One of your best yet, and on an extremely important topic for the modern world. Work - or "work" - is it seems to me one of the most important topics in freeing us from our imprisonment to modernity.
Thank you! I agree that this is one of the most important topics to deal with. That is why I have divided "work" into two parts. Next week, in the article "Homo Faber," I will deal with what work could and should be. Aside from securing one's sustenance, such as through berry picking, hunting, and weaving, the prime function of work should be the creation of beauty. Painting icons is an obvious task that may be rewarding, but many traditional crafts were by nature meditative. Jakob Böhme found God while hand-crafting shoes. Of course true craftsmanship has nothing to do with the postmodern hipster marketing of that term. Eric Gill understood that to escape the slavery of modern work required both a revolutionary change of thinking as well as an escape from cities full of fiery furnaces and dark satanic mills. For Gill, one should work at something that brings one absolute joy, and in one's free time do drudgery, such as washing dishes. Today we do drudge work for a salary, then come home and are too tired to do anything truly beautiful. Marx got a lot wrong, but he was spot on correct about the detrimental effects of alienation that modern capitalism leads to.
One of your best yet, and on an extremely important topic for the modern world. Work - or "work" - is it seems to me one of the most important topics in freeing us from our imprisonment to modernity.
Thank you, and please keep it up.
Thank you! I agree that this is one of the most important topics to deal with. That is why I have divided "work" into two parts. Next week, in the article "Homo Faber," I will deal with what work could and should be. Aside from securing one's sustenance, such as through berry picking, hunting, and weaving, the prime function of work should be the creation of beauty. Painting icons is an obvious task that may be rewarding, but many traditional crafts were by nature meditative. Jakob Böhme found God while hand-crafting shoes. Of course true craftsmanship has nothing to do with the postmodern hipster marketing of that term. Eric Gill understood that to escape the slavery of modern work required both a revolutionary change of thinking as well as an escape from cities full of fiery furnaces and dark satanic mills. For Gill, one should work at something that brings one absolute joy, and in one's free time do drudgery, such as washing dishes. Today we do drudge work for a salary, then come home and are too tired to do anything truly beautiful. Marx got a lot wrong, but he was spot on correct about the detrimental effects of alienation that modern capitalism leads to.