PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS AND COMMENTARIES

To be able to discuss national variety in philosophy it is necessary to start from cultural nominalism that determines the uniqueness of the philosophical subject. An appropriate concept of philosophy compared to other cultural phenomena is also a necessity. If we assume that philosophy is always meant to be a “doctrine about the last aims of human reason” (Kant), then a super national universal philosophy would be on hand, — i.e. philosophy “in general”, which considered as being organic part of unified human culture, would reflect on the unchangeable progress of Spirit. But the fact, that even the pretentious German classic philosophy still expresses German spiritual type to some extent and suggests the possibility to discuss national style of philosophy, makes ridiculous comparison in the variety of national philosophical “achievements”. If we take a different position from the philosophical globalism and if we insist on the suggestion that there is no such thing like philosophy “in general”, as philosophy is not just “pure knowledge” but a national vision of the Being (i.e. particular projection by which every nation sees the unified view of the Being), then any other type of reflection, any different national philosophy might construct in its own specific way and deal with its own problems which is one of the essential features of national identity.

The development of the image of a philosopher as well as of the philosophy itself (its place in knowledge and its life functions) might also he nationally specific. Indeed this is contrary to another way of expressing national origin of philosophy, which might vary from literary-centric to arid-academic. Complete mutual penetration might be seen among national psychology and such philosophical constructions, which are to some extent aside from “pure philosophizing” and could be called synthetic construction trends. In this regard it would be more correct to talk about national philosophical culture, in case the latter is considered an expression of the national style of thinking. Of course the self-dependence of such type of philosophy is always quite relative It is supposed to be a variant of the invariant. The individual vision of the Being must be correlative to the national vision as a whole, because otherwise its philosophical characteristic might be lost while appealing for national differentiation of culture.

Let’s skip the unnecessary now historiography of definitions of philosophy and concentrate on what is the legal philosophical answer to the question “What is philosophy anyway?” (transforming Heidegger’s words in the Bulgarian perspective). So, what is the correlation between Bulgarian philosophical thought and philosophical thoughts in Bulgaria? And also does the opinion that the “Philosophy of every nation in its deepest essence is the revealing of popular faith; this faith is fundamental for the people and to this faith it strives for” work for the Bulgarian mentality with its religious indifference proved by almost every Bulgarian expert in the field? Is of any importance the fact that the Bulgarian person is not persuadable to the spirit of Christianity as it’s first step is the denial of the Cross (according to
Janice Janev) or is his pagan essence of mentality exactly the same as Nayden Sheytanov insists, important to the philosophical origin? And is it actually possible to seek the variety of national philosophical process by binding it with some national religious tradition? What is the essence of the national style in philosophizing and is it possible to ask such a question?

For a relatively long period of time — from the Liberation till present times, one of the thorniest problems in this sphere was the creation of a national philosophical tradition. Its presence has ever since tended to be more discrete in the years of domination of the universal paradigm of Marxism. But still it doesn’t mean that the philosophical constructions of the time didn’t have national origin in one way or another. But the lack of specific altitude to the problem suggests that we might ignore this period of time or at least that part, concerning the discussion above.

Now we are still far a way from creating our own special vision of the Being as well as far from finding our own place in the world, in case such purpose has ever been pursued. Which is the period of Bulgarian history in philosophy that is closer to achieving this aim? The reproduction of the spiritual atmosphere between the two World Wars manifests that this is exactly that period with growing interest to the national specificity and differentiation, preservation and creation of national values became fundamental and this could easily be explained with the national catastrophe in economy at the same time. The philosophical pluralism of the period appeared to be also a condition for selection of national dominants.

The development of the philosophical thought far the period between the two World Wars consists of two contradicting trends — the “pure philosophizing” and the philosophy of national culture. Being adherent to the first trend Dimitar Mihalchev laid in the recent years special emphasis to the scientific (fundamentally scientific) character of philosophy. The logic of “fundamental science” was unfavourable to express national mental features, although Atanas Iliev — an outstanding representative of the national differentiation of culture, who approves the pragmatic position in his controversy with logic — considers exactly “the national style in science itself”. The importance of chance while establishing Rehmke’s doctrine as paradigmatic for the Bulgarian philosophical thought, might be intensively discussed, but it is a fact that the philosophical school, established by Mihalchev, initiated a tradition of permanent interest towards the problems in the field of theory of knowledge and ontology. As the field of problems is also one of the factors helping to express national spiritual type, the hypothesis made here about the success of Mihalchev’s school is his founder’s interest in more “rigid” forms of philosophizing and explicable not only by his personal features (as it is often said), but that of a particular interest adequate to the Bulgarian pre-reflexive, unconscious mentality.

