Placing itself on the level of philosophical anthropology, access key and primary method vilegiato to put in terms not simplistic question about the proprium of the party, Francesco Russo outlines, in this brief essay, the constitutive features of one of the most characteristic of existential living historical man: which celebrate the universal dimension of the experience. Refusing to situate his investigation on a purely descriptive, the author of the text that we analyze considers it necessary to pose the question in a more radical, thus tracing a path from phenomenology points strongly in the direction of hermeneutics. An analysis purely statistical or sociological, in fact, would access not, in the opinion of the A., The level more interesting and founding of similar problem, immediately placed among the most serious and vital social fabric and existential of every human coexistence.
What, then, is the relationship between the party and the totality of the human person? What are the elements that allow us to distinguish a genuine party from a party inauthentic, artificial? If from a philosophical point of view "strict" you can synthesize the core of the question in the question "what is the essence of the party?", The author reconfigures the issue appropriately, operating a twist of the question, "diverting" the question posed by the locus traditional "classic" of the ti esti, to a formulation more anthropologically centered: why us men we are celebrating? Which intimate requirement pushes humans everywhere and every time to celebrate?
In the four chapters that make up the work of Russian can indicate many key hubs that form the center of gravity within which the A. develops a reflection careful not to neglect the level of history or the level, just as decisive, meta-historical, metaphysical, present and operating in the watermark within the "broken paths' route anthropological sapiens. Although, in fact, the proceed of the A. develops within the safe margins of a genuinely philosophical discourse, this does not imply the refusal to question what, in hindsight, is suggested by the fund of the matter investigated. As shown above in the chapter con- clusive, to which we will return with more attention, Russian shows how deep in the dynamism of the festival will play a game that transcends and surpasses pure immanence, the mere horizontality of human relations, and has directly to do "with the origin of man, with the fundamental truths of its existence, with what structure his life and transcends it" (p. 66).
The party, therefore, as a locus religious, or how human activity - like activities equally significant, that structure and qualify her to be there, how to love, build, live, work ...- testifies and identifies sapiens in a teleology verticalizzante , a desire to transcend the limits of space and time to which it is bound, to reconfigure the everyday linear diachronic model of an eternal kairos, a Illud Tempus that restless and de-structure, placing it within vertical coordinates, its historical present. Break / exception ordinary concatenation of events, the festival is, nevertheless, always referred to daily life, and its extraordinary location within the boundaries of the '' Today 'indicates a voltage that, as Aquinas - which There. readily relates -, invests the experience of a being that exists on the horizon between eternity and time.
In the first chapter, the theme is that of the party, seen as a link with the origin, worship (see the triple value dell'etimo, discussed by Russian in the human person. Issues of philosophical anthropology, Armando, Rome 2000), fabric, furrow, luggage significant, including as a foundation, as the root of individual identity. Each personal story is, in fact, engaged in a trans- but more complex relationships, relationships, including nuclei of meaning: in a word, in a tradition. THERE. therefore reflects the function, and the role played by the festive celebration in the configuration process, rediscovery and acceptan- it (or rejection) of the cultural heritage, defined as the place in which it engages and is hosted l '"I" of each person . Described the process of assimilation of culture as a dynamic uni-total that come in all sizes dell'u- hand, from the most basic level of sensory perception, the A. draws attention to how appropriately even in the festive celebration is operational goes like dynamic 'humanizing', as it flows in and synthesizes a precise mode of 'living in the world'; or to face life, deal with each other, affirm certain basic values.
In celebration of the feast, every human culture expresses a conception of life and death, the meaning of events and the passage of time: in other words, in the festive ritual has meaning and celebrated the overall sense that a social group recognizes / attributes to his being in the world. In its positive expression goes, that is, in its balanced, virtuous relationship between a past full of sense - but not immutable or hypostasized -, and its openness to the future and possible developments unpublished, the party plays a key role as well, reinforcing and regenerating the community awareness of the community that celebrates it. Quoting a text of Levi Della Torre which pays particular attention, the A. indicates the common reference to the Jewish feast Saturday as a positive example of how the party young people play a crucial role, re-activation of the collective memory (orig- it, sanction of this, opening tomorrow). It is the case of a genealogy, a history that recognizes the observance of the feast an act of response to the positive relationship that God establishes with his people produced here. THERE. not fail to mention, however, the possibility that similar dynamic can pervert, tipping in strategy-directed from political or ecclesiastical to celebrate itself, raffor
Zando so its hegemony. The power is never - can never be - contradictory, and in the constant search for consensus, the control of the festive celebration takes on a strategic decisive. In a sense, and because negationis, Such manipulation - think of the bread and circensem of the Romans, the feast of the Goddess Reason in France or the Nazi and Soviet military parades - is further confirmation of what the dynamics festive, whether or less subservient to a political or economic that demeans and humiliates the original authorization bill, might serve as the litmus test, "director anthropological 'privileged to take the pulse, investigate the essential loci of a given society.
