A New Beginning and the Wisdom of the Past: Why the Greek Classics are Still Relevant

Along with millions of people around the world, I, too, watched as President-elect Barack Obama graciously thanked the American people for voting him into the highest office in the land. His was an inspiring message of change and hope; in a sweeping estimation of the work ahead, Barack Obama's words resounded and reached us as distinct individuals, we singled out those words more relevant to each one of us.

As Greece's Ambassador to the United States, representing the world's first democracy in the world's current most powerful democracy, some of his words spoke particularly to me, when he said that America's "true strength... comes not from the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals".

Considering the man, I was not surprised to hear him speak these words, reminiscent of the writings of one ancient Greek in particular, Isocrates, one of Greece's greatest orators. In his oration "On Peace", Isocrates proposes to the Athenian assembly policies for lasting peace with their neighbors. Along with suggestions, it is also recorded in the most relevant and timeless handbook, Thucydides' "History of the Peloponnesian Wars," written some 2,500 years ago. From this timeless text, one can draw lessons on how to treat allies, how to prepare for war, on the value of good advisors, warnings as to the arrogance, as well as the limits of power.

One of the most important lessons in this oration is that justice and interest, two seemingly irreconcilable concepts, are not mutually exclusive. Isocrates argues that justice, while making us better individuals, better nations, is at the same time a means of protecting one's self interest; power without justice leads to ill repute; power without justice will not win allies. He asserts that maintenance of power presupposes the existence of justice.

Thus, he tells the Athenians "We must be willing to treat our allies as we would our friends... and not exercise our leadership as masters but as helpers." "So we shall not lack allies... and shall find many ready and willing to join their forces with our own. For what city or what men will not be eager to share our friendship and our alliance when they see that we are at once the most just and the most powerful of peoples?"

I am not, nor do I pretend to be a classicist, and I confess that my first exposure to the classics wasn't even voluntary; I am Greek, after all, and studying the ancient Greeks was part and parcel of my basic education, from which I have drawn inspiration and counsel; valid and valuable today. Yet, it wasn't until my adult life that I recognized the value of this gift.

The Greeks were the first to explore most of the questions that continue to concern thinkers to this day, as they strive to understand, in logical, rational terms, both the universe and the position of men and women in it. Their speculating on society and the human beings gave birth to philosophy and science, eventually introducing the very concept of politics, and ultimately democracy.

The Founding Fathers of the United States, avid readers of Plato, Aristotle, and Greek history as recorded by Thucydides, Plutarch and Xenophon, looked to history for lessons for the future. From the classics, they drew inspiration, but also sought the key to protecting America against the pitfalls that weakened Greek city-states and rendered them vulnerable. The Federalist Papers themselves are testament to the lessons the Founding Fathers drew from the ancient Greeks. In these Papers, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton warned against tyrants who undid the liberties of republics, and sought ways to inoculate the United States from conspiracies, giving rise to the checks and balances of government. Legend has it that Thomas Jefferson carried his Greek grammar book with him wherever he went.

The very concept of public service, so highly regarded in the United States, whether in politics or as community volunteer, has its beginnings in ancient Athens. In his famous Funeral Oration, Pericles expounds on opportunity and prestige of serving your country, your society, presenting it as reward rather than an obligation:

...when a citizen is in any way distinguished, he is preferred to the public service, not as a matter of privilege, but as the reward of merit. Neither is poverty an obstacle, but a man may benefit his country whatever the obscurity of his condition. There is no exclusiveness in our public life...

The value of the Greek classics was not lost on another great man, Martin Luther King Jr. As a young man, with my own country under the heavy hand of a dictatorship, the news of Martin Luther King's death reached me across the Atlantic and his words sounded more relevant.

