JOY IN THE FACE OF DYING: FROM THE SACRED SOCIOLOGY TO THE INNER EXPERIENCE BY GEORGES BATAILLE

• Published in: Doksa = Doxa : zbirnyk naukovykh prat͡s︡ʹ z filosofiï ta filolohiï no. 2(30); pp. 118 - 127
• Main Author: Прушковська, Анастасія
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Odessa I. I. Mechnykov National University 15.06.2018
• Subjects: внутрішній досвід; радість перед обличчям смерті; сакральне ядро; сполучення; спільнота
• ISSN: 2410-2601
• DOI: 10.18524/2410-2601.2018.2(30).146565

Georges Bataille characterizes contemporary society as post-sacral, since it has lost the ways of communication with its own sacred core. The practice of joy in the face of dying arises as an attempt to revive this lost connection and open access to the personal sacred. The life of ancient communities was based on the alternation of periods of work and celebration, so that the latter opened access to the sacred world. There are two poles sacral poles: the left (low) pole is associated with the disgusting and terrifying and the right (high) pole exists as the object of attraction. Approaching in a transgressive act the sacred core, attractive and disgusting at the same time, a person can experience the transmutation of feelings: sacred core being the point where, according to Bataille, sadness can be transformed into joy, anxiety can turn to vital energy. The sacred core is created by people whose hearts are intertwined and who provide death with a certain meaning: death giving an access to the core of a terrifying silence whose cruel presence gives birth to an unavowable community The subject of this article is the consideration of the notion of joy in the face of dying described in 1939 in a report entitled «Joy in the face of dying» at the session of the College of Sociology and in an article «Practice of joy in the face of dying» in the journal «Acephale», which serves as a prerequisite for the emergence of Bataille’s concept of inner experience and analysis of the practice of joy in the face of dying (sequence of exercises for contemplation on one hand, and prayers or meditations on the other) which develops into the Torment, one of the key technics of the inner experience. Joy in the face of dying emerges as the individual confronts the sacred core of silence.