Modern man does not have too many reasons to rise above the ordinary and soar in higher spheres. We are sharpened rather on summing up, balancing, preparing reports, etc. actions in which there is no place for lofty feelings and high style. All this remained in the 19th century, or rather, in the 18th century.
However, at the subconscious level, it is natural for a person to strive for the transcendent: to that state that is difficult to describe, and special words are needed for this … At such moments, we suddenly, for no reason, begin to express ourselves the way it was customary either in the time of Homer or Derzhavin in his odes. Apparently, in the modern language there are no concepts for describing sublime feelings.
Striving for harmony
A person comes into this world for development through self-knowledge, which implies constant spiritual growth, which is impossible withoutchanges. Although the worst wish in the same China is when someone is offered to live in times of change. From an everyday point of view, this is understandable: constant adjustment to unstable conditions of existence is a blow not only to physical, but also to mental endurance. Life in pendulum mode is not for everyone. However, what does not kill us makes us stronger, shifting the "assembly point" of our awareness to a higher level.
The historical pattern is that after total changes, there follow times of comprehensive stagnation, in which reports, balance sheets, summary statements and other stationery become very much in demand, allowing the ruling elite to keep the masses in a state of mild tension with a taste of guilt. And this is where our subconsciousness begins to turn on the “go beyond the flags” function: we suddenly begin to be pulled into situations in which we have to face something beyond. So applying sublime style is the first sign that the brain is resetting.
Form and content
What is "sublime"? This is a concept related to aesthetics, showing the hidden side of things and phenomena, which is immeasurably more significant in terms of the strength of the impact and the depth of the subsequent spiritual transformation of the individual in comparison with the clearly expressed side, perceived by the subject, taking into account the existing reality.
Related to aesthetics, the concept of the sublime correlates with the category of beauty, but significantly expands the boundaries of the latter, resulting inlogically inexplicable feeling of infinity and majesty, causing either feelings of grace and holiness or fear and other shades of this state.
However, such an understanding of the sublime is the subtleties of Western philosophy. As far as the East is concerned, here the comparison of the sublime and beauty does not have such fundamental differences. Vivid examples of the sublime are the ability of the Japanese to enjoy the sakura flower, finding in it a reflection of world harmony, or the ability of the Chinese to see a flock of cranes flying into infinity in the form of a cloud.
Unity of opposites
It would be impossible to imagine that I. Kant, standing at the crossroads of two eras: romanticism and enlightenment, bypassed the topic of the sublime in his philosophical studies. Mankind is indebted to him for scientific works devoted to transcendental idealism, and he also gave a definition of the sublime. This, according to I. Kant, is a category, the essence of which lies in its infinity, inexpressible greatness, which goes far beyond the limits of human perception, limited by the framework of subjective consciousness. Beauty, according to Kant, has similar qualities to the sublime, but is contained within the boundaries of form.
Contemplation of the sublime leads a person to think about his own boundaries and finiteness of his existence. However, thanks to the awakening of the spirit, a person is given an awareness of his moral strength, thanks to which he rises above his fears, overcomes his base nature, becoming one step closer to the categorysublime.
Speaking of this concept, we mean something beautiful or spiritual, but one way or another they will be in superlative degree, an infinite number of orders higher than those forms with which we come into contact in everyday life. Feelings experienced in contact with the category of the sublime can reach a level that cannot be compared with mere delight: rather, they can be identified with the Divine opening of the soul.
However, any form of energy needs to be balanced. The sublime and the base are the same as the "yin-yang" mandala: being in a single space, they wage an eternal struggle of opposite principles.
Accordingly, base is an aesthetic concept, contact with which causes negatively charged feelings in the subject, suppressing his will, replacing value orientations, destroying the structure of the personality and, as a result, endangering society as a whole.
Synonyms of base - bestial, bestial, vulgar, vile, insignificant, that is, everything connected with the animal nature of man in the complete absence of a spiritual principle. As a result of the penetration of the low into public life - war, slavery, total control of the individual, a ban on a different opinion, passions that cause addiction: alcohol, drugs, fornication, zombies through the media.
Classic period
The significance and influence of the writings of the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle, who lived around 300 BC. e., it is difficult to overestimate. He wrote his treatise "The Teaching of the Three Styles", using exactly the sublime, which was in use at that timeat the speakers. However, considering the use of artistic genres in art, the philosopher singled out the ultimate goal of the work - to give pleasure. In the context of this topic, Aristotle considered the feeling of emotional pain as a consequence of the negative in creativity, which shocks, but still touches the poetic side of the personality.
It should be noted that in the art of antiquity one can find many examples of the opposition of the sublime and the earthly, when the hero is faced with a choice: personal happiness or sacrifice in the name of the public good. The images of such works are most often tragic.