Dr. King's "Letter From Birmingham Jail" of April 16, 1963, expounding upon his own theory of civil disobedience to his fellow clergymen, his words "I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment... is in reality expressing the highest respect for law" brought to mind Antigone, a reluctant but inevitably brave heroine, in Sophocles' namesake play, who said: "I will not obey an unjust law, and if something happens because of it -- so be it." Classics Professor Lewis Sussman from the University of Florida has written extensively on this connection.

Proof of the inspiration that Dr. King imparted from the classics is ample in the last speech of his life, which resounded around the world only the day before his assassination in Memphis on April 3, 1968, "I've Been to the Mountaintop":

I would take my mental flight by Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there. I would move on by Greece, and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality.

In my capacity as ambassador, as involved negotiator in issues of concern to my country, particularly today with wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, conflicts in many other regions, with challenges of climate change, terrorism, an economic crisis, I recognize the value of the Greek classics, of Thucydides, of Isocrates, of Xenophon.

On preparing for war, Isocrates counsels:

base our preparations against an enemy on the assumption that his plans are sound; indeed, it is right to rest our hopes not on a belief in his blunders, but on the soundness of our provisions... We must not rest our hopes of safety upon the blunders of our enemies but upon our own management of affairs and upon our own judgment.

And in the ancient plays of "Trojan Women", "The Persians" and "Lysistrata," the victors, not the defeated, talk of the evils of war, on the inhumane prize on individuals, in an effort to reign in the arrogance of power, as they recognize the down-side of their own policies and actions.

On the value of good advisors, Isocrates counsels again "The first way improve the condition of our state is to select as our advisers on affairs of state the kind of men whose advice we should desire on our private affairs".

Restoring the Politics of Measure (Metron) Ancient Greeks recognized that man is but a small part of a greater whole, of an interrelated system of checks and balances, which they knew they must tread with moderation, paying the price when they didn't. It is no coincidence that the protagonist, the hero, in all ancient Greek plays, paid a dear price for hubris, for arrogance, for aiming to reach beyond the limits of humanity. Today, we must remind ourselves that the safety of the world rests upon the realization that our fates are intertwined in a relation that requires balance and equilibrium, a blend of harmony, based on the essence of measure, of metron. Many of the global challenges we face today, whether it is climate change and global warming, or the gap between the haves and the have nots, or the appalling lack of human rights in many regions, even human trafficking, are due to the absence of these qualities

But with few exceptions, thinkers and leaders have always considered the classics a basic tool of analysis, of understanding the sound criteria for decision-making in politics, diplomacy and geostrategy.

I am given hope by the fact that the significance of these great texts has permeated many levels and aspects of our global society today; the great number of non-academic books continuously being published are evidence to me that the classics are no longer simply food for ivory tower intellectuals, but that they are entering the mainstream of society and politics, as food for thought, as the tools for living "an examined life".

Comments

[kylennblack]

It makes me wonder, did Churchill ever read about Themistocles - brilliant strategist who led the Athenians to one of their greatest victories against the Persians but whose hubris later led to him being ousted and sent into exile.

It it amazes me that a virtual on-the-fly decision to tame a mob and save his own political skin - Cleisthenes allowing Athenian citizens the right to vote on issues - would have a massive impact more than 2500 years later. It goes to show that sometimes, perhaps often, a brilliant, history-changing idea isn't the product of a deeply thought out, far-reaching ideal but a quick decision made in the moment. I have to wonder what Cleisthenes would think of the congresses and parliaments from all around today's world that owe their origins to him.

And poor Socrates, a voice of reason in opposing a war that later does not go well and is sentenced to death as a scapegoat (his opposition weakened their resolve, they said). Poor Cindy Sheehan and Dixie Chicks for getting the hemlock treatment by the Bush Administration and in the press for being "unpatriotic."

[Dap]

"There is only one good, knowledge, and one evil, ignorance"
Socrates

[beaupritchard]

Brings back memories ... I wrote my first college essay on Thucydides' "History of the Peloponnesian Wars," ...

