{"id":3936,"date":"2012-03-28T22:08:43","date_gmt":"2012-03-29T02:08:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gornahoor.net\/?p=3936"},"modified":"2021-04-03T09:30:28","modified_gmt":"2021-04-03T13:30:28","slug":"thought-word-symbol","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gornahoor.net\/?p=3936","title":{"rendered":"Thought, Word, Symbol"},"content":{"rendered":"

\nThe reform of the modern mentality, with all that it implies—namely the restoration of true intellectuality and of traditional doctrine, which for us are inseparable from one another—is certainly a considerable task; but is that a reason for not undertaking it? It seems to us, on the contrary, that such a task constitutes one of the loftiest and most important goals that can be proposed for the activity of a society such as the Society for the Intellectual Propagation of the Sacred Heart, so much the more in that all efforts in this direction will necessarily be oriented toward the Heart of the Incarnate Word, the spiritual Sun and Center of the World, ‘in which are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and science’; not of that vain, profane science which is all that is known to most of our contemporaries, but the true sacred science which, for those who study it in the proper way, open unsuspected horizons that are truly unlimited.
\n~Rene Guenon<\/strong>, Symbols of Sacred Science<\/cite>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\nIt is a fundamental proposition of Catholic philosophy that a mental concept is an expression of the reality of the object considered, and that linguistic constructions are an expression of the reality of the mental concepts. There is thus a chain of certainty connecting being, thought, and language.
\n~Romano Amerio<\/strong>, Iota Unum<\/cite>\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We prefer to reformulate Professor Amerio’s insight in metaphysical terms as the chain of certainty connecting the idea, the thought, and the word. “Intuition<\/strong>” is a fundamental concept in metaphysics and it refers to a direct, immediate grasp of reality. So when I see a banana tree out my window, I have a direct sensory intuition of it. But you have a mediated knowledge of it, since you know of its existence on my say so.<\/p>\n

A thought, then, is more like seeing than an activity, as something I do. Hence, a thought is an intellectual intuition of an idea, that is, a direct, unmediated of it. The word is its expression. This comprises the chain of certainty.<\/p>\n

This is totally opposed to any modern conception that regards language as a natural phenomenon, an advanced form of grunts and groans, and no more than a game with just a chance association with reality. You may repeat this at your university cocktail party to be considered wise and knowledgeable. Keep the rest of this to yourself, or to those who know the secret handshake.<\/p>\n

The Symbol<\/h2>\n

<\/p>\n

Pure intelligences, such as angels, or men who have achieved such states, don’t need more than the intellectual intuition to grasp ideas. However, for man such as he is, symbols are required to lead him to such an understanding. Guenon writes:<\/p>\n

\nSymbolism seems to us to be particularly well adapted to the exigencies of human nature, which is not a purely intellectual nature but requires a sensory basis form which to raise itself to higher spheres. We must take the human make-up as it is one and multiple in its real complexity … For pure intelligence, no outward form or expression is needed in order to understand truth, nor even to communicate to other pure intelligences what it has understood, insofar as this is communicable; but this is not how it is for man.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Guenon relates the symbol to the word in this way.<\/p>\n

Fundamentally, every expression, every formulation whatever it may be, is a symbol of the thought that it expresses outwardly, and in this sense language itself is nothing but a symbolism. There should be no opposition, therefore, between the use of words and the use of figurative symbols; rather, these two modes of expression are complementary.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The word and the symbol both express a thought, though in different ways. The word<\/strong> is analytic and discursive, like the mind it expresses. The symbol<\/strong>, on the other hand, us synthetic and intuitive. This characteristic of the symbol makes it more suitable as a support for intellectual intuition. Language is limited, symbolism is not. That is why the highest truths need to be expressed in poetry<\/strong>, as we saw in the case of Dante. Guenon writes:<\/p>\n

The highest truths, not communicable or transmissible in any other way, can be communicated up to a certain point when they are, so to speak, incorporated in symbols which will no doubt conceal them for many but which will manifest them in all their brilliance to those with eyes to see<\/em>.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There are two fundamental mistakes that are frequently made in regards to symbolism:<\/p>\n