Latest / Philosophy and Faith / 11 - A Confession - Leo Tolstory

Transcript

11 - A Confession - Leo Tolstory · Philosophy and Faith

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Chapter eleven of a confession by Leo Tolstoy, and remembering
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: how those very beliefs had repelled me, and it seemed
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: meaningless when professed by people whose lives conflicted with them,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: and how these same beliefs attracted me and seemed reasonable
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: when I saw that people lived in accord with them.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: I understood why I had then rejected those beliefs and
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: found them meaningless, and yet now accepted them and found
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: them full of meaning. I understood that I had erred,
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: and why I had aired. I had erred not so
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: much because I thought incorrectly, as because I lived badly.
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: I understood that it was not an error in my thought,
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: that it hid the truth from me as much as
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: my life itself and the exceptional conditions of epicurean gratification
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: of desires in which I had passed it. I understood
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: that my question as to what my life is and
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: the answer and Evil, was quite correct. The only mistake
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: was that the answer referred only to my life, while
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I had referred to it to life in general. I
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: asked myself what my life is and got the reply
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: and evil and an absurdity, And really my life a
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: life of indulgences of desires was senseless and evil, and
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: therefore the reply life is evil and an absurdity referred
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: only to my life, but not to human life in general.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: I understood the truth, which afterwards I found in the Gospel,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: that men love darkness rather than light, for their works
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: were evil. For everyone that doth ill hateth the light,
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: and cometh not to the light, lest his work should
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: be reproved. I perceived that to understand the meaning of life,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: it is necessary first that life should not be meaningless
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: and evil. Then we can apply reason to explain it.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: I understood why I had so long wandered round so
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: evident a truth, and that if one is to think
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: and speak of the life of mankind, one must think
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: and speak of that life, and not of the life
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: of some of life's parasites. That truth was always as
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: true as that two and two equal four, but I
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: had not yet acknowledged it, because on admitting two and
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: two to before, I had also to admit that I
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: was bad, and to feel myself to be good was
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: for me more important and necessary than for two and
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: two to be four. I came to love good people,
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: hated myself, and confess the truth. Now all became clear
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: to me. What if an executioner passing its whole life
• 1:59
  Speaker 1: and torturing people and cutting off their heads, or a
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: hope was drunkard, or of a mad man settled for
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: life in a dark room which he had followed, and
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: imagines that he would perish if he left. What if
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: he asked himself what is life? Evidently he would be
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: able to provide no other reply to that question than
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: that life is the greatest evil. And the madman's answer
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: would be perfectly correct, but only as it applied to himself.
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: What if I am such a madman? What if all
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: we rich and leisured people are such mad men? And
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: I understood that we really are madmen? I, at any rate,
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: was certainly such. And indeed, a bird is so made
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: that it must fly, collect food, and build a nest.
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: And when I see that a bird does this, I
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: have pleasure in its joy. A goat, a hare, and
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: a wolf are so made that they must feed themselves,
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: and must breed and feed their family. And when they
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: do so, I feel firmly assured that they are happy
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: and that their life is a reasonable one. Then what
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: should a man do? He too, should provide his living
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: as the animals do, but with this difference that he
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: will perish if he does it alone. He must obtain
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: it not for himself, but for all. And when he
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: does that, I have a firm assurance that he is
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: happy and that his life is reasonable. But what had
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: I done during those whole thirty years in my responsible life?
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Far from producing sustenance for all, I did not even
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: produce it for myself, I lived as a parasite. On
• 3:14
  Speaker 1: asking myself what is the use of my life? I
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: got the reply, no use. If the meaning of human
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: life lies in supporting it, how could I, who for
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: thirty years have been engaged not on supporting life, but
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: on destroying it in myself and in others? How could
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: I obtain any other answer than that my life was
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: senseless and evil. It was both senseless and evil. The
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: life of the world endures by someone's will, by the
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: life of the whole world, and by our lives. Someone
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: fulfills his purpose. To hope, to understand the meaning of
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: that will, one must first perform it by doing what
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: is wanted of us. But if I will not do
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: what is wanted of me, I shall never understand what
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: is wanted of me, and still less what is wanted
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: of all of us and of the whole world. If
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: a naked, hungry beggar has been taken to the crossroads,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: brought into a building belonging to a beautiful establishment, supplied
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: with drink, and obliged to move a handle up and down,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: evidently before discussing why he was taken, why he should
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: move the handle, and whether the whole establishment is reasonably arranged,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: the beggar should first of all move the handle. If
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: he moves the handle, he will understand that it works
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: a pump, and that the pump draws water, and that
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: the water irrigates the garden beds. Then he will be
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: taken from the pumping station to another place, where he
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: will gather fruits, and will enter into the joy of
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: his master, and, passing from lower to higher work, will
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: understand more and more of the arrangements of the establishment,
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: and taking part in it, will never think to ask
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: why he is there, and certainly will not reproach the master.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: So those who do his will, the simple, unlearned, working folk,
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: whom we regard as cattle, do not reproach the master.
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: But we the wise eat the master's food, but do
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: not do what the Master wishes, and instead of doing it,
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: sit in a circle and discuss why should that handle
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: be moved? Isn't it stupid? So we have decided. We
• 4:55
  Speaker 1: have decided that the Master is stupid or does not exist,
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: and that we are wise. Only we feel that we
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: are quite useless, and that we must somehow do away
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: with ourselves. End of chapter eleven.