shows that men make their tyrants as they make their gods, and his purpose is to unmake tyrants.”[9] Thus, even if one is inclined to reject every premise that Stirner supports, his fastidiously critical approach to understanding and appraising values from the standpoint of personal interests is indispensable. The Ego and its Own is a book that I would recommend to any reader who ever questioned the relationship between individuals, societies, and ideologies, or turned a critical eye to the prevailing Zeitgeist of the day. For them, Max Stirner may be an unlikely guide to some answers.
[1] Stirner, The Ego and its Own, pg. 118
[2] Stirner, Max, Ego and its Own, pg. 65
[3] Stirner, pgs. 60-61
[4] Stirner, pg. 74
[5] Stirner, pg. 75
[6] Stirner, pg. 15
[7] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1845/german-ideology/ch03a.htm
[8] Dostoyevsky, Fyodor, Crime and Punishment,
[9] Stirner, Max, the Ego and Its Own, pg. 8.