Le commencement n'est pas derrière nous, mais devant nous

Visage félin gravé dans une caverne mésolithique perdue dans une forêt d'Ile-de-France. Photo: Pierre-Olivier Combelles. Montage: Kristina Peña Olano.

Le commencement est encore. II ne se trouve pas derrière nous comme ce qui a été il y a bien longtemps ; tout au contraire, il se tient devant nous. En tant que ce qu'il y a de plus grand, le commencement est passe d'avance au-dessus de tout ce qui allait venir, et ainsi déjà au-dessus de nous-mêmes, pour aller loin au-devant. Le commencement est allé faire irruption dans notre avenir : il s'y tient comme la lointaine injonction à nous adressée d'en rejoindre à nouveau la grandeur.

Martin Heidegger, Discours du Rectorat (1933)
http://www.la-philosophie.fr/article-17768771.html

 

Both Aymara and Mäori refer to the past as the time before us and the future as the time behind us.

In Mäori, the phrase i ngā wā o mua, literally the time before us refers to the idea that tikanga, correct traditions [from tika, correct] are handed to us from the past as part of an unbroken chain which, if we take the time to follow it, will lead us all the way back to the creation. The past is not a mystery, it is something that we can see, whereas the future, which is yet to come, is unpredictable, and as hard to see as something behind us.  

In Aymara, qhipa pacha translates as behind time, which to speakers of English seems like the past, but which to the Aymara translates as the future, whereas nayra pacha, front time, refers to the past. In Aymara this understanding of time has even affected the body language of its speakers - Aymara speakers will often gesture forwards when talking about the back and point backwards when talking about the future.

The Selchie Warrior 

http://pocombelles.over-blog.com/taonga.html