Amor Fati

Heidegger

2006-02-19T23:40:00.000-08:00

heidegger on the death of mortals
Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

One of the central issues in philosophy is the phenomenon of death. It is not surprising because death, as a possibility of termination of all possibilities, is certain. It is more certain than the cogito of René Descartes. All mortals in so far as they are will die. My special someone will die, my father has died, and all of us will die. Time will come that you (the one reading this paper) will be leaving your love ones on earth and can no longer be called living. That is because it is our being. Thus, we are bound to temporality.

Human beings’ relationship to time is different from that of a chair, for example. We are involved in the three aspects of time namely past, present, and future. We are not confined in our present situations. We can transcend as they say. That’s why, according to Heidegger, the three characteristics of Da-sein (being-there) are (1) being-in-the-world, (2) being-along-the-world, and (3) being-ahead-of-itself.

Da-sein is thrown into the world. Thus, it is our facticity. We call the collection of our actions that we have done in the world past. At the same time, Da-sein is not alone in the world. We encounter other Da-seins. There is a crowd of Da-sein which Heidegger called “They” (das Mann). They are similar to everyone of us but the identity of each Da-sein remains. But, sometimes we tend to forget (become alienated to) our own being. We are prone to fallenness in our everyday present situation. It is also true that we care for our future. We transcend. We are ahead-of-ourselves. That is why we know certain possibilities including our death. If our relationship to time is eminent, therefore it is also important to study the existential meaning of it.

Historicity is part of our existence as Da-sein. Past may serve as an example (a lesson for instance) for our present struggle in life. On the other hand, we care also for the future so that we can be a better one when its time comes. We try to be acquainted with our possibilities. One of those possibilities (in fact an eminent possibility according to Heidegger) is our death. For sure it will come in the near future. That is why we care for it. There are several interpretation of death. Some are spiritual, scientific, humanistic, and so on and so forth. Martin Heidegger is one of those thinkers who mentioned something about the phenomenon of death. Maybe his thoughts will give us new insights on how to be at peace in our death.

The aim of this paper is not to salvage all human beings from the snare of death. Instead, the author tries to listen on Heidegger’s ideas concerning the death of mortals. This paper will neither talk about the possibility or impossibility of life after death, nor of a God that can save us. Rather, it will serve as a call for re-evaluation of our own relationship to death.

1. Can We Experience Our “Wholeness” On Death?

It is certain that all human beings will die. Nobody will doubt on it. Although it is certain, the time of its arrival is not definite. Anytime we may leave our love ones on this earth naturally or by accident. This characteristic of death (like a theft in the night) makes us indifferent to it. We have fear on death. Perhaps because of our common understanding is death entails ending of our “being-there”. By means of death our being Da-sein will come to an end. Let us first clarify what we mean when we say end.

End is not something negative. End (and totality) means wholeness. It is the “ontological determination” of being-there, which is the window to his Being. Can we say that totality belongs to Da-sein although it is yet to come (which means outstanding)? Does it mean there is something in Da-sein, which is lacking?

For Heidegger, existence of Da-sein is different. Its not-yet belong to its being. Therefore, death as a certain possibility of Da-sein belongs to man although it is yet to come. Death is an outstanding possibility of Da-sein and it is part of man’s wholeness. He claimed also that Da-sein is “always already in not yet as long as it is.”[1] We can say that everyday we sense that something have changed in us. But those changes are parts of our wholeness. It is geared toward the end. Heidegger said, “As soon as a human being is born, he is old enough to die right away” (BT, 228). But what do we mean when we say death is the end of Da-sein? Does it mean stopping or fulfillment? Does every Da-sein fulfill something through his death? Or does Da-sein simply disappear in the world through death?

This termination of life, which means termination of all possibilities, makes us frightened. Why are we so frightened on it? Most of the times, we neglect the issue about death. We always say, “knock on the wood” every time we talk about the possible death of someone near to us. But for Heidegger, death is not something to be afraid of, because it is the completion (he also uses the words totality and wholeness) of being. Through death we will become what we should be, which is more important than our present being. Thus, possibility is more eminent than actuality.

But it seems that this “wholeness” of Da-sein will never be an object of our experience since “wholeness” through death means an end of one’s existence. Heidegger says pertaining to the seeming problem of experiencing the “wholeness” of Da-sein:

As long as Da-sein is a being, it has never attained its `wholeness´. But if it does, this gains becomes the absolute loss of being-in-the-world. It is then never again to be experienced as a being (BT, 220).

The present situation of Da-sein is not yet his wholeness. There are lots of possibilities in front of him/her. The most certain possibility of Da-sein is his death, that is why one of his characteristics is being-toward-death. This possibility (as termination of all possibilities) is the end of Da-sein (being-there). He is no longer in-the-world when his death arrives. That is why it seems that we cannot grasp our wholeness as a Da-sein, as an entity. Because as long as we exist in this world we cannot say that it is our totality because we are geared toward something, toward an end. But the moment we reach that end, we are no longer being. Nobody will experience his/her death as such.

That problem of experiencing the “wholeness” of Da-sein (ontically) does not mean imperfection of our human faculty. It is because of our being human. That is our facticity. We are born in such and such a way. In the words of Heidegger, we are “thrown” into this world. Thus, we dwell in the world according to our being. One of those facts is the impossibility of experiencing our death (as I said earlier).

It is clear to Heidegger that there is a more fundamental way of dealing with our death, i.e., ontologically. The inaccessibility of our wholeness is ontic. That is why he asked, “Did we speak about `end´ and `totality´ in a way phenomenally appropriate to Da-sein?” (BT, 220). Therefore, we need to know the fundamental existential concept of death and “wholeness” for Heidegger. Related to that, is it possible to see my “wholeness” through the death of others? Can we use the death of others as an example to reflect on our own death?

2. The Death of “They” and the Everydayness

Since we cannot grasp our wholeness through our own death, it seems that the death of other is more penetratable because other Da-seins are “objectively” present in the world. That means we can observe the death of others, for Da-sein is being-along-with-others-in-the-world. But the question is, does it lead us to our main goal, which is to see the existential and ontological meaning of death for us?

Heidegger called other Da-seins “They” (das Mann). The “They” will no longer be Da-sein through death as well. Their being Da-sein lost. They will not experience their own death as well. But according to Heidegger, Da-sein leaves something which is objectively present in the world. He stated:

Yet, the no-longer-being-in-the-world of the deceased (understood in an extreme sense) is still a being in the sense of the mere objective presence of a corporeal thing encountered. In dying of others that remarkable phenomenon of being can be experienced that can be defined as the transition of a being from the kind of being of Da-sein (or of life) to no-longer-being-there (BT, 221).

We can say that from the words of Heidegger, dying means being no-longer-being-in-the-world and deceased means being objectively present in the world. The deceased person is different from the dead body. The being (representation of Da-sein) of a deceased Da-sein exists in the world while the Da-sein is no-longer-there. We can say that it is through our memories. We can save to our mind the happy memories and good examples of a deceased person. But the coming to an end as such remains untouched. We cannot experience the death of others as it is. We only observe it. We can see a dying person, but the death as such is not experienced. Because we never experienced death, all we can do is to assume, assumption. According to Heidegger, that is one of the habits of Da-sein, to compare. We represent something depending on our experiences with others in our everydayness. It is normal because it is part of our being-with-others. But it is not the proper way of dealing the death of Da-sein. It is a different thing.

Death of Da-sein is personal. Nobody can replace you in your death. “Every Da-sein must itself actually take dying upon itself. Insofar as it `is´ death is always essentially my own” (BT, 223). You cannot say, “I will look for a replacement for my impending death.” Your death is part of you. Although you cannot experience it ontically, that remains part of your being that others cannot rob. That is the ontological sense of death, i.e., death as part of our existence and it is personal. That is why only mortals died. We cannot say that plant died, nor animals died. They perish but did not die. Heidegger said:

The mortals are human beings. They are called mortals because they can die. to die means to be capable of death as death. Only man dies. The animal perishes. It has death neither ahead of itself nor behind it. Death is the shrine of Nothing, that is of that which is every respect is never something that merely exists, but which nevertheless presences, even as the mystery of Being itself.[2]

Perishing means end of life. The way Da-sein ends its life is different from other living things.
Da-sein is not alone in the world. We have fellow Da-seins. But according to Heidegger, the “self” of the everydayness is the collection of Da-seins which he called “They” (das Mann). We lost our selves in the crowd. The manifestation of that lost is our engagement to idle talk. We interpret our being-toward-death not in its existential meaning but the way the “they” view it. That is the fallenness of Da-sein. We live inauthentically in that way.

Death in our everydayness is an ordinary event. Somebody died a minute after I wrote this sentence. People will die but for now it is not my concern. I know that my time will come, but that is in the future. It is not yet. Thus, I am not involved in it yet now. It seems that death is not part of our being. Death is not yet here, we therefore postpone our reflection about it. But that suspension is not because be are not afraid of death. The fallen Da-sein postpones talks about death because he pertains death as a threat. It distorts the essentiality of death as constant mine, our facticity. Death got its demerits. It was leveled down into a kind of event that is ordinary in the world. We go away to the eminence of death.

Another habit of “They” in the everydayness is trying to comfort the dying person. Heidegger called that “tranquillization” (BT, 234). It means we try to get cover over the sadness of one’s death by comforting the “dying person.” It is not the proper way of preparing on person’s death. It is a way of padding and at the same time covering over what is essential to man. Our intention is to lessen the pain and sadness (for whom?), but its result is blindness of Da-sein. The point is, he does not reflect of his own death. The “They” divert his attention because of our indifference to death. We drive the dying person to another road where he cannot encounter his being. He becomes strange to his Being and thus, fallen.

3. Death: Window to Being

Everydayness knows the inevitability of death. It seems to me that nobody would doubt that fact, everyone would die. But everydayness tries to bypass death by neglecting it. Death is not yet, so it is not my concern now. Maybe because of the characteristic of certainty that its arrival is not certain. Nobody can say when and how he will die. How to deal with the certainty of death? What is the proper way to treating our own death? Heidegger said:

To be certain of a being means to hold it for true as something true. But truth means discoveredness of beings. All discoveredness, however, is ontologically based in the most primordial truth, in the disclosedness of Da-sein (BT, 236).

How to say that something is true? It must be certain. Certainty and truthness are two things but inseparable. Certainty dwells in truth equiprimordially (BT, 236). One characteristic of certainty is conviction, according to Heidegger. Conviction connotes trusting. It means to let the things be in itself because you believe in it. Thus you are confident to it, maybe because we observed that it always happening when you do something. That is the empirical way of gaining certainty. But there is a difficulty when we talk about our death. We cannot experience the death as an entity. Given this difficulty, can Da-sein essentially understand the concept of death as personal, eminent certain possibility, not-to-be-bypassed? Can we understand our concept of being-toward-death in its essential meaning?

So what is the proper way of dealing our own death? In answering this first we can relate to the phenomenon of expecting. Expecting means having an idea of possibility of one’s arrival. You expect you love ones to come because they sent you a notice. You expect your grade to fail because you did not study laboriously. Expectation depends on certain idea of possibility. It can mean also as waiting for its actualization. You are expecting someone to come, therefore you will wait for his coming. But there is a higher sense of waiting that is proper to being-toward-death. It is anticipation of death.

