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My Destination [from, Complete Short Stories (Schocken)]
I gave orders for my horse to be
ought round from the stables. The servant did
not understand me. I myself went to the stable, saddled my horse and mounted.
In the distance I heard a bugle call, I asked him what this meant. He knew
nothing and had heard nothing. At the gate he stopped me, asking: "Where are
you riding to, master?" "I don't know," I said, "only away from here, away from
here. Always away from here, only by doing so can I reach my destination."
"And so you know your destination?" he asked. "Yes," I answered, "didn't I say
so? Away-From-Here [weg-von-hier], that is my destination." "You have no
provisions with you," he said. "I need none," I said, "the journey is so long that I
must die of hunger if I don't get anything on the way. No provisions can save me.
For it is, fortunately, a truly immense journey."
The Coming of the Messiah [from, Parables and Paradoxes (Schocken)]
The Messiah will come as soon as the most un
idled individualism of faith
ecomes possible--when there is no one to destroy this possibility and no one to
suffer its destruction; hence the graves will open themselves. This, perhaps, is
Christian doctrine too, applying as much to the actual presentation of the
example to be emulated, which is an individualistic example, as to the symbolic
presentation of the resu
ection of the Mediator in the single individual.
The Messiah will come only when he is no longer necessary; he will come only
on the day after his a
ival; he will come, not on the last day, but on the very last.
Paradise [from Aphorisms, XXXXXXXXXXSchoeken)]
The expulsion from Paradise is in its main significance eternal: Consequently the
expulsion from Paradise is final, and life in this world i
evocable, but the eternal
nature of the occu
ence (or, temporally expressed, the eternal recapitulation of
the occu
ence) makes it nevertheless possible that not only could we live
continuously in Paradise, but that we are continuously there in actual fact, no
matter whether we know it here or not.
Why do we lament over the fall of man? We were not driven out of Paradise
ecause of it, but because of the Tree of life, that we might not eat of it.
We are sinful not merely because we have eaten of the Tree of Knowledge, but
also because we have not yet eaten of the Tree of Life. The state in which we
find ourselves is sinful, quite independent of guilt.
We were fashioned to live in Paradise, and Paradise was destined to serve us.
Our destiny has been altered; that this has also happened with the destiny of
Paradise is not stated.
We were expelled from Paradise, but Paradise was not destroyed. In a sense our
expulsion from Paradise was a stroke of luck, for had we not been expelled,
Paradise would have had to be destroyed.
God said that Adam would have to die on the day he ate of the Tree of
Knowledge. According to God, the instantaneous result of eating of the Tree of
Knowledge would be death; according to the serpent (at least it can be
understood so), it would be equality with God. Both were wrong in similar ways.
Men did not die, but became mortal; they did not become like God, but received
the indispensible capacity to become so. Both were right in similar ways. Man
did not die, but the paradisical man did; men did not become God, but divine
knowledge.
He is a free and secure citizen of the world, for he is fettered to a chain which is
long enough to give him the freedom of all earthly space, and yet only so long
that nothing can drag him past the frontiers of the world. But simultaneously he
is a free and secure citizen of Heaven as well, for he is also fettered by a
similarly designed heavenly chain. So that if he heads, say, for the earth, his
heavenly collar throttles him, and if he heads for Heaven, the earthly one does
the same. And yet all the possibilities are his, and he feels it, more, he actually
efuses to account for the deadlock by an e
or in the original fettering.
Since the Fall we have been essentially equal in our capacity to recognize good
and evil; nonetheless it is just here that we seek to show our individual
superiority. But the real differences begin beyond that knowledge. The oposite
illusion may be explained thus: nobody can remain content with the mere
knowledge of good and evil in itself, but must endeavor as well to act in
accordance with it. The strength to do so, however, is not likewise given him,
consequently he must destroy himself trying to do so, at the risk of not achieving
the necessary strength even then; yet there remains nothing for him but this final
attempt. (That is moreover the meaning of the threat of death attached to the Tree
of Knowledge; perhaps too it was the original meaning of natural death.) Now,
faced with this attempt, man is filled with fear,; he prefers to annul his
knowledge of good and evil (the term, "the fall of man," may be traced back to
that fear); yet the accomplished cannot be annulled, but only confused. It was for
this purpose that our rationalizations were created. The whole world is full of
them, indeed the whole visible world is perhaps nothing more than than the
ationalization of a man who wants to find peace for a moment. An attempt to
falsify the actuality of knowledge, to regard knowledge as a goal still to be
eached.
