Category Archives: Weekend Updates

The Bottom of the Mountain

by Dave Mathwin

“Whatever we may think of Alexander–whether Great or only lucky, a civilizer or a sociopath–most people do not regard him as a religious leader. And yet religion permeated all aspects of his career.”

This opening line of the book blurb for F.S. Naiden’s Soldier, Priest, and God: A Life of Alexander the Great, sucked me right in. I too had viewed Alexander nearly solely through a narrow political and moral lens, and had never really considered his religious views and acts as central to his successes and failures. The book was too long for me. I would have preferred if he assumed reader knowledge of the standard elements of the Alexander narrative. But what Naiden draws out from his expertise in ancient religious rituals helps us see Alexander afresh in certain ways.

Historians tend to think about Alexander along three standard deviations:

  • Great visionary and magnificent strategist, one of the truly “Great Men” that, naturally, and tragically, few could truly follow
  • Fantastic military leader with flawed political skills. After Gaugemela in 331 B.C., his political skills become more necessary than his military skills, and so his fortune waned and his decisions got worse
  • A thug and barbarian who lived for the chase and the kill. He never really changed, or “declined,”–he always was a killer and remained so until his death.

Soldier, Priest, and God tries to bypass all of these paradigms, though touches on each in turn. Naiden’s Alexander is a man who mastered much of the trappings and theater of Greek religion, which included

  • The hunt
  • Prowess in battle
  • A religious bond with his “Companions,”–most of whom were in the elite cavalry units.
  • Responding properly to suppliants

As he entered into the western part of the Persian empire, i.e., Asia Minor, he encountered many similar kinds of religious rituals and expectations. The common bonds and expectations between he and his men could hold in Asia Minor. But the religious terrain changed as Alexander left Babylon (his experience in Egypt had already put some strain between he and his men, but it could be viewed as a “one-off” on the margins), and he had to adopt entirely new religious forms and rituals to extend his conquest.

Here, Naiden tacitly argues, we have the central reason for Alexander’s failures after the death of Darius. Some examples of Naiden’s new insights . . .

Alexander’s men did not want to follow him into India-they wanted to go home. Some view this in “great man” terms–his men could not share Alexander’s vision. Some view this in political/managerial terms–his army signed on to punish Persia for invading Greece. Having accomplished this, their desire to return was entirely natural and “contractual.” Naiden splits the horns of this dilemma, focusing on the religious aspects of their travels east.

Following Alexander into the Hindu Kush meant far fewer spoils for the men. Some see the army as purely selfish here–hadn’t Alexander already made them rich? But sharing in the spoils formed a crucial part of the bonds of the “Companions.” The Companions were not just friends, as Philip had created a religious cult of sorts of the companions. It wasn’t just that going further east would mean more glory for Alexander and no stuff for his men. It meant a breaking of fellowship and religious ritual. This, perhaps more so than the army being homesick, or tired, led to Alexander having to turn back to Babylon.

Alexander killed Philotas for allegedly taking part in a conspiracy against him. Others see this as either Alexander’s crass political calculus, or a sign of megalomania, or paranoia. Naiden sees this action in religious terms.

  • Philotas was a Companion. To execute him on the flimsy grounds Alexander possessed could amount to oath-breaking by Alexander, a dangerous religious precedent. “Companionship” bound the two together religiously, not just fraternally.
  • Philotas did not admit his guilt but presented himself as a suppliant to Alexander and asked for mercy. True–not every suppliant had their request granted, but Philotas fit the bill of one who should normally have his request met.

Killing Philotas, and subsequently Philotas’ father Parmenio (likely one of the original Companions under Philip), should be seen through a religious lens and not primarily psychologically (Alexander is going crazy) or politically (politics is a dirty business, no getting around it, etc.).

We also get additional perspective on the death of Cleitus the Black. We know that he was killed largely because of the heavy drinking engaged by all during a party. We know too that Cleitus had in some ways just received a promotion. Alexander wanted him to leave the army, stay behind and serve as a governor/satrap of some territory. Why then was Cleitus so upset? Naiden points out that Alexander had not so much promoted Cleitus, but made him a subject of himself, as well as exiling him from the other Companions. The Companions shared in the spoils equally, and addressed each other as equals. As satrap, Cleitus would have to address Alexander as king and treat him as other satraps treated the King of Persia. Hence, the taunt of Cleitus (who had saved Alexander’s life at the battle of Granicus), “this is the hand that saved you on that day!” came not just from wounded pride, but as an accusation against Alexander’s religious conversion of sorts. Alexander had abandoned the “Equality” tenet of faith central to the Companions.

We can imagine this tension if we put in modern religious terms (though the parallels do fall short):

  • Imagine Alexander and his men are Baptists of a particular stripe. They grew up in Sunday school, reciting the “Baptist Faith and Message.” They join Alexander to punish Moslems who had tried to hurt other Baptists.
  • As they conquer, they link up with other Baptists. There are Southern Baptists, Regular Baptists, Primitive Baptists, and so on. They go to worship with these people, and while it might be a bit different, it is still familiar. All is good.
  • Flush with success, the go further. Now they meet more varieties of Protestants–some non-denominational churches, Lutherans, Presbyterians, some Assemblies of God, etc. Ok, from a traditional Baptist perspective, it’s getting a little weird, but we are still more or less on familiar ground.
  • Now we go to Egypt and–what!–Alexander seems to be joining in on a Catholic service. Ok, this is bad, but at least very few in the army saw this, and we don’t have to spread the news.
  • Now as we get into Bactria and India Alexander seems to be converting to something unrecognizable. He seems to be breaking with the Baptist Faith and Message and repudiating his past. Or is he? He might be converting to Islam, or what else, I have no idea. We can no longer worship with him. In hindsight, his killing of Philotas was a decisive move in this “conversion.”

Naiden points out that Alexander never officially becomes king of Persia, and attributes this largely to the religious ideology behind the Persian monarchy that Alexander could not quite share or, perhaps understand. As he went into Bactria and beyond, not only had he grown religiously distant from his men, but he could no longer understand or adapt to the religions he encountered. He found himself constantly torn between acting as a king to those he conquered, and as a Companion to his army. In the end he could not reconcile the two competing claims, and perhaps no one could.

Alexander stands as perhaps the most universal figure from the ancient world. Obviously the Greeks wrote about him, as did the Romans, but stories cropped up about him in India, Egypt, Israel, Byzantium, and within Islam as well. Naiden mentions this but fails to explore its meaning. Naiden has a remarkable ability to find facts and present a different perspective. But he never explores how and why most every ancient and pre-modern culture found in Alexander something universal. Though it will strike many as strange the most common image of Alexander has him not riding into battle on his famous horse, but ascending into the heavens, holding out meat so that large birds will carry him up into the sky.

This image comes from a medieval Russian cathedral:

The story comes from the famous Alexander Romance, and runs like so:

Then I [Alexander] began to ask myself if this place was really the end of the world, where the sky touched the earth.   I wanted to discover the truth, and so I gave orders to capture the two birds that we saw nearby.  They were very large, white birds, very strong but tame.  They did not fly away when they saw us.  Some soldiers climbed on their backs, hung on, and flew off with them.  The birds fed on carrion, so that they were attracted to our camp by our many dead horses.  

