Mihailo Đurić

Mihailo Đurić (Serbian Cyrillic: Михаило Ђурић; 22 August 1925 – 25 November 2011) was one of Serbia's most prominent philosophers. He was a professor at the University of Belgrade's Law School and member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts.

Within the frame of ancient Greek culture, he studied philosophy, law, politics and history, but also modern political theory and ethics. A majority of his works are within the field of philosophy and method of sociology, history of political theories and political science. In the past two decades, his work was mainly devoted to the study of Nietzsche and Heidegger.

Education Đurić studied law, philosophy and classic philology in Belgrade, where he obtained his PhD with the thesis on Ideas of the Natural Law in Greek Sophists (1954).

Trial and imprisonment

In 1972, Mihailo Đurić was expelled from the university, tried and sentenced to 9 months in prison for his criticism of the 1971 Constitutional Amendments as well as his opposition to demolishing of the Petar Petrović Njegoš chapel on Mount Lovćen. The discussion at the Law Faculty was delivered in a public discussion within the university building and the article on Njegoš in a literary review written in opposition to the destruction.

During his trial and imprisonment, many public figures expressed their opposition to then Yugoslav communist government, among them philosopher Ernst Bloch.

After the release from prison Đurić was formally employed at the Institute of Social Sciences in Belgrade, from 1974 until 1989, when he returned to university. From his release from prison (1972), he was also a visiting professor at the Universities of Vienna, Berlin and Augsburg. In 1991, after rehabilitation, he returned to Law School. For many years Đurić was a member of the Institute of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade Faculty of Philosophy, the Scientific Council of which he chaired from 1986 until 1998.

Nietzsche and Heidegger Starting from 1980s, Đurić's writings both in Serbian and in German fundamentally contributed to our understanding of the works of Nietzsche and Heidegger and the crucial link between these two philosophers. While his Nietzsche and the Metaphysics (1984) and The Challenge of Nihilism (1986) concentrate mainly on Nietzsche, the On the Need of Philosophy Today: Philosophy between East and West is mainly a book about Heidegger and his reading of Nietzsche.

Selected bibliography

Đurić's prominent works in Serbian Source: , 1954 (The Idea of Natural Law among the Greek Sophists) , 1962 (Problems of the Sociological Method) , 1964 (Sociology of Max Weber) , 1968 (Humanism as Political Ideal :A Study of Greek Culture) , 1972, (Disaster of the Iskustvo razlike: Suočavanje s vremenom- Beograd, 1994 (The Experience of Difference : Facing the Modern Age) , 1984 (Nietzsche and the Metaphysics) , 1986 (The Challenge of Nihilism) , 1989 (Myth, Science, Ideology. Outline of a Philosophy of Culture) , 1989 (Philosophy in Diaspora. Petronijevics “Principles of Metaphysics”) , 1992 (Roads to Nietzsche : Contributions to the Philosophy of Future) , 1994 (The Experience of Difference : Facing the Modern Age) , 1999 (On the Need of Philosophy Today: Philosophy between East and West) , 2001 (Origin and Future of Europe : Odyssey of one ancient philosophic Idea) , 2002 (The Fragile Human Good. Contemporary Importance of Aristotle 's Practical Philosophy) , 2003 (Serbia and Europe between Past and Future. Annals of the Yugoslav Tragedy) , 2003

Đurić's prominent works in German Source: , Amsterdam 1979. , Berlin 1985. , Würzburg, 1986. , Würzburg, 1990. , München, 1993.

Editor and coauthor Das Denken am Ende der Philosophie. In memoriam Dušan Pirjevec (Ljubljana 1982) Kunst und Wissenschaft bei Nietzsche (Würzburg 1986) Nietzsches Begriff der Philosophie (Würzburg 1990) Nietzsche und Hegel (Würzburg 1992) Die serbische Philosophie heute (München 1993)