To understand why the ending is so arranged, we must first understand the part where Grace and her father blame each other. Instead of accusing each other of the depravity of human nature, they accused each other of "arrogance". This word is the key to understanding this film. Understand that in the whole movie, even at the last moment of life, the residents of Dogville don't think they have done bad things, and they will be punished for doing bad things. Their way of thinking is: I protected you, Grace, and you have to pay a certain price for your protection (I don't want to use words that give people a lot of associations). As the cost of protecting you increases, we naturally have to raise the price. If you want to run away, I will give you the chain, but I will stop you from running away. From beginning to end, they are doing evil from the perspective of a charity, so they don't feel that they are doing evil. Their cause is arrogant, a kind of complacency from a superior point of view. Once this superior position is fully consolidated, that is, Grace will stay in Dogville at all costs, this arrogance will naturally turn into evil. We can look at the concrete examples of doing evil in the name of goodness in history, such as the Cultural Revolution, the Crusades, and so on. There are too many. The reason why I chose to let Grace take revenge in the future is actually because Grace is the same person. This arrogance is the evil of human nature, not the evil of a few people. Grace is not an angel. Once she has a chance to do evil, she will do the same. And she did it for punishment, not for evil itself. The occurrence of evil does not necessarily have evil reasons, but requires a condition of absolute power and arrogance.

Highway:

Arrogance appears at the beginning of the film, and it appears as a theme at the end, but in the whole film, the word is not used for Dogville residents. I think what the residents of Dogville symbolize is very simple, that is, the sin of ordinary people. Therefore, I don't agree that arrogance is the source of evil.

In fact, the moral of this movie is very obvious. In Christian discourse, the word grace means "the grace of God" and can be used to refer to Jesus in many cases. We distinguish Christian culture from classical culture (ancient Greek and Roman culture), and think that the characteristic of classical culture is "morality is in this world", and its core is the simple view of justice that good and evil are rewarded, while the characteristic of Christianity is "faith is on the other side", and its core is absolute tolerance, which transcends the distinction between good and evil in this world.

To give a simple example, in the classical world, people are unequal. People with virtue are more noble than those without virtue, and the most obvious criterion to distinguish whether a person has virtue or not is whether his behavior is good or not. In Christianity, it doesn't matter whether a person behaves well or not in theory. Even criminals who commit all kinds of evil deeds and a devout monk are equal before God. Transcendence of faith requires tolerance of all evils.

We admit that Christianity's "tolerance" is an excellent spirit and lofty ideal. However, if this spirit of absolute tolerance develops to the extreme, it will lose the support of human nature, because it is impossible to completely accommodate all the evils in life; The real distinction between good and evil in life just needs the classic "justice" to bear. Therefore, even in a Christian world, the highest state is not pure Christian tolerance and fraternity, but how to accommodate the classical spirit of justice to the greatest extent in the tolerant logic of Christianity.

This is the theme of Hamlet, Dostoevsky and Dogwell. The characteristic of Dogwell is that it directly equates the image of God (Grace's father, a gang leader) with the classical spirit, and through his mouth, it tells the inherent drawback of Christian tolerance logic, that is arrogance.

The tolerance of Christianity began with arrogance. Christianity says that it is arrogant to judge others by morality, because the real judicial power is in God's hands, and people cannot surpass it. Grace's father pointed out the paradox of this logic, that is, trying to accommodate everything, which is precisely the greatest arrogance. This sentence was said by Grace's father, that is, the Christian God himself, so we can understand it this way: since only God has the power to judge, only God has the power to tolerate. In fact, whether it is temptation or tolerance, there are right and wrong points. Wrong trial is trespassing, and wrong capacity is trespassing. The true spirit of Christianity should be the combination of trial and tolerance, that is, even if everyone is equal before God, sinners will eventually be tolerated by God, but human affairs must truly implement the spirit of human justice and cannot be perfunctory in the name of tolerance.

Walker:

Arrogance is the evil of human nature. That's true.

