The Ongoing Miracle and its Historical Roots

Abstract

Introduction: 'Remembrance of Miracles Past' Solidarity is a 'miracle.' How otherwise could we describe a phenomenon whereby strangers put radical amounts of trust in each other, enter into demanding cooperation together, and thus give rise to new qualities? Cooperation based on trust usually produces not only some sort of external results, but also strengthens social ties, increases mutual reliance and the joy of acting together (as such, solidarity has an internal, per se value), and occasionally leads to heroic sacrifice. Understanding this phenomenon can be particularly difficult for the 'Western man' brought up on subjectivism combined with Protestant individualism and the Weberian 'spirit of capitalism' (which are all positive in their nature, although seemingly non-solidary), and often influenced by a truly nonsolidary attitude in the form of Hobbesian atomism streaked with deep social fear. When Margaret Thatcher spoke her famous words "There's no such thing as society. There are individual men and women and there are families,"2 she was not aware of the centuries-long philosophical 1 The article was written as part of the 'Solidarity as an ethical and legal principle' research project (No. 2015/17/N/HS5/00434), financed by the National Science Centre. 2 Cf.