Abstract

It is quite strange that a work whose author apparently deliberately avoided the term “human dignity” is today known under the title “Oration on the Dignity of Man”. In my contribution, I examine the extent to which the famous tract of Pico della Mirandola can be linked to the history of human dignity. This raises the fundamental question of what human dignity (for Pico) actually means. Pico’s famous text appears primarily as an ode to man’s capacity for transformation, which his freedom grants him. The image of the chameleon used by Pico - which is idiosyncratic in the context of his time - highlights this. His concern is a freedom of philosophising that does not impose any prohibitions on thinking even when dealing with other religions and thus seems radical for Pico’s time.