There is another line in Bulgarian history of philosophy, alternative to that of Mihalchev, anthropologizing, based on the Bulgarian variant of “philosophy of life”. This line suggests that the philosophy is “personal subjective act” (Spiridon Kazandjiev), “metaphysics of heroin” (Janice Janev), etc. That line ignores the “scientific” trend in philosophy and gives way for the creation of individual style and a method for reflection about national values, for penetration into the depths of national character. The appeals for national differentiation of culture and for “analysing and synthesizing the national spiritual type”, i.e. the dimensions of Bulgarian soul, become more and more popular.

Of course any diversion of philosophy from its own tasks and interests as a science is inevitable, less the creation of Bulgarian people’s psychology which makes the process of our self-reflection easy and even takes part in it. Both writers and thinkers take part in this integral understanding of the Bulgarian person, penetrating deeply into his world and determining the links that hold him tight to the society. The self-reflection of the Bulgarian person is the purpose of the native philosophy of Petar Voinikov who summarizes the results of the discussion held in the magazine “Zlatorog” about the opportunities of the Bulgarian person to reach its own philosophy, science and art: — “The idea of original philosophy is not a new one, writes Voinikov, it’s based on the plan for “Slavic philosophy” of Petar Beron which is to overtake the world from a Slavic philosophical point of view, synthesizing the western rationalism with the Slavic mysticism”.

The ways for self-reflection that are the purpose and the meaning of the Bulgarian philosophy remain quite often at the level of people’s psychology and nothing else. Opposite to them the Bulgarian philosophical activism resulted in different synthesis, which is far away from any academic style of philosophizing and presents philosophy of Bulgarian history, a philosophical perspective about the tasks of Bulgarian intelligence etc. Nayden Sheitanov’s universal outlook orientation, which is part of the “new Bulgarian philosophy”, is precisely the same type of synthesis. This is also true about Spiridon Kazandjiev’s essays (“History and People”, “National Consciousness”, etc.) And also about Janko Janev’s works: “About the Bulgarian spirit”, and “Myth of the Balkans”; and last but not least about Atanas Iliev’s essays. The philosophical vision of national identity resulted in rather vital and stable trend, which appears as a rather powerful rivalry to Mihalchev and his philosophical school. The interruption of native philosophical traditions revealed the problems around the outcome of this competition.

Until the 20s the influence of Kant’s ideas is partial, fragmentary without clear interpretational principles but between the two world wars a new characteristic features are formed: consistency, systematical method of studying, a lot of publications focused only on one school and studying different fields in philosophy — theory of knowledge, ethics, law, politics, etc. The central figure creating this tendency is Tseko Torbov. He was born on 15 April 1899 in Oriahovo. In 1920 he goes to Berlin to study law where communicates with Prof. Leonard Nelson who sends him several publications. T. Torbov translates two of them and this is the beginning of the publishing house “Public Life”. Later T. Torbov works as a collaborator of Prof L. Nelson in Gottingen.

In 1956 Bulgarian Acadcmy of Sciences entrusts him with the task to translate Kant’s main works. For first time are published in Bulgarian: “Kritik der reinen Vernunf” (1967), “Kritik der praktischen Vernunf” (1974), “Zuin ewigen Ftieden” (1977). He edits “Prolegoniena zu einer jeden kunftigen Metaphisyk, die als Wissenschaft wird auftereten konnen” (1968), “Grundlegung zur Metaphisik der Sitten” (1974) , co-translator is V. Topusova-Torbova. In 1970 T. Torbov becomes Herder-prize laureate of the Vienna University for the translation of the “Kritik der reinen Vernunft”. He is a winner of other international and national prizes as well. Dies on 8 June 1987.

T. Torbov respects with the incredible consistency of his work only the traditions of the critical school Fries-Nelson. From 1925 until his last publication “Das Grundgesetz des Rechts bei Kant, Fries und Nelson.” — Kant-Studien, 65. Jahrgang. Sonderheft, Akten des 4. Internationale Kant-Kongresses. Meinz, 6-10 April 1974, all his studies are focused on problems connected with this school. These are numerous studies subordinated to the main principles of this school (Torbov, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1933, 1993).

