05/04/2014

amavi fere semper linguam sanctam

Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael
Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael
Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael
Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael
Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael
Qal, Niphal, Piel, Pual, Hiphil, Hophal, Hithpael

Vasos Gregos

In 1949 [Seth Benardete] was for me a formidable exotic. I remember vividly to this day a long conversation we had one night in his dormitory room during which Benardete informed me that he regarded it immoral to love a human being. As a youth with a certain proclivity to this form of immorality, I was incredulous and asked him what we should love. He replied in a magisterial tone: "Greek vases."
Stanley Rosen in Leo Strauss in Chicago

03/04/2014

Tu és o Rio

Tu és o Rio, tudo conheces, tudo vês. E eu sou um peixe. Como posso encontrar o teu limite?
Para onde quer que olho, tu estás lá. Se saio de ti, estrebucho e morro.

Guru Granth Sahib, 25
Tradução minha da tradução inglesa.

17/03/2014

A repetição da antiguidade no pico da modernidade

The center of Strauss's reflection is the extraordinary nature of philosophical questioning, whose radicality he contrasted with the moderation required by political action. "The virtue of the philosopher's thought is a certain kind of mania, while the virtue of the philosopher's public speech is sophrosune." [...]

Philosophy necessarily begins with reflection on particulars that lead to awareness of the universal but are never wholly derivable from the universal. No instance of the philosophic life is strictly speaking repeatable, given that it is always a particular life, engaged with particular circumstances, in erotic quest for the universal. Löwith's formulation "repetition of antiquity at the peak of modernity"* spoke to Strauss since it brings forward the essential novelty of what seems to be only a recurrence of the same. The boldness of repetition involves the daring of unorthodox readings. "Who can dare to say that Plato's doctrine of ideas as he intimated it, or Aristotle's doctrine of the nous that does nothing but think itself and is essentially related to the eternal visible universe, is the true teaching?"

Richard Velkley. Heidegger, Strauss, and the Premises of Philosophy: On Original Forgetting. Chicago University Press (2011) P11&163


* Frase que Karl Löwith usa para se referir a Nietzsche.

26/02/2014

um de muitos hinos

não é esta a noite do mundo. se for, não sei
pra que serve este coro, face ao silêncio
dos titans e à iniquidade demente
aprisionada no teu peito - porque é hei-de

preparar as danças, aprender as falas,
praticar a fé, e ensair justiça
até que na estreia do mundo não esteja omissa
nenhuma das virtudes? «entregá-las

à humanidade.» ingenuidade, bela
e travessa, a trapaceira liberdade
de que só um deus como Sade
se poderia lembrar. a tua promessa é grande. ainda que sê-la

seja uma responsabilidade demasiado
pesada. preferimos tarefas mais simples:
a arte, a poesia, o desenfrear dos sentidos, a inteligência.
lançando-me contra o mar encrespado

gritei o bem que não sou. mas o bem
aprende-se, e se carece
de professores, bem, ao menos mede-se
segundo os teus beijos, e tem

na tua glória a escala.
virá o dia em que no céu estrelado
não brilharão mais deuses e que no estrado
teatral do coração a lei que o teu sopro exala

não se fará ouvir. virá o dia
em que a justiça não poderá jorrar
e nem sequer gotejar, e não trará enfado
aos propósitos dos iníquos. seja. até então, desafia

a nossa vontade para os teus mandamentos.
invade o nosso desejo. apodera-te dos nossos gestos.
mesmo se nem sempre cumprirmos, faz de nós a festa
rouca que dite e vote ao teu silêncio.

20/02/2014

Persas — Quando viste...

Quando viste no mundo alguém a sacrificar ao demónio, tu por tua vez começaste a adorar Deus; e quando viste alguém a atacar e a assaltar e a perturbar homens bons e a tomar o que era deles com más acções, tu por tua vez evitaste tratar as criaturas com violência e rapina; cuidaste dos justos e deste-lhes as boas-vindas e recebeste-os na tua casa com presentes. A tua riqueza, viesse de perto ou de longe, foi adquirida honradamente. E quando viste pessoas a prestar falsos juramentos e a deixar-se corromper com dinheiro e a cometer perjúrio, tu por tua vez decidiste-te a dizer a verdade e a falar com justiça. Eu sou os teus pensamentos justos, as tuas palavras justas, as tuas justas acções, pensados, faladas, realizadas por ti.
(Poema persa séc VI a.C.)

