{"title":"The structure and meaning of allegory in «Pensées» of Blaise Pascal: a cognitive context","authors":"Viktor Petruchenko","doi":"10.31649/sent05.01.105","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The author considers Pascal's method of allegory to be perhaps the most important technique of philosophical reflection introduced in the «Pensées». Since, according to Pascal, man occupies a middle position in the world, unambiguity in human reasoning could indicate: (a) either man's equality with God; (b) man's lack of life choice and self-determination. That is why the first truths, the first principles of life, the first prophecies and insights can be expressed only in the form of opposites. The means of clashing opposites is allegory. The author traces the apophatic origins of Pascal's concept and analyses the main storylines of allegories in «Pensées», which primarily concern the themes of God, religion, human existence and, thus, human nature and the very first principles of human thought.","PeriodicalId":37673,"journal":{"name":"Sententiae","volume":"31 10","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2023-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Sententiae","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.31649/sent05.01.105","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"Arts and Humanities","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The author considers Pascal's method of allegory to be perhaps the most important technique of philosophical reflection introduced in the «Pensées». Since, according to Pascal, man occupies a middle position in the world, unambiguity in human reasoning could indicate: (a) either man's equality with God; (b) man's lack of life choice and self-determination. That is why the first truths, the first principles of life, the first prophecies and insights can be expressed only in the form of opposites. The means of clashing opposites is allegory. The author traces the apophatic origins of Pascal's concept and analyses the main storylines of allegories in «Pensées», which primarily concern the themes of God, religion, human existence and, thus, human nature and the very first principles of human thought.
期刊介绍:
Sententiae is historico-philosophical open access journal. Journal created by Modern philosophy''s research group (Pascalian society). Founded in 2000. Published twice a year, in June and December. Our purpose is to foster the development of a wide gamut of contemporary approaches, active implementation of them into research practice, and establishment of high standards of teaching philosophy basing on the achievements of contemporary history of philosophy. Our key priority is to ensure the empirical substantiation of historico-philosophical conceptions, basing on the criteria of literality, exhaustivity, contextuality and taking into account the existing speculative interpretations. Jean-Luc Marion was the first to formulate this set of criteria in 1998 as the main features of contemporary researches of Descartes''s philosophy. We regard these principles as the methodological background of any substantiated research method in the history of philosophy. Publishing materials on all historico-philosophical topics, we pay special attention to researches in terminology, issues of philosophical translation and untranslatability, manuscript researches (including handwritten heritage of Kyiv-Mohyla Academy professors of ХVІІ–ХVІІІ century), and cover the development of large-scale projects in this area. We also publish new bilingual and commented Ukrainian translations of classical foreign philosophical texts. Among our priorities there is also a coverage of the history of philosophical thought in Ukraine and other Eastern European countries and its relations to the wider cultural context (theology, literature, natural sciences, political ideology etc). The content of each issue is distributed according to Genre Sections and Thematic Headings. Currently there are 10 Genre Sections.