Semantic Field: schema, figura, habitus

M.A. Screech Ecstasy and the Praise of Folly

In the Annotations on the New Testament he [Erasmus] points out that the original Greek word, schema, may be translated by habitus (state, condition) or by figura (fashion, structure).

I find this conjunction of terms very suggestive. The annotation is to a verse concerning the world and what passes away.

I Corinthians 7: 31: praeterit enim figura hujus mundi: ‘For the fashion of this world passeth away.’ He himself preferred to render the Greek not by figura but habitus.

Apart from the theme of what passes away, I am intrigued by the relations between figura and habitus as they may pertain to descriptions of acts of perception.

And so for day 546
11.06.2008

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