Theodicy

Is Maximus “European”? Is Maximus a “philosopher”? The two questions of our conference also entail the concomitant questions «what is Maximus’ contribution to Europe?» and “what is his contribution to philosophy?”. They might equally presuppose the questions “is Maximus something else than just a “Byzantine”?” and “is Maximus something else than just a theologian?”. These are not new questions and they have actually mobilized research in the last decades. It is to be reminded that Hans-Urs von Balthasar, who is considered to be a sort of “founder” of a new period of interest in Maximian scholarship, has regarded Maximus as a great European thinker who struggled against the “asianic” spirit and its despotism. He considered Maximus as a precursor of Hegel and he has linked him to the latter’s dialectical thought . Roman Catholic specialists from 1970 onwards have tried to interpret Maximus as a precursor of Thomas Aquinas. They have insisted on Maximus’ sojourn in the province of Africa, that is in the same places where Augustine of Hippo was active, as well as in Rome and they have highlighted Maximus’ conflict with the Byzantine state. Juan-Miguel Garrigues, in particular, has portrayed Maximus as a fugitive and a “refugee”, who was fleeing Persians and Arabs, but also, in a certain sense, struggling against Byzantines. In the experience of this clash with the world of Late Antiquity, Maximus has supposedly discovered historical contingency  and formulated in his thought what has come to be a major problem of Western modernity. On the contrary, Orthodox scholars often consider Gregory Palamas as Maximus’ true heir . But for Orthodox scholars as well, the vindication of Maximus was related with all the important enjeux of European philosophy, both old and new. For example, Maximus’ theories on the person, logos and tropos were linked to the modernist philosophical program of existentialism, as well as with personalism. The idea was to promote Maximus as an alternative thinker of the person that is not in an occidental modernist sense, but in an alternative version that is nevertheless equally European . That was combined with an equal effort to regard Maximus as a more authentic continuator of Aristotle . In the last decades we witness an important turning to Maximus’ Psychology and a comparison with contemporary Psychology and Psychoanalysis, for example in its Lacanian version , or with other schools . All these bold interpretations have of course coexisted with patrological, philological and historical studies, feeding one another, and reaching the great interest in Maximus that we witness today.

We discuss the philosophical problems attendant to the justice of eternal punishments in Hell, particularly those portrayed in Dante’s Inferno. We conclude that, under Dante’s description, a unique version of the problem of Hell (and Heaven) can be posed.

SINOSSI: Lo spaventoso sisma di Lisbona, verificatosi il 1° novembre 1755, non comportò solo incalcolabili devastazioni sul piano socio-economico, ma andò a colpire profondamente tanto l’immaginario popolare (minandone le certezze quotidiane), quanto i savants dell’Europa settecentesca, stimolando un’intensa riflessione (che coprì l’intero spettro dei punti di vista, da quello teologico, a quello scientifico). Il giovane Kant è chiaro exemplum dell’interesse suscitato dall’eccezionale fenomeno tellurico presso gli illuministi: tra il gennaio e l’aprile del 1756, egli dette alle stampe tre brevi saggi interamente dedicati alla descrizione scientifica del terremoto portoghese, saggi che si inseriscono nel contesto degli studi del pensatore di Königsberg riguardanti la filosofia della natura e, nello specifico, l’età, l’origine e la costituzione della terra (oggetto dei saggi del 1754 e del 1755). Con il presente lavoro, si intende portare all’attenzione del lettore quella che pare essere una precisa evoluzione della concezione dell’utilità del terremoto, nel passaggio dal periodo pre-critico a quello critico, in particolare nella Kritik der Urteilskraft (1790). Qui l’Autore pare escludere il terremoto dall’elenco degli eventi naturali catastrofici la cui esperienza, “se ci troviamo al sicuro”, genera nell’uomo il concetto di sublime dinamico (KU, AA 05: 261). Quali sono le ragioni per cui il terremoto non trova spazio in questo discorso? Il sisma perde cioè i caratteri di catastrofe agli occhi di Kant, oppure è giudicato così terrificante da togliere ogni razionalità all’uomo e impedire ogni spiraglio interpretativo?

ABSTRACT: The dreadful Lisbon earthquake, which occurred on 1 November 1755, did not only cause an untold socio- economic devastation, but it also profoundly affected both public imagination (by undermining everyday certainties) and the savants of 18th century Europe, stimulating an intense debate (which covered the entire spectrum of points of view, ranging from the theological to the scientific). Young Kant is a clear exemplum of the interest aroused by this unprecedented seismic phenomenon amongst European thinkers of the Enlightenment: between January and April 1756, he published three brief essays entirely devoted to the scientific description of the Portuguese earthquake, essays that must be understood in the context of his studies on natural philosophy and, in particular, on the age, origin, and formation of the Earth (which were the topics of the essays of 1754 and 1755). With this paper, we aim to draw the Reader’s attention to the evolution that has characterised, in our opinion, Kant’s theses concerning the value and the benefit of the earthquakes, from the pre-critical to the critical period. We intend to focus on the Kritik der Urteilskraft (1790), in which Kant seems to exclude earthquakes from the list of catastrophic natural events, the experience of which generates the concept of dynamic sublime “wenn wir uns nur in Sicherheit befinden” (KU, AA 05: 261). Why do earthquakes have no place in this discourse? Namely, does the earthquake lose its catastrophic essence in Kant’s eyes, or is it judged to be so terrifying that it deprives man of rational thought and suppresses any glimmer of further interpretation?

RESEARCH ARTICLES
Gideon Calder, Family Autonomy and Class Fate
Horaţiu Traian Crişan, Reparations for Recent Historical Injustices. The Case of Romanian Communism
Marlon Jesspher B. De Vera, Freedoms and Rights in a Levinasian Society of Neighbors

DISCUSSION NOTES/ DEBATE
Katerina Deligiorgi, Autonomy in Bioethics
William T. Lynch, Social Epistemology Transformed: Steve Fuller’s Account of Knowledge as a Divine Spark for Human Domination
Steve Fuller, Social Epistemology for Theodicy without Deference: Response to William Lynch
Md. Munir Hossain Talukder, On “Self-Realization” – The Ultimate Norm of Arne Naess’s Ecosophy T

Book panel on The Ethics of Time, hosted by the Psychology & the Other Conference, Cambridge, MA, October 13, 2017. Panelists: Brent D. Slife (Brigham Young University), William Woody, S.J.(College of the Holy Cross), Mark Freeman (College of the Holy Cross) and Matthew Clemente (Boston College). Response by J. P. Manoussakis