Theologie, William Blake

(1) D.G. James, “The Romantic comedy  – An essay on English Romanticis,”, Oxford University Press 1963; “… Blake may fittingly be comapered with Spinoza. For Blake had, if anyoe ever had the anima naturaliter hristiana, which shows itself in his writings. But he aso set his face firmly againt the Christian tradition in which he was reared and combated it trhoughout much the greater part of his work. In reagrd to the second, Blake like Spinoza, exalts deseire to a placeof the highest importance. Spinoza had indeed to resort to understanding, at the priceof consistency, for salvation; but in the doctrine of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell we hear little of understanding and reason.  If they are mentioned, it is to call them the ‘usurpersof the place of desire’; they are the enemiesof ‘energy’ and therefore of the emancipation of the senses and of the imagnation. Now Spinoza’s theoretical inconsistency though deplorabe philosophically, rescues his ethic and gives it a peculiar importance in the history of human thought. But Blake’s ethic, sof ar as Blake may be said to develop it, although consistent, hardly merits begin taken seriously. Spinoza acknowledgeds, in effect, however unwilingly, that advance to the ife of fredom iis thorugh conflict beteen ‘desire’ and ‘understanding’; Blake apears to beleive that any such conflict should cease and that desire should be given free rein. He wishes hus, thatis to say, to be as ‘natural’ oas possible, and thinks that we can, if e wish, beentirely natural. To be atural, to be ourselves, as he thinks, through placing no restraint upon ourselves, would be to have freedom and an immense enrichment of ourives and or our imaginations. /

(2) Passim: So much at least Blake certainly appears to believe. But he shows little of any signof ahving thought with any care concerning this starngedoctrine. In fact, it requires little thougt to see that waht Balke says is both confused in itself and contrafy to the facts of experence. It is not difficult to show, inthe First place, how confusedit is. In act, it requires little thought to see that what Bake says is both confused in itself en conrtary to the facts of experience. It is not diffcult to show, in the First palce, how confucsed it is. He wishes us to be creaturs of desire and imagination, not of moral restraint and reason;  a violent antiintellectulism goes alng with his desire that mankind should release itself from a moral state in which chekck is placed upon impulse . Now animals have not reason, nor do they chose. But Blakes doesnot, we may resume, wish us to become animals in the sense that we shall become incapable fo reason;o rif, in his vague dreaming, he did desire this, he could only do so by forgetting that if we had not reason we cerainly would not have imagination. For it is certain that imagination, whatever it may of may not be, cannot possbly act in independence of the nowledge afforded us by the prcessus of thougt. Without power of thought awareness of a world of object as objects is not possible. It is foolish to think that, our intelecutal nature desrowyed, we could then be possessed of imagination, wheteher or not apprehenindg infinity in all things. If the imaginaiton may ever, in any sense, be sid to transcend thougt, it can do so, we may bes ure, onlu, in part at least,throughthe previous aid of thougt; and with this Spinoze, for his part, would have emphatically agreed, for hi ‘scienttia intuitiva’ isno mee collapse below the level of the rational, but a consummation of the rational. Without the aid of thought, the iamgination has no world in which to act, no materials to refashion. It may be indeed that, as Kant said, thought without imagination is helpless; but it is certain that iamgination without thought is tillborn. It is all very well to be vaguely and grandly anti-intellectualist; and no doubt it may well bet hat the intelligencehas its limits.But whatever the inteligence may not do, it is the height of folly and vague emotionlaim to overlook what in fact it does. Spinoza was wiser in trying to see … man’s rational and moral life as a partof what he regarded … as man’s animal nature. /

(3) Passim: Let us therefore accquit Blake of so extreme and mistaken a view, more perhaps fot he sake of the argument hanin cnfidence hat he did nt think something Lieke this. If he desired that we should remain intelligent creaturs, he seems nevertheless to have thougt that thrugh the continued parcticeof not restraining our desires we should reach a state of equilibirum in which acting wholly on iimulse, whe should be happy, stabe, and social. This of course asumes a great deal as to what human nature is really like, ansd as to what it ‘naturally’ is. But putting this aside, it requires a curious lack of thought to belveivetht beign whose inteligens is at all more noticable than that of animals [even if thier life be lived for ever in a Garden of Ede or happy South Sea island] could live in ignoranceof experience of choosing. Blake of course is ware that the presence  in us of reason is part and parcel of our leves as moral beings. But if we are at a to eve and intelgent [and threrefore imaginatie life, it is inconceivable that we can with any show of sense hope for our release from a moral state in which we are constantly confronted with alternative Lines of action No doubt we can sympathise with his lining for wholeness of mind an dfredom; but it is certain that is doctrine, offering the way of fingththse things, is very confused. /

(4) Pasim: In the second place, if his idea is confused in itself, it is also clear that he could only have envisaged, however vagueley, this kind of innocence and fredom by overlooking certain important factors; and another Romantic riter, wrting indeed without any knowledge of Blake, thrugh aware that htis kind of belief was abroad at the time, obsered whtat these facotrs are. Keats said in one of his letters that he did not ‘at all believe in this sort of perfectibility’. // ‘The nature of the world’, he went on, ‘will not admit of it – the inhabitants of the world will correspond to itself. Let the fish Philosophise the isce away from the Rivers in winter time and they shall be at  contnual paly in the tepird delightsof Summer. Look at the Poles and at the Sands of Arica, Whirlpools and volcanoues – Let men exterminate them and I will say that tey may arrive at earthly Happiness – The point at which Man mary arrive is as far as the parallel ste in sensation, it blooms on a beautiful morning it enjoys itself – but there comes a cold wind, a hot sun – it cannot escape it, it cannot destroy its annoyances – theyr are as native to the world as itself …’ // But this is no all. // ‘The most interesting question that can come before us it, How far … mankind can be made happy – I can iagine such happiness carried to an extreme – but what must it end in? – Death – and who could in such a case bear with death – the whole troubles of life which are now frittered away in a series of years, would then be accumulatd for the last days of a being who instead of hailing its appoach would leave this word as Eve  left Paradise’. // So do Keat’s almost casual remarks demolish Blakee’s vague daydreaming. It required a curious perversity to overlook the considerations which occupy Keat’s sentences, and in disregard fort hem to try to see in an obscurely conceived ‘natural innocence’ what might be an end for human ife. //

(5) Passim:  Fianlly, Blake’s beliefs appear to rest on the assumtion that our desires are somehow good and must lead to happness.But the great mass of opinon agress that there is little or no ground for ths belief; and that on the contratry the expeirenceof the race leads ut to cnclue that human nature is in part at least naturally eveil. This is also the view of Christianty , and Blake himself, irrittingly enough, appears to have thought so from time to time [here, however, agin he went to extremes – ‘Man is only evil’ he said]. Now if this is so, and the human will mysterously infected with evil, only a supernatural agency can save it. The Crhistian belief, wheter right or worng, is that the evil natural to us is finally expunged by the grace and act of God. That act, moreover, does not restore us to the innocence of an Adam in Eden; we are ‘made new new in Christ’ and in that state indeed are redeemed from tme in the knowledge of God. The evil in man is overruled by God to serve teh purposesof an new cratin. But thise beliefs are altogether opposed to those of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, and Balke cannot have them both. Sooneror laater he must come to acknowledge, if not Christianity, the absurdity of his belief in ‘desire’. But it will be a long time before this acknowledgement comes; and in th First group of propheti corks, to which we shall now turn, it is the gospel of desire which he preaches. In them he paapearts to llk, not for the ‘innocence’ of eternal life, which Christianity promises, but a wholly natural innocense. He will try, in thes prophetic books, to set out in poetry a notion and ideal, confused in itself, and divorced from the plain facts of the world and of life.”