[longislandlol]

God bless the Greeks -the forerunners of our Democracy--- can our schools forget the dismal no child left behind- an offer the Classics?

[kylennblack]

Yes, please!

I got a smattering of Greek classics when I was in school: a bit of ancient Greek history folded into world history (mainly focusing on names, dates and wars; little about Athenian life), a brief bit on Greek democracy before rushing on to the Magna Carta in US history class, and read the Odyssey in high school literature.

Other than going out of my way to take a quarter of Greek language in college, that was it.

It wasn't until relatively recently that I picked up the Iliad, read the Histories of Herodotus cover to cover and dug into the works of the luminaries listed in the essay above. I'm upset that I didn't get more than a basic introduction in public school and I'm angrier still that I got more exposure than most.

[rbenjamin]

Mr. Ambassador, your ancestors required commanders in chief to lead from the front rank of the phalanx. Losing generals didn't just lose prestige. I can't help but feel that the Iraq unpleasantness would never have happened if the US had only followed the equivalent custom.

[Hoelder]

I applaud you, ambassador. Greek philosophy, literature and history has witnessed the rise and the fall of empires in asking basic question about society, our relationship to nature, each other and divine forces. Disregarding its' accomplishments set the path to incessant human suffering. Unfortunately education omits these experience from curricula around the world's school systems. Thank you.

[OldPete]

What a wonderful post. I have just forwarded it to every thinking person I know.

Maybe we're entering a time when the thoughtful, deep-thinking public intellectual is back, and we can put an end to the "gut-check", anti-intellectual, alternative reality world of Bush/Cheney/Rove.


Thankyou for your thoughts, Ambassador Mallias.

[krisgarfield]

How I wish the American public school system will one day (after the trauma of the past eight years) start teaching the basic fundamentals of Greek philosophy to grade schoolers. I hope the Obama presidency will inspire people to introduce themselves to the Philosophers of all cultures. If he turns out to be the "Philosopher King" we so desperately need, perhaps we as a society will look inward resulting with becoming world citizens who promote well being to all others (that's what Stoicism is about).

"Human good turns out to be activity of soul in accordance with virtue, in accordance with the best and most complete". - Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics

[teacheng]

I heartily agree, Mr. Ambassador.

[Social Construct]

Excellent, Mr. Ambassador. Of all the great thinkers that have contributed to the evolution of the Western Society, it is the ancient Greeks that give it all the profoundest of meaning. Like Jefferson, with careful editing of the Ancients' teachings, being careful to extract contemporary relevance from outside the social mores of their time, we result in the very foundation of who we are and where we need to go. With few exceptions, none that followed captured the purity of the essence of power and the balances within to exert it.

[kemstone]

That was beautiful. A combination of two of the things I love most: philosophy and politics. I always appreciate anyone who can so eloquently put the events of the day in a broader historical, philosophical perspective, and this is about as broad as it can get!

[Jakealoper]

Wonder what those ancient Greeks would have said about Obama, given his sense of grandeur, arrogance and simplistic assumptions that he can deal with anyone reasonablly

[Garioch]

Probably very little as they would have been smart enough to see that he has said or indicated nothing of the sort.

[Zenith1959]

The "right of center people" are both funny and sad at the same time.

[spotter]

Author writes:

"And in the ancient plays of "Trojan Women", "The Persians" and "Lysistrata," the victors, not the defeated, talk of the evils of war, on the inhumane prize on individuals, in an effort to reign in the arrogance of power, as they recognize the down-side of their own policies and actions."

Gotta ask - does he mean "reign in the arrogance of power" or "rein in the arrogance of power?" two
very different meanings...

[marignymitch]

Ambassador Mallias:

Thanks for sharing. I have sent links to your essay to friends of mine who might have missed it on HuffPo.

[patmos68]

After 8 years our country has returned to its democratic roots. At last we can rid ourselves of the petty tyrants that sought to trample our constitution and loose the worlds respect.