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“Sic transit gloria mundi*”: quoted the Italian premier on hearing the ignominious death of Col.Gadaffi- a mere rhetorical remark and not a didactic one. That we are not concerned with a virtue until we find it lacking in our adversaries, we observe with Nietzsche. Our epistemological and ethical quests have taught us to treat the other as a mere object and ensured that an inescapable dichotomy is maintained. As a result the inauthentically constructed or constituted human nature enters into a labyrinth of complex power relations. The papal election was once followed by the illustrious ceremony of burning a ball of flax mounted on a gilded pole with the exhortation of the above mentioned: *“Thus transits the glory of the world,” serving a grim reminder against hubris.

Imagination goads man to further the limits of his exertions. All the technical advancements of our times are augmentative rather than therapeutic. The classical attributes of God- omniscience, omnipresence and omnipotence- seem to lure man into their realizations in the temporal realm. This is to be read together with the death-of-God trends in the contemporary worldview. The plight of the technologically, informationally or cognitively disadvantaged sections of the society signals the new equations of power that takes apolitical forms but nevertheless presenting an increased existential impact. Social watchers speak of zombification of the society where corporate greed has made zombies out of men drawing away all the vitality. Mimetic contagion impels men to herd-thinking and increased levels of socio-cultural claustration and poses hermeneutical ceilings. Hannah Arendt has observed that the leader of a mob appeals to the generic or biological needs of the mob and hence cannot lead to an effective social reconstruction. The decadence in our public and private lives is a clear indication of the mob compliance that is latent in our collectivities.

Reflecting on the word “authority” can be enlightening. It is double headed and hides within itself connotations of a making (authoring) and of an enforcement or administration of a set of norms. The objectivity of moral norms has always been objectionable. Consider the case of a religious rule. There exists a sort of realism in understanding this rule. The rule has to precede the congregation of adherers normatively and constitutively of its lifestyle. It is inauthentic to think that the rule can be disposed to suit the congregational contingencies. There is objectivity of a norm, which at the same time warrants concretization in an intersubjective real-time situation. When a keeper of law presumes himself as the author of the law it becomes purely whimsical and subjective. In that case the sense of “authority” can be suggestively and conveniently explained by the term auctoritas. Let me posit it as an embodiment of an obfuscated distinction between being an auctor in the genitive sense and in the administrative sense. The objectivity shall never be lost sight of and the subjectivity shall not go untouched.

The Nativity reminds us of a dialogical discourse. Arendt classifies actions as those which are meant to fabricate or make and those which are meant to communicate acknowledging the intersubjectivity. Action can become the most dangerous of human faculties. The monologic discourses that govern the world actions can become constitutive of reality. The theocratic world view, reeking of an authoritarian God, gave way to a Christophanous ontocracy in our religious understanding. This was effected by Incarnation. By Incarnation God became perceptibly pervasive of all realities. Every moment of our life should, hence be open to the public aletheia- the gradual disclosure of the whole. There should also be the admittance of non-sovereign qualities of human freedom. God the Auctor-par-excellence subjected his auctoritas to the non-sovereignty of human condition.

This makes the life of Jesus, a kaleidoscope of miraculous activities, a celebration of spiritual spontaneity and a preparation of the unexpected.

23.11.11

Text of Times

Advisory: Wherever one comes across the word ‘text’, do not understand it merely as a written group of letters, but as any experience or events where somebody(thing) else is involved.

We all are accustomed to hypertexts, especially those net-savvy who have seen the cursor magically turning a pointed finger when placed over certain text in a webpage. Well, that is just the tip of the iceberg of what is informationally available beyond.

Before a computer started to connect to other computers, it was just a tool but now it has become a portal to look into a virtual world created elsewhere and where you can peek into someone else’s projects. That signals the rising of a digital culture or more aptly what José B. Terceiro has dubbed as the homo digitalis in lieu of homo sapiens. Incidentally, the word ‘digital’ literally means ‘pertaining to fingers.’ When one speaks of information at the fingertips it sounds as if the information is ‘present-at-hand’- vorhanden (to borrow from existential phenomenologists)- as reified. When a piece of literature is seen just as a juxtaposition of chunks of texts which are situationally disparate in their origins (eg. When one fabricates an essay by fishing the material out from a searchable electronic text) what is at stake is the coherence of the idea. Conversely, an author who has created an original piece may find it difficult to find a reader who has enough willingness to traverse an “unsearchable” text (by ‘searchable’ we mean that which is able to return results for a particular ‘search string.’) Suppose one is reading a voluminous printed text which has no subject index. In that case a reader who is looking for a particular idea in the text will be bound to follow the logical structure of the work. In that way he tentatively participates in the original logic of the author. Then there is a more degenerate option at hand- to make a cursory scan over the text, one that is disinterested about any other details, and to locate the one that concerns us. What the computer search algorithms of our times have accomplished is the augmentation of that disinterested search. No matter how intelligent the algorithm is, it cannot represent the participation in the mind of the author.