In the second chapter the A. highlights a further building block of dynamic festive: relationality. The aspect of sharing, the joy of a little tem- lived "for each other and for others" - in the words of A. Fabris - is an essential note of this experience: no one can celebrate alone, each party is always the place of physical encounter between two or more people who participate, within a space-time (extra) ordinary happen to the sense of a meaningful, shared by the participants and involves them in an event that binds the fates, marking a report that is always, as mentioned earlier, reciprocity shared. Another aspect emphasized, related to the previous one, is related to the experience of freedom (positive) that the celebration of the festival is able to strengthen and defend; of in the present historical epoch, marked by consumerism and by an economy that often takes on the traits of a dehumanizing Moloch, the defense of the dies festivus, animated by a logic other than the mechanisms often asphyxiating the daily routine, arises as unavoidable necessity, need to cultivate and care for a human space, possibility to regain himself, to regain consciousness of a domain far as that imposed by what ever threat of subtracting man to himself. Decisive, it seems, this last step. THERE. Indeed, signaling as in technological civilization sapiens is always exposed to the danger of becoming mere cog in an impersonal system, and pointing to the "area of freedom" opened by the logic of the party, proves to be perfectly aware that it will, at contrary to the view taken by scholars less noticed, is something extremely seriously, so much so that, as it emerges in different passages of the text, in the more or less conscious adherence to the time of the party 'leaves' of the same humanitas of the subject. However, not to be omitted, and in this case either the A. indulges in similar ingenuity, the risk that the festive time can be transformed from 'oasis of freedom "to his ghostly residue, the product of manipulation of consumerism, the relevant account, avidly accurate logic enjoined to use and consumption of cash.
In the third chapter of the book, entitled Work, leisure and "idleness", Russian addresses the crucial issue of the relationship between work and party, leaning on the reflections, in this fundamental sense, of J. Pieper, in tune with the world. A theory on the party, rightly says that the two companies are inevitably related. This relationship is illuminating, and more or less founded consistency of one highlights the "state of health" of the other. Only a work time lived as a place of meaning can introduce the man to a festive time equally sensible. Here one of the theoretical articulations in our opinion the most interesting short essay. THERE. in fact considers absolutely necessary not split the party and its reflection on the possible 'cri
is "the equally decisive crisis in the world of work (subject, however, already addressed by the author in collaboration with A. Vaccaro in integral human development and labor organizations, Cantagalli, Siena 2013). Only a daily work experienced as a place of satisfaction, generated by the consciousness of the commitment, the value and the deep motivation, proves able to prepare a true enjoyment of the time of the party. This virtuous relationship, also evaluated in reference to a theological perspective, reports a balance never achieved once and for all, and particularly threatened in an era, ours, in which the workplace is often dominated by a carrieristica and activist: the success of the enterprise, the professional, became the idol whose sacrifice any other good. And rightly the A. states that, within similar coordinates, the festive time no longer has any reason for being, becoming a mere parenthesis "tolerated only to return soon to the usual chores never forget" (p. 42). With singular acute psychological me the author outlines a concise but detailed phenomenological analysis, indicating the various perversions, the different possible reversals of the complex balance between celebration and work; as carefully outlines the differences between the game and party - the A. appropriately recalls the famous classic Huizinga, Homo Ludens, criticizing some conclusions.
In the fourth and final chapter addresses another crucial point of reflection on the party, on the function of hope, transcendence, perfection. On the feast, breakage and interruption of ordinary time, you can experience the fullness of a '' transfiguration, as it can find the positive value of the ordinary activities and reconnect the time to his sense. Thus the Sabbath and the Christian Sunday open a perspective of regeneration that is not only postponed to the future but it is working right now "(p. 61).
But inscribed in the very core of human existence, the party is decisive in the process of humanization of the subject; one of the most decisive anthropological dimensions that the celebration of the festival is able to re-center and educate is related to the experience of temporality. It allows you to live a proper balance between historical present, past and future. Remember, to thank, to become aware of a call that moves beyond the daily wheezing its vanishing point. Function of hope, the authentic party never arises as a mere celebration and re-actualization of a significant event, now relegated to a past dead and buried, but always brings with it an 'imbalance' facing further goals. Resting on the solid foundation of an anthropology that recognizes nell'anelito of happiness and fullness of a distinctive ontological constitution of homo sapiens, Russian concludes his short work indicating openness to transcendence, to the drive towards fullness foreshadowed and desired, but never fully owned, the stretch of the most qualifying celebrat- jars. Taking up, once again, some reflections decisive J. Pieper, the A. points out that, after all, in the celebration of the feast is highlighted more than a pre- via implicit acceptance by the man, the world tout court approval that energizes in the very act by which we celebrate something, was nothing more than an event, in hindsight, in itself insignificant. The more or less important event celebrated passes, in a sense, in the background, since celebrating the single event that does not celebrate something even more decisive. Celebrate the birthday of someone means to rejoice that this someone is, that his life has a meaning, a meaning far greater, irreducible to what you can 'wrap' in the short space of a birthday celebration.
Providing a general survey of some constitutive features of the experience of the festival - by repeatedly not to make any claim to exhaustively activities -, A. contributed, in the opinion of the writer, to call attention to an extremely topical theme; to anyone who wanted to investigate in this direction, the essay by Francesco Russo offers remarkable insights, able to encourage further efforts of reflection.
davide navarria