Hubris

Worked through in 21 videos · 28 passages.

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Summary

Dominique Pagani regards hubris as the gravest fault among the Greeks and the driving force of tragedy. He prefers to translate it as "excess" (démesure) and links it to the word "hybrid": it means wanting to equal the god, mixing the human and the divine1. He sets it against the Greek cult of measure, the metron, visible in the Parthenon, the temple at Cape Sounion or the lintel that moderates the temple. Hubris gives rise to the monstrous and calls for punishment. His examples are Icarus, Prometheus, Oedipus, who wants to know too much, Hippolytus, Phaedra, Aricia, and above all Antigone and Creon, whose two excesses balance each other in a tragic "algebra" that must equal zero2. He places Babel, the Flood and Sodom alongside these figures. In contrast to Icarus, Daedalus finds the middle term3. Finally, he contrasts paganism, which punishes the will to be infinite, with Christianity and the religions of transcendence, which command one to make oneself infinite4 5.

Summary produced automatically from 28 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.

Series · 13 Jun 2025Our former savagery? An Illumination by Arthur Rimbaud

24:46Excess of one who wants to draw too close to the gods, a mixture from which "hybrid" comes. Tragedy purges the hero who flies too high or wants to know too much.

Cycle 13 · 2 Dec 2024Evil, or the “unknowing” of the self

10:11The gravest fault among the Greeks, the driving force of the tragedies; hybris gives hybrid; the proposed translation is excess.
40:24For the Greek, wanting to identify oneself with the absolute is the worst of all hubris; Christianity demands exactly that.

Cycle 11 · 17 Feb 2023Roots or migration? From analytical reverie to current events, from Hölderlin to the war

42:33To turn one's back on the infinite, leave it to the gods: no hubris.

Cycle 10 · 10 Feb 2022#9 Pictures at an Exhibition: art, seen from here or from the other side?

1:55:51Antigone's hubris, disobeying the city, balances Creon's hubris; tragedy is an algebra that must equal zero.

Cycle 9.1 · 24 Dec 2020#10 Benefits and harms of amnesia…

48:35Aricie, who disdains a man loved by other women and wants to make Hippolyte yield, shows a hubris.
1:02:08Oedipus has a hubris of inquiry: he interprets the oracle's word too infinitely.

Cycle 9.1 · 17 Dec 2020#9 Benefits and harms of amnesia…

49:11Classicism detests hubris; tragedy shows how the hero's excess is purged and punished.
1:02:29Leaving would be for Hippolytus an intolerable hubris with regard to the unity of place: he will die before leaving.

Cycle 9.1 · 13 Nov 2020#4 Benefits and harms of amnesia…

54:18Prometheus commits hubris against Zeus's law by stealing fire for man.
1:26:51The gods are indignant when someone gives themselves entirely without preserving their soul, like Icarus or Oedipus.

Cycle 8 · 30 Jul 2020#16 Return to the logics of the subject

28:03Classical tragedy shows the punishment of hubris, from which arises the certainty of oneself.

Cycle 8 · 21 Jun 2020#11 Return to the logics of the subject

1:09:58The best translation of hubris is excess; Antigone and Creon each commit a hubris.

Cycle 7 · 4 Apr 2020#3 Harnessed to confinitude

52:51The greatest Greek fault: wanting to equal the god, mixing the human and the divine as in a hybrid.

Cycle 5.2 · 26 Mar 2019#5.5 Nature or landscape?

37:43The poem begins at the highest point, at the bell tower, in excess; descending toward the body means returning to human measure.

Cycle 4 · 12 Apr 2018#4.7 Angélique (by Nerval)

1:49:03Daedalus finds the middle way between the servitude of the low and the hubris of the high in which Icarus loses himself.

Cycle 2 · 1 Aug 2017#2.5 Between crisis and war: philosophising?

52:10Hippolytus believes himself beyond the common law, watching shipwrecks from the shore: he is punished for believing himself set apart from the common lot.

Cycle 3 · 1 Aug 2017#3.4 From Ulysses to Daedalus

41:12Transgression by which the human ventures into the divine; paganism punishes it, whereas the religions of transcendence command one to make oneself infinite.
1:42:02Babel, the flood and Sodom are accounts in which a transgression is punished.

Cycle 3 · 1 Aug 2017#3.1 From Ulysses to Daedalus

1:33:34Greek aesthetics is that of the metron; hubris transgresses measure, engenders the hybrid and the monstrous, and calls forth punishment.

Cycle 2 · 1 Aug 2017#2.6 Between crisis and war: philosophising?

53:14Among the Greeks, one constantly encroaches on the domain of the gods: without fault, there would be nothing to purge.
1:36:31Hubris is what lies beyond the circle of the city; the play unfolds on the edge, in extreme tension.

Series · 2 Feb 2016Hegel on the Beach 3/5

3:36Excess, crossing the limit: the worst fault for the Greeks, which the temple moderates through the lintel and which Phèdre commits.

Series · 1 Feb 2016Hegel on the Beach 2/5

1:36:38Antigone and Creon each commit a hubris: she against the law of the city, he by overstepping his sphere.

Cycle 1 · 11 Dec 2015#1.7 Between crisis and war: philosophising?

1:14:30The tragic hero transgresses the fragile balances of the law; Antigone and Creon each overstep their own field.

Talks · 8 Aug 2015Mythology and truth

46:56The Greeks above all fear excess, hubris, and hold to the cult of measure, as shown by the Parthenon and the temple at Cape Sounion.
49:02Oedipus embodies the excess of knowledge: he wants to know too much.

Series · 7 Jan 2015X for Xanthippe

10:33To want to be infinite is hubris, like the Tower of Babel, Icarus, or the vault of Beauvais that collapses.