It doesn't matter what I answered her then, something else is important - today, for many, Conscience has really become a rudiment. And with the rudiment, what do they do? Right! From it, as from the superfluous and interfering with life, they simply get rid of it.
Today, the trend is the expression: “I have no Ego!” or to put it another way, I don't have a "I". Curiously, do those who have no Ego still have a conscience??
But before getting rid of Conscience as a rudiment, let's talk about this purely human property.
“Conscience” or, in ancient Slavic, “Svest” is a united good news about the consequences of the deed.
We humans are arranged in such a way that at first we do something, and then it hits our brains, it is not clear where the News came from about what the consequences of what we have done will now be. So in most cases, we are strong in hindsight.
However, let's get it right!
In ancient Israel, there lived a wise man named Hillel. It is to him that several miraculous expressions are attributed:
One thing about Conscience: "Don't treat others the way you don't want them to treat you."
And his other tips for our loved ones are relevant to this day:
“If not for himself, then who for me? And being only for myself, then who am I? And if not now, then when?
- "Do not separate from society, for we are all one."
“Do not judge your neighbor until you are in his place.”
- "Work hard, and the wages that await you in this and the worlds to come will be according to work."
The wise Hillel banally called on everyone to analyze their actions and to calculate the possible consequences of their deeds, that is, he suggested that we earn only positive karma. And besides, he urged to act actively and fully live every day.
Every healthy person from birth is endowed with four properties that allow him to accumulate a large positive Karma by the end of his life.
We have analyzed the first human property - Conscience, which is expressed in the fact that you should not treat others the way you don’t want your loved ones to treat you.
The second property is Navigation.
Navigation is the ability to set goals and independently achieve what is planned.
The third property is Creation.
Creation is the ability to perceive information and transform it into personal resources: into a status in society; in assets of all kinds (movable and immovable property, money, rarities); in business and friendship relations, as well as in image and reputation. To make it clearer, imagine that you have learned something, began to work and, realizing your potential, are constantly accumulating personal resources, that is, your physical and creative forces convert to assets.
The fourth property is Efficient life.
An effective life is the ability to plan one's life and implement what has been planned in such a way as to constantly recruit and increase one's personal resources throughout one's life, in order to leave “father's boots” to one's children and grandchildren in the end.
Now let's talk about Karma!
Karma is reward.
Karma is negative if mistakes are made, and Karma is positive if a person does only the right thing.
To understand what is good and what is bad, you need to learn how people make mistakes:
The first mistake is that people do not set goals and do not strive for self-realization. For this, they are deducted points, that is, they accrue negative Karma.
The second mistake is not the ability to create. We live in an information world, and information can and should be used to create personal resources. If you don’t create, they charge negative Karma again.
The third mistake is that not all of our contemporaries know how to live effectively, that is, they do not accumulate their assets by methodical and scrupulous work. Again, penalty points.
And the main mistake! Life not according to Conscience gives the most difficult Karma, unless, of course, such a form of life is prescribed in the program of your incarnation. But this is a completely different article.
So the words of grandfather Hillel:
Work hard, and the pay that awaits you in this and future worlds will be according to your work,” today is no less relevant than in the last Era.
Do not turn Conscience into a vestige, analyze your actions and earn positive Karma, this is the path to Success.
Does a person need a conscience?
In Shchedrin's fairy tale "Conscience Lost" people begin to suffer when the judgment dictated by conscience wakes up in them. Wishing to get rid of the unnecessary “things” as soon as possible, “unfortunate drunkards”, merchants and representatives of the wealthy bourgeoisie give gifts, toss them into the pocket of the inattentive, give Conscience to just anyone. It is no longer valuable to anyone - rather, people will call it a curse, a terrible disease, because when it wakes up, its owners, people with unclean hearts, suddenly become vile and painful in their souls.
And if we imagine that the people have lost all the remaining rudiments of conscience in an instant forever? It is impossible to describe this darkness into which everything in the world will plunge. After all, conscience is the first virtue that makes us understand in time when it is worth stopping, otherwise something bad will happen.
A person without an internal regulator, which is conscience, is doomed to a difficult and terrible life path. He may mistakenly think that his conscience can do nothing to help him. But it is worth rethinking the end of the fairy tale “Conscience is lost”, it will not be timid and will want to manage everything on its own”, and on its basis there will arise: Fortitude, Justice, Faith in truth, so loved and sung by many honest and whole peoples, people will follow who wants to achieve the truth and is not afraid to pay for it with his stomach.
Does a person need a conscience? Let this person answer first: will she have the courage to own it?
(Tsaplina Olga, student of the 8th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
It seems to me that conscience is an internal control. With it, a person weighs his actions. How terrible the world would be if conscience did not visit humanity at least occasionally.
For example, when a person goes to murder, robbery, does he realize it? Certainly. But he stifles his conscience in every possible way. Even if people go unpunished and live with their sin, there are moments in their lives when everything emerges in their consciousness. This happens especially when death is near. Conscience burns the hearts of these people and makes them suffer.
And if a person has a conscience, and she does not sleep? He lives in peace, enjoys life. He is not afraid that he will have to give an account for his deeds and deeds. There are very few such people and there are fewer every day.
