What is the worthiest subject of human contemplation? Many will jump with the answer God, remembering the noble endeavors of Isaac Luria and of the rabbis of the Kabbalah, and of all those religious philosophers and mystics who devoted their lives to contemplating the Divine and the esoteric. Yet the answer given in this entry is a different one. It does not mean that I am against such supernatural contemplations, far from it! But, as always, it is most edifying to offer a variety of different answers to a complex question, thus doing justice to its complexity.
One of my Apte Dictums says that “life is a contract between man and God, at the end of which we receive our wages.” (I bet that if one could be put to the test of writing down a thousand one-word descriptions of “life,” like the word “contract” above, in the course of a single day, such a task would not turn out to be too hard. After all, almost any word in the dictionary can apply, isn’t that true? In my wife’s splendid definition, for instance, “life is… an experiment.” Well, c’est… la vie!)
Among these thousand epithets, the words ‘gift’ and ‘burden’ ought to occupy distinguished positions. If we attempted to compare a large number of such lists and ran a semantic word-count analysis of these lists, both these words would appear high on the composite tally.
Now, how does the word "gift" apply, except to indicate something given? On the other hand, this is not a free gift, in the “take it or leave it” sense. Noblesse oblige that we do not discard this gift, when the giver is not looking. Yes, it is noblesse, and not the ignoble dread of “the undiscovered country.” As I have put it elsewhere, the words “death before dishonor” become meaningless, to the point of mockery, when death itself turns out to be a greater dishonor than a dishonorable life.
But let us be fair to the better, non-mechanical connotation of the word “gift.” After all, the many presents each of us used to receive for birthdays, holidays, and other special occasions, especially as young children, have meant much more to us than the fact of their being ‘given’ and dutifully ‘received’! Most of them were delightful and pleasurable in themselves, and they never failed to brighten our life. Let us, therefore, look at our life as an exceptional gift in that sense, too.
For many obvious reasons, life is a wonderful gift, especially, when we are young, and our list of “capital” regrets is short and mostly inconsequential. But extremely lucky are those for whom, at some critical point, life does not become a burden, either due to the infirmity of old age or an incurable disease, or else because of a mental anguish, caused by particular circumstances. On the first scenario, here is Nietzsche’s take on suicide, in Menschliches (80):
“The old man and death. One may ask, why, aside from the demands of religion, it is more praiseworthy for a man growing old, who feels his powers decrease, to await his slow exhaustion and disintegration, rather than to put a term to his life with complete consciousness? In this case suicide is quite natural and should rightfully awaken respect for the triumph of reason. This it did in those times, when the preeminent Greek philosophers and the doughtiest Roman patriots used to die by suicide. Conversely, compulsion to prolong life from day to day, anxiously consulting doctors and accepting the most painful, humiliating conditions, without the strength to come nearer the actual goal of one’s life, is by far less worthy of respect. Religions provide abundant excuses to escape the need to kill oneself. --- This is how they insinuate themselves with those who are in love with life.”
My opinion is that, of course, in most cases, suicide is a dishonorable ploy to bail out of our contract with God, which requires us to live out our life in toto. However, I am categorically opposed to prolonging one’s life artificially, without a perfectly good reason, that is, in Nietzsche’s words, purely out of being “in love with life.” The only reason to prolong life is when one has some useful unfinished business to wrap up, and that business is truly important. On the other hand, that reason should not, at any time, become an excuse…
So much, then, for prolonging life. But suicide is an altogether different matter.
I would not call suicide either a weakness or a strength of character, but rather a luxury no decent man can afford. In this sense, “death before dishonor” is an empty phrase. The so-called “dishonorable life,” if it is a life of involuntary dishonor, must be viewed as a penance, as an expiation of sins, so to speak, and as such it is no longer a dishonor. The real dishonor is avoiding penance, becoming “a fugitive from justice.” There is a remarkable passage in Plato, referring to the secret practices of the Pythagoreans, which, in my view, has a surprising relevance to this subject, although, to my knowledge, it has not been understood the way I see it, by anybody else:
“The saying uttered in secret rites, to the effect that we men are in a sort of prison, and that one ought not to loose himself from it nor yet to run away, seems to me something great and not easy to see through; but this at least I think is well said, that it is the gods who care for us and we, men, are one of the possessions of the gods.” (From Phaedo: 62 B)
I find this passage remarkable, in the sense that here I can clearly see an explicit prohibition of suicide, so unexpected to be found in classical Greek thought, which seems to treat suicide rather casually, especially if one allows himself to be convinced on this matter by the authority of Schopenhauer, who attributes to the Greeks an explicit approval of honorable suicide.
Therefore, it is not what Schopenhauer thinks about it, but this Pythagorean Commandment of sorts-- Thou shalt not loose thyself from this prison, nor yet run away, as we men are one of the possessions of the gods! -- that, to me, becomes the definitive expression of the real Greek position on the inadmissibility of suicide as an easy way of bailing out of one’s duties and responsibilities to one’s life, and those who are of a different opinion, must rather be treated as an exception, and by no means as the rule.
But Schopenhauer, whether we disagree with him on the tricky subject of suicide or not, teaches us a very important pessimistic lesson about life (we need his old-age pessimism to balance our youthful optimism), suggesting that, generally speaking, life is more of a burden, than anything else:
“There is no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome, to be got over with.” (From Schopenhauer’s Counsels And Maxims, Section I.)
