Tag: human dignity

When I studied Tudor Arghezi's work at secondary school, I was deeply impressed by the bold conclusion of the poem "He Who Thinks Independently," which brings the 1955 volume Song to Man to a close: "It is time, old servant and slave of the evil one, / You, man and brother, to be your own master." Long before that, in 1871, the British poet Algernon Charles Swinburne had written "Hymn to Man," which also concludes triumphantly: "Glory to man in the highest! For man is the master of things."

How can we recognise when our dignity is being violated, and what effect does this have on our everyday lives?

"My exploration of the nobility of the spirit . . . began with the realisation that, following 9/11, many intellectuals were desperate to justify what had happened, failing to distinguish between being highly critical of their own Western society and legitimising a crime, no matter the reasons. I asked myself, 'What use are so many intellectuals who know all the books and music, from Mozart to John Cage, by heart, if they cannot distinguish between right and wrong?'" (Rob Riemen, writer, philosopher, and director of the Nexus Cultural Institute in the Netherlands).

Although the concept of human dignity may appear relatively recent from a historical perspective, the notion of human worth has a long history, as evidenced by accounts in the Book of Genesis, Cicero, and Kant, among others.