Human beings live in the world with physical bodies, and all life or experiences become our lives through encounters. When experience has not yet found language, it is in a nameless state. The nameless experience is waiting for language to be investigated. When experience finds language and speaks it, it obtains its reality. Death makes a sound from the vague world of life, and confusion, confusion, fear, and uneasiness enter our lives; while life is alive, the face of death does not encounter us. Facing death is in a state of difference. , a state of being threatened but defeated. Simply put, it is a "negative" experience.
Negation is not pure rejection. Undoubtedly, it has a dialectical role, pointing to some new possibilities, and is a transcendence of experience in encounters. In theology, this means that the way to the divine is admitted through the path of negation. The "negative aesthetics" of the Jewish philosopher Walter Benjamin prohibits allegiance to any promise of salvation in this world and removes teleological hope. In the ashes of the darkness of history, the sorrow and pain of a lost paradise are the only way to express it. A negative sign of the coming of Sai. Traces of the Divine can only be found in its own radical negation.
Modern society is full of objectification. The objectification of language is an act of idolatry, which is expressly prohibited in the "Ten Commandments". Tantalizing with the reification of language, death is the complete split between meaning and matter. In Benjamin's view, the mission of theology is to repair the rich symbols that have been blocked in language. In the speech of divinity, almost revolutionary aesthetics can truly liberate people from death. What is extreme is that in divinity The way of death is revealed to us through the cross event. Only through the suffering and encounter with Christ can we enter death, lead to life, and survive the desperate situation. The incarnate crucifixion is a highly symbolic asset that relieves the reification of language. For those of us who have lost meaning, the death of Christ is the abandonment of the tyrannical signifier of materiality (flesh) under the melancholy gaze of allegory. The speech is transformed from the alienation of the plane into the power of life (resurrection).
II
From the end of the 18th century to the beginning of the 19th century, a large number of talents emerged in the German cultural circle, which was almost an "age of genius." Writer Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749--1832), aesthetic educator Friedrich von Schiller (1759--1805), poet Friedrich Hoelderlin (1770--1843), philosopher Hegel ( Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770--1831) and theologian Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768--1834) were born in the same period, and Ludwig van Beethoven (1770--1827) also participated in its great success. It was very lively.
When I came to Bonn (Bonn) on the Rhine River, I was not interested in learning about Bonn as the temporary capital, but I wanted to know more about Beethoven, the "Le Saint" who was born here, and German studies The University of Bonn (Rheinische Friedrich-Wihelms-Universitaet) is an academic center for the philosophy of Kant and Hegel. When I mentioned the University of Bonn, I quickly thought of Marx who was a student here. The theologian Barth was expelled from his chair by the Nazis for not shouting about Hitler when he was teaching at this university. It is said that when Napoleon captured Bonn, , once ordered that a statue of the Virgin Mary be removed from a university building, but the result was that the ropes of the carriage were disconnected... and so on. Bonn is a beautiful and quiet city. Although it is the administrative center of Germany and the official residence of envoys from various countries, it is not cluttered or vulgar. People are accustomed to traveling by bicycle. Firstly, they can exercise and secondly, they can avoid air pollution. The roads are also very special. Establish dedicated bicycle paths to give equal respect to people of different classes. I look forward to it. If I have the opportunity to do academic research in Germany, Bonn is a place worth considering.
The first and second symphonies still retain the shadow of Haydn, Mozart or Bach. It was "Hero" that really made him break away from classical music and enter romance. Therefore, "Hero" is not just Beethoven's personal death and rebirth, but also music history's death and rebirth. The key is "negation", and "negation" is the aesthetics that shows life.
First of all, the first movement of "Hero" mainly portrays the image of the hero. It starts with the majestic and courageous ensemble chords. It is urgent and powerful, reflecting the abundant and indomitable will of the hero. The volume of the second movement is especially kept between pianissimo and pianissimo. The double bass forms an independent part with a low and dark tone, creating a tragic and sad effect, which is almost suffocating. The mood is sometimes sad and sometimes high. The second movement is the famous "Funeral March". The third movement gradually moves away from the painful issue of death, showing great vitality and power. The last movement, the fourth movement, takes the "Spirit of Prometheus" from the Greek mythology as its theme, fully displaying the hero's perseverance and turning the brief notes into the fire of hope. This is the "battle between heaven and man" between talented artists. The real hero in "Hero" is not Napoleon (Note: Beethoven originally intended to give this symphony to Napoleon, whom he admired. However, as a man who advocated freedom, he heard about Napoleon. When he became emperor, he tore off the dedication page from the score and wrote "composed for an unknown hero." Beethoven said, "Do as much good as possible and love freedom above all else. It is absolutely undeniable." The truth should be like this even in front of the king"), the real hero should be Beethoven himself.
Those who are familiar with Greek mythology must know that Prometheus was a heroic figure who risked his life to steal fire from heaven and return it to the world. As a result, he was caught by Zeus and used an evil eagle to eat his flesh. Liver for punishment. Perhaps Beethoven realized from Prometheus that music creation is like stealing fire, and today's deafness is the price of stealing fire. The greatness of a hero is that he can endure pain just to survive. The more painful it is, the more perseverance he can show. Indomitable spirit.
