The attitude of Kabbalah to life and death Question: Is death a conscious process? We know this in the subconscious...Why in the subconscious? If you ask a Kabbalist about death, he will answer that death is felt in him as necessary and an integral part of transformations, through

Introduction

Attitude towards death has a huge impact on the quality of life and the meaning of existence of a particular person and society as a whole. In history human civilization There are various ideas about death: mythological in archaic societies, courageously optimistic in the ancient Roman era (Aristotle, Epicurus), tragic-pessimistic in the Middle Ages, pantheistic in modern times (Spinoza, Hegel, Goethe), romantic (Schopenhauer, Nietzsche) and ethical (L.N. Tolstoy) in the 19th century. Attitudes towards death vary depending on the level sociocultural development society and its system of spiritual and moral values.

What is the reason that among the problems of the history of culture and worldview developed by modern historians, the problem of death occupies one of the prominent places? Until relatively recently, it hardly occupied them at all. They silently proceeded from the postulate that death is always death (“People were born, suffered and died...”), and, in fact, there was nothing to discuss here. Now the problem of people’s perception of death has emerged. different eras, their assessments of this phenomenon. And it turned out that it was highest degree a significant problem, the consideration of which can shed light New World on systems of worldview and values ​​accepted in society.

F. Ariès outlines 5 main stages in the slow change of attitudes towards death:

1st stage, which does not represent a stage of evolution, but rather a state that remains stable among large sections of the people, from archaic times until the 19th century, if not up to the present day, he denotes by the expression “we will all die.” This is the state of “tamed death.” This classification does not at all mean that death was “wild” before. Ariès only wants to emphasize that the people of the Middle Ages treated death as an ordinary phenomenon that did not inspire them with special fears.

The idea of ​​the Last Judgment, developed, as Ariès writes, by the intellectual elite and established between the 11th and 13th centuries, marked 2nd stage evolution of attitude towards death, which Ariès called “My own death”. Starting from the 12th century, scenes of the afterlife judgment were depicted on the Western portals of cathedrals, and then, from about the 15th century, the idea of ​​judgment of the human race was replaced by a new idea - of individual judgment, which occurs at the moment of a person’s death.

3rd stage the evolution of the perception of death according to Aries - “Death far and near” - is characterized by the collapse of defense mechanisms from nature. Both sex and death return to their wild, untamed essence.

4th stage centuries-old evolution in the experience of death - “Your death.” The complex of tragic emotions caused by the passing of a loved one, spouse, child, parents, relatives, in Aries’s opinion, is a new phenomenon associated with the strengthening of emotional ties within the family. With the weakening of belief in punishments beyond the grave, the attitude towards death changes.

Finally, in the 20th century, fear of death and its very mention develops. “Death inverted” - this is what Aries means 5th stage development of the perception and experience of death among Europeans and North Americans.

“For a long time, people have been afraid of death and at the same time interested in it. But she always remained mysterious and incomprehensible. Man cannot live forever. Death is a necessary biological condition for the turnover of individuals, without which the human race will turn into a huge, inert monolith. For the stability of any social education, a clear designation of moral criteria related to the phenomenon of human death is required. This... helps to keep society in a dynamic balance of morality, preventing aggressive instincts from coming to the surface, uncontrollable massacres and suicide."

Egyptian version of death

Among the slave states that arose in the valleys of large rivers after the collapse of the clan system, Egypt was the first to achieve true power, to become a great power dominating the surrounding world, the first empire to lay claim to world hegemony - albeit on the scale of only that insignificant part of the earth that was known to the ancient Egyptians.

Once it was possible to create on earth such a power that subjugated everything to itself, is it really impossible to perpetuate it, that is, continue it beyond the threshold of death? After all, nature is renewed every year, because the Nile - and Egypt, as Herodotus wrote, is the “gift of the Nile” - overflowing, enriches the surrounding lands with its silt, gives birth to life and prosperity on them, and when it goes back, drought sets in: but this is not death, because then - and so every year - the Nile floods again!

And so a creed was born, according to which the deceased awaits resurrection. The grave is only a temporary home for him. But in order to provide the deceased with a new, already eternal life, it is necessary to preserve his body and provide in the grave with everything that he needed during life, so that the spirit can return to the body just as the Nile returns annually to the land it irrigates. This means that the body must be embalmed and turned into a mummy.

And in case the mummification turns out to be imperfect, it is necessary to create a likeness of the body of the deceased - his statue. And therefore in ancient Egypt the sculptor was called “sankh”, which means “creator of life”. By recreating the image of the deceased, he seemed to recreate life itself.

A passionate desire to stop and overcome death, which seemed to the Egyptians to be an “abnormality”, a violation of the natural course of life, a passionate hope that death could be overcome, gave rise to a funeral cult that left its mark on almost all the arts of ancient Egypt.