Hypertext links can facilitate a non-sequential reading of the text. One of the most important aspects of information revolution is that it can accommodate private schemes. One wants to read on Sartre and goes to a Wikipedia page, and one finds numerous openings for digressions and random access of diversified topics concerning Sartre. This way, one develops a private scheme of interpreting the text on a pragmatic basis. This is the great tragedy that can befall on an author- when a reader approaches the piece of literature with a vested interest the authors scheme is aborted. That is inevitable, some may say, but it shall not be forgotten that the worst malformations of ideas have been triggered by a text being torn out of context. These private schemes or customizations are possible, as is familiar in digital media players too, by way of playlists (a playlist is a list of music to be played which the hearer can pick; contrast this with the earlier ways of cassettes which would play only sequentially and one had to traverse the length of the tape mechanically to reach one’s hotspot. That is called a sequential approach). Nowadays all the information storage devices are built with the idea of random access in view. (So you get what you wanted at click of the mouse.) To accommodate an element of surprise in the sequence (playlist) some shuffled modes are possible, but be assured that there is no absolute uncertainty over what is going to play but only a diminished probability. In real life this can amount to a nomadic wandering vis-a –vis a guided tour. In a private scheme we pre-ordain the events. A private scheme is detached from the original rendering, is pragmatic and often exclusivistic interpretation of the original text. Very often we miss the silence intended between the lines of the text- a room for brooding over. In a private scheme the utilitarian chunks of texts are juxtaposed in a very dyslogistic manner which often has no relation to the source.

St.Cyprian has made a very insightful comment as he said that the Word of God remained silent when He was led to the Cross. It is the very nature of word to communicate, but when it remains silent know that we are treading on a plane where no words can avail. In the hegemonical plot that leads Jesus to Calvary , atleast under the mirror of time, the script of the high priests was being enacted. It was their private scheme and they took it to be ordained course of events. Therefore the silence that pervaded Calvary and the Sepulchre was musical to their ears until the tomb tore open and let Him out, whom nothing can contain. There the silence is broken and the Eternal Disordination happens.

Transit Us

I feared that the verb ‘transit’ would be intransitive, but hopefully it is not. It plays double and gives me enough space to work my legs both ways. The inquisitive nature of man had always had overtones of accusation, a sense of angst and an orientation to salvation. It inevitably involves a release from the monotony of daily routines or general procedures. Philosophical endeavours thus poised on the verge utter non-conformity and many of the mystical writings from any part of the world sounded like narrations of escapades often spilling over to erotic symbolism. The adventurous medieval soul expressed itself with full import wherever it was involved. Thus it is with the same recklessness that sent Francis flying in his mail and tapestries that he approaches the burning bush of God’s love. We should start to speak of these singular experiences as paradigm shifts rather than conversions, because no such transformative action takes place in a mediocre soul; even God finds it unpalatable. To know that ‘transit’ admits passive and active modes makes us all the more accountable, sparing us the trouble of locating a first cause for our demeanours for which none but we are responsible.

Foucault speaks of ethics as ascetics. Ethics becomes self’s relation to itself and is therefore part of both the history of subjectivity and the history of governmentality. This reminds one of the need to take constant care of oneself- an intensification of relations to oneself. The alienation from the self is the greatest impediment to wholesome axiological experience of any given situation. It robs us of the basic certainty of our experiences. Foucault quotes Seneca as saying Disce gaudere - learn how to feel joy, that which will never fail one when one has found its source. It is a de tuo - from your own store- which implies that it is the very self and the best part of you. This realization led the early philosophers to have recourse to ascetic styles of life. By their out-of-the-ordinary behaviours they came to be called as atopos- unclassifiable. This is to be seen as a way of eminence by which the philosopher attempts to transcend the banality of the situations. This is in stark contrast to dystopic lives which are malignantly out of place and contra-communitarian. Asceticism necessarily warrants social involvement. The essential psychic content of the spiritual exercises of ancient philosophy is the feeling of belonging to a cosmic consciousness. As Seneca calls it, ‘a plunge into the totality of the world.’

It is, therefore, no surprise that in the Canticle of Brother Sun each cosmic element is seen to be an appreciation of matter and thought to possess a profound splendor. Imagined (oneiric) images of material things have their roots in the soul and ‘every landscape we love is a state of soul.’ It is noted that the adjective ‘precious’ Francis adjoins to the elements of nature is used elsewhere by him only in relation to the Most Holy Body and Blood. The theological intuition of Francis regarding the universal fatherhood of God was inseparable from a profound affective and aesthetic experience.

