Max Scheler

German philosopher (1874-1928)

  • Fame58.0
  • Momentum0.0
  • Wikipedia9.6K
Source-basedStable
Lived 1874–1928, aged 54Germany
  • Wikipedia
    58 languages
    Cross-language footprint
  • Era
    1874–1928
    Aged 54
Summary
Updated 2026-06-08

A German philosopher who took Husserl's phenomenology and bent it toward ethics and the question of what human beings actually are — considered by Heidegger the strongest philosophical force in Europe before vanishing from most non-specialist conversation after his death in 1928.

Biography

About

Max Ferdinand Scheler was born 22 August 1874 in Germany and spent his career extending Edmund Husserl's phenomenological method into territory Husserl hadn't claimed: ethics, emotion, the structure of personhood. By the 1920s he stood among the most prominent philosophers in Germany, working out a philosophical anthropology that asked what separates humans from animals and how values operate in lived experience. He died 19 May 1928, and in the aftermath both Martin Heidegger and Ortega y Gasset declared that every philosopher of the century owed him a debt. The tribute didn't stick — his name…

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In their own words

Sourced, dated quotes from Max Scheler

Max Scheler
saidundated
It is peculiar to “ressentiment criticism” that it does not seriously desire that its demands be fulfilled. It does not want to cure the evil.
L. Coser, trans. (1973), p. 51
Max Scheler
saidundated
Existential envy which is directed against the other person’s very nature, is the strongest source of ressentiment.
L. Coser, trans. (1973), pp. 52-53
Max Scheler
saidundated
The ultimate goal of the arriviste’s aspirations is not to acquire a thing of value, but to be more highly esteemed than others.
L. Coser, trans. (1973), pp. 55-56
Max Scheler
saidundated
The medieval peasant prior to the 13th century does not compare himself to the feudal lord, nor does the artisan compare himself to the knight.
L. Coser, trans. (1973), p. 56
Max Scheler
saidundated
The “old maid” with her repressed cravings for tenderness, sex, and propagation, is rarely quite free of ressentiment.
L. Coser, trans. (1973), pp. 61-62
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Fame
Stable
58.0
Composite of search demand, mentions, audience & graph footprint.
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Historical24.3
Source confidence60.0
Completeness70.0
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Sources

  • Wikidata
    wikidata · wikidata.org
    High confidence
  • Wikipedia
    wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org
    High confidence
  • Pantheon 2.0
    database · pantheon.world
    High confidence