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(6) D.G. James, “The Romantic comedy  – An essay on English Romanticis,”, Oxford University Press 1963; “Both Uranos and Urizen are jeaous gods and fathers. I do not wish to erect a vague enough similarity into a show of certainty; but the matter is at least worth considerations. Also, it is worth noticing the following passage. In the Third Night of Vala, Urizen, addressing Ahania, says: ‘O bright Ahania, a Boy is born of the dark Ocean / Whom Urizen doth serve, with Light repenishing his darkness. / I am set here a Kingof trouble, commanded here to serve / And do my ministry to those who eat of my wide table. / All this is mine, yet I must serve, and that prophetic boy / Must grow up to command his Prince; but hear my determin’d decree: / Vala shall become a Worm in Enitharmon’s Womb, / And Luvah n the loinsof Los a dark and furious eath. / Alas for me! What will become of me at that dread time?’ // This passage like most in Blake’s work, is obsucure enough. Whatever else Urizen may be saing, it seem clear that th e anticipates taht a child wil be ron, presumably of Los and Enitharmon [the sinificance of whom we need not ere apuse to consider], who will oertrouw Urizen – ‘that Prophetic boy must grow up to command his Prince’. Now in fact a child [Orc] is brn to Los and Enitharmon – a ‘fiery child’ [Vala, Fifth Night]; and it is he who oertrows the power of Urizen. In the Sevent night of Vala Urizen is terrified by the appearance of Orc, whom he recognizes as fulfilmnet of a prophecy. I suggest that here aso we have an adaptation of Greek myth. Bot Uranos and Zeus feared the power of a child yet to be born and that this child would overthrouw them. We can plausibly believe that any mythology attract Blake’s interest. REbellion against established Deity was a favourite theme with hi as it was to be with Sehlly. Certainly if Blake was drawing, consciously or unconsciously on Greek mythology, het ook little care to follow the myths closely; but this indeed could hardly be expected, for reasons which will become clear later on. /

(7) Passim: We shall regun again to this mater. For the rpesent, we must observe two other stand which ent tothe makingof the tangle of Blake’s mythology. They are Milton’s version of the conflict of God and Satan, and the sory of the life and eath of Christ. The Marriage for heaven and Hell is based on Blake’s rick of reversing the roles of God and Satan in paradise Lost. Milton never failed, right up to the end, as Milton shows, to fascinate Blake, and the great bulk of the group of poems we are considerng in Marriage of Heaven and Hell Blake says that the Jehovah of the Bible is ; no other than he who dwells in flaming fire’. ‘it need appear’d to Reason s if Desire was cast out; but the devil’s account is, that the Mesiah fell and formed a heaven of wht he stole from the Abyss.’ Thus, what Milton called satan was really the Messiah, or Desire of Energy. ‘The reason Milton wrote in fetters wehn he wrote ofangels and God, ant at liberty when of the Devil and Hell, is because he was a true poet and of the Devil’s party without knowing it.’In bearing thsse pasages in mind, which are of the greatest importance in reading Balke’s Prophetic Works, it is also useful to bear inmind Shelley’s famous remark that ‘The only imaginary begin resembling in any degree Prometheus, is Satan’; and shelly goes on to attribute tot satan as to Prometheus, ‘courrge, and majesty, and firm and patient opposition to omnipotent force’. Again, in the Defence of Poetry, Shelley observee that ‘Nothing can exceed the energy and magnificence of the character of Satan in Paradise Lost … Milton’s Devi as a moral begin is far superior to his God … and tis bold neglectof a direct moral purpose is the most decisive proof of the supremacy of Milton’s genus’. These remarks at once link Shelley with Bake, and Promethus with Satan. Orc is the Satan and urizen the God of Paradise Lost. /

(8) Passim: W mut not, hoewever, imagine that Balkeg ie a consistent and clear version ofthe story ofthe fall of Satan and of his temptationof Adam and Eve. In addition, i think there were good reasons why Blake cold not folow Milton’s story of Satan our cosely, just as there wer good reasons why he could not folow the Prometheus story closely. Of thse we sahll spak at a later juncture; my immediate purposeis only to indicate this important component in Blake’s confused mytholoy. Inthe Sevent Night of Vala, in its First version Orc is represente in his caves in a manner which recalls Satan in the First book of Paradise Lost. ….. We are no perhaps in a position to consider the naureof Blake’s atemps at mythology. I have said that Blake uses a number of myths for is purposes: soem fragments at elastof Greek mytholgoy, the Miltnic myth as me may call it, and the Christ myth. Someof his later use of these mthses we shall observe at another stage. Bur we have aready seen that he uses nn of these myths with care; he runs peicesof them into an clearness of outline. They run into each other ad are mingled quite bewilderingly; and if their outlnes, singly, are lot sight of Blake’s synthesis equally has no Sharp utline. That this is so, no reader of Blake takes long to discover I have ilusrated Blake’s irresponsibility by speaking of his arbitrariness in giving substantially the same figures different names when it pleases him to do so. And it would not be at all difficult to show his disregard for elementary rulesof communication in several other respects. / our immediate purpose, however, is to notice Blake’s use of mythology in the light of what we may think his puroses was in writing these peoms. The preceding paragraphs represent, I believe, a substantially correct recod, sof ar as it goes, of Blake’s doctrine. If so, it may be of some value to consider his mytholgiy as an expresion of his beliefs Sof ar, I have spoken of Blake’s Prophetic Books can with equal justice he said to be allegorical; and that at lest a partof this failure is due to his having fallen bewten the two stools of mythology and allegory. /

(9) Passim: Now a mth is not a thing which springs, fully formed, from the head of any man; it grows up as partof the cuture of a eople or peoplesNow Boake, seting out to creat a mythology, however original he may intend it to be, in fact drwas upon the mythology and symbols of the past. He takes pieces ofthem, uses tehm very much as he wishes, jons them togheter acts in no loyalty to any one. Aso, because a myth is not a quick creation but a slow development, it has a richness and a depth which are inexhaustible. In it the symbol and what is symbolized are wellnigh inseparable; the symbol is apprehended with a singlenessof mind in which thoughts are, as it were, more percieived and felt than explicitly grasped as thoughts. No philosophy of religion is a substitute for symbolic figures and events; in the last resort a theology is baren in comarison withthe contemplation of the story. Now an allegory on the other hand may well spring, neat and fully grown, from the mind of an indivdueal. But it differs from a mth in a very important respect. In allegory, thought and its figurative expresion run, so to speak, side by sisde. We must have both a narrative and a clear conceptual scheme; we re awareofth story as illustrative of the rality whih it treats of. Thse two tings cannot become one in allegory, by its ery nature; they remain appart. Certainly, they illuminate each other; but our minds are kept moving back and fore between narrative and meaning. These two tings cnnot become one in aegory, by its very nature; they reamin apart. Certainly, they illuminate each other; but our minds ae keptmoving back anffd fore bewteen narrative and meaning. It may besaid thatthe difference betwen myth ad allegory is primriy one of degree; and this may be allowed. A successful allegorist willl certainly exert himself to reduce the gap bwteen what is tougt and what is perceived; but it ramins partof the idea of allegory and the gap not wholly obliterated. /

