Adam

Summary

Dominique Pagani returns above all to one passage of Genesis: God gives Adam the privilege of naming the creatures. He sees it as an act of sovereignty, a "right of majesty" and a first appropriation of nature12. To name is to master, and in this man resembles God. He compares this privilege to the decree that turns a rock into a table, or to the power to establish measure. For him it is also the "Adamic stage" of speech, that of right names, which all great poetry seeks to recover34. He most often calls it the first act of the "tragedy of language," and once that of its "comedy." He also reads the Fall: Adam hides because he is naked, and this shame proves that he has tasted the fruit of knowledge. It marks the passage from animality to humanity. With clothing and labour "by the sweat of the brow," praxis begins56. Finally, he recalls that Adam, drawn from mud and animated by breath, is an artificial creature, and that his likeness to God lies in freedom7.

1. 1#5.2 bis Questions (Facebook Live)6 Dec 2018 · 52:30
2. 2#5.4 Introduction: nature or landscape?25 Jan 2019 · 51:46
3. 3#2.2 Between crisis and war: philosophising?15 Feb 2016 · 47:42
4. 4#14 Caves of yesterday and today: from Plato to modernity10 Jun 2022 · 14:19
5. 5#9 Return to the logics of the subject30 May 2020 · 57:32
6. 6#8 Benefits and harms of amnesia…10 Dec 2020 · 50:26
7. 7Worldliness in Clouscard: the clash of worlds?9 Jul 2023 · 1:16:25

Summary produced automatically from 40 of the passages below, to be reviewed; the numbers link to the moment in the session.