“Why God Sleeps” is the only work of art by Leonid Pinsky , unpublished during the author’s lifetime. In this work, Leonid Pinsky poses metaphysical questions already familiar to philosophy: what happened before the creation of the world, why did God create the world after all, and, in fact, why does he sleep after his creation? The main question is: what should we humans do if God “fell asleep” forever, giving the world completely to us? On the one hand, the author of this story gives a humorous answer, on the other hand, this playfulness and the nonchalance that gives birth to it is the only acceptable state in which, according to the author, God had to remain during creation and in which man must stay in order to become “ like gods. "
Content
Features of the work
This short “treatise” fits in with a philological analysis and demonstrates Pinsky’s worldview, for which it is possible to speak at the same time about Heraclitus ’s philosophy, and about ancient Greek mythology , and about Buddha ’s religion, and about Moses ’s religion, and about the Renaissance literature, and about the impact of Pervitin on of man, - therefore, one can, in some respects, compare this work with Speech on the Dignity of Man by Pico . Namely, in relation to the coverage of various cultural codes in which there is a common divisor - a person with his meaning in, it seems, the world left by God. And only in this work is Pinsky’s worldview “representing a bizarre and unthinkable mixture of Judaism , Christianity , Marxism, left Hegelianism , Stoicism , epicureanism , Spinozism , Eastern and Western mysticism, Italian humanism , German romanticism (especially Schelling’s philosophy ). and many other components ” [1] , fully revealed.
The choice of the main metaphor for the entire book of divine and human graceful negligence - as if it is given by taking pervitin tablets - is not accidental. The fact is that, as Alexander Kozintsev writes in the preface to the publication of the book, one of the reasons for creating the work was Pinsky’s exit from depression as a result of medical treatment. However, such a parody trick does not reduce the value of the work - and, first of all, for the author himself. Judging by the letters of Pinsky to Grigory Kozintsev , it was important for him to know the opinion of his friend about the work.
“Rummaging through my old papers, I found a“ tale ”about which I completely forgot about the cat. I wrote it when I was working on my Rabelais and - for the first time in my life - I resorted to the “Pervitin” stimulator (now I would have it, but they say its release has stopped). I had a “Pantagruel” tone mixed with Pervitin in my head - and I made Rabelais glorify Pervitin. Descriptions of the impact, as well as the whole fact of the "natural" side of the tale, are accurate. I wanted to entertain you a little and, having corrected a little, retyped it on a typewriter and bound it. Write how you liked it (the beginning, it seems, is artificial - and then what?) ” [2] .
Most likely, this “Pantagruel tone” served as the reason why the work did not find a place in the “Minima” - a collection of the author’s posthumous works.
Contents
The story is introduced by a certain person who sits in a barrel and calls to listen to the “preaching tale” by Rabi Lei (Rabelais). Rabbi Lei also repaired this barrel, which had already reached him from Sidhartha Gautama, who had made it. His sermon on how God was in a “grave state of excruciating, exhausting, eternal indecision” before the creation of the world, and the Indecision was followed by the Affair: “In the beginning was the Affair”. Yes, it was the Case before the Word - God materialized his determination in Pervitin tablets and took them on every day of creation. And on the seventh day of creation, when Pervitin ended and His power dried up, He went to eternal sleep.
It was then that Prometheus also abducted, the narrator continues, the divine fire, it was then that he tempted the serpent of the forefathers with fruit from the tree of knowledge. But God himself allowed it, because in His providence - to know how this will end, and in His will - to let it be. And then the spirit was confused in the sophisticated person, that third rational principle, which is labeled, like its Prototype, the Holy Spirit, between two others: male-creative and female-moral.
But man created Pervitin, like the one that God had, and this is the only way to eradicate shame, which inhibits the spirit, in order to be “like gods” to man. “Whoever woke up from a Bad Dream and cast off Fear, he became like gods, became“ like gods ”. For Fear is not rooted in the real and the divine, but only in Maya's life, in ghosts, in demons (or in “peaks” [which in all languages means a demon or a devil]) ” [2] . Thus, carelessness is divine and holy, in contrast to care, shame and fear.
“And you already know, my children, why there is nothing to fear from God. After all, He sleeps (or, as Apecur puts it, God, dodging, abides in ataraxia), leaving the whole thing to us so that we ourselves “become like gods” ” [2] .
So it remains for people to follow God and complete creation, daring to it thanks to carelessness and a joyful spirit.
Notes
- ↑ Foreword by A. G. Kozintsev: Pinsky L. E. Why God is sleeping: The Samizdat treatise by L. E. Pinsky and his correspondence with G. M. Kozintsev. - SPb. : Nestor Story, 2019.
- ↑ 1 2 3 Pinsky L. E. Why does God sleep: The Samizdat treatise of L. E. Pinsky and his correspondence with G. M. Kozintsev. - SPb. : Nestor Story, 2019.
Literature
Links
- Pinsky, Leonid Efimovich // Brief Literary Encyclopedia / Ch. ed. A.A. Surkov. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia, 1962-1978.
- Photo portrait of B. Tsukurman, 1959
- Pinsky, Leonid Efimovich in the "Journal Hall"
- Boris Dubin . Daily book
- Sergey Zenkin . Aesthetics of resistance
- In the book Pinsky L. E. Renaissance. Baroque. Enlightenment: Articles. Lectures. - M .: RGGU, 2002. - ISBN 5-7281-0305-7 :
- Lysenko E.M. Leonid Efimovich Pinsky. A brief biographical sketch. - S. 5-24;
- Piskunova S.I. From sociological poetics to stoic humanism. - S. 769-811.