The development of the Nelson’s philosophy in Bulgaria is an excellent example for that exactly in the odd philosophical partialities of the philosophers of the small countries is hidden their great cultural significance — they accept, keep and develop traditions and ideas, which are not in the dominating “flow” of the philosophical knowledge.

In the philosophical activity of prof. Tseko Torbov two tendencies can be distinguished. The first one is the continuation of the trend in the interpretations of Kant’s philosophy connected mainly with the ethical and pedagogical problems. And the second one is the introducing of new trend — the studies focused on the philosophy of law and politics. The importance of Tseko Torbov in the development of the critical direction in the bulgarian philosophical history is not only the establishment of the school in Bulgaria but that in this school for a first time in our philosophical history is presented a systematic and worked up in details philosophy of law. He makes this in the 30s and 40s here in Bulgaria. Besides the originality and the specificity of the critical school of Fries-Nelson, the orientation towards it is determined by some ethno psychological differences and mainly the strong realistic pathos of the bulgarian philosophical spirit. In the philosophical dictionary of Schmidt, Fries is characterized as the founder of the positive philosophy. The thread which connects T. Torbov with the previous period is the special accent on psychology. The main thesis in this school is that the criticism of reason is something different from the system of metaphysics and is based on psychology. Very important for the critical method from this point of view is the so called psychological deduction of the main metaphysical principles. Here, as it is in the first period the philosophical thought remains mainly in the outlines of one psychological treatment of basic theoretical parts of Kant’s system.

In the so called ontological interpretation of Kant’s philosophy the accent is mainly on the constitutive (negative) dialectics. The new basic theoretical focuses connected with the dialectics in Kant’s philosophy are as follows:

1. The solution of the antinomies is grounded on the transcendental logic not ignoring the laws of formal logic used as a negative condition for validity.

In this sense the estimation of the problems about dialectics are inseparable from the problem about the character of the so called regulative dialectics, in contrast to the constructive. The regulative dialectic is the “highest” theoretical “grounding” of the transcendental idealism. It puts forward and solves the problem for the essence of the philosophical knowledge.

Topics of language and philosophy, democracy and politics, united in broad lines by the theme and the occasion of this meeting were debated on the second day of the conference, in concrete relation to D. Mihalchev’s philosophical views. The parallel made between T. Masaryk and D. Mihalchev on the first day was not so strongly manifested on the second, probably due to the predominantly Bulgarian participation. The aim of the papers presented was to accent on the relationship — both political and private — which existed between the two philosophers at the beginning of the XX century. This tendency gradually gave way to first hand accounts about interesting events in the Bulgarian philosopher’s life.

It was not so strange that some stories as well as evaluations were controversial. Of course, above all remained the respect for a man, who had represented Bulgarian philosophical thought abroad, who had published one of the most weighty journals, “Philosophical Review”, as an expression of broad variety of opinions, problems and interests. It was pointed out that D. Mihalchev compared to T. Masaryk was engaged in politics less and predominantly from the pages of his journal. Evaluations of him ranged between the “most subtle philosopher of southern Slavic people” (according to T. Masaryk’s own words) and a “speaker of two coup d’etat governments”. This variety only denoted that praises as well as criticism had their ground during the discussions. And this could be only positive, since one-sided tendencies either to idealize D. Mihalchev or to emphasize his faults were mutually balanced.

Prof. Elena Panova examined his work “Traditional Logic and its Materialistic Foundation”. She indicated the relation between language and reality as major object of D. Mihalchev’s criticism. In accordance with him she explained that misunderstood relation between language and thinking leading to certain delusions in formal logic research; this idea was shared by I. Kant, F. Bacon and Leibnitz. D. Mihalchev joined an already existing tradition, which required overcoming of the formal logical approach. According to D. Mihalchev, traditional logic had no right to be a science because it substitutes the analyzes of logical thought with investigation of grammatical forms of statement in language. Prof. E. Panova specified that this position is a principal linguistic philosophy characteristic as well — language is expressing thoughts, therefore the statement can reveal the nature of thought; a judgment must not be confused with a statement and if we want to be logicians we should have given up formal logic.

In 1953 such claims raised objections and disagreements, alas — D. Mihalchev had no opportunity to refute them. He planned a discussion at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences to present his research and argue with his opponents, but it turned into something else. Prof. E. Panova’s first-hand account was an answer of the question, which held the audience attention: what happened in 1953, when offensive attitude and ideological atmosphere forced D. Mihalchev to resign from active teaching at the University.

