SHS

Introduction to the Philosophy of

the Human Person
Quarter 1 – Module 8
THE BODY AS LIMITATION
AND TRANSCENDENCE

1
Introduction to the Philosophy of the Human Person
Quarter 1- Module 8: THE BODY AS LIMITATION AND TRANSCENDENCE

Republic Act 8293, section 176 states that: No copyright shall subsist in
any work of the Government of the Philippines. However, prior approval of the
government agency or office wherein the work is created shall be necessary for
the exploitation of such work for a profit. Such agency or office may, among other
things, impose as a condition the payment of royalties.

Borrowed materials (i.e., songs, stories, poems, pictures, photos, brand

names, trademarks, etc.) included in this book are owned by their respective
copyright holders. Every effort has been exerted to locate and seek permission to
use these materials from their respective copyright owners. The publisher and
authors do not represent nor claim ownership over them.

Regional Director: Gilbert T. Sadsad

Assistant Regional Director: Jessie L. Amin
Regional EPS: Sheila C. Bulawan
Division EPS: Presyl A. Bello

Development Team of the Module

Writer: NEIL B. HUGO – Legazpi City Science HS, SDO Legazpi City
Editor: JESSIE MARIE MATA MORCOSO- Pawa HS, SDO Legazpi City
ALVIN A. SARIO, PhD - University of Santo Tomas, Legazpi
Reviewers: GERRY A. BAJARO - Oro Site HS, SDO Legazpi City
JESON D. BALINGBING - Pag-asa NHS, SDO Legazpi City
ROMEO A. TUSI - Pawa HS, SDO Legazpi City
ROMMEL U. QUIÑONES - Homapon HS, SDO Legazpi City
Illustrator: VIAN GABRIEL SPES B. QUINONES - Grade 7, Philippine
Science HS, Goa, Camarines Sur
Layout Artist:
Cover Photo: ROMEO ANDES TUSI- Pawa HS, SDO Legazpi City
INTRODUCTION
Life is a raw material. We are artisans. We can sculpt
our existence into something beautiful, or debase it into
ugliness. It’s in our hands.”
-Cathy Better

Our uncertainty about many things stems from our

limitation as human beings. Specifically, we learn that many of
our limitations are due to our being embodied beings. This
does not mean, however, that our bodies are merely
hindrances to our desires and aspirations. Just as much as our
bodies limit us, our bodies also enable us to create meaning in
the world. Hence, the body is both a source of limitation and possibility.

In this module, you will perform different activities that will help you better
understand and evaluate your own limitations and possibilities for transcendence.
Read, follow and accomplish the activities. Have a meaningful day!

OBJECTIVES
At the end of this module, you should be able to:
1. Explain how the human body imposes limits and possibilities
for transcendence
2. Distinguish the limitations and possibilities for transcendence

VOCABULARY
Now that you know your targets for the day, here are the new words
you will encounter in this module.
LIMITATION is restriction, lack of capacity, restrictive weakness.
POSSIBILITY is the thing that may happen given your condition and
circumstance.

TRANSCENDENCE refers to our ability to explore and surpass our

limits.

BODY is a material entity extended in space observable and measurable.

POTENTIAL is the ability of a person that may be developed that will lead to future
success.

1
PARADOX is a statement that brings together two opposing ideas as true at the
same time.
FREE WILL enables us to do actions whenever we want to do and make self-
determination possible. It is also the capacity to choose a course of action from
various alternative.
CONSEQUENCE is the result or effect of an action or condition.
“URAG” is A Bikol term which mean a kind of power, passion or energy emanating
from an individual.
SELF-AWARENESS refers to the person having a clear perception of oneself
including his or her thoughts, emotions, identity and action.
SELF-DETERMINATION refers to the awareness of ones action and the notion
that oneself is the source of action.

PRE-TEST
Appraise your prior knowledge about the topic. Read and
understand the following questions and write the answer in your
notebook.

1. Which of the following best describes the Bikol word for

“Urag”?

a. love
b. compassion
c. greed
d. focus

2. Which situation below best demonstrates transcendence?

a. Richie highlights her talents in values but resents her teacher’s feedback
about her reading comprehension.
b. Susan spends extra time in the tennis court to perfectly execute the single
back hand stroke.
c. Mel compares himself with others and resolves to imitate their way of
doing things.
d. Bernard believes that he knows himself better than his friends do so he
does not mind whatever they say about him.

