I scanned books on the Internet and found a copy of "Blasphemy" and searched for the author Giojo Agamben, who is an influential contemporary philosopher. "Blasphemy" has ten articles. In addition to "In Praise of the God of Gamblers" which is used as the title of the collection, it also explores topics including patron saints, bid days, parody, desire, magic and happiness, assistants, authors, etc. Xiaowen.
I don’t know if it is because of my lack of research on religion. I cannot really grasp the essence of many of his words. Moreover, it is a collection of essays, so I am not too familiar with his philosophical views. clear. Even so, it does not prevent me from discovering some dazzling insights in his articles. The short words connected several ideas in my mind and lit up a few small light bulbs.
It often makes sense to understand a word and study its etymology. The etymology of Genius in Latin is close to genius (genio) and generation (generare), and in Western astrology, a person's guardian star is related to the moment of birth. In the Roman family tradition, on the birthday of the patron saint, wine, two-month-old piglets, lamb with sauce, and honey cakes were offered to the patron saint, all in order to thank the patron saint for giving "me" existence. At the moment of birth, the patron saint comes, who gives us talents, gifts, and allows a person to "become" himself, taking with him the cosmic form of that moment. Thinking about the importance of birth time in Chinese birth horoscopes and Western personal horoscopes, they actually represent the energy given to a person at a certain moment. Therefore, rather than respecting the patron saint, it is better to say that people should be kind to and grateful for their innate talents, and not waste or ignore them. Why celebrate a birthday? In the past, in the West, it was actually to celebrate the appearance of the patron saint in people, but now it is mostly to gather friends together. Agam must have read Jungian theory. He believes that in addition to the perceivable parts of the patron saint, there are also many "impersonal" parts that cannot be perceived, those "intimacy in non-conscious areas" and "everyday mysteries". "Practice of doctrine" and "writing of impersonal power" are all ways in which the patron saint exists. "Guardian Saint", which is placed in the first chapter of the collection, is very eye-catching.
Do you know where the patron saint is? forehead. When people are confused, they often put their hands on their forehead unconsciously. This is the ritual gesture of worshiping the patron saint.
What does another commonly used word, "religion" mean? An etymology that Agamben considers inaccurate is that religio (religion) comes from religare (something that connects and unifies the human and the divine), while Agamben believes that the etymology comes from relegere (referring to the relationship between something human and divine). Religio "is not what unifies man and God," It is something that ensures that the two are different. "There is no religion without separation, and those meticulous rituals - sacrifices - fulfill the role of separation.
Ha, religion does not simply connect you to God, but emphasizes differences, emphasizing the clear boundaries between "gods" and "humans". This boundary is built by a series of rituals. The opposite of religion, therefore, "is not distrust and indifference to the sacred; on the contrary, it is 'negligence', that is, an act of freedom before things and their uses, before separated forms and their meanings", "blasphemy" ” (Agamben here refers to the “blasphemy” of sacred categories and realms, rather than referring to a specific god) Returning things that belong to the gods in some way to human use and ownership. Ritual is no longer sacred, humans liberate sacred ritual through games.
Games are a bridge between the sacred and the non-sacred. If I hadn’t read Agamben, I wouldn’t have known that many games originated from ancient religious rituals: playing ball originated from the battle between the gods for possession of the sun, games based on chance to win originated from the practice of oracles, Tops and chessboards are tools for divination... The sacred is composed of myths and rituals. Through games, we either retain the rituals and remove the myths, or retain the myths and remove the rituals, allowing the sacred things to step off the altar. They secularize (bringing power back to some divine model that ensures its exercise, such as the political secularization of theological concepts that replaces celestial monarchy with earthly monarchy) and blasphemy (deactivating the apparatus of power and converting it into The space seized by power is returned to the same use), allowing the sacred to lose its aura.
Agamben elaborates a lot on "blasphemy", mainly to illustrate that capitalism is a more powerful religion. This religion uses various methods to prevent people from "blasphemy" behavior and allows itself to firmly establish itself as a god. On the altar. In this "Praise to Blasphemy", his analysis of capitalism did not interest me very much, but his study of the etymology of "religion" and his analysis of "blasphemy" and "secularization" opened my eyes. Vision.
What you can’t get is happiness
Do you want to have magic? I think. Walter Benlangming once said that a child’s first experience of the world is not " "Adults are stronger but they don't know magic". Agamben also believes that sometimes children's sadness is caused by their own lack of magic. If you can bring Aladdin's magic lamp with you and say "Open Sesame", it will turn it on. Treasure, or having a magic wand or invisibility cloak, that is the happiest thing.
A decent life and a happy life are completely different. How can we be happy? There is an old adage that says, "He who realizes happiness is no longer happy." Therefore, what Agamben means is that happiness is what cannot be obtained. However, he also extended the idea. All definitions and naming are constraints. When you liberate yourself from names, you have the key to the kingdom of magicians.
Photos of the apocalypse
What kind of photographer is excellent? It can create a sense of the end of the world and the feeling of Judgment Day. Why? Photos are meant to prove that moment when you existed but disappeared.
Parody
Comes from ancient Greek epics. When the chanter interrupts his recitation, the performer comes in to reverse and subvert the previous recitation content. By changing the words, the meaning becomes into something ridiculous. Of course, there are so-called "serious parodies" that do express serious content, such as the vomit-inducing movie "120 Days of Sodom."
"Blasphemy" is not a very thick book, and since some of the content is not to my liking yet, I read it very quickly. But catching a few eye-catching insights is a bonus. I like his discussion on etymology.
Giorgio Agamben (1942-) is a famous contemporary Italian philosopher and thinker. He has taught at many colleges and universities such as the University of Macerata, University of Verona, School of Architecture in Venice, International Institute of Philosophy in Paris, and European Graduate School in Italy. His research fields are extensive and far-reaching, and he enjoys a high reputation in the international academic community. He has written extensively, including "Nude", "blasphemy", "What is an installation", "On Fraternity", "Church and Kingdom", "The State of Exception", "The Sacrament of Language" and other works involving philosophy, politics, literature and art.