The funeral cult in ancient Egypt was not a cult of death, but rather a denial of the triumph of death, a desire to prolong life, to ensure that death - an abnormal and temporary phenomenon - would not violate the beauty of life.

Death is terrible when the deceased does not receive a dignified burial, allowing the soul to reunite with the body, terrible outside Egypt, where the ashes are “wrapped in ram’s skin and buried behind a simple fence.”

In the “History of Sinuhet,” a literary monument created approximately two thousand years BC, the pharaoh exhorts a nobleman who fled to another country to return to his home in Egypt with such promises: “You must think about the day of burial and about the last path to eternal bliss . Here is prepared for you a night with fragrant oils. Here the burial shrouds, woven by the hands of the goddess Tait, await you. They will make you a sarcophagus of gold, and a headboard of pure lapis lazuli. The vault of heaven (the canopy or the inner lid of the sarcophagus with the image of the sky goddess) will spread over you when they put you in the sarcophagus and the bulls drag you away. Musicians will go ahead of you and perform a funeral dance at the entrance to your tomb... They will announce the list of sacrifices for you. They will slaughter sacrifices for you at your funeral stele. They will place your tomb among the pyramids of Pharaoh’s children, and its pillars will be built of white stone.”

In a special ritual included in the funeral ceremony, the deceased was likened to Osiris himself, the son of heaven and earth, killed by his brother and resurrected by his son to become the god of fertility, the ever-dying and ever-resurrecting nature. And everything in the tomb, in its architecture, in its paintings and sculptures, in all the luxury items with which it was filled to “please” the deceased, was supposed to express the beauty of life, the majestically calm beauty, as the imagination ideally pictured it ancient Egyptian. It was the beauty of the sun in the eternal blue sky, the majestic beauty of a huge river giving coolness and abundance of earthly fruits, the beauty of the bright green palm groves among the grandiose landscape of boundless yellow sands. Smooth distances - and the colors of nature, full of sound under the dazzling light, without haze, without halftones... An Egyptian cherished this beauty in his heart and wished to enjoy it forever, having overcome death.

Egyptian texts indicate that the Egyptians' views on the nature and essence of man were quite complex. In their view, a person consisted of a body (Het), a soul (Ba), a shadow (Khaybet), a name (Ren) and, finally, Ka, which can perhaps best be expressed in the words: “double, invisible double.” Ka is born along with a person, relentlessly follows him everywhere, constitutes an integral part of his being and personality; however, Ka does not die with the death of a person. He can continue his life in the grave, which is therefore called the “house of Ka.” His life depends on the degree of preservation of the body and is closely connected with the latter. It is easy to see that the idea of ​​Ka formed the basis of all funeral rites. Thanks to him, the corpse was turned into a mummy and carefully hidden in a closed room of the tomb; the possibility of accidental destruction of the mummy was also provided for; in this case, statues that conveyed as closely as possible the features of the deceased could replace the mummy and become the seat of Ka. Ka's life did not depend on the integrity of the mummy alone - he could die of hunger and thirst; tormented by them, he could go so far as to eat his own excrement and drink his own urine. Regarding food, Ka was completely dependent on the voluntary donations of children and descendants; funeral services were performed solely for him; all the real estate was intended for him, which was placed along with the dead man in the grave. The deceased enjoys only conditional immortality; the part of it that remains after death is closely connected with the grave and continues to lead earthly life. This primitive idea caused the establishment of funeral rites in Egypt, which were preserved throughout Egyptian history.

Along with Ka, Ba also matters. Ba is already mentioned in the most ancient inscriptions, but given the current state of our knowledge, we cannot isolate the pure Egyptian ideas about the soul, since they early fell under the influence of the views about Ka. Initially, Ba was represented in the form of a bird, and in this one can see a hint of the role of the soul after the death of a person: obviously, it was not associated with the grave and could freely leave, rise from it on wings to the sky and live there among the gods. We sometimes meet Ba in the grave visiting the mummy; she also resides on earth and enjoys all earthly bliss; in contrast to Ka, the soul is not constrained in its movements. According to the pyramid inscriptions, the deceased flies into the sky in the form of a bird; he sometimes also takes the form of a grasshopper - the Egyptians considered the grasshopper a bird - and in this form reaches the sky or rushes there in clouds of incense smoke. There she becomes Hu - “brilliant” and rejoices, being in the company of the gods.

jealous Greece and death

Ancient culture is considered the greatest creation of mankind. At first it was perceived as a collection of myths, tales and legends. However, in the 19th century, views on the processes of antiquity changed fundamentally. It turned out that it was no coincidence that ancient Greek culture the problem of life and death became one of the key ones. Religious and philosophical movements in ancient Greece dealt with death dramatically. IN classical period Ancient Greek philosophy attempted to overcome the fear of death. Plato created the doctrine of man, consisting of two parts - an immortal soul and a mortal body. Death, according to this teaching, is the process of separation of the soul from the body, its liberation from the “prison” where it resides in earthly life. The body, according to Plato, as a result of death turns into dust and decay; after a certain period of time, the soul again inhabits a new body. This teaching, in a transformed form, was subsequently adopted by Christianity.

