After minutes wasted of procrastination on picking a page to focus on in the Steiner book, I decided to just randomly have my book open to a page and then plunge myself into that page regardless. Well my book stopped on page 232. I have read and reread that page and i think i have uncovered Steiner's writing style. He loves to repeat and throw in very unnecessary and complicated words. Don't worry Dr. Sexson i am not complaining....i always love to learn new words :)
Page 232 is full of repetition. Steiner is talking about the five different categories and he uses this page to label those categories in several different ways.
He starts on the previous page (231) to label and introduce these five categories. They should seem familiar to everyone who has been coming to class.
1. of men and of women
2. of age and of youth
3. of society and of the individual
4. of living and of dead
5. of men and of god(s)
After reading on, Steiner just goes on to describe these categories with different names that he finds appropriate. I have kindly decided to list the different names that he listed. I also at the end of each category have typed out what he has described the categories to represent and my own interpretation of what i think he means.....i hope i am not too far off base.....
1. men and women
masculinity and femininity
gender
*"When man and woman meet, they stand against each other as they stand close"
-I am not quite sure what he means by this statement...it seems awfully obvious.
*"Old and young seek in each other the pain of remembrance and the matching solace of futurity"
-I have understood this to mean that the old look back to the young to remember and to think of "the good old days" while the young look towards the old to see what is to come. I think both can learn a lot from each other not only about their own life but also about the lives of the people around them
3. society and individual
individual and the community or state
of private autonomy and of social collectivity
community
individual and communitas
*"Anarching individuation seeks interaction with the compulsion of law, of collective cohesion in the body politic"
- Here i believe that Steiner is just explain the different between the people that prefer to live a life without laws and regulations along with the people that like to live as a part of a larger whole.
4. living and dead
quick and dead
existence and mortality
by the cut between life and death
living and deceased
*"The dead inhabits the living and, in turn, await their visit"
-I believe this statement is just showing that the dead are around the living and just waiting until they too become part of the dead...??
5. men and god(s)
mortals and immortals
the human and the divine
by the potentials of accepted or denied encounter between the existential and the transcendent
mortals and god(s)
*The duel between men and the god(s) is the most aggressively amorous known to experience
-If I am reading into the correctly i believe that Steiner is saying that this pair is the one relationship most connected with love. This makes sense when you think about religions and how the god(s) are loving and the mortals are in love with the god(s). But this love is described as aggressively which i also find very appropriate when talking about the relationship between man and god...they don't always agree on what is right
Also, one of the sentences that struck was..."To arrive at oneself - the primordial journey - is to come up, polemically, against 'the other'"
To me this means that to fully understand oneself and to truly be awake with life is to understand the categories and to face them each, one against the other.
Page 232 is full of repetition. Steiner is talking about the five different categories and he uses this page to label those categories in several different ways.
He starts on the previous page (231) to label and introduce these five categories. They should seem familiar to everyone who has been coming to class.
1. of men and of women
2. of age and of youth
3. of society and of the individual
4. of living and of dead
5. of men and of god(s)
After reading on, Steiner just goes on to describe these categories with different names that he finds appropriate. I have kindly decided to list the different names that he listed. I also at the end of each category have typed out what he has described the categories to represent and my own interpretation of what i think he means.....i hope i am not too far off base.....
1. men and women
masculinity and femininity
gender
*"When man and woman meet, they stand against each other as they stand close"
-I am not quite sure what he means by this statement...it seems awfully obvious.
2. age and youth
old and young
ageing and youth
age
old and young
ageing and youth
age
*"Old and young seek in each other the pain of remembrance and the matching solace of futurity"
-I have understood this to mean that the old look back to the young to remember and to think of "the good old days" while the young look towards the old to see what is to come. I think both can learn a lot from each other not only about their own life but also about the lives of the people around them
3. society and individual
individual and the community or state
of private autonomy and of social collectivity
community
individual and communitas
*"Anarching individuation seeks interaction with the compulsion of law, of collective cohesion in the body politic"
- Here i believe that Steiner is just explain the different between the people that prefer to live a life without laws and regulations along with the people that like to live as a part of a larger whole.
4. living and dead
quick and dead
existence and mortality
by the cut between life and death
living and deceased
*"The dead inhabits the living and, in turn, await their visit"
-I believe this statement is just showing that the dead are around the living and just waiting until they too become part of the dead...??
5. men and god(s)
mortals and immortals
the human and the divine
by the potentials of accepted or denied encounter between the existential and the transcendent
mortals and god(s)
*The duel between men and the god(s) is the most aggressively amorous known to experience
-If I am reading into the correctly i believe that Steiner is saying that this pair is the one relationship most connected with love. This makes sense when you think about religions and how the god(s) are loving and the mortals are in love with the god(s). But this love is described as aggressively which i also find very appropriate when talking about the relationship between man and god...they don't always agree on what is right
Also, one of the sentences that struck was..."To arrive at oneself - the primordial journey - is to come up, polemically, against 'the other'"
To me this means that to fully understand oneself and to truly be awake with life is to understand the categories and to face them each, one against the other.
