La présence dans le prologue des catégories centrales de la pensée johannique affirme son lien au corps de l’évangile, tandis que l’absence dans ce dernier de plusieurs thèmes majeurs du prologue crée une distance entre l’un et l’autre. Pour rendre compte de cet ensemble de continuités et de discontinuités, beaucoup d’exégètes recourent aux analyses diachroniques, les uns voyant dans l’évangile le commentaire postérieur du prologue, d’autres, inversement, faisant de celui-ci le résumé d’un évangile antérieur. L’analyse littéraire du (...) genre « prédiscours » paraît plus féconde. Sa fonction est d’inciter au désir de lire, de mettre le lecteur en position d’écoute, de solliciter sa mémoire, de guider sa lecture, de décoder le récit évangélique. Par le langage mythologique de la remontée au commencement, le prologue invite le lecteur du récit à appréhender Jésus dans son égalité et son intimité avec Dieu. Par la dynamique de la descente du Logos divin vers le monde, il articule l’histoire de Jésus à son origine en Dieu. Ni résumé ni commentaire, mais acte de relecture, il fixe le cadre herméneutique dans lequel doit être lu le récit johannique.The presence in the Prologue of the central categories of Johannine thought affirms its connection to the body of the Gospel, while the absence in the latter of a number of major themes of the Prologue creates a distance between the one and the other. In order to take into consideration this ensemble of continuities and discontinuities, many exegetes have recourse to diachronic analyses. Some see in the Gospel a posterior commentary on the Prologue, others, on the contrary, make of the latter a resumé of an anterior Gospel. The literary analysis of a “prediscourse” genre seems more fruitful. Its function is to incite a desire to read, to put the reader in a position of listening, to provoke his memory, to guide his reading, and to decode the Gospel story. Through mythological language of a going back to the beginning, the Prologue invites the reader of the narrative to find Jesus in his equality and intimacy with God. Buy the dynamism of the descent of the divine Logos towards the world, it articulates the history of Jesus from his origin in God. Neither resumé nor commentary, but an act of rereading, it sets the hermeneutical framework in which the Johannine narrative ought to be read. (shrink)

This is the prologue to a collection of essays on eugenics and psychiatry.

Iphigenia at aulis presents many problems to the literary and textual critic. Among these the problem of the prologue is as clear-cut as it is controversial. It may be summarized as follows: Our text opens abruptly with an anapaestic dialogue between Agamemnon and the Retainer , instead of the usual monologue in trimeters. In reply to a question from the Retainer, Agamemnon launches into a long iambic narrative , describing much that the Retainer must know already, and with no (...) sign, for more than sixty lines, that the Retainer is being addressed. Moreover 49 {γνοντο ۸ήδαι…) reads like the first line of a conventional opening monologue. (shrink)

Iphigenia at aulis presents many problems to the literary and textual critic. Among these the problem of the prologue is as clear-cut as it is controversial. It may be summarized as follows: Our text opens abruptly with an anapaestic dialogue between Agamemnon and the Retainer, instead of the usual monologue in trimeters.In reply to a question from the Retainer, Agamemnon launches into a long iambic narrative, describing much that the Retainer must know already, and with no sign, for more (...) than sixty lines, that the Retainer is being addressed. Moreover 49 {Ἐγ⋯νοντο ۸ήδαι…) reads like the first line of a conventional opening monologue. (shrink)

Scholars still struggle to characterize, evaluate, and understand the mesmerizing prose pieces of Ficciones that raised Jorge Luis Borges to the first ranks of literary fame. Speaking to Philosophy and Literature, Borges once described his work as "the fiction of philosophy," and the two prologues he wrote for Ficciones leave enticing clues about what this means in practice. I argue that these long-neglected prologues open critical space for Ficciones, slyly mocking three idols of literary cant: that genre informs a work, (...) that epic tomes best represent the real, and that great authors write unprecedented books. Borges knew better. (shrink)