In anticipation, we do not simply wait (passive). We practice it. That is why Christmas in the Philippines is a kind of anticipation. We practice Christmas before it arrives. We can hear Christmas songs in malls even if it is almost four months to go. We also attend misa de gallo as preparation for Christmas. Another thing is our practice of anticipated mass every Saturdays. That is in preparation (excitedly) for the day of the Lord (next day, Sunday). But how to anticipate our own death? Can we anticipate it without fear?

Death is something not to be afraid of. That is part of our being. That is why Heidegger urges us to anticipate and embrace it. The acceptance of the certainty of death will set us free from the notion of death of the everydayness. He said:

Anticipation reveals to Da-sein its lostness in the they-self, and brings it face to face with the possibility to be itself, primarily unsupported by concern taking care of things, but to be itself in passionate anxious freedom toward death which is free of the illusions of the they, factical, and certain itself (BT 245).

[1]Martin Heidegger, Being and Time, trans. Joan Stambaugh (New York: Harper and Row, 1996), 227. Hereafter, Being and Time shall be designated as BT.
[2]Martin Heidegger, “The Thing,” in Poetry, Language, Thought, trans. Albert Hofstadter (New York: Harper and Row, 1971), 178.

Fathers of Postmodernism

2006-02-19T23:29:00.000-08:00

Aristotle Nietzsche Foucault

Emmanuel C. de Leon

Saint Augustine Seminary

Introduction

History of philosophy can be divided into four periods: ancient, medieval, modern, and contemporary. Ancient philosophy is said to be geocentric because they are looking for the basic stuff of the universe. Then, the God question was put into the center stage upon the arrival of medieval period. That is why they are characterized as theocentric. Modern thinkers, on the other hand, focused their attention to the ego or self which gave them the refutation of egocentricity. Lastly, lack of center can be the temperament of Contemporary period for they are trying to give more emphasis on the particularity of things.

At the first glance we cannot notice the interrelationships among these epochs. But evaluating their problematic and situation will surely give us a glimpse of their common endeavor and struggle. On this paper we will evaluate three important philosophers, Aristotle, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Michel Foucault, who have clear contributions to the present way of thinking. This will start from the very assumption that postmodernism is a re-appropriation of Aristotle’s philosophy.

Using Nicomachean Ethics as a framework, we can see that for Aristotle everything is always a working progress. Why is that the case? That is because life (in the richest sense of the word) is also progressive. We can notice that there are so many unforeseeables in a certain structure that will give us some elements of surprise in a particular situation. That is why he will instruct us to look for a right (primordial) move by looking closely to the things and it is of importance. Similarly, Nietzsche and Foucault have high regard to particulars and call for the destruction of “textbook” when it comes to life. Most of the times, the concept of on-goingness is seen as the battle cry for them.

Nietzsche, on the one hand, calls for a revaluation of values for the right place at the right time. But, when he says “right” is does not mean a canonized “truth” or objective value that will govern our every action at all time. Moreover, they are those practical things which are useful for our lives. Thus, it needs a critical eye in assessing the very context of our lives. In other words, it is a certain kind of developing a disposition of restlessness by seeing the things as if for the first time. Foucault, on the other hand criticizes totalizing forms of analysis because of a conviction that simple things or particular events are much important and very proximate to our lives. He reestablished the importance of the periphery as the immediate concern for the quest of knowledge. But, it does not mean that he is skeptical to the center. Besides, he affirms that peripheries are microcosms of the center. But for him, the proximate things should be the immediate and primary concern of us. In the way of diagnosing the here and now, how the things come to be the way we encounter them in the present, Foucault re-instituted the primacy of particular events over the grand narrative. And that is also the conviction of Aristotle of the ancient Greece. He teaches it firmly to the Athenians that participation to the specific and concrete situation can be the window to happiness vis-à-vis good life.

Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics

Interestingly, Nicomachean Ethics is said to be the symbol of Classical civilization. Aristotle wrote this as a form of commentary on Athenian way of life. Most of the times, ancient people are preoccupied of those questions of life: who am I in relation to others? How things come to be? What is a good life? Aristotle, as a brilliant and valiant teacher tries to drive home a message to the Athenians that there is no easy way towards the answer. There is a need for an attentive (active participation) struggle for meaning based on particular experiences. This does not mean neglecting the universal nor denying the world of forms. Instead, it is more proper to say that for Aristotle familiar and simple things should be the starting point of every quest for knowledge.

For while we should certainly begin from origins that are known, things are known in two ways; for some are known to us, some known unconditionally [but not necessarily known to us]. Presumably, then, the origin we should begin from is what is known to us.[1]

The point of Aristotle here is to think of our own way of life based on the things that are known to us or things that are close to us. Why is that the case? It is not because of the absence of universal Form, in fact he affirms it, but the proper way of arguing for him is not so much on deductive method (from universal to particular) but more on inductive one (from particular to universal). As he is quoted,

We must notice, however, the difference between argument from origins and arguments towards origins. For indeed Plato was right to be puzzled about this, when he used to ask if [the argument] set out from the origins or led towards them – just as on a race course the path may go from the starting-line to far end, or back again.[2]

If we are just that attentive and open to what things are manifesting, Aristotle would say, we are on the way to knowledge vis-à-vis happiness. Thus, it needs our involvement. It is an activity of man towards happiness. For the telos or end[3] of all these quests is happiness.

Now, for Aristotle happiness (Eudaimonia) as the ultimate end of all human actions can be attained through practices of virtues. “For actions in dealing with [other] human beings make some people just, some unjust…”[4] Therefore, virtue is not a quality but an activity. It entails doing, living an active life, being in the arena so to speak. That is why Aristotle elevates the importance of habituation in forming character by telling us to avoid excess and deficiency. But Aristotle’s idea of the mean (meson) does not mean passivity or elimination of emotion. On the contrary, developing ones character through the virtue of the mean is very emotional, being passionate about all things. Although character will create an aspect of predictability in us, but still, we are sometimes surprised by our decisions. Thus, learning to trust our emotion is of value for Aristotle. His ethics teaches us not to cast away our emotions but to befriend them for emotion is part of our soul. This (emotion as a non-rational aspect of the soul) also “[obeys and] is persuaded in some way by reason, as is shown by chastening, and by every sort of reproof and exhortation.”[5] Students do not go to the classroom because they are thirst or seeking for sex, etc. Presumably, they go because of their love for learning. And that is the rational part of the soul. But for Aristotle, that is not just the part of our soul. We also have non-rational aspect of it. And that is the point of entry for ethics, emotion. So, we need to cultivate our ethical faculty as well, i.e., by examining our emotion at the right place, at the right time, for the right reason.

Aristotle is teaching us that happiness can only be achieved by practicing virtues. In other words, happiness comes from our ability to live responsibly, taking charge of our lives. But Aristotle warns us about unlimited or unbounded happiness. He stated it firmly pertaining to the completeness of good that,

Though apparently there are many ends, we choose some of them, e.g. wealth, flutes and, in general, instrument because of something else; hence it is clear that not all ends are complete. But the best good is apparently something complete. Hence, if only one end is complete, this will be what we are looking for; and if more than one are complete, the most complete of these will be what we are looking for.[6]

You cannot be happy, for Aristotle, unless you have sense of boundary or limit. It cannot be the case of giving focus on many things without sense of commitment. That is why one virtue for him is prudence, the ability to decide what is reasonable for a certain condition.

Friedrich Nietzsche’s Aristotelian Influence

Friedrich Nietzsche wrote on his book The Will To Power that “[t]he dominion of virtue is not established by means of virtue itself; with virtue itself, one renounces power, one loses the Will to Power.”[7] This influential thinker wants to say that the esse of virtue is not ipso facto but in fact a creation of those in the powerful institutions. In other words, the goodness of a virtue depends upon the eye of the originator (a conscious or unconscious moralist) and how his followers (those who acknowledged his or her authority) internalized that. Thus, it is about “fame” and by the way of acceptance virtue attains power. Nonetheless, he calls for the revaluation of values. And that can be done through the reestablishment of our childlike inquisitiveness. “The child”, Nietzsche said, “is innocence and forgetfulness, a new beginning, a sport, a self-propelling wheel, a first motion, a sacred Yes.”[8] A child has no care for what other people will say and has no formula for every action. For they act according to givenness of a thing.

Nietzsche wants to say that there is no “textbook” about life. When it comes to life, no system can be canonized as the truth. For life is bigger than system or science and there is something in life that cannot be governed by science. It is the same with Aristotle’s concept of moving target, i.e., there is something in human existence which cannot be neutralized. This reality becomes the source of frustration in man. Our will to power pushes us to a kind of wanting to rule the world. But, the reality of life has its own dynamism that human knowledge cannot comprehend. Thus, this should not result to a certain kind of dissatisfaction. Rather, accepting and befriending the element of surprise should be the best of all the possible attitudes towards life.

Life is never finished. In fact it is always seen as a moving target for Nietzsche. He exclaimed: “Then it comes to understand the phrase “it was”, that password with which struggle, suffering and boredom approach man to remind him what his existence is – a never to be completed imperfect tense.”[9] That is also language of ancient people. Even Jesus Christ would tell us that life is a journey and he warns us against inattention. “Stay awake, therefore, you cannot know the day your Lord is coming (Mt. 24:42). It is the same temperament that Nietzsche wants us to develop, an active and critical mind for evaluating the things which are still useful for our life. Seeing things as if for the first time and in many angles.

Martin Heidegger explained this also that “…if man is to find his way once again into the nearness of Being he must first learn to exist in the nameless….man must first let himself be claimed again by Being, taking the risk that under this claim he will seldom have much to say.”[10] What does it mean “to exist in the nameless”? For Heidegger, we must start from the fact that “we do not know.” It means the thinking is yet to come and it is important that you are actively waiting for that appropriation of Being (which is yet to come).

Foucault’s Method of Genealogy

Michel Foucault does not in any way perceive history as a grand-narrative. Nor does he purport that it is a series of events with a characteristic interconnection and affinity to it. He has always consciously tried to avoid, in all his writings, totalizing forms of analysis and is very critical of systematization. These point to the fact that he not only believes in universality of truth but is equally disinterested with that kind of “knowledge”. Instead of interpreting the totality of our history per se, he focused his attention on a particular event that is free from other incidents.

An interviewer once asked him about the shift that occurs in the field of philosophy, on the way philosophers view things and the task they have made. His answer was clear and articulate:
Well, perhaps one could say this: philosophy from Hegel to Sartre has essentially been a totalizing enterprise, if not of the world or of knowledge (savoir), at least of human experience. I would say that perhaps if there is now an autonomous philosophical activity, if there can be a philosophy that is not simply a sort of theoretical activity within mathematics or linguistics or ethnology or political economy, if there is a philosophy free or independent of all these domains, then one could define it as a diagnostic activity. To diagnose the present is to say what the present is, and how our present is absolutely different from all that is not it, that is to say, from our past. Perhaps this is the task for philosophy now.[11]

The task of his philosophy, according to him, is not to unify all events in order to put them into a single history but to “diagnose” the present. This means acquiring knowledge of the identity of the present and identifying its difference from other events (which, collectively refer to the past).

What does this further mean? Does his proposition require placing oneself outside the present in order to diagnose the same? For example, to know what a bacterium is--its nature and the way it lives, one ought to provide himself a microscope, perform an experiment and come up with a scientific generalization based on the data. Manipulative science, among other fields, utilizes this kind of system. Acquisition of “scientific” knowledge, which is a primary end among scientists, entails placing themselves in a superior level as the subjects of knowledge. However, Foucault prescribes that there are myriad ways of “knowing diagnostically”.

