From The Fear Of Death To Eternal Happiness

The Epicurean School is the first philosophical school in the Hellenistic era.Previous studies have regarded Epicurean "happiness" as the respective fulfillment of the soul and the body,which caused a break between the "fear of death" as soul pain and the "happiness" as desire satisfaction.Therapeutic view allows us to explore the organic relationship between "fear of death","desire" and "happiness" under a holistic framework,and makes improvements on this shortcoming.From a therapeutic perspective,the pursuing of happiness is,on the one hand,the process of treating "sickness",and on the other hand,is also the process of restoring the overall "health" of the body and mind.Therefore,the "fear of death",as the most significant disease,has become the starting point of happiness.Further analysis shows that the fear of death is actually a manifestation of the problem of desire,and the elimination of the fear of death requires the elimination of the empty desire behind it.The realization of happiness is a process of satisfying necessary desires,so finding the inner connection between necessary desires and empty desires becomes the key to problem solving.By clarifying the three-fold connotation of necessary desire,we have clarified the inner relationship between soul-level pain and necessary desire;through the understanding of the receptive nature of desire,we have seen the connection between empty desire and necessary desire: the essence of empty desire is polluted by false beliefs Necessary desires.Based on this,we realize that “fear of death” is related to the pain of the soul and the necessary desire;the reason behind the desire is empty because of the wrong understanding of immortality itself-the necessary desire is not the pursuit of “existence” "The immortality" or "the existence of immortality",but the "perceptual immortality" or "the feeling of immortality".The true happiness of those who fear death lies in satisfying the desire for an immortal happiness.Epicurus believes that this kind of immortal happiness can be experienced in static happiness.Static happiness is the self-sufficiency of physical and mental desires;it is a kind of non-temporal happiness,a kind of "god-like" happiness.As a result,we have realized the integration of "death fear","desire" and "happiness" from the perspective of therapeutic philosophy: death fear is the starting point for the pursuit of happiness and the manifestation of the problem of desire.Desire is the mechanism behind the fear of death and the basis for the realization of happiness.Happiness is the disappearance of the fear of death and the satisfaction of the eternal desire for happiness.