The good, the wicked, the submissive, the rebellious, the sad, the happy, the homeless, the refugee, the orphan, the bereaved, the hungry, the cold, the lover, the unemployed, the enslaved, the oppressed, the yearning, the gloating, the spiteful, the hater, the lover, the criminal, the altruist, the weak, the strong, the ambitious, the contented, the noble, the lowly, the oppressor, the oppressed, the pessimistic, the optimistic, the indifferent, the alienated, the objectifier, the dissolute, the absurd, the generous, the miserly, the fighter, the opportunist, the ignorant, the learned, the racist, the tolerant, the pretender, the liar, the honest, the concealer, the believer, the infidel, the atheist, the beautiful, the ordinary, the familiar, the surprising, the writer, the reader, and the contemplator are the true sources of the great questions of philosophy, of the philosophy of values, life, death, and destiny. Indeed, philosophy arose from thinking about the problems of people’s daily lives, from the never-ending historical determinations of human existence.

The philosopher is the only one concerned with all these determinations of being, without anyone charging him with that. And because he is always preoccupied with this being and its determinations based on his personal mind, exposing, revealing, and understanding, the general mind, asleep in the bed of illusory certainties, quickly builds a hostile and aggressive relationship with philosophy and the philosopher, with those he thinks about, with their reality and their destiny.

The good, the wicked, the submissive, the rebellious, the sad, the happy, the homeless, the refugee, the orphan, the bereaved, the hungry, the cold, the lover, the unemployed, the enslaved, the oppressed, the yearning, the gloating, the spiteful, the hater, the lover, the criminal, the altruist, the weak, the strong, the ambitious, the contented, the noble, the lowly, the oppressor, the oppressed, the pessimistic, the optimistic, the indifferent, the alienated, the objectifier, the dissolute, the absurd, the generous, the miserly, the fighter, the opportunist, the ignorant, the learned, the racist, the tolerant, the pretender, the liar, the honest, the concealer, the believer, the infidel, the atheist, the beautiful, the ordinary, the familiar, the surprising, the writer, the reader, and the contemplator are the true sources of the great questions of philosophy, of the philosophy of values, life, death, and destiny. Indeed, philosophy arose from thinking about the problems of people’s daily lives, from the never-ending historical determinations of human existence.

The philosopher is the only one concerned with all these determinations of being, without anyone charging him with that. And because he is always preoccupied with this being and its determinations based on his personal mind, exposing, revealing, and understanding, the general mind, asleep in the bed of illusory certainties, quickly builds a hostile and aggressive relationship with philosophy and the philosopher, with those he thinks about, with their reality and their destiny.

Before we begin searching for an answer to that relationship that we have titled (We and Enlightenment), I will pause at what seems at first glance to be something that does not require consideration. I mean the separate subject pronoun, which indicates a group’s awareness of itself, in that “we” is the plural of “I.” Just as the pronoun “I” refers to both masculine and feminine, so too the pronoun “we” refers to both masculine and feminine plurals. When a group, or someone who has chosen to represent it without being assigned to do so, uses the pronoun “we,” this means that they have an awareness of an identity that makes them belong to the group (from the nation to the group), and they have an awareness of what the members of the group have in common.

But the speaking ego cannot possess the characteristics of a group, and a group that shares a characteristic cannot be a collection of similar individuals. Therefore, when the ego asks, “Who are we?”, it declares its affiliation with the “we” it refers to.

“We” here in the question form are the inhabitants of the region extending from the ocean to the Gulf, with its Arab majority and various minorities. The inhabitants of the Arab region, with their classes and groups, their countries and regions, their religions, sects and denominations, with their contradictions and differences.