Does it not rhyme well when Max Weber proposes Buddha, Jesus and Francis as archetypes of world-denying love (Liebesakosmismus) and posits that such a stand is more akin to mysticism rather than asceticism? The religiosity of the congregation transferred the ancient ethic of neighbourliness to the relations among brethren of faith. It moves in the direction of universalist brotherliness which goes beyond all barriers of social association, often including that of one’s faith. There existed a sense of generalized reciprocity among kinsmen in pre-congregational societies but the expectation of reciprocity was indefinite. This gets absolutized in religious brotherhoods. Weber believes that Jesus was quite deliberately homeless as he invited others to this life of zero-establishments. In Buddha the superhuman compassion bridges the vast gulf between eternal silence of transcendental wisdom and the preaching of the truth in the world. Similiarly one may very well think that in the Incarnation, God himself tried to bridge a communication gap putting an end to his supposed status of absconditus. God so loved the world. This is reminiscent of Heinrici’s co-incarnational model of communication. There is an intrinsic relationship between world-denial and love. Our love for man is entirely dependent on God and as we are obliged to love everyone, we can do that only in the respect in which everyone is equal, i.e., in the relation to God, whose children they are.

As Onam celebrations came to a close, something strikes my mind, incidentally. Three teams went up for a bicycle slow-race taking turns on the only two bicycles available, one with a rickety seat which gave its rider a visible disadvantage. It occurred to none (me culpa!) to fix it. Rather lots were cast to condemn a team to this bike. In such an exercise we preclude a positive action and localize the naturality in time and space tying to the singularity of the action of taking lots. Thereby we adopt an arbitrary turnout as a determinant. It works well with lotteries but not with men. If only we could transcend and transit over the conveniences of a false conscience and associations to delve into a cosmic liturgy.

11.09.11

An I for an eye

Sartre has spoken: “In football everything is complicated by the presence of the opposing team.” Watching an amateur football game where the instincts are not subjected to a legitimacy check, one may rephrase the above as “...by the presence of others in my team.” It is just an innocuous reminder of a momentous trend to monologically resolve the contrasts and hence to preserve oneself. Ironically, this act of reconciliation is not by sharing of space with the other but by re-asserting oneself in the scenario. This leads to the rise of insular entities which are not thoroughly secluded but protruded on a grid of inter-relations.

Lives are getting reduced to monographs and cyber profiles are posited as a mode of existence. Octavio Paz has commented that monotony is an attribute of immensity. Transcribed into social realm, a quest for personal immensity can lead to a monographic representation of oneself. In the levels of communicationa monographic expression can become monotonic and its constitution can become monolithic. The Virtual World (read as cyber world) has changed the way we think of the world. It has given us a sensible substratum to project oneself, but being in vogue can become a matter of life and death in the virtual world. Tenability and viability in the virtual world has added a new dimension to the longing for our immensity. People come as profiles, enumerating a bundle of categories (which largely serve the commercial interests of hidden players). Constant status-updates and customizations of personal space and the volume of communication, as a norm, suggest a dynamic virtual life. One can catch up with it and even turn up in the halls of fame in the virtual world. Every virtual activity ultimately boils down to a nondescript and extremely personal expression of a self which is conveniently called by a username. A cyberpersonality secures the liminal space of his existential microcosm from the macrocosm of the virtual world by a password, technically a private key which is very vulnerable to an incursion by a "bad other." When these sort of monographic expressions become the order of the day, what is at stake is the readiness to face the concrete reality man-to-man.

The monotony of monographic existence can be very heady Monotony transposed into eternity gives cyclicity. Cyclicity is the mark of man's sacred exercises as Mirce Eliade has shown. A search for a meaning in the cyclicity or the recurrences of life and understanding them as scaled down versions of a cosmic cycle has been the thrust of a variety of religious traditions. The celebrated Tea Ceremony in Zen Buddhism reveals how a unique instance is possible even when the framework remains rigidly essential and canonical. Monotone is the sound of universalization and as such it overlooks the beauty of particularities. Music takes our breath away and syncopation even more. Nevertheless in an actuarial mode of understanding life there are no particulars, only eventualities. Foucault speaks of a carceral continuum running through the society. Accordingly, discipline is understood as an economy of the body. Structural similarities exist between monastic formation and penal confinement. What robs the charm off
the latter is the tiring monotony of that life reminiscent of the infraction each moment and thus reliving the moment of infraction in a vicious circle, it is a monolithic existence. Monastic discipline is an orientation towards a soteriological point. This renders fluidity to that life.

So far an attempt was made to draw a distinction between adopted and inflicted versions of monographic existence.