About "the absolute tolerance of Christianity transcends good and evil, which is the realm that God can reach, but in the face of the real distinction between good and evil in the world, this unrealistic ideal cannot bear the requirements of justice."

I understand it this way:

All kinds of evils and sins cannot and will not be imposed on God after he becomes a God. What he saw was exactly what people suffered. Therefore, he can ask others for absolute tolerance. Ha ha. It seems that God is arrogant, too. In the MR73 revolver, the old policeman finally killed two villains. One is a bad COP and the other is a villain. When you fuck a bad COP, beat him to death on a prostitute's bed with a pistol handle, because old cops hate him, garbage cops. When you're a villain, it's a simple shot. Sincerely. Unforgiven.

Even justice that is late is unjust, not to mention justice that cannot be done.

Wu Gongqing:

I watched Dog Village again in my spare time to see what my brother said. On the whole, I agree. I think my brother asked the question right from the beginning, and I think there is no problem in the general direction. Mention a few small points and discuss them together.

1 First of all, I don't quite agree to compare the big concept of Christianity with classicism. This is because although there is a concept of "super good and evil" in the Bible, it is not the case. Strictly speaking, we should probably draw the conclusion that the extreme emphasis on "justification by faith" in the Protestant Reform led to Nietzsche's "super-good and evil". In other words, "super-good and super-evil" itself is Protestantism and a reflection of modernity. We can hardly say that Catholicism has absolute tolerance. Moreover, as far as the Bible itself is concerned, although the spirit of the gospel is tolerant, it also has enlightenment. The unity of these two logics has been debated endlessly in history. This shows that Christianity itself is also complicated and historically changing in dealing with tolerance.

Of course, I agree that this film is an adaptation of the gospel. As you said, it may be called "alternative gospel". In other words, it is the "gospel" against the gospel. The basic reason is that the ultimate goal of the film is to save, but the channel is not unified with the basic spirit of the Bible.

However, if we carefully scrutinize the last paragraph and regard Grace as a god in history, there are still two problems: 1. The film assumes that Grace is a god, so we certainly know what is good and what is evil. Through the quarrel with her father, she clearly knew that people in Dogville were bad people. This is the basis of her final trial. However, as far as the social statement that the film tries to achieve is concerned, this god must actually transition to man and country. In this way, can they know what is good for themselves? 2. Even assuming that Dogwell's is bad and people know others' evil, where can they get the right to judge? This is one of the themes of this film, I think. Although as far as I know, the director is extremely dissatisfied with the ugliness and injustice of society and demands political speech. This is actually the "power" struggle at the end of the film. From this logic, we can think that in the director's logic, as long as our power is used to do good deeds and achieve good goals, then the injustice of means may be excusable. The director is an anti-American, and what he wants to do is of course predictable. But the question is, even if he is really grateful and has power, can he really use this power to exercise what he wants to do?

My second point, in short, is that there is tension between the Christian logic of this film and its political-social logic. Although in a considerable sense, this film exposes the plight of Christianity. But in my opinion, when it realizes the gospel in an anti-Christian way, I think his logic is a little simple and even dangerous. Christianity says that forgiveness is true, but it doesn't mean that it has no means to punish people's sins. Christianity itself and the legal spirit influenced by Christianity are manifestations; It is true that evil can be eliminated by violent forces, but it does not necessarily achieve good in itself. Grace destroyed Dogwell, but in fact she committed another crime. In this way, the final discussion of the film also has a lot of vague and extended space.

I wrote two points casually, which is not very rigorous. If you think there is a problem, let's continue our discussion.

Highway:

My brief reply is as follows, and we will discuss it in detail later.

1, I think Protestantism is a more thorough Christianity. It did not create new principles, but took the logic of Christianity to the extreme. Modernity is no problem, but modernity is also an heir of Christianity.