A different understanding of death is characteristic of the philosophy of Epicurus and Stoicism. The Stoics, trying to alleviate the fear of death, spoke of its universality and naturalness, for all things have an end. Epicurus believed that there is no need to be afraid of death, that a person does not encounter death. His words are known: “As long as I live, there is no death, when there is death, I am not.”

The ancient philosophical tradition has already come to consider death as a good. Socrates, for example, speaking before the judges who sentenced him to death penalty, stated: “... it really seems that all this (the verdict) happened for my good, and it cannot be that we understand the matter correctly, believing that death is evil.” “On the eve of his execution, Socrates admitted to his friends that he was full of joyful hope, because, as ancient legends say, a certain future awaits the dead. Socrates firmly hoped that during his just life, after death he would end up in the society of wise gods and famous people. Death and what follows is the reward for the pains of life. As a proper preparation for death, life is a difficult and painful business."

death in the Middle Ages

During the European Middle Ages, the dominant view was that death was God’s punishment for the original sin of Adam and Eve. Death in itself is an evil, a misfortune, but it is overcome by faith in God, faith that Christ will save the world, and that the righteous will have a blissful existence in paradise after death.

For the early Middle Ages, a person’s attitude towards death can be defined as “tamed death.” In ancient tales and medieval novels, death appears as the natural end of the life process. A person is usually warned about his approaching death through signs (omens) or as a result of internal conviction: he is waiting for death, preparing for it. Waiting for death turns into an organized ceremony, and it is organized by the dying person himself: he convenes immediate family, friends, children. Aries specifically emphasizes the presence of children at the bedside of a dying person, since subsequently, with the development of civilization, children begin to be protected in every possible way from everything connected with the image of death. Hence the concept of “tamed”, chosen by the historian: death is “tamed” not in relation to ancient pagan ideas, where it would act as “wild” and hostile, but precisely in relation to ideas modern man. Another feature of “tamed death” is the strict separation of the world of the dead from the world of the living, as evidenced by the facts that burial places were moved outside the boundaries of the medieval city.

In the late Middle Ages the picture changes somewhat. And although during this period the natural attitude towards death continues to dominate (death as one of the forms of interaction with nature), the emphasis is somewhat shifted. In the face of death, each person rediscovers the secret of his individuality. This connection was established in the consciousness of man in the late Middle Ages and still occupies a strong place in the spiritual baggage of man. Western civilization.

Along with Christian ideas about life and death in the Middle Ages, there was a very powerful layer of ideas and ideas inherited from traditionalist, patriarchal ideology. This layer is associated mainly with rural culture and is, as shown historical facts, a fairly stable formation that existed for centuries despite the strong influence of Christian ideology and practice and had a strong influence on Christian ideas themselves. What does this layer include? It embraces, first of all, a set of spells against death, predictions of the time of death, conspiracies to bring death to the enemy. All this is the legacy of the “magical death” of the era of patriarchal society. As for predictions of death, for example, in Germany the shadow of a headless man on the wall is considered a harbinger of imminent death; in Scotland, dreams in which the burial of a living person appears were used as a warning; in Ireland, it was believed that the spirit of Fetch takes the form of a person who is destined to soon leave this world and appears to his relatives, and another spirit of the dying person - Beansidhe - two nights before warns of death with a song. In European folklore, animals also play a significant role in predicting death: a black ram, a hen crowing as a rooster, etc. A lot of fortune-telling is common: in Naples it was believed that death was foreshadowed by certain outlines of pieces of wax thrown into water; in Madena they used ice crystals to tell fortunes; in Brittany, pieces of bread and butter were thrown into the fountain for the same purpose.

The process of Christianization of ideas about death does not mean the complete destruction of the magical world of pre-Christian beliefs. The process of interaction and mutual influence of both types of consciousness continues to deepen, leading to a radical change in both types. Thus, under the influence of the traditionalist image of death, new image in Christianity - the passion of Christ, and then many holy martyrs. Ideas about the afterlife are changing: although images of heaven are still very rare and scarce, the image of hell absorbs a description of all the horrors accumulated in the popular consciousness over the previous centuries; The significance of purgatory is also increasing, although it is still weakly rooted in the popular consciousness. Aries calls the structuring of ideas about the afterlife “the most important phenomenon in the history of mentality,” reflecting the affirmation of individual moral consciousness.