The Times of Homer
The widely known ancient Greek poet Homer left to his descendants samples of the sublime works of the Iliad and the Odyssey. From them we can judge the style used in oratory. However, in the time of the epic storyteller, this way of telling was the norm and was not assigned the category of "sublime".
The philosophers of Ancient Rome came to grips with this concept later, as evidenced by the information about the now lost treatise of the Roman rhetorician Caecilius, who lived approximately from 63 BC to BC. e. up to 14 a.d. e., when the emperor Augustus, who was called "father of the fatherland", ruled. The theme that occupied the mind of Caecilius is set forth in the essay "On the High", the author of which for a long time was considered Dionysius Cassius Longinus, who lived in 200 AD. e. However, the Neoplatonist Longinus merely recounted the work of Caecilius known in his time.
Still with a slightthe hand of I. I. Martynov, who translated and published the arguments of Dionysius Longinus in 1903, all subsequent researchers began to attribute the authorship of the work "On the High" to him. Restoring historical justice and discussing the theses that took place in the treatise "On the High", we should mention Caecilius, who studied in detail the concept of "sublime" and synonyms related to it.
Listing words that are close in meaning, such as: ideal, sacred, poetic, solemn, divine, allows you to expand the understanding of the original term. The Roman philosopher drew attention to the fact that the sublime is a special state, which is based not so much on understanding coming from the mind, but on admiration that originates in the heart. Caecilius also warned readers about the possible substitution of the sublime for its imitation due to the use of acting techniques: solemn pomposity, importance and pomp, seasoned with colorful gestures.
It should be noted that the techniques described by Caecilius were studied by philosophers and orators in the Renaissance.
Incarnation in creativity
The meaning of the word "sublime" is inseparable from the process of aesthetic perception of works of art by a person. But no matter what kind of creative results they belong to, they will amaze the imagination with their grandeur and grandeur. One of the synonyms of the sublime is the concept of "inspired", and this is how one can characterize such embodiments of creative inspiration as the Saint-Remy Cathedral in Reims,St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow or St. Peter's Cathedral in the Vatican, on which the great sculptor Michelangelo, the inspired artist Raphael, and the architect Bernini worked. It should be noted that Peter's Cathedral can accommodate 60,000 parishioners, not counting another 400,000 people who can accommodate on the square.
Among the creations of architecture, the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, which has been under construction for over 134 years, is striking in its monumentality, in which Antoni Gaudí's flight of fancy and neo-Gothic are combined.
The sublime has also found its embodiment in music, a vivid example of this is Beethoven's "Pathétique Sonata" or Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 6, also called "Pathétic".
English look
In the romantic 18th century, English writers Shaftesbury, Addison and Dennis visited the Alps several years apart, after which they shared their impressions with the general public, focusing their attention on the category of the sublime.
John Dennis distinguished between feelings associated with the mind, such as delight, and an all-consuming sense of horror, combined with admiration from the contemplation of the infinity and incomprehensibility of nature. Since Dennis was a literary critic, he used his ambivalent experience in his work.
Shaftesbury also noted the mixed feelings that seized him when he came into contact with the magnitude and grandeur of the picture that opened up to him in the Alps.
Joseph Addison's travel experiencewas expressed by the definition of "pleasant horror", referring to the surveyed landscape, striking the imagination with its grandeur and beauty. In his notes, Addison did not use the term "sublime", replacing it with a more suitable synonym for "majestic", etc., which, according to the traveler, brings the person closer to understanding the category described.
Thus, Addison drew a line between a beautiful work of art and a category of sublime states that beauty cannot reach. This point was developed by the philosopher Edmund Burke.
Ideologist of conservatism
A politician known in England and Ireland in the middle of the 18th century, Edmund Burke was a famous publicist and was considered one of the founders of conservatism. His work "Philosophical research on the emergence of our concepts of the sublime and beautiful" is devoted to the development of this topic in the context of his opposition to the beautiful. According to Burke, in the sublime there is always an element of the terrible, which is the opposite of beauty.
This concept is fundamentally opposed to the dialogues of Plato, who combined the beautiful and the sublime, thanks to which the person, in his opinion, received an inexpressible experience of the soul.
Conservative Burke put forward the idea of ugliness that transforms the emotional perception of the individual through a new aesthetic experience, the experience of which expands the consciousness of the subject and leads him to an understanding of the sublime.
As a result of mergingantagonistic categories, the subconscious operates in the "pendulum" mode, the amplitude of which is the higher, the greater the gap between pain and the grandeur of aesthetic experience. Such, for example, are pictures of great battles, where fortitude is combined with pain from large-scale losses of human lives.