(10) Passim: Curiously enogh, Blake has himself some iluminating remarks to make on this topic. Speaking probably of  Vala, possibly of Milton, he says in a letter ritten to Butts in July 1803, that ‘it is the Grandest Poesm that this World Contains. Allegory addressed to the Intellectual power, while it is altogether hidden from the Corporeal Understanding, is my Definition of te Most sublime Poetry …’ But he says elsewhere, nthe note called A Vision of the Last Judgment, ‘Fable or Allegory are a totally distinct and inferior kindof Poetry. Visio nor Iagination is a Representation of what Eterally Exists, Really and Unchangeabley. Fable or Allegory is form’d by the Daughtersof Memory. … Note here htat Fable or Allegory is seldom without some Vision ought to be known as Two Distinct Things.’ Blake’s prose is rareley more easy than his verse; and the difference between wat Balke Calls the ‘INtellectual Powers’ and what he calls the ‘Corporeal Understanding’ is by no menas clear to tme.The Significant matter in tese reamrks is, however, this conclusion that allegory’ is inferiro to ‘iionn’; and we may perhaps take Blake to mean sutantially what I treid to express above. Myeth, we may say, partakesof ‘ision’; allegory partakesof ‘vision’ only partialy, and involves constant apeal to memory and to explicit intelctual processes. In this sense, it is not only myth which may appeal to ‘vision’. The highest forms of literature, whether using myth or nog, may do so. The difference between King Lear and The Faerie Queene is not far to seek. This dference etwen myth and alegory is cardinal.  / We may add, though with less conidence, that mytht is most feuently cosmological and represents deities in ther ceations of worlds or their dealings with men; allegory is psychological, setting forth states and pwoer in the human mind in thier reaction upon and conflict with one another. Myth is born of speculation alleory of introspection; the frmer is outward-looking, metaphysical, ad springing from wonder, the latter inwardlooking, moral, and sprnging form mental conflict and suffering.”

Krijgsgevangenschap

(1) Yvon Garlan, “Ancient culture and society  – War in the ancient world: a social history”, Chatto & Windus 1976; “The priceof ransom varied accoring to th esocial condition of those involved, the political situation in general, and the state of th slave market. / Teh very fact thet tye wer captives usually made it imporsible for prisoners to pay for their liberty. Someone else therfore had to assure the responsibility, in archaic societies ofthen the kinsmen. A law of Gortyn in Crete of about 460 B imosed an obligation on Gortynians to buy back members of thier hetairia who were put up for sale by the enemy. Later the sate itself, withthat heigtened sense of colective solidarity which inspried it in early times, sometimes intervened directly [as in Rome, durig the second Punic war]. Alternativley, a semi-public organ for mutua aid, like the chruch in the ate Emprie, performed this function. Between allied or freindly peoples the subject was, on occasion incorporated in a treat. For instance, in about 260 BC such a treaty was dwan up bttween Miletus and the Cretan cities of Cnossus, Gortyn and Phaestus. And at all times, men urned to those who felt a ocation, more or less alruistic, for the role of benefactor [euergetes]. Increasingly however, withthe decline of family solidarity, of mutual help between citizens and of the spirit of ‘euergetism’, it bacme necesar to depend up the nonbenevolent intervention of individuals /

(2) Passim: In theory, a man whose rights and personakity had been in suspension while he was in captivityshould have automatically recoverd his old status th moment he set foot onhis ative sild. The Romans spoke of teh right of postliminuim which restored to the ‘living dead’ his former condition, his possessions andhis family. [not until the time of Constantine as a woman who hwas unable to prove thedeath of her husband in captivity prohibited from remarying.] But in fact thngs did not always work out this way, either because the repratrated man had frist to prove he had en honourable captured, and then retuned to his country, or, as was more ofthen the case, bceause he had First to repay the ransom advanced in his name by an intermediary. In such cases the ancients took considerably parins to safeguard the interersts of both parties. Bt in Greece an in the Roman Empirere form th end of th second century to the Froman Empierse fom th end of th second century to the foruth a ‘man brought back from teh enemy’ belonged to his ’benefacotor’ as a slave,until the ransom was epaid. The Gortyn code expressly stipulated that a free man ransomed from a foreigner ‘will be at th disposal of th man who bought him the extinction of this obligaion was sanctioned by a form of manmission. This type of slave was, however, of a very particular kind: he engaged his ervices without abndoning either his personaity or his patriony. Le lost his independence, not hs liberty.

(3) Pasim: At other times, under the roman Republic and at the beginning of the Emprie, it even seems that ransom was juristicaly assimilated intothe law of debt, not of sale. Thse varied measures rested on the twofold desire to respect the native liberty of a citizien onhis own territory and, in termsof the international situation, to encourage the practive ce of bying back prisonersof war. The guarantees geven to the buyer were increased or diminished accoring to the gravity of the problems which such a course presented.On the hwole, the fate of prisoners was erhaps ameloratd. But we shold be mistaken is we saw this tend as evidence of hmnitarian feelings at work or of a growing respect for human personality.Esentialy, the motivation was social or political, reflecting the interests of the community rahter than of the individueal. Hence, when it was in their interest – for example in the conquestof Gaul by Caesar- the romans easliy reverted to the most primitive ways of treating prisoners, untoubled by any scruples.”

Antropologie, boeddhisme

(1) Walt Anderson, “Das offene Geheimnis – Der Tibethische Buddhismus als religion und Psychologie – eine Einführung aus westlicher Sicht”, Goldmann 1979; “Ondanks alle gelijkenis tussen de gestaltetherapie en boeddhistische oefening in concentratie gaan de beide aanzetten in hen filosofische onderbouw van twee fundamenteel verschillende voorwarden uit. De Gestaltetherapie werd maatgevend door de holistische theorie beïnvloed en door de gestalt psychologie, die zich met de vaardigheid van het brein bezig houd, individueel of zich zelfs warrig doorkruisende zinnelijke data tot zinvolle eenheden [gestalten] te organiseren. Fritz Perls, de vader van de Gestaltetherapie, was hoofdzakelijk door de werken van de Gestalt-psycholoog Kurt Goldstein gekenmerkt; Kurt Goldstein had met soldaten gewerkt, die hersenbeschadigingen gedragen hadden, en had de vaardigheid tot zelforganisatie en functievaardigheid bij ernstig beschadigde personen onderzocht. Perls bericht, dat hij de eerste keer tijdens zijn samenwerking met Goldstein eraan gedacht had, om het menselijke organisme als een geheel te zien en niet slechts als een bundel van functies en eigenschappen. / Het Boeddhisme echter zegt, dat de mens een bundel zou zijn van eigenschapen, of niet eens dat, dat zou nog te duurzaam zijn – eerder een vloed van gebeurtenissen. Het menselijke bestaan is in ieder ogenblik niet meer als een verzameling van dharmas, psychologische processen, die meestal onder vijf hoofdgroepen samengevat worden: gevoel, waarneming, impulsen, bewustzijn, vorm. Het boeddhisme accepteert als enig geheel slechts het geheel van de kosmos, of misschien de totaliteit van onze ervaring in een gegeven moment, zolang deze ervaring niet door de voorstelling van een duurzaam zelf, welke het proces van het ervaren voorstelt, gefilterd word. /