When Foucault talks about diagnostic knowledge, he exactly refers to “a form of knowledge that defines and determines differences.”[12] A doctor diagnosing his patient of tuberculosis looks for differences which usually distinguish regular patients with tuberculosis from those who are inflicted with pulmonary infection and other kinds of sickness. To determine that it is indeed a particular kind of sickness, the doctor needs to look for symptoms or signs. Needless to say, his stock of knowledge is at work here. He is to base his final diagnosis on the symptoms which are the empirical data known to him.

Similarly, that is what Foucauldian diagnostic enterprise is – to determine the differences among epochs, there is a need to establish certain kinds of knowledge concerning an epoch’s attitude or character most peculiar or very prominent in that period. The present has its own way of thinking, as well as the past, precisely because Foucault sees that there is a definite “law of reason” within an epoch that governs behavior, knowledge, belief, and way of life. It vaguely resembles the Freudian unconscious[13] of that epoch.

Foucault, in his works, tries to unearth and discover the underlying principles that govern certain periods. He stated that his working hypothesis emphasizes that:
the history of science and of knowledge (des connaissances) doesn’t simply obey the general law of reason that somehow possesses the laws of its history. Underneath what science itself knows there is something it does not know; and its history, its progress (devenir), its periods and accidents obey a certain number of laws and determinations. These laws and determinations are what I have tried to bring to light. I have tried to unearth an autonomous domain that would be the unconscious of science, own laws, just as the individual human unconscious has its own laws and determinations.[14]

Thus, Foucault employs the method of genealogy in order to bring to the fore certain historical conditions responsible for producing the types of “scientific” truths of any given society. What, then, is this method of genealogy? And how is it different from other traditional methods of viewing history? Is it not a system as well?

Genealogy is a conception of history which Foucault borrowed from Nietzsche. It is a term that has often been used by Nietzsche in discussing how will to power expresses itself in covert ways. Foucault, together with Nietzsche, tries to legitimize the present by separating it from the past. He aims to establish the singularity of the present by separating it from events of the past. His book Discipline and Punish: The Birth of Prison is an example of his “genealogical” work.

In Discipline and Punish…, he tries to trace the history of the birth of prison. “This book is intended to be a correlative history of the modern soul and of a new power to judge; a genealogy of the present scientifico-legal complex from the power to punish derives its bases, justifications and rules, from which it extends its effects and by which it masks its exorbitant singularity.”[15] The genealogical work of Discipline and Punish calls our attention to the true character of governmentality and disciplinary society.

Genealogy is also analytical investigation. It poses the question “Where are we now?” and tries to understand how things come to be as we find them today. Contrary to the traditional forms of historical analysis which trace a line of inevitability, Foucault breaks away from the past to establish the legitimacy of the present.

Traditional method describes history as a linear development and reduces every event and its origin into a single grand-narrative. For Hegel, history is purposeful. Every event is part and parcel of the greatest scheme of things. “World history is the progress of the consciousness of freedom.”[16] However, plain cognizance of freedom does not necessarily conjure that it has been fully attained. In sum, it may be said that the whole sweep of world history is a process of the human spirit becoming aware of and realizing its freedom.

Foucault rejects the Hegelian teleological model in favor of Nietzschean technique of criticizing events by presenting their differences, i.e., to begin with the present situation and regress until a difference is located. Afterwards, one proceeds again to preserve the discontinuities and connections. Nietzsche always summons us to love our existence not for the sake of a “great plan” that is to be conceived in the future but simply for its own sake. This attitude towards one’s existence is what he calls amor fati or “love of fate.” He is quoted as stressing:

My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different . . . not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it . . . but love it.[17]

At the heart of Foucault’s conception of history, the gap between the past and the present underlies the principle of difference. He lets the “gap” remain unexplained. This is by reason of one of the principles of the genealogy of difference-- preserving discontinuities and connections. Therefore, the method of genealogy is way different from the traditional analysis of history simply because it tries to preserve the singularity of events while traditional historiography leads to a totalization of the whole history by collecting all events into a linear process. According to Foucault, “[t]he historian’s history finds its support outside of time and pretends to base its judgement on an apocalyptic objectivity.”[18] This statement is possible because they believe in eternal truth, self-consciousness, immortality of the soul, and other metaphysical principles. On the contrary, Foucault argues that our actions are direct responses to a given situation. Because every situation is different from the others, they altogether appear in singular randomness. History as a step-by-step idea is an Enlightenment fallacy for Foucault.

Foucault is not an iconoclast in that sense. His task is not to destroy the “walls” of technological institutions (like that of prisons). He just felt a need to reexamine those institutions. He takes out the hammer just to make some noise and to find which part is hallow. He does not want to ruin the system either. He mainly wanted to inspect the hallow parts of it and probe on them. He seems to be saying, “Let me say what is the history of this system.”

He employed the concept of prison as an example to unveil the reality of power-knowledge relation in society. His principle is that prison is a writ large of society. The prison may just be a part of the periphery, but for him, what appears at the periphery seems to be happening at the center.

[1] Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Terence Irwin, (1985:Hackett Publishing Company), 6.

[2] Ibid.

[3] For Aristotle, all actions are always done for a certain end or purpose. Proximate end may characterize the immediate purpose of the action. While ultimate end pertains to the very purpose of all human actions, i.e., happiness.

[4] Ibid, 34.

[5] Ibid, 32.

[6] Ibid, 14.

[7] Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will To Power, trans. Walter Kaufman and R.J. Hollingdale, (New York: Vintage Books, 1968).

[8] Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, trans. R.J. Hollingdale, (England: Penduin Books, 1961).

[9] Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Advantage and Disadvantage of History for Life, trans. Peter Preuss, (Indiana: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 1980), 9.

[10] Martin Heidegger, Letter on Humanism, 199.

[11] Michel Foucault, “Foucault Responds to Sartre,” interview by J.P. El Kabbach, in Foucault Live (Interviews, 1966-84), trans. John Johnson, ed. Sylvere Lotringer (New York: Simiotext, 1989), 38-39.

[12] Michel Foucault, “An Historian of Culture,” interview by Guilio Preti, in Foucault Live (Interviews, 1966-84), trans. John Johnson, ed. Sylvere Lotringer (New York: Simiotext, 1989), 38-39.

[13] For Freud, our decisions are products of our conscious and unconscious. Similarly, for Foucault people of an epoch decide, think, and believe in such and such a way because of a certain hidden principle that is very prominent in that epoch. They may never be mindful of this “unconscious” but it has power over the laws of its history. It is the reason of a certain epoch.

[14] Michel Foucault, “Foucault Responds to Sartre,” interview by J.P. El Kabbach, in Foucault Live (Interviews, 1966-84), trans. John Johnson, ed. Sylvere Lotringer (New York: Simiotext, 1989), 39-40.

[15] Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: The Birth of Prison, trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: Vintage Books, 1979), 23. This is a translation of Surveiller et punir: Naissance de la prison originally published in Paris by Editons Gallimard in 1975. Henceforth, this work shall be cited as DP.

[16] Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Reason in History: a General Introduction to the Philosophy of History, trans. Robert S. Hartman (Indianapolis: Liberty of Liberal Arts, Bobbs-Marril, 1953), 24.

[17] Friedrich Nietzsche, Ecco Homo, “Why I am So Clever,” trans. Walter Kaufmann, in On Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo, ed. Walter Kaufmann (New York: Vintage Books, 1969), 10.

[18] Michel Foucault, “Nietzsche, Genealogy, History” in The Foucault Reader, ed. Paul Rabinow (New York: Pantheon Books, 1984), 87.

Soren Kierkegaard

2006-02-19T19:33:00.000-08:00

Lecture on Soren Kierkegaard
December 08-14, 2005
College III classroom
Mr. Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

Although considered contemporary and almost new thinking, existentialism was first expressed in the literary writings of Soren Kierkegaard. That is one of the reasons why he was considered father of religious existentialism. Born in Copenhagen in 1813, Kierkegaard spent his life battling for good health. At the age 17, he entered Copenhagen University to major theology at the insistence of his father. But later on, he became interested on philosophy. During that time, the systematic philosophy of Hegel was very famous. Because of that, as a student he has good training at Hegel’s thinking and was not favorably impressed by it. In fact, it was Schelling’s lectures at Berlin (which were critical of Hegel’s speculative thinking) that strikes him most. Oftentimes, he ridiculed Hegel’s writings as comedy of errors. In his journal, he ironically stated “[i]f Hegel had written his whole logic and had written in the preface that it was only a thought-experiment, … the he could certainly have been the greatest thinker who ever lived. As it is, he is merely comic.”

What is the reason why Hegel was comic in the eyes of Kierkegaard? It is ironic because Hegel, in his whole life, tried to fit all the pieces of reality and history together in his speculative system of thought, but in the process he had forgotten the most important element which is existence. What is that? For Kierkegaard, existence is an essential aspect of human being. Human being exists as a certain kind of individual. It is an individual who seeks; know how to act according to the will, the one who decides, and above all, the one who has sense of commitment. And those qualities are essential to self-understanding. In other words, we can gain self-understanding if and only if we choose our own action, take charge of our “subjective” volition, and for most of the time make risk without the shield of objectivity. That is according to Kierkegaard a non-existent in the whole system of Hegel. That is why he made a conscious effort to revolt against Hegelian philosophy. And, at the age of 42 his health began to fail and died. Although he lived relatively short, the echoes of his brilliant mind never perish.

His books were forgotten after his death but they made a tremendous impact on the 20th century upon the rediscovery of his writings by some passionate German scholars. For that reason, he was called the “Danish time bomb”.

Making Life More Difficult and Thinking Existentially

Most of us would think that it is practical to use high-tech devices in order to make life easier. That is why sciences always seek for improvement that will bring humanity towards easy life. But according to Kierkegaard, if that is the case, we are giving people what they are missing but what they really needed, that is difficulty. For that reason, he made “making life more difficult” as his mission rather than providing instant solutions to human life struggles.

Now, why Kierkegaard wanted difficulty instead of convenient way of living? Come to think of your mother. She endures nine months of conceiving you in her womb. And after a long time of anticipation, she will give-birth a son and would feel fulfillment as a mother. In that case, suffering does not end to a mere pain because that is just half of the story. After enduring all these difficulties reward is always at stake. The same thing in self-understanding. There is no instant path towards it and it involves the person himself.

For Kierkegaard, self-knowledge cannot be provided even by the most expensive book nor can be lectured by the most brilliant professor in Harvard University. Instead, only the subject who searches for that kind of understanding could discover it. It is his or her own pilgrimage that no other person can replace. And that is not a no-brainer type of seeking rather a difficult one. You cannot be a “Juan Tamad” type of person who idly waits for a ripe guava to fall from the tree. Self-understanding means going to the battle field called life where the keyword is survival for the fittest, where every smell of the blood means something, and being caught unaware is the most dangerous vice. Thus, instead of providing map for this journey, Kierkegaard will let you find the way that suits to your condition. In that way, one would realize that there are personal choices to make. That is what Kierkegaard means when saying “think in Existence”.

Human beings find themselves always in “existential situations” or contexts if Kierkegaard would accept the term. This will be the driving force for his thinking. In other words, solutions to the problems are based on the problems as well. But, most people try to think about universals. We want universal solution to different problems. In that case, it called upon to think and not to be, to think about the universal rather than committing your being to decision making. We need to think according to our very existence not from the abstract Absolute Thinking that would promise a comfort zone. Interestingly, that sounds like Feuerbach’s statement: “Do not wish to be a philosopher in contrast to being a man … do not think as a thinker … think as a living, real being … think in Existence.” For thinking involves context. Instead of thinking about universal ideas, Kierkegaard favors thinking existentially, that is, thinking about your particular human condition.

