Stanislas Barszczak ; Le prêtre et le rabbin

1. A la recherche de la sujet

Il ya trois ans j’ai déjà édité le livre sous le titre : « Autrui et lui. Philosophie de Paul Ricoeur et d’Emmanuel Levinas », Czestochowa, 2008. J’ai présenter là les considerations des choisis penseurs sur sujet, personne, communauté. Certains pensées cependant imposent constamment de nouveaux gros plans, cela m’est venu dans la tête, basés sur tout le monde autour de nous. Dès le début de cet essai, je tiens à souligner que nous pouvons être ici en tant que meilleurs tireurs de la prochaines générations des sociétés humaines. Et si, d’une part le sens de la personne que nous voyons dans la validité de sa exemple, mais de l’autre coté la personne morale est soumise au cours, à ceux de la période de l’affaire devant les tribunaux, est soumise ses idées à ceux du «pouvoir» qui vient de la valeur de l’irréel. Il y a une certaine dépendence de la personne de la nécessité qui existe dans le domaine irréel de valeurs, même pour un clin d’œil. La valeur est indépendante de l’objet de la cognition. Le philosophe nous a offert une mémoir transcendant devant le sujet connaîssant. Nous comptons sur la mémoire pour éjecter le sujet et l’appréciait. Parce que la réalité elle-même n’est pas suffisant H. Rickert s’est fondé sur les soi-disants, sur « la connaissance objective ». Ainsi, la pensée vraie ou cognitive est en tout cas quelque chose de plus que la pensée pure. C’est là que réside l’essence de la connaissance dans l’acte de délivrance de la cour: une confirmation ou une infirmation. Une telle approche ne permet pas de compter sur la connaissance du degré transcendantale. Car l’acte est un acte de connaissance d’évaluation, qui comprend ce qui n’existe pas, le philosophe dit sur les valeurs comme des propriétés, comme une combinaison ceux avec la réalité. Ainsi l’homme « est » par exemple , mais les valeurs font valoir ses droits. Le sujet sans valeur demeure comme incomplète. Seule la présence de la valeur en sujet organisme à produire un sentiment de certitude. En l’espace de la pensée, dit-il Rickert, doit apparaître « un endroit vide ».” Nous voulons remplir ce lieu par endroits, avec la mémoire de ce lieu, qui je note ici comme un appel de mobilisation de non se subordonner de la personne, à cause de supprimer d’elle des humeurs changeantes de son temps, mais de construire tout le monde, de prêcher d’exemple pour tous, d’être les témoignages de la vie. Nous avons un parfait temps. Mais aujourd’hui, nous sont encore totalement ruine de la vie. S. King va à diagnostiquer: «Une fois, pas si longtemps, un monstre alla à la ville», «J’ai un but l’œil, je m’empare de l’esprit, Je tue avec le cœur »,« Donnez-moi un choix, et je déplacerai »Midsummer Night’s Dream» sur «Hamlet» dans chaque période de temps. “Au XXe siècle, Emmanuel Levinas, qui possédait maître magnifiques, Mr Chuchani, découvrant devant lui l’importance du Talmud et le rôle de la méthode d’approximation à lui, il écrit:« Bonheur de venir de ce monde, de descendre comme fils de ces hommes, en ligne droite, sans recourir à la médiation de quiconque ! Qu’il fait bon d’être Juif!” Bien qu’il a dit sur lui-même qui n’est pas un « penseur juif », mais«, mais un « penseur tout court ». Donc, nous avons la lumière pure de Dieu de l’Ancien Testament ici. Mais nous vivons à une époque de plus en plus avec la lumière de Jésus, qui n’est plus l’amour pur, mais l’amour de Jésus. Saint Padre Pio pourrait tout à fait viser à la lumière de Jésus dans la manière victorieuse. Ne pas courir ici et là, mais avec un cravate, il faut se lier avec Jésus, pour rendez-vous avec Jésus-Christ le Sauveur. Tout le monde avait une perle dans sa vie. Mais il y a beaucoup des hommes qui ramènent au chemin cahotan et nous pouvons s’arrêter à mi-chemin. Il est nécessaire de coopérer avec Jésus. Nous sommes les mêmes, mais la prière change tout, nous devons apprécier une offre, le dévouement, mais plus encore le sacrifice, dit le Padre Pio. Ecoute, il ya dans le monde une diversité de trop abondante, ainsi nous devont creer de l’infrastructure. Une période de trois jours de Jésus de douze ans dans le Temple de Jérusalem est très important. Stade de l’ignorance devant lui, et Jésus qui grandit. Et au bout de trois jours, nous avons un stade de maturité. Jésus s’efforce docilement à Nazareth, et puis retourne à Jérusalem. Et nous devons choisir la voie (pas une seul). Voici, le Seigneur qui me crois, va avec moi, pardonnera. Ne prenez pas de l’esclavage pharaonique. Pharaon a été perturbé dans la naissance du peuple d’Israël. Et nous avons une discussion difficile, la pensée, il se réalise dans le vide, dans la solitude. R. Rorty nous a fait valoir, bien que même si nous sommes toiles d’araignées, de croyances et de désirs, nous ne se dirigissions jamais à la vérité, mais à seul le Christe. Dans le monde de diverses déclarations, une question sur la nature de l’identité humaine a aussi le sens du complexe. Dans cet article, je voudrais très brièvement présenter la thèse principale du livre d’Emmanuel Levinas sur un autrui, qui vient à l’idée ici, parce qu’il y a il est premier de nous, qui est plus mort que vif maintenant. Nous voulons prendre lieu nouvel pour un autre type de “endroit vide” de Rickert. En même temps nous pouvons produir ici quelque chose de nouveau. Ainsi nous avons « le sujet ou soi » de la position du prochain – qui sait, qui oblige à, met, tient le temps, et il voudrais croire que l’œuvre de sa vie puisse enfin à bon definitivement commencer. Alors que pour Heidegger, l’éthique n’est qu’un mode d’être parmi d’autres et même relativement accessoire, Levinas donne à l’éthique le statut de philosophie première. Soyons plus précis. Par éthique, Levinas entend non pas une recherche de perfectionnement ou d’accomplissement personnel, mais la responsabilité à l’égard d’autrui à laquelle le moi ne peut échapper et qui est le secret de son unicité : personne ne peut me remplacer dans l’exercice de cette responsabilité.

2. Tenir compagnie a voisin

D’ou vient un homme dont ici nous avons parlé le voisin? En examinant cette question, il est impossible de ne parler de notre vie. En bref, il ya dans notre pèlerinage vers la mort phase de maturité, qui peut être appelée sagesse. Je suis un homme différent, pas un gentil ou définitivement hantant les murs du monastère, mais pleinement moi-même. Mais d’abord, question cardinale, en quel termes peut-on parler d’autrui ? Levinas répond inlassablement à cette question et les pages qu’il lui consacre figurent parmi les plus belles de la littérature philosophique. Voici, succinctement indiqués, quelques repères. Il convient d’abord d’employer des tournures négatives, d’exclure toute dénaturation.Je voudrais citer ici un homme qui soit un le plus proches des commentaires, le membre de famille de Levinas. Autrui n’est pas élément d’une espèce, fut-elle l’espèce humaine, n’est pas un concept, n’est pas une substance, ne se définit pas par des propriétés, par son caractère, par sa situation sociale, par sa place dans l’histoire. Autrui n’est pas objet de connaissance, de représentation, de “compréhension” ; on ne le “saisit” pas. Autrui n’est pas l’objet d’une description, il n’y a pas de “phénoménologie” d’autrui. Il est même impropre d’employer à son égard les termes d’apparition ou de dévoilement, termes qui appartiennent encore au registre de la connaissance et du savoir. Que dire alors positivement de cet autrui, évadé de tout ce que nous connaissons, de l’être, comme disent les philosophes, que dire de cet autrui qui vient d’un ailleurs n’appartenant à aucun monde ? Ayant épuré notre langage, que reste-t-il ? Autrui est “visage”, non pas dans le sens d’un visage “vu”, d’un visage pouvant se fixer sur une photographie ou dans la mémoire, mais expression, discours. “Visage” qui est d’emblée et tout à la fois parole, demande, supplication, commandement, enseignement. Et dès lors, le “visage” oblige ; il exige réponse, aide, sollicitude, compassion. Et nous arrivons ainsi au terme peut-être le plus employé par Levinas : la responsabilité à l’égard d’autrui. Chez Levinas, à la différence de Buber, la relation à autrui est fondamentalement dissymétrique. Ce n’est pas la rencontre entre deux personnes placées sur un pied d’égalité, une amitié à base de réciprocité. L’obligation du moi à l’égard d’autrui n’est pas le résultat d’un contrat et n’est pas librement choisie. La survenue d’autrui arrache le moi à sa condition, à son ipséité, et le place en situation d’infiniment obligé. Les figures de cette dissymétrie sont nombreuses et prêtent souvent un sens aux situations de la vie la plus quotidienne. Le “après vous” de la politesse, la relation au féminin, la filialité, la préoccupation pour le besoin du démuni ou de l’étranger en sont les exemples les plus simples. Parfois la pensée de Levinas s’exacerbe au point de pénétrer dans une région qu’il sait être utopique. Ainsi en est-il du souci pour la mort de l’autre au prix du sacrifice de sa propre vie, de la responsabilité pour la culpabilité d’autrui même s’il me persécute (formule extrême que Levinas nuance toujours immédiatement). Cette mutation du souci pour soi en souci pour autrui, de la subjectivité qui ne se définit plus comme persévérance dans l’être, accaparement et domination, mais au contraire comme sujétion, ce “retournement ontologique”, est ce qui, pour Levinas, constitue la véritable humanité de l’homme.

