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Saturday, September 15, 2007

A matter of style

from http://tijil.org/gallery/d/214-1/cellist.jpg

For a moment What a surprising incongruous image! and I love this from Tomas' collection. I don't know whether he drew it or got it from some where else. The drawing style is of course Asian manga/anime but the instrument very Western and high art and the girl is drawn very street style.

In a life on another continent I was a bureaucrat and strangely I often went to work in a green army jacket and jeans. On it I wore a patch which said Don't follow me, I'm lost too! If you know me already, you would know that there a contrariness in me. If you asked me a question presenting a black and white situation, I will often bring in the grays. One of my close friends told me that if he wanted to explore the options he would come to me but if he wanted to make a decision then he wasn't sure.

The Greeks had a wider vocabulary for many concepts and love is probably the most well-known because of CS Lewis who listed storge, phileo, eros, and agape . For wisdom Aristotle presented two intellectual virtues: sophia and phronesis. Sophia is what we usually translate as "wisdom". Thus philosophy is love of wisdom. Sophia is the ability to think well or critically, and is used in our study of the world and the way it is; sophia involves deliberation concerning universal laws and truths. Phronesis is sort of more pragmatic and a way of being in the world. It is the ability to think about how and why we should act in order to change things, and especially to change our lives for the better. I have heard common sense and prudence as words used to translate phronesis. Aristotle said that phronesis isn't simply a skill, in fact it involves the abilities to both to decide how to achieve a certain end, and to reflect upon and determine that end. (This latter point is under dispute because I think it brings Aristotle much closer to Plato.) Phronesis requires time and thus is not truly common sense.

I think juxtapositions which set things or ideas in opposition are often unhelpful. However incongruities can bring the norms and values of the world to sight. The wisdom of phronesis is not based on conformity. Human existence is hugely ambiguous and even the Christian faith is based more on phronesis than sophia because it is based on a transcendent relationship lived out in concrete realty.

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. Romans 12:2