 I ordered that the birds be captured, and given no food for three days.  I had for myself a yoke constructed from wood and tied this to their throats.  Then I had an ox-skin made into a large bag, fixed it to the yoke, and climbed in.  I held two spears, each about 10 feet long, with horse meat on their tips.  At once the birds soared up to seize the meat, and I rose up with them into the air, until I thought I must be close to the sky.  I shivered all over due to the extreme cold.  

Soon a creature in the form of a man approached me and said, “O Alexander, you have not yet secured the whole earth, and are you now exploring the heavens?  Return to earth quickly, or you will become food for these birds.   Look down on earth, Alexander!”  I looked down, somewhat afraid, and I saw a great snake, curled up, and in the middle of the snake a tiny circle like a threshing-floor.  

Then my companion said to me, “Point your spear at the threshing-floor, for that is the world.  The snake is the sea that surrounds the world.”

Admonished by Providence above, I returned to earth, landing about seven days journey from my army.  I was now frozen and half-dead.  Where I landed I found one of my satraps under my command; borrowing 300 horses, I returned to my camp.  Now I have decided to make no more attempts at the impossible.  Farewell.  

Here we have the key to understanding the meaning of Alexander as the ancient world saw him.*

The person of a king becomes the focal point of “bodies.” For example, a single, jobless, man living alone in his parent’s basement has only himself as a “body.” His identity includes only himself–his identity includes nothing outside of himself. Thus, he grows stale. Now imagine said man gets a job. He adds the identity of others to his own. If he gets married, now he has bound his identity to another person. This is why marriage has always been viewed as a religious rite within almost every society past and present, Christian or otherwise. Only God/the gods can effect this kind of change in a person. Then the couple has children, and the man has added more “body” to himself. Then one day he has grandchildren and ascends to the level of “paterfamilias.” His “body” includes multiple families.

A king of Macedon has more “body” than the average Macedonian. As we have seen, Macedonian kingship didn’t function like kingship elsewhere, either politically or religiously. Still, kingship has roots in every culture. But everyone knew that this kind of adding of body involved something of a risky and religious transformation–something akin to marriage. If one goes too far you risk losing everything. We can think of Alexander as holding folded laundry in his hand. He bends down to pick up a book, and can do that, then a plate, and it works, then a cup, etc.–but eventually one reaches a limit as to what you can add to oneself, and everything falls to the floor.

I have written before about the biblical image of the mountain in Genesis. Adam and Eve seek to add something to themselves that they should not. As a result they must descend down the paradisal mountain, where more multiplicity exists, and less unity. This leads to a fracturing of their being, and ultimately violence. This is King Solomon’s story as well. He receives great wisdom–the ability to take in knowledge from multiple sources and achieve penetrating insights (many scholars have noted that the biblical books traditionally ascribed to him contain tropes and fragments from cultures outside of Israel). But he goes too far–he strives for too much multiplicity, too much “adding of body,” as is evidenced by his hundreds of marriages to “foreign women.” This brings about the dissolution of his kingdom, the same result Alexander experienced after his own death. But before Alexander lost his kingdom, many would say he lost himself, with executions, massacres, and other erratic behavior. Like Solomon, he lost his own personal center in his attempt to add body to himself ad infinitum.

The story of the Ascension of Alexander hits on these same themes. He tries to ascend to a unity of the multiplicity through the multiplicity itself (note the use of body in the form of the meat to accomplish this). But it can never work this way. When you attempt to ascend via a Tower of Babel, you get sent back down.

The universality of this problem manifests itself today in these two kinds of people:

  • Purists who believe that even the slightest deviation from an original aim or interpretation destroys everything. Things here get so dry and lifeless that it brings the “death” of the desert.
  • Compromisers who want to stretch anything and everything to fit anything and everything. No exception ever endangers the rule–everything can always be included. Here you have the flood–undifferentiated chaos with nothing holding anything together. Eventually you reach points of absurd contradiction, and then, conflict.

Alexander’s life fits this tension between purity/unity and multiplicity:

  • He could take in Greece
  • He could take in Asia Minor
  • Perhaps he could just barely take in Egypt
  • But beyond that–though he could “eat” other kingdoms further east, they certainly didn’t agree with him.

Indeed, why invoke a blessing from God on food before we eat? We ask, in fact, for a kind of miracle–that things dead might be made life-giving. We too ask for help on the potentially treacherous path of making that which is “not us” a beneficial part of our being. We cannot have real unity without multiplicity, and vice-versa. But no blessing will save us from every deliberate choice to drink from the firehose and ingest foreign gods.

Dave

*Understanding this episode in The Alexander Romance will clue us in on how to read ancient texts. We should not assume that the ancients believed that this story was true in a scientific or “literal” sense. It was true in a more profound, metaphorical, and spiritual sense.

11th/12th Grade: Haste Makes Chemical Weapons

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

We moved forward with  W.W. I this week, and this coming week we plan to discuss trench warfare and its companion, chemical warfare.

The map below shows Germany did have Turkey and Austria as allies, but both were very weak, leaving Germany to carry the overwhelming part of the burden against England, France, and Russia.  They knew they could not win a long a protracted war.  Trench warfare would do nothing if not slow the war down to a grind, and Germany knew that this would work against them.

Germany came up with two tactics to try and tip the scales in their favor: Chemical and Submarine Warfare (we will discuss sub warfare next week).

Chemical weapons were made with gas heavier than air.  The idea was that the gas would sink down into the trenches, killing men and perhaps, with high enough concentrations, make the trench unlivable.  This would flush them out of the trench, where they were sitting ducks.  Germany knew that they could not win a long war.   If they wanted victory, they believed, they needed a way to break the stalemate sooner rather than later.  Mustard Gas seemed like it might do the trick.

British 55th Division gas casualties 10 April 1918

England ruled the waves, and this allowed them to continually supply their troops in France and keep their economy moving forward.  Germany’s pre-war challenge to England’s naval supremacy fell short, but subs were a cheaper way to try and eliminate that lead.

Immediately the allied powers regarded both kinds of weapons as unfair and unlawful.  Most nations today agree that chemical weapons should be banned, but submarine warfare stuck around and became standard practice. Why do we make this distinction?  Is it justified?

In regards to chemical warfare:

  • It is a different form of killing, but it is a qualitatively different form?  Does anything separate being killed by a bullet and killed by gas?  Some argue that chemical weapons stay around and linger in the soil.  But what about unexploded land mines?  Should land mines also be banned?  In fact many argue that international treaties should do just that.
  • Sub Warfare was regarded as cowardly and ‘unsporting.’  It is also was patently ‘unfair,’ as it involved hiding from the enemy giving you an unfair advantage.  Thus, in the minds of many, war became murder.

At the back of all these issues is the ‘lawfulness’ of war.  Just war theory as it emerged from the early and Medieval church emphasized the ‘proportionality of response.’  But — if you don’t have ships, can subs be a ‘proportional response?’  If you lack the funds to make jets with precision guided weapons, can you instead develop an anthrax bomb?  Is that a proportional response?   Should war be essentially an affair of honor, like dueling?  Or is war really about victory, despite whatever gloss we put upon it?  We can also ask if moral action would always lead to victory, and what should a commander in chief do if moral action would make their country lose and suffer? Some students countered back to the original question – ‘Why are chemical weapons less moral than artillery shells?’

By the end of World War I, the European idea of war conducted in a gentlemanly way between ‘civilized’ nations disappeared.  Of course this would not be the first time in history that certain ideals about war would erode. Students who had me in the past may recall how the Peloponnesian War ended traditional ways in which the Greeks fought.

