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THE MISFORTUNE OF THE HAPPY
Author(s) -
Ferreira M. Jamie
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
journal of religious ethics
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.306
H-Index - 20
eISSN - 1467-9795
pISSN - 0384-9694
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9795.2006.00278.x
Subject(s) - happiness , generosity , passion , character (mathematics) , philosophy , consciousness , epistemology , agency (philosophy) , reflexive pronoun , conscience , face (sociological concept) , aesthetics , psychoanalysis , psychology , social psychology , theology , linguistics , geometry , mathematics
ABSTRACT Levinas himself raises the question: “why would I feel responsible in the presence of the Face” since “we are separate ontological beings?” This questions the character of our response to the other—both in terms of agency and motivation. While the general reception of Levinas's thought has focused on his description of us as “hostage”—that is, on the moment of assignation (or assignment) by the other—I suggest that Levinas himself also, though not as directly, addresses (as he needs to) the correlative moment, the moment of response. My essay reconstructs Levinas's implicit understanding of the character of our initiative in the light of his concept of Desire. I explore the different dimensions of Desire as appetite and generosity, and I argue that the “transition to moral consciousness” that Levinas wants to “justify” is one from complacent happiness to “non‐complacent happiness” and can be illuminated by the notion of “passion seeking its downfall.”