Cormac, I think I am starting to understand how fundamental these two forces are. The movie clip helped me grasp a lot of the ideas you have been discussing. I really see this push and pull in the context of my own mairrage how often I am unconsciously caught up in this whirlpool of passions. In the light of your "meet help" article, I have an inuition of a way out of this dialectic into a unity where the pushing and pulling compliment each other.
Thanks so much for your work! I try to share it with as many people as I can, and it is always well received.
Glory be to God, this is very touching for me to read. And I do appreciate the shares. I don’t know if I have any responsibility to my writing here other than producing it. If I’m also supposed to be marketing it, I certainly have been negligent in that regard. So thank you for filling in!
Grateful for these Substack contemplations. Have no doubt that souls are inspired. Always had trouble myself with anthropomorphizing nations by their political actions, but it is true in your sense that we all participate in the culture/what-have-you that brings them about. But I figure there's also that best-versions-of-ourselves sense that we ought to cling to and not forsake even at the level of the nation, which isn't necessarily political. The "true" versions of the West and of Russia in that differentiated unity: the city of God living on as the city of man burns away?
I remember no details from 1984, but from refreshing my mind with some quick online research, I see in Oceania a more totalizing governing structure than that, with the four ministries corresponding to the soul (in its three faculties) and the body. The Ministry of Truth = logos. The Ministry of Peace = thymos. The Ministry of Love = epithymia. The Ministry of Plenty = the body. Does that accord at all with your reading of the book? Tyranny is most easily associated with thymos because thymos is most directly concerned with control. But the poles are contained within each other, and epithymia can have just as tyrannical a grasp on the soul. Totalitarianism is approached equally from the right and the left.
Ah, I see your point better, especially in contrast with Brave New World. Jonathan Pageau (who's from Canada, which has a more controlling government) has often described our times as a burgeoning synthesis of these two dystopias, one based on extreme licentiousness, the other on extreme control — in which case, yes, 1984 represents thymos. Such a synthesis sounds like a paradox, but I think it's exactly what results from a polarized populace.
Yes! I definitely think so, but that is not at all to exhaust the meaning of the whore and beast symbolism. It's the same as with male and female, which correspond typologically with thymos and epithymia, but if you view sexual differentiation only from that lens you'll miss a lot of vital information.
Cormac, I think I am starting to understand how fundamental these two forces are. The movie clip helped me grasp a lot of the ideas you have been discussing. I really see this push and pull in the context of my own mairrage how often I am unconsciously caught up in this whirlpool of passions. In the light of your "meet help" article, I have an inuition of a way out of this dialectic into a unity where the pushing and pulling compliment each other.
Thanks so much for your work! I try to share it with as many people as I can, and it is always well received.
Glory be to God, this is very touching for me to read. And I do appreciate the shares. I don’t know if I have any responsibility to my writing here other than producing it. If I’m also supposed to be marketing it, I certainly have been negligent in that regard. So thank you for filling in!
Grateful for these Substack contemplations. Have no doubt that souls are inspired. Always had trouble myself with anthropomorphizing nations by their political actions, but it is true in your sense that we all participate in the culture/what-have-you that brings them about. But I figure there's also that best-versions-of-ourselves sense that we ought to cling to and not forsake even at the level of the nation, which isn't necessarily political. The "true" versions of the West and of Russia in that differentiated unity: the city of God living on as the city of man burns away?
A couple of great points here that I wish to elaborate on in my next post. Thank you so much for comments like this; they are very helpful.
I remember no details from 1984, but from refreshing my mind with some quick online research, I see in Oceania a more totalizing governing structure than that, with the four ministries corresponding to the soul (in its three faculties) and the body. The Ministry of Truth = logos. The Ministry of Peace = thymos. The Ministry of Love = epithymia. The Ministry of Plenty = the body. Does that accord at all with your reading of the book? Tyranny is most easily associated with thymos because thymos is most directly concerned with control. But the poles are contained within each other, and epithymia can have just as tyrannical a grasp on the soul. Totalitarianism is approached equally from the right and the left.
Ah, I see your point better, especially in contrast with Brave New World. Jonathan Pageau (who's from Canada, which has a more controlling government) has often described our times as a burgeoning synthesis of these two dystopias, one based on extreme licentiousness, the other on extreme control — in which case, yes, 1984 represents thymos. Such a synthesis sounds like a paradox, but I think it's exactly what results from a polarized populace.
Yes! I definitely think so, but that is not at all to exhaust the meaning of the whore and beast symbolism. It's the same as with male and female, which correspond typologically with thymos and epithymia, but if you view sexual differentiation only from that lens you'll miss a lot of vital information.
Glory be to God, Fredrik, I'm glad to hear it. And you've given me an assignment for next week: something more uplifting!