Peter Wust was a German existentialist

Existentialism

Existentialism is a term applied to a school of 19th- and 20th-century philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief that philosophical thinking begins with the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual...

 philosopher.

Biography

Wust was born the oldest of eleven children in Rissenthal in Saarland

Saarland

Saarland is one of the sixteen states of Germany. The capital is Saarbrücken. It has an area of 2570 km² and 1,045,000 inhabitants. In both area and population, it is the smallest state in Germany other than the city-states...

. He attended the local public school, then the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Gymnasium in Trier

Trier

Trier, historically called in English Treves is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. It is the oldest city in Germany, founded in or before 16 BC....

. Though his parents had hoped he would become a Catholic priest, he decided on studying Geisteswissenschaft

Geisteswissenschaft

Geisteswissenschaft is a traditional division of faculty in German universities that included subjects such as Philosophy, History, Philology, social sciences, sometimes even Theology, and Jurisprudence...

. After 1907, Wust pursued German studies

German studies

German studies is the field of humanities that researches, documents, and disseminates German language and literature in both its historic and present forms. Academic departments of German studies often include classes on German culture, German history, and German politics in addition to the...

, English studies

English studies

English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language , English linguistics English studies is an academic discipline that includes the study of literatures written in the English language (including literatures from the U.K., U.S.,...

, and philosophy

Philosophy

Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems, such as those connected with existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing such problems by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on rational...

 in Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

 and Strasbourg

Strasbourg

Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace are historically German-speaking,...

. He taught in Berlin, Neuss

Neuss

Neuss is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located on the west bank of the Rhine opposite Düsseldorf. Neuss is the largest city within the Rhein-Kreis Neuss district and owes its prosperity to its location at the crossing of historic and modern trade routes. It is primarily known...

, Trier, and Cologne

Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

, and earned his doctorate in 1914 from the University of Bonn

University of Bonn

The University of Bonn is a public research university located in Bonn, Germany. Founded in its present form in 1818, as the linear successor of earlier academic institutions, the University of Bonn is today one of the leading universities in Germany. The University of Bonn offers a large number...

.

Under the influence of Max Scheler

Max Scheler

Max Scheler was a German philosopher known for his work in phenomenology, ethics, and philosophical anthropology...

, Wust, originally a neo-Kantian

Neo-Kantianism

Neo-Kantianism refers broadly to a revived type of philosophy along the lines of that laid down by Immanuel Kant in the 18th century, or more specifically by Schopenhauer's criticism of the Kantian philosophy in his work The World as Will and Representation , as well as by other post-Kantian...

, moved toward Christian existentialism

Christian existentialism

Christian existentialism describes a group of writings that take a philosophically existentialist approach to Christian theology. The school of thought is often traced back to the work of the Danish philosopher and theologian considered the father of existentialism, Søren Kierkegaard...

, a development in which the burgeoning Renouveau catholique, the originally French effort to modernize and enlighten traditional, conservative Catholicism, played an important part. In 1928, in Paris

Paris

Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, Wust met Georges Bernanos

Georges Bernanos

Georges Bernanos was a French author, and a soldier in World War I. Of Roman Catholic and monarchist leanings, he was a violent adversary to bourgeois thought and to what he identified as defeatism leading to France's defeat in 1940.-Biography:Bernanos was born at Paris, into a family of...

, Léon Bloy

Léon Bloy

Léon Bloy , was a French novelist, essayist, pamphleteer and poet.-Biography:Bloy was born in Notre-Dame-de-Sanilhac, in the arondissement of Périgueux, Dordogne. He was the second of six sons of Voltairean freethinker and stern disciplinarian Jean Baptiste Bloy and his wife Anne-Marie Carreau,...

, Paul Claudel

Paul Claudel

Paul Claudel was a French poet, dramatist and diplomat, and the younger brother of the sculptor Camille Claudel. He was most famous for his verse dramas, which often convey his devout Catholicism.-Life:...

, and Jacques Maritain

Jacques Maritain

Jacques Maritain was a French Catholic philosopher. Raised as a Protestant, he converted to Catholicism in 1906. An author of more than 60 books, he helped to revive St. Thomas Aquinas for modern times and is a prominent drafter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...

. He developed close friendships with the editors of the Munich-based Catholic monthly Hochland

Hochland (magazine)

Hochland was a German Catholic magazine, published in Munich from 1903 to 1941 and again from 1946 to 1971. Founded by Carl Muth, it was regarded critically by the church, and published work by authors regardless of denomination on topics related to religion and culture.-History:Hochland was,...

, Carl Muth

Carl Muth

Carl Borromäus Johann Baptist Muth was a German writer publisher, best known for founding and editing the religious and cultural magazine Hochland.-Biography:...

 and Otto Gruendler, maintaining an "intense" correspondence with them and publishing six essays in the magazine between 1922 and 1926.

