Is the death of Eduardo Campos a turning point?

By Luís Pellegrini, editor of Oasis magazine.

In Ancient Greece, whose culture gave rise to almost everything we are or aspire to be in terms of thinking beings, death was always understood and accepted as a sign of mutation, of a change in personal, social, or historical cycles. Perceived – in the same way as birth – as a natural phenomenon inherent to the very dynamics of existence, it was never seen as an "end," but rather as a necessary bridge to reach a new beginning. Therefore, as a "means." And for the Greeks, inventors of Western philosophy, the means were always far more important than the ends.

As wise men and women, whether ancient Greeks or from any other time, well know, there is no rebirth without a preceding death, whether real or symbolic. A death is always a sign that a new cycle must begin, and it is up to all who witness it to act so that the new cycle may take place.

This reflection is important and necessary at a time when all of us Brazilians are confronted with the sudden and premature death of a young politician who was a candidate for the supreme position of national citizenship, the Presidency of the Republic. Eduardo Campos was not just a young, intelligent, and brilliant politician, as everyone now refers to him. He represented, more and more each day, the possibility of the emergence in our country of a new breed of distinguished public figures, characterized not necessarily by saintliness – for politics is much more an arena of gladiators than a pantheon of saints – but rather by a joyful and almost naive enthusiasm, by an honest desire to change things, typical of idealists who do not yet fully understand the thickness of the barriers that attempt to impede the advancement of reforms and revolutions. We all know that great utopias have little chance of being realized. But idealists like Eduardo Campos are absolutely necessary, always, and especially when a nation falls into disrepute regarding the world of power, politics, and politicians in general. Can anyone honestly deny that this is happening here and now in Brazil?

Fate killed Eduardo Campos. Some commentators describe his sudden disappearance as a "stupid death." But one only needs to raise the scale of thought an octave to realize that no death is stupid. Every death holds a lesson, a message, a meaning that must be deciphered if we don't want to—as we have done so many times and continue to do—miss the opportunity to learn from the lessons that existence wants to teach us.

In the case of Brazil, to arrive at such an interpretation, it is necessary to begin by going to the root, to the very origin and basis of the national soul: the bodily, psychic, mental, and spiritual syncretism that characterizes us. This syncretism, whether we like it or not, is European-African-Indigenous. The orixá Olodumarê, the supreme lord of destiny, holds sway over it. Alongside him, acting as his faithful servant, is the orixá Exu, his messenger, the one in charge of carrying out Olodumarê's designs on Earth and among men.

Exu, whom the holy ignorance of Christian missionaries identified with the devil, is nothing more than the regulating arm of destiny. The principle of power that is activated every time the natural order of things is subverted and broken, and which acts – devoid of any compassionate consideration – to restore that order.

What causes the disruption of the natural order of things? First and foremost, arrogance, vanity, excess, and the loss of awareness of limits. All of these are perverse factors that Greek thought grouped under the same name: hubris.

Not only Brazilian politics, but the world as a whole, lives today under the aegis of hubris. Isn't it by chance a lack of awareness of limits that we are doing in squandering and polluting our own home, planet Earth? Isn't the model of civilization we have created, entirely based on the slavery of unsustainable productivity and consumerism, excessive? Isn't the Persian market that our political world has become, a veritable MMA ring where anything goes for the clash of all kinds of cronyism, agreements, and spurious and ill-advised alliances practiced by legions of politicians transformed into puppets of Gérson's Law, perhaps lined with arrogance?

It is part of the natural order of things, however, that a political career is almost synonymous with priesthood. In its original etymology, politics means: "The art or science of organizing, directing, and administering nations or states." Is it possible to conceive of the practice of this art or science in a way that is dissociated from the concept of Sacrum Officium, sacred office, signifying the submission of the desires of the personal ego to the needs of the common good?

When a sacred function in the world—be it that of a teacher, a doctor, a priest, or a public figure—is vilified and distorted, this constitutes a rupture of the natural order of things. This activates the power of Exu. The regenerative principle manifests itself, almost always violently and blindly, undoing in its blind fury things, values, and people that in one instant were whole and in the next turned to dust. This is the moment when, frequently, the innocent pay for the sinners...

This is the moment when the inexorable Olodumarê, in taking Eduardo Campos and what he represented from us, is perhaps trying to tell us: "Worldly ambitions, competitive impulses, the yearning for status, power or material possessions, all tend to dissipate when seen against the backdrop of potentially imminent death. It is as Carlos Castaneda wrote, describing the teachings of the yaki sorcerer Don Juan: "An immense amount of pettiness is abandoned when your death beckons or you glimpse it in a brief glance. (...) Death is the only wise advisor we possess."