3. Le tiers et tous les autres

Ce serait toutefois une erreur de croire que tout se réduit à la relation à autrui. Car voici que se présentent le tiers et tous les autres ! Si je donne tout au premier venu, je lèse les suivants. Dès lors, il me faut réfléchir, calculer, comparer, “juger”. La théorie, le savoir, les institutions, le droit, congédiés dans un premier temps, retrouvent leur place. Levinas n’est pas un anarchiste. L’Etat démocratique a son rôle, garantir la justice. Rien n’est plus étranger à Levinas qu’une certaine écologie, lorsqu’elle magnifie la nature, oubliant la société des hommes. Jamais le moindre dénigrement de la science ou de la technique. Les problèmes que peut poser la technique doivent être résolus par un surplus de technique, disait-il parfois. Ainsi l’éthique doit se prolonger par la science, par l’institution, par la politique ; “l’Europe, c’est la Bible et les Grecs”. On notera l’originalité de la perspective. Classiquement, la vocation de l’Etat s’analyse seulement comme nécessité d’un ordre réfrénant les appétits car, à l’état de nature, l’homme est un loup pour l’homme. Levinas donne à la loi une autre dimension : fixer une limite à la générosité envers autrui, générosité devenue excessive non pas par l’oubli de soi, mais par celui du tiers. Mais il y a encore un troisième mouvement. L’institution dont nous avons vu la nécessité, peut à son tour se pervertir, oublier sa justification et écraser l’humain dans une totalité impersonnelle. Il faut rester vigilant pour empêcher que les droits de l’homme, ou plus précisément de l’autre homme dans son unicité, ne se trouvent bafoués par l’abstraction d’un système. Philosophie première, l’éthique est aussi philosophie dernière : l’institution doit être critiquée, sans cesse améliorée ; en dernier ressort, la morale doit contrôler l’Etat. Comme dans le droit juif, où le juge ignore les “visages” pendant l’audience mais les retrouve à son issue. Levinas ne donne pas seulement à l’éthique le statut de philosophie première (et dernière). Le primat donné à l’éthique dans la pensée de Levinas est tel qu’il en chasse toute considération théologique au sens prégnant du terme. La mystique, le sacré, la possession de l’homme par Dieu, le “numineux” (terme souvent employé bien qu’il ne figure pas dans la plupart des dictionnaires), ne sont que chimères invariablement dénoncées, parfois même rattachées à l’idolâtrie. Plus encore : on cherchera en vain dans toute l’œuvre de Levinas la moindre considération de théologie dogmatique. Levinas est-il croyant ou athée ? Absurde question à laquelle il sait répondre par une moquerie cinglante : « Nous sommes loin des prétendus spinozistes à qui l’alternative croyant-non-croyant est aussi simple que pharmacien-non-pharmacien. »

Stanisław Barszczak; Kapłan i Rabin, 2

3. Przedstawienia trzecich i wszystkich innych

To w każdym razie byłby błąd wierzyć, że wszystko redukuje się do relacji z bliźnim. Co pozostaje, to wyobrażają sobie właśnie
trzeci i wszyscy inni. Gdy daję się cały pierwszemu przybyłemu (premier venu) krzywdzę następnych. Stąd trzeba mi zreflektować, skalkulować, porównywać, „sądzić”. Teoria, wiedza, instytucje, prawo, wydalenia (odprawy) w pierwszym czasie, odnajdują (w końcu) ich prawe miejsce. Levinas nie jest anarchistą. Państwo demokratyczne ma swoją rolę, gwarantować sprawiedliwość. Nic nie jest bardziej obce Levinasowi, jak pewna ekologia (z cementowni w Polsce przejmuje się wysuszony cement, przewozi się do Niemczech już bez trujących składników- o tym niedawno czytałem), która podnosi naturę, zapominając o ludzkiej społeczności. Nigdy najmniejsze oczernianie nauki czy techniki. Problemy, które może stawiać technika powinny być rozumiane z racji na nadwyżkę techniki- mówił czasem Levinas. W ten sposób etyka musi się prolongować przez naukę, poprzez instytucję, politykę. „Europa to jest Biblia i Grecy”. Zauważamy oryginalność perspektywy. Klasycznie powołanie Państwa analizuje się tylko jako konieczność porządku powściągająca apetyty ponieważ, w stanie natury, człowiek jest wilkiem dla człowieka. Levinas daje prawu(la lois) inny wymiar: ustalić, wyznaczyć (zdecydować się na) granicę dla szlachetności w obliczu bliźniego, szlachetność staje się nadmierna (przesadna) nie przez zapomnienie Jaźni, lecz przez zapomnienie trzeciego. Istnieje zatem jeszcze trzecie poruszenie. Instytucja której ujrzeliśmy konieczność, może z kolei zdeprawować się, zapomnieć swojego usprawiedliwienia (swoje udowodnienie) i zniszczyć to, co ludzkie w bezosobowej totalności. Trzeba pozostać czujnymi jeśli chodzi o zagłuszanie, w kwestii praw człowieka, dokładniej praw innego człowieka w jego jedyności, żeby one nie znalazły się wyszydzone(wykpiwane) przez abstrakcje systemu. Filozofia pierwsza, etyka jest także filozofią ostatnią: instytucja musi być krytykowana, bez przerwy ulepszana; ostatecznie moralność musi kontrolować Państwo. Jak w prawie żydowskim, w którym sędzia ignoruje „twarze” podczas audiencji, ale na nowo odnajduje przez swój sposób wyjścia. (Dzisiaj niestety lekceważy się życie tego tysiąclecia- możemy pokazywać to palcami.) Levinas nie daje tylko etyce statutu filozofii pierwszej (i ostatniej). Prymat dany etyce w myśli Levinasa przechodzi w tropienie wszelkiego rozważania teologicznego w bardzo ścisłym znaczeniu podobnego określenia. Mistyka, sacrum, posiadanie człowieka przez Boga (i „numineux”) są tylko donosami –chimerami, czasem, nawet połączone z idolatrią. Bez dogmatyki tutaj. Zatem, czy Levinas jest wierzącym czy eteistą? Na to absurdalne jego zdaniem pytanie myśliciel odpowiada: „Jesteśmy daleko od rzekomych Spinozystów, dla których alternatywa wierzący- niewierzący jest tak samo prosta jak aptekarz-nie aptekarz.”

4. Bóg poza poznaniem i bytem

Levinas chce wywinąć się od tego problemu. Dla pojęcia Boga unika kategorii egzystencji, Bóg wymyka się egzystencji i nie jest przedmiotem poznania. Bóg nie jest bytem, ale niejako był kwalifikowany jako najwyższy(supreme). Nieskończony Bóg, nie można nic powiedzieć, nie można nawet określić go jako „egzystencja konieczna”. Levinas nie jest myślicielem „religijnym”. Myśliciel zarazem napisał:” Relacja moralna na nowo łączy się jednocześnie w świadomości Jaźni(soi) i świadomości Boga. Etyka nie jest korolalium(dodatkiem) wizji Boga. Ona jest samą wizją…W Arce Świętej, w której Mojżesz słyszy głos Boga, są tylko tablice Prawa…’Bóg jest miłosierny’ znaczy ‘Bądźcie miłosierni jak on’…Poznać Boga, to jest to, co należy uczynić…Pobożny, to znaczy sprawiedliwy.” Myśliciel XX wieku Rav Kook napisał: To nas nie zasmuca, gdy taka czy inna struktura sprawiedliwości socjalnej określa się bez najmniejszej wzmianki Boga, ponieważ wiemy, że jedyne wymaganie sprawiedliwości…konstytuuje się przez wylanie boskie najbardziej świetliste (l’epanchement). Tę koncepcję Levinas zaaplikował Państwu Izrael. Egzystencja i powołanie Izraela mają sens, który przekracza politykę. W tym punkcie, dla nas żywym i nie wymagającym kompetencji filozoficznej szczególnej, oddajemy głos myślicielowi:” Znaczenie Państwa Izrael nie polega na realizacji antycznej obietnicy, ani na debiucie, który znaczyłby erę bezpieczeństwa materialnego…ale na okazji w końcu ofiarowanej wypełnienia prawa (la loi) socjalnego judaizmu. Lud żydowski był chciwy, łakomy(avide) swojej ziemi i swego Państwa, nie z powodu niepodległości bez treści(opanowania), na którą czekał, lecz z powodu dzieła swego życia, które mogło w końcu się rozpocząć, zacząć na nowo. Po dziś dzień spełniał on przykazania; następnie tworzył sztukę i literaturę, lecz wszystkie te dzieła, w których się wyrażał pozostają jedynie jako szkice zbyt długiej młodości. W końcu przychodzi godzina na „danie dnia”(zob. jadłospis). To było zarazem straszne(horrible) być jedynym ludem, który definiuje się przez doktrynę sprawiedliwości i jedynym, który nie może jej zastosować. Rozdarcie, ból moralny i sens Diaspory. Podporządkowanie Państwa tym obietnicom artykułuje znaczenie religijne (niejako pismo rehabilitacyjne) rezurekcji Izraela jak, w czasach dawnych, praktyka sprawiedliwości usprawiedliwiała teraźniejszość na ziemi.” Właśnie przez to zdarzenie polityczne zostało wypełnione, przelane. Levinas akcentuje tutaj opozycję między żydami, którzy szukają Państwa dla sprawiedliwości i tymi, którzy szukają sprawiedliwości dla utrzymania (subsistance)Państwa. Dla Levinasa religia to jest sprawiedliwość jako racja bytu Państwa.

5. Obowiązek, subiektywność, odpowiedź, braterstwo

Levinas nie celuje w uzgadnianiu filozofii i judaizmu. Jego przejście filozoficzne kieruje się sobie właściwą logiką, inwokacja wersetu Biblii jest ilustracją, lecz nigdy sprawdzaniem, dowodem choćby nadobfitości „ogrodu Pisma”, z jego brzoskwiniami, ananasami i daktylami. Dzieło Levinasa zostało przetłumaczone na liczne języki, stało się przedmiotem licznych prac. Powtórzmy to, Żyd przekracza historię obficie korzystając z Biblii opartej na mocy i Transcendencji. Izrael jest chciwy szczęścia, żeby dzieło jego życia mogło się zacząć. Państwo Izrael, to jest właśnie taka sprawiedliwość, tak ma być. Istnieje Państwo tylko dla takiej sprawiedliwości. Wówczas następuje poddanie się obywateli. Obywatelskość Państwa zostaje oparta na subiektywności, odpowiedzi, braterstwie. Chcąc przekroczyć obowiązek w takim Państwie trzeba obudzić generację kolejną ludzi, by ratować najdłużej swobodę jednostki. „Nie burzcie ołtarzy przeszłości, choć sami macie doskonalsze wznieść.” Ja już jestem związany wiarą i osobistym poświęceniem. Módlmy się. Ponieważ my jesteśmy tacy sami, a modlitwa zmienia wszystko. Żeby w końcu dzieło życia ludzi mogło się zacząć. Niestety nie dane jest to kolejnej generacji. Choć stajemy się sobą, to nie dane jest powstać w człowieku zarazem osobie i sobie. W najpiękniejsze dni początku maja tego roku Episkopat Polski postawił na kardynała Claudio Hummes, Prefekta Kongregacji odpowiedzialnej za Duchowieństwo. Kapłani z całej Polski mają stawić się u stóp Matki Bożej, Jasnogórskiej Królowej Ojczyzny, na modlitwie. Oby ta modlitwa przyniosła spodziewane owoce. Osobiście jestem za Chrystusem, Najwyższym Pasterzem, za jedną owczarnią wszystkich ludzi dobrej woli, a nie za Hummesem choćby Kardynałem i Brazylijczykiem. Ale się wybieram z procesją do Czarnej, pięknej Pani. A teraz na niedzielę Białą dla wszystkich Czytelników naszego czasopisma ponawiam życzenia opieki Najświętszej Matki Częstochowskiej, większego błogosławieństwa Bożego, obecności pośród was Jezusa-słowa życia i niesłabnącego zdrowia.