(2) Passim: Dit idee, de meest radicale fundamentele gedachte en tegelijkertijd het belangrijkste punt van de boeddhisme, ontstond als antithese tot de historistische Atman-leer van de onvernietigbare persoonlijke ziel als de nucleus van het menselijke bestaan. Het boeddhisme leert anatman, ‘geen atman’, geen ziel, geen vindbaar ‘ik’ geen zelf Dat mag op het eerste gezicht als onbegrijpelijk metafysische bewering schijnen, abstract als de vragen van Potthpada. Mar alle boeddhistische leraren zeggen, dat het een eenvoudige, makkelijk herkenbare waarheid zou en, een fundamenteel feit van het menselijke bestaan, die door systematisch onderzoek van het eigen leven – achtzaamheid en Samadhi – op har waarheidsvisie beproefd kan worden. Uit een boeddhistische visie is de voorstelling van de onwerkelijkheid een zelf noch negatieve noch nihilistische, doch een realistische inschatting van het ding, zoals zij nu eenmaal zijn. In een voorstelling van het boeddhistische Denken heet het: ‘Naar de leren van Boeddha is de mening ‘Ik heb geen zelf’ [de theorie van de volkomen vernietiging]  net zo vals als de mening ‘ik heb een zelf’ [ de theorie van het eeuwige bestaan] want beid zijn zij boeien, beide ontstaan uit de valse voorstellingen van het ‘ik ben’.  Slechts wanneer wij de dingen objectief zien, ze projectieloos as dat zien, wat zij werkelijk zijn, kunnen wij tot de vraag van het Anatman de juiste positie van de onvooringenomenheid betrekken. Alles wat wij als ‘ik’ en als ‘zijnde’ benoemen, zien wij dan als combinatie van psychofysische aggregaten, die naar de wet an oorzaak en werking in een voed van voortdurende transformatie in wederzijdse afhankelijkheid weken, en ontdekken dat het in alle zijn niets duurzaams, steeds voortdurend onveranderbaar en eeuwig bestaan …’ //

(3) Passim: Dit idee doortrekt de hele 2500 jarige geschiedenis van het boeddhisme. Zij heeft alle transformaties en cultuur bedingde modificaties bestaan. De anatman-leer heeft over de eeuwen vele filosofische geïnteresseerde mensen gefascineerd, is warm omstreden en vaak misbegrepen geworden. Het boeddhisme is echter veel meer als slechts een filosofisch system. De uitdaging ligt slechts in een bewijs of tegenbewijs, die het idee van de Anatman op het intellectuele niveau uiteindelijk zou verklaren, doch daarin, Anatman te ervaren, tot die werkelijkheid te ontwaken. Neemt men het wezen van de eigen ervaring ongefilterd waar, dan, zo heet het, lost zich daarin alle begeerte, alle ontevredenheid op. Bevrijding wordt niet door dwangmatige onderdrukking van alle wenen verkregen, doch slechts door een heldere visie op dat, dat wenst, en op dat, wat het wenst. Natuurlijk zijn er werkelijke behoeften, en wij moeten deze bevredigen, maar er zijn ontelbare andere wensen, die niet meer zijn als de confuse begeerten van een bundel van gebeurtenissen, die zich zelf voor een persoon met een vaste wezenlijke kern houdt. / Het boeddhisme accepteert geen duurzaam zelf. Alles is in voortdurende transformatie begeerten. Met zin laatste woorden herinnerde de Boeddha zijn leerlingen daaraan, dat alle dingen vergaan, dat alles, wat eens samenkwam, zich ook weer scheiden zal. Het individueel bewustzijn reflecteert een kosmos, die zich een voortdurende vloed bevindt, wiens elementen zich voortdurend opnieuw groeperen Wat steeds weer ook tot een bepaald moment moge zijn of te zijn denken, het is een telkens momentane groepering van bestaansfactoren.

(4) Passim: Alexander David-Neel heeft het in een van zijn boeken over een Tibetaanse parabel voor de wijze van functioneren van het menselijke bewustzijn: ‘Een ‘persoon’ is als een raadgevend lichaam, dat uit een aantal leden bestaat. De discussie van deze verzamelingsronde hebben geen einde. Af en toe verheft zich een lid, houd een redevoering en adviseert een handeling; de collega’s stemmen toe, en men beslist, om het voorstel in de daad om te zetten. Af en toe verheffen zich enige leden gelijktijdig en staan daarbij geheel verschillende dingen voor, en ieder van hen steunt uit eigenbelang zijn voorstel. Deze meningsverschillen en het enthousiasme, met welke de redenar hen onderscheiden visies vertegenwoordigen, kunnen soms ook tot de strijd of zelfs gewelddadige uiteenzettingen voeren, zo dat de leden onder elkaar handgemeen worden. / Van tijd tot tijd scheiden maatschappijleden op hen eigen wens uit het lichaam uit; anderen zullen geleidelijk eruit gewerkt worden; sommigen worden dook dor hen collega’s met geweld uitgefloten. En steeds weer zijn er nieuwe gezichten in de ronde. Of zij hebben zich door de deur naar binnen geslopen of zich met geweld entree verschaft. / Het komt ook voor, dat bepaalde leden van de maatschappij geleidelijk aan verbleken; hen stemmen worden zwakker, tot zij geleidelijk aan niet meer te horen is. Gelijktijdig horen anderen, die vooreerst zwak en terughoudend schenen, versterken eisen, zij worden ongeduldig en brullen hen mening in het rond; zij terroriseren hen collega’s beheersen ze en eindigen tenslotte als dictator. /

(5) Passim: De leden van dit adviserende lichaam zijn niets anders als de fysieke en geestelijke elementen, uit welke zich een ‘persoon’ constitueert; zij zijn onze instincten, onze neigingen, onze voorstellingen, onze wereldvisies, onze wensen. Ieder element, iedere afzonderlijke bestaansfactor, is op grond van zijn oorzaken nakomeling van vele daarvan uitgaande ondergrondige stromingen en erfgenaam van hele gebeurtenissen, die ver in het verleden terugrijken en hen sporen zich in de raadselachtige verten van de oneindigheid verliezen.”

Verband tussen literatuur en wetenschapsfilosofie

(1) Frederick Karl, “Franz Kafka – Representative man / Prague, Germans, Jews, and the crisis of modernism”, International Publishing Corporation 1993; “One teacher who proved the exception to Kafka’s ‘harmful’ education impressed him wihout becoming an object of fear. A disciple of ernst Mach, the influential physicist and philosopher Adolf Gottwald served as a good part of the science epertment, instrucitngin physics, botany, natural history, astronomy, and other subjects. Kafka was under his instruction for five of his First six ears at the gymnasium, and Gottwald’s pointof view was quite important for the Young boy at this critical deelopmental stage. Gottwald tied to teach his students to thin, not mreley to absord material by rote. As a folowerof Mach’s philosopy, he he empassized the importance of sensory mipresions as themeans by which the individua conncted himself to the physical world.Machs evolutionary thories with the mental processes of the individua, so that a single theory could hold true for both the objective and subjective world. Mach was a Prague citizen, but his philosophy spread out to Vienna, Berlin, and other centers of developing modernism. / If we seek a key iea in Kafka’s early intelelctual development, it would not come form wicence as such but from Gottwald’s philosophy and from hism back to Ernst Mach, one of whose most famous disciples was Robert musil, who wrote hi docoral thesis on the philosopher. We fid in Mach’s views a good deal of the resonance we discover n in various avant-gardes, since Mach criticized nineteenth-centurey science as ful of frozen concepts that were to be swept away by his tory of an impresionistic moe dependent on sensory impresions. Mach sought a unified thory, not a number of disparate ideas that explainend one tingor another. His influential Analysis of Sensation and the relation of th Physical to th Psychical [1886] stressed human sensations as te entirety of experience. If ‘substance was unncesary, then al was ‘becoming’, and man neded only a languge to gorund what  he sensed. Mach’s philosopy was so significant becuae it supported, paralleed, and inflenced similar thories, all of which undermined artionaity. Mach relied upon correspndences, aoocialitin, tangential moment, revelations, antirational processes, nonlogical linkages, unconsicous ives, mad moent, extremesof subjecttivity, demonstrations of ego and self.These wer new forms of ‘thougt’, not antithougtor nonthougt. Thought itself as a concept was being redefined, whereas earlier, as in Immanuel Kant, Mach asserted, it had been frozen. /

