Yesterday we read Hume in the aesthetics course. What a revelation! Hume in the original proves to be a clear and profound thinker. I had expected him to bandy about the usual "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," and in fact he does begin by noting that there is a variety of tastes. He does admit that taste and sentiment are 'subjective', in the sense that they belong to the subject. Soon, however, he is pointing out that we do naturally seek general or common standards of taste, and he even criticizes 'philosophies which hold that it is impossible to arrive at such standards.'
He seems to be implying that there are certains forms or orders in nature that evoke aesthetic appreciation in us. He also makes a strong plea for common standards of taste. He explains the diversity by a series of external and internal factors: lack of serenity, of focus on the object, of experience, of practice, of delicacy of taste... And he warmly recommends practice: the more one practices, the more one develops delicacy of taste.
Friday, 23 January 2009
De Smet's Sankara studies
Strange: I didn't intend to, but I found myself drawn into beginning work on a second collection of De Smet's essays, with the tentative title, Forward Steps in Sankara Research: Essays by Richard De Smet, SJ.
There is, of course, the experience of working on the first collection. I had already drawn up a list of Sankara essays by De Smet, so I began by writing for permissions, which was, I think, the most delicate and difficult part of the previous work.
OUP has already replied, but they said they preferred dealing directly with the publishers. But MLBD can correspond with them only after I submit my MS to them - which will be another year at least?
The scanning has begun. Unfortunately, the new scanner is a very low level one, and the errors in the text are far more than the Provincial House scanner....
Whatever: the work has begun, and I am excited about it.
There is, of course, the experience of working on the first collection. I had already drawn up a list of Sankara essays by De Smet, so I began by writing for permissions, which was, I think, the most delicate and difficult part of the previous work.
OUP has already replied, but they said they preferred dealing directly with the publishers. But MLBD can correspond with them only after I submit my MS to them - which will be another year at least?
The scanning has begun. Unfortunately, the new scanner is a very low level one, and the errors in the text are far more than the Provincial House scanner....
Whatever: the work has begun, and I am excited about it.
Tuesday, 20 January 2009
De Smet, Brahman and Person
From one of my jottings:
"Where Zaehner stresses bhakti/love as culmination, De Smet strikes at the root: the Absolute Brahman of Sankara is itself personal! Cf. De Smet, "Indian Understanding of Man" (1970) 10-12.
God's love is the highest integrator. Zaehner.
Educated Indians familiar with Advaita often look down on the God of Christians as Isvara, the lower, qualified, saguna Brahman - see, for example, Radhakrishnan. De Smet: charitably (1) explains 'person'; (2) explains saguna/nirguna (through analogy).
The reading method
The reading method is turning out to be really excellent. We are following the readings on aesthetics from the reader edited by David Cooper, and it is quite amazing how questions come alive by reading the primary sources. The students seem to be enthusiastic. Of course, there is much practical work too: going through the many 'picture books' in our reference library, reporting on paintings, sculpture, architecture, listening to and learning to criticise music, poetry, drama, literature... There is the Wodehouse - Shaw - Shakespeare progression learned from Fr Joe Dhyrianathan, there is Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood read by Richard Burton, there are Urdu ghazals and poetry... and Gerard Manley Hopkins, and our chapels and churches...
There used to be a similar method used in Philosophy of God - learned originally from Lisbert D'Souza, who had come from Oxford with a degree on Wittgenstein.
Could we do something of the sort for Philosophy of Knowing? We might not be able to 'teach' Lonergan as we have been doing so far, but... it might just be worth trying to raise the questions by means of readings from the classical sources, East and West.
There used to be a similar method used in Philosophy of God - learned originally from Lisbert D'Souza, who had come from Oxford with a degree on Wittgenstein.
Could we do something of the sort for Philosophy of Knowing? We might not be able to 'teach' Lonergan as we have been doing so far, but... it might just be worth trying to raise the questions by means of readings from the classical sources, East and West.
Saturday, 17 January 2009
Retrieving good work
The last dot (hopefully) was put on the De Smet manuscript yesterday, feast of Blessed Jose Vaz. Wonderful day on which to finish this homage to De Smet, this great effort at retrieving - or is it generating? - the category of person from within Indian thought.