Personal memoirs were interesting first of all because of their unsophisticated authenticity. Partiality was their priority over the weighted objectivity of a scientific paper. So it was most exciting to hear the remembrances told by E. Panova about what kind of person, philosopher or lecturer D. Mihalchev was, how he argued and defended his ideas. An interest developed, which was entirely justified by the wish to create more definite and complex vision of what in fact was this man, who juggled with dialectically opposite theses, spreading unrest in his students’ minds, making philosophy something more then just an academic discipline.

D. Mihalchev was described as a “born polemicist”, devoted to philosophy and always ready to defend his thesis “intelligently, politely, civilly”. With sadness she explained to the audience how after 1944 K. Marx’s dialectic philosophy was held as the only true scientific philosophy and how the so-called discussion on D. Mihalchev’s research predestined the time of his removal. According to Prof. E. Panova, at that time the whole philosophical tradition before K. Marx was presented as “foreword” to Marxism. It meant, though not directly, erasing of pluralism in philosophy, due to the conviction that the whole preceding philosophical tradition is not scientifically significant.

Sharing Remke’s “nons-cientific” ideas, D. Mihalchev opened the door for all kinds of accusations against him after 1944 as well as before 1944. At first he had been accused of being supporter of “materialism”, later he was considered a philosopher whose ideas lingered in idealism. Of course each similar case of incorrectly posed “questions” is at least inadequate and sad. Accusation is too miserable beginning for a philosophical dispute. And it’s not easy to answer how and why it was necessary to substitute the professional discussion on D. Mihalchev’s work “Traditional Logic …” with a condemnation. How should we understand those accusations today? Do they mean that D. Mihalchev’s works were actually not read at all, or the wish to discredit the author by all means came first?

D. Mihalchev was always ready for discussion to argue and defend his position — and this fact alone turned into a problem after 1944, since he never felt inclined to censor himself and follow into the steps of dialectical materialism. Unfortunately, that was expected from every philosopher.

The memoirs about D. Mihalchev and the time of Marxist philosophy in Bulgaria added a new flavor to the key concepts of the conference: “worldness”, “democracy” and “small nation”. Being considered on Bulgarian ground, they acquired specific meaning, fully worth of satire. The concept of “worldness” brought up the question about the power of restrictions imposed upon philosophical thought by the new ideology after 1944. On the other hand, the question was raised: why D. Mihalchev preferred exactly Remke’s philosophy? This question was bearing quite delicate meaning: was Bulgarian philosophical thought at the beginning of the century and ever after up to world standards?

Questions related to this problem varied between historical and philosophical themes, from relations between Bulgaria and Czechoslovakia to how D. Michalchev represented Bulgarian philosophical thought abroad and what connections he established. The principle of “worldness” was examined in the context of ethical problems. Should we tolerate cosmopolitanism? Whether as an ultimate aim of mankind it would be enough to give people freedom, prosperity and happiness. And didn’t this same purpose involve violence, brought by the good intentions of those who wanted to apply it in reality? Aren’t we stumbling here over a principle with a questionable advantage, which we should formulate as: “To achieve happiness, we should kill everyone, who is unfortunate”.

This formula is a satiric generalization of 20th century anti-utopia ideas. Building better world must not be grounded on violence over human personality, no matter how refined are its forms, concealed behind slogans of misunderstood freedom, fraternity and equality. The concept of democracy itself invariably points to the problem of pluralism in philosophy. Both philosophy and politics cannot avoid it and need pluralism as much as they are trying to get over it.

D. Mihalchev’s work as a lecturer at the Sofia University and an editor of “Philosophical Review” journal shows rather peculiar meaning of the principle of democracy. Why S. Kazandjiev’s or J. Sakuzov’s works never appeared on the pages of this “most democratic Bulgarian journal” — this was a question asked by Prof. K. Vasilev. The answer was based on the argument that demand for perfection from any human being lacking realism. D. Mihalchev was impartial and objective in accordance to the possible in those conditions objectivity and so D. Mihalchev had the right to allow himself certain preferences. K. Vasilev finished his speech stating that there was something moving in the faults of a great thinker: “We are given flaws in order to be human”.

The audience learned about the relations between D. Mihalchev and his students, since he was interesting professor. Again the emphasize fell on D. Mihalchev’s passionate devotion to philosophy and philosophical disputes, as well as on his readiness and ability to defend his theses (a reason for the eagerness of his students to take the floor at his seminars and in the same time for the real hardship to do it). But it was exactly his irreconcilability to a new, politically supported philosophy, which caused the shameful events, which followed.