3. Which situation below demonstrates self-determination?

a. Net compares himself with others and resolves to imitate their ways of doing
things.
b. Bernard believes that he knows himself better than his friends do, so he
does not really mind whatever they say about them.
c. Edgar helps others especially when requested to do so.
d. Ton understands that if he studies hard, he will get high grades and land a
good job.

2
4. Which of the following statements is true about self-awareness.

a. Marta denounces immorality by revealing an illicit affair between two

married co-worker publicly.
b. Jun expressed his passion for fairness in labor practice by leading a union
strike.
c. I am a student of Legazpi City Science High School.
d. Cess secretly nurtures her love for a married man, and decided later to
overcome her feelings for him.

5. Which is not an expression of free will?

a. study the lessons

b. go to sleep
c. shotgun marriage
d. watch movie

LEARNING ACTIVITY 1
One of the things done during the community quarantine or
lock down because of the COVID 19 was to watch favorite
action movie or read a favorite novel. The millennials
enjoyed watching their favorite superheroes. In your
notebook draw a table, as shown below, of at least 5
superheroes and their heroic acts from movies you
watched. Share what heroic acts the superhero did that
makes him/her distinct from other superheroes.

Name of the Superhero Heroic Act

Movies about superheroes are watched because they narrate amazing

abilities which an ordinary person cannot do. Superman can fly. Iron man can
escape an explosion. These are superhuman abilities. Aside from the effects
experienced while watching the movie, how the director conceptualized and
imagined the whole story amazes the audience. The story of Superman was

3
conceptualized during the 1930’s when Mafia-led crimes were rampant in America.
Americans love Superman because of their desire for a safe society.

Bicolanos have their own superheroes celebrated every August, during the
Ibalong Epic festival. They are Baltog, Handyong and Bantong. The furious Baltog
chased the Tandayag (wild boar) who destroyed the crops of the Ibalong. He killed
it with his bare hands. Because of this marvelous feat, he was acknowledged chief
of the local hunters. Handyong, the central figure in the Epic, cleared the land of
predatory monsters, inspired inventions like boat making, reintroduced agriculture,
and set up code of laws and established golden age in the land. Bantong, a good
friend of Handyong, killed the half man and half beast named Rabot who could
change its enemies into rocks. Because of the presence of these men there is
peace in the land.

What is interesting in these superheroes’ stories is how they project

superhuman abilities at the same time reveal the limitations seen in everyday
existence. Ordinary persons only have a certain amount of strength to carry things
or to accomplish tasks. Accidents cannot be prevented entirely, no matter how
careful one is. One could only move as fast as he could from one place to another.
Despite all advances in technology, no one can ever reverse the course of time.
These are some of the limitations of embodied beings.

Human existence is an embodied existence. Many things that are related to

the existence of a person are related to the body – age, sex, race, relationships,
etc. Birthdays are counted to determine age from the time one is born into this
world. Parents didn’t count the child’s age from the time they fantasized on having
the child. Age count begins as soon as the embodied existence, not imagined
existence, began. The body one is born with also determines the sex. (Gender is
not completely synonymous with sex. Gender is defined culturally rather than
biologically). Race or the line of descent among the groups of the first human
beings in the evolution is determined by the body. Finally, biological relationships
– mother, father and siblings – are connected to embodied existence. In other
words, a large part of who the person is and how the person defines himself/herself
is determined and delineated by the body. The details written in bio-data are not
things one can simply choose or change – birthday, age, sex, and familial
relationships, lest falsifying of information about oneself will happen. In this sense,
one is confined to these details about oneself. Confine comes from the Latin word
confinis made of two words: Con – ‘together’ + finis – ‘end, limit or territory’. It is as
if bodies are made up of fixed boundaries that cannot be transgressed.

On limitation, the body-related aspects are not products of free choice. They
have, in a sense, been given in a permanent basis. It then comes as no surprise
that the body is the source of frustration to many. Some people are not happy with
their age, sex, or familial relationship. Some people wish that they were born at a

4
different time, of a different sex, or a different family. Frustration of this kind put the
body in a negative light as if it is some form of imprisonment (Corpuz, et.al. 2016).

LEARNING ACTIVITY 2

The five-minute pause provides a chance for you to stop,

reflect on the concepts and ideas that have just read, make
connections to your prior knowledge or experience, and try to
evaluate its content.

List down at least 5 achievements What did you do to achieve them?

that you have right now.

