Consider supporting the new documentary on Simone Weil. Simone Weil is among my favourite philosophers and mystics. I have read her book "Waiting For God" countless times and have profited immensely. She was very much of an individualist when it came to her spirituality. She never became baptized although she was very sympathetic to the Catholic church. She was born Jewish and raised in a moderately observant home and some of her comments on Judaism have been meant with criticism by Jewish scholars. She is without a doubt a great contemporary mystic who deliberately chose to stand at the margins and crossroads of every institution; religious, academic and corporate. She may have had what we would describe as anorexia and died of starvation after choosing to live in solidarity with soldiers in World War II. She also taught and worked in a factory.
She analyzed oppression and the structure of political oppression. In an essay entitled “The Analysis of Oppression” she asks “why the oppressed in revolt have never succeeded in founding a non-oppressive society, whether on the basis of the productive forces of their time, or even at the cost of an economic regression which could hardly increase their misery; and lastly he, (Marx) leaves completely in the dark the general principles of the mechanism by which a given form of oppression is replaced by another” (Weil, An Anthology, 1986, p. 130).
That concept of lateral oppression is one of the most difficult ones to understand. She advocated radical solidarity and according to the documentary, Camus meditated in her room before accepting the Nobel prize. Her philosophy also led her to adopting a quasi-anarchical political ideology. Nonetheless, she was compelled by a deep and abiding spirituality. She famously wrote in Waiting for God that "today it is not nearly enough merely to be a saint; but we must have the saintliness demanded by the present moment, a new saintliness".
Her reflections on the value of focussed attention is most worthwhile and the documentary begins with a quote of hers on the theme of attention which is a subject she gave a lot of philosophical reflection to. "Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity".
She analyzed oppression and the structure of political oppression. In an essay entitled “The Analysis of Oppression” she asks “why the oppressed in revolt have never succeeded in founding a non-oppressive society, whether on the basis of the productive forces of their time, or even at the cost of an economic regression which could hardly increase their misery; and lastly he, (Marx) leaves completely in the dark the general principles of the mechanism by which a given form of oppression is replaced by another” (Weil, An Anthology, 1986, p. 130).
That concept of lateral oppression is one of the most difficult ones to understand. She advocated radical solidarity and according to the documentary, Camus meditated in her room before accepting the Nobel prize. Her philosophy also led her to adopting a quasi-anarchical political ideology. Nonetheless, she was compelled by a deep and abiding spirituality. She famously wrote in Waiting for God that "today it is not nearly enough merely to be a saint; but we must have the saintliness demanded by the present moment, a new saintliness".
Her reflections on the value of focussed attention is most worthwhile and the documentary begins with a quote of hers on the theme of attention which is a subject she gave a lot of philosophical reflection to. "Attention is the rarest and purest form of generosity".
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