Stanisław Barszczak; Kapłan i Rabin, 1

1. W poszukiwaniu tematu

Kiedyś przed trzema laty zredagowałem książkę pt. Bliźni i on. Filozofia podmiotu Paula Ricoeura i Emanuela Levinasa, Częstochowa 2008. Zawarłem tam rozważania wybranych myślicieli w temacie podmiot, osoba, społeczność. Pewne myśli jednak –jak nieustannie twierdzę- wymagają zbliżeń nowych, w oparciu o otaczający nas świat ludzi. Zaraz na wstępie tego szkicu pragnę podkreślić, że opowiadamy się tutaj za jedynym szczytem ujęcia wartości przez kolejną generację ludzkich społeczeństw. I tak z jednej strony sens osoby widzimy w obowiązywalności jej przykładu, ale z drugiej strony osoba-podmiot uzależniony bywa w okresie wydawania sądów od „mocy” płynącej z obowiązywania nierzeczywistych wartości. Pojawia się jakaś zależność podmiotu od konieczności, która obowiązuje w nierzeczywistej sferze wartości, choćby przez mgnienie oka. Wartość stanowi niezależny od podmiotu przedmiot poznania. Filozof zaproponował pamięć transcendentną wobec poznającego podmiotu. Mamy oprzeć się na pamięci, by wysunąć podmiot i go dowartościować. Ponieważ sama rzeczywistość nie wystarcza H. Rickert oparł się na tzw. obiektywnym poznaniu. Zatem prawdziwe albo poznające myślenie jest w każdym wypadku czymś więcej niż czyste myślenie. Tutaj istota poznania kryje się w akcie wydawania sądu: potwierdzenie bądź zaprzeczenie. Takie ujęcie uniemożliwia oparcie poznania na transcendentnej mierze. Skoro akt poznania jest aktem wartościującym, czyli obejmuje to, co nie istnieje, filozof mówi o wartościach czyli o dobrach, jako powiązaniu wartości z rzeczywistością. Oto człowiek jest, wartości obowiązują. Podmiot bez wartości pozostanie jakby niepełny. Dopiero obecność wartości w podmiocie wywołuje poczucie pewności. W przestrzeni myślenia- jak pisze Rickert- musi pojawić się jakieś „niewypełnione miejsce.” Chcemy zapełnić to miejsce pamięcią, którą zauważam jako niepodawanie się osoby zmiennym nastrojom swego czasu, za to budowanie wszystkich przykładem świadectwa życia.

Mamy doskonały czas. Lecz dzisiaj stajemy się bez reszty jeszcze ruiną życia. S. King stawia diagnozę :”Pewnego razu, nie tak dawno, potwór przybył do miasteczka;” „Celuję okiem, strzelam umysłem, zabijam sercem;” „Daj mi cudny wybór, a przeniosę ‘Sen nocy letniej’ nad ‘Hamleta’ w każdym czasie.” W dwudziestym wieku Emmanuel Levinas, który posiadł olśniewającego mistrza, Pana Chuchanego, odsłaniającego przed nim wagę Talmudu i rolę metody zbliżenia doń, napisał: „Szczęście zyskania tego świata, zstąpienia jako syn tych ludzi, w prawej linii, bez nowego rwetesu, biegnięcia w oparciu o jakiekolwiek zapośredniczenie! Jak dobrze być Żydem!” Choć o sobie mówił, że nie jest „myślicielem żydowskim”, lecz właśnie „myślicielem po prostu.” Mamy zatem światło czyste Boga Starego Testamentu. Ale żyjemy w czasie więcej, bardziej światła Jezusa; już nie czystej miłości, ale miłości Jezusa. Święty Ojciec Pio pokazał totalnie, zwycięsko drogę światła Jezusa. Nie należy biegać tu i ówdzie, lecz związać się z Jezusem, zamówić wizytę u Jezusa Chrystusa Zbawcy. Każdy miał w życiu perłę. Ale tylu sprowadza na złą drogę; dzisiaj trzeba współpracować Z Jezusem. Jesteśmy tacy sami, właśnie modlitwa nas zmienia, trzeba cenić ofiarę, ale jeszcze bardziej poświęcenie, powiedział Ojciec Pio. Słuchajcie, istnieje różnorodność nazbyt obfita, tworzymy zatem infrastruktury. Okres trzech dni dwunastoletniego Jezusa w Świątyni w Jerozolimie jest bardzo ważny. Poprzedzał go etap niewiedzy, rośnięcia Jezusa. A po trzech dniach mamy etap dojrzały. Jezus zdąża posłusznie do Nazaret, następnie powraca do Jerozolimy. I my musimy wybrać drogą (nie jedną). Oto Pan mi wierzy, idzie ze mną, przebaczy. Nie należy przejąć zniewolenia faraońskiego. Faraon przeszkadzał w narodzeniu się ludu Izrael. I my mamy też trudne warunki dyskusji, myślenie realizuje się w pustce, samotności. R. Rorty twierdził, że choć jesteśmy pajęczyną przekonań i pragnień, nie odwołujemy się do prawdy, ale do samego Chrystusa. W świecie różnych deklaracji także pytanie o naturę tożsamości ludzkiej ma sens zawiły. W artykule tym chciałbym w wielkim skrócie, zaprezentować główną tezę książek Emmanuela Levinasa o naszym umieraniu za innego, niejako stanąć blisko Rickertowskiego „niewypełnionego miejsca”, równocześnie ponieważ chodzi o wysoką stawkę, przedstawić coś nowego, a więc „Podmiot albo Ja” ze stanowiska bliźniego- który poznaje, który przymusza się, poddaje, trzyma czas, wierzy i chciałby, żeby dzieło jego życia mogło się w końcu mądrze zacząć. Dla Heideggera etyka jest tylko sposobem bycia pośród innych i nawet relatywnie wymiennym, dodatkowym. Levinas daje etyce statut filozofii pierwszej, przez etykę rozumie nie tyle poszukiwanie udoskonalenia czy spełnienia osobowego, skończenia, lecz odpowiedzialność w obliczu bliźniego (autrui), której Ja nie może uniknąć i która jest sekretem jego jedności(unicite): nikt nie może zastąpić mnie w uprawianiu tej odpowiedzialności.

2. Zniewolenie bliźnim

Skąd przychodzi człowiek, którego tutaj nazwiemy bliźnim? Rozważając to zagadnienie nie sposób wspomnieć nasze życie. Krótko mówiąc pojawia się w naszej pielgrzymce ku śmierci etap dojrzały, który można nazwać mądrością. Jestem innym człowiekiem, nie zamyślonym czy nawiedzającym na stałe mury klasztorne, ale w pełni sobą. W jakich pojęciach można mówić bliźni? Emmanuel Levinas odpowiada niestrudzenie, niezmordowanie na to pytanie i strony, które mu przeznacza figurują pośród najpiękniejszych jeśli chodzi o literaturę filozoficzną. Oto zwięźle przedstawione kilka punktów obserwacyjnych. Przede wszystkim mówiąc figurami negatywnymi, bliźni(w języku francuskim jest zaimkiem), on nie jest elementem rodzajowym czy gatunku, niejako był gatunkiem ludzkim, nie jest pojęciem, nie jest substancją, nie definiuje się przez własności, przez swój charakter, przez sytuację socjalną, przez swoje miejsce w historii. Bliźni nie jest przedmiotem poznania, reprezentacji, „pojętności”; nie „ogarnia się”(zajmuje) go. Bliźni nie jest przedmiotem opisu, nie ma „fenomenologii” bliźniego. Niewłaściwe jest nawet użycie w tym względzie pojęć zjawienia się czy odsłonięcia (wyjaśnienia), terminów które przynależą jeszcze do rejestru poznania i wiedzy. Co można powiedzieć zatem pozytywnie o tym bliźnim, nie dającemu się ująć przez to wszystko, co poznajemy, przez byt jak mówią filozofowie, co powiedzieć o tym bliźnim, który przychodzi zresztą nie przynależąc do żadnego świata? Oczyszczając nasz język, co pozostaje? Bliźni jest „twarzą”, nie w sensie twarzy „widzianej”, twarzy mogącej utrwalić się na fotografii albo w pamięci, ale wyrażeniem, przedmową-rozmową. „Twarz”, która jest za jednym zamachem i jednocześnie słowem, żądaniem, suplikacją, rozkazem-nakazem, uczeniem-radą. Stąd „twarz” obliguje; domaga się odpowiedzi, pomocy, troski (pieczołowitości, starania), litości (współczucia). Przybywamy w ten sposób do pojęcia być może najbardziej używanego przez Levinasa: odpowiedzialność w obliczu bliźniego. Co trzeba powiedzieć u Levinasa, w odróżnieniu z M. Buberem, relacja z bliźnim jest fundamentalnie dyssymetryczna. To nie jest spotkanie między dwoma osobami umiejscowione na stopniu równości, przyjaźń na bazie wzajemności. Zobligowanie ja w obliczu bliźniego nie jest rezultatem kontraktu i nie jest dowolnie wybrane. Wydarzenie (przybycie) bliźniego odciąga Ja od jego kondycji, pozbawia uwarunkowania jego trwaniem(ipseite) i umiejscawia w sytuacji nieskończenie obligującej, ręczącej za kogoś. Figury tej dyssymetrii są liczne i ofiarowują często sens sytuacjom życia najbardziej codziennego. Levinasowskie „po was” grzeczności, relacja do kobiecości, synowskość, uprzedzające zajęcie z racji na zapotrzebowanie ogołocenia (pozbawienia się zapasów) czy obcego (nie znającego czegoś, nie mieszającego się), są przykładami najbardziej prostymi. Czasem myśl Levinasa wzmaga się (zaognia) w momencie penetrowania w region o którym wie, że jest utopijny. W ten sposób także w kwestii zatroskania za śmierć innego, za cenę poświęcenia swojego własnego życia, odpowiedzialności za zawinienie (cudowność-culpabilite) bliźniego, nawet gdy on mnie prześladuje (ekstremalna formuła, którą posługuje się Levinas zawsze bezpośrednio). Ta mutacja troski, kłopotania się dla Jaźni, w trosce za bliźniego, subiektywności, która nie definiuje się już jako wytrwałość w bycie, zagarnianie dla siebie (skupowanie) i dominacja, lecz przeciwnie jako poddaństwo, przymus, podległość (sujetion), ten „ zwrot ontologiczny” dla Levinasa konstytuuje prawdziwą humanitarność człowieka.

