Jarosław Płuciennik

Polish Antigones and Holiness in the Dis-enchanted World. Changing of the Cultural Pattern in the Relationship with Protestant Cemeteries in Poland after 1989

In this article, the authors set themselves the goal of describing the pattern of civil engagement comparable to that of Antigone in relations with the state on the case study of people associated with the “Anna Foundation,” saving the evangelical (protestant) cemetery in Gostków (Lower Silesia) from the mid-nineteenth century. The area of operation of this foundation is the local communion of multicultural influence. The research method involved reading sources, a series of qualitative interviews with activists and other subjects with “borderline experience,” a description of photographic documentation and an interpretation of the history of modernity. The article is a case study and an attempt to interpret a broader phenomenon of saving cemeteries of various denominations from destruction and oblivion in Poland after 1989. This study contributes to studies on culture and religion, and the philosophical and theological reflection of late post-modernity. In interpreting the phenomenon of civic involvement, the authors use the concepts of “disenchantment of the world,” “rationalization,” “bureaucratization” and “the garden state,” as well as “re-enchanting of the world” and “holiness in the secular age.” In the conclusions, the authors propose to correct both the definition of “world enchantment” and the definition of the inevitable secularization of the world in late (post) modernity. The authors argue that in the time of the post-pandemic crisis and the climate catastrophe, Albert Schweitzer’s “reverence for life” may be an equivalent that is appropriate for the non-rational elements of contemporary culture.

In theory of suggestion, the metaphor of the mask and the face is used to better define the only concept of suggestion. I use here the metaphor as a starting point to tie the theory of suggestions to the theory of the sublime. The analytic material provides me with 15 English translations, 15 Polish translations, 2 Latin translations, 2 German and 2 Swedish and Greek and Hebrew versions of Psalm 139. When analysing the translations I use a concept of the dominant semantic domain as references of metaphors in a given text. In Psalm 139, there are several important terms to know. According to my analysis of the dominant domain of reference for the metaphors used in the text, it is the experiential domain, defined by senses other than sight. Knowledge does mean meeting with the presence, of which can be illustrated by the metaphor of the face and that feeling is overwhelming, corporeal, visceral, and tangible. An important argument and analysed text in this article are drawn from a poetic paraphrase of Psalm 139 by Jan Kochanowski.