Concept Of Detachment Research Articles

Peregrine Identity: Introduction and Conclusion from an Early Version of Wandering Joy

ABSTRACT Published here, for the first time in any language, are excerpts from an early, markedly different version of Schürmann’s celebrated book Wandering Joy: Meister Eckhart’s Mystical Philosophy (1972). Schürmann submitted this early version to the Dominican school of theology Le Saulchoir as a final thesis in 1969, titling it Peregrine Identity: The Concept of Detachment in Meister Eckhart’s German Sermons. In it, Schürmann focuses on Eckhart’s preaching of detachment as an imitation of Christ’s self-emptying on the way of the Cross. The detached thereby undergo a practical transformation of existence that Schürmann calls ‘peregrine identity with the origin,’ i.e. with the Godhead at the source of the Trinity. This early version also contains valuable remarks on conversion, on letting-be as a solution to the violent, ‘Promethean attitude’ of our age, and on St. Francis as the one who ‘most visibly put into practice the doctrine of detachment.’

The Call of the Origin: On Christology, Conversion, and Peregrine Identity in Reiner Schürmann’s Early Work on Meister Eckhart

ABSTRACT In 1969, Reiner Schürmann submitted a thesis to the Dominican school of theology Le Saulchoir. It was titled Peregrine Identity: The Concept of Detachment in Meister Eckhart’s German Sermons. Three years later, Schürmann published Wandering Joy, his celebrated book on Eckhart. In this article, we examine four aspects of the earlier study that cannot, as such, be found in the later one: (1) the specifically Christological dimension of Eckhart’s teaching of detachment; (2) a logic of conversion at work in Eckhart and St. Francis; (3) Schürmann’s hermeneutics of the symbol; and (4) the practical outcomes of Heidegger’s ontological difference as it is inflected by what Schürmann calls wandering or ‘peregrine’ difference. We aim to show how the questions and issues raised in Schürmann’s thesis remain vital for all those readers of Eckhart who seek to restore their own existence to its essential freedom.

“Faces” and “Disguises” of V. Rozanov’s SolitaryThoughts and Fallen Leaves

An intensive study of V. Rozanovs work naturally actualizes the question of the reasons for the contradictory assessments that have accompanied it for more than a century. The author explains their polarity by the prevalence of subjective or stereotypical ideas about the fundamental novelty of V. Rozanovs approach to the psychology of literary creativity and to the aesthetics of secluded nudity, which the creative subject of his books invariably followed. The article examines the space of solitude as a sphere of creative realization of Rozanov, where the main attention is paid to the intuition of intimacy, interpreted by the writer as a genuine spiritual act underlying the true creativity of life and literature. In solitude the authors intuition of intimacy penetrates into the phenomena and objects of life, endows them with related intimate meanings, is reflected in them and contributes to the creation of a mythopoetic picture of the world, filled with a variety of subjective and personal ideas of V. Rozanov about God, the world, cultural and literary values, about to yourself. In the above examples, V. Rozanovs faces appear in the process of intimate rapprochement with the Absolute and revealed in ontological insights. Disguises are figurative dialectical projections of the intimate faces of the author, opposed to the traditional views on the writers personality. These are polar, familiarly traversed projections of his intimate faces designed to enhance their ontological and aesthetic significance. The philosophical concept of detachment in myth and literature, developed by A.F. Losev in Dialectics of Myth , served as a methodological basis for the study of the phenomenon of solitude and unity in V. Rozanov of the myth-maker and writer.

Ontological struggle over new product category: Transition potential of meat alternatives

In recent sustainability transitions research, more attention has been called to dynamic relations between regimes and niches in complex processes of systemic change. In this paper, we provide the case of meat alternative markets, which have been expanding rapidly in Europe and in Northern America. During this expansion, animal-free alternatives are in a contradictory situation. In aiming to carve out market space for these products the aim is to be as similar to meat as possible. In this paper we study how, in Finland, the niche actors have situated themselves within the regime by detaching from the first generation of plant-based foods and attaching to shared rules, materialities and cultural meanings in the meat regime. We discuss how the concepts of detachment and attachment can help in understanding further the transitional pathways created as niches aim to fit-and-transform the rules of the market, and the regime.