The Method of Indirect Communication

Coming from the assumption that “truth cannot be communicated to anyone”, Kierkegaard employs indirect communication as his method. Barrowing the Socratic method of irony (which is the topic of his master’s thesis), “he uses literary devices such as irony, humor, satire, parables, and thought experiment.” Most of the time, he makes use of biblical characters in order to explain certain Christian thought. But, in reading him it is good to note that we must not be too much amaze of the style. Instead, it is to the “meaning” where we need to fix our gaze on. That is because, for Kierkegaard literary forms of writing are mere instruments to communicate (indirectly) truth. It will make us conscious about existence and of our life-long journey towards self-understanding.

Epistemology: Truth as Subjectivity

In Kierkegaard’s discussions about theory of knowledge, there is a clear cut distinction between objective truth and subjective truth. On the one hand, objective truths are those pre-given realities like the mathematical statement 3+2=5 or that triangle has three sides. It is certain that your statement is correct everytime you speak about that truth. On the other hand, Kierkegaard claims that truth is subjectivity. In order to understand that, we need to clarify first what does it mean when he talks about subjectivity. The word “subjective” has negative connotation. Most of the time, we associate it with being “one-sided”, “biased”, “prejudiced”, or “twisted”. For instance, if a solon interpolates a witness of the opposition unkindly for the reason that he belongs to the administration, then his line of questioning is subjective in the negative sense of the word. But, “subjective can also mean ‘necessarily related to the subject.’” When one decides to embrace the vocation of priesthood and celibate life, he necessarily involves himself to it. Maybe he will do some process of discernment, but at the end of the day the person will be deciding what is reasonable and impartial. And in that case, he needs to ask what are his needs, values, or interests in order to arrive to a certain choice, his subjective choice.

But it is good to clarify that Kierkegaard never negates objective truth. For him, they are of use when we are settling the issues about logic, mathematics, science, and other fields concerning objectivity. But when it comes to the task of becoming a self, that kind of truth is not intrinsically essential.

Knowing Objectively the Truth and Being Subjectively in the Truth

Socrates asserts that knowing truth means doing it. That means if you have right knowledge about something then you are capable of practicing it. For instance, if you know that it is unjust to steal, then you would never do it. But for Kierkegaard, a person could have a complete understanding of the ground and norms of morality, but when it comes to actual practice it’s another story. “Such a person would objectively know the truth but not subjectively live in the truth.”

Now, knowing and being in the truth for Kierkegaard have something to do with the process of knowing. “What you know is bound up with how you know it.” What does it mean? Because truth is subjectivity, you could never set it aside from the way you know it. It involves the person. Thus, the personal process is vital. Self-understanding is not an easy task. And how you make your self is the most important aspect of it.

The Three Existence-spheres

In Kierkegaard’s voluptuous books Either/Or volume one and two (which he claimed an eight-month work), he explicates “Stages of Life’s Way”. And, he completed it in his 1843 opus Fear and Trembling where he figured out how is it to be a knight of faith.

According to Kierkegaard, there are three existence-spheres: Aesthetic sphere, Ethical sphere, and Religious sphere. Unlike Hegel who argued that there is a logical reason in the dialectic of history, Kierkegaard elevates human freedom in becoming. It is a “one act of consciousness”, so to speak. In other words, to be in a certain walk of life means choosing that kind of living.

Aesthetic stage, as the first stage of dialectic process, is typified by childlike immediacy. A child always wants attention, new things to do, or else he will be crying. There must be no dull moments for an aesthete. So, for a person in this stage, life is about boredom and enjoyment (in one way or another, a hedonist resembles an aesthete). When there is boredom, that cannot be called life. In Filipino, we express it this way: “Wala namang kabuhay-buhay dito.” Most of the time, we encounter repetitions and the taste of it is not good for eating. In effect, we need to find new things, new “happenings”, as the youth put it, in order to enjoy life. We need to use our faculty of impulses and emotions. Easy-go-lucky type of person might be a very good representation of an aesthete. They have no sense of universal and morality because everything varies according to its kind of offering. Don Juan, in his books, characterized an aesthete. According to Kierkegaard, although aesthetic persons live in existence, it cannot result in true existence (that term will be “authenticity” for the existentialists). At the moment of despair, you will be confronting yourself, “What am I doing?” “Do I want this kind of existence?” The aesthete is now in the event of choosing either/or. Either I remain in the aesthetic stage or become an ethical one. And that cannot be done by speculative thinking, according to Kierkegaard. Rather, it involves an act of the will or commitment.

The second existence-sphere is the ethical. If boredom and enjoyment are the things that matter for an aesthete, it is the binary of opposition of good and evil that drives the actions of an ethical person. By employing universal moral principles, rules of conduct that speculative reason made, persons at this stage are scientific and consistent. Socrates is the emblem of this stage. What is missing in this existence-sphere? The true self. Although an ethical person decides to do good and avoid evil, he or she has no authentic self. He is always under the shield of universals. Therefore, an ethical person is slave of do’s and don’ts. According to Kierkegaard, the time will come in the dialectic process that an ethical man encounters face-to-face a certain kind of dread. He will become conscious that there is something more than the rules of conduct, that he is a greater responsibility of making decisions – in orchestrating his or her own life. The feeling of guilt, or the sickness unto death, will lead the ethical person to another either/or. Either he hides in the shelf of morality or go beyond the limits of reason by becoming aware of finitude and estrangement pertaining to a God. Again, like in the first either/or, personal commitment is a condition sine qua non. It cannot be achieved by mere thinking or by realization of emptiness alone. Commitment or leap of faith is the keyword for the next stage.

The paradox of the third existence-sphere, religious, is that although leap of faith becomes the master-name it brings no “idea” or proof about an “objective” God. Rather, it conceives the possibility of becoming a true self. The act of commitment is an act of subjectivity therefore. Why is that the case? Because for Kierkegaard, human beings’ relationship to a God cannot offer any kind of rational knowledge. And we cannot prescribe universals because that relationship is something that is personal. “The God of Abraham”, my God. “Knowledge” to that kind of God is only a matter of approximation process. That means only an act of faith (a kind of risk) can move mountains. “By faith I make renunciation of nothing, on the contrary, by faith I acquire everything…” (Fear and Trembling, 59). What interesting in his concept of faith is the idea that faith is not a mere sign of resignation. For him, faith requires courage to renounce the temporal in favor of the absurd. A knight of faith, as he calls the religious persons, knows the importance of “a teleological suspension of the ethical”. At the last analysis, for Kierkegaard the vanishing point of reason is the battleground of a knight of faith. It is being wounded on the field, in the dialectic process. That is thinking in existence and it’s the path towards our greatest project, self-understanding. The quest is to follow your star without an armory of universals. He gave up objectivity in favor of a “greater” one. Rico Blanco, the epitome of a music genius, expresses his leap of faith in the last stanza of his opus “You’ll Be Safe Here” (or the mostly known Spirit theme song): “When no one understands, I believe….” So, goodbye to the arrogance of reason, for true existence has its own foundation. Goodbye to the fallacy of enlightenment, for the logic of silence and passionate living is the password in becoming. Certainly, shit happens. Albert Camus once enunciated that at every street corner, the feeling of absurdity can strike any man at the face. Truly, his prophetic words become the driving spirit here and now. Meaninglessness, boredom, and indifference to be are just some symptomatic of this age. Yes, it can injure one’s being, but this is our time. And, we are condemned to live this kind of life. We are summoned by Kierkegaard to passionately live in that “everydayness” (in Heideggerian term). For sleeping in the bank is a vice.

Kay Marcel Pa Rin

2006-02-19T19:29:00.000-08:00

Sa Presensya Bilang Misterio
(Isang Salamisim ika-siyam at ika-sampung yugto ng Mystery of Being Volume I)

Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

Sa ating ginagalawang mundo ngayon, mistulang nawawalan na ng saysay at kahulugan ang salitang “komunikasyon” at relasyon sa ating kapwa-tao. Kahit sa simpleng mga sitwasyon, nawawalang silbi ang mga ngiti dahil mayroong hindi pagkatotoo sa ipinakitang emosyon. Mayroon ngang kahiligan tayo sa pagkukunwari. Isa ito sa mga manifestasyon ng “Wasak na Daigdig”. Meron tayong pagtingin sa ating kapwa na isang katunggali, isang kasabay sa paglalakbay nguni’t isang ring kaagaw sa mga naiisin o mga kagihawaan sa buhay.

Ayon kay Gabriel Marcel, resulta ito ng ating matinding pagkiling sa unibersal na matematiko. Lahat ay gusto nating gawing instant. Dahil dito, lahat nga ay nais nating biglaan at awtomatiko. Parang paggalaw ng isang makina na nahuhulaan mo na ang magiging bunga ng kanyang pagkilos dahil may patakaran itong sinusunod. Nahihiwalay nga ang proseso sa bunga. Ano ang hindi maganda sa kahiligang ito? Hindi ba’t napapadali nito ang buhay ng tao?

Ito nga ang dahilan, hindi madali ang buhay ng tao. Hindi basta alam mo na ang prinsipyo ay ito na ang buong kwento. May kalaliman ang pagpapakatao. Hindi basta basta o bara bara na lang ito dahil mayaman at malawak ang kabuoan ng ating pagkatao. Isa nga itong misterio.

Sundan natin ang pagmumuni-muning ginawa ni Marcel tungkol sa pamilya upang magkaroon tayo ng ideya tungkol sa nais niyang ipahiwatig tungkol sa misterio. Kailangan natin itong gawin sa maingat na paraan sapagkat hindi basta basta ang ating pinagmumuni-munihan.

Sa kulturang ating ginagalawan, ang relasyong ama-anak ay patuloy na nawawalang kahulugan. Bunga ito marahil ng panahong moderno na nagdududa sa tradisyon at awtoridad (panahon ng Kaliwanagan o Age of Enlightenment ng 18th century). Kinukwestyon ang dahilan ng pagsunod sa awtoridad at ng kaugnayan nito sa ating buhay. Masasabi raw na ang relasyong ama-anak ay isa lang kaugalian na nakasanayan lang natin.

Mayroong ring malawak at matinding pagtuligsa sa relasyong ama-anak sa larangan ng syensya. Para bagang itinuturo na pagkatapos maisagawa ng ama ang pakikipagtalik ay tapos na ang buong istorya. Wala nga siyang responsibilidad sa bunga ng pagtatalik nila sapagkat hungkag din naman para sa oryentasyong ito ang pagsasama ng dalawang tao sa kama.

Gayundin ang nangyayari sa bahagi naman ng anak. Sa proletarianized society o sa mundong nagsasabuhay at nangangalandakan ng indibidualismo, hindi niya hiniling na isilang siya sa mundo sa gantiong sitwasyon. Hindi niya piniling maging ama si X. Kaya nga may karapatan siyang tanggihan si X. Isa itong dahilan marahil ng sobrang pagtitiis sa kahirapang nararanasan at nagreresulta sa kulturang nihilismo, na halos wala na tayong pakialam kung ano ang sasabihin ng iba. At para bagang ang totoo ay walang kwenta sapagkat masaklap nga ang aking karanasan.

Ngayon, bakit ito tinatalakay ni Marcel? Isa ba itong uri ng pag-aaral na sosyolohikal? Para sa kanya, lampas ito sa sosyolohiya (metasosyolohikal). Tinatalakay nito ang mas malawak na dimension ng buhay ng tao. Nakasangkot nga ang taong naghahanap sa kanyang paghahanap kaya hindi maaring ihiwalay ito sa bunga.

