NotaBene

NotaBene е електронно списание за философски и политически науки. Повече за нас

The Word and Beyond It

In this issue

Journal NotaBene Issue 35 (2017). Editor: Antoaneta Nikolova

Topic of the issue: The Word and Beyond It

Waterfalls and Fountains in Haiku and in Western Poetry

Abstract: This article tries to answer two questions: first, why are civilization and its main symbol “the city” opposed to Nature in the West, while they are not confronted in the East; and second, in what way does this divergence between the Eastern and the Western cultures develop corresponding to different levels of Western poetry and haiku. The investigation proves that the primary contradiction – anthropocentrism versus cosmocentrism – reveals itself at different levels and raises other contradictions, such as: linguistic code versus pictorial code; metaphor understood in a narrow literary sense versus kigo; personification versus animism.

Key words: poetry, haiku, nature, city, Western culture, Eastern culture.

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ISSA AND PROSTITUTES: HAIKU PORTRAITS OF EARLY MODERN JAPAN

Abstract: Japanese haiku master Kobayashi Issa (1763-1828) considered beggars, peasants, orphans, and even ethnic minority outcastes, the Ainu, to be worthy subjects in his one-breath sketches: not looked down upon but rather appreciated as human beings. As a male poet acculturated in the male-dominant Japan of his era, did Issa’s penetrating sympathy for fellow creatures extend also to the economically, socially, and—in some cases—physically enslaved women of his time? An examination of his haiku about prostitutes—from the highest class courtesans of the Yoshiwara down to the lowest grade of streetwalker—reveals that, while there are exceptions, for the most part his haiku portraits of prostitutes coax readers toward deeper understanding and compassion.

Key words: poetry, haiku, Kobayashi Issa, haiku portraits of prostitutes.

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Rain Drops in a Glass of Wine

Abstract: The article is a compendium of the development of modern Haiku. The Shomon School and the Nippon-ha (Japanese School) have been briefly analysed. The paper surveys two lines in the development of haiku after World War II: the Kyoshi-Line, in which the beauty of Nature is described and the Hekigoto-Line, which has added to perception also knowledge. In conclusion it is formulated that a universal nexus between traditional and modern Haiku is the aesthetic category “yugen” – the pure life beyond comprehension, the elegant and timeless beauty, the “ingeniously created ambiguity”.

Key words: history of haiku, traditional haiku (dento), modern haiku (gendai), perception, knowledge

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History of Haiku Poetry in Italy

Abstract: The paper examines the history of Italian haiku. It is emphasizes that we live in the era of media, where the uppermost value is communication, and poetry is bound to lose ground and relevance. However the interest in haiku has been increasing recently. Some organizations and projects related to haiku are discussed. A gallery of portraits of Italian haiku poets is presented, including biographies and samples of haiku poems.

Key words: Italian poetry, Italian haiku, Haiku organizations.

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Language, thinking, education

Abstract: The text consists of 27 fragments written between 2014 and 2017. These are reflections devoted to the principles of humanities and humanitarian education and the necessary conditions for the development of the scholar. To the end, the focus is particularly on the study of Antiquity and classical education.

The fragments are grouped thematically in seven sections, with the following headings: "Language", "The Gift and Its Enhancement", "The University and Humanities", "The Method", "Free Thought", "Intellectuality and Virtue", "Antiquity and Education".

Key words: humanities, language, education, Antiquity

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Medias in Totalitarian Society

This article explores one of the most powerful methods, used by totalitarian regimes to control the population. This often involves large-scale of lies, manipulation of the opinion, censorship and various techniques of propaganda. The current text also refers to the modern media tools such as the internet to show ways to counteract manipulation and the fabrication of opinions. As the third level of these reflections is the question of the opposition nature-nurture, nature-law and nevertheless - the difference between human interests and human rights.

Key words: Communication, manipulation of the opinion, social media, propaganda, mindcontrol, censorship, nature, nurture, law, human rights, interests.

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Podium

The Influence of Herman Lotze on Gottlob Frege

Annotation

The paper reveals in broader lines the influence which Herman Lotze had on young Frege. Several ideas propounded by Lotze and later defended and developed by Frege are into focus: namely, the anti-psychologism, or objectivism, in logic; the context principle; and the broader view of logicism which Lotze maintained in a somewhat weaker version.