Some students thought that you could not introduce chemical weapons, but could use them if someone else did. What is the basis for this distinction, and does it work?

Some thought that Germany’s position of weakness justified their action, but this gets back to the question of whether or not some concept of right action or victory is most important in war.  Of course poorer countries today may not like being in an inferior position militarily, and may say that current bans on chemical and biological weapons are simply a way for the rich countries to maintain their advantage.

Whether the aggressor or not, Gemany’s ‘hurry up and win’ tactics hurt them strategically.  Their actions against Belgian civilians helped drum up political support for the war in France and especially England.  Their use of the submarine would ultimately bring in an entire new country against them, the United States.   It appears that for all their tactical success and ability (all agreed that Germans made the best trenches, for example), they lacked a workable long-term vision for how to win the war.

In this post I reviewed the book Just War and Christian Discipleship where author Daniel Bell makes the point that Christians need to abandon the “checklist” approach to war.  This attitude argues that the dominant theme in just war theory has been based on the idea that, “Because you did ‘x,’ now I can do ‘y.’  Such an approach, Bell argues, abandons the idea of war as a distinctly Christian calling, an activity like any other, designed to bring us closer to Christ.  Certainly Bell, I’m sure, would argue that chemical weapons have no place in a Christian concept of war.

Blessings,

Dave Mathwin

The Red Pants of France

by Dave Mathwin

Barbara Tuchmann’s The Guns of August discusses the controversies, dilemmas, and human drama in the days leading up to World War I. She puts a special focus on the war plans developed by France and Germany in the years leading up to the war. The two plans reflect much about the two nations. Germany’s Schliefflin Plan

  • Relied heavily on rail transport with precision timetables
  • Relied heavily on heavy artillery and all of the other goodies of industrialization
  • Involved violating Belgian neutrality, but no matter–the winner would determine the post-war narrative, and they had to go through Belgium to make their plan work.

France’s Plan 17 relied

  • Heavily on initiative in the field for individual commanders, with the emphasis on attack
  • Much more than Germany on the human element, “men win wars, not machines,” and so on–what the French called “elan.”
  • They eschewed heavy artillery, feeling that it would slow their men down and give them a dependent mindset.

Both sides had perfect awareness of the other’s plans, and both thought the strategic situation favored their own side. The French, with their army in red pants, hearkened back to an older time. Some called for the uniforms to be replaced with a more drab color less visible on the spectrum. The French general staff refused absolutely. The red pants embodied the spirit and will of the army, a refusal to bend to the industrial spirit of the age.

Alas, German organization, artillery, and precision destroyed the French army in first weeks of the war, inflicting at least 250,000 casualties. France had to adjust, and while they managed to stave off disaster at the Battle of the Marne, the dash and the human initiative would fade away just like the red pants. They too brought out heavy guns and “succumbed” to the Germany way.

As events unfolded, both sides ended up digging into the ground for what became known as Trench Warfare, which characterized the fighting in the western front right through 1918. Historians usually offer a variety of explanations for this unusual development–neither previous or future wars would ever use trenches so completely.

  • Some focus on the significant imbalance between defense and offense that existed between the western powers. Heavy weaponry for the most part had little mobility at this time, which limited offensive capability and gave an enormous advantage to the defensive.
  • Some focus on the narrow geography between the German and French borders, which meant an extreme concentration of men and machines. More space on the Eastern Front, for example, meant some more mobility and much less trench digging.

These explanations have merit but I think miss the larger picture.

The triumph of the metric system presaged military developments in World War I. The old systems of measurements had its roots in human experience and proportion, i.e., the “foot.” or the “stone” (about 14 pounds), which would be local and based on the weight of an actual stone in a particular town or region. The new system greatly maximized standardization, minimizing locality, and made it easier to count, measure, multiply, and so on. In other words, the new system granted one more power.* The Industrial Revolution continued this standardization, which naturally granted increased power to produce goods on a mass scale

But all of this power came from literally digging into the earth to obtain the necessary raw materials for the engines of industry and war. As industrialization reached its peak manifestation, the soldiers too dug into the earth. Perhaps the eastern theater of war saw less trench warfare because it had less industrialization. It seems a curious symmetry exists between the birth of the modern war machine and trench warfare, and we should endeavor to explain it. In other words, the creation of industrialization (digging into the earth), and its apotheosis (trench warfare) mirror each other (in the picture of the soldiers above, change the uniforms and the men could look exactly like miners). For Europe, World War I ended the belief in the inevitable progress of mankind, represented by science/industrialization and democracy. One can easily argue that science and democracy (in the form of mass media, mass mobilization, and mass production) made the war much more deadly than any previous conflict.

We can begin by noting the symmetry between birth and death. Interestingly, many ancient cultures buried people in the fetal position, linking birth and death in a circle, which I discussed here.

Perhaps this should not surprise us, as birth and death have something of a symbiosis.

We see a similar symmetry in rock music. I grew up partially in the Grunge Era. I took great delight in the transition from 80’s pop to Nirvana and Soundgarden. But anyone who reflects for a moment should see something odd going on with music in the 1990’s. In his excellent book on that decade, Chuck Klosterman made two keen observations:

  • The grunge attitude and aesthetic brought about the end of rock and roll. The whole foundation of rock music involved stardom, mass appeal, etc. Grunge artists had massive success while deriding, mocking, and hating that success, a kind of matter-anti-matter collision. In this sense, Kurt Cobain’s tragic suicide** can be seen as a harbinger, a death-knell for the genre as a whole. In many ways, the power that comes with stardom brings not life, but a kind of death, just as the power granted by industrialization ushered in an era of millions of deaths in war.
  • What was with the litany of songs with large portions of lyrics devoted either to nonsense, mere sounds, or garbled unintelligibility?

We’ll get to that list momentarily. We saw something similar at the birth of rock and roll in the late 50’s-early 60’s, in the form of a variety of songs with nonsense/unintelligible lyrics that made their way into the American psyche.

All of these songs share the exuberance that characterizes the birth of an era. The nonsense, the invented sounds, reminds one of little kids discovering their mouths for the first time.

In the 90’s you have Klosterman’s list of songs with nonsensical and unintelligible lyrics. But this time, the tenor, and atmosphere of the songs embrace not the excitement of new life but chaos, meaninglessness, and death.

  • Of course, Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” with Weird Al parodying the song’s unintelligibility.
  • Blur’s “Beetlebum,” and “Song 2.” “Song 2” has a something of exuberance in it, but the video clearly shows it is the excitement of destruction, not creation. No coincidence then, that Paul Veerhoven used this song to promote his movie Starship Troopers, which parodied the meaninglessness of fascistic violence.
  • Trio’s “Da Da Da.” Volkswagen used the song expertly to hint at the banality of life for young men. Leave it to the Germans, I suppose.
  • Basement Jaxx’s “Bingo Bango.” Yes, the song has an upbeat mood to it, but the video hints at disorienting chaos.
  • “Mmmmm Mmmmmm Mmmmmm” by the Crash Test Dummies. The song has beauty, but it is the beauty of an elegy. The group’s other hit, “Coffee Spoons and Afternoons” talks about receding hairlines, hospitals, drinking coffee in the afternoon wearing pajamas–not exactly the stuff of birth.
  • At first glance, Hanson’s “Mmmmbop” may seem to have the stuff of “life” embedded within, but after listening for about 90 seconds, thoughts of anger, hatred, and despair flood one’s being. The song is hypnotically annoying/infuriating.

