389 - The Works of Simone Weil

The Works of Simone Weil
By Eric O. Springsted

THE writings of Simone Weil (1909-1943) often baffle would-be readers for two major reasons. On the one hand, they are often complex in content and structure, besides being written frequently in an aphoristic style occasionally as obscure as it is pithy. On the other hand, they are difficult to approach because of their wide diversity of subject matter, thus making it difficult for the reader to know where exactly to begin. Weil wrote on religion, ancient and modern philosophy, politics, social structures and relations, and in many essays she mixes many or all of these subjects. Because of the complexity and diversity of her writings we offer this annotated bibliography.

I

Weil's writings consist entirely of essays, notebooks, and letters with the one exception of the book-length report she prepared for the Free French in London which has come down to us as The Need for Roots. We are fortunate that almost all her major writings are now available in English translations; however, in the various published collections of Weil's writings, there is frequent overlap between different editions, and in some cases essays which are complete in one edition appear in only partial form in others. For these reasons we will first list what is available in English and then introduce the most important essays individually, giving the edition(s) in which they may be found. Each book listed here is followed by an abbreviation for later identification.

First and Last Notebooks, London, Oxford, 1970 (FLN).¹

Gateway to God, Glasgow, Collins, 1974 (GW).

Gravity and Grace, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1972 (GG).

Intimations of Christianity among the Ancient Greeks, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976 (IC).

Lectures on Philosophy, Cambridge, Cambridge, 1978 (LP).

Letter to a Priest, New York, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1959 (LR).

The Need for Roots, New York, Harper & Row, 1976 (NR).

The Notebooks of Simone Weil, London, Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1976 (NB).

Eric O. Springsted is a graduate of St. John's College, New Mexico. He received his Ph.D. from Princeton Theological Seminary, where he served as a Teaching Fellow with Professor Diogenes Allen. Professor and doctoral candidate shared a common interest in the philosophy and theology of Simone Weil. Dr. Springsted is Chaplain and Assistant Professor of Religion, Illinois College, and President of the American Weil Society.
¹ Presently out of print, but generally available in libraries.

390 - The Works of Simone Weil

Oppression and Liberty, Amherst, Univ. of Mass. Press, 1973 (OL).

On Science, Necessity and the Love of God, London, Oxford, 1968 (SN).¹

Selected Essays, 1934-43, London, Oxford, 1962 (SE).¹

Seventy Letters, London, Oxford, 1965 (SL)¹

The Simone Weil Reader, New York, David McKay Co., 1977 (SWR).

Waiting for God, New York, Harper & Row, 1973 (WG).

II

The center of Simone Weil's religious thought (and I believe, the center of all her mature thought) is to be found in the essay, "The Love of God and Affliction" (WG*, SN, SWR, GW*)² in which she presents her analysis of the greatest evil in human life-affliction-and her interpretation of Christ's Cross as being the only thing capable of shedding enough light to illumine affliction. God's love and goodness are perfectly manifested on the Cross, she believed, and it is the Cross that is the source of all true good for creatures. Even Creation, she argues, is accomplished by a crucifixion in God and perfected on the historic Cross. With this in mind, she then drew upon the Cross for the criteria of love and goodness. She applies these criteria most effectively for human spiritual life in the essay "The Implicit Forms of the Love of God" (WG, SWR*) in which she shows four basic categories-the love of neighbor, the beauty of the world, religious practices, and friendship-to have the marks of God's grace and the power to raise the soul, even where God is not known. Weil further develops her religious thought in the short essays, "Some Thoughts on the Love of God," "Some Reflections on the Love of God" (SN, GW), and in "The Theory of the Sacraments" (GW). She expresses her own most personal views in the brief "Last Text" (GW) and in her letters to her friend and confidante, Father Perrin (WG), presenting them in an experimental way in the longer "Letter to a Priest" (LR, WG). To these should be added her beautiful meditations, "Reflections on the Right Use of School Studies with a View to the Love of God" (WG, SWR), and "Concerning the 'Our Father"' (WG, SWR).

One of Weil's chief concerns was to find how and where God's goodness and love can be mediated to humanity outside historical Christianity. She concentrated mainly on finding this love and goodness in ancient cultures and mythologies, especially among the Greeks. In the magnificant essay, "The Iliad: Poem of Force" (IC), she looks at Homer and finds that the poet's ability to see the effects of force on human beings with an impartial eye is a witness to his true divine inspiration. (This essay is also important for understanding Weil's own concept of force which plays a large role in many of her writings.)

