I don't mind questioning for example whether tradition is important or not. Certainly you never brought the question up. I don't mind discussing the importance of authority in religion or in society - but again you never brought that up. You take your liberal principles as a priori truth, and aren't even willing to discuss them, much less question them. You consider them holy truth, and disgusting to even dare to question them! In fact principles which are different are emotionally repugnant to you. But hey - each to their own! — Agustino
Also it seems to me that you don't want to admit that there is a mystical tradition at the very heart of Orthodoxy, which isn't against Orthodoxy, but is Orthodox itself. I don't see why not. You just want to monopolise mysticism for some progressive-liberal politics, but if you look at history this isn't the case in many actual cases. — Agustino
But traditions are there to be creatively used by individuals for self-education, development and inspiration; individuals are not there for traditions to use or dictate to, in the name, and for the interests, of authorities or powers, or to repress and subjugate under the aegis of orthodox totalitarian ideologies. — John
That great, distant authority (whom it was death to look upon) became a living, particular man in time. — Hoo
Not that this is directed at me, but I think "right" is functioning here in the realm of politics or the Law. We are all endlessly guilty before the infinite law. "Finite" personality is just endless accusation and guilt. To accuse finite personality for this is just--- more finite personality, more word grinding. That too. That especially. By "infinite" personality, I just mean the negation of this game as the ideal mode. We "fall" into liberalism or conservatism or some other righteous role. Even here, I clash with you, enter the game of essences in order to point at it. Life is funny.A sinner has just as much of a right to exist and be loved as the perfectly virtuous. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Sin can never annihilate worth altogether, but it can certainly diminish it. — John
As we enter the game of discourse, yes, we are impinging on the world. In a minimal sense, you can call this politics. But in that sense Keats was a politician. Even Lewis Carroll was therefore a politician --in that minimal sense. But this isn't about "politics is bad" or "politics is good" but a pointing toward that which transcends political assertions or political focus. It's about being able to laugh from one perspective at our earnest investment from another perspective. Are we good people? Good liberals? Good conservatives? Good whatever? Is that the whole story? Or is that a crust on the top of our consciousness? A construction of "oughts" and "truths"?Always, in the sense that anyone arguing a postion as wisdom or ethics is concerned with politics. They want to make the world into something, even if they are only concerned with speaking their own voice — TheWillowOfDarkness
This is partially true, except that I still think you are understanding in political terms, as if I am "politically" asserting an anti-politics. Thou shalt not take politics seriously! But that is just more (generalized) politics and law bringing. I'm not trying to say that X is bad. Nor do I assert that my ideas are even compatible with just anyone's personality. We can use the "escape" metaphor, but it's misleading, for it already frames such an "escape" in terms of some violated duty. Thou shalt advance the cause of humanism/progressivism! You're right that the attitude I'm hinting at reframes all of this duty and perceives the narcissism/escapism within this "duty." It's hard to meet someone who doesn't think that his duty is also your duty. His abstract "gods" or causes are also yours, if you ask him. But look around: there is no consensus. There are positions that depend on thier anti-positions for an inferior or "fallen" out-group. Be it condescending pity or outright hatred, the group identification is something to melt in to.You view the "transcendent" as our meaningful escape from the squabbling politics of the world. Whether the transcendent Christian, mystical, atheistic or someonewith else, you view them all equal which saves from the ignomy of conflict, duty and demands of others. Everyone is saved by their ability to the meaning of the world and any conflict it might contain. — TheWillowOfDarkness
The pragmatisist is found to be ignoring the world in favour of the fiction which produces a lesser degree of conflict or hides its presence. You often see pragmatism expressed as the phrase "we only need what works." How exactly is anything going to work though? For that to function, the world must have significance in-itself, else there would be no measure of what was working. Conflict and significance must be expressed by the world. It cannot be just a question of politics. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Why is thinking that adultery should be legally punished in some form "self-righteous prozelytizing" and something like thinking that a husband beating his wife should be punished legally is NOT "self-righteous prozelytizing"? Do you have some special love for adultery, or what is it, when it comes to sexual harm, that you treat it so differently from other forms of harm? Really... people are rightfully outraged if say a husband beats his wife. All good in that. But if the same husband were to commit adultery on his wife - suddenly no one is outraged - people even find it funny and interesting to hear, and if someone were to be outraged then he is an ultra-conservative fundamentalist. What is it about sexual sins that makes them different from other sins which harm other people - if not for the selfish liberal propaganda that you can do whatever you want with your body? Look this is all propaganda - this has nothing to do with ethics or morality - it's in fact the contrary of ethics and morality - the care of self and of other.someone produces self-righteous prozelytizing — John