But a child is born with a pure soul, with a pure conscience. Probably, it also depends on the family what character will be formed and what will happen to his conscience in the future.
(Zakorchemnaya Anna, student of 8 "B" class of MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
Conscience is one of the wonderful gifts of God given to us from above. It reveals the deepest qualities of our essence. It cannot be denied that conscience is inherent in man by nature.
There is hardly a person who does not have a voice in his soul. Conscience is the first deepest source of responsibility. A person's departure from conscience is fraught with dangers and troubles. This will continue until the return comes. The sooner and deeper humanity comprehends nature, the more clearly it will understand that neither life nor culture is possible on earth without conscience, and the more troubles and suffering will be prevented.
(Chabanenko Ekaterina, student of the 8th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
Conscience is decisive driving force in personality development. The presence of conscience helps to evaluate your act in terms of rightness and wrongness. You can often hear a person say, “You have no conscience!” This means that a person does not look back at his actions and does not take any measures to correct the evil done. Conscience allows a person to be convinced of whether he is doing something good or something evil.
Remorse of conscience is familiar to everyone. For some people, their conscience would not allow them to compromise with their parents, family, and society as a whole. When you do well and your conscience is clear, you experience a pleasant state of mind, peace. Conscience is responsibility for one's own thoughts and actions.
(Kabychkin Pavel, student of 8 "B" class of MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
Conscience combined with the mind -
this is a good moral compass.
However, conscience without mind or mind without conscience -
it is a compass without an arrow or cardinal points.
What is conscience? Does a person need it? These questions got me thinking.
“Conscience is a feeling and consciousness of moral responsibility for one’s behavior and actions to oneself,” such a definition is given in the dictionary, and I agree with it. However, having learned about the "heroine" from Shchedrin's fairy tale, one might think that now conscience is really just an annoying "habitant". No matter how you look at it, it's nothing but trouble everywhere. The world is cruel, you need to adapt to it, and honor in this "list of necessary improvements" does not appear at all.
And the first discrepancy between conscience and a comfortable and easy existence is fully manifested at work. To get promoted, you need to frame someone else. What to do in this situation? Here it is, the moral choice of everyone. But more important are the actions of those whose professions are by their nature built on lies and influence the fate of other people. For example, a lawyer. How will he act, protecting the criminal: to the detriment of his career, but for the good of society, or as an excellent specialist?
It turns out that not all people need a conscience. (And those who don’t need it would really come in handy).
But on the other hand, how cruel and unbearable a “shameless” world would be! Everyone has experienced dishonest treatment of themselves, and knows how unpleasant it is.
Yes, living with a conscience and a sense of duty to society is hard, but necessary. After all, at right attitude conscience will not be a burden that you want to throw off your shoulders as quickly as possible, but a faithful assistant.
Although there is a problem here: everyone's conscience is different - for someone this or that act is within the normal range, while the other is already squealing with indignation. Here it is important to correctly determine the boundaries of what is permitted for yourself, and act in life in such a way that there is simply no reason for mental anguish.
Having considered all this, I come to the conclusion that conscience is still needed. But only if she does better and won't clogged and forgotten in the deepest corner of my heart.
(Frank Anastasia, student of the 8th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
During his life, every person at least once hears in his address: “You are shameless!” And what kind of person then is “conscientious” - “conscientious”?
A conscientious person is one who is aware of his actions, analyzes them, asks himself questions: “Am I doing the right thing?” “Maybe I offended someone?”
Everyone probably wants to be comprehensively healthy, and conscience is a kind of medicine that helps you feel more confident and better. To be conscientious is in the interests of any person. You do not lie - you do not have to make excuses, because a conscientious person first thinks and then does. You did something bad - you start to suffer and suffer, an overwhelming fear settles in your soul, and something inside says that something terrible has been done, something that will not let you live in peace until you remember what you have done and repent.
A conscientious person is inwardly superior to those who try to stifle in themselves the sprouts of goodness and piety. And sooner or later life will put everything in its place.
(Utkina Elena, student of the 9th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
Conscience ... It is she who torments us every day. Sometimes, we want to get rid of this feeling, because it brings so much excitement. But after a while, this fuss in the soul disappears, and we again feel free. But for how long? After all, soon everything will start again and will continue again and again ... and so it will always be. The inner voice will repeat all the time: “You need to be responsible for your actions!” And then you sit down and think: “Why do we need a conscience?”
Everything has its purpose. In Shchedrin's fairy tale, conscience is a useless, greasy rag that no one wants to own. But why? After all, she is needed for something or is it just nerves? The fact is that the author of the fairy tale wanted to show that conscience exists so that a person understands when he does not act “according to his conscience”.
The heroes of the fairy tale do not want to worry about what they do and how they act, and therefore they drive an unhappy conscience away from themselves.
But can it happen that there is no trace of conscience? It's scary to think what will happen then! Universal void.
Each of us, sooner or later, will receive a good lesson for ever hiding our conscience away and not listening to it. It’s not in vain that Shchedrin wrote the following ending in his fairy tale: “A little soul grows, and conscience grows with it ...”