Sa mundong may pagkahilig sa unibersal na matematika, nahihiwalay nga ang biolohikal na aspeto ng buhay ng tao sa ispiritwal na aspeto. Nalilimutan ang metapisikal na bahagi dahil sa pagkagumon o pagka-addict sa kung ano ang nakikita at nararanasan. Kung ano ang nakikita ay siya na ngang itinuturing na buong istorya. Nalilimutan nga ang mas mahalagang parte ng buhay, nalilimutan nating gumalaw sa misterio.

Ano nga ba ang misterio? Talakayin natin ito kasama na rin ang namamayaning temperamento ngayon, ang problema. Ano ang problema at ano ang misterio? At bakit sila magkaiba? Ang problema ay isang uring pagkalito na kapag natapos na ang kalituhan ay maaari nang tumigil sa paghahanap. Tulad halimbawa kapag nasira ang iyong ilaw, maghahanap ka ng paraan para matunton ang dahilan ng pagkasira. Malilito ka at mababalisa. Nakita mong mayroon palang naputol na kable (wire) sa gitna ng mga koneksyon. Papalitan mo ang naputol na kable at tapos na ang iyong pagkabalisa. Sa kabilang banda, ang misterio ay isang uring pagkalito na hindi mahahanapan ang solusyon. Hindi mo ninanais na lutasin ang misterio sapagkat misterio nga siya. Hindi dahil walang katotohanan ang misterio kundi dahil malawak at mayaman ang kanyang katotohanan. Hindi maikakahon sa isang konsepto o maging sa koneksyon ng mga konsepto ang kabuoan ng isang misterio. Tulad ng kongkretong halimbawa na ating binanggit kanina, ang relasyon ng ama at anak. Misterio ito sapagkat hindi natin mabibigkas ang kahulugan ng ispiritwal na dimension ng kanilang relasyon. Maipapahiwatig ito ng mga nakakadama nguni’t hindi pa rin maiisapapel ang buong istorya.

Puntahan natin ang pagpapaliwanag ni Marcel ukol sa “obheto” at “presensya” upang mas maliwanagan tayo sa ating tinatalakay na misterio. Ang obheto para kay Marcel ay isang bagay na nakatapon sa harap mo (Gegenstand) na maari mong sakyan, manipulahin, at balibaligtarin. Hindi mo isinasangkot ang iyong sarili sa pakikitungo mo sa isang obheto. Tinatawag mong “ito” kaya nga itinuturo mo siya na sa paraang magkaibang magkaiba kayo. Samantala, ang presensya ay isang kalagayan kung saan nararanasan mo ang kalooban ng isang kapwa-taong kasama mo. Bukas ka sa kapwa mo at hinahayaan mong pasukin ka nito. Isa itong uring pakikipagkapwa-kalooban na hindi malilimitahan ng oras at maging ng espasyo. Tulad halimbawa ng dalawang taong magkasama sa isang kwarto na hindi naman magkakilala. Ibang iba ito sa isang taong sabik sa kanyang tinubuang bayan. Sa unang halimbawa, wala silang pinagsasaluhang kalooban. Ang dalawang tao sa silid ay maaaring mayroong komunikasyon sa bawat isa. Maaaring nag-uusap sila o nagmumustrahan sa isa’t isa nguni’t wala iyung malalim na presensya ni X kay Y. Dahil wala silang pagsasama. Sa bahagi naman ng taong homesick, ang kalooban niya ay nasa kanyang bayan. Sabik siyang umuwi, magbalik sa bayang kanyang nakasama at tinahanan sa matagal na panahon. Mayroong pag-apaw ng sarili. Lumalampas siya sa kanyang sarili. Maaaring hindi siya naroroon sa lugar o malayo talaga sa lugar (ibig sabihin ay mayroong hadlang na distansya) nguni’t hindi nalimitahan ang kanyang kalooban. Umapaw siya, lumampas sa kanyang sarili. Binuksan niya ang kanyang kalooban at nakita niyang siya ay kalaliman, na hindi lang karanasan ang totoo. May pangangailangang lumampas sa empirical ego at sa unibersal na ako.

Kaya nga ito ay isang misterio. Hinding hindi mabibigkas ang nais ipahiwatig sa atin ng ating buhay. Nais ni Marcel pukawin at akitin ang ating malay-tao at sabihing malalim ang ating buhay. Ang katotohanan nga ng ating buhay ay misterio. Hindi dahil walang sagot ay misterio nang matatawag. Ang buhay nga natin ay misterio sapagkat nakasangkot tayo, isang nilalang na malawak at hindi makokonsepto. Ganun rin ang katotohanan.

Ang katotohanan ng buhay ng tao ay hindi “siya”. Hindi sarili ng tao. Iba ang katotohanan sa sarili. Kaya nga tulad ng isang alagad ng sining, hindi lahat ng tao ay matatalaban nito. Subali’t hindi rin naman ito isang bagay na kanyang kanya at hindi nga maibabahagi sa iba. Lampas ang katotohanan sa unibersal ng pribado. Isa nga itong misterio (tatawagin ni Marcel na ispirito ang katotohanan sa huling bahagi ng librong Mystery of Being Volume I) na gumagabay sa atin. Kaya nga dapat tayong maging bukas sa katotohanan. Dapat nga tayong magpa-akay sa katotohanan.

Pero ang katotohanan ay dapat ngang hanapin, dapat rin itong isagawa. Hindi dahil misterio ito ay isa na itong abstraktong kataga. Ang katotohanan ay nagpaparamdam. Kaya nga ito ay may presensya. Nguni’t hindi ito makokonsepto sa paraang gusto ng syensya. Hindi ito mahuhuli at maikakahon na para bang isang specimen na babalibaligtarin sa isang laboratoryo. Hindi ito isang obheto na nakatapon lang sa harapan mo at walang kinalaman sa iyong pagkatao.

Masakit mamuhay sa wasak na daigdig. May talab sa atin ang katotohanan na hindi tayo maaaring magbulag-bulagan sa mga nangyayari sa atin. Ang tangi sigurong magagawa ay magsimula sa saril. Buksan ang sarili sa katotohanan at matutong umapaw para sa katotohanan. Tama nga si Marcel, kung mulat tayo sa katotohanan, alam rin natin na dapat tayong maging handa sa anumang itinuturo nito. Handa rin tayong magsakripisyo sa isang katotohanan kahit na nangangahulugan pa mang buhay natin ang kapalit. Sapagkat tayo ay mga alagad na tinatawag ng liwanag ng katotohanan. Kailangan nating magpagabay at mamuhay para sa ipinakikita nito.
Mahirap ngang sumalungat sa agos ng panahon. Pero, ito ang kinakailangan sa ilang pagkakataon. Kailangan nating mamuhay sa katotohanang masakit kaysa mabuhay sa isa paniniwalang hungkag. Kailangang buo ang ating loob at bukas para sa ibang tao. Makikita rin natin ang katotohanan sa pamamagitan ng ating pakikipagkapwa-kalooban. Hindi nga tayo dapat magkuta sa ating sarili lamang, sapagkat kaylangan nating danasin ang kayamanan ng ating pagkatao – may panlabas at panloob na hindi naglalaban sa halip nagtatalaban. Mahalaga ang kapwa natin para sa hinahangad nating katotohanan. Sa huli, sino nga ba ako? Ako ay isang taong malawak at sumusunod sa katotohanan.

Gabriel Marcel

2006-02-19T19:27:00.000-08:00

Ang Katotohanan Bilang Gabay sa Buhay
(Isang Salamisim sa Mystery of Being Volume I)

Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

Sa ikalawang yugto ng Mystery of Being na may pamagat na “Wasak na Daigdig”, ipinamulat sa atin ni Gabriel Marcel ang atin mismong kalagayan. Sinasabi niyang ang ating daigdig ngayon ay walang puso, parang isang relo o orasan na natanggalan ng pangunahing makina. Walang puso sapagkat nahihilig tayo sa pagkilos ayon sa idinidikta ng isang sistema. Ang sistema na ang nagiging kabuoan ng ating pagkatao. Ginamit niyang halimbawa ang talamak na paggamit ng mga dokumentong personal (bio-data, identification card, etc) bilang pagkakakilanlan sa isang empleyado ng isang kompanya. Naisasalin nga raw ang kabuoan ng ating pagkatao sa isang dokumento at nakalilimutan na ang tao ay isang orihinal at hindi kailanman maikakahon sa isang papel ang identidad ng isang tao sapagkat ito’y napakayaman.

Sa kabilang banda, mayroon ring kulturang nagtataguyod naman sa katotohanang personal. Ito ay nangangalandakang ang katotohanan ay ayon sa sarili lamang, na kung ano ang totoo para sa akin ay siya na ngang totoo. May pagkahilig ito sa parte ng indibidwal na pribado.

Sa pagninilay ni Gabriel Marcel, nais niyang sabihin na ang katotohanan ay lampas sa unibersal na matematiko at sa indibidwal na pribado. Mayroong matinding pangangailangang igpawan o lampasan ang ako-na-unibersal (universal ego) at ang ako-ng-karanasan (empirical ego). Sa paanong paraan?

Ginamit niyang halimbawa ang isang alagad ng sining. Hindi lahat ay natatalaban ng sining sapagkat ang pagtalab ng sining ay nakadepende sa kakayahan at kahandaan ng isang taong tatanggap. Nangangahulugan lamang na hindi unibersal ang pagtalab ng sining. Subalit, hindi rin naman personal o kanyang kanya lamang ang karanasan sa sining na hindi na niya maaaring ibahagi ito sa iba. Hindi ito pansarili lamang o para sa indibidwal na ako.

Gumagalaw ang katotohanan sa gitna ng unibersal na matematiko at sa indibidwal na pribado. At mayroong matinding pangangailangang lumampas o sumaibayo sa unibersal na matematiko at indibidwal na pribado.

Paano natin nalalaman na ganito ang katotohanan, ang merong matinding pangangailangang lumamapas? Sapagkat nakakaramdam tayo ng kakitiran o kakulangan. Alam natin na hindi pa ito ang totoo at nararamdaman nating may mas mataas pang halaga o value kaysa sa atin.

Tulad ito ng isang mag-asawa. Kailangan ng lalaki ang kanyang asawa para magluto sa kanya at magbigay ng kaginhawaan tuwing uuwi siya galing sa trabaho. Nguni’t dahil sa matinding pagmumuni-muni, nalalaman niya na higit pa roon ang pagkatao ng kanyang asawa. Ang asawa niya ay isang katuwang sa buhay, isang minamahal na kasama tungo sa mas makatotohanang pagmamahalan.

Sa halimbawang nabanggit, mayroong paglampas sa isang karanasan tungo sa mas mataas na karanasan. At gano’n rin sa katotohanan. Ang katotohanan, ayon kay Marcel ay lampas sa atin at lampas rin sa unibersal na matematiko. Hindi maikakahon ng unibersal na sistema o ng personal na pagtanggap ang katotohanan sapagkat ang katotohanan ay may pag-iral na kanya. Ang katotohanan ay siyang gumagabay sa buhay. At ang mga taong nagpapagabay sa katotohanan ay may pagkabukas sa ipinahihiwatig at ipinakikita ng katotohanan.