The knight of the early Middle Ages died in all simplicity, like the Gospel Lazarus. A man of the late Middle Ages was tempted to die as an unrighteous miser, hoping to take his goods with him even to the next world. Of course, the church warned the rich that if they were too attached to their earthly treasures, they would go to hell. But there was something comforting in this threat: the curse doomed a person to hellish torment, but did not deprive him of his treasures. The rich man, who unjustly acquired his wealth and therefore ended up in hell, is depicted on the portal in Moissac with an unchanged wallet around his neck.

In Hieronymus Bosch's painting National Gallery in Washington, which could serve as an illustration for some treatise on the “art of dying,” the devil, with obvious difficulty, drags a heavy, thick bag of gold coins onto the bed of a dying man. Now the patient will be able to reach it in his mortal moment and will not forget to take it with him. Which of us “today” would think of trying to take a block of shares, a car, diamonds with us to the afterlife! The man of the Middle Ages, even in death, could not part with the goods he had acquired: when dying, he wanted to have it near him, to feel it, to hold on to it.

The question of attitude towards death has always had an ethical connotation. But long before the late Middle Ages, a situation arose when the confrontation between interpretations of death in European civilization reached incredible tension (the struggle between traditional Christianity and Manichaeism).

The polarity in relation to the world manifested itself in these faiths in this way: the Manichaeans considered matter, the commodity world, human flesh to be evil, and the Emptiness to be good, in contrast to Christians, who argued that God's creations cannot be bearers of the Eternal Darkness, who did not deny the meaning of the joys of the flesh life for the human soul.

“The simplest way out for the Manichaeans would have been suicide,” writes L.N. Gumilev, “but they introduced into their doctrine the doctrine of transmigration of souls. This means that death plunges the suicide into a new birth, with all the ensuing troubles. Therefore, for the sake of salvation souls were offered something else: exhaustion of the flesh either by asceticism, or by frantic revelry, collective debauchery, after which weakened matter must release the soul from its clutches. Only this goal was recognized by the Manichaeans as worthy, and as for earthly affairs, morality was naturally abolished. After all, if matter - evil, then any destruction of it is good, be it murder, lies, betrayal... Everything does not matter. In relation to objects of the material world, everything was allowed. The fact that the Manichaeans disappeared from the face of the Earth by the end of the 14th century is not surprising, for they, strictly speaking, strove for this. Hating the material world, they had to hate life itself; therefore, they should not even affirm death, for death is only a moment of change of states, but anti-life and anti-world."

contemporary attitude towards death

The revolution in attitude towards death, according to Aries, comes at the beginning of the 20th century. Its origins lie in a certain mentality that was formed in the middle of the 19th century: those around them spare the patient and hide from him the severity of his condition. However, over time, the desire to protect last moments, released to a person in this world, from vain torment takes on a different color: to protect from emotional shock not so much the dying person, but his loved ones. Thus, death gradually becomes a shameful, forbidden subject. This trend has been intensifying since the middle of the 20th century, which is associated with a change in the place of dying. A person now passes away, as a rule, not at home, among his relatives, but in a hospital, meeting death alone. The “main character” of the drama changes again: for the 17th-18th centuries, Aries notes the transition of initiative from the dying person to his family, but now the doctor and the hospital team become the “master of death.” Death is depersonalized, banalized. The rituals are preserved in their main features, but are devoid of drama; too open an expression of grief no longer evokes sympathy, but is perceived as a sign of either bad upbringing, or weakness, or a mental shift.

Today's attitude towards death includes the following traits and attitudes:

1. Tolerance. Death has gotten used to it and has become an ordinary and commonplace phenomenon in the games of politicians (Chechnya), among criminals (contract killings) and “scumbags” (killing a grandmother because she did not give her drug-addicted grandson a dose). Death, therefore, goes to the periphery of consciousness, becomes invisible, subconscious, repressed. Moreover, this happens not only in the consciousness of the above-mentioned “representatives” human race, but also in the everyday consciousness of the average person.

2. Manufacturability. A tolerant personal attitude towards death pushes one’s own death as such into the background, but brings forward the issues of post-death technology: funerals, money spent on them, tombstones, monuments, obituaries, etc. factors of relatives' prestige. These technologies do not lose their importance after funerals and wakes: tombstones, slabs, and monuments take several months, sometimes even years, to make.

3. The phenomenon of immortality. “People are dying around me, others are dying, but not me, my death is still far away. Death is an invention of science fiction writers.” This immortal attitude is located in the subconscious of modern man. The words of Thomas Aquinas: “We live for others, but everyone dies for himself personally,” take on an ominous meaning, which is constantly pushed “for later.” Have you ever seen people think soberly about own death in the face of another's death? This is not the case because there is no awareness of one’s own death.

4. Theatricality. There is no death as an event or empathy. As Epicurus said: “As long as we exist, there is no death, and when there is death, then we are not.” Thus, death is played out according to literary scenarios and arranged according to the scenarios. As a result, death appears to us in the form of a performance in the theater. The theatricality of death makes life itself theatrical.