Man is a social animal. Being a social animal entails that one's happiness depends, at least in part, on other people. It would be foolish not to be interested or concerned with what others do - given that your own well-being also depends on it - because you are not an atom. This is exactly the point that Plato and Aristotle made so long ago - which is why they devoted their lives to teaching other people, and encouraging them towards virtue, because they realised that virtue is the requirement that leads to both individual and social fulfilment. If social harmony doesn't exist, then the individual will be frustrated in his aims, and neither will be happy. Our duties to one another are more important than our rights from one another - and this is the conservative point. That's why obedience is, as per Roger Scruton, the prime political virtue. Other people matter - you're not the only one who matters. It's not all about your desires and what you want - it's first of all about not hurting others.but the person need not be directly concerned with the politics of influencing others, and much less would she need to be concerned with the politics of determining exactly what others are to think and do in regards to particular issues. — John
This is only partly true - not all mystics were condemned as heretical. Pseudo-Dionysius is one of the most important mystics - he was the first author St. Thomas Aquinas studied as a monk - how do you think this was possible? Clearly because the Church appreciated the mystical teaching. Furthermore, the Eastern Orthodox tradition has accepted mystics from the very beginning - starting from the Desert Fathers.This has meant that mystics that adhered (at least outwardly) to the Roman Catholic tradition, had to be very careful about what they said. This has obviously also been the case with men of science and Giordano Bruno (who was both a hermetic mystic and a man of science) is a striking case in point. — John
Individuals don't exist. No one is born an individual. You get your individuality from a tradition. Tradition forms and shapes you into who you are. The sense of self is emergent, and it depends on your community, by which it is created and sustained. Individuals are not atoms flying all alone, who live in society just for ensuring their survival. We are social animals - we depend on society.But traditions are there to be creatively used by individuals for self-education, development and inspiration; individuals are not there for traditions to use or dictate to, in the name, and for the interests, of authorities or powers, or to repress and subjugate under the aegis of orthodox totalitarian ideologies. — John
Orthodoxism isn't totalitarian. ISIS is totalitarian. There's a big difference between what ISIS does, and what the Catholic Church does.orthodox totalitarian ideologies. — John
My apologies, but it does seem to me, even now, that there is some liberal bias in your thinking, which you have picked up from society. I may be wrong, but that's the impression I get. But indeed, you are not a liberal in the traditional sense of the term, so my apologies for that.And again, underlined here is another example of a presumptuous and unwarranted characterization of my philosophical stance and personal aims; which it seems is based on the fact, that given your own preoccupation with politics, you seem to automatically assume that others must be (or at least should be?) motivated in like manner. — John
The idea that we don't have a duty to the past is wrong I think. If it wasn't for the past, we wouldn't exist as we exist. Therefore we owe it to the past, which entails that we have a duty towards it. The past is not there for us to use however we see fit. Society is a contract between the past, the present and the future, as per Burke. There is no dictatorship of the present.The past exists for us, not us for the past. The desire to freeze time is the desire for "undeath" or "unlife." — Hoo
You can remove "arch" because it is simply conservative. No arch needed.arch-conservatives — John
Cut out dictatorial. There's a difference between it being instructive and respected, and it being dictatorial. You don't seem to be able to see that.For him tradition is meant to instructive and dictatorial — TheWillowOfDarkness
This is true.It's meant to be the becon of imagine which defines what we aspire to — TheWillowOfDarkness
Let me re-edit this. "We no longer understand the perennial aspects of reality and of ourselves. Marriage is no longer forever. Family is understood to br breakable. The vision of the perfect life has been lost. It's no longer there to help define our lives and guide them when they are less than perfect". Now I agree :DWe are no longer understand ourselves to be destined for anything. Marriage is no longer forever. Family is understood to be breakable (to pick one of Agustino's favourites). The vision of the necessarily perfect life has been lost. It's no longer there to define the lives of some and act as the fiction which hides when we are less than perfect. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Yes it does.Sin has no future consequence for the integrity of one's worth. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Moral laxity is no different from immorality.Liberalism amounts to accepting or even celebrating living imperfections — TheWillowOfDarkness
This is false. It's not about calling for their destruction, as for calling for the destruction of such behaviour and the reform of people who commit it. That's what moral education is.In liberalism, the ability to call for the destruction of those who sin is lost. It's this which Agustino despises most. Philosophy is unable to form a culture which veiws sin and worth as mutually exclusive. — TheWillowOfDarkness
Given by who?? Rights don't exist out there flying in the sky!In themselves, rights are an infinite — TheWillowOfDarkness
Enlightenment, for the authors of the Hermetica and for Hegel, is not just an intellectual event; it is expected to change the life of the enlightened one. Philosophy, for Hegel, is about living. In brief, the man who achieves Selbstbewusstsein [literally 'self-confidence' but more like 'self-realisaton'] is the man who becomes selbstbewusst: confident, self-actualized, no longer an ordinary human being (cf Abraham Maslow, 'hierarchy of needs' and the self-actualized human.)