It cannot leave our souls without a trace, because it was given to us from above at birth and “grows” with us.
(Kostenko Ekaterina, student of the 9th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
The most important decoration is a clear conscience.
Cicero
Dictionary of Brockhaus and Efron: Conscience is the moral consciousness of a person, expressed in the assessment of one's own and other people's actions, based on a certain criterion of good and evil.
Everyone makes a choice for himself: to take the path of evil, or to serve faith and truth until the end of his days.
Conscience has no unit of measurement, it cannot be counted. It can only be felt. IN modern world, where violence, rudeness, theft and corruption are very often, we completely forget about what conscience is intended for, although this does not relieve us of responsibility, each of us is responsible for his actions. Forgetting about honor and conscience, closing our eyes to rules and obligations, we violate moral boundaries without noticing it ourselves.
What drives people in the moment of lack of reason? What to do if the soul goes against material values?
Everything is possible and depends on you. I think so, and I have several reasons for this. First, a person must pass with dignity the tests destined for him by fate.
Secondly, no matter how trite it may sound, the main thing is to help your neighbor in difficult times, not to offend the younger, and of course respect the elder, treats people with kindness.
Conscience is the source of happiness and the guarantee of truth. Why do people forget about it? The warmest, most tender, truly alive and sensual should be invested in a child from birth. So that from the first years of his life, the baby understands what is good and what is bad. How to do it is possible and even necessary, and what is not even worth trying. With age, of course, views on the same things change, but the moral core, which has been developed since childhood, must definitely make itself felt. Experience comes with time, as well as intelligence, beauty, material wealth. A conscience, it either is, or it is not.
Today, kindergarten teaches us to be friends and work together, in a group, the school gives us an idea of adult life, with all its negative aspects: resentment, pain, humiliation, betrayal and much more. And only then, after studying at a university, a person chooses his own way of life. The most important thing is to live in such a way that you do not take a bad example from others, but that you are remembered as worthy personality, honest and conscientious.
(Viktoria Petrosyan, student of the 9th "B" class of the MAOU gymnasium No. 1)
First, I propose to read the statements of famous people about conscience. And then we'll try to figure it out.
So, on the one hand:
I release you from the chimera called conscience. Adolf Gitler
There is a degree of inveterate deceit, which is called "clear conscience." F. Nietzsche
Have I ever experienced remorse? My memory is silent on this matter. F. Nietzsche
Conscience - official name cowardice. O. Wilde
A person with a clear conscience is likely to have a weak memory. M. Pagnol
Often people take pride in the purity of their conscience just because they have short memory. L. Tolstoy
Conscience depends on knowledge and on the whole way of life of a person. The republican has a different conscience than the monarchist, the possessor has a different conscience than the have-not, the thinker has a different conscience than the one who is incapable of thinking. K. Marx
Others, only having lost their conscience, find what they need. S. Luzan
If you want to quickly climb the Summit, leave your conscience at the foot of the mountain. Neuah
And on the other hand (as I see it):
Conscience is the right judgment good man. Aristotle
The most important decoration is a clear conscience. Cicero
My clear conscience is more important to me than all the gossip. Cicero
A clear conscience is not afraid of lies, nor rumors, nor gossip. Ovid
Do not do what your conscience condemns, and do not say what is not in accordance with the truth. Keep this most important thing, and you will complete the whole task of your life. M.Avreliy
Worse than slavery, remorse. Publius Cyrus
To have a clear conscience is not to know sins behind you. Horace
A clear conscience is a constant holiday. Seneca
Better a face paint than a stain on a heart. Cervantes
Conscience is the moral lamp that illuminates the good path; but when they turn to a bad one, they break it. G. Hegel
The whole force of moral conscience lies in the awareness of the evil done. D. Diderot
Conscience is an inner, closed luminary, which illuminates only the person himself and speaks to him in a quiet voice without a sound; gently touching the soul, brings it to life, and, following a person everywhere, does not give him mercy in any case. A. Suvorov.
Never act against your conscience, even if the public interest requires it. Albert Einstein
Honor is an outward conscience, and conscience is an inward honor. A. Schopenhauer
Remorse is the only virtue left to criminals. Voltaire
Yes, pitiful is the one in whom the conscience is not clear. A. Pushkin
Conscience is our inner judge, unmistakably testifying to the extent to which our actions deserve the respect or censure of our loved ones. P. Holbach
The mighty forces that destroy cities and annihilate states, nevertheless, remain helpless against one person, if he has enough will and spiritual fearlessness so that the conquerors of millions cannot subjugate one thing - a free conscience. S.Zweig
Our conscience is an infallible judge until we have killed it. O.Balzac
Nothing worries people more than a bad conscience. E. Rotterdam
The most pleasant property of conscience is that it is always on your side. She won't disturb you as long as you feel good. R.Orben
If you want to sleep soundly, take a clear conscience to bed with you. B. Franklin
The strongest feature of the difference between man and animals is the moral sense, or conscience. And his dominance is expressed in a short but powerful and extremely expressive word "should". Ch.Darwin
The law that lives in us is called conscience. Conscience is, in fact, the application of our actions to this law. I.Kant
Conscience is the law of laws. A. Lamartine
There is always a reason if your conscience bothers you. Rejoice, for this is the best of torments, for conscience is alive, and you will definitely find the reason and cope with God's help! V.Borisov
So what is conscience? Lots of people are voicing their opinion. In short, what is the point?