So the topic of “small nations”, parallel with the possibilities for an objective (impartial) historical approach, fostered partial and sad thoughts about the “small human”, making faults much easier than he/she would like to. It is arguable to wonder what makes a human “small”? Is it his incapacity to defend freedom of speech and thought? Is it his inability to tolerate differences and respect due to the opinion of others?

Probably, yes. T. Masaryk, the politician, thought of another kind of “small nation” when he wrote his book. Probably he had in mind demographic and geographic factors to assess the chances of a different Slavic world. However, D. Mihalchev, the philosopher, throughout the last years of his life encountered with the “small”, which was the measure for the scope of Bulgarian philosophical thought as well as of mutual (colleague) respect and tolerance.

To celebrate the 120th anniversary of the Bulgarian philosopher’s birth was a good cause, because this not only signified the much broader horizon of Bulgarian philosophy today, but it was also an occasion for a talk on its specific features. Unfortunately, precisely Bulgarian philosophy is outfield in Bulgaria. Students of philosophy are better acquainted with the history of western thought, than with its Bulgarian counterpart, even the names of its most notable representatives are not known. This is quite pitiful because the support of an original tradition, even not expressed in a succession, nourishes although not too great, but constant source of self-confidence. A tradition is important, even only with consciousness of it.

Too early is to ask whether deference to Bulgarian philosophical thought will be revived in its homeland, but definitely it will reflect on the growing consciousness of one small nation.

In this presentation of scholars who devoted all their intellectual and personal energies to the formation of a philosophical culture in Bulgaria, we are obliged to include the two most influential thinkers during the period of the "status nascendi" — Tseko Torbov and Dimitar Mikhalchev. Neither Torbov nor Mikhalchev were exactly historians of philosophy. Nevertheless, both philosophers incorporated a great deal of the ancient and medieval conceptual heritage into their own thought.

Dimitar Mikhalchev was known as the patriarch of Bulgarian philosophy. A prolific philosopher, Mikhalchev also represented the soul of "Philosophical Review" — the most respected Bulgarian journal in the field of the humanities between 1928 and 1943. He completed his doctoral degree in Germany, where he gradually shifted from a neo-Kantian to a Rehmkean position. As a professor at Sofia University and author of numerous papers, articles and books, Mikhalchev devoted his energy primarily to the theory of knowledge, logic, history of epistemology, and theory of truth. He also wrote much on the philosophy of history and sociology, relentlessly criticized a certain occult theosophical school popular in the 1930s in Bulgaria, and also maintained an uninterrupted, critical dialogue with the Bulgarian Marxists. However, he denied that Marxism is philosophy at all "senso stricto", but he did admit the scientific validity of Marxian explanations of social reality and historical development.

In his writings and lectures Mikhalchev plumbed boldly into the history of philosophy to provide further backing to his own positions; in truth, however, he is not an historian of philosophy in the classical sense. That said, he did conduct many studies in the field including ‘Time, Succession and Moment’ (in which he had recourse to the Eleatic conception of time), ‘Problem of the Relativity of Truth in the Teaching of the Ancient Greek Sophists’, ‘New Thoughts on an Old Sophism’, ‘Can a Man Step into the Same River Twice?’, ‘Being and Consciousness’, ‘Essence” of Things and its Manifestations’, and ‘Origin of Logical Thought. Functional Semantics and the Problem of Irrational Formation of Concepts’. His own quite individual work reevaluates the philosophical thought of the past, incorporating its
elements in his voluminous writings ‘Form and Relation’ (sec. ed. 1931) and ‘Traditional Logic and its Materialistic Justification’ (published first in 1918). Not only in these books, but also in numerous other papers he constantly refers to the Eleatics, the Sophists, Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Leibniz, Spinoza, Kant and Hegel.

Mikhalchev was not a philosopher seeking an immanent and objective understanding of the thinking of the past. He was rather akin to some of the famous European thinkers who absorbed and molded the ideas of their great predecessors. Like Aristotle and Hegel, Heidegger and Derrida, Mikhalchev exemplified the rule that the
independent thinker cannot be a faithful historian of philosophy. The elaborate nature of Mikhalchev’s own system of thought and his peculiar point of view look to the past not to cautiously reconstruct objective mental facts, but to transform them into useful elements of his own philosophical thought. This is evident especially in his analyses of psycho-physical parallelism, essence of truth, philosophical interpretation of logic, reasoning of the Eleatics, the Sophists, and, above all the philosophy and logic of Aristotle.