The end of rock music mirrored its beginning, but the mirror has cracks.

Historians date the birth of the modern state at different points. One can trace the beginnings in the later Renaissance, and things look more clear at the Peace of Westphalia in 1648. But to see the state as we know it, with its bureaucracy, centralization, uniformity of law, and military organization, we have to look at Napoleon. We have a fascination with Napoleon for good reason–undoubtedly he embodied something romantic, something of promise, in his early years.

But 100 years later, that civilization, while having much more power at its disposal, actually approaches its death–a variety of historians (Niall Ferguson, Oswald Spengler) see World War I as the end of the west. Certainly at least, Europe–the core of western civilization– has never recovered from that conflict. Western civilization’s power and identity had its start with going into the earth in hope that its raw materials would give us power to establish Kant’s dream of perpetual peace. It ended differently.

Dave

*A variety of people have pointed out this connection between counting, numbering, and power. This may be why King David suffered such a strong rebuke when he took a census in Israel. He tried to count “excessively,” i.e., he tried to consolidate power inappropriately at the end of his reign.

**In an interview with Vulture magazine, Klosterman commented,

What is so profound about Nirvana is that the relationship ended up becoming real. The song “I Hate Myself and Want to Die.” The idea that a person who writes that song also does commit suicide — that is so on the nose. People would say things like, “If that guy hates fame so much, why doesn’t he just stop?” We did not fully believe that Kurt Cobain was actually unhappy. And then when he killed himself, it made that music suddenly weirdly true.

He was presenting ideas in a culture where irony was the central understanding of all messages, and he seems to have had no ironic distance at all. It actually was incredibly sad and depressing to him that people he didn’t like loved his music. It legitimately bothered him that, say, homophobes liked his music. It bothered him in a way that for other artists, it would’ve been seen almost as branding.

8th Grade: The Military Revolution of Macedon

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

This week we began looking at Macedonian civilization, and as usual we began with geography.

The map shows Macedon as a land-locked and mountainous area, and we would expect this kind of terrain to have a particular emphasis on its people. . .

Map

  • Mountainous areas are always difficult to control, leading to weak central governments
  • Usually an aristocratic warrior elite seeps into the culture, which usually divides the people into warring clans (for this and the above point, think of Afghanistan, which has a similar geography to Macedon).
  • With this environment, we usually see a low level of cultural output, due to their relative isolation and internal divisions (this is not the case with Scotland, but Scotland is not land-locked as Macedon is).

I was glad to see the students start to make connections between Macedon, Assyria, and Sparta.  All three share a similar geography, and all three share a similar geographic position — on the periphery of their respective societies.  Sparta and Assyria had stronger central governments than Macedon, but their similarities should make us realize of the power of geography to shape the course of a civilization.

As I mentioned, Macedon had little role in Greek civilization for many centuries.  But as luck would have it, Macedon saw the rise of the charismatic and ruthless Phillip II just at the very moment of Phillip of Macedongrave political weakness for Athens, Thebes, and Sparta.  Opportunity knocked for Macedon.   Phillip looked every inch the tough customer he portrayed, wearing an eye patch over his wounded eye for necessity, and probably, for effect as well.  But Phillip combined his personality and appearance with a keen understanding of how to maximize the qualities of his society into a formidable military machine.

One key to the effectiveness of his military was that he matched the personality of his culture with his army.  Infantrymen in other Greek city-states often came from the middle-upper classes.  He owned land and had a stake in the politics and way of life of his city-state.  The Athenian hoplite, for example, therefore oriented himself toward defense of what he had.  He wore heavy armor and carried a large shield.  This was not a mobile force, but one geared to “make a stand” to defend home turf.  A standard Greek military formation might look like this:

Greek Phalanx

In contrast to other city-states, Macedon had virtually no middle class.  Anyone recruited for the infantry would be either poor or a mercenary.  This type of man would not fight to defend anything in particular.  He has no stake in the society for which he fights.  Such a man might be motivated to take from others, however, and this would require shifting the balance toward an offensively minded and equipped infantry, which you see below:

Macedonian PhalanxIn addition to the long spears you see above, their soldiers also carried a long dagger, another offensive weapon.   While the image above does show the Macedonians with shields, I agree with Victor Davis Hanson (and others) that argue that Macedonian shields had no real function in battle.  They were worn apparently mostly around the neck and draped to the side (as both arms would be needed to wield their spears).  Some argue that the shields were used in battle, but mainly as a prop for their spears.  If this is so, we see that even their shield served as a offensive weapon of sorts.

Phillip’s infantry gave them much more firepower at the point of attack.  Not only did they have longer spears, but because they had to stand sideways to hold the spears, they could fit more men in each row.  Some students wisely pointed out that the Macedonians would be vulnerable to a quick flanking movement, but the Greek infantry Phillip faced was “heavier” infantry, and not equipped for fast movement.  They could not exploit this weakness of Phillip’s force (though a century later, the Romans would do so).

I hope that the students understood that militaries don’t, or at least should not, be created in a vacuum. They function best when they are a direct product of the civilization from which they arise.  Next week we will continue by looking at the most famous Macedonian of all, Phillip’s son Alexander.

Many thanks,

Dave

 

11th/12th Grade: World War I: Tension between Diplomacy and Military Action

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

This week we examined four crisis that led to the outbreak of war in 1914.  In American World War II has always gotten more attention, but in Europe “the War” is still World War I, and I think with good reason.  World War II can be seen as a continuation of the first World War, and it was the first World War which ushered ended one world and brought forth another.
The outbreak of such a devastating conflict gives us a couple key points of focus:
  • Tension between Diplomacy and the Military — Diplomats, by their nature and job description, like to keep their options open and maintain the greatest possible flexibility.  This allows for the greatest amount of possible outcomes, and in their view, a greater chance for peace.
  • The military of course, needs to be fully prepared to face the worse case scenario, which is war.  It is wrong to view the military as always wanting war.  But, it is not unusual for them to argue that, in the event of war, we must be ready.  So often, political leaders will begin military preparedness in the midst of negotiations.  This rush to prepare, to call up troops, amass weapons, etc. inevitably narrows the options of the diplomats negotiating for peace.  If they are not careful, events will take on a life all their own.  In times of crisis, the goals of the diplomat and the general can easily veer in separate directions.
  • One of the problems in the days leading up to World War I was that in the minds of many ‘Mobilization means war.’  Once the Russian military began it’s mobilization, for example, Germany felt it must mobilize, and other countries followed suit on down the line.  It could be argued that no one really wanted war (this is debatable), but how could war be avoided if every nation acted as if war was imminent?
  • The Problem of Interpretation — As is often said by BIblical scholars, no one disagrees on what the Bible says (except in rare cases), they disagree on what it means.  It boils down to interpretation.  In the same way, does a strong military buildup send the message that 1) We are getting ready to fight you and want to be strong enough to win, or 2) We are a peaceful nation that wants a large military to deter any future attack.  If we were weak, we would be vulnerable, and invite war.  Thus, it is in the interest of peace that we build up our military.

The buildup of the German navy, for example, brings these issues into sharper focus.  For the entirety of the 19th century, England put nearly all of its security eggs in their naval basket.  They maintained one of the smallest infantries in Europe.  When Germany united in 1871 they immediately had the largest and best infantry in Europe.   This in itself posed no threat to England.  But in the 1890’s Germany begins a significant naval buildup, and one can have two basic perspectives.