Conscience is the ability of a person to independently realize his moral duties and exercise moral self-control. Demand from yourself the fulfillment of moral duties and evaluate the actions you perform. Conscience manifests itself in the understanding of the morality of the actions performed, as well as in the form of emotional experiences (“remorse of conscience”). There is a connection between the concept of conscience and shame, consciousness.
There are endless debates about the origins of conscience. The main ones are two versions.
The first, younger version of the origins of conscience.
Human actions that harm others, as well as selfish actions associated with them, cause condemnation in society. And actions based on self-giving, disinterestedness, which are beneficial, on the contrary, cause approval. And therefore, over time, the connection of self-giving, selflessness (altruism) and approval is fixed and inherited. The real attitude to harm and benefit is forgotten, and selfishness is already condemned in itself, while altruism, on the contrary, is approved. The difference between the assessment of egoism and altruism is passed on to children (by teachings and punishments). Over time, people believe that the connection was not established by them, but existed for thousands of years and there can never be another.
That is, conscience is a long-term habit. The habit of approving altruism in others and condemning selfishness. And this habit is involuntarily transferred by a person to his actions.
The second, more common and ancient version of the origins of conscience.
Conscience is a property of a person given to him by Nature, the Creator, God, and not a derivative of other elements. Yes, conscience can develop or degrade (depending on historical conditions, time, cultural phenomena), but conscience is one of the main properties of the human spirit! Conscience is a moral law a priori, universal and necessary. The law of the concept of the highest good as the goal and object of reason. Conscience is the voice of God. In the conscience of man lies a power that is higher than man.
For the first version, morality (and conscience) is changeable and relative; for the second version, the principles of morality and conscience are absolute. According to the second version, conscience is the highest will. This is an indicator of goodness. Good is the command of God. And this command is innate in man.
It is believed that conscience is closely related to the feeling of shame. The children are already kindergarten have shame (then they are affected by both upbringing and examples of others, as a result, the difference in shame increases). And according to the observations of travelers, there are many tribes with low level development, but with high morality, modesty, truthfulness, kindness. This means that the connection between the level of modesty, morality and developed culture, way of life, laws is very weak.
Kabbalah.
Conscience is shame before people and oneself for selfishness. Separation from the Creator, God is the root of all suffering in the world, therefore conscience is the most painful experience of a person.
Orthodoxy.
Conscience is one of the most wonderful gifts of God that we have received from Him.
Conscience is a feeling of the human spirit, subtle, bright, distinguishing good from evil.
This feeling distinguishes good from evil more clearly than the mind.
Conscience is a natural law.
Killing the conscience is impossible. She will accompany a person to the terrible judgment of Christ: there she will convict her disobedient.
Conscience is a rival of man, resisting every illegal undertaking of ours. Do not do violence to the opponent - conscience! Otherwise, you will lose your spiritual freedom: sin will captivate you and bind you.
A faithful witness is an immaculate conscience: it will deliver the soul that listens to her advice from sins until death and from eternal torment after death.
From conversations with Schema-Archimandrite Eli —
“Conscience is a function of our soul, and it, of course, says a lot to a person.
When a person acts according to the moral laws that are from God, then the conscience approves. On the contrary, when a person violates the Law of God, acts against the Law, naturally, his conscience convicts him. But man still has a will. By will, a person sometimes transgresses this voice of conscience and acts against it.
Conscience is given to us by God. It is innate in humans, like the mind. Man is given intellect, given will and given conscience.
Every baptized person has a guardian angel. He teaches in holiness. The guardian angel tries to get close enough to a person, to inspire him with good deeds, good deeds, behavior. If a person does not hear the Angel, then his state of mind is as follows ...
Often a person is influenced by dark forces. When a person does not hear the Guardian Angel, an evil force approaches here, demons inevitably surround us. But the closer a person is to God, the purer morally, the further evil spirits go. They cannot, if a person lives honestly, prays. But when a person loses contact with God, loses prayer, then the devil inspires him with all sorts of evil thoughts, evil intentions and deeds.
Prof. Ivan Ilyin -
“Among the modern intelligentsia, there reigns an unspoken, but tacitly implied and more and more rooted view that a “smart” person, in fact, has absolutely nothing to do with his conscience; he has many other more important things to do; he needs to adapt to the complex laws of society, economics and politics in order to learn how to combine these laws in your own favor and build your well-being on this; life becomes more and more difficult, the struggle for existence requires more and more attention and tension ...; what does "conscience" have to do with it? what can it give, except new and, moreover, fruitless complications and worries? real life, and they, "smart", are not up to it ...
Conscience is a living and integral will to the perfect, therefore, where this will dies, quality becomes indifferent to a person and begins to disappear from life; everything begins to be done "in bad faith", everything decreases, depreciates, becomes useless to anyone: from scientific research to a factory product, from school teaching to livestock care, from an official's office to street cleaning.