5. Game character. The games that people play: business, politics, cars, weapons, women, drugs, money - all this works for win-win or suicide. Any game aimed at winning at any cost “rehearses” death. Those. either winning, like a rehearsal for death, or losing, like a “little death,” a fall down the social ladder. That. a person's death becomes a stake in his "game".

6. No one is equal in the face of death. Inequality in dying is determined by the presence of capital - social, economic and political. The death of a lonely homeless person in a heating main and the death of the first president of Russia are different deaths. People die in accordance with the capital and hierarchy that they had before death.

It can be said that in given time tolerant attitude to death results in an intolerant attitude towards people and their diversity (multi-subjectivity), as a result of which a person becomes depersonalized, leveled down to a simple representative of consumer society, an impersonal agent popular culture.

Today's Western society is ashamed of death, more ashamed than afraid, and in most cases behaves as if death does not exist. This can be seen even by turning to Internet search engines, which give on average eight times fewer links to the word “death” than to the word “life.” One of the few exceptions is the popularity in the West of the ideas of natural death and the “correctly” lived previous period.

Today we live in a society that pushes away death, forcing people to die alone. Meanwhile, death is something that should prepare us, emotionally and spiritually, to see the world in our respective perspective. The dying person thus becomes the center of a necessary and useful drama, important part studying life. Hospitals sometimes help to close the individual off from living connection with family and friends, making it more difficult to end a life due to the lack of expressions of love.

Alas, as the modern French chansonnier Georges Brassans sang: “Today, death is not the same, we ourselves are all not the same, and we have no time to think about duty and beauty.”

Today's death pattern is determined by popular word"privacy", which has become even more stringent and demanding than before. And next to this comes the desire to protect the dying person from his own emotions, hiding his condition from him until the last moment. Doctors are also invited, and in some countries even obliged, to participate in this loving lie.

Fortunately, the above applies to the so-called Western civilization, and some other cultures provide us with examples of a different cultural attitude towards death.

Over the modern civilized world there is a sentiment that death is a simple transition to better world: to a happy home where we will find our missing loved ones again when our time comes, and from where they, in turn, come to visit us. Thus, the comfort of life in the West is simply projected onto the afterlife. In addition, every fourth resident Central Europe believes in the transmigration of souls. This was recently stated by the German researcher Jutta Burggraf, speaking at the XXII International Theological Symposium.

Europeans readily believe in reincarnation, as if they want to give themselves “a chance to try again.” Over the past forty years, the doctrine of transmigration has spread throughout Western world, because it seems very attractive to those minds that refuse to look into the “eyes of death.” If we change our place of residence, profession, or spouse so easily, then why not assume that our lives will change? Although from the point of view of Christian theologians (both Catholic and Orthodox), salvation is possible for both body and soul, which is why Eastern doctrines about the transmigration of souls do not seem necessary.

conclusion

If people die, it means someone needs it. But seriously, this is how the world works... Not only humans, but all living things on Earth are mortal. But when every living creature dies, it leaves behind a trace. This is exactly the way development occurs. I'm just curious - why is this necessary? Who needs it? After all, there is no such thing as eternal... Probably every sane person has asked himself these questions at least once in his life. But the answer to them has not yet been found... It's a pity...

And therefore we just need to live, just do good, in order to leave at least something good for those who will come after us. Who knows, maybe this something can help someone and then we will be remembered with a kind word. Even though we won't hear him...

Literature

1. Aries F. Man in the face of death. M., 1992.

2. Lavrin A.P. Chronicles of Charon. Encyclopedia of death. M., 1993.

3. Anthology of world philosophy. T. 1. Part 1. M., 1983.

4. Fedorova M.M. The image of death in Western European culture. //Human. No. 5. M., 1991.

5. Kovtun A.V. Contemporary context of death. //Sofia: Handwritten journal of the Society of Devotees of Russian Philosophy. No. 3 (Ural State University). Ekaterinburg, 2002.

6. Schopenhauer A. Death and its relation to the indestructibility of our being. http://sopenga.narod.ru/sopa_books/Smert/smert_08.htm.

The Christian understanding of life, death and immortality comes from the Old Testament position: “The day of death is better than the day of birth” (Ecclesiastes) and the New Testament sermon of Christ: “... I have the keys of hell and death.” The divine-human essence of Christianity is manifested in the fact that the immortality of the individual as an integral being is conceivable only through resurrection. The path to it is opened by the atoning sacrifice of Christ through the cross and resurrection. This is the sphere of mystery and miracle, for a person is taken out of the sphere of action of natural-cosmic forces and elements, and becomes, as a person, face to face with God, who is also a person. The goal of human life is deification, movement towards eternal life. Without realizing it, earthly life turns into a dream, an empty and idle dream, soap bubble. In essence, it is preparation for eternal life which is just around the corner for everyone. That is why it is said in the Gospel: “Be prepared: for at an hour you do not think the Son of Man will come.” So that life does not turn, in the words of M.Yu. Lermontov, “into empty and stupid joke“We must always remember the hour of death. This is not a tragedy, but a transition to another world, where myriads of souls, good and evil, already live, and where each new one enters for joy or torment. In the figurative expression of one of the Orthodox hierarchs: “A dying person is a setting star, the dawn of which is already shining over another world.” Death does not destroy the body, but its corruption, and therefore it is not the end, but the beginning of eternal life.

