Language reveals hidden aspects of reality, which are often overlooked, perhaps ignored. Although if language is studied, conclusions can be reached that bring meaning and beauty to human life. This happens with the study of the concept of the person and forgiveness that will be analyzed below.
As we know, the Spanish language is a Romance language, like Portuguese, French, Italian and other languages derived from Latin. This way, if we look at the root of the language, we can discover many previously unknown aspects. An example of this is the word “forgive” and what it hides. The word “forgive” in these languages can be separated into two aspects: in Spanish; perdonar per-donar; likewise, the English word forgive can do so: for-give; also, the German word: ver-geben. All of them have something in common in their structure: to give, to donate. To forgive means a certain donation of the person.
The study of language reveals aspects of it that have not been noticed, as happened in the study of the word forgive. Therefore, the study of a word taking into account its root can reveal hidden meanings. This happens with the concept of person, which will be analyzed from its Greek and Latin roots.
Some authors derive the concept person from the Greek πρóσωπον (prósopon), and then from the Latin word persona-ae. The Greek concept refers to the masks used by actors in the theater to play their characters. Then, the Latin concept came to be understood as a certain status possessed by some human beings, a certain value of those free, autonomous and subject to rights and duties men. So, being a person means two aspects: the mask of the actors (Greek concept) and subject of rights and duties (Latin concept).
While today it must be understood that every human being is a person, therefore has an intrinsic and inviolable dignity, this was not the same 170 years ago (or worse, only 28 years ago with apartheid). An example of this can be found in the Scott Vs Sandford case studied in one of the texts of the CTP, where African descendants are denied the status of personhood and thus deprived of all political rights and duties. In this sense, the person is taken only as that subject capable of rights and duties in the city; but, the Greek concept is forgotten, understanding the person as one who wears a mask, or more specifically, as someone with a face.
Julian Marías makes an interpretation of the Greek concept of person understood as a mask. For him, the person is SOMEONE with interiority, with a biography, with a project that he carries out day by day.He is a loving being that manifests himself in a face, not in a mask like the Greek actors, but in a particular and exclusive face, because the person is an exclusive, unique and unrepeatable being.
Thus Marías goes so far as to affirm that “the deepest and truest knowledge that we can attain of a person is that which is provided by the contemplation of his face; the deeper and more complex, the more real this contemplation is” (Marías, 1983) and is it not perhaps through the face that we know a part of the interiority of the person? That is to say, is it not through the contemplation of a face that we know whether someone is happy or angry? The face allows us to express that inner world of the person. By contemplating a person’s face and eyes one can to some extent access the life (βίος) and biography of a person; that is, by looking at a person’s face one can realize how arduous, easy, complex, happy or sad a person’s life has been. It is very different to contemplate the face of a peasant than the face of a movie actor, it is different to contemplate the face of someone who works for peace than that of a mafioso. The face reveals the person and his inner life.
The relationship that Julián Marías makes between face and person may be clearer when he affirms that the concept of person refers to that which is unique, proper and specific to each human being. That is to say, each man is not just another individual of a species. This does not happen with a bee, plant or cell, which are individuals of more than one species. The bee is one more bee among all the bees, among the species; the rose is one more thing among all the roses in the garden, and the cell phone is one more device among all those in the world. But it is not the same with the human being, he is a person. He is a person because no two human beings will ever be the same (not even twins), that is, the human being is not reduced to being just another individual of the species, as is the case with the bee, rose or cell phone. And precisely for this reason it is called Person, due to its singularity, to its uniqueness, to its unrepeatable being. The same happens with the face, because there are no two faces alike (two manifestations of the same human being), each face is different, each manifestation and life of the person is different. That is why the person besides having life (βίος) has biography (βιογραφια)
The face of the person allows the expression of an I, but it also allows there to be a You. The face needs someone to look at it, to welcome it, and take care of it. Someone who is responsible for it. The face allows us to understand that it needs to exist an I and You who look at each other and recognize each other. An example: no one knows what his face looks like until they have looked at themselves in the mirror or until someone else tells them what they look like. It is only possible to know the face of the person from the other, whether this is a person and there is mutual subjectivity, or whether this is an object like a mirror. The face needs itself and the other, or, in Buber’s words, there is no I without a You, there is no pure self.
In this way, we can discern how understanding the person as one who possesses a face allows us to understand mutual subjectivity. Likewise, it can be seen that the person means that someone is a bearer of rights and duties, but, above all, the person is someone with an intrinsic dignity who possesses an inner world, and that this inner world is manifested in their face. If one contemplates the face of another human being and shows that they have an inner world, one can come to understand the other as a person and therefore as someone worthy of respect. Contemplating the face of another person allows me to understand the person, their experiences, their biography, in a word: to be empathetic. It allows me to create a mutual subjectivity and to defend dignity, so let’s contemplate more faces!
Published: October 6, 2021
Written by Ricardo Andrés Suarez, project management intern for WYA Latin America regional office
Reference mentioned: Marías, J. (1983) Antropología metafísica. Madrid: Alianza editorial
