Michel Onfray

"La fiction de Jésus n’a été nourrie que de mots, de couleurs, de pierres, de livres, de chants. Le Christ est une invention des hommes qui a nécessité la confiscation de l’art pour rendre possible une incarnation."

The fiction of Jesus was nourished only by words, colours, stones, books, songs. Christ is an invention of men that has required the confiscation of art to make possible an incarnation. Michel Onfray, from Cosmos

Philosophy and Art for the Truth

A philosopher of the first order, a humanist like no other, an intellectual for the astute, a mesmerising writer, what a revelation he turned out to be, what a rare individual he is! Michel Onfray may represent (is) Nietzsche’s advent in the 20th and 21st centuries, a giant of the intellect and the truth, each one of them, although Onfray is the giant here, with a grandeur that has reached beyond the firmament. As one of the greatest contemporary philosophers and surely the most prolific, his L’Ordre Libertaire: La Vie Philosophique D’Albert Camus (The Libertarian Order: The Philosophical Life of Albert Camus), Un requiem athée (An Atheist Requiem), Penser L’islam (To Think Islam), Cosmos (Cosmos), Décadence (Decadence), and Sagesse (Wisdom) are musts, especially in French (the second most beautiful language after Portuguese; it is, of course, a matter of taste), and there are numerous others.

"Camus croyait au dialogue et à la diplomatie, et a enrôlé son travail de philosophe sur la nécessité de trouver des solutions non violentes, tandis que Sartre appelait à des conflits violents et justifiait la terreur."

Camus believed in dialogue and diplomacy, and enlisted his work as a philosopher to the need to find nonviolent solutions, whereas Sartre called for violent conflicts and justified terror. Michel Onfray

Cosmos of Free Ideas and Truths

Reading Onfray is like rediscovering the world, the Cosmos, as he aptly titled one of his masterpieces. I wish I could read every language and have sufficient time to read everything sublime in each one. A very tall order, indeed! I can read (and write) almost four (the fourth, Greek, is a work in progress), which is adequate to some degree but splendid given that French is one of them. On- and or in fray, one has to admire this towering figure of factual savoir faire, a purveyor of knowledge via his books, and a teacher of free knowledge via his Université populaire de Caen (Popular University of Caen).

Mere words, one could declare and appear half-witted

Inasmuch being part of a deluded crowd

Can someone raise a head to at least seem committed

Hell is everywhere now, with many feeling cowed

Elephants in the rooms, with cowards wearing masks

Lambasting every truth with a snide pack of lies

Onfray, Michel, one of the fearless ones, who asks

Negating each violent deceit with blue skies

Far away in the future, surely not the past

Reaching a consensus will be up to AI

Avatars of contentment could leave us aghast

Yearning for a truthful and enduring good-bye