The first edition of the Journal “Signs of time” for the year 2023 brings about a series of author texts primarily occupied with issues pertaining to the philosophy of freedom, which was a suggested topic for the previous issue. The research paper with which we are opening the subject issue of the “Signs”, is signed by Žarko Paić, a philosopher and art theorist, who deals with interpretation of freedom as an event which is a condition of possibility of the total metaphysics and history as a whole. The author follows the issue of the occasion of freedom through fundamental modes of its manifestation, with which the totality of such a realization occurs as a sign of protest against every attempt at reducing man to matter/the object in times of post-human state presiding.
Furthermore, in an effort to further answer the question of what freedom is and where to look for it, Daniel Bučan considers the paradoxical elements of freedom itself, which in its essence, as the author shows, necessarily implies an inseparable attachment to a certain kind of overcoming the self. This will mean that freedom practically functions only in pair with that which is duty.
Elvis Fejzić is interested in the issue of political challenges of direct democracy through inquiry into fundamental determinants of libertarian politics and the associated understanding of freedom.
Referring to the post-structural theorists, primarily the thoughts of Nancy and Derride, Bernard Harbaš deals with understanding freedom in its non-conditionality, or rather as a possibility for every not-I, that there may be that which truly is, outside of every shape form of reciprocity.
In accordance with the set thematic framework, Asim Delibašić opens up the issue of relations between human freedom and moral prejudice in democratic societies showing that the very liberal moral system contains a type of paradox, where freedom is shown in its final form as a possibility of accepting a chosen, and not real choice, which brings into question the very concept of freedom as a realization of the highest possibilities of man.
Furthermore, following the movements in the process of understanding the concept of freedom in the intellectual tradition of Islam, Samedin Kadić brings a series of worthy interpretations, which demonstrate the specificity of such a disclosure of meaning, while primarily referring to several modern Muslim thinkers.
Mubina Moker brings to attention the interpretation of freedom as a precondition of every authentic belief, fundamentally structured on the principles of the Sufi worldview, showing how an essential realization of existence occurs only with a consciousness of transcendence.
Two papers follow which we are publishing as translations from the Persian language into Bosnian, albeit in the thematic framework. Namely, Reza Daveri in his paper Freedom and law explores the issue of fundamental forms of meaning and understanding the term freedom in the age of neoliberalism, while Seyyid Hamid Hashemi questions the line between freedom of speech as an inalienable form of human right and hate speech as a certain incitement to violence and the violation of the rights of others.
Outside of the thematic series on the philosophy of freedom, we bring about three papers, among which the first is signed by Esad Duraković, where in the context of what he calls “the openness of text”, he primarily deals with the possibility of sacralization of the ruling power, and he does this through the analysis of a specific Qur’anic ayah.
Shahab Yar Khan refers to the issue of post-colonialism as a characteristic type of fact which during the last decades appears as a specific “behavior of the mind”, which refers to the complexity of the colonizers relations and the active subjects of that relation. Finally, Sabahudin Šarić thematizes the issue of Islamophobia, following the development of a specific way of dealing with Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina and with that following the strengthening of of the right-wing discourse in Europe over the last couple of years. For the rubric “Book reviews” we bring about the reviews of the titles: Bosniaks before Challenges of Global Political Processes: Political Becoming of a Nation, by the author Admir Lisica, which is signed by Harun Nuhanović, as well as the review of Azra Medara, who in the form of a short draft, analyses the contents the Historical Dictionary of Sufism study by the author John Renard.
Rusmir Šadić