Plague Journal, Labor Day
Monday, the end of summer. The street is eerily quiet at State and 3rd in Geneva. At the hour of 7AM, there’s not the usual bustle.
While driving to Starbucks I listened to a NPR piece covering the aftermath of hurricane Ida’s destruction on the coast of Louisiana. Several individuals were interviewed that formerly had homes on Grand Isle close to the gulf. It is quiet there as they are cut off, have not seen any “help” from FEMA, no electricity, — one female saying that she “just does not know what to do.” Is not silence the norm when the customary physical links with civil society are severed?
Yesterday I ordered from Amazon a copy of Human All Too Human by Nietzsche. I am eager to read the slim volume of aphorisms. The pithy observations of human behavior, the unmasking of the stories which we continually tell ourselves seem more important than ever to me. My instinct tells me that silence is certain to grow in the near future. On the positive side of the ledger, silence presents the opportunity for reflection, to weigh the meaning of the journey that I have taken, the effects of my way-of-life upon my fellow humans, and upon the earth.
That which the world calls virtue
is usually nothing but a phantom formed by our passions
to which we give an honest name
so as to do what we wish
with impunity.
Human All Too Human, On the History of Moral Sensations, section 35
Man the super-animal (“das-Über-Tier”) wants to be lied to. Social instincts are grown out of shared pleasures and a common aversion to danger. Morality is an official lie told to keep the super-animal in order.
— Excerpt, I Am Dynamite! A Life of Nietzsche by Sue Prideaux p. 175
2 thoughts on “Plague Journal, Labor Day”
There is a clear theme running through your latest essays. A portion of that theme has to do with the dysfunctional nature of the dogmatic ramblings of much of Christianity. What is interesting to me is that you used to differentiate between the teachings attributed to Christ and the various religions that ostensibly base themselves on those teachings. In your introduction to this blog you continue to label yourself as a part time Christian. With that said, is it not critical to add a caveat to your mentions of Christianity as a wholly separate institution outside the realm of the teachings set forth in much of the New Testament? Of course, this note is coming from someone who has zero religious affiliation but since you and I (and western civilization in general) are steeped in the Judeo/Christian ethic, perhaps we should come up with a different name for the tolerance and acceptance of the teachings of Christ and the supposed religions that are not really based on those teachings yet carry his name. Just a thought.
Labeling, naming is everything is it not?! There’s a profound truth in the Confucian effort to “rectify names” to make our language be in accord with the connotations which are attached to things… Whether that is even possible is quite another issue.
The teachings of Jesus have been bastardized into a plethora of sects all claiming to be Christian. I doubt there is any remedy for the inevitability of the matter. How does one escape the deeply embedded notion that divine authority is the ultimate bedrock? To do so is to court uncertainty, to be willing to set sail on the uncharted sea. What do we have as an anchor point, except believe in non-divine others who recognize this as our shared destiny? What name would make sense for that?
Maybe to be aware is the best that we can do.