Religious Individualisation Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Imagine great natural objects, scenes or events: waterfalls, the ocean churned up by stormy winds, or still and motionless, formations of clouds in the sky, thunder, deserts, a panther, preferably not behind bars but in its natural habitat. We may call all of this sublime, and if we do so, everybody will understand what we mean even if they do not agree. This general and colloquial use of our language refers to experience which for the first time was made a central subject of philosophical investigation in British 18th century aesthetic theory (cf. the classical overview of this tradition in Monk 1960). Joseph Addison and his successor, Edmund Burke, claim that we predicate natural objects or events as sublime if they have aroused the sensation of an 'agreable Horrour' in us (Addison 1965 [1711/12]). Whatever evokes the idea of pain and danger in an undirected lustful manner we call sublime (cf. Burke 1990 [1757], 36). The sublime experience (i.e. the experience of the 'sublime') is one of potential, but never of actual domination; personal safety is the prerequisite of our experiencing the sublime. Possible candidates have properties such as extensive size, overwhelming power, unpredictability, lack of contour or structure, infinity. English philosophers give us a good description of what happens to us when we experience the 'sublime'. 'Horror'-and even more so 'terror'1-may be a strong word for our feelings, but it certainly points in the right direction. There is something repelling about the sublime-being brought about, as Kant says, 'by the feeling of a momentary check to the vital forces' (Kant 1953 [1790], 91)and this effect has to do with the threat that we sense in the sublime. This threat appears to be latent, since no effective and identifiable power is actually used against us, and therefore our repellence contains, however faint and vague, eerie feelings. This is exactly what makes the sublime a source of 'horror'. Burke as well as Kant emphasize, though, that this repellence is only an integral part of an experience that contains attraction as well: the horror-in Addison's original words-is 'agreeable'. Burke even gives etymological references to support his argument that the differentiation between horror and delight, repellence and attraction is a merely analytical one. The Greek term 'thambos' means 'fear' or 'wonder', 'deinos' is 'terrible' or 'respectable' (Burke 1990 [1757], 54). Colloquial 'Examine the depths of your heart, how it is there', Arndt requires of the true believer (Arndt 1845 [1605/09], 148; my translation-M.S.); cf. other characteristic examples of the demanded observance in the records of Philipp Jakob Spener's pietist collegia: Spener 1979 [1687], 479 [and repeatedly]). This may initiate a regressus ad infinitum that leads into the struggle of penance (Bußkampf) which characterizes the most dominant form of pietism in the18th century, the Hallensian pietism, established by August Hermann Francke. Cf. my reconstruction of the pietist logic of belief in Schlette 2005a.