Nikolas Kazantzakis

[johnalexis]

Originally Posted by Promethean Fire

Owning a delux copy of the "Last Temptation of Christ" on DVD i must say i have an infamous respect for the man. I knew little of him untill my mum told me he actualywroete Zorba the Greek aswell and i have readon is background now.

He seems a very coplex man not knowing the purpose of his existance like most of us, and he seeked to fund himself spending time with German philsophers and traveling and meeting new people.

I found this interesting piece on him.

Composed while in Berlin in 1923, in 1927 Kazantzakis published in Greek his "Spiritual Exercises," known as The Saviors of God, translated and published in English in 1960.

The figure of Jesus was ever present in his thoughts, from his youth to his last years. The Christ of the The Last Temptation of Christ shares Katzantzakis' anguished metaphysical and existential concerns, seeking answers to haunting questions and often torn between his sense of duty and cause on one side and his own human needs to enjoy life, to love and to be loved, and to have a family. A tragic figure who at the end sacrifices his own human hopes for a wider cause, Kazantzakis' Christ is not an infallible, passionless deity but rather a passionate and emotional human being who has been assigned a mission, with a meaning that he is struggling to understand and that often requires him to face his conscience and his emotions and ultimately to sacrifice his own life for its fulfilment. He is subject to doubts, fears and even guilt. In the end he is the Son of Man, a man whose internal struggle represents that of humanity.

Many Greek religious conservatives condemned his work. His reply was: "You gave me a curse, Holy fathers, I give you a blessing: may your conscience be as clear as mine and may you be as moral and religious as I" (Greek: "Μου δώσατε μια κατάρα, Άγιοι πατέρες, σας δίνω κι εγώ μια ευχή: Σας εύχομαι να ‘ναι η συνείδηση σας τόσο καθαρή, όσο είναι η δική μου και να ‘στε τόσο ηθικοί και θρήσκοι όσο είμαι εγώ").


The thing i loved about his movie is that he shows Jesus as a normal human being seeking spiritual guidance and facing human temptation righ till then end where the devil tempts him one more time, and shows his life if he chose to have a family and just be a common man.

Its one of my all time favourite films and go out and rent it, trust me its very under rated.

I have almost all of Kazantsakis' books in English. The translations are really good because his wife Eleni Kazantsakis was involved in them.

Read his books. Forget about films, although sometimes films are beneficial in that they give us an optical translation of the book. With films, though, we should always remember that they are just the way one man sees the images he has "downloaded" into his brain from the book. For example, I am going to rent Mel Gibson's The Passion this week because something in the film touched me deeply. I am also going to reread the passages from the NT afterwards. Remember Mel Gibson is a Roman Catholic and some of the things in his film are from a Roman Catholic viewpoint.

Kazantsakis' books need to be read! They are quite difficult in Greek because he uses a lot of Cretan phrases in his books about Crete. Zorba the Greek was the first book of his I read, but I was too young to appreciate the nuances in it. I have reread it many times since then, and each time I discover something more, something I missed the previous times.

[KarrieTamsin]

I initiate a uncut knot of soups that inquire terrific, and can be made in big batches and frozen.
Is there any interest?

[pankration]

Originally Posted by KarrieTamsin

I initiate a uncut knot of soups that inquire terrific, and can be made in big batches and frozen.
Is there any interest?