all right so let's talk about subjectivity as subjectivity starting with maritan and then moving on to uh Carol voitiwa so uh best place to start here I think um jumping off of where we were on the previous video let's go to page 69 and look at the bottom half of this page in existence in the existent but the intuition of subjectivity is an existential intuition which surrenders no Essence to us we know that which we are by our phenomena our operations our flow of consciousness the more we grow accustomed to the inner life the better
we decipher the astonishing and fluid multiplicity which is thus delivered to us the more also we feel that it leaves us ignorant of the essence of ourselves subjectivity as subjectivity is in conceptualizable is an unknowable abyss so uh that natural or the way that Maritime calls it is co-natural knowledge it's a specific kind of knowledge that basically means that you know it because you are it so as a human being with subjectivity you know yourself by virtue of being yourself and uh this focus on the inner life and that sort of knowledge I think is
close to what we have with phenomenology uh the only difference is that I think phenomenology is a little bit more analytical than this kind of knowledge whereas co-natural knowledge is more instinctual than that it's less analytic and more instinctual but the key phrase here is that subjectivity considered as subjectivity is an unknowable abyss which is interesting to think about immediately I remember when I read this thinking that a lot of what meritan was saying uh really tracked with what I had read with John Paul II but when he got to this point thinking that well
philosophy can't really deal with subjectivity as subjectivity I remember thinking well is this is this different from what uh way tiwa says so uh we should come back to that later because obviously at first glance it seems like maybe this is an area that they'll depart but I think that there is a way to reconcile the two thoughts uh and I think that in the end they end up expressing uh the same thing at root but uh but we'll come back to that later now let's keep going let's look at page 70. um in the
middle of the page here even for the most superficial persons it is true that from the moment when they say I the whole unfolding of their states of Consciousness and their operations their musings memories and acts is subsumed by a virtual and ineffable knowledge a vital and exist existential knowledge of the totality imminent in each of its parts and immersed without their troubling to become aware of it and the diffuse glow the unique freshness the maternal con events as it were which emanates from subjectivity subjectivity is not known it is felt as a propitious and
enveloping night so uh just to pause there for a second again this is highlighting what he's going to describe as this knowledge by mode of inclination this co-natural knowledge uh this living with and um it's in this way that you can know yourself as a subject but uh that kind of knowledge that maritan describes again is not this kind of objective philosophical or scientific knowledge but it's its own kind of mode and it's one that nevertheless is still incomplete to a certain extent I mean you know yourself so let's say that this would be like
if one were to ask you what do you mean by I in reference to yourself what is all that entail uh even if you can't describe it fully in words you you do have a kind of feeling or inclination about what this all means based on being yourself and in that experience of yourself um you know it as as you are so this is what he's trying to get at here this is that sort of thing where you know you could be tempted to say uh to give the answer that philosophers hate which is well
I just know that this is the case um there's actually something to that and uh it's not you know again it's not this kind of scientific knowledge but it is a knowledge it is a kind of knowledge um but it doesn't it doesn't proceed in the same way so let's see how he keeps describing it from there so bottom of page 70. there is secondary secondly a knowledge of subjectivity as such imperfect and fragmentary of course in this instance formed and actually given to the mind and which is from thrown into Relief by what Saint
Thomas calls knowledge by mode of inclination sympathy or co-natural out co-naturality not by mode of knowledge it appears before us under three specifically distinct forms the first practical knowledge which judges both moral matters and the subject Itself by the inner inclinations of the subject I mentioned this some pages back in connection with moral conscience and prudence the second poetic knowledge in which subjectivity and the things of this world are known together in Creative intuition emotion and are revealed and expressed together not in a word or concept but in a created work and the third mythical
knowledge which is not directed towards the subject but towards things Divine and does not of itself issue in any expression but in which God is known by Union and by co-naturality of love and in which this very love that becomes the formal means of knowledge of the Divine self simultaneously renders the human self-transparent in its spiritual deaths let the Mystic reflect an instant upon himself and the Saint Teresa or Saint John of the Cross will show us to what extent the Divine Light gives him a lucid and inexhaustible knowledge of his own subjectivity but in
none of these instances is the knowledge of a subjectivity as subjectivity however real it may be a knowledge by mode of knowledge which is to say by mode of conceptual objectization Okay so uh this is the key point and I think this is what allows us to draw a parallel with John Paul II so in another way and this is how uh waitiva puts it butiwa talks about the irreducible in human subjectivity in personal subjectivity and I think this is really what maritan is getting at as well that what he's talking about ultimately is the
irreducibility of the subject such that you cannot know the subject in this kind of philosophical analytic way as a subject rather you have to approach it as an intellectual object which will always fall short because you're only going to be able to pin down the reducible elements of the human person so like our common nature and things like that but uh by and large though as far as who the person is and the essence of the person itself in the full sense of that um there will be a lot in there that is simply irreducible
that you can't reduce or objectize in that way and so it will always Escape that that kind of thinking and that's what we should be careful about so that's why I think rather than highlighting philosophy here mariten talks about a kind of practical or moral knowledge poetic and Mystic that will give us maybe a different sort of mode of thinking that that uh shines light on the subject but even those of course are still incomplete so uh what remains to be seen then is well how do you know the subject as subject fully or what's
uh the proper domain for this if not philosophy and maybe this is also one way in which even though I think that both maritan and jp2 are hitting upon the same point about the irreducibility of the the human subject or the personal subject um nevertheless I think it seems like in the way that they talk about it that jp2 has a little bit more confidence in the ability of philosophy to say a little bit more at least about the subject as subject while nevertheless retaining that sense of the irreducible so knowing that uh there will