  • Germany is a nation like any other, and with a powerful industrialized economy will come the desire to have a powerful navy.  This is only natural.  Secondly, France and Russia have an alliance against them, and to prevent blockade and encirclement in the event of war, it is only fair, just, and reasonable that they have a well-equipped modern navy.  Germany’s navy is rooted in self-defense, not aggression.
  • By building a navy, Germany did the one thing guaranteed to provoke England and turn them against themselves.  Their naval buildup was not necessary, so it cannot be termed self-defense.  England is their biggest trading partner and so any worries they have concerning their trade England can cover.  The only reason for Germany to build a navy, therefore, must be that they want to change the status quo, which they can only do through aggressive action.  The German navy means that Germany poses a distinct threat.

Which is it?

Blessings,
Dave

8th Grade: An Introduction to Civilizations

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

I hope the school is going well for you and your family.  I already can tell that I will enjoy this class. They are enthusiastic participators and willing and able to track with me and think about the issues before us.

As I told the students, before we move into the actual study of certain civilizations, I thought it appropriate to think of what we mean by the term ‘civilization,’ and what this might have to do with a Christian worldview.  I gave the students an example of a desert island divided into two halves.  Both halves have a government (a despotic king), religion (worship of a bloodthirsty god), laws and a way of life, (everyone pick up a stick and try and bash in the head of someone on the other side of the island).  They have a large enough group of people and a defined location, if one happens to believe that these are important criteria.

We discussed whether or not  this be could be termed ‘civilization.’  Even if it was a place where you would not want to live, was it ‘civilization?’  While I acknowledge that defining the concept is a bit slippery, in the end I think we can give a clear answer in the negative.

The definition I am using for civilization in this class is from historian Will Durant, who stated that civilization is, “Social order that promotes cultural creation.”  Life on our hypothetical island could not allow for ‘cultural creation.’ No buildings could be built, no books written, not even advances in weaponry could be made if everyone’s daily life consisted entirely of sleeping, eating, and fighting.

I believe the definition we are using is a good one because human society should help us live out what it means to be made in God’s image.  The first thing we see about God is that He creates.  A society that did not allow for human creation would deny a fundamental tenet of what it means to be human. Being made in God’s image means many things, but surely it must include something of what J.R.R. Tolkien called ‘sub-creation’ on our part.   If we look back on the island example, is the life lived there really human life?  Even beavers build dams, and otters make water slides for themselves.  Living just to eat, sleep, and fight would put us below many animals.

This week we also looked at the basic elements of all civilizations.  What purpose do civilizations serve, and how do they function?  Ultimately, civilizations exist to provide a means of human interaction, a structure that allows us to live out God’s image and call on our lives.  While none of the civilizations we will study will be ‘Christian’ civilizations (if such a thing is even possible), the closer one gets to this goal, the better off people are.  While we may not need civilizations per se, we do need each other.  God Himself is a kind of Community (Father, Son, Holy Spirit) and as we are created in His image, so too we need to live in community with one another to make us fully human.

We examined what I call the Five Elements of Civilization:

Geography

Suppose that you and your friends wish to do something together.  You would need to agree on a location to meet.  For there to be profitable human interaction, we need a defined physical space to do so.  Obviously, the geography must provide a minimum of food, water, etc. for civilization to exist.  But as we discussed, ideal geographies do not tend to foster civilizations.  When things are too easy, we never need to learn, invent, or progress.  Historically speaking, we need a challenge to thrive.  On the flip side, some geographies present such an extraordinary challenge that man’s nearly heroic adaptation to them binds them into such narrow confines as to stunt the growth of civilizations (one might think of desert nomads or Eskimo peoples in the Arctic).

Over the course of the year we will see the subtle influence of geography on the way people live.

Economics

No one can be completely self-sufficient. “No man is an island.”  We neither know all or can do all things well.  We need others to help us, but also need to have a means of exchanging goods and services fairly so these beneficial trades can take place.

A strict barter economy makes perfect sense.  I have apples, you have wood.  If we trade we both get something we easily know to have a direct value.  With one I can build a house, with the other I can avoid hunger.  Barter economies have the great advantage of simplicity, but the great burden of a complete lack of flexibility.  Imagine doing your weekly shopping, having to load up the wagon with bushels of grain, a few pigs, etc.  Then, you can only get what you need in return only if someone needs what you have.

A money economy helps solve some of these problems, and money began with precious metals.  But who made the first exchange of a shiny metal for a bushel of wheat?  You cannot eat, wear, or live in shiny metal.  The same is true of paper money.  In itself, it’s only a piece of paper.  You could write on it, or perhaps burn it for a few seconds of heat.  The money has value not for anything in itself, but because of our agreed upon belief about what it represents. Hence, the link between the health of our economy and the trust we place in our government and those around us.

A good economy will foster helpful and just exchanges of goods and services, which in turn fosters honoring social interaction.

Politics

Or — what I call the outward structure of civilization.  We need an agreed upon way of making decisions, and we need to know what is expected of us.  For example, we must decide if we are to drive on the right hand side or the left, or no one would drive at all.  We must also have an agreed upon way of deciding what side of the road we drive on, or nothing can ever get accomplished.

Laws serve a good purpose if they help grow helpful interaction between people.  They oppress if they stifle such social interaction.

Religion

Or – what I call the inward structure of civilization.  Since no one can write a law code that covers every situation, if we are to interact with others successfully we need a strong set of unwritten rules that everyone follows.  If someone cuts in line at the grocery store, we do not have the option of calling the police, for example.  This unwritten code comes ultimately from our religious beliefs.  We don’t cut in line in the final analysis because we believe in Justice.

I encouraged the class to think about religion more broadly than just what happens on ‘Sunday,’ in a given civilization.  As Jesus said, “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” or to put it another way, “You are what you worship.”

Religion is in a broad sense what we give ourselves to truly, not merely our lip service.  A society might outwardly worship God, gods, or possibly even ideals and values like freedom, and so on.  Everyone worships something, and we cannot help but be conformed to the object of our worship.  This ultimate devotion becomes the main spring of our values.

Many modern historians often make materialistic arguments for the origin of civilization.  They will say things such as, “When river valley ‘x’ began to dry up the people came together to maximize their food input and begin to specialize.  From this early social organization governments arose, and then these governments codified religious belief to enforce their power.”

And so on, and so on.

I entirely disagree with these kinds of explanations, at least as the primary explanatory concept.  Such theories completely misunderstand human nature.  Why do relationships happen?  We do not enter into a relationship with people based on the need to survive.  We are made for relationship (“It is not good for man to be alone”).  We are drawn together by our common loves, by our common worship.  We were made for worship, and this is why religion forms the heart of any civilization.

Culture

In the narrow sense, culture is what we do with our free time.  A person’s hobbies are often a better insight into who they are than their jobs.   In a broader sense, culture is about how we interact with God’s creation, and how we outwardly express our inner values and strengths.  Broadly then, culture speaks to our values, and a bit more narrowly, culture is that which makes life enjoyable (reading books, playing games, etc.), and sets us apart from the rest of creation.

Of course every culture can and should have room for purely “fun” activities, but ideally our recreation truly engages in “re-creation,” whereby we image the God who creates.

My goal through all this was to try and show how each element is not an island, but impacts other areas.  These elements are interconnected and depend on one another. For example, I asked the students to think about American culture, and clearly, we value sports very highly. We put a great deal of time, attention, and money into sports. What might this say about us, and what might be the connections to other areas of our society?

