Sculptor1 wrote: ↑August 25th, 2024, 10:58 am
Belinda wrote: ↑August 24th, 2024, 6:26 pm
Sculptor1 wrote: ↑August 24th, 2024, 2:14 pm
Belinda wrote: ↑August 24th, 2024, 6:16 am
It was an efficient political move on the part of the RCC to retain as much of the savage Dyonysian as was possible, hence Xian versions of human sacrifice and drinking blood. Protestantism thrived on the scientific enlightenment. I predict that only with Dionysian behaviours can American Protestantism , and indeed Trumpism, survive.
Is this a Nietschean reference?
Nietzsche did have opinions about the broad social -psychological divide between the Apollonian and the Dionysian. Jane Austen in her 'Sense and Sensibility' has it as a theme without mentioning those two personifications. American Protestantism includes those churches where people seem to be having a lot of fun, I think they are Southern Baptist where singing and dancing goes on.
The RCC in it's wisdom built old parish churches on ancient pagan sites , and the RCC christianised Yuletide, the spring fertility rites, and Samhain with its bonfires and ghosts.Moderation between the Apollonian and the Dionysian is generally recommended for social-psychological health.
I gather that Trump actively makes rioting and general unreason into a fun thing for his followers. The Apollonian/Dionysian divide is a useful hermeneutic.
Will Kamala Harris inject some emotional unreason into her campaign or are Democrats too intellectual to tolerate that?
Whilst I think Nietsche's Phd thesis might be interesting in terms of Greek philology, I do not feel under any obligation to apply it elsewhere. The dihotomy is an imposition; an interpretive device where we can sunder various themes in Greek Drama. But the political realities of Christianity and Society are not the creative genius of a single author, unless you beleive in god. And so I simply do not find it very useful as a tool elsewhere.
We may find Dionysis and Apollo lurking across the Christian spectrum. It would not take long to make a case for unvailing these tendancies in other religions from the Jewish myth through to Hindu and Islam fantasies. but the actual contents and motivations that are present in religiious practice go way beyond this dichotomy.
Applying it might be of some interest, but its a bit like the tail wagging the dog.
How would you take a single issue, such as abortion and apply it to that alone?
Well the abortion scenario is a challenge I can't resist.
I might describe some young Dionysian expectant mother in terms such as drunk with delight that she would have a beloved baby to care for, a young woman whose happy anticipation leaves no space to reckon that she needs to think about the hard facts of bringing up a child .
Her more Apollonian mother while not unsympathetic is concerned for the welfare of her daughter and the baby, and even considers abortion and adoption.
The expectant mother believes feeling is the priority , and the grandmother- to- be believes that reason is the priority.
They are psychological stereotypes, I think there is a bell curve. The poor old Apollonians are usually the ones who end up looking after the Dionysians.
There won't be too
many Dionysians doing philosophy, or legislating .