Old Greek ideal of kalokagathia and its examples in the contemporary world. A reminiscence of the beautiful, good and wise associate professor – Halina Zdebska-Biziewska

Abstract

The crisis of traditional values in the contemporary world is becoming a serious social problem of global range. New values appear and displace the ones that we regard as timeless and universal. The values which were originally located in men involve the commonly known ones which are included in the basic categories of ethics – truth, goodness and beauty. Unfortunately, in present times, traditional values seem to lose to the unrefl ectively popular trend of success and being “cool”, fi t and trendy. More and more often, anxiety appears regarding shaping a type of a man of one dimension or a man of narrow specialisation or a man of a civilisation of death. Is the old Greek ideal of a versatile personality possible in the contemporary world, is it desired and where do we look for its embodied examples? The present work is an attempt to provide an answer to this question on the basis of the examples of the Polish “KalosKagathos” distinction as well as the versatile personality of HalinaZdebska-Biziewska (1960-2018).