Gumamit tayo ng isa pang halimbawa. Kahimanawari’y akayin tayo nito sa katotohanan. Mayroong isang seminarista na malapit nang magpakasal sa Diyos. Pero, nagdududa siya sa kanyang bokasyon. May mga facts o mga detalye sa kanyang buhay ng tumuturo sa kaliwanagan. Una, siya ay nabigo sa pag-ibig at maaaring isa ito sa mga dahilan ng pagpasok niya ng seminaryo. Pangalawa, mababa ang tingin sa kanyang pamilya ng mga tao sa kanyang lugar at ang paggiging pari ay magtataas ng pangalan ng kanilang pamilya. Pangatlong fact, masarap ang buhay sa loob ng seminaryo. Kaya mayroong pagdududa ang seminarista sa kanyang bokasyon. Naliliwanagan ng mga facts (galing sa salitang latin na factum na nangangahulugang mga naisagawa) ang pagdedesisyon ng seminarista. At kailangang maging bukas siya sa kung ano ang kanyang nakikita. Kailangan ang pagtanggap sa katotohanan kahit na ito ay masakit o taliwas sa ating kagustuhan.

Maaari rin namang maghintay pa sapagkat hindi pa alam ang katotohanan. Kailangan pa ng panahon upang malaman kung ano talaga ang totoo. Sapagkat hindi minamadali ang katotohanan. Minsan kailangan ng panahon upang magkaroon ng kahandaan at pagkahinog.

Ang katotohanan para kay Marcel ay isang gabay sa buhay. Nguni’t ito ay hinaharap at isinasabuhay. Nariyan nga ang katotohanan pero kailangan itong hanapin. Kailangan rin ng pagkamalay at pagkamulat rito. Kailangan tayong mulat sa kung ano ang gumagabay sa atin. At handa rin tayong magsakripisyo para sa katotohanan kahit buhay pa man ang maging kapalit.

Naaalala ko ang aming bise alkalde na kailan lamang ay pinaslang ng dalawang hindi pa nakikilalang mga tao (nangyari sa bayan ng Naujan, sa probinsya ng Silangang Mindoro). Sinabi niya na handa siyang mag-alay ng buhay para sa mga naaapi at para sa maliliit. May pagkamulat siya na may naaapi at may mga maliliit na nangangailangan ng kanyang tulong. Nguni’t mayroong mga taong masasagasaan, mga taong iba ang paniniwala sa buhay. Handa siyang ialay kahit na ang kanyang buhay sapagkat mayroon siyang nasumpungang katotohanan na dapat ipaglaban. At handa siyang magsakripisyo ng pagod, lakas, talento, talino, at maging sariling buhay para sa katotohanan na gumagabay sa kanya.

Tulad ng sinasabi ni Marcel, kailangan tayong maging mulat sa katotohanan, na mayroong tawag na lumampas pa sa makamundong pagnanasa kahit na ito ay masakit at kahit na kakaunti lamang ang yumayakap sa katotohanan. Kung tayo ay nagpapagabay sa katotohanan, nararapat lang na manatili tayo sa katotohanan at maging tapat dito. Sapagkat hindi tayo ang tumatawag sa katotohanan, ang kabaligtaran ang totoo. Tayo ang tinatawag nito. Tayo ang mayroong katungkulang tumugon at magsabuhay ng ating sinusundang katotohanan. At dapat itong isagawa, sapagkat mistulang pader na hungkag ang katotohanang hindi isinasagawa.

Binubulaga tayo ni Marcel sa ating hindi pagkamulat sa katotohanan. Nakakatakot, Ngunit ganito talaga ang buhay. Ang buhay na sumusunod sa kanyang gabay ay nangangahulugan rin ng hindi pagkapit masyado sa buhay. Ang pananatili sa kung ano ang pinapakita ng katotohanan at pagpapatuloy sa hamon ng kasaysayan ay isang malaking aral. Magmimistulan lamang itong hangin kung hindi maisasabuhay.

Process Theology

2006-02-19T19:20:00.000-08:00

Evil in Our Midst

(A Reflection on Process Theology)

Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

Our history has produced so many forms and embodiments of evil. Usually, these are characterized as destructive and mysterious. Destructive, because evil resembles the Visigoth-- ruining our dignity, freedom, and even our own concept of goodness. Mysterious, because “we cannot explain evil systematically and scientifically.”[1] We cannot deny the fact that evil exists because it has a great number of manifestations. There are natural evils (by God and nature) and moral evils (by human persons). But the dilemma is how to reconcile the existence of a good God and the existence of terrible things in the world. Where does evil come from? Does God allow evil to exist?

In this paper, I attempted to discuss the most basic, pertinent questions and difficulties regarding the problem of evil. I tried to lay the framework of a brief survey on possible explanations about the reality of evil from St. Augustine’s concept of privation to Charles Hartshorne’s idea of human freedom to further this attempt.

Lance Morrow in his article, “Evil,” enumerates three propositions that are even more divisive on the means to approach evil: 1. God is all powerful; 2. God is all-good; and 3. terrible things happen. These propositions can present themselves in pairs but are impossibly combined altogether without violating the principle of contradiction. Here, one is confronted with clear dilemmas as shown by the following statements: if God is perfectly loving, God wishes to abolish all evil; and if God is all-powerful, God must be able to abolish all evil. Contrary to the premise established by these logical pairings of thought however, evil exists. Therefore, a conjecture arises that God may not at all be both omnipotent and perfectly loving.

Theologians often encounter difficulty in formulating their theodicies.[2] In fact, St. Thomas himself admitted that the existence of evil is considerably one of the best arguments against God’s existence. Meanwhile, St. Augustine and Charles Hartshorne had also responded to the challenge of being able to offer resolutions to the timeless question of evil. The Augustinian theological response is hinged upon the concept of the “fall” of man from an original state of righteousness, while the philosophical strand of his response holds that evil is a privation of goodness. Thus, it is not proper to ask for its source (efficient cause) because evil is deficient. On the other hand, modern process theology responds by saying that God is not all-powerful and not in fact able to prevent evils arising either in human beings or in the process of nature.

For Saint Augustine, evil initially came about in those levels of the universe that involve free will—that is, free will of the angels and of human beings. The “fall” of angelic and human beings was the origin of moral evil or sin. Consequently, natural evils like diseases and catastrophes are deemed to be the penal effects of sin. Since humanity was intended to be guardian of the earth, human defection has set all nature awry. This notion underlines the belief that God has no responsibility for the existence of evil. Creatures are the ones responsible for them.

Still, disturbing questions surface, where did evil that is product of the “fall” of angels and human beings come from? Do they come out of nothing? We can conceive, without any logical contradiction, that human beings and angels (like Satan) could never go wrong. And we can debunk the Augustinian proposition in the light of modern knowledge. It is no longer possible to regard the natural evils of disease, earthquake, and the like as consequences of the “fall” of humanity, for we know that they existed long before human beings came to be.

But his philosophical theodicy seems to hold water. For Augustine, “…evil was nothing else but a privation of good, next indeed to that which has no being (malum non esse misi privationem boni usque ad quod omnimo non est)”[3] This statement implies that evil is not a subsistent being. Evil will never exist if goodness is not present. Despite the opposition of these two forces, evil owes its existence to goodness, nonetheless. St. Augustine adds, “Let no one, therefore, look for an efficient cause of the evil will; for it is not efficient, but deficient, as the will itself is not an effecting of something, but a defect.”[4] Does it mean that good is the cause of evil?

Charles Hartshorne, on the other hand, holds that evil is a by-product of our free actions. He accepts the notion of human freedom. God has no control over human freedom precisely because His intervention in its realm and imposition of His own will are tantamount to the elimination of human free willing. This does not mean, however that he is defective in power. God is all-powerful (omnipotent) in a uniquely different sense, which Hartshorne articulates:
…power adequate to preserve the society no matter what other members may do. It does not mean, power to prevent any and all evil or conflict, for social power, even, in the perfect form, is still social, that is, it is power to set limits to the freedom of others, but not to destroy all freedom; and where there is freedom, however sharply limited, conflict and evil must always be possible.[5]

God will not destroy human freedom for the sake of the so-called power because freedom is the fruit of His love. Love is His essence, and to destroy the fruit of His love means denying His very essence. This way, Hartshorne creates a confluence of idea of God’s omnipotence (in a new definition) and the existence of wickedness in the world. Evil comes from our free will. As St. Augustine had put it once, the possibility of wrongdoing is logically inseparable from the creation of finite persons.

I am very much convinced that evils are resultant by-products of a dynamic exercise of human freedom. Evil does not possibly come from a God who is all-good. Perhaps, we, human beings, have come to be entangled in a culture that dictates the wrong sense of freedom thus need to re-evaluate our notions of it.

Martin Heidegger stated in one of his articles that “the essence of freedom is originally not concerned with the will or even the causality of human willing.”[6] For Heidegger, freedom is not in the ability to choose. It is more of setting-free (Freiheit ist frie-lassen), to let the things be what they are. There is a call to cease patronizing our manipulative kind of thinking and accept the fact that we possess no absolute power to do everything.

There is a particular context with which all human beings are struggling to live. Other beings are our co-constituents, meaning they are our co-equals in rights and freedom. I believe when everyone strongly acknowledges human dignity being innate to all men and women, chaos remain a distant eventuality in life. At the end of the day, respect for human life is the sole and most compelling factor behind shunning any form of evil there possibly is.

[1] Lance Morrow, “Evil”, Time Magazine 137, no. 23 (10 June 1991), 42.
[2] Theodicy is a technical term for attempts to solve the theological problem of evil. It comes from Greek words theos which means God and dike which means righteous.
[3] St. Augustine, Confessions, ed. Capps, Ph. D. LL.D, T.E. Page, Litt.D, and W.H.D. Rouse, Litt.D (Great Britain: Richard Clay and Sons), 121.
[4] St. Augustine, The City of God, trans. Marcus Dods, D.D. (New York: Random House, Inc., 1950), 387.
[5] Charles Hartshorne, Reality as Social Process: Studies in Metaphysics and Religion (New York: Hafner Publishing Company, 1971), 41.
[6] Martin Heidegger, “Question Concerning Technology”, in Question Concerning Technology and Other Essays, trans. William Lovitt (New York: Harper and Row, 1977), 25.

Process Metaphysics

2006-02-19T19:14:00.000-08:00

What Do We Mean By Freedom?
(A Reflection paper for Process Metaphysics)

Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

When we use the word freedom what do we really mean? Is it simply being able to act, move, or use something without hindrance or restraint? When we say, “malaya ako” do we really mean it? And are we the only beings in this universe that possess freedom?

Ever since the days of Aristotle, the human person has been confronted with issues regarding the good life. A considerable portion of western philosophy as such, has been engaged in the question of the human being’s place in the greater scheme of things; with several notions of the good life being the guiding principle in his quest. Plato illustrated the human person’s participation in the Good, Nietzsche provided man with the option to model himself to a work of art and Heidegger called upon him to “let things be”. However, when we examine the problem of the human person more closely, we come across the inescapable question of freedom; for the human person is as such (a human person) only insofar as he has been gifted with the ability to realize himself according to his own judgments and actions. The self-actualization or self-realization of the human person is inextricably linked with the principle of freedom because the latter, strictly speaking, allows him to be who he is in the most fundamental sense.