Stanislaw Barszczak, The archeology of happyness
The east I know. As I said for the several months I’ve been in India. A long train journey on a late December evening was a new experience. I suppose that my fellow traveller and I could consider ourselves lucky to have a compartment to ourselves, even though the lights went out entirely in the night and were too dim anyway for us to read the book without straining our eyes, and though there was no restaurant car to give at least a change of scene. It was when we were trying simultaneously to chew the same kind of dry bun bought at the same station buffet that my companion and I came together. Before that we had sat at opposite ends of the carriage, on the bet above or beneath, both muffled to the chin in plaids, as I threw the remains of my cake close to wall our eyes met, and
he slept down. By the time we were half-way to Ujjain we had found an enormous range of subjects for discussion; starting with buns and the weather, we had gone on to politics, the government, foreign affairs, the atom bomb, and, by an inevitable progression, God. However, we had not become either shrill or acid. My companion, who now sat opposite me, leaning a little forward, so that our knees nearly touched, gave such an impression of serenity of a spirit that I never would have remembered in my life of today. In the Ujjain’s street called in hindi, near the merchants of books and lanterns, of embroideries and bronzes, miniature gardens are sold: and, as a studious idler amid this fantastic display, I mentally compare these little fragments of the world. The artists have subtly shown themselves masters of the exquisite laws by which the lines of a landscape are composed, like those of a physiognomy. Instead of drawing nature they reproduce it, constructing their counterfeits from the very elements of the original, which they borrow, as a rule is illustrated by an example. These images are usually exact and perfect replicas. All sorts and kinds of pines, for instance, are offered me to choose from; and their position in the jar, with their height as a scale, proportionately shows the dimensions of their original territory. Here is a rice-field in Springtime; in the distance is a hill fringed with trees (they are made of moss). Here is the river Shipra, with its capes! By the artifice of stones we went to the holy river down to make prayer for inhabitants of that city.
For ten years I wrote essay titled ‘Canyon of a life’, I suppose, that as the other essays titled for exemple ‘The evenings of an eternal will’, ‘The concert of Jankiel’, ‘The constitution of a human subjectivity’ had been perished on the parsonages of the friends-priests. In my dreams this was not my first visit to the Grand Canyon. . . Suddenly I plunged into recollection, and arrived at that first great visit there in my writings about. I had planned ‘a stop-over’ of a few hours, I began noting. Our coach leaves the main west-bound train at Williams, Arizona, wanders up the sixty-four
miles to the station at the Southern Rim of the Canyon, doing this during the night when you are fast asleep, and when you wake in the morning–there you are. That is the theory of this ‘side trip.’ It did not work well for me in practice. The night that had seemed
very convenient and comfortable in the railway time-table was actually most unpleasant. First there were giant shuntings and bangings that made sleep impossible. By the time I had adapted myself to these shuntings and bangings, they stopped, and the train was
left paralyzed in an uneasy silence and stillness, a doomed train that whispered, ‘Sleep no more.’ In the end I must have slept a little, for I remember waking to find that we were somewhere very high and it was snowing. Heavy and hot about the eyes, I put on some clothes, then went blinking and shuffling out into the cold blue morning, a peevish passenger. The little station looked dreary. The young man waiting with the hotel bus looked opposite, all wrong. For he wore a ten-gallon hat and an embroidered cowboy coat with English riding-breeches and long boots, like a cowboy in a musical comedy. There was the beginning of my new story about life, that I never have ever changed in my next decades.
For that reason I run in my mind some thoughts. After much thought I chose what as follows: ‘The good artist believes that nobody is good enough to give him advice. He has supreme vanity. No matter how much he admires the old writer, he wants to beat him.’ On the role of “place” in my work: putting it as modestly as I can, it wouldn’t be what it is if I’d been born in Poland, and it wouldn’t be what it is if I’d stayed in America. On my childhood: ‘I was thought somewhat eccentric, which was fair enough, and stupid, which I suitably resented.’ ‘I am more interested in works than in authors. The paternal wish of critics to show how a writer dropped off or picked up as he went along seems to me misplaced.’ ‘Sartre expressed the despair of this generation. He did not create it, but he gave it a justification and a style.’ I would say I must have given any responsibility. A writer survives in spite of his beliefs. Georges Simenon said; ‘The fact [is] that we are I don’t know how many millions of people, yet communication, complete communication, is completely impossible between two of those people . ‘ On sitting down to write: ‘It’s like standing on the edge of a cliff. This is especially true of the first draft. Every day you’re making up the earth you’re going to stand on.’ ‘I suspect that there is no serious scholar who doesn’t like to watch television. I’m just the only one who confesses.’ ‘When I started out I wouldn’t write a poem until I knew the first line and the last line . . . I was a tyrant and I was good at it.’ That’s true. ‘I need, physically need, several hours every day to be alone and write.’ I create new hero now. But I made him the precocious child already that had been faded away before (at least!)his adolescence. ‘They did type me as a horror writer, but I have been able to do all sorts of things within that framework.’ I am notorious for my political comments, most of which are picked up from international interviews and shamelessly manipulated by some nationalist journalists to make me look more radical and politically foolish than I really am. ‘A story doesn’t have to be simple, it doesn’t have to be one-dimensional but, especially if it’s multidimensional, you need to find the clearest, most engaging way of telling it.’ I try to do something in this way. ‘ I’m not adopted. But longing and sense of absence . . . are perhaps other ways of expressing the actualities of my church. Different facts, same emotions. On starting a new novel: ‘Every time I must find something to do that will look like a novelty, something a little beyond my capabilities.’ On the Sexual Revolution: ‘some very plausible stuff is being written by women in a way that most men are not doing .’ ‘If [you] want to publish the lie perceived behind the interview, [you have] to write fiction.’ I write the throuth only. On the extinction of dinosaurs: ‘When they died, they died in a very clean way . . . This will not happen with human beings. When we die there will be a terrible breath of poison.’ ‘The one thing you can bet is that spying is never over. Spying is like the wiring in this building: It’s just a question of who takes it over and switches on the lights. It will go on and on and on.’ ‘I wouldn’t say that I dislike the young. I’m simply not a fan of naïveté.’ I have a chest full of all the insults, villainies, and infamies a man is capable of withstanding. If I want to become famous, and rather to have distinguished reputation, I will have to go through all that. ‘A book is finished and appears and I feel, Well, next time I will unveil myself. And when the next book appears, I have the same feeling. And then your life ends, and that’s it.’ I have to write the verse titled IT. ‘The sensation of falling into the past is not unlike that of coming home for the holidays from a new, strenuous, unpleasant school and finding oneself back in wholly familiar surroundings.’ ‘If a society without social justice is not a good society, a society without poetry is a society without dreams, without words . . . and without that bridge between one person and another that poetry is. If society abolishes poetry it commits spiritual suicide.’ I knew it. ‘This is a blindness permits us . . . to send a craft to Mars to examine rock formations on that planet while at the same time allowing millions of human beings to starve on this planet. Either we are blind, or we are mad.’ On Yeats’s assertion that one must choose between the life and the work: ‘Of course, if by life you mean life with other people, Yeats’s dictum is true. Writing requires huge amounts of solitude.’ You have to love the victim, but still more the suffering. ‘Southern writers must have learned the art of storytelling from listening to oral tales. I did. It gave me the knowledge that the simplest incident can make a story.’ Such I learned to discover the reality of world and I made trips to a liquor store twice a week on my bicycle.’ On Hemingway: ‘He always had trouble with plots because he wasn’t so much filling out a plot as he was making a journey or progression, day by day.’ I’m looking for my way yet. Somebody said; ‘the idea that by birth you are born a sinner. Why? I didn’t ask to be born. Why do I have to be born on a blacklist?’ ‘The laws of gravity can be figured out much more easily with intuition than anything else. It’s a way of having experience without having to struggle through it.’ I had passed an exam from I.Newton, I suppose now, there would had ben an exam one in the presence of Professor M. Heller, from the saving of a experience without bother about. ‘When I was eighteen I’d write little text reviews. There was a review of pilgrimage of the pope to Poland, and I didn’t see that there was any difference between the kids’ books I read at the time and . . .my Diary. ‘I detest and despise success, yet I cannot do without it. I am like a drug addict if nobody talks about me for a couple of months I have withdrawal symptoms.’ ‘The great European novel started out as entertainment, and every true novelist is nostalgic for it. I’m very serious about it. On being single: ‘You know what happened to poor Norman Mailer. One wife after another, and all that alimony. I’ve been spared all that.’ ‘My house has been burned; I have been detained more than once; I have been exiled; they have declared me incommunicado . . . Very well then. I’m not comfortable with what I have.’ ‘Writing to me is a deeply personal, even a secret function and when the product I turned loose it is cut off from me and I have no sense of its being mine. Consequently criticism doesn’t mean anything to me. As a disciplinary matter, it is too late.’ Somebody said; ‘Appreciation of art is a moral erection; otherwise mere dilettantism. I believe sexuality is the basis of all friendship.’ ‘I’ve shown women as they are, as divided human beings, and not as they ought to be.’ On the origins of Wife to Mr. Milton: ‘I’d always hated Milton, from earliest childhood, and I wanted to find out the reason. I found it. His jealousy. It’s present in all his poems.’ I like jealousy. I spent my entire youth writing slowly with revisions and endless rehashing, speculation and deleting and got so I was writing one sentence a day and the sentence had no feeling. Goddamn it, feeling is what I like in art, not craftiness and the hiding of feelings. ‘I believe in saying the truth, coming out with it cold, shocking if necessary, not disguising it. In other words, obscenity is a cleansing process, whereas pornography only adds to the murk.’ ‘[With Dr. Zhivago] it seemed to me that it was my duty to make a statement about our epoch. . . . I wanted to record the past and to honor . . . the beautiful and sensitive aspects of the Russia of those years.’ ‘Once in college I . . . got to going to the library and reading what I wanted instead of what was required. I got behind. . . . And I still have bad dreams about that. It must have cut a very deep channel.’ When I write, I aim in my mind not toward Częstochowa but toward a vague spot a little to the west of Częstochowa at Tarnowskie Góry.
My east is in Europe also. In 1992 I was in Nicea I saw the night of the Harvest Festival. I dream about it now; ‘So passed the early part of the summer. Night was at one time almost non-existent, a mere holding of the breath, as it were, by the heavens while evening gave way to morning. The young and happy needed sleep only as the slightest break in their days, and very little food either. For many young people, and older ones, it was the last beautiful summer. To be sure, there are always some living their last summer, but in the case of this summer there were special reasons. Everyone had his or her premonitions, but no one knew. Midsummer too passed. The human mind still tried to imagine the nights were white. Here a girl sat by a window reading, as midnight drew nigh, the letter she had received that evening. She even took out her writing materials and set to work on her answer; it was still light enough for that, though July had begun. And so expressive was still the nocturnal light that the writer got no further in her intention than the opening phrase: “I am writing to you in the delicious summer night. . . .”–before she was lost in memories of her distant friend, fancying herself walking with him this same night there where they had once. . . .and the dawn was reddening the north-west. The young lady is on a holiday here and has hoped for more experiences than have come her way, by these hopes betraying her friend. But her hopes have remained unfulfilled, and now she tries to compose a pretty answer to her friend’s letter.’ Dear Reader, now I also would like to compose such pretty answer already on my own to your joy of today for ever. May it will be the archeology of happiness of toomorow.