Monday I hope to send the manuscript to the publishers. Gratitude to the countless friends who have helped in one way or another.
And the possibility, of pursuing the work further: "'Retrieving good work': De Smet's generation of the category of 'person' in Indian thought." What would that involve? Apart from De Smet's own work, I guess also a study of Lonergan on person and subject, in order to understand the possibility of transposing the metaphysical category 'person' into an appropriate psychological category; and then using this psychological category to identify/confirm De Smet's own attempt. Indicating further work to be done by way research in Western/Indian thought.
And the question: to which functional specialty would all this belong? Interpretation, I think. But aren't categories generated seminally in dialectic, and with explicit commitment in foundations? True, but then this is the effort of one person to retrieve the work of another person. That effort might eventually lead to dialectic and foundations.
Monday I hope to send the manuscript to the publishers. Gratitude to the countless friends who have helped in one way or another.
And the possibility, of pursuing the work further: "'Retrieving good work': De Smet's generation of the category of 'person' in Indian thought." What would that involve? Apart from De Smet's own work, I guess also a study of Lonergan on person and subject, in order to understand the possibility of transposing the metaphysical category 'person' into an appropriate psychological category; and then using this psychological category to identify/confirm De Smet's own attempt. Indicating further work to be done by way research in Western/Indian thought.
And the question: to which functional specialty would all this belong? Interpretation, I think. But aren't categories generated seminally in dialectic, and with explicit commitment in foundations? True, but then this is the effort of one person to retrieve the work of another person. That effort might eventually lead to dialectic and foundations.
Monday, 1 December 2008
Lonergan Reading Group
We will soon be starting a Lonergan reading group here in Divyadaan. Yesterday, during the NASA meeting, I floated the idea, which we have been mulling over for some time, and fixed a time. The meetings will be 1300-1400 hours, Mondays, in the Staff Room in the New Academic Block. Not the best time to read Insight, but there it is. A small beginning.
The group will, for the time being, be restricted to the Divyadaan staff. But in principle we should be able to open it up to all men and women of good will... I look forward to this: a dialogue between equals. Several staff members have been telling me: I've never had a chance to get into Lonergan, or to read Insight. Lonergan reading groups exist all over the world. I am excited that something is starting here in Nashik.
The group will, for the time being, be restricted to the Divyadaan staff. But in principle we should be able to open it up to all men and women of good will... I look forward to this: a dialogue between equals. Several staff members have been telling me: I've never had a chance to get into Lonergan, or to read Insight. Lonergan reading groups exist all over the world. I am excited that something is starting here in Nashik.
Fragility
I came across this lovely little incident revealing the fragility of us all, including the great ones:
In May 1975, I attended a lecture by Bernard Lonergan at the Thomas More Institute for Adult Learning in Montreal. I listened as he spoke about Healing and Creating in History, understanding little and feeling confused and disappointed at the end of the evening as I watched him walk slowly out of the large hall. I stoo behind a pillar to get a better look. As he passed, our eyes met, he nodded, and I found myself reaching out to shake his hand and saying: Thank you, Father Lonergan. Some of my best teachers have been inspired by your work. His mouth dropped open in apparent surprise, and then the blue eyes sparkled as he said: Thank you, my dear, I needed to hear something like that tonight.
I am not sure why I feel compelled to share this story with every group of students that I now introduce to Lonergan's thought. Perhaps I want them to understand something of the fragility of the man who wrote... even with talent, knowledge makes a slow, if not a bloody entrance. To learn thoroughly... calls for relentless perseverance. To strike out a new line and become more than a weekend celebrity calls for years in which one's living is more or less constantly absorbed in the effort to understand. Perhaps they will agree with me that the questions that move us to make the effort to learn something new are usually stirred into life by another human being. Perhaps they too will marvel at the mysterious effect we have on one another as we struggle to find meaning as we create a life for ourselves. (Moira Carley, Creative Learning and Living: The Human Element, Montreal 2005, 10-11)
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