Processing Questions:
1. Which achievement clearly shown my limitation?
2. Of the ways I did to have such achievements, which one do I value most?
Why?
3. What have I learned from the activity?

The Body as Transcendence

There is an important paradox about the body that we need to understand.

While the body limits us, the very same limitations create opportunities for us. We
Bikolanos have the term “URAG”. Wilmer Joseph Tria a Professor in Ateneo de
Naga University discusses in brief the word “urag”. It is a blind energy that prompt
us to action. He narrates:

An gabos na tawo igwa nin urag (Ing. ‘drive’, ‘passion’) o puluspugos. An

prinsipyong ini sarong klase nin kusog, nin isog, nin enerhiya na gikan sa tawo.
5
Ini an nagbubugtak sa tawo sa sarong aksyon. Alagad, an prinsipyong ini mayo
kan kaipuhan na direksyon. Mayo siya nin mata, nin paghiling, nin pakasabot. Siya
sarong butang kakayahan. Siring siya sa sarong aking nagpaparaurag-urag huli ta
dae nya nakukua an saiyang gusto. Igwa nin enerhiya, alagad mayo nin
padumanan”(2009).

Everyone has urag (a drive). This is a kind of power, passion or energy

emanating from an individual. This propels him/her to certain movements.
However, it lacks a sense of direction. It does not have eyes, a sense of vision nor
understanding. It is a blind ability. It is like a child, restless and persistent because
it cannot get what it wants. It is a strong prompting, but it is aimless (Translated by
M.C. Jaucian, 2020)

The “URAG” is a blind energy, it lacks a sense of direction, vision nor

understanding. The body needs somebody who will tame the energy, a visionary
and a reason. Philosophers point to another unseen aspect of human person
which along with the body defines us as a person. That is the soul. It enables us to
exercise thought, possess awareness, interiority and the capacity to reach out to
the outside world and other person. (Abella 2016). We can conclude that a person
is compose of Body and Soul, an Embodied Soul.

The Body and soul come together to form a whole as a person. I give us
self-awareness. Self-awareness refers to the person having a clear perception of
oneself, including his or her thoughts, emotions, identity, and action. It also enables
a person to reach out to other person and establish a meaningful relationship with
them. (Abella, 2016). This gives us an idea that we are different from others even
we are twins. Soul gives us also self-determination. This refers to the awareness
of one’s actions and the notion that oneself is the source of action. It also gives us
free will and awareness of its consequences. This gives us the reason why we
need to wear a mask when we are outside of our homes. Why we need to follow
the IATF – COVID 19 rules and regulations and strictly observe the safety
protocols.

Your simple achievement cannot be achieved without your body. Taming

your body creates an opportunity, thus it focuses on your life goal. We are directed
to transcend to our body’s limitation. Because of this limitations, you are opened to
the possibility of learning something new.

Athletes would understand best what this paradox of the body as limitation
and possibility means. The best athletes we know today – Manny Pacquiao, Hidilyn
Diaz, Roger Federer, Michael Phelps – are bound together by a common story. All
of them have been subjected to rigorous training at a very young age. Pacquiao’s
first coach Sardo Mejia shares how Manny has been so disciplined with his training
at the age of 15. He would always wake up at 4 am to jog. Every day was a difficult

6
day of subjecting the body to exhausting and painful exercises. He knew he was
small, compared to all the other boxers who grew up in the West. In the world of
boxing, this can be a source of limitation, but Manny used his limitation as an
opportunity to define boxing in a new way. Because of him, boxing became less
about the bulk of one’s muscles or the might of height. It became more the
phenomenal experience of watching the beautiful unity of hand, foot, and the head
work.

DEEPENING
The Paradox of Possibility in Limitation

We often complain that we cannot be everything we want to be. In this

lesson, the paradox of the body as both limitation and possibility teach us to be
thankful that we cannot be everything, because trying to be so would end us up
being nothing at all. This is a paradox. A paradox is a statement that brings together
two opposing ideas as true at the same time. In the outset, a paradox seems
senseless or absurd. Upon closer look, however, the contradiction is sending a
very powerful message. “It is through our limitations that possibilities become real.”

To illustrate, we use the analogy of a potter. He scoops mud from the floor
and mixes it with water and makes the clay, throws it into a potter’s wheel and with
his firm and gentle hands, shapes it as he wishes. What the potter does is put a
form to the shapeless clay. But this entails putting boundaries and limits to the free
and shapeless clay. Without those limits, the mud may just as well be nothing, a
shapeless entity spread out on the ground for stepping on.