(2) Pasim: Gottwald offerd a trimmed-down version of this theory, but its import was quit effective in reaching th young Kafka. He would, in a few year, begin to read Darwin and atmpt to blend evolutionary theory with his own subjective appoach to pshenomna. The thories outlined in class permitted Kafka to seek associations beween tow warring world, that of sciene and hat of pure knowledge, blending spirit, soul, mind. . In their efforts to undermine traditiona frozen concepts of tougth or knowlegd, Modernist artist emphasized the subjective, but in oint of fact they re mereley addresing one imbalance with another moderneinsm become in one of its pahse, an efort to bring back intellect and psirti from intellecutal libo. In this, Kafka played a large role ….. ater on, when the complained about the wishy-wahies of Hermann Kafka’s religion, Kafka wa not lamenting the ossof religious life as cuh, but het communitye that reigious belief could bring tothe etire family. He sa wit as social empowerment, not as amaterof Faith, tradition, even history. When he look lingingly at Easern European Jews, he saw not the Old Testamnt or oses or the torah, but a comunity shaped by acceptanceof certai recived ideas, ideas ess significant than the forms of acceptance.HE tells us repeaedly in diary entries and letter how he missed some principe of coherece; dyas, weeks, moths, years passed by while he waited for somethig that, within, he kenw would never arrive. He learned [howearly we cannot tell] that whatever coherence there was to be he would have to creat, and that would come only in his writing, where transformationn of all the unvcertainty was the sole certainty. /

(3) Passim: The ideal was Hugo Bergmann, and if Kafka measrud imself agant that student, First in his class, a scholarschip boy , and a tutor on the side, then Young Franz was lost. Bergnann was every other student’s nightmare. He not only did it all, he made it look easy, a student seemingly nfrufled by the inconsitencies and pitfalls life et up for the Young adolescent. Bergmann avoided them all, and yet although he had an important career as a scholar and archivist, he somehow id not leap into th kindof fame his early career suggested for him.  Kafka, the the far greater figure, found everyting eating into him. He palyed off his reigion teacher, Nathan Gruen, againt his teacher of logic, the ever present Gschwind, and both of them against Gustav Efenberer, one of those strict teachers who can make science and mathematics into memorably unplesat experience Bergmann asimilatd it all, and it seeme to make sense for hi; but for Kafke, whom Bergmann helped with mathematics, it all remained discret and troubling.”

Feodalisme Viëtnam

(1) Nguyen Thua Hy, “Economic history of Hanoi in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries”National Political Publishing House 2002; “The feudal government controlled its official and scholars by recruiting them into the ruling machnery through examinations, salaries, privieges and bonuses. Bureaucrats and mandarin-scholars althoughthey wer the ruling class, were themselves under the control of the king and the imperial Court. The governmnet contolled and influenced farmers by levying personal taks and farmland taks, althogh farmers insde Than Long had to pay only 50% of the amount parid by farmers in ohther regions. // IN the 17th and the First half of the 18th century, in some ares that are now suburbsof Hanow, there wer grand plantaitons owned by the government on the scale of thoseof King Le Thanh Tong’s reign. Prsonersor soldeirswere recruited to work them. Decrees by the Le dynasty in 1757 and by the Nguyen dynasty in 1841 abolished such forcedlabor farms and farmlands were returned to the peasant so that they could be taxed. … The state also controlled, both directly and indiretly merchants and handicraftsmen, two major economic classes of Thang Long-Hanoi. Firstly, it directly controlled commercial activities by such means as the establishmentof coin casting workshops. Secondly, the feudal State indirectly controlled the economic activities of merchants and handicraftsmen by establishing craftworker labor depeartments with an appointed chief, and by taationof farm products, markets and newly appinted mandarins. State control of merchants and handicrafstsmen varied over the years. tHe merchants and handicraft people of Than Long-Hanoi weren ever free of state control. …

(2) Passim: During the Later Le time, Thang Long was the social-poitical centre of the country.The Imerial Court established thse werkshops to satisfy the demansof economy, national defense and the ruling machinesry, such as coin minting workshops, weapons workshops and shipbuilding workshops. Many consruction sites wer set up in order to build the citadel and the palaces of the Le Kings and Trinh Lords. The stae appealed to skilled workers from al over the country to work for the feudal State throught he cong tuong,  the state-controlled cratworker mechanism. // The most important characteristics of the cong tuong mechanism was its restricting and constrainig role in the state labor force. Labor or the state was considered a duty of every citizen like other duties, such as military service. The diret control of this labor and the large numberof laborers involved resulted in militarized plantations. The producers were both workers and soldiers, orin other wrods, soldier-workers. There apeared the combination of hiered labor, and a system of obligation that were outside, and in addition to the economi considerations. This ‘extra-economic obligaion’ was the more important one.”

Moraal, Slavenhouders Zuidelijke V.S.

(1) Albert Wirz, “Sklaverei und kapitalistisches Weltsystem”, Suhkamp 1984; “De tegenspraken van de tijd werden voelbaar aan de persoonlijkheid van Thomas Jefferson Hij haatte de slavernij, hij zag in har in personificatie van het slechte en de ongerechtigheid, een misdaad tegen de natuur. Zijn ‘Notes on the State of Virginia’ [1781/82 geschreven, maar pas in 1783 gepubliceerd, en dit in Parijs] behoorden tot de klassieke veroordelingen van de slavernij. Zijn levensonderhoud dankt hij echter, wanneer men de politieke ambten eenmaal weglaat, aan de arbeid van meer dan honderd slaven. Zijn politiek bleef door afafwachten bepaald, hij was ban, dat een al te snel vooruit gaan de zaak van de vooruitgang zou schaden. Niet eens al zijnslaven mocht hij tenslotte vrijmaken. Wij dan aan hem weliswaar diepe inzichten in de negatieve uitwerkingen van de slavernij: zij vernietigeden moraal en vleet van de heren, die tot despoten werden, zij ondersteunden ontwaardigende onderworpenheid bij de slaven en verhinderden bij hen ieder vaderlandsliefde. Tegelijkertijd echter ontwierp hij een beeld van de mensen van Afrikaanse heerschappij, dat men slechts racistisch kan noemen. Naar zin mening ware de zwarten van natuur natuur uit aan de blanken inferieur, waarbij hij de volgend karakteristieke indelingen hanteerde: mentale prestatie – ‘langzaam van begrip, zonder smaak en abnormaal’; Muzikale prestatie – beer. Daarom hij het voor denkbaar, dat de morele zin bij de zwarten net zo goed ontwikkeld zou zijn als bij de blanken. . Hij was ook onbevooroordeeld genoeg, om de vrij geboren zwarte publiciste, mathematicus en astronoom Benjamin Banneker als landmeter voor de nieuwe hoofdstad te beroepen. / De blanken leerden, om al het Afrikaanse te verachten en als tegenpool tot beschaving en cultuur te begrijpen. De gelijkstellingen van Afrika met de natuur en de natuurlijkheid waren geenszins alleen maar pejoratief, daar zij samengingen met de overdreven vruchtbaarheidsvoorstellingen. Juist in het beeld van de landbouwproductie kon het negatieve en – dat moet benadrukt worden – valse Afrika beleid ondertussen een doorgaans positieve betekenisinhoud krijgen. Zo bijvoorbeeld, wanneer men ‘wilde negers’ de macht toevertrouwde, om aanzienlijk meer katoen te uit de grond ‘te toveren’ als ‘tamme negers’, zoals ‘William Faulkner in zijn roman ‘Absolom, Absolom’ bericht, die in de Amerikaanse Zuidelijke staten speelt. /