08/02/2014

O que faz falta...

What is most needed is a thorough and accurate knowledge of the poems, conjoined with the sort of common sense that would be used in the study of a modern author. This can be better attained by reading Homer and consulting the literature of criticism than by reading the literature of criticism and consulting Homer.
George M. Calhoun, Polity and Society p.438
(citado na epígrafe a Anne Parry, Blamess Ægisthus)

obrigado Sophia!

05/02/2014

PRECE QUA FATIGENT?

Quem vocet divum populus ruentis
imperi rebus? Prece qua fatigent
virgines sanctæ minus audientem
     carmina Vestam?

ει δέ τις ὑπέροπτα χερ-
σὶν ὴ λόγῳ πορεύεται,
Δίκας αφόβητος ουδὲ
δαιμόνων ἕδη σέβων,
κακά νιν ἕλοιτο μοῖρα,
δυσπότμου χάριν χλιδᾶς,
ει μὴ τὸ κέρδος κερδανεῖ δικαίως
καὶ τῶν ασέπτων έρξεται,
ὴ τῶν αθίκτων ἕξεται ματᾴζων.
τίς έτι ποτ' εν τοῖσδ' ανὴρ θυμοῦ βέλη
εύξεται ψυχᾶς αμύνειν;
ει γὰρ αἱ τοιαίδε πράξεις τίμιαι,
τί δεῖ με χορεύειν;

Serus in cælum redeas diuque
lætus intersis populo Quirini,
neve te nostris vitiis iniquum
     ocior aura

tollat; hic magnos potius triumphos,
hic ames dici pater atque princeps,
neu sinas Medos equitare inultos
     te duce, Cæsar!

01/01/2014

Conhecimento & Pesquisa

I know that sermons against specialization are two a penny and that they are unlikely to make an impression on those who know how hard it is even to master a small field of research. But I should like to urge here the essential difference, in this respect, between the role of research in the sciences and in the humanities. The scientist, if I understand the situation, must always work on the frontiers of knowledge. He must therefore select a small sector in which hypotheses can be tested and revised by means of experiments which may be costly and time-consuming. He, too, no doubt, should be able to survey a larger field, and be well-read in the neighbouring disciplines, but what he is ultimately valued for is his discoveries rather than his knowledge.

It is different, I content, with the humanist. Humanistic education aims first and foremost at knowledge, that knowledge that used to be called 'culture'. In the past this culture was largely transmitted and absorbed in the home or on travels. The universities did not concern themselves with such subjects as history or literature, art or music. Their aim was mainly vocational, and even a training in the Classics, though valued by society, had its vocational reasons. Nobody thought that it was the purpose of a university education to tell students about Shakespeare or Dickens, Michelangelo or Bach. These were things the 'cultured' person knew. They were neither fit objects for examinations nor for research.

I happen to have some sympathy for this old-fashioned approach, for I think that the humanist really differs from the scientist in his relative valuation of knowledge and research. It is more relevant to know Shakespeare, or Michelangelo than to 'do research' about them. Research may yield nothing fresh, but knowledge yields pleasure and enrichment. It seems a thousand pities that our universities are so organized that this difference is not acknowledged.

Much of the malaise of the humanities might disappear overnight if it became clear that they need not ape the sciences in order to become respectable. There may be a science of culture, but this belongs to anthropology and sociology. The cultural historian wants to be a scholar, not a scientist. He wants to give his students and his readers access to the creations of other minds; research, here, is incidental. Not that it is never necessary. We may suspect current interpretations of Shakespeare or the way Bach is performed and want to get at the truth of the matter. But in all this research the cultural historian really aims at serving culture rather than at feeding the academic industry.

This industry, I fear, threatens to become an enemy of culture and of cultural history. Few people can read and write at the same time; and while we pursue our major and minor problems of research, the unread masterpieces of the past look at us reproachfully from the shelves.

E. H. Gombrich. In Search of Cultural History. Clarendon Press (1969).