Thinking about death: fear or courage

Document Type : Scholarly Article

Author

Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy of Islamic Encyclopedia Foundation, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

A wise and appropriate confrontation with death has been the question and concern of many philosophical systems of thought, and various opinions have been presented about the desirability and undesirability of thinking about death and different solutions to eliminate the fear of death. One of the most famous solutions is the Epicurean and Stoic solution to deal with the fear of death, in which an attempt is made to psychologically convince the self through the psychological analysis of fear and assuming the factor of pleasure and pain. But in the theory of Socrates and Plato, which is based on the superiority and independent survival of the soul, the desired perfection of man is to reject the body and stay away from its desires and the senses, and such conditions naturally occur at the time of death. Therefore, the philosopher and sage, not only does not fear or run away from death but welcomes it. Many Islamic sages and mystics have adopted an approach similar to that of Socrates and Plato or similar to the Epicurean and Stoic approaches. Ibn Sina is one of those who, like Socrates and Plato, consider facing death bravely as a type of mystical perfection. However, following Aristotle's opinion, Farabi considered the virtue of courage to be learned and based on human will and discretion and interpreted it in the way of living.

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Avecinnian Philosophy Journal
Volume 28, Issue 72
January 2024
Pages 97-114

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