(2) Passim: Alles bij elkaar waren de gewetenskwellingen, die zich Jefferson als verlichtte tijdgenoot wegens de slavernij maakte, van die aard, met welke men kan leven, vooral daar hij zich op de kunst van het verdringen begreep: hij strafte bijvoorbeeld niet zelf, doch liet straffen. En Monticello, zijn heerlijke landbezitting in het noordelijke Virginia, door zijn eigen slaven gebouwd, was zo aangelegd, dat de slaven hen heer steeds er hand, maar desondanks ut de ogen waren; niveauterrassen en een labyrint van achtertrappen zorgden daarvoor. Kentekenend dus waren de door hem zelf voor de eetkamer ontworpen draaideur met afvoer voor het bestek op de ene zijde, zo dat de slaven uit de keuken de eetruimte niet zouden moeten betreden, wanneer zij het eten opdienden! Des te pijnlijker moest hem het openbare spreken zijn over zijn enge relaties tot Sally Hemmings, een van zijn huisslavinnen, die hij, zo was het gerucht, zwanger gemaakt zou hebben. Historici hebben veel acribie op de waarheid in de aangelegenheid toegepast, maar slechts tegenstrijdige mogelijkheden tevoorschijn gebracht. De discussie mag onbevredigend zijn, doch de ongewisheid zegt meer over Jefferson en zijn tijd, als een eenduidig antwoord het ooit vermocht. De historische betekenis van deze liaison scandaleuse ligt minder in het antwoord op de vraag: heeft hij of heeft hij niet?, doch daarin, dat sexuele relaties tot zijn slavin aanzet tot gepraat, morele veroordelingen en openbare aanvallen konden zijn. Noch in de Caraïbik noch in Latijnsamerika was zo iets denkbaar geweest, het was echter kentekenend voor de toestand in de V.S.”

Peronisme

(1) James Petras, “Politics & Social structure in Latin America”, Montly Review Press 1970; “The contradictory elementsof Peronism – a mix of conservatige paternalism and a agressive popular mass base – have been noted by some observers.To be sure, the contraticion is due partly to the fact the revolution of 1945 was carried out largely, though not toally, from above. But more important for its long-term effect was the internal transformation within the Peronist mass organizations: what started above took hold below. The post—1955 Peronist movemnt has been, par excellence, a movement from below, marked by the occupaton of factories and politica strike against represieve military governementsor military-controllend civilian governments. The continued strengtof th tade unions and of Perón’s appeal suggest that whta occurd [whatever Perón’s intentinons] wasnot just goernment impositon of organizational forms to conrol the workers, but the creation of organizations compriging the majority of industrial workers and capable of defending thier interests afther the Popular Governmen fell. The years folowing the overthrow did not see the disappearanceof Peronism. The viability of the trade unions and the movemnt did not depend exclusively on the patrón or the state. On the contrary, Preonrist organization withstood military persecutuion and ermged stonrger than ever since they provided benefits and protection to their members which other organizd forces were unwilling or unable to provie. At least in the short run, they served the interestsof the working class. / But if one cannot equate a national-popular movement liek Peronism with fascism, neither ca none disregare th abrupt and sometimes brutal methods used by Perón to deal with his opponents.The corporative eleents in teh Peronist ideology [justicialismo] have certain similarities to Italian fascism. Even today, trade-union differences are occasionally settled by bulets rather than through discusion and voting. And the elemants of corporative ideology are still discernible among the trade unionists who advocate a direct link between trade unions and political institutions. NEverteheless, it canbe said that during the 1945-1955 period, Peronism wa an essentially national-popuar movement, with authoritarian trappings.

(2) Passim: A major factor conditioning atitudes toward Peronism in Argentina was a double failure of the taditional Left. First, it failed to organize the majority of unskilled insdustria workers and therefore was unable to rpovide tangible benefits tothegreat mass of the working. Class. Te Communnist and Socialit parties wer base don craft unions and isolaedplant unions, highly fragmented and generally ineffective, leaving the mass of workers out of the range of thier organization.This undercut any ideological appeal based onclass analysis.Second, the traditional Left couldnot realte to the basic social conflicts within thecountry since it sought alliance with traditional parliamentary groups and tied itself to the foreinpolicy needsof othe countirs – the Socialist Party to ghose of the United States, the Communist Party to those of RUssia. / Thse tendencies were acentuated during Workd War II when the Communist and sociat parties joined the ‘Democratisc Uion’ and, in the name of antifascism, set aside all pretenseof defending workig-class interests. The taditionaLeft finaly severed itself completely from the working class when it joined other groups and the United State in denouncing he emerging national-popular movement as ‘afsscist’ precisely when the werkers wer begin initiatd into citizenship en masse. A consequence of the Left’s declining prestige was a contempt for ideology, which was identified with tortured abstractions defending authritarian national instituionns in the name of a mythica internationaism. This facilitated the growth of the national-popular movement, ilustrated, symbolically, on October 17, 1945, by the raising of Argentine flags and te downing of red ones – an assertion of national independence againt Stalinism and U.S. imperialist domination. /

(3) Passim: Ther are three sources ofr Peronism’s continuing strength:  [1] its smbolic importance as a moveent which succeeded in creating an identity for the averarge worker, raising morale, and impelling the self-organization of th working class; [2] its organzational legacy of clubs, unons, hospitlas and credit unons; [3] its national-popularideology wich provided, in however loos a fahhhion, the basis for working-cass solidarity. / The heterogenoous organizaitons, eaderschip groups, and ideologies gathered under the Peronist umbrella preclude a definition of ‘the’ Peronst. Nor is there a single stye of polities; the range of Peronist politicians runs fro typical parliamentary gentry, trough militant trade unionists, to gun-carrying commandos. / Whle there are frequent nonideological power struggles, there are also small militant activist grous which seek to further polarize Argentine socieity around the question of el retorno, the return of Perón. Some trade-union leadershave expresed their growing independendce from Perón and pointto thier strength without hi.Itis doubful that they would accept such state direction as existed during the 194-1955 period. Other Argentines denounce el retorno as mystification of the masses. Nevertheless no decisiwe social changes can occur without the masses who support the Peronist movement. / Peronismhas twbaic organizaqtional characteristic: the parliamanetayr-electoral and the trade-union structure. The trrade unions maintain thier independence fromthe pariamentarians, which has both advantagges and disadvantages. On the one hand, it allows freedom of action for a militant rank and file. On the other, the parliamantarians are not held responsible to their constituents and frequently wander over to conservative ranks.”

