Tag Archives: reversals of fortune
The Thrill of Admiration
The Thrill of Admiration These days I’m reading Jacob Howland’s wonderful book about Plato’s Republic, the great dialogue that shows how hard it is to teach virtue in the political arena. At the same time, I’m mentally settling down … Continue reading
Posted in Absolute Freedom and Terror, absurdism, academe, action, afterlife, alienation, American politics, art, art of living, atheism, autonomy, beauty, books, bureaucracy, childhood, chivalry, cities, class, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, courtship, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, femininity, feminism, films, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, heroes, hidden God, hierarchy, history, history of ideas, idealism, ideality, identity, ideology, idolatry, immorality, immortality, institutional power, Jews, journalism, Judaism, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, literature, love, male power, martyrdom, masculinity, master, master/slave relation, memoir, memory, mind control, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, mortality, oppression, past and future, philosophy, poetry, political, political movements, politics, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, presence, propaganda, psychology, public facade, public intellectual, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, roles, scientism, secular, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, social climbing, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, terror, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, twentieth century, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, violence, war, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged a long romance, Abigail L. Rosenthal's "A Good Look at Evil", admirers and detractors, Adolf Eichmann, Aristotle, “call no man happy”, buffetings of public opinion, Chaim Tchernowitz, death and glory, deserved honors, fall from grace, fame and fortune, Hannah Arendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, history’s big stage, history’s unfair verdict, history’s verdict, inflated reputation, Jacob Howland’s Glaucon’s Fate: History Myth and Character in Plato’s Republic, Jewish history, legacy, lost reputation, lucky in love, mental programming, mindless bureaucrats, named professorships, Nazi bureaucracy, opinion shapers, Plato, Plato's Republic, posterity's verdict, posthumous reputation, public disfavor, public esteem, Rav Tsair, reputation, reversals of fortune, risks to happiness, Solon of Athens, the Holocaust, the just and the unjust, the just man, the race well run, uplifting versus defaming a reputation, victims and perpetrators, W.H. Auden's In Memory of W B Yeats, writers and philosophers
Leave a comment
The Devil in the Details
The Devil in the Details Depression is not an attractive word, but it describes my mood in recent days. Two explanations (or causes?) spring to mind. First: I have this neuropathy handicap. My walking lacks its former, rhythmic life-of-its-own, becoming … Continue reading
Posted in absurdism, academe, action, alienation, anthropology, art of living, atheism, autonomy, Biblical God, Christianity, conformism, contemplation, contradictions, cool, courage, cults, cultural politics, culture, desire, dialectic, erotic life, eternity, ethics, evil, existentialism, exploitation, faith, fashion, femininity, feminism, freedom, friendship, gender balance, glitterati, Gnosticism, guilt and innocence, health, hegemony, hidden God, hierarchy, history of ideas, idealism, ideality, identity, idolatry, immorality, institutional power, Jews, Judaism, law, legal responsibility, life and death struggle, male power, masculinity, memoir, memory, modernism, moral action, moral evaluation, moral psychology, morality, ontology, oppression, past and future, peace, philosophy, politics of ideas, postmodernism, power, presence, promissory notes, propaganda, psychology, public facade, reading, reductionism, relationships, religion, roles, seduction, self-deception, sex appeal, sexuality, social construction, social conventions, social ranking, sociobiology, spiritual journey, spiritual not religious, spirituality, status, status of women, suffering, the examined life, the problematic of men, the problematic of woman, the profane, the sacred, theism, theology, time, twenty-first century, Utopia, victimhood, victims, work, writing, Zeitgeist
Tagged Abigail L. Rosenthal's "Confessions of a Young Philosopher", beat the devil, Bible study, Confessions of a Young Philosopher, corrupt influence, counterproductive remedy, decentered feeling, dentists, depression, expensive cavities, experimental treatments, fair fights, firm footing, Halakah, hard-bought wisdom, holistic treatments, hollow self, ideal life story, impersonal wisdom, incurable, Jewish observance, life rhythms, life story, limping, Loma Linda Hospital, malevolent spirit, medical treatments, midrashim, mood changes, narrative view, neuropathy, New Age, New Age-niks, patient no better, Pentateuch, personal identity, personal wisdom, philosophy of religion, physical footing, physical therapy, place to stand, placeholder self, Reform temple, reversals of fortune, shell of oneself, solitary walker, speculative theology, spiritual footing, stratagems of evil, taking a walk, talking it out, textual study, the devil, thought experiment, Torah Study, treatment failure, treatment success, walking handicap
Leave a comment