内容简介

What does it mean to say that we live in a secular age? Almost everyone would agree that we - in the West, at least - largely do. And clearly the place of religion in our societies has changed profoundly in the last few centuries. In what will be a defining book for our time, Charles Taylor takes up the question of what these changes mean - of what, precisely, happens when a society in which it is virtually impossible not to believe in God becomes one in which faith, even for the staunchest believer, is only one human possibility among others.Taylor, long one of our most insightful thinkers on such questions, offers a historical perspective. He examines the development in "Western Christendom" of those aspects of modernity which we call secular. What he describes is in fact not a single, continuous transformation, but a series of new departures, in which earlier forms of religious life have been dissolved or destabilized and new ones have been created. As we see here, today's secular world is characterized not by an absence of religion - although in some societies religious belief and practice have markedly declined - but rather by the continuing multiplication of new options, religious, spiritual, and anti-religious, which individuals and groups seize on in order to make sense of their lives and give shape to their spiritual aspirations.What this means for the world - including the new forms of collective religious life it encourages, with their tendency to a mass mobilization that breeds violence - is what Charles Taylor grapples with, in a book as timely as it is timeless.

作品目录

作者简介

Charles Taylor is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Philosophy at McGill University and author of influential books including Sources of the Self, The Ethics of Authenticity, and A Secular Age. He has received many honors, including the Templeton Prize, the Berggruen Prize, and membership in the Order of Canada.

精彩摘录

当我们追问好生活有何好处时，就能最清楚地看到其中的差异；或者稍微换一种角度，问问吸引我们的喜乐（或满足）的本质是什么。在形式起作用的古代伦理中，这个问题的答案有两个层次。首先，既然我们是人类之形式的具体呈现，那么，去过好生活就是让我们与自身天性相合；这样我们就能逃离分割和内心骚动，享受和谐；我们不再被相反作用的种种力量撕扯，由此才能得到恒定。我们不再渴望不适合我们的东西，由此实现自立。其次，形式也在我们周遭的整个宇宙中起作用，这一点在某些伦理学说中占有一席之地。比如，在柏拉图那里，我们内在的理性只是让我们看到宇宙中的秩序并去爱它。我们对它的爱使得我们想要模仿它，这样我们自己也可以过一种有序的生活。向善的动力不仅来自我们予以具体呈现的形式，也来自整全，而此整全的秩序则由“至善之形式”（FormoftheGood）奠定。换言之，喜乐或满足之得到，不仅靠我们依循自身天性，而且也靠我们与整全保持合拍。

——引自章节：2规训社会的兴起……………………/

我该怎样生活？我该怎样生活这个问题不仅是人生道路之初的问题，更是贯穿人的一生的问题。这个问题，主要不是选择人生道路的问题，不是选对或选错人生道路的问题，而是行路的问题——知道自己在走什么路，知道这条路该怎么走：我们是否贴切着自己的真实天性行路。在最初“选择人生道路”的时候，没谁一开始通透了解自己的本性，了解周边环境并预见环境的变化。我们一开始不可能通透了解自己的本性，这不在于我们还不够聪明，而在于我们的本性在一开始不够具体，本性有待在盘根错节的实践中向我们逐渐清晰地显现。我们大概可以在这个意义上去理解歌德说他的浮士德是一系列越来越纯粹或纯洁（rein）的努力。我把这个纯粹或纯洁理解为：自身通透。我以为，这种自身通透是phronesis最核心的含义——洞明自己行在何处，浑然一体地洞明自己和自己所行之路，从而能贴切着自己的真实天性行路，把自己大致保持在天性所指的道路上。

——引自章节：CONTENTS