Key words: Lotze, Frege, objective content of ideas, logicism

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Ideas about the Attitude to the Other - VI-XVI centuries

Abstract: The article makes an attempt to analyze the IDEA of the OTHER within the frames of Proto-globalization. The question of how to live in the conditions of uncertainty created by the presence of the Other has become extremely acute in the XVIth century when Europe has faced the unknown "Other" in America, India, China, Africa. This question is also a current, topical issue, because globalization requires an even greater intensity and permanence to continuously live in the company of the Other.

Key words: Oter, Otehrness, proto-globalization

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Minima moralia

Pictures and words from an exhibition

Review of the exhibition of Marin Podmolov

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The Weber's spirit of capitalism - a precursor to the risky society. About the creditworthy person - the "hero" of early and late modernity

Abstract: The creditworthy person is the real "hero" of our time, but he isn't a discovery of modernity. In 1905 the father of sociology Max Weber "discovered" the creditworthy individual to be the bearer of the capitalism spirit. "The spirit of capitalism is the creditworthy person," Weber writes in his main work "The Protestant Ethics and the Spirit of Capitalism" and admits that the true measures and characteristics of the spirit of capitalism were set in the 18th century by one of the founding fathers of USA, Benjamin Franklin. Under the conditions of late modernity the creditworthy person again has a fundamental role in our society considered as a risky society in accordance with the definition, given by Urlich Beck in "The Risky Society - On the Way to Another Modernity".

Key words: Max Weber, spirit of capitalism, risky society

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Babylon

Su Nu Jing and the Tianxia Supreme Path

Abstract: The paper presents the philosophical implication of the ancient treatises on Daoist sexual practices. The meaning of the concepts of yin and yang as well as of the three kinds of energy are explained in both the theoretical and practical sence. These explanations should serve as an introduction to the translation of Su Nu Jing, one of the most popular scriptures on this topic.

Key words: Daoist sexual practices, yin and yang, qi

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Love, Perfection, Beauty, Truth and Self-realization in the Initiatic Path of Samael Aun Weor

Resume: The paper is an exposition of the main ideas of the book The Perfect Matrimony by Samael Aun Weor. According to him life by itself is an amazing experience that is based on unitotal understanding. Within the delicious feeling of sex, man finds his own path to creative comprehension. Sex is the vital function of the Cosmos. Thanks to it, everything lives and breathes. Man and woman gathered together in the solemn copula become divine creatures of indescribable nature. To live is to have universal consciousness. The grand fusion of religion is revealed within the incarnation of Word, which, Weor said, is one hundred percent sexual. Cosmic Christ and Sexual Magic form the basics of all teachings within the whole corners of the entire universe.

Key words: sacred sexuality, sexual regeneration, direct experience of reality, synthesis doctrine, supraconsciousness, sanctity, universal religion

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Announcement

Concepts of Chaos in Old Greek and Old Chinese Thinking

Annotation: In this paper, the basic points of the concepts of Chaos as developed in Old Greece and Old China are compared. The main idea is that in Greek thought Chaos is a term for the cosmological beginning, prior to the order of Cosmos, while in the Chinese thought Chaos is a synonym to the unnamed and undifferentiated Ultimate reality. Therefore, while the Greek concept of Chaos represents the shift from mythological to rational thinking, the Chinese one is connected with ancient mystical practices for achieving this Ultimate reality that could not be grasped within the means of logic.

Key words: Chinese philosophy, comparative philosophy, Chaos

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Comparison between the ideas about the Ultimate Reality in the Teachings of Daoism and Buddhism

Abstract: The aim of this article is to make a short comparison between the main concepts in the two most popular Eastern philosophies after giving a short description of both. The core conclusion of the work is that the Western perception is finding it extremely difficult to think "outside of the box" and therefore hard to understand the Eastern intentions.

Keywords: East, West, Daoism, Buddhism, Ultimate reality, concept, reason, language, expressing, metaphysic, nature

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Poiesis

Italian haiku poets

Abstract: The paper examines the history of Italian haiku. It is emphasizes that we live in the era of media, where the uppermost value is communication, and poetry is bound to lose ground and relevance. However the interest in haiku has been increasing recently. Some organizations and projects related to haiku are discussed. A gallery of portraits of Italian haiku poets is presented, including biographies and samples of haiku poems.

Key words: Italian poetry, Italian haiku, Haiku organizations.

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Auras of Flowers

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