The fraternity in E. Levinas

Abstract

The author approaches fraternity from Levinas’ perspective. For Levinas, fraternity is not an “added” quality to human behaviour that accredits him as a good citizen. It is his ‘natural condition’. Man is, by his ‘nature’, a compassionate, fraternal being. The whole reason for man’s being and existence is to be open to others; he is a being for others; transcending himself and opening himself to others is part of his nature. Levinas draws on the Hebrew Bible as a source for his thinking. The biblical texts present us with the man who welcomes the immigrant, who shares his bread with him and gives him shelter. He is the man who takes care of the stranger, the orphan and the widow. Finally, the author analyses the consequences of the morality of ‘duty fulfilled’, insensitive to situations of injustice, and defends an ethic that arises from the experience of suffering, not from a judgement of reason about “good” and ‘evil’.