engleski

Happiness

Though at first sight the concept of happiness may appear completely self-explanatory, it is one of the most puzzling and complex concepts in our culture. Historical development of the concept of happiness shows its complexity. Already the Greek term for happiness – eudaimonia indicates this complexity: eudaimonia is composed of two parts (eu “good” and daimon “god, demon”) which echoes an old, pre-rational and pre-socratic understating of happiness as something to do with good luck or good fortune. For Aristotle, eudaimonia is a goal (telos) of a virtuous human life. Christianity brings new elements into the concept of happiness transcending the goal of human life over the limitation of biological living in the eternity. Together with many other humanistic themes from the Antiquity, happiness becomes a much-discussed topic during the Renaissance, and this leads to flourishing of many competing understandings of happiness. Depending on how human being, its goals and its specific activities were understood, so did happiness receive different forms and definitions: a revived ancient humanistic understanding of happiness (with its rather mystically Platonic or stoic or sceptic overtones) stood in opposition to the dominant Christian (i.e. Augustinian and Tomistically-scholastic) understanding. The rebirth of interest for humanistic themes in arts and philosophy is the trademark of the Renaissance period. Man has become a focal point of interest. Pico’s exclamation „Magnum, […] miraculum est homo“ (“Human is a great miracle!”) is one of the best confirmation of the new shifts in philosophical interests. One part of the Renaissance understanding of happiness continues the tradition from Antiquity which we would label “rationalist” (since Plato and Aristotle, through Augustine to scholastic scholars, and Arab tradition) while the other part of the Renaissance understanding of happiness builds the understanding of man and humanity (and in consequence happiness) based on the traditions which from our point of view appear more mystical (the Hermetic or Orphic traditions). These two lines of traditions have become new sources of justification and have provided with new authorities. On the one hand, there is a sort of a theological approach to happiness that sees Good as the ultimate source of human happiness. On the other hand in the Renaissance there emerged new questions about the necessity of moralization of happiness: especially literary works of art discuss the issue of happiness on the level of pleasure and everyday life, but also in the context of morality and virtuous individual life that goes beyond the current sense of well-being. That leads to a new aspect of happiness in the context of questioning the proper planning of community life. This discussion further opens the question of the roles of human discipline in the achievement of happiness, as well as re-examination of the well-being and the bodily goods as important aspects in acquiring happiness. Further, besides the traditional concepts incorporated in the Renaissance understanding of happiness, there are also some new, typically Renaissance moments in the concept of happiness, like social relations, well-being, security etc., emphasizing more down-to-earth aspects of happiness.

happiness

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