Term
Ressentiment
French term used by Nietzsche and Scheler. A persistent, imaginative resentment that, unable to act, inverts moral values. Distinguished from ordinary resentment by its systemic character.
Nietzsche 1887 · Scheler 1915
Philosopher
Friedrich Nietzsche
1844–1900 · Germany
Argued that ressentiment was the origin of Judeo-Christian morality. Diagnosed a moral inversion following the “death of God.”
On the Genealogy of Morals, 1887
Philosopher
Max Scheler
1874–1928 · Germany
Early phenomenologist. His 1915 book Ressentiment gives the concept its most rigorous treatment.
Ressentiment, 1915
Psychiatrist
Viktor Frankl
1905–1997 · Austria
Holocaust survivor. Founded logotherapy. Argued that the last human freedom is the freedom to choose one’s attitude.
Man’s Search for Meaning, 1946
Psychologist
Jordan Peterson
b. 1962 · Canada
Professor emeritus, University of Toronto. Author of 12 Rules for Life.
12 Rules for Life, 2018
Author
Dennis Prager
b. 1948 · United States
Radio host and author. Writes on happiness, ethics, and gratitude as disciplines.
Happiness Is a Serious Problem, 1998
Philosophers
Marx & Engels
1818–1883 · 1820–1895
Authors of The Communist Manifesto. Argued that the “bourgeois family” is a unit of private property.
Manifesto, 1848
Document
The Communist Manifesto
1848
Section II explicitly addresses the “abolition of the family.”
Marx & Engels, 1848
Philosopher
Simone de Beauvoir
1908–1986 · France
Existentialist. Author of The Second Sex. Documented the constraints marriage placed on women.
The Second Sex, 1949
Book
The Second Sex
1949
Beauvoir’s landmark work. Argued marriage “automatically confers” a subordinate status incompatible with freedom.
de Beauvoir, 1949
Philosopher
Michel Foucault
1926–1984 · France
Argued that knowledge is produced by power relations and that “truth” is never neutral.
Power/Knowledge, 1980
Political Scientist
Charles Murray
b. 1943 · United States
Author of Coming Apart, documenting class-based divergences in family structure.
Coming Apart, 2012
Book
Coming Apart
2012
Murray’s study of family structure divergence between upper- and lower-income white Americans, 1960–2010.
Murray, 2012
Novelist
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
1918–2008 · Russia
Soviet dissident. Wrote The Gulag Archipelago. Argued that resentment is “barren.”
Gulag Archipelago, 1973
Author
C.S. Lewis
1898–1963 · Britain
Oxford and Cambridge scholar. Argued that forgiveness is a repeated discipline, not a single act.
Mere Christianity, 1952
Novelist
George Orwell
1903–1950 · Britain
Criticized the reduction of persons to identity categories, whether practiced by left or right.
1943 column
Founder
John Adams
1735–1826 · United States
Second President. Argued that national morality must be rooted in private families.
Letter to Abigail Adams
Theologian
Augustine of Hippo
354–430 AD
Bishop and theologian. His City of God distinguishes the earthly city from the City of God.
De Civitate Dei, 426
Demographic
Refined Marriage Rate
Number of marriages per 1,000 unmarried adults (age 15+) per year. Fell from 37.5 in 2008 to 33.6 in 2023.
NCFMR, BGSU, 2024
Psychology
Locus of Control
Internal: outcomes depend on one’s own actions. External: outcomes depend on external forces. Internal locus consistently predicts better outcomes.
Rotter, 1966
Psychologist
Julian Rotter
1916–2014 · United States
Introduced locus of control in 1966. One of the most replicated constructs in behavioral science.
Psychological Monographs, 1966
Psychologist
Martin Seligman
b. 1942 · United States
Demonstrated learned helplessness (1967); substantially revised the theory in 2016. Founded positive psychology.
Seligman & Maier 1967 · Maier & Seligman 2016
Psychologist
Albert Bandura
1925–2021 · Canada/US
Studied self-efficacy for four decades. Central finding: belief in one’s competence is a cause, not just a reflection, of competence.
Self-Efficacy, 1997
Psychology
Self-Efficacy
A person’s belief in their capacity to execute the actions required to achieve a goal.
Bandura, 1997
Philosopher
Theodor Adorno
1903–1969 · Germany
Co-author of Dialectic of Enlightenment. Argued Enlightenment reason had become an instrument of domination.
Adorno & Horkheimer, 1944
Philosopher
Max Horkheimer
1895–1973 · Germany
Co-author of Dialectic of Enlightenment and director of the Frankfurt School.
Adorno & Horkheimer, 1944
Economist
Isabel Sawhill
b. 1946 · United States
Brookings Institution. Author of Generation Unbound, arguing economic factors explain more of family decline than ideology alone.
Generation Unbound, 2014
Author
Kate Millett
1934–2017 · United States
Feminist writer. Her 1970 book Sexual Politics argued that the family is the chief institution of patriarchy.
Sexual Politics, 1970
Philosopher
Jürgen Habermas
b. 1929 · Germany
Argued in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (1962) that the public sphere had been hollowed out by mass media.
Structurwandel der Öffentlichkeit, 1962
Category
Prophetic Lament
A biblical form of prayer that names wrong honestly without organizing identity around it. Distinct from both denial and despair.
Psalms 13, 22, 88; Habakkuk 1
Practice
Gratitude as Discipline
Not a mood but a deliberate retraining of attention. The practice is specificity: name three concrete things each day.
Prager, 1998 · 1 Thess. 5:18
