Transcending the Human

Abstract

‘Transcendence’ is a word which has largely disappeared from our discourse, and that is perhaps as it should be for so, it seems, has the concern with it from our lives. As for the concept, it subsists in the thin atmosphere of scholarship rather than normal — ordinary or philosophical — discourse; in theology rather than religion; in the unfamiliar Eastern or the esoteric Occult. The consequent difficulty in reaching the issue through ordinary language justifies, perhaps even necessitates, dropping it — unless one thinks, or feels, that there is an issue. In that case, however, one needs to recover the issue in the absence of language, perhaps even save it from the language. In the following I will nevertheless try to get some grip on the concept so as to attempt its analysis. If this fails I will try the more troublesome analysis of ‘experience’. Ideally, of course, the two should come together in a better understanding of how we speak about what we think and feel. But that is to be hoped for rather than aimed at. Though ‘transcendence’ seems largely moribund, other members of the family, most noticeably the verb ‘to transcend’, have some life left in them and so offer an opening for an inquiry. We encounter ‘transcend’ in newspapers, in public addresses, in advertisements for vacuum-cleaners, not just in recondite journals or flyers for yoga classes.

I dedicate this paper to the memory of Dr Paul McLaughlin.