2. It is not evil to destroy Dogwell, just as Hamlet killed his uncle, both of which are the realization of justice. The realization of justice requires people not to cling to fragile and sensitive conscience: although killing is violent, justice often needs violence to achieve it. What is really vicious is the hatred behind the killing. Grace didn't kill with hatred. Dogwell's people deserve to die Grace is just doing justice for heaven.

I know these formulations are too simple, but it is impossible to expand them here, which only shows my basic tendency. There is a very important question. Let me reiterate: I think the destruction of Dogwell is also an evil, and I can't do it out of conscience and pity. This is precisely the embodiment of the Christian logic of super-good and evil. It can be great love and kindness, but it will also do harm to the good and evil in the world. I think another choice is more noble: do what you should do without hesitation, but don't have hatred. Even if violence is always evil, human justice is achieved through the cycle of good and evil. It is an eternal truth that good is rewarded with good and evil with evil. Don't use the so-called absolute goodness to save the world. It needs arrangement, not redemption.

I look forward to your reply. Besides, is everything all right?

On ninth street, fun run:

About these concepts of Christianity, I thought of another movie, Yang Mi.

After losing her son, the mother sought comfort from religious teachings. Finally, one day, with the encouragement of parishioners, she went to prison to tell the criminal who killed her son that she forgave him. When the criminal replied that she also believed in Christ and felt that she had been forgiven by God, she collapsed.

Relying on faith to maintain one's psychological defense line collapses instantly.

Wu Gongqing:

Highway,

1, whatever you say. There are no fundamental differences.

What you said is very profound and Confucian. But the question is whether the evil in the film needs to be realized in such a strong way. I agree with appropriate violence, but I am also wary of its simple and terrible consequences. I think the ending of the film is evil, because it is only from the perspective of divine righteousness; But for people, does he have a better way? Everything saved in the first half of the film is extremely released in the back. Then should we also ask: If you are God, was your previous connivance evil? Why cover up your past in this way? If you are not God, why can you do this? How can you have such great power? Therefore, I think the value of the end of the film can only be reflected in an extremely abstract way. Specifically, it is very problematic.

Highway:

I agree. I also understand the ending very abstractly.

Wu Gongqing:

So up to now, what I am most interested in is not the core theme of the film, but what he wants to bring, such as: 1, Tom's portrayal of human nature. Why has he been trying to find a literary genre? Why did he try to integrate everything into the text? For me, or for other people with the same problem, the direct question is: how can we get rid of our original life and predicament, sin and depravity through words and thoughts, so as to anesthetize ourselves with illusory attention? 2. Children who violate grace. I don't know why, but I feel very sad about this scene. Because I almost see the poor shadow of human beings here. If the film has been trying to describe God's experience, then this scene is definitely the core. There is no doubt that God is grace and grace. But for people, elegance is not easy to do. People will refuse grace and even be jealous of it because of their sins. Even, like interrogators, we can say that when God appears, people will still kill him. Really speaking, the grace that people need is not from God, but from people. He must be the grace of forgiving people's sins, not the grace of moral redemption, which is too heavy for people. If we look at it this way, Grace's final anger and violence may be more reasonable: it is precisely because she gave Grace infinite love that people stubbornly resisted again and again (including smashing toys representing the seven seals), and God needs to punish people's freedom with extreme violence (extreme Grace). Therefore, it also contains the theme we have been discussing: grace and human freedom. 3. From this, one question that we can think deeply is: What does Christianity really mean? On the surface, with God, Christianity has certain standards of good and evil and the best spiritual trend of mankind. But on the other hand, the film also reveals to us that it is the forgiveness of Christianity that pushes people into the endless abyss of evil; It is because of the existence of God that children have the motivation to do evil, which is the so-called "good for evil"; Therefore, Christianity seems to be an illusion created by human beings, which has transformed the problem of human nature in the classical era and thus become more prominent. However, this role is really twofold: Christianity not only deepens the dilemma of human nature, but also greatly enhances people's spiritual tension and pushes it to an absolute depth. Our problem is that in this tension, we should always consider the ideological significance of Christianity to the West, and thus to China. This is what I realized when writing Kant's thesis: any modern thinker must start from the deepest understanding of Christianity. They are wrapped in Christian issues, but they dig deep into the great spirit. On the one hand, it is very problematic.