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(4) Roberto Aizcorbe, Argentina the Peronist myth – An Essay on the Cultural Decay in Argentina After the second World War. , Exposition Press 1975; “When Peron was still alive he used to spread such wild tales concerning his accomplishments. Thus, in a speech to workers on December 13, 1973, he boasted, ‘We started the industrialization of this country. This country, which we received utter destitute of industries in 1946, I surrendered in 1955 supplied with a complete line of medium industry, exports and manufacture of diesel electric machinery with which we have modernized railroads, trucks, cars and tractors.’ These worked were broadcast by radio, television, and newspapers and accepted by commentators of all tendencies, but- they are untrue./ In a report published by the executive itself during Peron’s second administration [1952-1955], figure show clearly that the industrial production gross value grew by 537%  between 1937 and 1946 and by scarcely 16,4 percent between 1946 and 1954. This report, ‘Production and Income in the Argentine Republic – 1935-1954’, was published in Buenos Aires and can be obtained at any Government agency. The data shown here appear on page 149 of that report. / The exciting semiotic exercise, this strange confusion between past and present, between fealty and falsehood, which, according to the electoral results, the Argentine people largely accept, have so staggered my colleagues, the foreign journalists also tolerated them to ascribe things to the ‘extravagantly personal character of Latin American politics’.”

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(5) Roberto Aizcorbe, Ärgentina the Pronist myth – An Esay on the Cultural Decay in Argentina Afther the second World War. , Exposition Press 1975; ; “Hernández Arregui is a widely know writer and is reputed to be the greatest national-socialist theoretician, so that ome of his disciples,lie Frncisco Licasto an Fernando Solanas, arein turn leardof ht should that introducd marxim under disguise in th Argentine army and in th moviesThier mentor, however, is not a historian. He ptretend to be a sociologist and a criticof cultur in Argentina.But he does use – and abuse – Argentine history. / Argentine history can be divided into vfive periods. In the frist [1810-1820] the liberal patriots declard the country indpendenfrom Spain. In the second, from 1820-1829, appeard the cudillos [leaders] in the provinces, true feudal lords who overran the legal government, heading irregular troops, the montoneros. In the third period, Juan Manuel de Rosas, the most important of these caudillos, took power in 1829 and kept it until 1852. During this era all liberal expressions were subjugated by force and gallows;  all foreigners were deprived of navigation right to commerce along the Paraná River, and the country was closed won to the world. In 1852 Rosas was overthrown and the Constituional Republic was founded with an economic systm of liberal capitalism that lasted until 1943. In 1946 Perionism took power. / Hernández Arregui proposes to condemn the entire liberal period. He establishes that in the caudillos’ times a primitive democracy was ruling the people, whose mensof ‘expresion’ wer though the caudillos, just as,since 1943, the masses have found their ‘expresion’ through Perón Hernández arregui proposes a surgical operation on Argentine history He thinks it possible to join the fifth period, Perón’s, to the caudillos’ period, the third one. That is, in his opinion, the real Argentina’s history. For him the liberal period history was made up by Europeans supported gy the ‘treacheous oligarcy’, and it must be condemned. Finally, he proposes to join th Peronism of the masses to the caudillos’ primitive socialism so as to construct in the future the ‘socialist country’, that is, the Marxist one.”

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(6) Roberto Aizcorbe, Ärgentina the Peronist myth – An Esay on the Cultural Decay in Argentina Afther the second Werld War. , Exposition Press 1975; ; “wath wer Astrada’s philosophical ideas and thwt ws their influenceon he Marxist and nationalist symbiosis in Argentina? Basically, astrada support apposition antagonistic tothatof Sarthre tna dht othe French existentialist. He says that, in order to affirm theprimacy of existence over essence, Sartre rescus the duality fro traditional philoopy. IN this sense, Astrada accuses Sartreof begina conservative and denies him any revolutionary character: ‘Sartre’s existentialism is thereiteraionof an extremely old commonplace: the scholastic difrernce between existentia and essentia … Heidegger said that to invert a relation is not to modify it. If Sartre put on the jacket inside out, the jacket is alwsy the same one’ / To astrada the human being is pure existence, a gelam in the dimness of the unverse. Ther is no essence. Accoring tothis philosophy, man is subjected to temporality, thatis, to his epcoch; to themiliue, the ‘otherness’, that is, thot heother human beigns who surround him; and to historicity, the historical cprocess in which he is iimmersed.In sartre’s oinion, man is able to chose and thus exercise his freedom. For Astrada  tye option ability is minimal, almost nonexistent. / This issue had a radical impotnace for Astrada’s audience, and his followers came to conlude that redom dos not exist, that it is a Western culture categroey, and intelelcual flirtation to keep the masses hopeful. To Astrada man must practice self-redemption, in opposition to the Chistina Salvationism and technique. Astrada’s philosophy is highly nihilistic: ‘active and affirmative nihilism, on clearing the path to man’s recovery, redicalizes and totalizes the crisis ocndintin in whichhe stands.’ If man doesnot have the option to be in any sense, then he has no option among infinite paths. He can realise himself only by assuming the characterof the human being he feels himself to be. In the ARgenticne case, he must realize his onw myth: the gaucho myth. /

(7) Pasim: The gaucho is well known. He is Argentina’s primitive denizen, a descendant of th eimmigrnatsof the early Spanish conquest.As the legend goed the gauchos wanderd the immense pampas, landlords of the unpopulated vastness. The y freely slagutherd wild steers for a day’s meals suandering almost the whoe animalThe gaucho is anindivdual aliento history, a sortof Grek demigod. / But thisis only a legend,a mth.The historicl truth is quite different. The gaucho as a man settlingaroundvilages with cattle a home of his onw, the Catholic religion subjection to authority and social lving. It is true that the gauchos left the urban nuclei to reach the no-man’s-land I conquest of territory, but this doe nito make them asocial beingUsing a terminology creatd by Roet ARdrey, we would say that the gaucho was a person with wide ‘individueal distance’, in the senseoof resistance to the intruder, and a arrow ‘social distance’, in the senseof adhring to the group in which he was born Tis, in my opinion, doe not convert him into an asocial being. / Astrada knew all this. He kenw about the wild and progresie association the gaucho had, as hundredsof argentine hamlets spread all over the pampas before the declaration of Independence in 1816. But Astradaclearly establishethat the modernArgentine tends to identify himself with the gaucho mytht, with the legendary, nomadic, fre gaucho, not with the historical gaucho.

