Josef Pieper's Leisure: The Basis Of Culture

Josef Pieper (1904-1997) was a German, Catholic philosopher who wrote Leisure: The Basis of Culture. He wanted people to understand the actual value and importance of leisure and it means to philosophize. Pieper believes that philosophy is taking a step beyond work. Is thinking in depth and critical about things. He relates it to a state of freedom, or not having to work. Is the act of thinking on your free time. For Pieper to philosophize is to act in such a way that one steps out of the workaday world. He mentioned: “It means to experience the fact that our immediate surroundings, prescribes as they are by the aims and need of life, not only can be, but must be broken in upon, by the disturbing call of the “world”, of the whole and the everlasting and essential images of things mirrored by reality” (Pieper ). It is having a “free knowledge” where people can think in depth on whatever they want and gain knowledge for their own sake. People usually philosophize in their free time. I think that is is something that people break their daily routines to do. Like for example, when they get out of work and sit to wonder things. When people wonder because they do not know what is behind it all,

Philosophy is the act of stepping out the workaday world. Is having time just for your self to think and analyze things. People withdraw from the currently accepted meaning of something and think beyond what they already know. Some people actually enjoyed a lot doing this and that is why Pieper first related it to leisure. For some people it is just a way of freeing the mind. The Merriam-Webster online dictionary states that leisure is the time when you are not working: time when you can do whatever you want to do. To philosophize in their leisure time, is to do what you like. In my opinion, philosophy is continuous search for wisdom that starts by wondering about things in which we find