Faculty Publications
Minority Report: Re-Reading Gilgamesh After Levinas
Document Type
Article
Keywords
Epic of Gilgamesh, compassion, Levinas, meaning of life, morality
Journal/Book/Conference Title
SAGE Open
Volume
6
Issue
3
Abstract
The Epic of Gilgamesh attempts to answer the question of how, given the finality of death, one might find meaning and happiness in life. Many commentators argue that the text provides two separate, although ultimately unsatisfactory, alternatives. What these commentators appear to miss, however, is the possibility that these two solutions may not be separate. Using Levinas’s distinction between “need” and “desire,” I argue that, by the end of the Epic, they may in fact be synthesized into a single solution, one that suggests the priority of an affective moral grounding as prior to and more fundamental than intellectual solutions.
Department
Department of Philosophy and World Religions
Original Publication Date
7-1-2016
DOI of published version
10.1177/2158244016657858
Repository
UNI ScholarWorks, Rod Library, University of Northern Iowa
Language
en
Recommended Citation
Degnin, Francis Dominic, "Minority Report: Re-Reading Gilgamesh After Levinas" (2016). Faculty Publications. 1062.
https://scholarworks.uni.edu/facpub/1062
