3116 - Mankind and Time XI

N. Lygeros
Translated from the Greek by Evi Charitidou

To proceed with Mankind’s analysis, we have to examine the solitude of intelligence and rarity of resistance. To do this we have to comprehend that the human seems inhuman to society. If Electra’s humanity in the homonym Sophocles’s play shocks society that much is because she seems too human. There is nothing normal in her behavior, because this does not rest on either her age or rank. It is not an insane behavior, though, either. Sophocles does not use a stratagem of this type, he takes advantage of human soul through its actions. But, of what kind those actions should be, since the whole system is corrupt, since the whole world collaborates with the system’s power? Where is the place of the human in this context? Do we have to adopt Chrysothemis’s model to grasp the importance and depth of compromise? Do we have to be rebellious like Electra who waited for her brother’s return? Neither of the two models is independent and sufficient enough. Both of them bear witness of strong dependence on the system on the one hand and on the principles on the other. If Electra paves the way of human revolution, it is only because she is convinced of her brother’s death. For, it is only and merely and that moment that she really takes her destiny in her hands. In all the rest of the cases, she did nothing but suffer tragedy’s destiny. Her revolting does not become conscious until there is no hope any longer. For, hoping causes expectation which has no sense in itself. Human incrustation into time has to be will to become reality. Waiting for reality does not generate will. So, without will how can we speak of free choice? One could seem too human for society, because one is capable of accepting no compromise without ceasing existing, though. Electra does not cease troubling a whole palace and nevertheless she is not sentenced to death. It is true that she does not represent a danger equally important as that produced by Antigone’s will. Nonetheless, she is the source of danger since she is the one who has enabled Orestes’s escape. She symbolizes a bridge between the past and the future. Despite omnipotence of the present to erase, she resists so that memory may live and also in order to give a meaning to Orestes’s action. For, without memory’s presence, what dispensing justice would mean? The action of justice comes directly from the action of memory. Electra represents Orestes’s memory. Without it, she would be only useless, without it, she would not exist. For, Electra is Orestes’s justification; otherwise, Orestes could not be Electra’s justice. So, one is characterized by memory and action. The former is one’s part of humanity and the latter is one’s part of time. If these two components are separated they do not have a real meaning and seem absurd. It is only the amalgam of both, albeit extreme in the eyes of society, that allows a realization of utopia. Thus, the paradox becomes strange, and the strange, human.