Conscience is the first and deepest source of a sense of responsibility, therefore, where this feeling dies away, general indifference to the result of labor and creativity reigns; what can an irresponsible judge, politician, doctor, officer, engineer, conductor and plowman create?..
Perhaps the spark of the Christian conscience will be revived only in the final twilight of godlessness and disintegration...
And the sooner and deeper humanity comprehends the nature of the spiritual crisis it is experiencing, the more clearly it understands that neither culture nor life is possible on earth without conscience, the more troubles and suffering will be prevented...
Conscience manifests itself in the human soul often unexpectedly, but excitingly. No words are spoken, no commands. There are no judgments or formulas in consciousness. In wordless silence, conscience takes possession of our heart and our will. Its appearance can be compared with an underground shock, in which an always present, but hidden force appears. And words and thoughts wake up in us only later, when we try to describe and explain the act that has taken place. At the moment when conscience takes possession of our soul, we often have the feeling that something has awakened or risen in us - some special force that, apparently, had been dormant for a long time and suddenly woke up and unfolded imperiously ... ".
I consider conscience to be an innate feeling. It does not evolve with age and does not change after a person enters different societies. However, relationships in the human environment affect the mind and allow it to manipulate the conscience, drown out its voice. But conscience and at the same time reminds of itself with its remorse. Conscience is almost the only measurement of the fidelity of a person's decisions.
In our modern world, for the sake of money, material values, fame, power (the list is clearly not from God), most people daily drown out the inner voice of conscience. Destroy the tool for assessing Good and Evil. Thus, they are moving further and further away from Light and approaching Darkness. Leaving the heaviest legacy not only to himself in another world, but also to his children and grandchildren.
Great is the power of Conscience!
(Cicero)
A person who has lost Conscience does not distinguish between good and evil.
(I. Ilyin)
According to the philosophical dictionary, conscience is a category of ethics that expresses the inextricable connection between morality and the human personality, characterizes the ability of a person to exercise moral self-control, independently formulate moral duties for himself, demand their fulfillment and self-evaluate his actions. This is one of the expressions of the moral self-consciousness of the individual.
In many European languages the word "Conscience" etymologically means "common knowledge". In particular, in Russian - it consists of "with" (together) and "to know" (to know). That is, the concept of "Conscience" presupposes the knowledge by the whole society of the laws of the community (naturally, in order to be guided by them in life!) and individual control over their implementation. At the same time, the punishment for non-fulfillment of moral norms is the emotional experiences of a person (remorse of Conscience).
A highly moral person is characterized by a constant feeling of dissatisfaction with himself, a desire for self-improvement, responsibility for the disorder of the world and a desire to participate in its improvement. In other words, Conscience is the individual's awareness of his duty and responsibility to society. Formally, awareness acts as a responsibility to oneself. The presence of Conscience is a criterion of high spirituality and morality of a person. Morality, as you know, is a class concept. That is, what seems moral to a modern Russian nouveau riche does not seem at all to a respectable citizen! Obviously, when we talk about high morality and Conscience, of course, we do not mean the morality and Conscience of a thief, robber, destroyer of Russia! High morality is based on the eternal values set forth in the Commandments and Beatitudes of I. Christ, the corresponding suras of the Koran, in the teachings of Buddha and Confucius - people who are proud of the peoples of the Earth, and whose names will live forever!
Russian encyclopedist V.I. Dahl interpreted Conscience as a moral consciousness, a moral instinct in a person, an inner consciousness of good and evil; the secret of the soul, in which the approval or condemnation of each act is recalled; a feeling that induces to truth and goodness, averting from lies and evil; involuntary love for goodness and truth; innate truth in varying degrees of development. He confirms his thoughts with Russian proverbs and sayings: "Shy Conscience, as long as you do not drown it out", "You hide from a person, you cannot hide from Conscience (from God)," "Good Conscience is the voice of God", "A rich Conscience will not buy, but his destroys", "Whoever has shame, that is Conscience", "Eyes-measure, soul-faith, Conscience-guarantee".
Thus, Shame, according to Dahl, is nothing but an external manifestation of Conscience (God) in the human soul! A person's lack of shame testifies to his lack of Conscience (God, the internal controller of his actions)!
The basis of any morality is the understanding of good and evil. Dobrym V.I. Dal rightly considers an act that contributes to life according to the laws of high deer! The antipode of good is evil - everything that contributes to the violation of divine commandments: "I am the Lord your God, and there is no God besides me", "Do not make yourself an idol", "Do not kill", "Do not steal", "Honor your father and your mother…" etc.
In a sense, Dal identifies God and human Conscience! That is the great importance he attaches to this human quality! The close connection of Conscience with religion, with God is also evidenced by the existence of such a concept as "Freedom of Conscience", meaning freedom of religion. And, indeed, why not God - something constantly present next to a person, seeing everything and knowing everything about him, appreciating his every deed, encouraging for good spiritual joy and punishing evil with spiritual suffering!? It seems that even the most convinced atheist would not object to such a God!
