SUBJECTIVITY OF PURPOSE AND SELF-DENIAL In each stage of the human civilization...

SUBJECTIVITY OF PURPOSE AND SELF-DENIAL In each stage of the human civilization, and in each period of man's life, people face numerous interests whose achievement requires a quantitative action in this degree or the other.

No matter how diversified the qualities of these i nterests or the manner of bringing them to life from an age to another are, they can still be divided into two sorts of interests:- One: interests whose materialistic gains and outcomes go to the individual himself, on whose work and endeavour depends the achievement of that interest. The Other: interests whose gains go to those other than the direct worker or group he belongs to.

In this second kind are included all sorts of labour which aim at an even bigger goal than the existence of the worker himself, for every big goal cannot be usually achieved except through the collective efforts and endeavours of a long period of time.

The first sort of interests guarantees the inner motif of the individual: its availability and effort to secure it, for as long as the worker is the one who reaps the fruits of the interest and directly enjoys it, it is natural to find in him the effort to secure it and work for its sake.

As for the second kind of interests, here the motif to secure these interests is not sufficient, for the interests here are not only the active worker's; and often his share of labour and hardship is greater than that of his share of the huge interest. From here, man needs an upbringing of subjectivity of purpose and self- denial in motif; i.e., that he must work for the sake of others, of the group!

In other words, he has to work for a purpose greater than his own existence and personal materialistic inter- est. Such upbringing is necessary for the man of the electricity and atom age as it equally is for the man who used to fight with the sword and travel on camel-back! They both confront the worries of construction and of the great aims and situations 'which demand self-denial and working for the sake of others, sowing the seeds whose fruits may not be seen by the person who sowed them . .

. ! It is necessary, then, to raise every individual to perform a portion of his labour and effort not merely for his own self and its personal materialistic interests, so that he will be capable of contri- buting with self-denial, of aiming at a purely "objective" goal . . . ! Rites perform a large role in this upbring- ing.