Wust, without habilitation

Habilitation

Habilitation is the highest academic qualification a scholar can achieve by his or her own pursuit in several European and Asian countries. Earned after obtaining a research doctorate, such as a PhD, habilitation requires the candidate to write a professorial thesis based on independent...

, was appointed professor of philosophy at the University of Münster

University of Münster

The University of Münster is a public university located in the city of Münster, North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. The WWU is part of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, a society of Germany's leading research universities...

. At the same time as Martin Heidegger

Martin Heidegger

Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...

, he developed an existentialist philosophy, though Wust's was essentially Christian. When Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler

Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...

 came to power, Wust, one of the few early readers of Mein Kampf

Mein Kampf

Mein Kampf is a book written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926...

, became active in the church's resistance. He promoted a cultural offensive for Catholic Germany, and based much of his philosophy on what he perceived as the cultural unity of Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

.

He suffered from cancer since 1938 and died at age 56. Only a few days before his death he wrote a farewell letter to his students, which reportedly was widely read at the Eastern Front

Eastern Front (World War II)

The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...

.

Reception

Founded in 1982, the Peter Wust Society is dedicated to the spiritual heritage of Wust. Its 20th anniversary occasioned a monument to commemorate Ungewissheit und Wagnis. The house in Rissenthal where Wust was born is marked with a plaque. A school is dedicated to him in Münster

Münster

Münster is an independent city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also capital of the local government region Münsterland...

, as are gymnasiums in Wittlich

Wittlich

The town of Wittlich is the seat of the Bernkastel-Wittlich district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, and thereby the middle centre for a feeder area of 56 municipalities in the Eifel and Moselle area with its population of roughly 64,000...

 and Merzig. The Peter Wust Society annually awards a "Little Peter Wust Award" to a graduate from one of the two gymnasiums.

The Catholic Academy of Trier and the Association for Christian Adult Education award a biannual prize, the Peter Wust Prize, for the promotion of European culture and unification. The 2005 winner was the German politician Bernhard Vogel.

Werner Schüßler, philosophy professor at the University of Trier

University of Trier

The University of Trier , in the German city of Trier, was founded in 1473. Closed in 1798 by order of the then French administration in Trier, the university was re-established in 1970 after a hiatus of some 172 years. The new university campus is located on top of the Tarforst heights, an urban...

, re-edited Wust's magnum opus, Ungewissheit und Wagnis, in 2002. in einer neuen Bearbeitung herausgegeben (LIT Verlag, Münster). The influence of Wust's philosophy on Paul Klee

Paul Klee

Paul Klee was born in Münchenbuchsee, Switzerland, and is considered both a German and a Swiss painter. His highly individual style was influenced by movements in art that included expressionism, cubism, and surrealism. He was, as well, a student of orientalism...

's student Hubert Berke (1908–1979) was the subject of a 2004-2005 exposition in Merzig

Merzig

Merzig is the capital of the district Merzig-Wadern, in Saarland, Germany. It is situated on the river Saar, approx. 35 km south of Trier, and 35 km northwest of Saarbrücken.-Municipalities:...

, "Von Peter Wust zu Paul Klee - Der Kölner Maler Hubert Berke."

Works by Wust (selection)

• Abschiedswort (1940)
• Auferstehung der Metaphysik (1925)
• Gestalten und Gedanken (1940)
• Der Mensch und die Philosophie (1934)
• Rückkehr aus dem Exil (1926)
• Ungewissheit und Wagnis (1937)
• Gesammelte Werke Ed. Wilhelm Vernekohl, 10 volumes. Münster: Regensberg-Verlag, 1963–1969

Books on Wust

• Peter Keller (ed.), Begegnung mit Peter Wust. 26 Autoren im Dialog mit dem christlichen Existenzphilosophen aus dem Saarland. Saarbrücken: Verlag Die Mitte, 1984. ISBN 3-921236-48-7
• Alexander Lohner, Peter Wust. Münster: Regensberg, 1991, ISBN 3-7923-0601-8
• Alexander Lohner, Peter Wust. Gewissheit und Wagnis. Paderborn: Schöningh, 1995.
• Bernhard Scherer, Ein moderner Mystiker. Begegnung mit Peter Wust. Würzburg: Naumann, 1974.
• Wilhelm Vernekohl, Der Philosoph von Münster. Münster: Regensberg, 1950.
• Peter Wust und Wilhelm Vernekohl, Briefe und Aufsätze. Münster: Regensberg, 1958.
• Josef Pieper, Noch wußte es niemand. Autobiographische Aufzeichnungen 1904 - 1945. Munich, 1976. Pp. 152ff.
• F. Werner Veauthier, Kulturkritik als Aufgabe der Kulturphilosophie. Peter Wusts Bedeutung als Kultur- und Zivilisationskritiker. Heidelberg, 1997.

External links

• Peter-Wust-Gesellschaft Biography, bibliography, Peter Wust Prize
• "Geborgenheit in der Ungeborgenheit" by Josef Bordat, on Ungewissheit und Wagnis
• Peter Wust in Saarlander biographies