Obviously, Conscience is organically connected with the nature of man as a social being. At the same time, if shame characterizes the dependence of the individual on society, then Conscience, on the contrary, is the dependence of society on the individual. Hence its enormous role in the regulation of social processes. The concept of "Conscience", as it were, defines the ideal of the relationship between a person and society as this individual understands it. It is no coincidence that a morally impeccable person is called the Conscience of the people.
Conscience certainly has public origin, is determined by the life and upbringing of a person, that is, it depends on his class affiliation. However, Conscience also has a universal human content based on universal human values. Differences in the understanding of conscience among different individuals comes precisely from the difference in their value systems, and, consequently, in the understanding of good and evil.
Since ancient times, people have been interested in such a quality of a person as Conscience, understanding its most important role in life. human society. In ancient Greek mythology, Conscience was personified by Erinyes (goddesses of damnation, revenge and punishment), punishing criminals and benefactors, encouraging people who repent of unseemly deeds. The problem of Conscience was first raised by Socrates, who considered the source of moral judgments of a person to be his self-knowledge. The question of Conscience is one of the central ones in the ideology of the Reformation. Luther believed that God is present in the mind of every believer and guides them independently of the church. However, already in the XVII - XVIII centuries Philosophers began to deny the innate nature of Conscience and pointed to its dependence on social education, living conditions and the interests of the individual, as well as its relativistic (relative) nature, at the same time not denying the influence of the psyche. At the same time, idealistic ethics develops the idea of an autonomous person (inherent in liberal, bourgeois ethics), which, independently of society, determines its own moral laws. J.J. Rousseau, for example, believed that the laws of virtue "are written in the hearts of all" and for their knowledge one should only listen to the voice of Conscience. Approximately the same was stated by E. Kant. The modern understanding of Conscience lies in the unconditional recognition of its social nature and dependence on living conditions, as well as the ideological and social position of a person. The higher the spirituality of the individual (greater priority is given to spiritual values in their common system), the higher the emotionality, social activity and consciousness, the greater the role played by Conscience in its life. The elimination of classes and class-antagonistic contradictions, the adoption of a single system of values by the whole society, a common understanding of good, evil and the meaning of life can lead to a common understanding of Conscience, the ability to refuse to regulate the life of society with the help of legal laws and life according to the laws of morality common to all; in a society in which the individual human Conscience will become the only manager. Of course it's ideal! But the ideal is something to strive for! Perhaps someday people will mature for this! In different periods of the history of mankind in general, and of Russia in particular, the Conscience played a different role in its significance.
Religion has been engaged in public morality, the moral education of a person (teaching life according to the laws of morality) for many centuries. Note that in addition to the obligatory cult component, any religion contains a moral one. By the way, one must only regret that Soviet authority, planting atheism in society, refused the services of the church for the moral education of citizens. It seems that this was not just a mistake!
The role of the spiritual, moral education of the people at all times was well understood by progressive people all over the world. “There are many types of education and development, and each of them is important in itself, but moral education should be the most important,” wrote V.G. Belinsky. On the attitude towards the education of citizens in tsarist Russia at least the fact that in a conversation about a person’s education they did not say “he graduated from (studied) at a university, a cadet school, etc.”, but “he was brought up there!” At the same time, the priority of education over training in the profession was emphasized! Even the Russian ABC already contains an instructive moral instruction for a beginner to master literacy. For better memory alphabet in the ABC, an acrophonic method is used, when each word of the phrase begins with the corresponding letter (recall, for example, the phrase known from school times: "every hunter wants to know where the pheasant is sitting"). The moralizing contained in the ABC in modern Russian sounds like this: "I know the letters. The letter is an asset. Work hard, earthlings, as it should be reasonable people! Comprehend the universe! Be true to this word! Knowledge is a gift from God! Dare, delve into it in order to comprehend the light of existence! "It was not for nothing that Mother Russia was called Holy Russia! The moral education of Russians, thanks mainly to Orthodox Church, was not comparable to the Catholic European! For example, Russian merchants most often did not draw up contracts and did not give receipts. We believed this partner's word! Not a single Russian pioneer declared himself a king or tsar, but continued to remain faithful to his sovereign in the open land! It must be said that in Soviet time worthy attention was paid to the issue of highly moral education of the people. Remember the October, Pioneer, Komsomol, party, trade union, Domkomovo organizations, people's squads, comrades' courts, courts of officer honor, etc.; TV - and radio programs of the Soviet period, literature and art of those years. No matter what the "democrats" say today, but all the ideological work then was aimed at educating a kind, sympathetic person, a patriot and defender of the Fatherland, proud of the achievements of his Motherland. And yes, there was a lot to be proud of. Remember the achievements of the golden age of socialism: the sixties and seventies of the last century! Achievements in the field of cosmonautics, atomic energy, science and art, the leading position of the USSR on the world stage! In general, a universal system of values was established in Soviet society, the human conscience played an important role in the public consciousness and reliably kept the majority of Soviet citizens from anti-social acts. The vast majority of our citizens adhered to uniform moral norms corresponding to universal human values1 Eyewitnesses of those years will confirm that there was no such rampant crime in the country, we knew about prostitution and drug addiction only by hearsay (and not because it was hidden from us!), bringing sexual relations and sexual perversions to the stage public life considered immoral (intimate and should be intimate!); bullying and cruelty were fairly severely punished. The Soviet people were reliably protected from informational, physical, economic and other types of violence by the entire power of the state, serving the majority of citizens. A respectable citizen constantly felt behind his back his strength and justice, and an immoral scoundrel - the inevitability of punishment! What happened to the morality of society after the bourgeois revolution of the early nineties, we have not seen even in a nightmare.
