New Releases by Josef Pieper

El interés básico del libro reside en que es una defensa de la filosofía desde la filosofía, según sus propios criterios, y no según otros de utilidad o cientificidad, a los cuales tratan de acomodarla quienes la critican desde fuera. Para Pieper, la filosofía tiene sentido en sí misma, y no tiene por qué ser asimilada a otros modos de conocimiento: es una pregunta constitutiva del ser del hombre.

"This is a masterpiece of a forgotten virtue by one of the great Christian philosophers of the twentieth century"--Publisher''s description.

"Cicero said philosophy was nothing but consideration of death. Augustine ''became a great question to myself'' upon the death of Alypius, the beloved companion of his youth. Montaigne wrote that ''to philosophize is to learn to die.'' Such formulations, especially when separated as these are by centuries, are reminders that death has probably always been the most powerful provoker of man''s serious thought--and ''What are the dimensions of death?'' his most human question. In Death and Immortality Josef Pieper explores with his customary philosophic artistry what we can know about dying and its implications. He makes judicious use of man''s thoughts, experience, and feelings about death and possible immortality from antiquity to the present. The view of death that emerges from his many-faceted investigation is that of a violent rending and destruction affecting the whole man--a destruction that Pieper believes can be best understood as just punishment because it seems to involve the painful and freeing elements that characterize the assumption of guilt."--front and back flaps.

Pieper distinguishes between Platonic stones in which Plato crystallizes mythical fragments from the mere stories which contain them, and Platonic myths, in which he purifies the proper mythical elements, freeing them of the non-mythical elements which tend to obscure them.

1 Vorlesungen iiber die Geschichte der Phi!osophie. Erster Band. Hrsg. Joh. Hoffmeister. Leipzig 1940. S.101. ! Confessiones 11, 14. 3 Aufzeichnungen aus den Jahren 1875/79. Gesammelte Werke. Musarion-Ausgabe (Miinu00ad chen 1922 ff.), Bd. 9, S. 480. 4 Kurt Eisner, Feste der Festlosen. Dresden 1906. S. 10. S Gerhard Nebel, Die Kultischen Olympien. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung vom 20.8. 1960. 8 Martin P. Nilsson, Griechische Feste von religioser Bedeutung, mit AusschluB der attiu00ad schen. Leipzig 1906. S. III und S. 160. 7 Richard Alewyn, Karl Salzle, Das groBe Welttheater. Die Epoche der hofischen Feste in Dokument und Deutung. Rowohlts Deutsche Enzyklopadie. Hamburg 1959. S. 16. 8 J. Pinsk, Die sakramentale Welt. 2. Auf!., Freiburg i. Br. 1941. S. 163. 9 Alewyn-Salzle, Welttheater S. 13. 10 Karl Kerenyi, Yom Wesen des Festes. Paideuma, Bd. I. Leipzig 1938-40. S. 73. - ders., Die antike Religion. Amsterdam 1940. S. 67. 11 Dictionnaire des Antiquites Grecques et Romaines. Ed. Ch. Daremberg und E. Saglio. Paris 1896. Artikel "Feriae". Bd.lI, S. 1044. 12 Georg Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Romer. 2. Aufl., Miinchen 1912. S.432. 13 Theorie de la Fete. Nouvelle Revue Fran~aise, Bd. 53 (1939). - Spater aufgenommen in L''homme et Ie sacre. 3. Auf!., Paris 1950. S. 128; 165 f. 14 Phaidros 276 b 5. 16 Phi!osophie der Weltgeschichte. Samtliche Werke. Jubilaumsausgabe. Hrsg. H. Glo- ner. Stuttgart 1927-1940. Bd. 11, S. 318. 18 Adolf Ellegard Jensen, Mythos und Kult bei Naturvolkern. Wiesbaden 1951. S.77.

"Original German titles: Vom Sinn der Tapferkeit and Zucht und Mass." Includes bibliographical references. Table of Contents: FORTITUDE -- Introduction -- Readiness to fall in battle -- Fortitude must not trust itself -- Endurance and attack -- Vital, moral, mystic fortitude -- TEMPERANCE -- Selfless self-preservation -- Chastity and unchastity -- Virginity -- On fasting -- The sense of touch -- Humility -- The power of wrath -- Disciplining the eyes -- The fruits of temperance.