¹ Presently out of print, but generally available in libraries.
² An asterisk indicates that the essay in question is only partial in the edition indicated.

391 - The Works of Simone Weil

Other essays which are particularly important in this search for essential spiritual truths in Greek mythology and literature are found in Intimations of Christianity among the Ancient Greeks (IC). Besides these, Weil wrote a number of important essays on Greek philosophy, especially on Plato. These essays are significant because they attempt to show that grace pervaded certain forms of Greek philosophy and because they attempt to show where and how grace may enter philosophy and science in general. They also contain some of the clearest details of Weil's own metaphysical thinking. The difficult, but rewarding, "Pythagorean Doctrine" (IC) is, in this last regard, probably the most important of Weil's essays for grasping the overall structure of her thought. Other essays that should be read in conjunction with the "Pythagorean Doctrine" are her commentaries on Plato, especially "God in Plato" (IC*, SN) and "Divine Love in Creation" (IC).

III

The place of labor in society, the condition of workers, social structures and relations were also major concerns of Weil even before her mystical conversion to Christianity. Oppression and Liberty (OL) contains many of the most important of her writings on these subjects, including the masterful early work, "Reflections concerning the Causes of Liberty and Social Oppression." This essay is still today considered a major critique of Marx and is also the best example of pre-conversion Weil.

Because these questions of society, work, and oppression occupied Weil throughout her life there is, of course, a certain amount of change to be expected in the way she treats the issues. The book The Need for Roots (NR), Weil's last work, is the fruit of these changes. In it she claims that it is obligations to persons, and not rights expected from others, that constitutes the only truly just basis of society. She concludes with the argument that work understood in its spiritual essence (which is a form of Christ's submission on the Cross) should be the spiritual core of any civilization. The major principles upon which she bases The Need for Roots are presented also in a particularly clear manner in "Draft for a Statement of Human Obligations" (SE).

Weil also wrote a number of essays in a more general philosophical mode which echo the thoughts of works already discussed. The most important of these is the essay "Human Personality" (SWR, SE) in which she describes the true basis of what it means to be human; that is, the expectation of a good that cannot be provided by anything here on earth. Of particular concern to her are the ways in which this expectation is destroyed by others or denied by oneself and then turned into a form of idolatry. Language, she discovers, plays a key role in this, and in the essays "The Power of Words" (SE, SWR), "The Responsibility of Writers" (SWR, SN), and "Morality and Literature" (SWR, SN) she develops this insight. She was also concerned with the role science plays in modern life and what it has become, and she treats these issues in

392 - The Works of Simone Weil

"Classical Science and After" (SN), as well as in many of her writings on social relations and structures.

IV

For those who wish to read in further depth there is a considerable body of primary texts. These include the First and Last Notebooks (FLN); the first being written during the years 1933-39; the last during 1942-43; and The Notebooks of Simone Weil (NB), written between 1939-42. These notebooks are valuable not only for the light they shed on the finished essays but also because Weil apparently used them to develop thoughts that did not appear in finished essays, excepts perhaps in inchoate form. A number of bon mots have been selected from these notebooks and have been published under the title Gravity and Grace (GG). Weil's letters, published as Seventy Letters (SL), are also valuable for understanding both her thought and her personality. Finally, we now have a translation of the lectures Weil delivered as a professor of philosophy in the girls' lycee at Roanne during the years 1933-4. This work, Lectures on Philosophy (LP), was not written by Weil herself; rather, it is the notes taken by one of her students. It is, however, a marvel of faithful note-taking and is helpful for gaining an understanding of Weil's philosophical ideas during the early years.

Unfortunately, there is a scarcity of good secondary works on Weil in English. Simone Petrement's The Life of Simone Weil (New York, Pantheon Books, 1976) is as close as possible to a last word concerning the facts of Weil's life and is also a sympathetic interpretation.³ Richard Rees's Simone Weil: A Sketch for a Portrait (Carbondale, Southern Illinois Press, 1966) contains a short biography and the best available treatment of her thought in English, although it does not go into any great depth. A complete listing of Weil's works and the secondary works up to 1973 in both French and English is to be found in J.P. Little's Simone Weil: A Bibliography (London, Cutler, 1973).

³ Reviewed in THEOLOGY TODAY, VOL. XXXIV, No. 3 (Oct., 1977), pp. 341-343.