why is simone weil so inspiring?

by THOMAS HIRSCHHORN

Simone Weil wrote: “I do not love war, but what has always horrified me most about war is the situation of those who find themselves in the rear, chattering about what they do not know.”

She is inspiring because, although she was a pacifist, she took up arms and fought courageously on the ground against the Falangists during the Spanish Civil War in 1936. She didn’t want to merely chatter in the rear: she wanted to go to the front and confront the reality of war.

Simone Weil is inspiring because she engaged in war without fearing contradictions and instead boldly confronted them. By going to the front, she experienced “in her flesh” the full horror of war. She bore witness, with humility and honesty, to the contradiction between being a pacifist and needing to engage in a war against oppression. That is what she did, testifying…