I\u2019m a very stable and fixed sort of person \u2013 you could call it mulish (or if you happened to be interested in astrology, you could say it was because I have a grand cross of major planets in the fixed signs \ud83d\ude09 \u2013 but one way of thinking about it, which my wife uses every so often, is to say that I have a lot of inertia. Normally that means that her husband is accumulating too much lard on his backside through being inert, but I actually like the strictly physical definition, whereby a body at rest needs a lot of prompting to move, but also a body which is moving requires a lot of force to change course. For I have been known to move, on occasion. <\/p>\n
This sequence of thoughts was prompted by the arrival of Ollie \u2013 not an expected arrival, but one which was nevertheless sought out, and is from God \u2013 for Ollie is dragging said husband off his backside onto the beach two or three times a day, and the pressure of a wagging tail and a wet nose is a sufficient force to cause the mass to enter into movement. I think this is a very good thing for me \u2013 I haven\u2019t been getting enough exercise ever since I got married (and have accumulated nearly an extra three stone in weight) and this exercise is going to persist. So although I find it uncomfortable \u2013 my inertia is resisting this outside force \u2013 I can see it is a tremendous blessing for me.<\/p>\n
Now yesterday I managed to read a review in the Times Literary Supplement which discussed the\u014dria<\/i>. The\u014dria<\/i> is seen by Aristotle as the highest virtue, and it is normally translated as contemplation. My spiritual director once told me that I have a significant contemplative streak, and I think this is true \u2013 I like to ponder questions, and weigh them, sifting them for nuggets of truth. Think of Rodin and a part of my self-image is revealed. Yet I have always seen this as a principally sedentary and immobile activity. Now I read this in the review:<\/p>\n
\u201cIn due course, Aristotle would assert that the\u014dria<\/i>, meaning philosophical contemplation of the nature of things, is the best, most enjoyable activity there can be; hence it is God\u2019s sole occupation and the central purpose of the best possible human life.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is easy to misunderstand, in part because \u2018contemplation\u2019, the now conventional translation of Aristotle\u2019s the\u014dria<\/i>, suggests a single, steady gaze held on a single impressive object, like a telescope focused on the peak of a high mountain\u2026 But the original the\u014dros<\/i>, engaged in \u201csacralized spectating\u201d at the Olympic Games or watching a tragedy in the theatre at Athens, saw a complex multiplicity of events, which could only be properly understood in relation to one another. (Compare: the spectator\u2019s experience of a modern cricket match is more like following a narrative than viewing a mountain peak.) There is no good reason to think that this complexity dropped away when Plato and Aristotle made the transition to abstract, philosophical the\u014dria<\/i>. Their the\u014dria<\/i> is not analagous to a single steady gaze at a single impressive object.\u201d<\/p>\n
(MF Burnyeat, reviewing Andrea Wilson Nightingale\u2019s \u201cSpectacles of Truth in Classical Greek Philosophy, TLS February 24 2006) <\/i><\/p>\n
It seems to me that this sense of the\u014dria<\/i> has just a little in common with blogging \u2013 on going comments on those things which enter into the mental frame of reference of the blogger, which do not have to be fixed and stable like a mountain, but can be an ongoing drama like a greek tragedy, or like the fall of western civilisation as a result of Peak Oil (grin).<\/p>\n
So the\u014dria<\/i>, contemplation, that which I enjoy \u2013 this is not a \u2018single steady gaze\u2019 \u2013 and to undertake contemplation I do not need to be passive, which is the psychosomatic hole in which I have placed myself. My inertia can be mobilised, I can indeed be a body in motion, and still I can pursue that highest, most divine of virtues \u2013 \u201csacralized spectating\u201d \u2013 which is, I believe, what my blog should aim to be.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not there yet, but I\u2019ll keep going at it<\/b>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I\u2019m a very stable and fixed sort of person \u2013 you could call it mulish (or if you happened to be interested in astrology, you could say it was because I have a grand cross of major planets in the … Continue reading