USSR Archives - Rest and Trust

What is asymmetrical ethics? The French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, who spent four years as a POW in German camps and whose family was killed by the Nazi in Lithuania, wrote in his book Totality and Infinity (1961):

“The face of the Other comes toward me with its infinite vulnerability, its destitution, its defenseless eyes. It calls me into question and orders me: ‘Thou shalt not kill.’”

Reflecting on his experience, Levinas’s central question was: “How is ethical responsibility possible after the Holocaust?” How can one regard their torturer as human when he treats them as less than human — in fact, worse than an animal?

An experience like that “calls me into question.” Who am I? For Levinas, the answer lies in what he calls ethical asymmetry. True ethics is never based on mutuality or reciprocity; it does not depend on others treating you in a certain way. Ethics, in its purest form, is always asymmetrical — you are ethical simply because you recognize the face of the Other.

“The face is what forbids me to kill.” Ethics and Infinity (1982)

For Levinas, the main challenge was to continue seeing the face of the one who consistently and radically negates the face of others. But what is the source of ethical asymmetry? How can one keep seeing the human in someone who continually dehumanizes others?

For Levinas, ethical responsibility is not a contract; it is a response — a response to seeing a face. Our capacity to see the Other’s face, regardless of their actions, depends on whether we ourselves have experienced ethical asymmetry. To love, we must have someone who has seen our Face.

I can only treat others as human if I have experienced being treated asymmetrically — loved without condition, regardless of what I do. It is this experience of ethical asymmetry that forbids me to dehumanize others. That is why Beauty and the Beast remains one of the most powerful mythical archetypes of all time.

As G.K. Chesterton puts it,

“There is the great lesson of ‘Beauty and the Beast,’ that a thing must be loved before it is lovable.’”

The 1977 Soviet romantic comedy Office Romance is one of the most beloved films of the Soviet era. A shy, divorced statistician, Anatoly Novoseltsev, unexpectedly falls in love with his stern, irritable, and lonely boss, Ludmila Kalugina. Wounded by a past betrayal, Ludmila has closed herself off from love and prefers to be seen as “an old maid.”

But the moment she realizes she is loved despite all her harshness, something within her breaks. The next day, she arrives at work transformed — the old maid is gone, and everyone in the office is stunned by the beautiful woman they had never truly seen before.

A thing must be loved before it is lovable. No wonder the Hebrew word rachamim (רָחַם), used in Exodus 34:6–7 and usually translated as “compassion” or “mercy,” literally means “womb.” According to the Torah, we exist in the womb of God — we are “en-wombed” in a loving Presence.

When we become aware of that Presence, we are changed. Someone has seen our Face, and we begin to seek the faces of others. It’s our response to being seen. Love is not something we manufacture; it springs from a heart that has been touched by ethical asymmetry.

Has communism ever been successful? When I talk about what it was like to live under socialism, I sometimes get this reaction from people in the West: “But the USSR didn’t hold a monopoly on socialism. There are many examples of it being successful.”

I asked: “Can you name some?” One person answered, “Many indigenous communities were socialist in nature. And I have been part of spontaneous communities that had everything in common. It was very successful.”

Unfortunately, we didn’t continue this discussion, but later I realized that this answer revealed a deep misunderstanding of the nature of everything ending in “-ism.” There’s a world of difference between “social” and “socialism.” There’s an unbridgeable gap between community and communism. Just like there’s an unbridgeable gap between capital and capitalism.

Things like social justice are good. Taking care of the ill and elderly is good. Taking care of widows and orphans is good. But socialism is vastly different. When we add “ism” to “social” we turn morality into God. Being “moral” becomes the highest priority. It becomes the all-important thing. It becomes an idol.

Community is good. Community is the essence of spiritual life. The Lord’s Supper is called “Communion.” Yet, when we add “ism” at the end, we change its nature. Communism is the worship of the collective. Collective good becomes the highest good. The collective becomes God… or rather an idol.

The nature of idols is paradoxical. They promise a lot but deliver… well, they don’t deliver at all. Was there social justice in the socialist USSR? Deep sigh… No. Did the worship of the collective create healthy communities? Deep sigh… No. The “ism-based” idols produce the opposite of what they promise. The irony of all “isms” is that they deprive us of the very thing they promise to deliver.

That’s why Augustine called sin “disordered love.” What we should love first, we love second; what we should love second, we love first. By loving a good thing in the wrong order we make a good thing into a bad thing.

Capital is a good thing. It’s a resource. When we worship capital, it becomes capitalism where capital becomes the all-important thing. A good thing becomes a bad thing because we love it in the wrong order.

Why is this “order of love” so important? Because of the nature of the human heart revealed in the Decalogue. The first four of the Ten Commandments have nothing to do with morality. The remaining six have everything to do with morality. The first four are about our relationship with the Divine. The remaining six are about what we do (or don’t do).

In other words, when the first four are first, the last six will be second. When the last six become first, the first four will never be followed — as well as the last six ones. True action never starts with action. It starts with our connection to the Source of all action.

When our connection to the Source is primary, all good things remain good. When good things take the first place, they become bad things because they don’t proceed from the Source. We live in a world of disordered love. Disordered love always leads to “isms.” Isms are inevitable when we put action first.

Action is always second. All morality is derivative. We proceed from first to last, not from last to first. When first things remain first, the second things will always be second.