Saipramouk,+Brian

====This is a Judging philosophy. But what is Judging philosophy? A Judging philosophy is this. But what is this? This is a relation which relates itself to this, or it is that in the relation [which accounts for it] that the relation relates itself to this; this is not the relation but [consists in the fact] that the relation relates it to this. This is a synthesis of the infinite and the finite, of the temporal and the eternal, of freedom and necessity; in short it is a synthesis. A synthesis is a relation between two factors. So regarded, this is not yet a Judging philosophy. ====

====In so far as debaters are in Error, but in consequence of their own acts (and in no other way can they possibly be in this state), they might seem to be free; for to be what one is by one's own act is freedom. And yet they are in reality unfree and bound and exiled; for to be free from the Truth is to be exiled from the Truth, and to be exiled by one's own self is to be bound. But since they are bound by themselves, may they not loose their bonds and set themselves free? For whatever binds me, the same should be able to set me free when it wills; and since this power is here their own self,they should be able to liberate themselves. But first at any rate they must will it. For they themselves forges their own chains of his bondage with the strength of their own freedom, since they exists in it without compulsion; and thus their bonds grow strong, and all their powers unite to make them slaves of sin. -- What now shall we call such a Debate Judge, one who restores the lost condition and gives the learners/Debaters the Truth? Let us call him a [|Saviour], for he saves the learner from his bondage and from himself; let us call him a Redeemer, for he redeems the learner from the captivity into which he had plunged himself, and no captivity is so terrible and so impossible to break, as that in which the individual keeps himself. And still we have not said all that is necessary; for by thier self-imposed bondage the learners/debaters has brought upon themselves a burden of guilt, and when the Debate Judge gives them the condition and the Truth they constitutes themselves an Atonement, taking away the wrath impending upon that of which the learners/Debaters has made themselves guilty. Such a Debate Judge the learners/Debaters will never be able to forget. For the moment they forgets him, they sinks back again into themselves, just as one who while in original possession of the condition, and thereby sank into bondage. ====

====I see it all perfectly; there are two possible situations — one can either go for that argument or drop the argument. My honest opinion and my friendly advice is this: do it or do not do it — you will regret both. ====

==== What is a debate judge? An unhappy man who hides deep anguish in his heart, but whose flows are so formed that when the sigh and cry pass through them, it sounds like lovely music.... And debaters flock around the judge and say: 'Judge my debate' - that is, 'May new sufferings torment your soul but your flows be fashioned as before, for the cry would only frighten us, but the RFD, that is blissful. ====

Debater in debate, debates over something. So, for a moment, it seems, but only for a moment. That same instant the true debate shows itself, or debate in its true guise. In debating over something he was really debating over himself, and he wants now to be rid of himself.

What characterizes a debater, is just this — that it is ignorant of being a debater.
If debating is ignorance, then debating does not really exist, for debating is precisely consciousness; if debating is ignorance of what is right, and one then does what is wrong because one does not know what is right, then no debating has occurred.

No debater is able to say, of his own and by himself, what debating is, for debating is the very thing he is in. All his talk about debating is at bottom a glossing over debating, an excuse, a debate-ful extenuation

====If I were to wish to judge a round, I should not wish to judge a critical or straight up team, but for the passionate sense of the potential, for the eye which, ever young and ardent, sees the possible. Pleasure disappoints, possibility never. And what wine is so sparkling, what so fragrant, what so intoxicating, as possibility! ====

====A RFD was given out during out rounds of a debate tournament. The judge warned and told the team about their arguments; they thought it was a joke and applauded. He repeated it; the acclaim was even greater. I think that's just how the world will come to an end: to general applause from wits who believe it's a joke ====

====I have the courage, I believe, to doubt everything; I have the courage, I believe, to fight with everything; but I have not the courage to know anything; not the courage to possess, to own anything. Most people complain that the world is so prosaic, that life is not like romance, where opportunities are always so favorable. I complain that life is not like romance, where one had hard-hearted parents and nixies and trolls to fight, and enchanted princesses to free. What are all such enemies taken together, compared with the pale, bloodless, tenacious, nocturnal shapes with which I fight, and to whom I give life and substance? ====

====Let other debaters complain that I am horrible as a judged; my complaint is that it is paltry; for it lacks passion. Debater's thoughts are thin and flimsy like lace, they are themselves pitiable like the lacemakers. The thoughts of their hearts are too paltry to be sinful. For a worm it might be regarded as a sin to harbor such thoughts, but not for a being made in the image of God. Their lusts are dull and sluggish, their passions sleepy...This is the reason my soul always turns back to the Old Testament and to Shakespeare. I feel that those who speak there are at least human beings: they hate, they love, they murder their enemies, and curse their descendants throughout all generations, they sin. ====

====If any debater on the verge of droping everything in the debate and going for one agurment should judge himself according to the outcome, he would never begin. Even though the result may gladden the whole world, that cannot help the hero; for he knows the result only when the whole thing is over, and that is not how he became a hero, but by virtue of the fact that he began. ====

====How did I get into judging this debater round? Why was I not asked about it and why was I not informed of the rules and regulations but just thrust into the ranks as if I had been bought by a peddling shanghaier of human beings? How did I get involved in this big enterprise called actuality? Why should I be involved? Isn't it a matter of choice? And if I am compelled to be involved, where is the manager—I have something to say about this. Is there no manager? To whom shall I make my complaint. ====

====If there were no eternal consciousness in a debater, if at the bottom of everything there were only a wild ferment, a power that twisting in dark passions produced everything great or inconsequential; if an unfathomable, insatiable emptiness lay hid beneath everything, what would life be but despair? ====