--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Andrew Jarrette" <anjarrette@...> wrote:
>
>
The meaning 'eternity' is fundamentally just an
> exaggeration of the idea of 'a whole lifetime', since again of course
> no one can experience eternity, only his own lifetime.
>
On second thought I don't like that word "exaggeration", a poor choice
of words. Better words might be "magnification", "extrapolation",
"derivation". In case you object to the association of "lifetime"
with "vitality", both are closely related to the basic idea of "life",
which for example means "lifetime" in English when one says "a life
sentence" or when the Queen said she accepted her duty "for life", and
which on the other hand means "animating principle, vital energy" when
one says "to breathe life into something/someone" or figuratively when
saying "this place has no life" and in the derivative "lively". The
association between these three meanings is so obvious (they are all
covered by the one word 'life'), and further to "eternity", I can't
see why you don't buy
the association between "young" (full of the vigour of life) and
"eternity" (the longest time one can experience, which is a lifetime)
whether in PIE (and I'm not sure whether the meaning "eternity" is of
PIE age) or today.
Andrew