Some students suggested that it means that we love competition, and I thought this an excellent insight. Indeed, we see competition baked into our political system (candidates compete for votes against each other), and our economic system as well. Some of you may be old enough to remember Hechinger hardware stores, and Crown Books, both of whom lost out in competition with other companies. These are just the kind of connections I want students to make. Well done!

Next week we will begin looking at actual civilizations, and begin applying this theoretical interpretative model to reality.  We will begin to look for the patterns and truths that history reveals to us.  Below I include the famous set of paintings by Thomas Cole called The Course of Empire.  I do not necessarily agree with everything regarding Cole’s interpretation of history, but it is a wonderful visual image of a thought provoking theory, from a civilization’s beginning to its end.

Thank you again for all your support.

Blessings,

Dave Mathwin

Play for Keeps

by Dave Mathwin

It is sometimes possible to enjoy a book that one cannot understand very much of, provided that

  • The author has a great deal of fun with the subject, and
  • The author clearly and deeply understands the subject, which allows him to express his ideas clearly.

I confess to knowing nothing about almost all of the authors CS Lewis discusses in his wonderful English Literature of the Sixteenth Century. Anecdotes exist that indicate Lewis felt real heaviness and irritation in cranking this one out, but this does not come across in the writing. It reads light as a feather. Lewis generously shares his opinions about literature, but mixes these opinions with a marbling of philosophy, history, and cultural analysis. All this makes Lewis’ work come alive and relevant for today. This is some of Lewis’ best writing, and his wit and humor shine on most every page.

Lewis finds this era worthy of extended examination because it stands at a nexus of a variety of momentous shifts:

  • The early 16th century saw the last vestiges of the medieval worldview have their final say
  • The early-mid 16th century saw the high water mark of Renaissance humanism and classicism
  • The entire 16th century saw tumultuous religious upheaval caused by the Reformation, followed on by the Counter-Reformation.

Lewis keeps his focus on the literature, as is proper, but his opening chapters also set the stage historically and culturally. For the historian, Lewis goes to great lengths to reset the balance between the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, but I have covered that topic elsewhere. His basic point for in these opening chapters involves prepping us for the fact that literature at a nexus of cultural death and rebirth tends not to be very good. Things eventually sorted themselves out with Sidney, Spenser, and Shakespeare, but the early to middle part of the century left much to be desired. The main fault of the writers of this time involved a hyper-exaggeration of a certain strengths of cultural movements, which robbed much of their writing of life and merit.

To be sure, the political, cultural and religious tumult eventually settled into a new equilibrium, and after that, writers could borrow from different literary genres much more freely and productively, but until that happened, very little of anything transcendent value got written.

This dynamic makes sense to us if we scale down this larger point to something more tangible to our own experience of, for example, adolescence. Our early teen years involve an ending of childhood and the beginning of something else, akin to a larger scale cultural breakdown and rebirth in our immediate personal experience.

I grew up playing drums and listening to a lot of my dad’s music. This was a pre-headphone era, so we all heard what he played on the living room stereo. I got a healthy dose of the Beatles, Otis Redding, Willie Nelson, and Beethoven, among others. I enjoyed almost all of it. But as a 16 year old drummer, I wanted something else (unfortunately it took a few more years before I appreciated Ringo and Al Jackson), and a way to distinguish myself. One day, my cousin’s friend played for me the opening 30 seconds of Rush’s “The Spirit of Radio,” and it was all over for me. I was enchanted. I had never heard progressive rock, so I dove in headfirst. I immediately went to Tower Records and bought Permanent Waves, Moving Pictures, and Hemispheres.* For the next year, I then decided that everything about my drumming, and many other things about my life besides, must conform to Neil Peart’s particular style.

This improved my drumming in certain small ways but ruined it in others. Things got misshapen. If one believes (as I did), that even when drumming for my high school jazz band I should act like Neil Peart, you sound like an idiot. It took hearing a recording of my playing at the county jazz festival, and the judges comments, to make me realize I needed to snap out of it. I spent the following summer listening Glenn Miller and Count Basie, and at least partially fixed things for my senior year.

This was a classic, “It’s not you, it’s me,” problem. Neil Peart has much to teach any drummer, but not if you become enslaved to his aura. In that state, one plays drums essentially to convince an audience, and you lose all sense of proportion.

Times of personal and cultural death and rebirth offer many opportunities. In separating certain aspects of life from a larger context, we can see them with more clarity, and this is exciting. I’d like to think that in college, I could throw in occasional progressive wrinkles without being bound by them. Unfortunately our internal instability in those moments of initial discovery make it very difficult for us to take fruitful advantage of whatever insights we gain. The same applies to a culture at large. In the midst of breakdown, when things come apart, we notice what we had never seen before. This is great as far it goes, but it has to kept in balance.

Lewis shows us how this dynamic plays out in the literature of the period.

Oftentimes, what seems like an era in the fullness of its strength actually ends up being something akin to “terminal lucidity,” a burst of energy many dying patients experience before passing. For example, the 1980’s seemed like the crest of a wave of American confidence. We had Reagan-era optimism. We won the Cold War. We grew economically. We wore bright colors and made our hair big. But look again, and we see that some of what we were about shows an uncomfortable exaggeration of a theme. We should never have attempted, for example, “Hands Across America.” Big hair is one thing, and glam-metal fashion ca. 1988 quite another.

This “hyper-extension” of cultural posturing naturally collapsed, leading to completely opposite atmosphere. Now we had grunge music with lyrics about how bad things were, loose clothes (anyone who tucked in their shirt at my high school in 1990 would have been hopelessly labeled as a nerd), and “heroin chic.”

In neither era do men or women look particularly normal, with both exaggerating certain ideas to a point of being ridiculous.**

I much prefer medieval literature to that of the Renaissance, but by the end of the Middle Ages, we saw the same kind of unfortunate exaggerations. Lewis suggests that Scotland’s king James IV perfectly encapsulates the problem with the period. “Peak” medieval chivalry ca. 1350 had much to commend it. It ennobled men, and greatly elevated the status of women.^ The courtly love tradition had its good parts, though the best literature of the period grappled with some of the contradictions and tensions involved in knightly service of ladies. The literary figure of Lancelot encapsulates this well.

James IV (b. 1473, d. 1513) had many good qualities. He was open hearted, high spirited, and generous in the best spirit of chivalry. He had courage, but a variety of contemporaries remarked that he had too much courage to be king. He needed more prudence and policy. Many of his contemporaries felt that James never should have fought the Battle of Flodden, where he met his death (in Henry IV, Pt. 1 Shakespeare may have had James IV as a model in mind for Hotspur). As to the service of ladies, James IV almost parodies the medieval complexity and tension by abandoning himself to countless prostitutes and fathering a variety of illegitimate children. His exaggerated chivalric ideals made chivalry itself look ridiculous.

So too, late medieval literature had little balance and often none of the sense of play of the best medieval prose from previous decades. Lewis cites the work of John Fisher, who drank heavily from the medieval moral sense, but alas, could not let an idea go once he fixed himself upon it. In his The Perfect Religion, he instructs a nun to be

  • Grateful for being created to live in a Christian society. As Lewis states, this is well and proper. But Fisher continues, telling the nun to be
  • Grateful for being created at all. This is still a good sentiment, but perhaps was already covered in the first injunction? Fisher doesn’t stop there, however, urging that she remain
  • Grateful that she was created as a human being, and not a toad, and tops this off with the counsel that
  • She be grateful that she was created instead of all the other people that might have been created instead of her.