IV
The death of Jesus left all those who had lived with Him in an instant confusion and frustration. He once gave people hope, and his disciples regarded him as the Savior and Messiah. But overnight, death took away everything. The failure of hope was bearable, but the question was how to face the courage to survive in the future. ? The hero's silence on the cross is incredible. Everything he promised was buried when he was buried in the grave. It was like the pain in the heart when waking up from a dream. It turned out that it was all illusion. of. Jesus' dialogue about the "Kingdom of Heaven" suddenly seemed ridiculous. The cruelty of the cross symbolizes the irresistibility of death, even to the one who claims to be Christ, Messiah, and Savior. The power of death is too great!
The hope that Christians have in life is their trust in the preaching of Jesus. He once declared: "I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, even though he dies, will he live." This means that there is hope in living. Although death can take away everything, if death can be overcome , then the survival of life is meaningful. Resurrection is not an unreachable salvation on the other side, nor is it the ultimate reward without heaven, because Jesus is not preaching to the dead, but to the living. The overcoming of death is to face survival, and to use survival to witness the truth and value of life. . But what will the reality be?
Resurrection is the will to survive of faith. It embodies freedom and gives people freedom from despair. Any danger to freedom is a danger to belief in the Resurrection; resurrection is freedom from the fear of death, that is, freedom from all fears that resemble the threat of death. The belief in art is sublime, and the belief in resurrection embodies possibility in the impossible. The faith that Christ brings to people is the good news of resurrection. Christians' Sunday worship is to announce and witness the resurrection of Christ, and to absolutely deny all forces that threaten survival. Through the Resurrection, freedom is given to people; if we fail to reject all elements of despair, I am afraid we have not yet truly entered into the faith of the Resurrection as freedom.
The cross is an event of death, but it is death that releases life.
Life leads to life through death. Without death, there is no life. If there is life, there must be death. To die means to live (live). If you have not tasted death, you will have no chance of life. The event of resurrection is a witness to survival. Only faith generated after complete despair can be counted as faith. Since death is complete despair of life, only by transcending death can we have hope for survival. The Danish philosopher Soren A. Kierkegaard (1813--1855) wrote such a profound sentence in his diary: "A cross must be built on the tomb of all his hopes." Despair leads to the existential meaning of faith.
Jesus risked the cowardice and ridicule of death on the cross in order to steal the "fire of life." Faced with the suffering of the cross and the fear and uneasiness that death is approaching, in the midst of love, compassion, tragedy, and strength, with the lofty value and dignity of life, we make a one-time and ultimate commitment to death, and we also make a fundamental commitment to death. , eternal overcoming. Resurrection from the dead on the third day is a manifestation of the extraordinary power of the "fire of life". The "funeral march" of the cross does not end with a rest. On the contrary, it is Jesus heroically crossing the threshold of death and leading to the chrysalis of life. road. It was unimaginable to be a deaf composer, but Beethoven did it; it was simply unimaginable to turn the death gloom of the cross into the triumphant song of resurrection, but Jesus made it possible. Beethoven gave a perfect performance in the world of his music. The fire of life opened by the resurrection of Jesus gives people the courage and motivation to survive. No such suffering can defeat our will to survive.
Death can be faced calmly, and God Himself has also experienced the pain of death. Therefore, no one can reject the will to live. Even if he encounters suffering, it is not enough to make it bigger or even bigger than what God Himself wants. bearable. Death is a mockery of life, and resurrection is a mockery of death. There is no binary logic here, but a dialectical relationship with each other. Resurrection is the proclamation of freedom, and Easter is the festival of freedom. If the most difficult problems in the world can be overcome, then there will no longer be any great problems in the world that can give us any shock.
Five
Beethoven's innovations in tonality were so radical that when his contemporaries heard his music for the first time, they would naturally Cover your ears. From harmony, rhythm, to instruments, etc., he broke the rules one by one in all musical forms. Beethoven used sensibility to control reason and content to control form. Someone described Beethoven's music as "making people feel uneasy, fearful, disgusted, or painful, etc., in order to arouse the never-ending longing deep in the soul. This is the true nature of romanticism."
Beethoven listened to music with his eyes, but we can see the resurrection with the eyes of our soul. In the world of music, sound is language. In fact, music is a language that transcends language. In other words, the world opened by faith is a real world that transcends language. Such a world has nothing to do with cognition, but is related to experience. If it is said that "music should move people's souls, but it must be listened to and understood with intelligence," then shouldn't the same be true for belief in resurrection?
Six
Modern people have given up their sober criticism of the existing order in the materialization of language, and have also given up their mysterious belief and longing for beautiful things. This means that people have lost their connection with the world. Contact with the eternal unconscious, loss and hope of escape from the predicament of the physical body. The eschatological promise of Christian faith through the resurrection of the body accepts death as a part of life. It is precisely here that the cross of Christ and the stolen fire of Prometheus are two different encounters. The body of Prometheus They have become hopeless in punishment, abuse, and pain, but Christ has brought people the courage and hope to survive through the resurrection of the body.
Adorno said this: "Death displays a generally expressionless, dark eye socket, associated with the most indulgent expression - the grinning."
Christ's attitude towards death does not fall into the negation of pessimism or fear of death. The belief in Christ's resurrection rejects and resists Plato's hostility to the flesh precisely because it affirms and firmly believes that eternal life can only exist in the flesh. In life, Christian asceticism can punish the sinful body to a degree beyond Plato's reach, but the hope of Christian eschatology is to redeem the sinful body. Negation, in the death and resurrection of Christ, and in eschatological hope, becomes dialectical transcendence.