Klaus Vondung writes that “The Hermeticist does not need to escape from the world in order to save himself, he wants to gain knowledge of the world in order to expand his own self, and utilize this knowledge to penetrate into the self of God. Hermeticism is a positive Gnosis, as it were, devoted to the world. To know everything is to in some sense have control over everything. This is what I term the ideal of man as magus, and it is unique to the Hermetica. See, for example, Corpus Hermeticum 4: “All those who heeded the proclamation and immersed themselves in mind [nous] participated in knowledge and became perfect [or “complete,” teleioi] people because they received mind [an expression also characteristic of Chinese Buddhism].
But those who missed the point of the proclamation are people of reason [or “speech,” logikon] because they did not receive [the gift of] mind as well and do not know the purpose or the agents of their coming to nous [i.e. trapped by mere discursiveness]. In other words, the men of complete self-understanding who know even the “purpose or the agents of their coming to be” are perfect human beings. If Hegel did not believe that man could literally become God, he certainly believed that the wise man is daimonic: a more-than-merely-human participant in the divine life.
Why is thinking that adultery should be legally punished in some form "self-righteous prozelytizing" and something like thinking that a husband beating his wife should be punished legally is NOT "self-righteous prozelytizing"? — Agustino
Individuals don't exist. No one is born an individual. You get your individuality from a tradition. Tradition forms and shapes you into who you are. The sense of self is emergent, and it depends on your community, by which it is created and sustained. Individuals are not atoms flying all alone, who live in society just for ensuring their survival. We are social animals - we depend on society. — Agustino
It's an act which harms someone. Same with adultery, the only difference is that one is physical harm and the other emotional/spiritual. You seem to ignore that very important commonality.Beating someone up is an act of aggression pure and simple, it is in no way analogous to adultery, as you are suggesting it is — John
Leaving aside the open marriage situation, these reasons you provide - are they justifications for harming someone? If those reasons are the case there exists divorce. Certainly not adultery.Perhaps the relationship is not good, they are not really attracted to one another physically, perhaps the one who commits adultery (does that consist in 'being an adult', by the way? ;) ) has difficulty controlling sexual desires, perhaps s/he has fallen in love with the person s/he commits it with, perhaps husband and wife share an agreement to live in an 'open' relationship. — John
Funny - statistically men cheat more often than women. Also statistically women are harmed by infidelity more frequently than men. This is exactly the liberal bias you have that Im talking about. You think sexual morality is a male invented tool to control women. That's exactly the liberal progressive propaganda. While the facts are quite possibly the other way around, as statistics widely illustrate.The way you frame the whole question is very male-centric, by the way. It wouldn't surprise me if you believe that men are naturally superior to women and that they should, in line with your beloved traditional values, rule the household. — John
I only meant that individuality is not primary - community is. Out of community arises individuality.Of course individuals exist; and each individual is responsible for their acts, both morally and before the law. If there were no individuality or individual freedom then logically there could be no personal responsibility, either. It's true that traditions that you are brought up within to a certain degree "form and shape...who you are" but they certainly do not totally determine it; again, to say that is to abolish the notion of personal moral responsibility. To the degree that we are merely shaped by our traditions, then what we become is not the result of reason and the kind of personal growth that results from real conscious spiritual work. — John
Please clarify what you're implying here.And of course they probably will, and should be, held to account for any acts, which sufficiently transgress the law or what is morally acceptable in their own culture, that their moral ,religious or philosophical beliefs may lead them to commit. — John
There are other significant differences, For instance one does not need to know anything about a relationship to know that one party physically attacking the other causes them suffering. However, one needs to know quite a lot about a relationship to know that adultery causes suffering to the other party.Same with adultery, the only difference is that one is physical harm and the other emotional/spiritual. — Agustino
It's an act which harms someone. Same with adultery, the only difference is that one is physical harm and the other emotional/spiritual. You seem to ignore that very important commonality. — Agustino
Leaving aside the open marriage situation, these reasons you provide - are they justifications for harming someone? If those reasons are the case there exists divorce. Certainly not adultery. — Agustino
I only meant that individuality is not primary - community is. Out of community arises individuality. — Agustino
Please clarify what you're implying here. — Agustino
However, one needs to know quite a lot about a relationship to know that adultery causes suffering to the other party. — AndrewK
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