Lewis rightly points out that by the third injunction, Fisher has descended into absurdity (“she” could never be a toad—not an option for a human being,) and by the fourth, a work intended to promote Catholic orthodoxy seems to promote a gnostic heresy of the pre-existence of souls and the separation of the body from personhood. Lewis writes, “Fisher’s sincerity is undoubted, but his intellect is not as hard at work as he supposes. We can’t hold Fisher accountable for not answering his questions, but he doesn’t seem to know that he is raising them.”

This lack of balance spilled over into the religiously polemical works of Fisher and Thomas More. Both wrote defenses of purgatory, and both in their zeal latched onto certain rogue strands of late-medieval asceticism. In Dante, the souls in Purgatory sing psalms joyfully, and their bodies suffer in service of redemption, and is in fact an integral part of their redemption. For Fisher and More, we have denigration of the body, so that the purgation is for the sake of purgation itself, and their vision of purgatory means a practically pointless circle of suffering.

We should expect this tendency to exaggeration during times of cultural fragmentation. What was once solid now moves apart. The bell curve of ABC, CBS, and NBC turns into a thousand scattered points, first with cable news, then with the internet. When this scattering happens, we naturally lose our bearings and find what we can to latch onto. What we latch onto, however, will be isolated from a larger context, and thus will lose its relationship to the broader whole.

I have mentioned two late-medieval/early modern Catholics, now for some early Reformation humanists (though it was certainly possible to be a Catholic humanist, i.e. Erasmus). John Colet wished to return to a more pure age, and thus urged a strict “anti-body,” morality upon his readers. He saw no real difference between marital union and fornication, and in fact wished that no one would get married. Marriage and the body proved to messy for his taste. He acknowledged that no marriage would mean the end of the human race on earth, but oh well, these things happen.

The humanists loved classical culture, either for its perceived purity, hardy innocence, or merely because the classical age was not feudal and medieval, the worst of all sins. This meant that he abandoned allegorical or symbolic interpretations of the Bible in search of a platonic “pure” meaning of the text. Others shared these views, but his thoughts on the subject of Latin take him into absurdity in a similar way to Fisher. On the one hand, as mentioned, he was a strict moralist with gnostic tendencies. This led to a distrust of much of pagan literature. On the other, he hated all things medieval, and that meant hating medieval church Latin, which had been “corrupted” from the past that was pure, not in morality, perhaps, but in its use of language. Lewis writes,

{For Colet] the spirit of the classical writers was to be avoided like the plague, and their form to be imposed as an indispensable law. When he founded St. Paul’s school, the boys were to be guarded from every word that did not occur in Vergil or Cicero, and equally, from every idea that did. No more deadly or irrational scheme could have been propounded. Deadly, because it cut the boys off from all the best literature in the Latin world, and irrational, because it put absurd value on certain arbitrary elements dissociated from the spirit which begot them, and for whose sake they existed. For Colet, this seemed a small price to pay for excluding all barbarism, all corruption, all “adulterated” Latin.

We noted above that when something reaches its end, it can mimic strength through one final, exaggerated effort. It might seem on the one hand that Latin had no greater champion than Colet, who sought to emphasize only the “best” Latin. But Lewis points out that all of the efforts of the Renaissance humanists to preserve the purity of latin in fact killed it. A variety of medieval people actually spoke latin (churchmen and merchants), or at least some version of latin. Only a very few scholars knew classical Latin, and fewer still spoke it, and then only in the academy. The attempt to save Latin destroyed it.

It is usually more fun to read a review where the critic pans rather than praises. I have focused on the first half of the book, where the literature, with a few exceptions, stunk. But we should remember that the century ended with some of England’s greatest writers, and with Shakespeare we have an “all-timer.” When we recall Shakespeare’s best work, we see how much more comfortable he was with tension and play than the previous generation. He incorporated medieval and modern elements without going out of his way to defend either. Stylistically, he stuck to certain meters and forms, but not all the time. He could happily dance between them. His characters are rich, both particular to his time and universal.

This can give us hope for our own future. We live in an era where many of the old categories of meaning and belonging have vanished. As a result we see the same kinds of intensification and exaggeration that beset the 16th century. But they learned, and so might we. The path forward comes from Thomas More’s most famous and least understood work, his Utopia. As mentioned previously, Lewis felt that much of More’s polemical work fell prey to the vices of the age. Those vices, he argues, cloud our perception of Utopia. Many moderns attempt to find a point to the work, obscured or otherwise, that will clue us in to More’s meaning in the text. Much of More’s other work had a definite argument. So too must Utopia, right? Was More secretly supporting communism, or was he a closet Protestant? Or perhaps he sought to make some other political point buried in code?

Lewis points out, however, that any attempt to pin the book down specifically one way or another will fail, because More writes in this text like a medieval. Given that medievalism was practically dead at this point, it is no wonder that even his contemporaries remained confused. But Lewis argues the book has no particular point. It’s meant as a romp of this and that, no more, no less. The medievals loved to bandy ideas about and put them in tension and opposition to one another. For them, this was fun–and that signifies of a more healthy age than either our own or the early 16th century. They were more interested in play, we in logical, deductive writing that makes a point and gets somewhere definite.

For us, as for the 16th century, the way out of our predicament involves not stronger arguments, but a greater sense of fun. More shows us that even politics, whatever our position may be, can bear the weight of humor in any age.

*I also bought what was at that time their most recent album, Hold Your Fire. Rush fans may relate to my utter shock, bewilderment, and even anger at going from “Red Barchetta” to “Time Stand Still” in the space of 30 seconds. To this day I still feel that Hold Your Fire is a ridiculous album. Not until Counterparts would I start to forgive them.

**At first glance no two things could seem further apart than the late 80’s and early 90’s aesthetic. But both participate in the same cultural breakdown, and are likely, therefore to share some crucial commonalities. A second glance shows that, surprise, surprise, they have androgyny in common. In glam metal, a lot of guys dressed similarly to women (tight pants, makeup, etc.) and in grunge, a lot women looked like men (short hair, lack of showering, no care for appearance, etc.) No doubt grunge devotees would have been horrified to learn that they shared a crucial similarity with hair metal, but there you go.

In one section of the book, Lewis shows that Thomas More (Catholic) and William Tyndale (Protestant), who wrote page after page attacking one another, actually had a lot in common. Both had similar economic ideas. And on Henry VIII annulment and remarriage to Anne Boleyn, the hot-button issue of the day, they were in lock-step agreement. Both seem to have missed this fact at the time.

^For an example of this, note the famous story from Froissart about how Edward III heeded his wife’s call for clemency for the population of Calais.

12th Grade: “The Center Cannot Hold. . .”

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

This week we looked at the beginnings of the Vietnam war under Kennedy and Johnson, up until the significant troop buildups of 1965.

One of my main goals with this unit is to avoid finger-pointing.  Hindsight is so often 20/20.  In truth the conflict in Vietnam posed questions that no one would wish to answer.  Vietnam’s dilemmas give no good answers, only hopefully less bad solutions.  When I think of the controversy surrounding the conflict, I am reminded of a comment of a monk named Columba Cary-Elwes, who wrote to a friend and professional historian in 1940,

I find we live in so criticizing an age that I spend my time summing people up — public figures, judging the motives of their actions and though I had the whole thing mapped out before me, as God must have, and I certainly have not.  We are always being given vulgar and crude and unkind judgments of people and peoples in the newspaper, and it becomes second nature.  I am going to try and not get caught up in this perfidious habit.  This arose out of Fr. Dunstan’s reminder that we are “near nothing” and we ourselves must try and imitate God, who is infinitely merciful.