The same is true of the limitation of the body. Even if we complain about our
age, height, race or sex, we must not fail to understand that these are the limits
that enable us to create our own unique identity. We may not be everything, but
we have to start with something in order to make our existence count in the world.

Human existence is embodied existence. We are not angels. We have

bodies. Many things that are related to our existence as human beings are related
to our bodies that limit us in many ways. So we have to take care of our bodies.

Our limitations are due to our being embodied beings. This does not mean,
however, that our bodies are merely hindrances to our desires and aspirations.
Just as much as our bodies limit us, our bodies also enable us to create meaning
in the world. Hence, the body is both a source of limitation and possibility.

APPLICATION
Take some time to look at your body in front of the mirror.
Identify those parts you like most about your body. Identify
those parts you hate the most. Write everything down in a
tabulated form – one column for likes, another for dislikes.

7
 Now focus on the column of dislikes. For each item you
write, focus on the things that you won’t be able to do or
miss if that body part is lost, destroyed or severely injured.
Write at least one for each body part you dislike.

Going back to the same column of dislikes, think of your achievements and
ask yourself whether or not those achievements were possible to achieve even
though the body parts you dislike were injured or permanently destroyed.

Finally, think of all of your dreams and aspirations. Ask yourself if it is

possible to achieve those dreams and aspirations if your disliked body part was
injured or permanently destroyed.

After asking yourself these questions, write a letter of reconciliation in your

journal addressing your body expressing everything you feel about it.

POST TEST

Read and understand the following questions and write the answer
in your notebook.

1. Which situation below demonstrate self-determination?

a. Bernard believes that he knows himself better than his friends better than
his friends do, so he does not really mind whatever they say about them.

8
 b. Net compares himself with others ans resolves to immitate their ways of
doing things.
c. Edgar helps others especially when requested to do so.
d. Ton understand that if he study hard, he will get high grades and land a
good job.

2. Which of the following statement is true about self-awareness.

a. I am a student of Legazpi City Science High School.

b. Jun expressed his passion for fairness in labor practice by leading a union
strike.
c. Marta denounces immorality by revealing an illicit affair between two
married co-worker publicly.
d. Cess secretly nurtures her love for a married man, and decided later to
overcome her feelings for him.

3. Which is not an expression of Free will?

a. go to sleep
b. shotgun marriage
c. study the lessons
d. watch movie

4. Which situation below demonstrates transcendence?

a. Mel compares himself with others and resolves to imitate their way of doing
things.
b. Richie highlights her talents in values and resents her teacher’s feedback
about her reading comprehension
c. Susan spends extra time in the tennis court just to perfectly execute the
single back hand stroke.
d. Bernard believes that he knows himself better than his friends do, so he
does not really mind whatever they say about him.

5. Which of the following best describe the Bikol word for “Urag”?

a. greed
b. compassion
c. love
d. focus

9
ASSIGNMENT
Explore your own possibilities for transcendence. Copy and fill out the table with
the appropriate responses.

I want to be… I can achieve this by…

I want to do the following… I can make this happen by…

10
Answer Key
Pre-Test
1. C
2. B
3. D
4. C
5. C

Post-Test

1. D
2. A
3. B
4. C
5. A

REFERENCES

Abella R. D. (2016). Introduction to the philosophy of the human person. Araneta

Avenue, Quezon City. Vibal Group, Inc.

Corpuz B. B. et al. (2016). Introduction to the philosophy of the human person.

Cubao, Quezon City. Lorimar Publishing House, Inc.

Gonzalvo R. P. (2016). Philosophy of the human person. Intramuros, Manila.

Mindshapers Co., Inc.

Palmiano D. A. (2015). Philosophy of the human person. Pili, Camarines Sur.

Prince Chariel Publishing House.

Maboloc C. R. B. (2013). Philosophy of man: the existential drama fundamental

topics and thinkers. Quezon City. Rex Printing Press.

https://www.google.com/search?q=clip+art+design+for+teachers&client=firefox-b-

https://www.google.com/search?q=clip+art+for+books+and+reading&client=firefo
x-b-

https://www.google.com/search?sxsrf=ALeKk00Zx8ijqdVi693sj6-

https://www.google.com/search?q=clip+art+teacher&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=AL

https://www.google.com/search?sxsrf=ALeKk03RMtjP4Fa3r1vm_ldB7PqsHDM-
9w

11