Publication: La vejez y la muerte
Authors
Rodríguez Rioboo, Francisco
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Publisher
Murcia: Universidad de Murcia, Servicio de Publicaciones
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DOI
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info:eu-repo/semantics/article
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Abstract
Este artículo es una reflexión, desde la perspectiva de la historia de las ideas, de como la construcción colectiva de la muerte va a incidir en la configuración de la vejez. En primer lugar se hace una exposición de la complejidad de la idea de muerte y de la dificultad de definirla como experiencia; tras ello se expone, apoyándose en textos del renacimiento y barroco español, que la visión de la muerte como horizonte esencial del viejo es determinante en la elaboración de la vejez en la Tradición; la omnipresente idea de orden, la rígida determinación de las edades y los códigos morales estrictos, confluyen con ese horizonte de muerte en la configuración de la vejez. En nuestra modernidad, la elisión y la pérdida de valor ontológico de la muerte ha sustraído a esta su papel de referente básico de la vejez. El proceso de morir, con sus cortejos de miedos asociados a la incierta muerte hospitalaria, ha desplazado a la muerte y a los miedos escatológicos que ella suponía. La difuminación de las sanciones provinientes de los códigos morales y religiosos, y la desaparición de la férrea distinción de edades, ha flexibilizado la vejez. Esa vejez más elástica queda informada por un generalizado principio -no exento de riesgos- de juventud.
This article is a reflection from the standpoint of the history of ideas on how the collective outlook on death shapes the concept of old age. In first place, the complexity of the idea of death and the difficulties of defining it as an experience are presented. There follows and explanation based on Spanish Renaissance and Baroque texts of how the idea of death as the essential horizon of the elderly determines the traditional view of old age. In our modern times, the silencing and loss of the ontological value of death have suppressed its role as the basic reference of old age. The process of dying, surroun-ded by fears associated with an uncertain hospital death, has replaced death and the scatological fears it used to entail. Old age has become more flexible because sanctions arising from moral and religious codes have become hazy, and the cast-iron distinctions between age groups have disappeared. This more elastic old age is infused with a generalised but not risk-free principle of youth.
This article is a reflection from the standpoint of the history of ideas on how the collective outlook on death shapes the concept of old age. In first place, the complexity of the idea of death and the difficulties of defining it as an experience are presented. There follows and explanation based on Spanish Renaissance and Baroque texts of how the idea of death as the essential horizon of the elderly determines the traditional view of old age. In our modern times, the silencing and loss of the ontological value of death have suppressed its role as the basic reference of old age. The process of dying, surroun-ded by fears associated with an uncertain hospital death, has replaced death and the scatological fears it used to entail. Old age has become more flexible because sanctions arising from moral and religious codes have become hazy, and the cast-iron distinctions between age groups have disappeared. This more elastic old age is infused with a generalised but not risk-free principle of youth.
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