Here is a statement of profound philosophical and religious importance, because there is no greater subject of thoughtful contemplation than the meaning of life. True, that objectively there can be no greater subject than God Himself, but how arrogant and disrespectful would we be, should we dare to aim our incompetent thinking at God, at the expense of that most tangible to us of all manifestations of His Existence: our own life!
One of my Apte Dictums says that “life is a contract between man and God, at the end of which we receive our wages.” (I bet that if one could be put to the test of writing down a thousand one-word descriptions of “life,” like the word “contract” above, in the course of a single day, such a task would not turn out to be too hard. After all, almost any word in the dictionary can apply, isn’t that true? In my wife’s splendid definition, for instance, “life is… an experiment.” Well, c’est… la vie!)
Among these thousand epithets, the words ‘gift’ and ‘burden’ ought to occupy distinguished positions. If we attempted to compare a large number of such lists and ran a semantic word-count analysis of these lists, both these words would appear high on the composite tally.
Now, how does the word "gift" apply, except to indicate something given? On the other hand, this is not a free gift, in the “take it or leave it” sense. Noblesse oblige that we do not discard this gift, when the giver is not looking. Yes, it is noblesse, and not the ignoble dread of “the undiscovered country.” As I have put it elsewhere, the words “death before dishonor” become meaningless, to the point of mockery, when death itself turns out to be a greater dishonor than a dishonorable life.
But let us be fair to the better, non-mechanical connotation of the word “gift.” After all, the many presents each of us used to receive for birthdays, holidays, and other special occasions, especially as young children, have meant much more to us than the fact of their being ‘given’ and dutifully ‘received’! Most of them were delightful and pleasurable in themselves, and they never failed to brighten our life. Let us, therefore, look at our life as an exceptional gift in that sense, too.
For many obvious reasons, life is a wonderful gift, especially, when we are young, and our list of “capital” regrets is short and mostly inconsequential. But extremely lucky are those for whom, at some critical point, life does not become a burden, either due to the infirmity of old age or an incurable disease, or else because of a mental anguish, caused by particular circumstances. On the first scenario, here is Nietzsche’s take on suicide, in Menschliches (80):
“The old man and death. One may ask, why, aside from the demands of religion, it is more praiseworthy for a man growing old, who feels his powers decrease, to await his slow exhaustion and disintegration, rather than to put a term to his life with complete consciousness? In this case suicide is quite natural and should rightfully awaken respect for the triumph of reason. This it did in those times, when the preeminent Greek philosophers and the doughtiest Roman patriots used to die by suicide. Conversely, compulsion to prolong life from day to day, anxiously consulting doctors and accepting the most painful, humiliating conditions, without the strength to come nearer the actual goal of one’s life, is by far less worthy of respect. Religions provide abundant excuses to escape the need to kill oneself. --- This is how they insinuate themselves with those who are in love with life.”
My opinion is that, of course, in most cases, suicide is a dishonorable ploy to bail out of our contract with God, which requires us to live out our life in toto. However, I am categorically opposed to prolonging one’s life artificially, without a perfectly good reason, that is, in Nietzsche’s words, purely out of being “in love with life.” The only reason to prolong life is when one has some useful unfinished business to wrap up, and that business is truly important. On the other hand, that reason should not, at any time, become an excuse…
So much, then, for prolonging life. But suicide is an altogether different matter.
I would not call suicide either a weakness or a strength of character, but rather a luxury no decent man can afford. In this sense, “death before dishonor” is an empty phrase. The so-called “dishonorable life,” if it is a life of involuntary dishonor, must be viewed as a penance, as an expiation of sins, so to speak, and as such it is no longer a dishonor. The real dishonor is avoiding penance, becoming “a fugitive from justice.” There is a remarkable passage in Plato, referring to the secret practices of the Pythagoreans, which, in my view, has a surprising relevance to this subject, although, to my knowledge, it has not been understood the way I see it, by anybody else:
“The saying uttered in secret rites, to the effect that we men are in a sort of prison, and that one ought not to loose himself from it nor yet to run away, seems to me something great and not easy to see through; but this at least I think is well said, that it is the gods who care for us and we, men, are one of the possessions of the gods.” (From Phaedo: 62 B)
I find this passage remarkable, in the sense that here I can clearly see an explicit prohibition of suicide, so unexpected to be found in classical Greek thought, which seems to treat suicide rather casually, especially if one allows himself to be convinced on this matter by the authority of Schopenhauer, who attributes to the Greeks an explicit approval of honorable suicide.
Therefore, it is not what Schopenhauer thinks about it, but this Pythagorean Commandment of sorts-- Thou shalt not loose thyself from this prison, nor yet run away, as we men are one of the possessions of the gods! -- that, to me, becomes the definitive expression of the real Greek position on the inadmissibility of suicide as an easy way of bailing out of one’s duties and responsibilities to one’s life, and those who are of a different opinion, must rather be treated as an exception, and by no means as the rule.
But Schopenhauer, whether we disagree with him on the tricky subject of suicide or not, teaches us a very important pessimistic lesson about life (we need his old-age pessimism to balance our youthful optimism), suggesting that, generally speaking, life is more of a burden, than anything else:
“There is no doubt that life is given us, not to be enjoyed, but to be overcome, to be got over with.” (From Schopenhauer’s Counsels And Maxims, Section I.)
Here is a statement of profound philosophical and religious importance, because there is no greater subject of thoughtful contemplation than the meaning of life. True, that objectively there can be no greater subject than God Himself, but how arrogant and disrespectful would we be, should we dare to aim our incompetent thinking at God, at the expense of that most tangible to us of all manifestations of His Existence: our own life!
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