Facts of immorality of modern Russian society crowded media. Let us cite only the fundamental, the most screaming and appealing to the Conscience. Let's start with a family and a woman, as the first teacher in an elementary school-family, where every citizen learns the basics of public morality.
The sexual revolution, which came to us along with market relations from the West, made a woman a commodity that satisfies the sexual needs of men. Goods for successful implementation always requires advertising. The advertisement was the appearance of a modern Russian woman that evokes animal passions in the consumer: female charms inflated with silicone, naked or completely covered; naked navel, seductive make-up, erotic tattoos, etc. and so on. All these are considered by potential buyers as advertisements for sale. Fashion has made many of the fair sex corrupt. Goods in the market of sexual services appeared in abundance. Naturally, the prices have dropped! Who today will read poetry to a woman or sing serenades?! The image of a beautiful lady - the prize of knightly tournaments - or a woman friend of the Soviet era, remained only on the pages of good old novels! It is a pity that women themselves do not realize that they voluntarily lost power over men and turned into inanimate commodities. What is readily available is never appreciated! Naturally, along with shame, the woman also lost her Conscience. But this is more than half of the entire society! That is, the controllability of half of the population of Russia with the help of moral laws has significantly decreased. Remember how television advertising began to attack our consciousness: yes, with a discussion of various types of women's pads with and without wings, as if there were no other products that needed advertising! But, in fact, it was the beginning of the struggle with our so-called stiffness - modesty! But shame is an outward manifestation of Conscience! The enemies of the Russian people dug deep, destroying their traditional morality! I think it is clear what kind of moral upbringing children can receive from a shameless, immoral mother!
The encouragement of the shamelessness and shamelessness of the Russian woman led to the collapse of normal family relations and the demographic crisis. Today the population of Russia is decreasing by one million annually! And the most important reason for this is the decline in morality and the loss of Conscience by society.
Family by definition Big Soviet encyclopedia is based on marriage or consanguinity small group, whose members are connected by a common life, mutual moral responsibility and mutual assistance. Marriage - a historically determined, sanctioned and regulated by society form of relations between a woman and a man, establishing their rights and obligations in relation to each other and children. It is clear that the growth of the population, the physical and spiritual condition of new generations depends on the nature of marital relations. Now this concept is shamelessly devalued. So in 2002, every tenth couple was in a civil marriage (in cohabitation) (according to other sources, every fifth!). An unregistered marriage does not oblige to communicate with relatives of the second half, to take care of the material well-being of a partner in sexual life. Today, more than a quarter of all children are born outside of a normal marriage. Alas, the male half of Russian society is just as shameless as the female! And this affects not only the present, but also the future of the country - children! Civil marriage is based on the principle: "I don't owe you anything!" If special measures are not taken to restore the lost morality, then the population of Russia by 2050 will be reduced by 40-50 million people! A strong normal family is the basis of a healthy and prosperous society and state. It has long been known: destroy the family - the state will collapse! I do not think that the current authorities do not know about it. Apparently, a strong Russian state is not the goal of their policy, otherwise some harmful freedoms would be limited in the interests of society! According to the data published by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, there are 730,000 homeless children in Russia today. And 80% of them have parents! In 2006, 160,000 children were identified as participants in crimes, and 96,000 children became victims of adult violence. There are 5.5 thousand social institutions for teenagers and fifty special educational institutions for children in the country! Children's crime has acquired menacing forms: children's gangs have appeared. ORT informed the public about them on April 17, 2007. The program stated that adults are already afraid to walk the streets of Ulyanovsk. The city is divided into zones of influence of nine children's gangs. Parents patrol the buildings of schools where their children study. Teen gangsters imitate TV show supermen and real gangsters from the 90s. In Kazan, a gang of ten teenagers, imitating adult bandits, is engaged in robbery and racketeering. A fifteen-year-old teenager with a friend killed all the family members of his compassionate, loving aunt, wanting to take possession of the money raised to buy an apartment. The scary thing is that bandit children do not feel remorse for their deeds, compassion, they are absolutely soulless! They quite calmly commit a crime, knowing that according to the current liberal laws, punishment awaits them only from the age of 14. Is it reasonable? Only the knowledge of the inevitability of punishment for the deed keeps a person from a crime, be it criminal or moral! This truth is known to everyone except our liberal authorities! In Samara, eleven-year-old boys were recently tried, who for a long time, living in the basement of a commune, killed one of their peers just because he brought lice. It was once reported that schoolchildren killed their history teacher because he fundamentally assessed their knowledge! There is a great deal of such rubbish in the media, but the authors never talk about the main reason for the misfortune that befell us - the upbringing by them of an immoral society, the practical elimination of such an important regulator of human relations as Conscience! Relying on the legal way of organizing life, complaining about the lack of laws, they "forget" that, if the moral factor is completely excluded, then a policeman with a baton should be placed over each citizen, who would constantly monitor the implementation of the laws. In other words, human society cannot exist without the unwritten rules of community life and control over their implementation by the individual Conscience of citizens. Nevertheless, with the blessing of the authorities, the Russian media continue to destroy the traditional, time-tested morality, every minute sinking society deeper into the cesspool of immorality! Putting the process of education upside down and explaining the subject matter with the wishes of the people-consumer of information, the publishers filled the shelves bookstores and aired erotic (or porn -?) materials, base bloody detective stories, stories about the beautiful life of gangsters, profiteers and prostitutes. Everything possible is being done to suppress human feelings among the people and awaken animal feelings! Is it any wonder that ten-year-olds today talk calmly about sex, impotence, and abortion; that among schoolgirls it is difficult to find a virgin, that passionately kissing and exciting each other by touching the erotic parts of the body of young people can be seen even in public transport; that natural needs are not infrequently sent in front of passers-by, that eleven-year-old girls give birth, and that the state has created shelters for underage mothers, where they learn to play with living dolls! But shame is a manifestation of Conscience - the controller of Human actions!
