EN LT
2004-05-14 Zivile : output
*H. Arendt + **R. Brague + ***A. Lingis

**Only going throught something, what was earlier, and what is alien, a European can acquire something, what is characteristic to him.

*Thus the undeniable loss of tradition in the modern word does not at all entail a loss of the past, for tradition and past are not the same.

**As an entirely, European culture is an attempt to return the past, which has never been its past, but from its point of view there has been an irreversible recession, a painful experience of estrangement. There is no necessity to linger over something, what is artificial in this past vision. I’m not ignoring the fact, that something, what reached us from the Ancient Culture is the result of selection, done since the Alexander Epoch, and the image of its entirely we have now is too generalized, based on masterpieces and presuming that the image of its entirely we have now is too generalized, based on masterpieces and presuming that the whole Ancient World used to be at the same level. Yet I’m not ignoring the fact, that on the contrary, the existing of Ancient monuments and texts in Europien space and first of in Italy, regardless of everything, vouched for at least minimum continuity. But what is most important to me – is to realize the situation. European understanding of their is situation is that they appeared quite late and they must get back to their roots, which are not and have never been us.


***In pursuing actions that expose us to the blows of chance, we know in exhilaration what we have received by chance, what we are by chance.

*With the loss of tradition we have lost the thread which safely guided us throught the vast realms of the past, but this thread was also the chain fettering each successive generation to a predetermined aspect of the past.

**Culture for a European can not be something, what belongs to one and what constitutes one’s identity. On the contrary, that is something totally strange, and taking over it requires certain effort.

*It could be that only now will the past open up to us with unexpected freshness and tell us things no one has yet had ears to hear. But it cannot be denied that without a securely anchored tradition - and the loss of this security occurred several hundred years ago - the whole dimension of the past has also been endangered. We are in danger of forgetting, and such an oblivion - quite apart from the contents themselves that could be lost - would mean that, humanly speaking, we would deprive ourselves of one dimension, the dimension of depth in human existence. For memory and depth are the same, or rather, depth cannot be reached by man except through remembrance.

***We are necessary as efficient causes of new sentences, producers of new information formulated with old words.

**Content of Europe is namely to be a repository, being open to university. To Europe, at the level of civilization it is as important as at the level of individual – proper names of those who live there. Our names in many cases are personal names. Exceptions occur seldom, for example, adjectives (Constant, Aimable etc.). In fact, here we face a specific result of secondary meaning in culture: proper Jewish and Pagan names, which could have meaning in Hebrew (John, etc.), Latin (Mark, etc.) or Germanic (Bernard, etc.) languages. Cristians have taken over the names, but forgotten their primary meaning. In most civilizations names have meaning – of course a priory praising, immediately referring to something what is expeted from a child who is given that name. And to a European, his identity is – just empty frame, which one will have to fill.

***As efficient causes of expressions that convey information, we are interchangeable. Our singularity and our indefinite discernibility is found in, and is heard in, our outcries and our murmurs, our laughter and our tears: the noise of life.

***It is not also false to suppose that only the meaning attached to words by a code, fixed or evolving, communicates? The rhythm, the tone, the periodicity, the stammerings, and the silences communicate. In the rush of the brethless voice, the tumult of events is conveyed; in the heavy silence theat weights on the voice, the oppressive tedium of a place is communicated. “ ‘Prove it,’ demands the logocentic system that the art historian worships. ‘Prove that you still love me….’ ”Joanna Frueh, performance art critic, is saying it in different intonations, volumes, and crescendos - sparring with the voice of the academic demand, and circling around the male: “prove it…. Prove that you still love me….” “Prove that you still love me….”