"Remember, man, thou art dust and unto dust thou shalt return." Memento, homo, quia pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris. This warning, from the Catholic liturgy for Ash Wednesday, is based on Genesis 3, 19: In sudore vultus tui vesceris pane, donec revertaris in terram de qua sumptus es: quia pulvis es et in pulverem reverteris.
Luther's German: Im Schweiße deines Angesichts sollst du dein Brot essen, bis daß du wieder zu Erde werdest, davon du genommen bist. Denn du bist Erde und sollst zu Erde werden.
Douay-Rheims: "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread till thou return to the earth out of which thou wast taken: for dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return."
How real can we and this world be if in a little while we all will be nothing but dust and ashes?
The typical secularist is a reality denier who hides from the unalterable facts of death and impermanence. This is shown by his self-deceptive behavior: he lives as if he will live forever and as if his projects are meaningful even though he knows, at a level deeper than his self-deception, that he won't and that they aren't. If he were to face reality he would have to be a nihilist. That he isn't shows that he is fooling himself.
More here.
Christopher Hitchens has been dead for over ten years now. In Platonic perspective, what no longer exists never truly existed. So here we have a man who never truly existed but who denied the existence of the self-existent Source of his own ephemeral quasi-existence. Curious.
On the still life: A meatless skull in the gathering darkness, the candle having just gone out, life's flame having gone to smoke, unable to read, with no need for food. The globe perhaps signifies the universality of the skull owner's predicament and fate.
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