Charles Hartshorne is one philosopher who has delved deep into the question of freedom and its relation to man’s self-becoming. For him, the freedom of man is essentially characterized by creativity. The creativity of man for Hartshorne is connected, if not identical with man’s ability to decide the course of his life. The creative process then is the gradual unfolding of human freedom in time, as it experiences the world. Freedom is creativity in the dynamism of the human spirit. This creativity allows for the human person to fashion his life according to the very ways and means afforded for him by the present without any deterministic implications from his past. As such the present is the stage where freedom enacts itself in the human person. The past, though it may have its own peculiar effects in the creativity of the present, nonetheless leaves a clearing for the human person’s essence, free from any fatalistic determinations and predictions from a deductive and logical schematization of his life’s past (such that the view wherein fated man is trapped in the jaws of his past, and thus “determined” by it would be rejected by Hartshorne). Hence, the freedom of man in this sense would be construed as a complete emancipation from determinism. But that does not mean that freedom is doing what one wishes. The creative process of freedom or self-becoming would be the present’s on-going process of actualization by the human person.

Charles Hartshorne did not stop his philosophical voyage of discovery with his profound reflection on human freedom. Furthermore, he extended his concern to sub-human creatures by arguing that even the lower forms of animals, trees, insects, rocks, atoms, and quarks have slim manner of self-actualization and freedom. Arguing to the point that God, who is supremely creative, cannot produce a non-creative being. He stated in one of his books that,

We must not, however, stop with God and man, as self-creative creators; we must go on to conceive the lower animals, and even atoms, as in some slight or trivial way self-determining and creative of others. For if supreme creativity is the divine nature, and an inferior creativity is man’s nature, then the lower animals must be still lower levels of creativity…How can an infinite creative being produce and absolutely non-creative being?[1]

We see a kind of “pecking order” on the hierarchy of beings in Hartshornean metaphysics here and all existent beings are significant for they create something for themselves and for others. God is like the main source of water that shares Its essence to the river and the sea and all inhabitants therein. The river and the sea have similarities but are different kinds of bodies of water. In the same vision, Hartshorne sees that human beings and other creatures share something in common. We can understand something about pigeon because there is a kind of interrelatedness among us. It is a kind of network that traps all beings into a single web.

Good bye to Enlightenment’s arrogance of human reason. Good bye to the anthropomorphic theory of existence. Human person now is just part of a great whole. Good bye to man’s selfishness for Harthshornean metaphysics of interrelatedness gives voice to the other creatures that have been marginalized for so many years because of our wrong interpretation of freedom.
We, human beings, tend to be selfish. Most of the times, we neglect the rights and freedom of our fellow creatures and just think for our own satisfaction. Do we forget or simply we don’t know that freedom entails responsibility? Our responsibility is to respect the freedom of others. What does it mean? It is to let the things become in their own essence and nature. But our responsibility does not stop there. Because we are capable to know, we are called to act. Knowledge requires action for the purpose of knowledge is activity. For knowledge of something is not yet complete without action.

If we have knowledge of love, truth, etc., we must love and put the truth into action. But sub-human creatures are not rational. They don’t know that they were created out of love. They live according to their instinct and nature. Thus, human beings have the responsibility to let things “know” how to respond to their freedom.
So, what do we mean by freedom? It is limited freedom. We cannot do whatever we wish to. It is a freedom that requires responsibility. And if we know that we are called for that duty, we must do something to act for that duty. Knowledge and action. Freedom and responsibility.

[1] Charles Harthshorne, Creative Synthesis and Philosophic Method (Chicago: The Open Court Publiching Co., 1970), 11.

Process Ethics

2006-02-19T19:09:00.000-08:00

Public Service and the Ethics of Contributionism
Emmanuel C. de Leon
Saint Augustine Seminary

In a milieu like we have today, impersonal dealings and pseudo-relations are most apparent. It has become extremely difficult to distinguish between genuine connections and pretentious ones. This reality, however, is a product of a multi-faceted context which seemingly involves all of us. This is just one side of the coin, for beneath it is a much more potent fact that authentic affinities are real and are actually a mere consequence of an even greater, true force. They just simply look faded in the picture called life.

The truth is, not everyday do we, comprising most of Juan dela Cruz’s in Philippine society get the chance to be formally educated of philosophies that support essential principles governing human interaction. The privileged select few, who are reminded of the raw wisdom underlying experience, should embrace and learn from it. This, I believe is an imperative response to Charles Hartshorne’s process thought—the metaphysics of interrelatedness towards the ethics of Contributionism. The latter, in fact, is reason enough to reform what has today become a culture of indifference and revolutionize human life perspective.

Love is an appropriate summary of everything Hartshornean Process Ethics teaches. It may be surmised that in trying to grapple with constructs like universal creativity, cosmic interrelatedness, sympathy, enlightened self-interest and devoted imagination, one touches base with love. Very particularly, he offers a clear view on the element of sympathy being a universal phenomenon and translated to a social view of reality. This reality, social through and through is a compendium of manifestations of life—of activity, of interplay and dynamism.
Set against the background of sympathy, as an appeal of life for life, of feeling for feeling and experience for experience, is a natural shift from enlightened egoism to enlightened interest. “To be is to be for others.” This statements eloquently speaks of the powerful intertwining of sympathy for oneself or self-interest and sympathy for others or altruism. One does not stand alone yet increases in autonomy once coupled with the other. Thus comes to fore a non-negotiable value, something that perfectly illumines, more than anything else, the essence of Hartshornean ethics, which is love.

Considered as the validity and universalization of love is the commandment “love thy neighbor as thyself”. Through this, the grand manner through which life interconnects human beings all the more achieves integrity. As we strive in our little realms to optimize the life given us by loving the other as much as we regard ourselves with love, a resultant end becomes the betterment of life. If something of a grand scale is best put to use, it consequently enriches the whole of which it is a part and remains an effective memory and influence long after it is gone. So goes for humanity, which capitalizes on the potential of every person to enjoy the self while providing for the happiness of others and life itself, hence, the concept and actuality of Contributionism.

Indeed, there is always a part of us that stays beyond existence. A life well-lived touches more lives, continually inspires and beckons eternal gratitude for life. Coined as devoted imagination, this tendency to believe and hope that an unseen flowing force actually governs perpetual living and dying is all worth the struggle to love life. Finally, like stirrings and echoes, lives are homage to one God, with Whom we all journey and enjoy the same. It completely, amazingly answers the question as to what is the supreme destination of all life. Hartshorne, through wrapping the entire package in the eyes of faith, presents an irresistible, compelling statement. We are here and now for life, love and God.

Looking at our very proximate settings, it is evident that Hartshorne succeeds in hitting at the very core of inadequacies experienced in it. The Philippines is inarguably besieged by myriad problems today, one of which is the rotten way dirty politics thrives and afflicts much more portions of its context. Another factor that deserves consideration is the fact that, the country in trying to emulate other nations, claims itself to be democratic and free. In principle, it may follow that the chaos flagrant in the way the Philippine government runs is directly due to the fact that it is democratic and fully provides for expression, competition and tremendous movement.

A deeper probe would find the extreme neglect of a higher value though, public service. In a remarkably literate environment like the Philippines, it does not need much argument to define what public service is about. When thoughtfully considered, the current fate burdening every Filipino is a loud, open call to public service in its very essence. No intellectual discourses or debates can take away the silent challenge of really caring for individuals and the entire Filipino community’s welfare. This is the sign of the times in this part of the world.

As the May 2007 poll comes nearer, we are again bombarded by endless braggings of different personalities wanting to get to power in the guise of public service. If it were to be given benefit of the doubt, every registered voter may as well take the risk through the ballot and expect that something far more important is behind the quest for authority among these candidates. In the process, both parties suffer apathy and indifference. Many of us have ceased to try. Many have chosen not to imbibe the participatory citizenship that is part and parcel of democracy we so regard highly. Most importantly, many of us have resigned to the crippling state of Philippine politics believing that there is nothing left for us to do. Or if there may be so, it remains not of substance, because power for us merely resides in the hands of what we call politicians.
With the advent of the elections, the ordinary Juan dela Cruz’s major problems are once again accentuated. To name a few, there are poverty, criminality and moral demise which are aggravated by corruption and political patronage at the very seat of power, the government. Countless issues have already been addressed and seemingly resolved, but the heart of every Filipino’s predicament remains unheeded. The vacuum lies in the refusal of both government and people to undertake a radical paradigm shift. This is a whole new understanding of a relationship, not subordination, of mutual respect, not exclusivity of interests, of compassion, not conquest.

Public service is indeed a public trust. It invokes the lofty value of learning to entrust your welfare in the means employed by another. If people solely wield power and abuse the same, public service is irreparably compromised. As being is contributory to others and life itself, Philippine politics, specifically its stakeholders, impersonal and indifferent as they all are, essentially cease to be. They all begin to exist without meaning, for they lose the integrity of self that underlies all interaction.

But hope is not lost. It is wonderfully sustained by forces which come from the salient reality that love triumphs. In government, there are still people who remain selfless and giving amidst the worst. They brave the giant leap to uncertain waters that is Philippine politics if only for the good of people and reform of system and structure governing them. They are those courageous souls who feel and know how it is to genuinely serve, experience joy in the process and await for better times that may never come in their lifetimes. Classic to Hartshornean ethics of Contributionism therefore, what becomes of this scenario is cosmic interrelatedness and devoted imagination.

People in government who rally behind the true essence of public service empower others and equally put confidence in their potential to effect change. This is what’s most life-giving about the richness of human interaction. It is constantly a two-way process allowing for growth of both ends and sustaining the fine, hard line connecting them. Over and above this, there is direct empowerment of the enveloping life, of settings and contexts, of people and events, of times of life. For the Filipinos, it is holding on to the promise that positive reforms carried out today will definitely traverse generations.

Kahlil Gibran had once put it, “He who sees his real self sees the truth of real life for himself, for all humanity and for all things.”[1] It has been explicated by Charles Hartshorne that “to be is to be contributory and to enjoy the contribution of others.” Being is made tantamount to a full discovery of life itself, and the boundless opportunities to make others and oneself happy. To reiterate Gibran, a person who is truly self-aware equally acknowledges the truth of his attachment to life and others. In this matrix can Contributionism abundantly thrive.
For us, Filipino people, an often dismal yet.

[1]Kahlil Gibran, The Little Book of Life’s Wisdom, (Denmark: Arrow Books, 2000).

"Shit Happens"

2006-02-07T04:52:00.000-08:00

Albert Camus once enunciated that at every street corner, the feeling of absurdity can strike any man at the face. Truly, his prophetic words become the driving spirit here and now. Meaninglessness, boredom, and indifference to be are just some symptomatic of this age. Yes, it can injure one’s being, but this is our time. And, we are condemned to live this kind of life.

Freaky friday night, while the city is busy and people are “gimmick” as usual, the feeling of emptiness smacked me down. I feel so alone and lost, dreadful to what is happening. I can sense it even in my stomach. Oh my, this is just another lonesome night.

In one way or another, mobile phone is an ally (thanks to Manny Pangilinan) for it made me connected to the outside world. I used to text personalities in my phonebook with regard to my queries, greetings, and some nonesensical things. This also helps me bravely survive a long distance relationship. But, what the hell is the reason for such a connection? Why is there a need for such a thing? Shrugged? Can it be an adequate answer?

My silent but restless friday night led me to a sort of reflection by making a giant leap backward. I am hitting the wrong target in this fight. Most of the time, I am so numb to the situation and caught unaware of the real problem. In other words, shit happens because of my inattention to the absorbing phenomena that appear in front of me. Sleeping on the bank, so to speak, is a deadly vice. I let go lots of golden opportunity to finish my studies that will give me multi-faceted career.