Cares of a Family Man [Hausvater] (from, Complete Stories [Schocken])
Some say the word Odradek is of Slavonic origin, and try to account for it on that
asis. Others again believe it to be of German origin, only influenced by Slavonic. The
uncertainty of both interpretations allows one to assume with justice that neither is
accurate, especially as neither of them provides an intelligent meaning of the word.
No one, of course, would occupy himself with such studies if there were not a creature
called Odradek. At first glance it looks like a flat star-shaped spool for thread, and
indeed it does seem to have thread wound upon it; to be sure, they are only old,
oken-
off bits of thread, knotted and tangled together, of the most varied sorts and colors. But
it is not only a spool, for a small wooden crossbar sticks out of the middle of the star,
and another small rod is joined to that at a right angle. By means of this latter rod on
one side and one of the points of the star on the other, the whole thing can stand upright
as if on two legs.
One is tempted to believe that the creature once had some sort of intelligible shape and
is now only a
oken-down remnant. Yet this does not seem to be the case; at least
there is no sign of it; nowhere is there an unfinished or un
oken surface to suggest
anything of the kind; the whole thing looks senseless enough, but in its own way
perfectly finished. In any case, closer scrutiny is impossible, since Odradek is
extraordinarily nimble and can never be laid hold of.
He lurks by turns in the ga
et, the stairway, the lo
ies, the entrance hall. Often for
months on end he is not to be seen; then he has presumably moved into other houses;
ut he always comes faithfully back to our house again. Many a time when you go out
of the door and he happens just to be leaning directly beneath you against the banisters
you feel inclined to speak to him. Of course, you put no difficult questions to him, you
treat him--he is so diminutive that you cannot help it--rather like a child. "Well, what's
your name?" you ask him. "Odradek," he says. "And where do you live?" "No fixed
abode," he says and laughs; but it is only the kind of laughter that has no lungs behind
it. It sounds rather like the rustling of fallen leaves. And that is usually the end of the
conversation. Even these anwers are not always forthcoming; often he stays mute for a
long time, as wooden as his appearance.
I ask myself, to no purpose, what is likely to happen to him? Can he possibly die?
Anything that dies has had some kind of aim in life, some kind of activity, which has
worn out; but that does not apply to Odradek. Am I to suppose, then, that he will
always be rolling down the stairs, with ends of thread trailing after him, right before the
feet of my children, and my children's children? He does no harm to anyone that one
can see; but the idea that he is likely to survive me I find almost painful.
Walter Benjamin, Hannah Arendt, Hannah Arendt, Ha
y Zohn - Illuminations_ Essays and Reflections-Schocken XXXXXXXXXXpdf
Walter Ben\amin :--------
I
Illuminations
+
Pranl Xa}ka
On the 1 entb Anniversary of 1-lis Deatb
POTEMKIN
It is related that Potemkin suffered from states of depression
which recu
ed more or less regularly. At such times no one
was allowed to go near him, and access to his room was strictly
fo
idden. This malady was never mentioned at court, and in
particular it was known that any allusion to it incu
ed the dis-
favor of Empress Catherine. One of the Chancellor's depressions
lasted for an extraordinary length of time and
ought about
serious difficulties; in the offices documents piled up that re-
quired Potemkin's signature, and the Empress pressed for their
completion. The high officials were at their wits' end. One day
an unimportant little clerk named Shuvalkin happened to enter
the anteroom of the Chancellor's palace and found the council-
lors of state assembled there, moaning and groaning as usual.
"What is the matter, Your Excellencies?" asked the obliging