ABSTRACT
The final story is a sequel to the parable of the prodigal son in the Gospel of Luke, one set in the present. In it, the resentful and responsible brother kills his returning sibling. It shows that the prodigal son reaches the moment through the beauty of the father’s love; however, his brother reaches the moment only by confronting the horror of his fratricide. This illustrates an alternative reading of Arendt’s moment to the more orthodox one presented in Chapter 10. It develops a new face of Arendtian freedom that Arendt sporadically alluded to as the “freedom of the beautiful,” a delight, wonder or horror in appearance, that is a precondition for action, thought or judgment. The book ends by exploring the implications of this moment, a new vision of human freedom as reading appearance, for an aesthetic politics.