always be a vastness of the person that can't be uh subject to the kind of you know objective philosophical thought or let's say objectizing philosophical thought um so there's always going to be some aspect there that is irreducible all right so let's keep going so we're gonna uh keep going at the bottom of 71 here in none of these instances is it philosophical knowledge it would be a contradiction in terms to seek to make a philosophy of that sort of knowledge since every philosophy like it or not proceeds by Concepts this is the first point
to which the consideration of subjectivity as subjectivity draws our attention and it is a point of capital importance subjectivity marks the frontier which separates the world of philosophy from the world of religion this is what Kierkegaard felt so deeply in his polemic against Hegel philosophy runs against an insurmountable barrier in attempting to deal with subjectivity because while philosophy of course knows subjects it knows them only as objects philosophy is registered whole and entire in the relation of intelligence to object whereas religion enters into the relation of subject to subject all right so uh on that
point there's a little bit here in the middle of uh the next page on 73 religion is essentially that which no philosophy can be a relation of person to person with all the risk the mystery the dread the confidence the delight and the torment that lie in such a relationship now uh this is going to be a key point for maritin in this chapter and he keeps bringing this up into work as well that um we can talk about certain things as philosophers uh regarding the subjects but there will always be a limit there because
we're primarily dealing with abstractions and intellectual objects and uh as far as this appreciation for the subject as subject or subjectivity as subjectivity rather than doing this through philosophical examination uh the domain for meritan the proper domain seems to be religion but uh I think what he means by that what he's what he's getting at there is uh the relationship the relationship of love between us and God and this is the most perfect kind of relationship that one could have from person to person and it's the one that will leave you most satisfied so you
can reframe this traditional understanding of happiness in our ultimate end along these kind of personalist lines I think because of that that uh it's through love with God that the highest good is attained and the highest good that we yearn for is had precisely through that relationship and as persons I think we have this natural sense for wanting to disclose ourselves and to be known um thinking again along these personalist lines but that's ultimately fulfilled in this specific religious relationship between us and God so American is going to talk a little bit more about that
now before getting there there's uh something I noted here on page 75 that uh also is a key parallel with boy tiwa that we talked about I think even at the very first lecture so we've had this kind of as a continual theme but it's the problem of subjectivism on the one hand and objectivism on the other hand where you know you can go into either extreme where you over emphasize the objective dimension of the person that's the reducible let's say or you could go to The Other Extreme where you over emphasize the irreducible at
the expense of uh the essential so uh let's see how maritan deals with that problem uh first of all this is his his Preamble let's look at 74. this is an interesting point especially if we think about the development of the medieval into the modern so on the bottom of page 74. being the only subject which is a subject for me in the midst of a world of subjects which my senses and my intelligence can know only as objects I am at the center of the World As We observed a moment ago with regard to
my subjectivity and act I am the center of the world the most important person in the world my destiny is the most important of all Destinies worthless as I know myself to be I am more interesting than all the saints there is me and there are all the others whatever happens to the others is a mere incident in the picture but what happens to me and what I myself have to do is of absolute importance and yet as regards the world itself from the most obvious standpoint of common sense I know perfectly well that I
am of no consequence whatsoever and that it would have made small difference to the universe if I had never existed I know that I am one of the herd not better than the rest worth no more than the rest I shall have been a tiny crest of foam here one moment gone in the twinkling of an eye on the ocean of Nature and Humanity so it's good to keep these two things in mind on the one hand uh there's a sense of metaphysical humility that we've talked about so you know that as a human being
as a creature you're not God certainly you're not at the top of this chain of being but at the same time as you as the i in the equation uh each person will have to necessarily think about themselves in a certain respect as the most interesting or most important person to them because uh it's yourself essentially you're the one that's responsible for yourself you're the one that's carrying out and acting out your subjectivity nobody's doing that for you right so in that respect uh you are your own first priority right and I say that not
uh not out of that sense of Pride I'm not talking about original sin I'm not talking about that um only that and and I think this is what maritan wants us to take away from this is that uh as the person we have that recognition of ourselves as we have that sense of self-dominion self-mastery and with that freedom uh comes that sense of responsibility for ourselves and that knowledge that no one else is responsible for us in that way now of course God helps us with Grace but um it's still up to us nevertheless uh
to act out or and develop our own personhood our own personality and subjectivity uh we're the ones acting it's our will it's our own personhood all right so moving on from there now getting into the problem of the two extremes uh so I'm in the bottom half of 75 now these two images of myself and of my situation in respect of other subjects can positively not be superposed these two perspectives cannot be made to coincide I oscillate rather miserably between them if I abandon myself to the perspective of subjectivity I absorb everything into myself and
sacrificing everything to my uniqueness I'm riveted to the absolute of selfishness and pride if I abandoned myself to the perspective of objectivity I am absorbed into everything and dissolving into the world I am false to my uniqueness and resign at my destiny it is only from above that the antinomy can be resolved if God exists then not I but he is the center now uh again that's something that we have to focus on for the end of this chapter so uh the best quote on this one I think is on 77 and I think that's
um that's the last point from the from this chapter at least that I want to end on although I think that there's another quote at the very end that can help uh tie these things together especially with last week uh thinking about voitiwa and the relation of love but um that point about uh how God enters the picture is is crucial so um I'll make one last separate video on that just uh since I don't want to make each video too long uh just to make it easier for for y'all to kind of break it
up into pieces but um but I think that's that can be where we end this week is to talk about that and then I'll I'll talk a little bit too about some bits of boy too I've been kind of trying to do that all along to point out generally at least where the points of contact are so I hope that you've been able to notice that easily enough in the reading but um but we'll keep doing that as we finish out uh this week's lecture