Burke drew readers' attention to the physiological aspects of the sublime, reinforcing the pole of the terrible, in contrast to which the power of the sublime should also increase many times over, which explains the experienced inexpressible feeling of "negative pain".
German Understanding
Johann Wolfgang Goethe lived and worked in an era when fateful events for many countries took place in the world, which he had the opportunity to observe and evaluate: the Seven Years' War, America's self-determination, the French Revolution, the rise and fall of Napoleon. As a witness and participant in changes in the world and human destinies, Goethe took shape as a person and created his own system of values. And the conclusions made by the writer and poet from the consequences of historical upheavals formed the basis of many of his works.
In particular, in the publication "About Laocoon", the poet argues that only an object should be depicted in a literary and other work at the highest moment of its spiritual development, breaking the boundaries of reality. Indeed, the most striking works of Goethe himself, which are a handbook of his contemporaries and a descendant, describe heroes approaching the climax on the path to the realization of their sublimedreams.
The founder of German philosophy, I. Kant, devoted the scientific work "Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and the Sublime" to the subject of the sublime. Analyzing the category under study, the philosopher came to the conclusion that there are three of its forms: noble, magnificent (or majestic) and awesome (terrible).
In his explanations in his Critique of Judgment, Kant came to the same conclusions as the Englishman Edmund Burke: the essence of the sublime lies in its grandiosity and monumentality, and the feeling of the sublime combines a high degree of fear and delight.
Further, the German philosopher divided the sublime into two types: mathematical and dynamic. However, some researchers insist on the presence of a third type - moral, identical to the spiritualized and highly moral.
As an example, the following can be cited: a person, going out on a fragile boat into the endless expanses of the sea, feels like a fine grain of sand, given to the will of the waves. However, if he is armed with the realization of his higher destiny and strives for a lofty dream, then he receives spiritual strength from an unknown source that allows him to overcome fears associated with carnal nature.
Continuing the thought of Kant, the German poet and philosopher Friedrich Schiller expands the concept of the sublime to historical horizons. He also came up with the idea to introduce the category of "perfectly beautiful".
The next step in the study of this topic by German philosophers was the unification of ideas and forms in the sublime. jeanPaul (Richter) interpreted the sublime as an infinite category related to the sensible object.
Under the prism of the beyond, Schelling considered the sublime in the final.
Hegel argued that the category of the sublime should be seen as a disproportion between a single phenomenon and the boundless idea embodied by it.
Reality of the Sublime
One should not think that the sublime is manifested exclusively in great events that have a grandiose format. The internal potential of the object, its scale is not always noticeable behind the external facade of everyday life.
However, the sublime may well manifest itself in everyday routine, behind which a high meaning is revealed. A perfect example of this is the behavior of people during the siege of Leningrad.
Crossroads of words and concepts
With the concept of "ex alted", which is related to the state of the spirit, is "related" to the turnover "ex alted position". This adjective in this case corresponds to the figurative meaning of the noun "position", meaning the value, the status of a person in society or in society.
The continuation of this topic will be the verb "raise", to which an outdated concept was found in Ushakov's dictionary: appoint to a higher post. The meaning of the word "elevate" can be understood in a slightly different way: "create someone a significant position in society", as well as "give weight and social status to someone".
One morethe phrase needs comments: "raise the price of something." Examples: "grocery prices increased" or "fare increased" are obsolete expressions and mean that the prices of something, and in this case, food, travel, are increased or increased.
In the works of the classics of Russian literature, there is an expression "to elevate to oneself." It means that someone who is on a relatively high spiritual, material or social level elevates someone to his position, thereby making the subject equal to himself.
Opposite words would be "lower or humiliate".
Let's talk about the highest
One more concept requires explanation - sublime love. If we combine the meaning of the word that we spoke about above and "love", then we can assume that the subject of high feelings is reverent, delighted, admired, adored. In a word, the beloved in this context becomes an idol, whom the worshiper is ready to love ex alted "to the grave".
And we can add to this that polarities arise here: "giving - receiving" or "higher - lower", "master - slave", because equality in such relations, by definition, cannot be. Sooner or later, a break in relations follows, and, it should be noted, not always at the initiative of the "master-idol", since any person needs feedback. The paradox of the situation is that the idol gets so used to being a consumer of love thatbecomes dependent on it, and when he is deprived of "feeding", it is a pitiful sight.
And in conclusion, let us recall the statement of Bishop Ambrose of Milan, canonized as a saint, who warned that it is necessary to ascend to the highest, for it is better to ascend than to descend. And he considered the desire to get closer to the Creator as a sign of an "ex alted soul", giving primacy to the Spirit, and only then to the body.