Alright, those are the givens and I gave to that my loudest YAWP. It is the time for me to appreciate the clear-cut distinction between a boy and a man. I lack maturity, sense of responsibility, and commitment to reality. This is my quest (as an old song goes) and no body can replace me to this personal journey. Success and happiness is at hand, but it remains in the realm of possibilities. Dum spiro, spero! (as long as I breathe, I hope).

2005-02-16T22:46:00.000-08:00

On the way to music

2005-02-16T22:44:00.000-08:00

where is the timer? Ok na yan. Click!!!

2005-02-16T22:40:00.000-08:00

Gathering as an event of the fourfold

2005-02-16T22:37:00.000-08:00

Joey Ayala in Bm

2005-02-16T22:35:00.000-08:00

Simple Reunion of Courageous Spirits

2005-02-16T22:31:00.000-08:00

Transcendence

2005-02-16T22:29:00.000-08:00

It captures the life, the window to Being

2005-02-16T22:26:00.000-08:00

Raven and I conspire

2005-02-16T22:24:00.000-08:00

On the way to Noel Cabangon

2005-02-16T22:23:00.000-08:00

Joey and Noel (the gods of music)

2005-02-16T22:21:00.000-08:00

Aubs, the music, and I (Sa Antipolo)

2005-02-16T22:19:00.000-08:00

On My Own

2005-02-16T21:56:00.000-08:00

Aubs and I (close up)

Kinahuhulugan ng Kanta: You’ll Be Safe Here

2005-02-16T12:47:00.000-08:00

Rico Blanco is truly a magician, a music genius.

The first time I heard his latest opus, “You’ll Be Safe Here” (or the mostly known Spirit theme song), I was not aware that a Filipino artist wrote it. The music that reverberates in my mind is of U2. I was bloody unaware. I thought it was really by Sting.

Then, after a few days, I became so curious about the meaning of the song. What the hell is in it that so many listeners are fascinated with the song? Is it for real or just another commercialized theme song? Is there anything new in this sucking music industry of the Original Pilipino Music (OPM)?

Because of that child-like inquisitiveness, I went to an Internet café and “googled” the title of the song. Fortunately, I got a reliable copy. (Thank you rockers!)

What is new in this song? Is this an original cry of a prophet in the wilderness or just an additional noise in every street corner? But lo and behold, it is a different (in its positive and fertile sense) brand of music. Swabe ang tono, patok ang mga titik ng kanta. Simpleng musika, pero tunay na kumakagat sa meron ang kaligayahang binibigay.

Suddenly, I was so absorbed with the music. I saw the light and it brought me to reflection.

Rico claims it is uncertain if there is a scheme of things or the life that we are living is a mere accident. Nobody knows yet. Why am i here and not there, it is a complete 'hidden-ness'. So, it is a game of anticipation for “the right place at the right time”, a waiting for the conspiracy of the universe. That means, the fulfillment, happiness, and totality of our lives is not just the I. On the contrary, it is the we. For without other entities we could not understand ourselves. Thus, the condition of the possibility of understanding the self is the letting-presence of others. Letting-it-be. Let the unknowable be unknowable. And live in the world of the impenetrable with joy and satisfaction.

Why are we so afraid of ignorance? Because we give high regard to reason and make it our foundation. For most of us, an action or speech-act that is not validated by reason is unfounded, senseless, and should therefore be committed to the flames. We make it our task to unlock the secrets of nature, and that task makes us so oblivious to the limits of reason. This was epitomized by the scientific revolution of the 18th century. As a result, we became agnostic to faith, religion, metaphysics, and even morality, the niches of beyond understanding.

The chorus goes like this:

Close your eyes.
Dry your tears.
‘Coz when nothing seems clear,
You’ll be safe here.

I am not so sure if it was meant to be a love song. But, for sure, it is a song about love, an unconditional love that transcends the world of reason. Doubt and fears may be existing, and our hearts may become weary, but love (in the richest and purest sense of the word) will find a way, You’ll Be Safe Here, because you belong. We belong in the one and the only force. What is that? Love. We belong because it is in love that we are one. We let love be our fortress and reason. and though love seems to be nameless and cannot be conceptualized, we learn how to live in the nameless. In the first place, it is our real dwelling place. Therefore, it is a homecoming. We let ourselves be claimed once again by love.

As the last stanza said:

When no one understands
I believe
You’ll be safe here…

Loving and living is a complete surrender. Goodbye to the arrogance of reason. For love has its own foundation. Goodbye to the fallacy of enlightenment. For the logic of silence and waiting is in the nearness of Being.

Sa oras na mistulang wala kang kasama, You'll be safe here.
Sa oras na hindi naririnig ang iyong mga hinaing, You'll be safe here.
Sa oras ng alinlangan at pangamba, You'll be safe here.
Sa oras na nakakatakot ang hibang na daigdig, You’ll be Safe Here.

Kundiman Natin Sa Mundo

2005-02-15T16:21:00.000-08:00

Nang dumating ka sa buhay ko marami ang nagbago
Natuto akong muling lumakad nang mag-isa na kasama ka
Sa mundo nating ito maari nang umiral ang uniberso
Lahat man ay nagbabago nananatili pa ring umaapaw ang pag-ibig mo.

Lahat tayo’y pinanganak na patungong katapusan,
Totoo rin ang mga katagang magkabilaan ang lahat
‘Pag magkasama tayo puedeng wala ang mga tinatanggap na prinsipyo
Ikaw at ako ay umiibig labas sa mundong ito.

Kundiman, pag-ibig ang awit natin sa mundo
Lilikha tayo ng bago dito, sa lumang paraiso
Kundiman, masaya ang simple at maganda ang balanse
Kundiman natin sa mundo, simple at balanse.

Nakita kita sa malayong perspektibo
Walang mukha at hindi maaninagan
Nang maalimpungatan na ako, magkalapit pala tayo
Nariyan ka lang pala, malapit kaysa sa Recto.

Does love bite?

2005-01-17T20:20:00.000-08:00

Kumakagat ba sa meron ang pagmamahal?

Teka, ang pagmamahal o pag-ibig ba ay maisasakonsepto?
Tila isang labi (remain) lamang ang nabibigkas na pag-ibig.
Kapag tinanong mong "meron ba talaga nung pag-ibig na binigkas?" Wala.
Nagmimistulang hangin ang binigkas pag-ibig.
Pero hindi pa rin hangin,
dahil ang hangin ay meron samantalang ang pag-ibig na binigkas ay wala.

Kung wala ang pag-ibig na binibigkas, ano ang pag-ibig na tumatalab sa meron?
O ito na naman, nagtatanong ako ng ano ngunit alam kong hindi mabibigkas.
Bakit ganun? Bakit hindi masasabi? Wala bang pag-ibig?
Hindi dahil walang pag-ibig, kundi dahil mayaman ito.
Hindi mabibigkas ngunit tumatalab, isang abot-tanaw.

Pero teka lamang, hindi ang abot-tanaw ang pag-ibig.
Mistulang ganito nga pero hindi naman ito ang kanyang eksistensya.
Mukhang hanggang dito na lamang ang maaari kong paglalarawan sa pag-ibig.
Dumating ako sa isang aporia, isang lugar na wala ng masusulingan, isang dead end.
Kailangan ko nang liparin ang mundo ng damdamin sa puntong ito.
Kailangan kong gumalaw at tumanaw,
sapagkat ang pag-ibig ay nangangailangan ng gumagalaw at tumatanaw.

Tama. Kapag gumalaw ang tumatanaw, mararanasan niya ang isang walang hanggang pag-akit.
Saan? Saan tayo inaakit ng pag-ibig? Sa isang walang hanggang pagtanaw.
Na kung minsan ay masakit at hindi pa maaninagan.
May pangako pero hindi pa kayang mahawakan.

Ang pag-ibig ay parang sarap.
Maipapaliwanag mo ba ang sarap?
Kumakagat sa meron pero hinding hindi maisasakonsepto.

Ang pag-ibig ba ay sadyang pangdalawahan?
Parang ganito ang tanong: pwede bang magbigayan na iisa lamang?
O kailangan sa loob ng pag-iibigan ang isang ako at isang hindi-ako?

May mga taong magtataas ng kilay sa mga bangkay ng aking utak dito at ngayon
(20:20, ExCel internet cafe, recto, manila)
Maaring sabihing pambata naman ang aking mga tanong.
Bahagi lang ito ng aking paghahanap at paglalakbay.
Dahil sa paglalakbay makakabalik tayo sa ating sarili.

kinahuhulugan ng kanta

2005-01-17T19:18:00.000-08:00

You’ll Be Safe Here
By: Rico Blaco

Nobody knows
Just why we’re here
Could it be fate
Or random circumstance
At the right place
At the right time
Two roads intertwine

And if the universe conspired
To meld our lives
To make us
Fuel and fire
Then know
Where ever you will be
So too shall I be

Chorus:
Close your eyes
Dry your tears
‘Coz when nothing seems clear
You’ll be safe here

From the sheer weight
Of your doubts and fears
Weary heart
You’ll be safe here

Remember how we laughed
Until we cried
At the most stupid things
Like we were so high
But love was all that we were on
We belong

And though the world would
Never understand
This unlikely union
And why it still stands
Someday we will be set free.
Pray and believe

Chorus:

When the light disappears
And when this world’s insincere
You’ll be safe here
When nobody hears you scream
I’ll scream with you
You’ll be safe here

Save your eyes
From your tears
When everything’s unclear
You’ll be safe here

From the sheer weight
Of your doubts and fears
Wounded heart

When the light disappears
And when this world’s insincere
You’ll be safe here

When nobody hears you scream
I’ll scream with you
You’ll be safe here

In my arms
Through the long cold night
Sleep tight
You’ll be safe here

When no one understands
I’ll believe
You’ll be safe,
You’ll be safe
You’ll be safe here
Put your heart in my hands
You’ll be safe here

Rico Blaco is truly a music genius. Swabe ang tono, patok ang mga titik ng kanta.
Simpleng musika, pero tunay na kumakagat sa meron ang kaligayahang binibigay.

Sa oras na mistulang wala kang kasama, you'll be safe here.
Sa oras na hindi naririnig ang iyong mga hinaing, you'll be safe here.
Sa oras na nakakatakot ang hibang na daigdig, you'll be safe here.
Sa oras ng alinlangan at pangamba, you'll be safe here.

I'm just another guy...

2005-01-05T13:40:00.000-08:00

God knows, i'm just another guy. I am fallible.

Hay, taking charge of oneself is really no joke. Here I am again, anxious and unrested.

I think one of the biggest mistakes I ever did is this. I took my study for granted, almost kissing goodbye to this seemingly elusive opportunity that a person of my type will never meet the second time. Hay! It sucks. And I feel really sorry for myself. But it happens. Shit really happens.

Pag Nanalo at Pag Natatalo

2004-12-27T21:04:00.000-08:00

manglalaro at mahalaga ang isang manlalaro para sa isang laro. Because the essence of the game is to be played. Kapag walang player walang kwenta ang laro, pero hindi ang player ang laro.

Nanalo kami kanina sa isang crucial game. May magsusuntukan. May reklamuhan. Naging madugo at marumi ang laro, pero sa kabila ng lahat na yon kaming lahat ay nanalo. Panalo sa karanasan.

Kung nalalaman lang ng lahat na manlalaro ang ginagawa sa kanila ng isang laro, masasabi nilang wala talagang natatalo sa isang game. Because the game paves the way for good relationship. We must let the game come to us, because It is the one who calls us to play. Not the referee, not the coaches, none of the players, neither the committee. The game sets us up. So, the role of the player is to let play. Let the game... Let the game come to us.