The fate of the university professors mentioned above was similar. Both of them were fired in 1953. Prof. Torbov was only allowed to continue to teach German language. Prof. Mikhalchev was at first permitted to continue his public activities only in his capacity as a member of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences (thanks to the fact that he had been Bulgarian ambassador to the Soviet Union and had accepted historical materialism as a valid scientific method of sociological research). But several months later, after a scandalous public discussion of ‘Traditional Logic and its Materialistic Justification’ he had presented in manuscript form, he was condemned for his retrograde ideas and expelled from the Academia well.

On repeated occasion, these thinkers were subject to investigations without a search warrant and certain papers were confiscated. In spite of this circumstances, they continued to work courageously for posterity — something familiar to many of their "brothers in fate" living in other socialist countries — without knowing whether their writings would ever find a public. The diverse points of view in the humanities and various cultural and intellectual trends cultivated in the inter-war period of Bulgaria were eradicated. Only one possibility remained: to praise in written and spoken word the doctrines of Marxist-Leninism, the only true and
veritable philosophy, and to promote the arts and sciences in accordance with its ideology. No wonder, then, that for almost 40 years (from the establishment of the "power of the people" in 1944 until the early 1980s) in this country (as in all the other socialist countries) there appeared books, films, theater-performances, exhibitions, etc., whose loyalty to the communist regime was beyond doubt. For almost 40 years even the slightest, most innocent, deviation in direction from the grandeur of Marxism was viewed with great suspicion. In this atmosphere of totalitarian rule the teaching and study of the history of philosophy was neglected and,
moreover, viewed as a potential threat to the socialist project.

In fact, some of the writings from Tseko Torbov and Dimitar Mikhalchev were published first posthumously, for instance Prof. Torbov’s "History and Theory of Right" and Prof. Mikhalchev’s "Traditional Logic and its Material Justification". What is more, in the so called debate which was designed to put an end to his intellectual carrier in 1954, Mikhalchev was not allowed to answer the criticism leveled by the young Marxists at the University. He was forced to listen to them and remain silent. Nevertheless, he provided a profound and dignified response to the criticism in a manuscript written for posterity. This response appeared for the first time in 1995 in D. Mikhalchev’s "Listen to the Other Side as Well ~ philosophical essays. Sofia: University Press, 1995, 392 pp".

Addendum: We have been trying in a series of sketches to mold the figure of bulgarian philosopher and politician Prof. Dimitar Mihalchev. In the first place the collectible on this particular author has been too large and unmanageable to interpretation. We did our best to introduce his early career as thinker and scholar in the years before World War I — cf.., the review from "Andreev, K and Subashki, V. Dimitar Mihalchev ~ Philosopher, Sociologist and Publicist. Sofia, 1975".

Secondly, there appears D. Mihalchev's jolted performance as politician and ambassador in the Czech Republic, his contacts with president Thomas Masaryk, and as omnibus himself in the role of functionary for the Slavdom and Democracy. These years from 1923-1927, which he spent in Prague (and where he witnessed a political assassination of his predecessor ambassador Rayko Daskalov), were formative. D. Mihalchev withdraw from his post as convinced Slavophil and adherent to a "small nation" philosophy.

On the third place comes the editorship of Prof. Dimitar Mihalchev with the journal "Philosophical Review" (1928 to 1943). As recipient of influence both from the left and the right political specter D. Mihalchev retains a third way path which gives him the chance to survive the World War alive, yet with a blemished postural image of collaborationist and non-Marxist. This gave Acad. Todor Pavlov — actually, a student of D. Mihalchev — chance to defame his opponent (1953) and from thence till the death of the philosopher in 1967, subsequently there is no valid information on the subject.

The posthumous rehabilitation of D. Mihalchev started in the 1990s. We present here a collection of unpublished essays and criticism "Listen to the Other Side as Well. Sofia, 1995", where the the philosopher and public man have been introduced by a lengthy forward from Prof. Kiril Vasilev, ditto.

(i). Collective photograph from Prague (1927). Dimitar Mihalchev — first row, second to the right; Alfons Muha — second row, center with white pointed beard; and, Ivan Mrkvichka — third row, right flank with stashed beard.

(ii). First issue of "Philosophical Review" (1929), with editor-in-chief Prof. D. Mihalchev.