Stanislaw Barszczak, Terms of endearment of Christian, part 3
I have long since retreated, working now just inside his window. So, I picture her hair as dark and soft, her lips vermilion, her eyes large and wary. But she does not turn, and he finds he is glad. I need her as she is, need her moving away from him into the snowy tunnel of his canvas, need the straight form of her back and heavy skirts with their elegant border, her arm cradling the wrapped object. She is a real woman and she is in a hurry, but now she is also fixed forever. Now she is frozen in her haste. She is a real woman and now she is a painting. “So I have felt about this book also. It is mine and not wholly mine, as I am constituted today; it represents rather some past self of mine which has already joined that long succession of other selves that existed for a while and faded away, leaving only a memory behind. For this reason it is impossible for me to write that book without hearing voice of mother always. Yet I have a broken cartilage in my left ear, I see her shield, missile, stove, primitive luxury in a countryside with few comforts. Each little girl had her own…I wonder at her escape into music which so soon becomes an escape into death…That last cry of mum was branded ineffaceably in my acoustic memory…
Nobody will convince us that white is white and black is black. Tell me what was your last love like, and I will tell you what will be the next one. He went away for good… She dropped her head, and as if her ears had been opened to the voices of the world, she heard, beyond the rampart of sea-wall, the swell of yesterday’s gale breaking on the beach with monotonous and solemn vibrations, as if all the earth had been a tolling bell. Constant chatter made it impossible to work. It’s all a desert: cracks in the earth that you can’t see the bottom of; and mountains–sheer rocks standing up high like walls and church spires, only a hundred times bigger. The valleys are full of boulders and black stones. There’s not a blade of grass to see; and the sun sets more red over that country than I have seen it anywhere–blood-red and angry. It _is_ fine. “That’s what the song says. It’s all about a pretty girl that tried hard to keep hold of a ‘Gambucino lover’, so that he should bring her lots of gold. No fear! Off he went, and she never saw him again.” “No woman can hold you, then,” she began in a brazen voice, which quavered suddenly before the end…The scrapes they got me into, and the scrapes they got me out of! I love them at first sight. I’ve fallen in love with you already… She was all in a flutter. Nobody had ever said so much to her before. She was gone already. He had been on the point of asking her to let him come inside. No matter. Anywhere would do. Devil of a fix! What would his chum think? ‘I didn’t ask you as a beggar,” he said, jestingly, taking a piece of bread-and-butter from the plate she held before him. “I asked as a friend. My dad is rich, you know. “She shook all over with noiseless dry sobs; but he was fuming and fretting too much to notice her distress. He bit his thumb with rage at the mere idea. A window rattled up…till death do us part …He set his hat firmly with a little tap, and next moment she felt herself lifted up in the powerful embrace of his arms. Her feet lost the ground; her head hung back; he showered kisses on her face with a silent and over-mastering ardour, as if in haste to get at her very soul. He kissed her pale cheeks, her hard forehead, her heavy eyelids, her faded lips; and the measured blows and sighs of the rising tide accompanied the enfolding power of his arms, the overwhelming might of his caresses. It was as if the sea, breaking down the wall protecting all the homes of the town, had sent a wave over her head. It passed on; she staggered backwards, with her shoulders against the wall, exhausted, as if she had been stranded there after a storm and a shipwreck. “You frightened him away. Good girl. Now we shall be all right. Don’t you be impatient, my dear. One day more…’
I moved around for work personally, but I think I also like to move. While there’s a certain rootlessness and solitude to nomadism, I suppose that I am, as mum asserts, fundamentally a Bedouin. I am driven to exploration and conversation despite my best efforts to sit quietly in one place. I am also crazy about film reviews, interviewing politicians and profiling county fairs, and fantasizing about writing great poem. My new idea is to meet beside the ocean with the Christian friends and live with my nervous little greyhound, and to work outside under an umbrella with a pitcher of lemonade and a plate of cookies. Once again, I will attempt to settle down and write for hours and hours at a time, the way I am told one must. But I suppose that I will end up, as usual, inviting friends or family over so I don’t eat all the cookies myself. We will sit outside together, contemplating our origins and destinations, and begin telling each other stories again. When I finally struck out on my own to do my graduate work, I instinctively sought out mentors. My first parson, the priest Stanislaw Pytlawski died during my eighth year at Olsztyn. As was increasingly that priest’s habit in the last few years, he had gone to the house for priests at Częstochowa. In the dreams he tripped on his way home, as if fell down an embankment of the city, and froze to death lying there. The funeral was my great visit at Konopiska since I had left for the next work. It was January, 2010 (on Monday) the wind piercing cold, the puddles on the path to the cemetery chapel frozen, and after having slipped and almost fallen, the neighbors accepted my arm again. They didn’t want to forgive me for not having visited for so long. At home they had made little sandwiches and tea for the others neighbors who had joined them at the cemetery. J. Conrad said, we live, as we dream—alone…He inspired uneasiness. That was it!…I saw on that ivory face the expression of sombre pride, of ruthless power, of craven terror—of an intense and hopeless despair. Did he live his life again in every detail of desire, temptation, and surrender during that supreme moment of complete knowledge?…the reluctantly taken-up pen of a sailor ashore, the pen rugged with the dried ink of abandoned attempts…G. Green said, There is so much weariness and disappointment in travel that people have to open up — in railway trains, over a fire, on the decks of steamers, and in the palm courts of hotels on a rainy day. They have to pass the time somehow, and they can pass it only with themselves. Like the characters in Chekhov, they have no reserves — you learn the most intimate secrets. You get an impression of a world peopled by eccentrics, of odd professions, almost incredible stupidities, and, to balance them, amazing endurances. We couldn’t get enough of each other. In human relationships, kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths. Obstacles are those frightening things you see when you take you eyes off your goal. I call people rich when they’re able to meet the requirements of their imagination. Only Human heart in conflict with itself is worth the agony and the sweat You can tell whether a man is clever by his answers. Let me say, we work in the dark — we do what we can — we give what we have. But Jesus Christ, and his saving pain and his love for man were always.