Evangelist Luke defined the essence of the Christian approach to life and death this way: “God is not the God of the dead, but the God of the living. For his people are alive.” Christianity categorically condemns suicide, since a person does not belong to himself, his life and death are “in the will of God.”

Islam about matters of life and death

To a person’s question: “Will I be destroyed alive when I die?” Allah gives the answer: “Won’t man remember that we created him before, and he was nothing?” Unlike Christianity, earthly life in Islam is highly regarded. Islam is based on the fact that man was created by the will of almighty Allah, who is above all merciful. However, on the last day everything will be destroyed and the dead will be resurrected and appear before Allah for final judgment. belief afterlife is necessary, because in this case a person will evaluate his actions and actions from the point of view of personal interest in the sense of an eternal perspective.

The destruction of the entire Universe on the day of fair judgment presupposes the creation of a new perfect world. A “record” of deeds and thoughts, even the most secret ones, will be presented about each person, and an appropriate sentence will be passed. Thus, the principle of the supremacy of the laws of morality and reason over physical laws will triumph. Morally pure man cannot be in a humiliated position, as is the case in real world. Islam strictly prohibits suicide.

The descriptions of heaven and hell in the Koran are full of vivid details, so that the righteous can be fully satisfied and the sinners get what they deserve. It is impossible to ask Allah about the hour of death, since only he has knowledge about this, and “what do you need to know - maybe the hour is already close.”

Attitude to life and death in Buddhism

The attitude towards death and immortality in Buddhism differs significantly from Christian and Muslim ones. Buddha himself refuses to answer the questions: is the one who knows the truth immortal or is he mortal?, and also: can the knower be mortal or immortal at the same time? In essence, only one type of “wonderful immortality” is recognized - nirvana, as the embodiment of the transcendental Superbeing, the Absolute Beginning, which has no attributes.

Since personality is understood as the sum of the drachmas found in constant flow reincarnation, then this implies the absurdity, meaninglessness of the chain natural births. The Drahmmapada states that "to be born again and again is sorrowful." The way out is the path to finding nirvana, breaking through the chain of endless rebirths and achieving enlightenment, a blissful “island” located in the depths of a person’s heart, where “they own nothing” and “covet nothing.” The well-known symbol of nirvana - the extinguishing of the ever-quivering fire of life - well expresses the essence of the Buddhist understanding of death and immortality. As the Buddha said: “One day in the life of a person who has seen the immortal path is better than a hundred years of existence of a person who has not seen the higher life.”

A calm and peaceful attitude towards life, death and immortality, the desire for enlightenment and liberation from evil is also characteristic of other Eastern religions and cults. In this regard, the attitude towards suicide changes: it is considered not so sinful as senseless, because it does not free a person from the circle of birth and death (samsara), but only leads to birth in a closer incarnation. One must overcome such attachment to one's personality, for, in the words of the Buddha, “the nature of personality is continuous death.” One of the wisest poets of the twentieth century. W. Whitman expressed this idea this way - you need to live “calmly smiling at Death.” Getting rid of the sources of suffering, “darkened actions and defilements” (selfishness, anger, pride, false views, etc.) and the power of one’s “I” during life - the best way gaining immortality.

© 2006 S.V. Kovalenko, O.Yu. Mikhailova

ATTITUDE TO THE LIFE AND DEATH OF ADOLESCENTS WHO COMMITTED HOMICIDAL ACTS

Man, unlike all living beings on Earth, is aware of the finitude of his existence and the inevitability of death. Awareness of the temporariness and finitude of physical existence, in turn, makes him think about the questions: how and why do I live? Moreover, each generation answers these eternal questions in its own way.

For a long time Issues related to life and death were considered within the framework of philosophical and religious concepts. The psychological study of this issue began relatively recently, which is determined by the personal, individualized and deeply intimate nature of these relationships (especially the relationship to death). It is no coincidence that the discussion of these issues initially began in the context psychological analysis problems human existence, the meaning of life, i.e. associated with awareness of the problem of human life.

Only in the second half of the twentieth century. active development of thanatological problems began. Moreover, interest in the problem of attitudes towards death in scientific literature so high that S. Ryazantsev suggests considering thanatology as independent science, studying the problems of death, its causes, processes and manifestations. In the context of the problem under study, several directions of its research can be distinguished.