Since antiquity, prologues are an opportunity to specify adaptations and translations, as well as to be polemical. In the 18th century, both these traditions merge into a new form: translation polemics in prologues. Such polemics, I want to argue in this paper, serve as a cultural and political medium of nation-building. This process becomes apparent in the reception of Voltaire in German-speaking theatre, particularly when it is mediated through English drama. The national antagonisms that are found in English Voltaire translations (...) (Hill, Miller) recur in prominent text such as Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s Hamburg Dramaturgy and Friedrich Schiller’s prologue To Goethe, On His Producing Voltaire’s »Mahomet« On The Stage in an effort to break new ground for German national theatre. (shrink)

This article offers a new interpretation of Apuleius’ story of Cupid and Psyche. Most scholars have previously offered a second-time reading of this story, according to which the reader reaches Book 11 and then looks back at Psyche's story of fall and redemption as a parallel for Lucius’ life. Following Graverini's and other scholars’ emotional approach to theMetamorphoses, I argue that the ecphrasis of Cupid's palace within the story of Cupid and Psyche includes multiple re-enactments of the novel's prologue. (...) These re-enactments invite the reader to undertake a first-time and immersive reading of this story, which focusses on Psyche's experience of Cupid and her reaction to his epiphany. In its use of immersion, this article draws from recent developments in cognitive narratology and pushes scholars of Apuleius to focus on the reader's immersive and emotional response in order to reassess the value of a second-time reading of theMetamorphoses. (shrink)

I don't want your agreement! I think I would prefer your understanding. Your agreement would be useful in a workplace to achieve a task. But that is not a social system. We want to live together in mutual respect. Your agreement would take hold of me and threaten to devour my own being - just as my agreement would do to you. For we each bring forth our own world in our every present moment. No matter how convenient it may (...) seem to be, I cannot truly stand still - with you or anyone. (shrink)

The article offers an edition of the prologue to the Lectura in Ethicam ueterem of the so-called «Commentary of Paris». This is one of six surviving commentaries on the first three books of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics translated into Latin by Burgundio of Pisa. The «Commentary of Paris» was probably composed around 1235-1240 by an anonymous master of the Faculty of Arts at the University of Paris. The prologue survives in one manuscript from the Abbey St.-Martial of Limoges and (...) describes the purpose of moral philosophy. This science is necessary for human beings since it enables them to acquire virtues and directs the practical intellect, which comprises two parts: a superior part, which is always oriented toward the good, and an inferior one, which needs ethics in order to reach its perfection. (shrink)

Vers la fin, probablement, du vie siècle de notre ère, David a composé un Commentaire à l’Isagoge de Porphyre comprenant un proème substantiel, lui-même précédé de très longs Prolégomènes à la philosophie (soixante-dix-neuf pages dans les CAG). Contrairement aux leçons préliminaires d’Ammonius qui précédaient le Commentaire de celui-ci à l’Isagoge, les Prolégomènes de David semblent former un tout autonome, sans relation évidente avec le Commentaire qui suit. Cet article a pour but de montrer que David a pourtant tissé des liens (...) solides entre son exégèse de l’Isagoge et les Prolégomènes à la philosophie. Ces liens, principalement noués dans le proème du Commentaire, sont de nature diverse. La première partie de l’article montre ainsi que les Prolégomènes préfigurent le Commentaire sous l’aspect de plusieurs concepts : la philosophie comme connaissance de l’universel ; l’homonymie ; les cinq « voix » ; la notion de « pur concept ». Tandis que la deuxième partie montre que certains principes structurels et méthodologiques du Commentaire à l’Isagoge, en particulier les « méthodes dialectiques », refluent sur la forme des Prolégomènes. En étudiant ces liens – conceptuels, d’abord, méthodologiques, ensuite –, l’article apporte des éléments d’interprétation originaux sur les Prolégomènes de David, en soulignant le profit qu’on tire à les lire à la lumière du Commentaire qui suivra. Comme on le voit dans une troisième partie, on peut extraire de ces textes une véritable « théorie du prologue », qui autorise David à « découper » dans l’Isagoge un proème sur lequel il projette les fonctions rhétoriques du prologue élaborées dans son propre Commentaire. Par un phénomène de « prologues emboîtés », les Prolégomènes constituent donc bien un préalable au proème du Commentaire, d’abord, puis au Commentaire à l’Isagoge et, enfin, au texte de Porphyre lui-même, lequel est comme une source irriguant, au moyen de concepts et de méthodes, l’exégèse de David. (shrink)