Redefining the Ideal Character: A Comparative Study between the Concept of Detachment in the Aṣṭasāhasrikā and Guo Xiang’s Theory of Eremitism at Court

The Aṣṭasāhasrikā Prajnāpāramitā Sūtra (The Perfection of Wisdom in Eight Thousand Lines) criticizes the traditional practice of dwelling in an isolated place for self-cultivation and advocates returning to the human realm with a liberated mind and compassionate engagement. This new theory of detachment aims at defining the Bodhisattva, a new ideal character, for the rising Mahāyāna movement. In his theory of eremitism at court, Guo Xiang 郭象 describes a sage image of governing the empire with a detached mind. This image is invested with the concept of self-liberation from reality and defines a new ideal character that actively engages in sociopolitical affairs while becoming freed from personal concerns. Guo Xiang’s sage image is similar to the Bodhisattva image in several aspects, and textual and historical evidence shows that Guo likely read the two early translations of the Aṣṭasāhasrikā and other Buddhist texts and was influenced by them to a certain extent. With the influence of Buddhist ideas, Guo completed the Mysterious Learning’s mission of harmonizing the teaching of names with spontaneity.

Minding the Gap: Detachment and Understanding in Aleksej Losev's Dialektika mifa

Aleksej Losev's definition of myth centres onthe concept of detachment. In modern timesdetachment has most often figured in thecontext of philosophical aesthetics, where itis a cognitive category akin to Kant's``disinterestedness'' or the Russian formalists'``estrangement.'' However Losev's usage alsomakes reference to the ontological sense ofdetachment as contemplativeascent (cf. Meister Eckhardt'sAbgeschiedenheit). Thus, Losev's concept ofmyth combines both senses of detachment,binding perceptual attitude and being togetherin a double movement of resignation from theworld and union with meaning; this movementliterally makes sense out of reality. Ittherefore bears comparison to the treatment ofdistanciation in contemporary hermeneutics,where detachment is a key condition ofunderstanding. By investigating Losev'sconnections to other Russian thinkers, theauthor makes a case for a distinct Russiantradition of hermeneutic philosophy (V. Ivanov,G. Shpet, A. Bakshy, A. Losev).

Practical Understanding vs Reflective Understanding

An interesting dualism runs through John Campbell's Past, Space and Self. It is a dualism between two different modes of representing the world. One such mode, the causally indexical mode, is practical and engaged. The other, the causally non-indexical mode, is disengaged and reflective. Campbell's primary project in the book is a neo-Kantian attempt to map the conceptual abilities which together make up the capacity for genuinely self-conscious thought. Since Campbell sees the capacity for self-conscious thought as inextricably linked with possession of a detached and reflective perspective on the world the precise delineation of the distinction between the two modes of representing the world is a matter of some importance, promising as it does a principled way of marking out the realm of self-conscious subjects. This is particularly so for two reasons. First, Campbell tends to discuss the core components of self-conscious thought in various domains (particularly with regard to the representation of space and the representation of time) by contrasting them with their causally non-indexical and non-self-conscious counterparts. Second, the concepts of detachment and reflection are central to Campbell's conception of self-consciousness, which he sees as crucially linked with the capacity to take a detached and reflective perspective on oneself. And throughout the book Campbell places considerable weight on the fact that both self-conciousness and an objective perspective on the world are reflective and detached when arguing for their necessary interdependence. Clearly, the dualism between detached and engaged perspectives on the world has a considerable amount of work to do in the book, and deserves careful attention.' Let me begin, though, by noting a respect in which Campbell's dualism is interesting and significant independently of his project of mapping the capacity for genuinely self-conscious thought. What he offers us is a distinction between two perspectives on the world, one considerably more cognitively * This commentary was written while I was a visiting scholar at Dartmouth College. I have discussed other aspects of Campbell's book in Bermddez 1995a

Penser la finitude. Création, détachement et les limites de la philosophie dans l'œuvre de maître Eckhart

Starting out with a sketch of Meister Eckhart's understanding of creation, this essay analyses the epistemo- logical implications of his concept of detachment and negative theology. These implications do not only include a reflection upon the limits of the notion of reason and intellectus but they also lead to a « hermeneutic turn » which responds to these limits and which can be observed in the rhetoric of Eckhart's sermons and his preaching. Thus, Eckhart's rhetoric of detachment can be characterised as an attempt to conceive of a « philosophy of finitude » where philosophy and negative theology converge.

Oriental Conceptions of Detachment and Enlightenment

An American philosopher returning from the East-West Philosophers' Conference at the University of Hawaii in the summer of 1949 remarked that he had not been able to discover there, in discussion with Oriental philosophers, any thought or concept which could not also be found, in some shape or form, in the annals of Western thought. I myself believe that even the concept of enlightenment is found in East and West alike, although in the East it is much more emphasized and developed than it is in the West. But I think that the concept of detachment, which originated in India and then spread all over Asia, is peculiar to the East. At least, I have never found it in Western thought. It is sometimes asked whether the East has any message for the West. Whether there is, in the concept of detachment, any such message can best be answered by trying to understand what detachment is.