Wisdom
The wisdom indicates the To know and the Vertu of a to be. It characterizes that which is in agreement with itself and the others, with its body and its Passion S (Vertu S of temperance, moderation and Justice), which cultivated its mental faculties, while granting its acts to its words.
History
Greek wisdom
At the Greek Philosopher S or in the Eastern tradition, the wisdom (“sophia” in Greek) is the ideal of the human life. It can be defined as a state of realization which is pressed on a self-knowledge and world, is accompanied by a supreme happiness and corresponds at the highest state of perfection which human can reach. Wisdom is the " to know to be heureux" or the science of happiness. Several ways are possible.The tragic wisdom of obscure the Héraclite proposes aphorisms which clarify the perpetual movement of the things, change which forces us to seek the adaptive solutions best and to which one must acclimatize oneself (“You will not bathe twice in the same river”) by a knowledge of the reason of the things: " wisdom consists of only one thing: to know the logos which acts always and partout."
Following Socrate, model of ancient wisdom, the Stoical ones and the Epicuriens define wisdom as the control of the Désir S by the reason and knowledge of what is of our spring and of what is not it. The Sophists evoke the relativity of the truth which is worked out in the speech, in the agonistic debate, the handling of rhetoric, the Logique and of the resolution of contradictions.
Among Academicians, it is a question of seeking the Souverain Good and Aristote proposes with prudence the contemplative and theoretic activities to arrive there. Socrate preaches reflection, humility, the acceptance of its ignorance and the absolute respect of the laws of the city, in fact: Athens. Pre-socratique, Parménide examines in a poem the ways to be it, that of the non-being and the possibility of a third way. The Cynical ones insist on the concept of individual joy, asceticism and freedom (“Is removed of my sun” thus said to Alexandre Large the the cynical philososphe Diogène de Sinope).
Religious wisdom
Eastern wisdom
August 1stIn the East, but also in the ancient Occident, wisdoms are sometimes difficult to distinguish from the religious steps, in particular because they are practiced (or were practiced) on a community scale of individuals sharing the same thought. Bouddha can for example be looked like a Master of wisdom or like the founder of a religion
These considerations of wisdom are of nothing exclusive with the Western thought. One finds them in authors as various as the philosopher Confucius or at Lao Tseu, the prince and Indian playwright Sudraka, the poet and Persan mathematician Omar Khayyam.
Christian wisdom
August 1stThe Christian wisdom of the late Antiquity and the Moyen-âge does not escape this ambiguity; first monks like the later philosophers (Holy Augustin, Holy Thomas d' Aquin…) aimed, through their religious faith, with the ideal of wisdom, sometimes while referring to the philosophers gréco-Romans explicitly.
And the monastic Communautés they were also generally founded by the wise ones (in the classical sense of the term). Authors of certain books of the Bible, Qohelet, the Ecclésiaste , as well as the " deliver of Proverbes" , identified with King Solomon nourished the religious reflections much on wisdom.
Modern and post-modern wisdom
As from the 16th century, movements like the Humanism of the Rebirth and later the Philosophie of the Lights gradually will institute other wisdoms, proposer to improve the human condition by the faith in the Raison, with the detriment of the religious dogmas. Montaigne incarnates the return of ancient wisdom, with a skepticism which borrows primarily from the hedonism epicurean of a simple love of the life.Spinoza incarnates the wisdom of a scientific reason which affirms its power of love and joy vis-a-vis the suffering disorder of passions. Nietzsche proposes to reconsider to the design héraclitéenne of a tragic wisdom founded the approval of reality (amor fati: love of the destiny). At the 19th century, the Positivistes as Auguste Count specifically will turn to technological advance and will associate wisdom with science, susctitant reactions on behalf of the monks and of the mystics.
However, and while at the same time the Individualisme developed in the companies of Occident, wisdoms (as ways of improvement of the Man by the individual) declined at the same time, supplanted by doctrines aiming at alleviating passions of mankind by means of comprehensive solutions, often of economic order and/or policy (liberalism, socialism, Communism, anarchism,…).
The bankruptcy, or at least the strong questioning of these systems, just as the awakening around certain problems (like the environmental pollution by the company materialist), has led, for a few decades, with an renewed interest for the " sagesses" , in the classical sense of the term, i.e. ways allowing the individual to improve by means of a balanced lifestyle and of a certain control of its passions with respect to the external world.
The search of wisdom when it is related to phenomena of mass is however not safe from certain disappointments as in the movement Hippie of the years 1960-70, or of mercantile drifts even dishonest persons, unquestionable cf " Sects " , but of authentic spiritual Masters continue to provide lesson of wisdom, such Krishnamurti or Swami Prajnanpad and its disciple French Arnaud Desjardins. After a certain phase of disinterest on behalf of the philosophers, wisdom becomes again today a central subject of the contemporary reflection: the Wisdom of modern the (Andre Count Sponville and Luc Ferry), Principles of wisdom and madness (Clement Rosset), Love of wisdom (Bruno Giuliani)…
See too
External bonds
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Of the constancy of wise the, Sénèque
- Site on Wisdom : Paramount wisdom
- Wisdom and Christian religion:
Simple: Wisdom