ABSTRACTHow are nostalgic memories created? We considered savouring as one process involved in the genesis of nostalgia. Whereas nostalgia refers to an emotional reflection upon past experiences, savouring is a process in which individuals deeply attend to and consciously capture a present experience for subsequent reflection. Thus, having savoured an experience may increase the likelihood that it will later be reflected upon nostalgically. Additionally, to examine how cognitive and emotional processes are linked across time, we tested whether nostalgia for a (...) previously savoured experience predicts optimism for the future. Retrospective reports of having savoured a positive event were associated with greater nostalgia for the event. Retrospective reports of savouring a time period were associated with greater nostalgia for that time period when participants were in a setting that prompted thoughts of the time period. Savouring an experience predicted no... (shrink)

Before I went to the university, whether at home, in primary or secondary school, all I studied was Confucian literature. In the first year of the university, the classes on Chinese culture amounted to rote learning of the Analects and Mencius. Traditional culture had been compressed into Confucian culture alone. Hence, as a young man, I often found it difficult to breathe in the narrow confines imposed by Confucian ritual norms. The monotonous, stifling, and insipid atmosphere of Confucian thought was (...) a major reason driving me in a way similar to Nietzsche's bacchanal philosophy of life. It was also a prime cause of my liking for the Zhuangzi. When I entered graduate school I occasionally had the chance to encounter the Zhuangzi. It was this that led me to realize that Chinese culture originally had another outlook on the world. (shrink)

This article examines the interpretation of Parmenides’ prologue (28 B 1, 1-30 DK) in Sextus’ account of the Criterion of Truth (M. vii 49-260). It proceeds by three ap- proaches, each telling part of the story regarding Sextus’ sources. The rst identi es two sets of source-material by means of the ideas and language. Here basic features of the interpre- tation of the prologue emerge. The second discusses why 28 B 1, 1-30 and 28 B 7, 2-B 8, (...) 2 DK are treated as one continuous whole, showing the kind of interpretation involved in a deliberate decision: making 28 B 8, 1-2 DK into a natural conclusion, referring to a path and to ambition (thymos) as 28 B 1, 1-2 DK had done. The third compares the prologue’s tech- nique of interpretation with the rst of two interpretations of Xenophanes, the interpretation of Pythagorean verse, and the rst of two interpretations of Empedocles, showing how these contrast sharply with the interpretation of Parmenides 28 B 7, 2-B 8, 2 DK and material linked with the briefer source. The amalgamation had originally helped assimilate Parmenides to Plato. Hence the amalgamator is seen as a Platonist with strong literary interests and skilled in the use of quotation. It is no accident that the discursive source is linked with the tradition of Timaeus-interpretation. (shrink)

Whatever the world thinks, he who hath not much meditated upon God, the human mind, and the summum bonum, may possibly make a thriving earthworm, ...

Several scholars, including Martin Hengel, R. Alan Culpepper, and Richard Bauckham, have argued that Papias had knowledge of the Gospel of John on the grounds that Papias’s prologue lists six of Jesus’s disciples in the same order that they are named in the Gospel of John: Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, James, and John. In “A Note on Papias’s Knowledge of the Fourth Gospel” (JBL 129 [2010]: 793–794), Jake H. O’Connell presents a statistical analysis of this argument, according to which (...) the probability of this correspondence occurring by chance is lower than 1%. O’Connell concludes that it is more than 99% probable that this correspondence is the result of Papias copying John, rather than chance. I show that O’Connell’s analysis contains multiple mistakes, both substantive and mathematical: it ignores relevant evidence, overstates the correspondence between John and Papias, wrongly assumes that if Papias did not know John he ordered the disciples randomly, and conflates the probability of A given B with the probability of B given A. In discussing these errors, I aim to inform both Johannine scholarship and the use of probabilistic methods in historical reasoning. (shrink)

Ancient to eighteenth century philosophy.--Hegel--God is love.