Stanislaw Barszczak, Terms of endearment of Christian, part 2

I think patriotism is like charity — it begins at home. There’s no place like home. All roads lead to Rome, and there were times when it might have struck us that almost every branch of study or subject of conversation skirted forbidden ground. Such it had been on our youth, I suppose. I would never have lost my faith. In 1995-2004 years I run the house. During that time I stimulated and enlivened him from all my heart. In our house the room was always crowded. Everyone talked. Only at the front could you hear the flutter of the wheels within the street. I might have look a window here. The many street noises came back after a little while from the caves of the sky. It seemed something new on my imagination. On street it was still bright afternoon and the gassy air was almost motionless under the leaden spokes of sunlight. And sawdust footprints lay about the doorways of butcher shops and fruit stores. And the great, great crowd, the inexhaustible current of millions of every race and kind pouring out, pressing round, of every age, of every genius, possessors of every human secret, antique and future, in every face the refinement of one particular motive or essence–I labor, I spend, I strive, I design, I love, I cling, I uphold, I give way, I envy, I long, scam, I die, I hide, I want. Faster, much faster than any man could make the tally. The sidewalks were wider than any causeway; the street itself was immense, and it quaked and gleamed and it seemed to me to throb at the last limit of endurance. Then the sunlight appeared like a broad tissue… At my house’s café , there is a TV tilted in the corner above the cash register, permanently tuned to the all-Arabic station, with news from Qatar, Paris, variety shows and a shopping channel from the whole world, endless Egyptian movies, Bedouin soap operas in Arabic, and American soap operas with Arabic subtitles. There are my favorite shows and dishes. There is always so much noise; there are birds arguing in the tree outside the kitchen window. Life is an argument! I look at mum, the white of her teeth, the silky dram of skin, cocoa-bean brown. She’s well worn, meagre, and strong. I laugh. She looks over, still smiling, to me behind the bank. Sometimes I used to scan the room, I linger a time away, I dry my nose with handkerchiefs. I masturbate into them. I wipe the sweat from my forehead. And when my eyes grow red from heat, I press them lightly with a handkerchief to cool them. Then I launder each handkerchief by hand. There’s a circular table next to us, and I turn to it. It’s thick with cocktail food: cheeses on a wood board, some fresh berries, a chopped-up pile of bread, crackers. I don’t know if it’s nervousness or situation, but I lose my appetite immediately, which is typical. And I haven’t eaten since breakfast, one lonely egg on a biscuit and black coffee in a paper cup, from a diner on dinner-party. This is why I often find myself going to bed hungry. I eat too little at the beginning of the day and then I’m left with an unquenchable nighttime hunger. I lack foresight. That’s my problem. But it’s just the sort of dilemma that’s difficult to fix. I take a piece of cheese and I eat it quickly. Incredibly, Mum is still here. Mum’s staying with me. Now I’ve got a sticky mouth and a stunned feeling that clenches at my ribs, because she continues to smile through my second and third glance. The room isn’t bright… My mother. She carried within herself a great fund of life, and her deepest enjoyment was to feel the continuity between the movement of her own heart and the agitations of the world. For this reason, she was fond of seeing great crowds, and large stretches of country, of reading about revolutions and wars, of looking at historical pictures. Mum was a young person of many theories; her imagination was remarkably active. It had been her fortune to possess a finer mind than most of the persons among whom her lot was cast; to have a larger perception of surrounding facts, and to care for knowledge that was tinged with the unfamiliar…It may be affirmed without delay that She was probably very liable to the sin of self-esteem; she often surveyed with complacency the field of her own nature; she was in the habit of taking for granted, on scanty evidence, that she was right; impulsively, she often admired herself…Every now and then she found out she was wrong, and then she treated herself to a week of passionate humility. After this she held her head higher than ever again; for it was of no use, she had an unquenchable desire to think well of herself. She had a theory that it was only on this condition that life was worth living; that one should be one of the best, should be conscious of a fine organization, should move in the realm of light, of natural wisdom, of happy impulse, of inspiration gracefully chronic. The girl had a certain nobleness of imagination, which rendered her a good many services and played her a great many tricks. She spent half her time in thinking of beauty, bravery, magnanimity; she had a fixed determination to regard the world as a place of brightness, of free expansion, of irresistible action, she thought it would be detestable to be afraid or ashamed. She had an infinite hope that she would never do anything wrong. She had resented so strongly, after discovering them, her mere errors of feeling. Sometimes she went so far as to wish that she should find herself in a difficult position, so that she might have the pleasure of being as heroic as the occasion demanded. You must be prepared on many occasions in life to please no one at all–not even yourself. Be not afraid of life. Believe that it is worth living and your belive will help create the fact. The dear mum, she had written a hundred stories, but none so curious as her own.
Many people had visited our house. There had been in room of imagined books also. Everything smells of books here: an odor of forgotten memories. This is the library of imagined books, mum says, because he never reads any of them. Still, I am collected them from friends’ basements and attics, garage sales and widows’ dens, all over the City, picking books for their heft and their leather-belted covers. The actual pages don’t matter. And now a young boy lies in his bed on the outskirts of town, still not-sleeping. He tries to calm himself by reciting poetry. The boy asked himself that question as he grew older and began more consciously to observe his parents’ caution. He also asked himself why it was that his parents insisted on their own space. The boy read it aloud, proud and anxious at the same time. A year later the boy decided to be somebody in his new school and circumstances. He was strong enough to have no trouble earning respect, and since he was also clever and inventive, he soon became part of a hierarchy. But he did not fall in love with girl. The boy was so happy that his mother hadn’t yelled at him, but had instead spoken to him in confidence and with affection, that he was willing to do anything. When I turned twenty two my mother resigned from the work and took a job with an insurance company of church for ever. She was a sensitive woman. I’m seeing her, her arms are dashed with red slivers of burns, and as she bends to scrape the grill surface she feels its smell passing into her hair and clothes. Even after a day off, she can still catch whiffs of it as she turns her head. There is a ruby haze beneath the heat lamp, vapors rising from the stove, and everywhere the murmurings of the fans. But mum’s world resembled the world of a child also. She herself did not know whether she believed in God. But she believed in me. For her my words were the truth. That was why she had remained calm when the death would have been come. As death approached, she had feared she would now be obliged to join her husband, my father, and prayed she would not have to. The funeral Mass was at two o’clock in afternoon of the seventeen day of May, the people stood about outside the cemetery gates, declaring that she would never be forgotten in the town and beyond it. The women who had toiled beside her in the Church of the Holy Spirit asserted that she had been an example to them all. They recalled how no task had been too menial for her to undertake, how the hours spent polishing a surfeit of brass or scraping away old candle-grease had never been begrudged. The altar flowers had not once in eighty six years gone in need of fresh water; the missionary leaflets were replaced when necessary. Small repairs had been effected on cassocks and surplices and robes. Washing the chancel tiles had been a sacred duty. While such recollections were shared, and the life that had ended further lauded, a young man in a pale tweed suit that stood out a bit on a warm morning surreptitiously photographed that scene. Nothing happened in Ząbkowice, its people said, but most of them went on living there. It was the young man who left for Dąbrowa Górnicza or Częstochowa, for Poland, sometimes for America. A lot came back. That nothing happened was an exaggeration too.
My mum would be for me near and dear always. I’m watching mum everywhere. Only one person is astir in all this desolation for world, a woman in heavy traveling clothes walking down a lane toward the last huddle of dwellings. Someone is lighting a lantern there, too, bending over the flame, a human form but indistinct in the distant window. The woman in the lane carries herself with dignity, and she isn’t wearing the shabby apron and wooden sabots of the village. Her cloak and long skirts stand out against the violet snow. Her hood is edged with fur that hides all but the white curve of her cheek. The hem of her dress has a geometric border of pale blue. She is walking away with a bundle in her arms, something wrapped tightly, as if against the cold. The trees hold their branches numbly toward the sky; they frame the road. Someone has left a red cloth on the bench in front of the house at the end of the lane a shawl, perhaps, or a small tablecloth, the only spot of bright color. The woman shields her bundle with her arms, with her gloved hands, turning her back on the center of the village as quickly as possible. Her boots click on a patch of ice in the road. Her breath shows pale against the gathering dark. She draws herself together, close, protective, hurrying. Is she leaving the village or hastening toward one of the houses in the last row? Even the one person watching doesn’t know the answer, nor does he care. I have worked most of the afternoon, stroking in the walls of the lanes, positioning the stark trees, measuring the road, waiting for the ten minutes of winter sunset. The woman is an intruder, but I put her in, too, quickly, noting the details of her clothes, using the failing daylight to brush in the silhouette of her hood, the way she bends forward to stay warm or to hide her bundle. A beautiful surprise, whoever she is. She is the missing note, the movement he needed to fill that central stretch of road with its dirt-pocked snow…

Stanislaw Barszczak, Terms of endearment of Christian, part 1
Dear Reader, I am a half-century. And I never thought that I would be fortunate to make a living as a writer. I dreamed of it, but even as I walked away from a priesthood practice to write my first novel, the decision was based on an undeniable need to at least try. That kind of need is very different from the conviction it would actually work. I often think of it as a kind of desperation, an urge to do something different, to make something from nothing: a compelling story, unforgettable characters, a message, maybe. I knew the odds of getting published were even small book, but I never much cared for being an attorney on this way. I guess it had something to do with my faith. My mum never doubted. As boy I needed parental authority and a home. And mother was my inescapable self. When I told her that I wanted to pursue the only dream I’ve ever had, she said, “Of course you should write,”she said once more, and I love her for that. That total trust. We lived lean while I wrote: no more friends out, no travel. We did not have to sell our house, but it was an interesting time. Ten books have now been published (The scar wound, The fenster of God, The corn-flowers of liberty, The friend loves in each time, The way of the cross, Petra and the holy Land, The gazing through my window, The another and he, The wonderful month of May, To fulfill the silence). I’m blessed to be published in my Archdiocese and in over thirty countries, a fact that still seems unreal. I’ve met the wonderful, committed people along the way. They shared an excitement about what I was doing, invested their energies and faith.

With my first books I took even more chances. I wanted to tell the story of me, of a child whose world is shattered so badly that no one can make it right: not his parents, or the cops, not the church or the community. How does the boy cope? Where does he find strength and down what dangerous path will that strength take him? The love of mother and faith in the church, I suppose. Making a writing work with a child as the main character is not an easy task. The risks have to be credible, the action not only compelling but very, very real. And the kid has to be real, too: his perspective, beliefs and actions, everything that he sees and thinks. That challenge so daunted me that when I first began the book I told mum that in a year’s time she would either love me or hate me. Thankfully, the books work. They are my favorite yet, and I couldn’t be happier. If I mentioned about my books I wrote lot of tales. One from them is titled: “A lay of the proud knight”. There is in Karak, now in Jordania. I visited this city three years ago personaly. In the year 1187 in Jerusalem was the king Baldwin IV. The soldiers carried him in a special seat on poles, because he was a lepper. One day he bent down at the place where Christ’s body was laid after he died on the Cross. In that day the Christians won the battle with the Muslims. But the days that followed they had to withdraw from Karak. In the city Karak is a great castle from the Middle Ages. During the battle between Christian soldiers and Muslims soldiers those lasts they threw people whose heads were encased in wooden cages off the castle walls from the height of 300 metres into a gorge. In my tale I wanted to express my admiration for Jesus. I want this tale and its translation as well to reflect Saint Francis’s of Assisi optimism and grace, because Saint Francis leads us to the joyful and polite faith. He always was and it’s a pleasure to go to Jesus with him. His external life, his deeds reflected his internal life. I also wanted to perform the liberty’s duty in my Christian life of today. For that reason I sent some texts to the world’s magazines (The place for an Other), also the tales “A Cousin of the flying Escadron” or “Chine vase” and go on There were many ideas stored in my mind: how inheritance corrupts families; the urge of communities to define themselves by excluding outsiders; what ‘family’ really means and what we might really be prepared to give up for our principles. I tried to set all these ‘big’ ideas firmly in the background and just let people walk about in the village of Jesus Christ. I always tried to follow the action, not dictate a particular story line. I showed it to the other people and their happy response seemed to suggest that I was on to something. It seemed an alarming but wonderful responsibility. I missed my busy advertising job and I wanted some intellectual or creative activity to balance my life. I had always wanted to be a writer, but had been too practical to chase such an impossible dream…I am on to snoop into other characters’ lives. Many people know what to do, but how many can do it? So, I wanted to seize all their day also. I was trying to stay alive and work too hard at it. That’s what’s turning my brains. This working hard defeats its own end. At what point should I start over? Let me go back a ways and try once more. How you can treat someone like this whom you lived with so long. Let me out of my trouble. Let me out of my thoughts, and let me do something better with myself.
When you write a book you try to project onto the main characters not exactly what you think but what they think, then you realize that these characters are part of your soul and that you are very complex. Sometimes I may not agree with me, because I have a life of my own also and I have to respect that as a novelist. Each one is unique and reflects a part of my questioning, of my hopes and doubts. Regarding the influence you speak of: I may have one but I think that the strength of it comes from the freedom contained in each one of us. I enjoy the freedom I have attained – being able to write about virtually anythingwithout political or marketing agendas. Furthermore, I think that it is everyone’s responsibility to be involved in one’s community. What is possible – and the most difficult task – is to first look at oneself and try to identify what’s wrong. Before searching for the other, one has to find oneself. I took forty years to find myself, to accept my dream, to become a writer. Only when I started to walk down the path of my personal legend was I able to honestly turn myself towards others; before that there were too many walls inside my soul. I looked around me and said, “I can’t change the world, I can’t change my country, I can’t change my city, I can’t even change my neighborhood. What I can change is my street.” Street of city full of fear yet. That’s when I went to a market in Częstochowa, in the center of the city and met a group of people that were taking care of children. I think my spirituality came from curiosity and, later, by understanding there is a silent presence around myself. I don’t try to explain it, but I try to live my faith according to the things I believe. For me, literature and spirituality are the same. In my books I wrote about my real journey, my true story. You see, during my pilgrimage it became increasingly apparent that I wasn’t happy and I had to do something about it – stop making excuses. As Paulo Coelho said, ‘Life itself is a pilgrimage.’ Every day is different, every day can have a magic moment, We are all on a pilgrimage whether we like it or not, and the target, or goal, the real scope, if you like, is death. You must get as much as you can from the journey, because, in the end, the journey is all you have. It doesn’t matter what you accumulate in terms of material wealth, because you are going to die anyway, so why not live? When you realize that, you can be brave, and that is the first tenant of any spiritual quest: To take risks. Who were the heroes in your life, There are many people I deeply admire, such as Giovanni XXIII, Gandhi. They certainly have made a difference for the better in our world. But I find that too often we overlook the greatness that is contained in people that lead less “extraordinary” lives. I’m talking about the everyday heroes that go about their lives and try, daily, to improve their surroundings. It may be a taxi driver, a person that you meet by chance in the bus: if you are attentive to the signs – this person, even if you never see him/her again, will give you the right input to take the decisions that you are postponing. Therefore, all we need is to be attentive to signs, open to people and willing to share our souls.