We'll talk about the rest next time, and we'll have classes later.

Wu Gongqing:

The inner evil of Dogwell people is intrinsically related to Grace's infinite tolerance. However, it is undeniable that their betrayal of grace is mainly related to their situation. It is because I am afraid of my misfortune that I threaten Grace again and again. This actually shows that the morality of ordinary people is always limited, even hypocritical. I think the film has objectively shown that this limitation of human nature is the basic nature of human beings, and it cannot be said that it is entirely the result of Grace's stimulation.

However, as our discussion above shows, the universal forgiveness of Christianity has indeed inspired evil again. As human beings, people's morality is always insufficient or even hypocritical. The point is, what do you think of this hypocrisy? Here, the understanding of classicism and Christianity is really very different. People in the classical era are not unaware of this, but willing to admit that it is a fact and then pursue its improvement on the basis of possibility. In this way, in the face of evil, we should respond in a positive way, because this response is human nature; On the contrary, Christianity knows that human nature is insufficient, but it thinks that human nature should be more perfect. People should follow God's example, overcome selfishness and achieve tolerance and redemption. But the question is: is there an inhuman basis for this practice of Christianity? That is to say: can man tolerate all good and evil like God? In this sense, Christianity is really unnatural. Back to the film, we can see that what Grace shows in the front of the film is a Christian ideal: to accept human beings with universal tolerance, in an attempt to touch people with this kind of thing and realize their moral promotion. But the problem is, for people, this kind of tolerance is not good for their own morality, and even stimulates the evil in people's hearts. For Grace herself, she is not God, so she is doomed to struggle between man and God. According to reason, Grace's ending should be that people like Jesus were crucified, but the director made a great innovation: Jesus should not be crucified, but should judge people. But the question is: Is Grace doing the right thing?

We can compare grace with Jesus himself. To a large extent, we all seem to think that she is Jesus Christ. She suffered, endured and was dirty. However, she is really not Christ. Because what Christ does is his nature, he is really God. On the other hand, Grace did everything in pain and trial. Grace is like a god, but not a god. He doesn't have the power and nature of God, and she can't really tolerate these people. Therefore, when the final film punishes evil in a divine way, there is a serious problem with Grace's image: if she is just a person, what is her rationality? If she is a god, how can she explain all her past actions?

The entanglement and contradiction between these two aspects profoundly reflects the director's ambiguity on this issue, or: dilemma. The basic context of modern society is no longer God, but we must think with the help of Christian logic. In the face of the depravity of human nature, who can uphold justice and make judgments? What the film wants to say is that it is right to realize justice by means of power, because this kind of justice is a normal return to his suffering. However, we still have to ask: 1. What is his current experience? Two: Does he know good? Three: When he knows goodness, can he judge people? One-to-one correspondence, there is something wrong with the logic of the film.

Therefore, the ending of the film seems to maximize the tension of Christian logic in modern society: we always need justice to judge evil, but we are always trapped in Christianity. People in modern society are so dissatisfied with Christianity, but they always think and do things according to the logic of Christianity. Isn't the extreme ending very Christian? In this way, on the surface, they tried to return to classicism or reshape a modern logic different from Christian logic, but the result was very problematic. This dilemma forces us to ask: What does the Christian context mean to the modern West?

Highway:

Wu Gongqing,

I can understand your original intention better now. The way the film ends seems to criticize the infinite tolerance of Christianity in an extreme form that completely conforms to the classic concepts of justice and revenge. As a result, it is the extreme way of its completion that has lost the "golden mean" in the classical sense. Neither Homer's epic nor the history of the Peloponnesian war has described such cruel revenge. If Hamlet finally achieved good revenge on the premise of "obeying fate", then Grace went from one extreme to the other under the command of God (her father), from infinite tolerance to merciless.