The most developed area of ​​psychological research, within which a person’s attitude towards death is analyzed, is the study of the causes of suicide, patterns of formation of suicidal states and possible directions for suicide prevention.

A number of studies are devoted to the study of the psychology of terminally ill patients, attitudes towards death, its perception and their changes in different age periods. A direction related to research into the memories of people who experienced clinical death. It should be noted that the available scientific psychological literature The research concerns the problem of attitudes towards one’s own death and the death of people close to one. Moreover, encounters with death are predominantly seen as a positive factor, one of the significant opportunities for personal growth. At the same time, they remain practically unexplored

Bathroom questions regarding the attitude towards the life and death of murderers, i.e. people causing death.

In this regard, issues of attitude towards the death of others are studied in the context of the problem of euthanasia - the intentional acceleration of death or the killing of an incurable patient in order to end his suffering. The question of its admissibility remains debatable. However, it should be noted that the most discussed within the framework of this problem is the question of the human right to voluntary departure from life. There is clearly not enough work on euthanasia as mercy killing.

There is a clear shortage of works devoted to the attitude towards death of the people who cause it in the criminal psychological literature.

One of the few scientists who considered the attitude towards the death of another person was the representative of the anthropological trend in criminal psychology E. Ferri. He identified an anthropological type of killer with physiological insensitivity, which is determined by anatomical and physiological anomalies of the body and can be established using objective methods. The consequence of physiological insensitivity is mental (or moral) insensitivity to the suffering and death of the victim, his comrades and accomplices, and, finally, to his own suffering and death.

As is known, S. Freud did not specifically deal with the problems of crime, so criminal aggression remained outside his field of vision. However, he postulated the existence of an unconscious desire for death in humans, which he associated with the desire for destruction and self-destruction. Comparing modern man with primitive people and their attitude towards the death of others, S. Freud argued that we are “the same killers as our ancestors were.”

This issue is analyzed in more detail in the concept of E. Fromm. As part of his theory, he identifies necrophilia, which means a desire for destruction - the desire to make life mechanical, controlled, dead, as opposed to biophilia - love for all living things.

The basis of necrophilia as one of the forms of “unproductive character orientation” of a person is the mechanism of escape according to the type of destructivism. Unlike sadism, which is aimed at strengthening one individual by dominating another, destructivism is aimed at eliminating any potential threat from the outside. It is from such people, says E. Fromm, that executioners, terrorists, and torturers are recruited. It is to this category of people that he classifies murderers.

E. Fromm believed that necrophilia as a phenomenon of mental pathology acts as an inevitable consequence of developmental delay, mental “disability” and as a result of an unlived life. In his opinion, if a person “...cannot break out of the shackles of his narcissism and constantly feels isolated and worthless, the only way to drown out this unbearable feeling of insignificance and some kind of “vital impotence” - to assert oneself at any cost, at least at the cost of the barbaric destruction of life. To commit an act of vandalism does not require any special effort, intelligence, or patience; all the destroyer needs is strong muscles, a knife or a revolver..." At the same time, as he believes, there is no hard boundary between necrophilic and biophilic orientation: each individual is a complex aggregate, a combination of characteristics found in a specific combination; the number of such combinations actually coincides with the number of individuals. Completely necrophilic characters are relatively rare, such people should be considered seriously ill, and we must look for the genetic roots of this pathology.In most people we can find a mixture of bio-philic inclinations and necrophilic tendencies, the latter being strong enough to cause internal conflict personality.

The influence of E. Fromm’s idea is clearly visible in the concepts of modern criminologists. For example, Yu.M. Antonyan also identifies necrophilia as a reason for murder. Moreover, unlike E. Fromm, who excluded the sexual meaning of this word, he considers necrophilia as an uncontrollable attraction to death, including pathological sexual desire. Considering the psychology of murder, he writes: “Murder is the denial of life and disgust for it, it is the most complete embodiment of hatred, very often unaddressed hatred, hatred in general, hatred of everyone, and it is the stronger more people or social system alienated from constructive values."

According to E.G. Samovichev, in the minds of the overwhelming number of people the problem of ontological

cultural foundations, the specificity of their “existential” status is not reflected. The confidence of the majority in their right to exist is confirmed for them by this very fact. At the same time, as the author believes, criminal killers represent a category of people for whom the right to their own existence is not obvious, but is proven solely by the fact of their criminal deprivation of the life of another person. As E.G. writes Samovichev, “murderers demonstrate a very specific way of human existence, which is based on the lack of subjective psychological certainty this fact and moreover, their right to exist.” Moreover, it is precisely this ontological status of the individual that has a powerful motivating potential: “Murder has no extrinsic motivation, it cannot be justified by any external circumstances (although such can almost always be found). It has a purely subjective motivation, the essence of which is not in achieving any specific objective result, but in overcoming its “unnatural” life position". Thus, according to the author, in the minds of killers the value own life confirmed by the death of another person.

