In class this week we read and discussed Sarte in his work Existentialism is a Humanism. The title of this work means man creates his
own destiny, and it is not predetermined for him by his faith or God. Thus a man is responsible for his own actions
and the consequences rather than believing the road he has taken was determined
already and relying on God to lead him in the right direction. Christians are very critical of this
philosophy and thought it to be extremely pessimistic, but Christians are actually
just fearful of this out look because if it were true then they would be in despair
because they would not know how to act if their lives were solely based on
action and not their faith. Furthermore
existentialism is viewed as pessimistic because for any action one makes people
can blame that action with the typical saying that it’s only human, and Sarte
many times seems almost naturalistic throughout this work and portrays humans
as ugly and vulgar. In this negative
view of humans I do no think Sarte is illustrating pessimism, but rather he is
actually being optimistic and hopeful that men would take hold of this
philosophy of his in the cruel and vulgar human world and take responsibility
for their actions. Furthermore Sarte not
only believes in existence before essence, but also believes a human being is a
freedom. What he means by this is that
the essence of a human is freedom. This
makes me think about the example we discussed in class of being a vegetable and
if person is indeed still a hum. Clearly
they do not have any freedom left if they are brain dead and never have the
chance of waking up. But I still
struggle to say that a person in a coma is not a human. I do believe in this notion that a human
being’s essence is freedom, and therefor I believe that a vegetable has some
freedom that we cannot perceive. Maybe it is the freedom of their soul or
something, but I cannot bring myself to believe that this person in a coma is
not free. Ever human being will never
have an instance in which they are not free, and even though I cannot tell what
it is for a vegetable I believe there is some freedom deep down that still
makes them a human.
I think according to Sartre, it is very clear that a person in a coma is no longer a person in the very necessary ways. A person is freedom, pure and simple. Vegetables are not people because they cannot take projects upon themselves, not even in the most BASIC sense. A chained prisoner can decide to think about freedom, or escape, or his or her cell, he or she can stop eating, he or she could decide to masturbate or yell at the guard. A comatose person cannot choose anything. Everything done to the person is done because of other people's choices, decisions, and projects.
ReplyDeleteWill, I liked this post because you got right to the point. After reading Sarte, and the Church's reaction to it, I get a little bit confused. I understand why they disagree with Sarte's writings to a certain extent, however it was my understanding that the majority of Christians do not believe in Predestination. Will I definitely agree with you when you said being a human being is a freedom. I like to think that we are put on this earth to prove ourselves. We need to prove that we can be righteous and moral on our own. I don't think it matters if Sarte was being pessimistic or optimistic, he was simply writing about what he believed to be true. As for me, I believe that we control our own destiny.
ReplyDeleteI am a Christian. I believe that God gives humans options. We choose from those options and which will create our own destiny. I disagree with your theory that Christians are fearful of Existentialism because they want their lives to be based on faith instead of their own actions. My theory is that Christians are not fond of Existentialism because they want God to direct their path because God is an “all good, all knowing, all powerful” deity. Humans are not. If I had a choice, I would whether lean on God for understanding for my life than on myself. To some, this may come off as a weak or fearful thing to do. But in my opinion, it takes a lot more strength and courage to put your destiny in the hands of someone else – especially someone you have never seen.
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