Stanisław Barszczak; Gala uniform of the life, part 2

I would like to return to my journeys now. When I was for the first time abroad in 1992 I saw a carnival at Nice. I remember the effigy – a coloured giant, first of all, close to it two rag effigies stuffed quite professionally with straw, tarred all over with pitch still smoking, and encrusted with feathers. Except for their heads, upon which sat the insignia of city — their abysmally unfashionable but very sensible hats, brim turned down all the way around so that the low round crown sat like the yolk blister in the middle of a fried egg…I’ve been at Edinburgh also and I visiting a dungeon of the fears. Though the noonday sun shone outside and light did diffuse through the bullioned panes of glass in the windows of the entrance one. Then we strolled over to the counter and the rays of an oil lamp had been seen. The large room was dim. Suddenly we saw the man like professor from the seventeen century, who it seemed he might have taken the butt of a horse pistol protruding from each greatcoat pocket. Spectacles perched upon the end of his nose, he started to read aloud, voice rising and falling in dramatic cadences. He roared of the parents with children, “bad” learners: ‘in open and avowed rebellion…the utmost endeavors to suppress such rebellion, and bring the traitors to justice…’ The next day I went to church and was arriving at my peroration. ‘The die is now cast! The polish colonies in Scotland must either submit or triumph!’. ’If the colonists in a faith endure, they must win.” I thundered…Once I descended into a mum’s flat still golden-lit as much from the westering sun outside as from the oil lamps fixed to the exposed beams of walls and ceiling, black against the brilliant pallor of whitewashed plaster…Mum went to a hook on the wall and plucked his stout canvas apron from it. I go to church-she said…I must help poor Stasiu. She was still thanking God as he bounded down the stairs, it having slipped his mind that until he saw a pustule of me developing, she had quite given up on God. She bought me plenty of palatable food…I were merry enough to tumble into bed and sleep the moment we got home, because that extended gloaming kept darkness at rail station…I would say here an angel was a cat, a plaster statuette, I had found after serving in my church. I gave him a coin, I prided myself. When a customer wanted a measure of generosity, he put a coin into its box and rested it upon the flexible knees, which flopped down with an audible click. Naturally the older children present were its greatest users; many a dad and mum were wheedled into drinking more than they ought for the sheer pleasure of putting a coin into angel’s knee. At the time of youth I was walking with the priest of Ząbkowice to the houses of our parishioners. I remember I brought the coins home and took it to mum. As I said in 1995-2004 years I lived for the second time at Ząbkowice. In this wooden house I would say I would not had been there. I came at seven in the morning and stayed until five in afternoon, sitting at “my” table under the window, which bore several quills, composing my lampoons. These were printed up by Częstochowa’s bookshop in John Paul II Street and sold there, though I also had outlets on a few stalls far enough from there’s not to affect its market. They sold extremely well, for I owned a rare ripeness of epithet and was apt into the bargain. My targets were usually Corporation Ecclesiastical Officials, or religious entities addicted to pluralism, or those who presided over the courts. In this wooden house’s back room I held an excellent double bed with thick linen curtains drawn about it from rails connecting its four tall posts, several chests for clothing, a cupboard for shoes and boots, a mirror on one wall for Peg to prink in front of, a dozen hooks on the same wall. There were carpets on the oak floor…And it was quite as good a room as any one would see in any house of similar standing, namely of the middling classes…I also good remember once, I was sleeping there soundly, mum in another room; but I lifted the cot closer to her bed. Mum took off her apron, her voluminous white cotton shirt, her shoes and thick white cotton stockings, but not her flannel underdrawers. At that time there was not with us Miss Helena, “the grandmother”, who I knew on parsonage at Konopiska near Częstochowa. She donned the linen nightshirt. She had had untied the ribbon confining his long locks and fitted a nightcap securely over them. All this done, he slipped close to us into bed with a sigh. I went to mum and snuggled up to her despite the warmth of the night and began to kiss her cheek. Very carefully I pleated up my nightshirt and hers, then fitted himself against her and cupped a hand around one high, firm breast. “Oh, mum, I do love you!” I whispered. “No man was ever gifted with a better mum.” “Nor woman with a better son, Stasiu.” In complete agreement, we kissed down to the lips. Then smiling to himself, I rolled flat in my linen breeches onto my side and slept. Winter came, the ordinary gloom of fog, drizzle, a damp coldness which seeped into the bones; untroubled by the ice which often pocked our river the Trzebyczka. Mum had had a cradle rockers and many broomstick in the corner of her room. She used to be the light of my life. She had, an uncle said, her grey-blue eyes and waving brown hair, her mother’s nicely shaped nose, and the flawless tan skin both her parents owned. The best of both worlds, I used to say, laughing, the little creature I cuddled to her chest with her eyes — his eyes — upturned to his face in adoration. At an end of her life mum was on the house of the Camillians near Olkusz. I went to Bolesław. I tried to help nurse, sitting hour after hour beside mum’s cot. Mum looked up, smiling contentedly. But her left upper arm was sore, she lay sleeping on his right side with the offending limb drawn comfortably across his chest. A nurse talked to mum and crooned to her, I held mum’s plucking hands while nurse changed her linens, washed her shrunken little buttocks as wrinkled and juiceless as an old woman’s. But the fever did not diminish. Brothers Mróz was overwhelmed with burials. But the Barszczaks had kinship rights, so despite the calls on my time I interred mum, aged eighty five, with all the solemnities the Church of Poland could provide. Heavy with exhaustion and near my time, Stanislawa leaned on her sister Janine (both were the daughters of my uncle Adalbert) while I stood, praying desolately, quite alone close to mum on the chapel. There were also Joseph, Janine’s husband and their son Christopher on the funeral. But I would not permit anyone to go near mum. So, mother had lost child — indeed, who had not? –I was humiliated by this torrent of grief, this unseemly unmanning. ‘My mum was dead and I, who would gladly have died in her place, was alive and in the world without her. God was not good. God was not kind or merciful. God was a monster more evil than the Devil, who at least made no pretense of virtue. The only anodyne for my grief was a new faith to love. Mum was right, God wrong.’ For the second time I was enveloped in that ocean of love, though now I had some idea of its profundity. Knew the immensity of its depths, the power of its storms, the eternity of its reaches. Mum had prepared herself empty the privy vault during her last years of life. With this vault, I had vowed, I would learn to float, I would not expend my strength in fighting. The parson of Ząbkowice he has not been a bloated heir at that time. So plain Stephania Barszczak, my mum was apotheosized into village, and now has a Ząbkowice street named after her. Tomorrow, I thought drowsily I will go to St. Holy Spirit’s burying ground and put flowers on mum’s grave. Soon it will be winter again, and of flowers there will be none. Dear Reader, I dream always. I was several time in Warsaw already. I would say I’m there near a river Vistula now. A peculiar lethargy had descended upon the Old City as a result of the panic which seemed to wing citywide in minutes whenever riots threatened. Passing the Coffee House, I stopped for a moment to contemplate the dangling effigies of heroes, my ears assailed by the fitful roars of laughter and spleen originating among the dining ranks of the free Society. Walking swiftly now, I strode along Street. From there I cut north up small Street and emerged onto the Warsaw’s castle. The vista spread southward was extraordinary. It looked as if a very wide street had been filled with ships in skeletal rigging, just masts and yards and stays and shrouds above their beamy oaken bellies. I saw the penthouses coastwise near a bank, then I heard day’s hubbub. Of the river wherein I actually sat, nothing could be seen because of those ships in their multitudes, patiently waiting out the days of their six weeks’ turnaround. The tide had reached its ebb and was beginning to flood in again at a startling rate: the level of the water in rose some feet, then fell thirty. At the ebb the ships lay upon the foetid mud, which sloped steeply and tipped them sideways on their beams; at the flood, the ships rode afloat, as ships were built to do. Many a keel had hogged and buckled at the strain of lying sideways on town mud. I’ve remembered once again the mum’s story. At mother’s time I had had a putridity of the world, winter’s sledge, but first of all a gem of cosmos. So the cosmos was hers. After a while my mind, once over its instinctive reaction to that wide avenue of ships, returned to its rut. People were boiling everywhere at street level, people leaned from every penthouse with necks craning; not a stone of the flagged road could be seen, nor a single slab of the new pedestrian pavement down either side of main street. The three men pushed into the crush and moved with it toward the junction — no, these were not rioters. These were affluent, extremely angry gentlemen who carried no women or children with them. I clearly terrified that I too would be lampooned in some highly uncomplimentary way, I descended from my vantage point and melted into the crowd.
PS. It is all in an author’s imagination only