It should be noted that in the scientific literature the attitude towards death is considered mainly in theoretical level. In this regard, the empirical study of the attitude towards death of persons convicted of committing various crimes by A.A. is very interesting. Bakanova. However, her sample included those convicted of both violent and nonviolent crimes.

We conducted an empirical study, the purpose of which was to study the attitude towards life and death of adolescents who committed homicidal acts. The object of the study was 43 juvenile male teenagers (15-17 years old) convicted of committing serious violent crimes: premeditated murder - Art. 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, infliction of grievous bodily harm resulting in death - Art. 111, part 4 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. As control group 45 minors convicted of committing mercenary crimes were examined: theft - Art. 158 parts 2 and 3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

The main hypothesis of the study was the assumption that such adolescents will have a specific attitude towards life and death. During the study, we studied the content of ideas about life and death among adolescents different groups and personal determinants that determine the

digital attitude towards this. Preliminary results Research generally confirms and specifies the hypothesis put forward.

Literature

1. May R. Discovery of being. M., 2004.

2. Frankl V. Man in search of meaning. M., 1990.

3. Ryazantsev S. Philosophy of death. St. Petersburg, 1994..

4. Ferry E. Psychology of a premeditated killer // Legal Journal. M., 1888. T. 29. Book. 1.

5. Freud 3. We and death // Psychology of death and dying / Comp. K.V. Selchenok. Minsk, 1998.

Rostov State University

6. Fromm E. Anatomy of human destructiveness / Transl. from English M., 1994.

7. Fromm E. Über die Liebe zum Leben. Stuttgart; Zürich, 1983. S. 112.

8. Antonyan Yu.M. Psychology of murder. M., 1997.

9. Samovichev E.G. Psychological etiology of murder // Psychological journal. 2002. T. 23. No. 5.

10. Bakanova A.A. Resources existential crisis in places of deprivation of liberty // Ananyev Readings - 1999. To the 40th anniversary of the creation of the country's first laboratory of industrial (engineering) psychology at St. Petersburg (Leningrad) University. Theses for academic and practical studies. conf. October 26-28, 1999 / Ed. A.A. Krylova. St. Petersburg, 1999.

Perm “contemporary artist” Alexey Ilkaev made adjustments to the city landscape: in the plywood installation installed on the city embankment - the inscription HAPPINESS IS NOT SOAR - replaced the first word with the much more realistic DEATH. The reshuffle and change of emphasis alarmed local officials, resulting in a scandal. At the height of the investigation, the artist Ilkaev admitted his guilt in his crime by writing a letter of repentance. Almost came to the police and confessed. And so I’m wondering: is this just another artistic gesture of a conceptual auctioneer or is it all for real? If the latter, then to what degree of ugliness did the cultural inquisition reach in the once progressive city of Perm?? After all, this is exactly like under Stalin, when poets, writers and artists, some of them great, wrote humiliated repentances and petitions, confessing political myopia, petty-bourgeoisism and insufficient proletarian enthusiasm... Apparently, DEATH in Perm will again be replaced with HAPPINESS. So that no one doubts. But then I would advise dark night There’s no point in setting this entire structure on fire, as Pyotr Pavlensky did.

In St. Petersburg, meanwhile, film director Alexei Krasovsky (not to be confused with his namesake Anton, who fell in love with Putin like a man) set out to make the film “Poazdnik” - a “black” comedy, the action of which takes place under New Year V besieged Leningrad. As soon as this became known, a “hate group” was formed, mainly consisting of the ubiquitous deputies, who called the very idea of ​​​​the film blasphemy and mockery and demanded that the film be closed. I understand that those suffering from incontinence know little about cinema, so I remind you of a very recent and very famous precedent: the film “Life is Beautiful” (1997) by the Italian actor and director Roberto Benigni, which received all possible main prizes, from Cannes to Oscar, and became an absolute classic. This is also a comedy, and not even a black one, about the Holocaust and the death camp with gas chambers. The topic, you see, is no less scary than Leningrad blockade. However, neither the Italian parliament and the government, nor even the all-powerful and worldwide Jewish “behind the scenes” vetoed the film. I don't think this even occurred to anyone.

Among those who especially zealously attacked the renegade filmmakers was a Duma deputy named Sergei Boyarsky. The surname is rare, I decided to check it out - and alas! Son. Born in 1980. I was spinning... It’s like this: dad is a musketeer, daughter Lisa is a lovely girl and a good actress, and nature rested on her son: a demagogue and a young guardian-type fossil fell out of the boyar’s nest. And a corresponding career. So much for “Dinosaurs”... Did you, Misha, really not let your child listen to the Beatles during his childhood and adolescence?!