The decline of morality, the loss of shame and Conscience were reflected not only in the foundation of social life: the family, women, children. This filth has already penetrated into all pores of Russian society and no, even a fabulous economic upsurge will not provide a spiritual, truly human life in Russia! And it is unlikely that with the loss of Conscience such a rise is possible. In addition, good, clean relationships between people for a Human are, perhaps, more important than economic prosperity!
For more than two thousand years, the life of human society has been regulated by two types of laws: moral and legal. Moreover, time-tested moral laws are more stable than legal ones (before the eyes of living Russians, legal laws were replaced with opposite ones!). It is not for nothing that there is a proverb: "The law that drawbar. Where you turned, it went there!" Russian people have always been more guided by the laws of Conscience. That is why the Democrats fail to make it law-abiding. And it won't work for a long time. It takes decades to make us Europeans! The morality of our society is destroyed on the instructions of "well-wishers" from the United States. So we got what we have! Russia can get out of the general crisis by returning to the people the historically established high morality and, above all, the individual Conscience! And do not pin your hopes only on the revival of religion. Modern means of communication in the education of the people play a more important role!
Historically, it happened that the French bourgeois revolution violated the unity of the most natural way of governing society - the monarchy - and its moral, spiritual foundation - Christianity. For two centuries liberals have been trying to establish a connection between bourgeois democracy based on the ideas of individual freedom and selfishness and Christian morality based on love for one's neighbor - altruism. Obviously, this attempt was doomed to failure from the very beginning. You can not combine incompatible! The selfishness of the bourgeois and the altruism of a Christian in a single person are impossible in principle! The bourgeois cannot come out of the gates of his factory and love the worker (whom he has been robbed all day) as himself! Naturally, Christian doctrine began to be adapted for the ideological support of bourgeois democracy. As a result, an era of moral freedom has come - better to say, moral licentiousness! Predictable ending! With a significant lag behind "civilized" Europe, today this has come down to us! It remains only to console ourselves with the fact that for two centuries there were people in Russia who successfully resisted the corruption of their people! By the way, the Soviet social system was more in line with Christian morality. The moral code of the builder of communism, in fact, repeated the Christian commandments. Therefore, public morality was not comparable with the current one, and people, for the most part, lived according to the laws of Conscience!
Today we have a choice: an immoral, soulless bourgeois society or the search for a new idea that replaces the liberal one.
What is conscience? Conscience is a sense of responsibility for one's behavior to others. Unfortunately, in today's world, many people have stopped "listening" to their conscience. That is why there are so many gross lies, hypocrisy and pretense around us. I believe that conscience is a lifeline for our society, which we should all hold on to. What did the loss of conscience lead to?
Loss of conscience led to global issues modernity, such as environmental issues.
Our experts can check your essay by USE criteria
Site experts Kritika24.ru
Teachers of leading schools and current experts of the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation.
The owners of large enterprises that poison the air, soil, and water do not think about the damage they cause to nature. And the existence of man directly depends on the state of nature. So polluting environment, the owners of plants and factories affect thousands of lives, and, unfortunately, they influence negatively. Prokhorych from M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin's "Conscience Lost" also influenced the visitors of his tavern negatively, pouring them alcohol. But when his conscience came to him, he realized that in his institution he was ruining the lives of dozens of people and the only way out of this situation was to break all the dishes and pour out all the wine. Unfortunately, the "rogues" who destroy nature do not understand the responsibility for their actions, they "lost their conscience." Maybe they should be advised to read M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin?
Summing up, I would like to say that, unfortunately, conscience is not a modern word, it is not popular in society. But, I want to believe that there are more conscientious people, and together we can return honesty and kindness to our world.