Urodziłem się 3 stycznia 1961 roku w Tarnowskich Górach k. Częstochowy, w warunkach szpitalnych. Na Śląsk wojenne i powojenne losy rzuciły moją mamę z dalekich kresów wschodnich, z pod Przemyśla. Parę lat dzieciństwa spędziłem w domach Dziecka, w Sosnowcu i Bielsku Białej. W latach 1964-1975 mieszkaliśmy razem z mamą w Ząbkowicach Będzińskich, obecnie Dąbrowa Górnicza. To była wynajmowana ślepa kuchnia i większy pokój z oknem na obejście kościelne. Za sąsiadów mieliśmy pogodne dwie panie Gajewskie (matka i córka), panów w sile wieku, osobliwość Ząbkowic-pan Nanuś i robotnik wykwalifikowany-pan Gęgotek(obecnie zamieszkuje także w Dąbrowie, ale na Bugaju). Tam też chodziłem do szkoły podstawowej. Nigdy nie zapomnę mojego Nowogródka. Jestem absolwentem Niższego Seminarium Duchownego Diecezji Częstochowskiej- Częstochowa, ul. Piotrkowska 17, a następnie Wydziału teologicznego obecnego Uniwersytetu Jana Pawła II- Kraków, ul. Bernardyńska 3. Od wielu lat jestem związany z ruchem ministrancko-oazowym. To on pod wieloma względami ukształtował mnie na całe życie. Harcerstwo pozostawało dla mnie wówczas czymś nieosiągalnym, choć w harcerstwie pragnąłem też poznawać najdalsze zakątki globu. Moją edukację i aktywność społeczną uzupełniały: działalność filatelistyczna, kolekcjonowanie książek z serii „Biblioteka Narodowa-Ossolineum”. W czwartej klasie liceum byłem prezesem i witałem Matkę Bożą u nas na drodze jej peregrynacji w cudownym obrazie po naszej diecezji. Jako młodzian opiekowałem się dziecięcymi pupilami-kot, ryba, pies, kanarek. W gorących miesiącach „Solidarności” tylko z poddasza Seminarium na ul. Bernardyńskiej uczestniczyłem we wszystkich zakrętach ojczyźnianej wolności. Od r. 1986 jestem magistrem teologii. Jako ksiądz piastowałem stanowiska w służbie naszej Archidiecezji, pracowałem do r. 1995 w parafiach Konopiska, Rząśnia, Sosnowiec, Blachownia, Radomsko, Bogdanów, Częstochowa. W latach 1991-92 spotykałem się z chorymi, pełniłem funkcję kapelana Szpitala im. Biernackiego w Krakowie. W październiku 1991 zostałem licencjatem filozofii. Poznałem wtedy konstrukcję milicyjnej pałki. Po roku 1995 łączyłem opiekę nad starszą mamą, zacięcie naukowe, gospodarowanie na prowincji. Po 1999 roku rodzina mamy i rodzina ojca przeżyły krach kolejnej generacji; obie rodziny, może nie w sensie materialnym, ale straciły wszystko. Osobiście z 2000 rokiem skończyłem eksperymentowanie i podjąłem starania o uwieńczenie moich planów uniwersyteckich, równocześnie ukazywały się w maszynopisach moje pierwsze ambitniejsze teksty publicystyczne. Na własnej skórze poznałem wówczas także możliwości policyjnej łapanki. Pierwszy raz zostałem aresztowany w grudniu 2000 roku. Stałem się następnie podziemnym drukarzem, dziennikarzem, kolporterem moich tekstów. W lutym 2002 roku przywieziono mnie do Olsztyna. Tutaj w Domu Rekolekcyjnym Księży Archidiecezji Częstochowskiej poznałem grono wypróbowanych przyjaciół. Od wiosny 2004 roku opublikowałem w sumie dziesięć książek. W tym okresie poza obowiązkami kapłańskimi wykładałem filozofię na kilku Uczelniach. Do r.2005 byłem fanem Jana Pawła II, równocześnie zacząłem wspomagać religijnie Polaków poza granicami kraju. Kilkakrotnie prezentowałem publicznie moje książki, w których opisywałem moją młodość i wojaże po świecie. W roku 2009 zostałem wybrany do podróży do Indii, którą poczytuję sobie za olbrzymie wyróżnienie. Starałem się pokazywać swym życiem i prawdę i dobro. Ale już choćby z tego krótkiego życiorysu widać jak wiele mi nie dostaje w kwestii popularyzacji nawet wartości chrześcijańskich.

Stanislaw Barszczak, The week of faith’s gift, part3

Now let us see the main event. It could be that Jacob began to pray that night. In the agony of his soul, he cried out to God. He began perhaps for the first time in his life, to earnestly wrestle in prayer. It was as though he sensed that God was really present with him. God’s presence and purpose became more and more real to him until, suddenly, He was real! His uplifted arms were actually clinging to God, Himself! There God was, …flesh to flesh, …bone to bone, …in human form! Jacob in his desperation realized the precious opportunity before him. If he let go, then God would leave with his needs unmet, his prayers unanswered! So, Jacob WRESTLED WITH GOD, back and forth, a head lock here, an arm hold there, the struggle perhaps went on for hours. God in His grace and mercy allowed Jacob to wrestle, …to work out his fleshly nature and anxiety, …for in his struggle, …in his wrestling, his faith and understanding was growing! The turning point came when God touched Jacob in the hollow of his thigh dislocating the ball-and-socket joint of his thigh. Suddenly he was weakened and immobilized. Jacob yelled out in pain, “Ahhhhh,” as he stopped wrestling and started clinging! There is a difference between wrestling and clinging. To “wrestle” is to contend and fight for dominance. However, to “cling” is to hold on to, to grasp in desperation. Jacob was persistent in his prayer; persistent in his plea; serious in his request from God, even though his body was racked with pain. I believe God knew the change which had transpired in Jacob’s heart. Jacob was now holding on in faith, rather than wrestling in fear. God was moved by the persistence of Jacob. It is the same for us! We are to “wrestle” in prayer. God blessed Jacob, not because He had to or was forced to, but because Jacob was ready to receive the blessing. What a blessing! “What is your name?” God asked. What He was really asking Jacob was, “Who are you?” As Jacob hung on to Him in pain, he answered, “I’m Jacob, the schemer, the one who grabs from behind, the scared mama’s boy, the con-man, the self-centered, self- serving, self-sufficient one!” Then God said, “Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed.” God was saying, “This is who you were, from now on you are the one who prevails with God, not wrestles without Him!” God’s blessing to Jacob was a new name, a new nature. His name was not just a new label on the jar, but a whole new shape to the jar itself! From now on God would help Jacob fight and conquer the baser elements in his character. The old tendencies no doubt would assert themselves again, but with God’s help they would never dominate his life! God had touched Jacob to the bone, to the nerve, yea to the innermost part of his heart. As Jacob released God, he walked with a limp, a weaker man, yet stronger. And we hear the words of Paul in II Corinthians 12:9, “for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” He went on to say, “for when I am weak, then am I strong.”
You see, the struggle of Jacob is our own. We all have the name and nature of Jacob. We all have the tendency to wrestle with life, to take things in our own hands, to set our own agenda, and work things out in our own strength. The result? The result is much the same, we make a mess of things which drives us to the river gorge, the banks of our own Jabbok. Family problems, financial problems, relational problems, no purpose, no sense of destiny, fear about the future, all drive us to the end of ourselves and hopefully into the arms of a God who has revealed Himself in the person of a loving, caring Savior, Jesus Christ. But we must stop wrestling and start clinging! We must surrender our lives, our wills, our dreams and schemes, to the Lordship of Jesus Christ and let Him change us. In Jesus Christ, we can have a new name, a new nature, a new destiny, and a secure future. Right now, you may see yourself in Jacob. You are in the night of your struggle, feeling all alone, scared, and afraid. Are you tired of wrestling? Are you at the end of yourself? Are you ready to acknowledge your weakness, the futility of grabbing from behind? Can you see that when you wrestle with life you are indeed wrestling with God? Perhaps this is the day, bruised, tired, and lame, you will surrender your heart and life to Jesus Christ. Today there is another rebellion against to God. Why do so many people in the world hate the Jews? Why is there so much anti-Semitism in the world? Why do so many nations in the world seem to despise Israel? I think the answer is plain and clear. The answer is God. The root cause of the hatred of the Jews and the animosity toward Israel is none other than hatred for God Himself. I mean the one and only true God, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob – the God of Israel. The hatred of the peoples of the world for Israel is, in truth, simply a symptom. Those who hate rebel against being accountable to God, and against living by His righteous values and standards, presented to us in the Torah and the Bible. Today still often anti-God bias is reflected in the unfailing opposition among liberals to the clear teachings of God’s Word. In education, these liberals have succeeded in expelling God from public schools, along with the Ten Commandments, the entire Bible, and prayer. Think of how the news media handle the news of the Israeli-Arab conflict. The Jews are “God’s Chosen People”; there’s no way that the liberal media will treat them fairly. God does not promise that there will be any abatement of this hatred in the near future. In fact, the bible indicates it may even get worse. The prophets of the Tanach tell us that in the end times this process will culminate in a coalition of armies arraying themselves for battle with the intent to annihilate Israel. Current events indicate that this battle may be imminent. But the prophecy goes on to say that the God of Israel will destroy these armies before they can do any damage. The Bible tells me that God will bless those who bless Israel, and history has confirmed God’s word. It would seem that the enemies of Israel would do well to recognize this truth and embrace Israel rather than engage in what will prove to be self destructive behaviors.
the greatest problem in life is not our circumstances but our heart. Jacob felt his life was filled with problems. He was exhausted from fighting Laban and now worn out thinking about having to confront Essau. But what Jacob didn’t realize was that the greatest battle being waged was the one being waged in his heart. The ultimate issue was this: “Who will be in Charge?” Jacob wanted God’s blessing but did not want God’s ownership of his life. He wanted God to “bail him out” in the hard times but he did not want to submit to God in his living. Jacob had a surface faith in that he wanted the benefits of God but not a relationship with God. Jacobs problem was not his impending meeting with Essau. His real problem was his superficial relationship with the Lord of the Universe. Yes, there are a lot of horrible and tragic things going on in the world. They break our hearts. Hopefully they will also break our wills. Hopefully these things will show us our desperate need of God. We see that even though we resist God, He pursues us. This has been a devastating week for many of us . . . including me. There will be scars for a long long time. There are lots of questions that we have that will never be answered. But the most important can be answered. It is the most important question: “Who will you trust?” “Where will you turn?”. Will you hold to the Lord with everything you have and cry out in faith, “Bless Me!” or will you turn in silence and walk away? Will you continue to fight Him or will you allow Him to change your heart, to lead your life and to call you “a child of God?”