(8) Passim: In his book on the gaucho myth, he maintans that the Argentine man, in his search for realization, will reach perfection only ot the extent that he realized the gaucho myth, that is to say, to the extent tha he himself become that free and self-made demigod: ‘The gaucho is not a myth in the sense that he may be or represent a human type long ago existing but at present not. Bt what we, Argentineans, habe the gaucho mtyth as an expresiono of ur biological and animistic sytel, always apable of a new life though successive transformationThis gaucho myth is noghitn less than the vital plasmaof our lineage that, from its initial ouspring, has bee extending in time.Heis the fourishingof human archetype, incarnating in new growth, which on renewing and enriching a tradition sotre shall secure the historic continuity of the Argentine commynity.’// Astrada’s philosophy had great influence not so much on the Peronist masses as on the ideologitst who later synthized national and marxiem to create the present national social.Astrada, who was not a politician built his observation on the gaucho myth to the point show, but his followers gave it a well-defined political meaning / If the Argentine man, they said, may lierate himself only in the selfrealization of thgaucho myth, then the destruction of th entire cultural superstructure created by the Western Hemispher in Argentina is unavoidable, because it is a mere European grafting. Similarly, they concluded, when the Argentineans recoerthe characteristics that the legendary gaucho had [not the real one, but that invented on th myth], they will be in a condition to progressform their  pastoral socialism to a superior socialism, but one creaed in Argentina.”

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(9) Roberto Aizcorbe, Ärgentina the Pronist myth – An Esay on the Cultural Decay in Argentina Afther the second Werld War. , Exposition Press 1975; ; “The film Juan Moreira relased at the end of 1973, grossed more than 300.ooo dollar, a major amount for Argentina.The actor Bebán playe the title role, under the directionof Leonardo Favio, one of Peróns best friend ans member of Café Society.As we have seen, favio was one of those who accompanied Perón on his return trip to Argentina. / Juan Moreira is a story about a famous bandit of the last century. E murdered eighty people in Buenos Aries province, before dyingin a fright with a police patrolHis death inspired many popular balled, like thos published yb the poet Ricardo Gutriérrez at the endof the nineteetnht century. / IN thre film, Moreira is a man pusued by the implacable systemof captiaist liberalism. Often he resembles such Americanfilmbandits as AlCapone, Jesse Jaes and Scarace. But a basic difference occurred in the plot development. Americans consider such characters real bandits, but in Argentinefims theyare the innocent victimsof an unfair sytem.Itis not te criminal who is guilty, but the society that forces hem to break the law.”

Religie, Egypte, 19e eeuw

(1) Francoise Dunand, “Isis, Mére des Dieux”, Actes Sud 2008; “Maar ze is er wel als de Egyptische godin, beschouwd als de bron van een antieke en universele vertelster, die an het einde van de 18^e eeuw de dogma’s en de rituelen inspireerde van de vrijmetselarij. De Engelse grootmeester George Smith [1783 spreekt in de Egyptische mythe over de bron van de inspiratie van de ‘mystéres’ de la maconnenerie: ‘Osiris en Isis vertegenwoordigen in theologische zin het eeuwig wezen en de universle nabuur, en fysiek de twee grote lichten, de zon en de maan, vervolgende hen invloed op de hele natuur’. In 1784, creëerde Cagiostro in Parijs de Mére Loge de L’Adaption de la haute Maconnerie égyptienne; de ceremoniën vinden plaats in een ‘tempel van Isis’ waar Cagliostor zelf de officiële grootpriester werd. En, in 1791, op weg van de eerste vertegenwoordiging van de Flute enchantée in een theater van de banlieue van Wenen … / Het boek van Schikaneder, dat een historische roman’ inspireerde van de abbé Trason, Séthos,  gepubliceerd in 1731, vervolgens geredigeerd en verhandeld in Nederland, het is niet zonder fabels, in zijn burleske melange, van feeën en filosofisch mysticisme. Maar de wonderbaarlijke muziek van Mozart verenigt dit ongelijke ensemble, en maakt de lente tot een spirituele belevenis. Isis en Osiris verschijnen als de incarnatie van de profeet; de grootpriester, Sarastor bedreigt de zuiverheid van de nacht met de strijd van het licht tegen de duisternis. Tamino en Pamina  zullen de beproevingen moeten doorgaan van de initiatie om dit licht te verkrijgen, en kent het goed een de oprechtheid, net als het koppel Papageno-Pagagena, dat de ‘gemiddelde’ mensheid vertegenwoordigt, de strijd aangaat met de kennis van de luchtspiegeling, zij bevredigt een gewone eer. De zoektocht van Tamino om een zekere objectieve hereniging te zoeken met dit doel, maar helaas heeft de objectieve zin hier een ander meer diepere zin: zijn zoektocht is die van de profeet. De beproevingen die zij ondergaan komen overeen met een initiatieceremonie: ‘zij die voortgaan, zoeken de ervaringen op, zij gaan intact door het uur, het water, de lucht en de aarde; men kan de angst voor de dood overwinnen, men lanceert de aarde tot aan de lucht …, zingen de mannen in wapens die Tamino begeleiden in zijn beproeving. Het gaat duidelijk om een ritueel dat analoog is met die van de elementen.’ En ‘de vrijwillige dood’. /

(2) Passim: Vele jaren later, heeft Lenoir, in zijn Franche-Maconnerie rendue á sa v’ritable origine [1814], geprobeerd om te bewijzen dat men deze oorspring kan terugvinden in Egypte, en de vrijmetselarij dit doet herleven in de mysteries van zijn ceremoniën; hij beschrijft ook de initiatie in de eerste gaard van de vrijmetselarij als een passage door de leementen, een beetje in dezelfde termen als gedaan wordt in de Flute. Voor hem, is Osiris de rede en het licht, Isis de natuur, moeër van alle keuzes, vervolgens strekt haar macht zich uit over de hele wereld, zoals een reliëf opstijgt in een plafond van het Dendéra, verbonden met een dessin van Denon [en dat vertegenwoordigd in feit de godin van de hemel, nacht, die om de wereld cirkelt in haar eigen lichaam]. De filosofische interpretatie van de Isismythe leidt ook, hier hiertoe, op een paradoxale manier, in een tijdperk waarin het christendom gewelddadig in vraag wordt gesteld, in een nieuwe religie, met zijn nieuwe initiatieritueel dat pretendeert zich te conformeren aan zeer oude antieke traditie.”

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(3) Francoise Dunand, “Isis, Mére des Dieux”, Actes Sud 2008; “In het milieu van de XIX eeuw, bezet Isis een centrale plaats in de visionaire verbeelding van Gérard de Nervals. In zijn gedichten zowel als in zijn prozawerk, hij aantrekkelijke, melancholie en fantastische vrouwelijke figuren, zoals die van de verloren moeder, nauwelijks bekend, die de weg inslaat naar een onmogelijke liefde. Zij dromen, onthullingen of niet, maken de geleende heilige figuren tot hele mythologieën, maar het is ‘de eeuwige Isis’ die er is voor het imago van de moeder. Gérard de Nerval makt ‘reis naar het Oosten’ volgends de traditie van zijn tijdperk en bleef in Cairo; in een pagina vertelt en hervertelt over een Pruisische officier die op het punt stater terug te keren naar e archeologische missie van Lepsius te Fayou, hij pretendeerde zich te hebben geïnformeerd naar de hiërogliefen schriften en leest ‘L’Oedipus Aegyptiacus van pére kircher et la grammaire van Champolion’. /In feite, lijkt hij een oorlog te voeren met de Egyptische oudheden, en prefereert zonder twijfel de smaak van de archeologen, in de beelden die zijn fantasie creëert. In Eurélia, het hallucinerende verhaal van zijn visionaire ervaringen, schrijft hij waarschijnlijke ten dele wanneer hij intern verblijft in de kliniek van Dr. Blachne, verder gaat hij voor zichzelf door met wat hij noemt ‘de opeenhoping van beelden in het reële leven’. De figuur van Isis neemt heel zijn belangstelling in. “