We ourselves bear culpability for what happened in Vietnam, but to understand this we need to understand events in Europe in the aftermath of W.W. II England led the way in divesting themselves of their colonial empire.  To be fair, England emerged from the war with its reputation generally intact, whereas France humiliated itself in its capitulation to the Nazi’s.  Much of our modern image of France comes from this singularity, but for the previous 1000 years, France had the pre-eminent military in Europe, with luminaries such as Charlemagne, William the Conqueror, St. Joan of Arc, and Napoleon to their credit.  Their post-war agenda did not leave room for looking any weaker than they already appeared.  They were keeping their empire, thank you very much.  That included Indochina.

Some within Indochina looked to the U.S. for aid in their bid for independence.  After all, we too rebelled at one point from a European colonial power.  We declined.  Truman felt it more important to appease France (who wanted very much to join NATO to keep them out of the communist fold).  Unfortunately for us, (though not perhaps for the Vietnamese), this came back to bite us when France lost in Indochina and left NATO anyway.  A possible golden opportunity slipped away.

Historians debate the nature of this turning point in Asia.  Some assert that if FDR had lived, he would have made a different choice.  There are some intriguing quotes from FDR about how Europe was basically dead and how Asia represented the future.  But all we can do is speculate.

In the aftermath the U.N. created four nations, Cambodia, Laos, North and South Vietnam.  The division between north and south was certainly artificial, done for political reasons and not historical or cultural ones.  Was Vietnam within the purview of our strategic interests?  What kind of aid should we give them?

To understand our commitment to Vietnam, we need to go back to the Korean conflict.  Many believe now, and believed at the time, that our neglect to publicly proclaim our commitment to South Korea may have encouraged the North to invade.  We wanted to learn from the past, and so Eisenhower made our commitment to South Vietnam plain.  This, we hoped, would forestall an invasion from the north.

Well, it failed to do, which left us with a series of terrible dilemmas.

  • We could let South Vietnam collapse.  But what about then, our pledge to defend it?
  • We could give aid to the South and try and “prop them up.”  But how much aid should we give, and what form should it take?  Moreover, would the aid we gave them really solve the problems that South Vietnam had?

Johnson and his advisors knew full well that any aid to South Vietnam might be counter-productive.  We couldn’t keep them on life-support forever.  But eventually a new idea emerged.  Perhaps military engagement might force the South to get its act together.  If that didn’t happen, our military involvement might at least slow the North down and create a level playing field between the two nations.  While the South might not be better off, at least the North wouldn’t pose as much of a threat.

Such is the logic of war.  What I hope the students recognize is that not every story needs a dastardly villain.  Sometimes nations, as well as individuals, face only a series of bad choices, and have to make the best of it.  This, however, is not to say that the U.S. did in fact make the best of a bad situation, as we shall see.

We also looked at the 1960 presidential debate between John Kennedy and Richard Nixon, important for many reasons in our political history.  Most that heard the debate on the radio thought Nixon won.  Those that watched on TV (the majority) believed Kennedy won.  We saw a brief clip of the debate and discussed why that might be the case.

  • Nixon wore no makeup, while Kennedy did
  • Nixon looked much less comfortable on camera.  He shifted his eyes and smiled awkwardly.  Of course it’s not hard to miss his infamous sweating (towards the end of the clip).
  • Nixon wore a blase grey suit, Kennedy the classic politician dark blue.

This may also have helped originate many common tactics of candidates in debates, where candidates try to “stay on message” no matter what the question.  If you watch the clip, you see this perhaps more with Kennedy than Nixon.

Many of us lament the current state of our political discourse, and nearly all would agree that our modern presidential debates hardly dignify the word.  But the reality of our situation raises some interesting questions:

  • In the modern era, to what extent do we need presidents to be “actors,” and project a certain image?  Should it be an unwritten qualification for leadership?
  • TV is an inherently visual medium, and thus does not do well communicating written or spoken words (this was one of Neil Postman’s point in his Amusing Ourselves to Death).  Whether we like this or not, it is a reality of our culture and not likely to change soon.  Do we adjust the way we think of politics because of it?
  • If this concern for image has at least some legitimacy, what has it cost us as a democracy?

Later we will switch gears and look at the changes in music as a mirror for the changes in culture between W.W. II – Mid – 60’s.  I wanted the students to see our transition from broad based group oriented culture to a more individual/niche orientation.  Think for example of Glenn Miller.  He headlines, but the band is the star, and not him.  The music aims for a broad acceptance of broad cross-section of the population.  Culture in general happened on a big, broad scale.  Think of Cecil B. DeMille movies with their grand sets and dramatic scores, or Fred Astaire pictures with their big dance numbers.  Fewer African-Americans were bigger stars than Cab Calloway, but look how quickly he steps aside for the Nicholas brothers incredible dancing in this clip (certainly worth watching in its entirety — Fred Astaire himself called this the greatest dance number ever filmed):

Here is Fred Astaire himself in perhaps his most famous clip, a tribute to Bojangles.

The swing music of Glenn Miller, most popular in the 1940’s, showcased the big, broad, ensemble sound.

Overall, the theme here is akin to the summer movie blockbuster.  Go big or go home.

As we move into the late 50’s this begins to change, and we see this change first beginning in jazz music.  Ornette Coleman comes up with a different idea of what a musical note is. Coleman’s ensemble allowed for the musicians to each put their own individual, emotional interpretation on the music.

Thelonious Monk’s angular rhythms hit anything but the broad middle.  He created a sound totally his own.

In general, we see soloists rise in prominence in music, and this will presage the rise of individuals in society as a whole.  We should be careful.  The difference between an ensemble based sound and a preference for solos is not a moral one, so much as a change of emphasis.  We exist as members of groups and as individuals.  Both have importance, and our cultural expressions reflect both of these realities.  But, the change in emphasis does reflect broader changes in general.

We also saw how the niche of blues music morphs into the mainstream with rock and roll.  Artists like Elvis and the Beatles obviously gained huge followings.  But some of the British groups like The Who and The Kinks foreshadow disenchantment with the prevailing ethos.  Listen to “Everybody’s Going to be Happy,” and you can feel the intensity.  It’s not, “Everyone’s Going to be HAPPY! (YAY!) but “EVERYONE’S Going to be Happy.”  The Who appear to be harbingers of zany disregard for everything.  The song is called “Happy Jack,” and there are happy-sounding “la-la-la’s,” but the mood of the song gives a different message.

The music no longer aims for the broad middle.  As W.B. Yeats wrote in his famous poem, “the center cannot hold.”  Why did this happen, and what will be the results?  We will explore these questions next week.

Blessings,

Dave M

Mankind, Armies, and Strategy

by Dave Mathwin

I have always had great sympathy for Louis XVI. As far as moral character goes, he far outstripped his two predecessors. He had a genuine Christian faith and a genuine love for his family. The first several years of his reign show a movement towards humanitarian and scientific improvements throughout the country, and he sought to limit spending and the Versailles fluffery that characterized Louis XIV-XV. It seems ironic and almost non-sensical that the French Revolution should have come for him. It makes sense, however, when one realizes that for all his virtues, Louis could not play the role of King when it counted most. He had the very common foibles of indecisiveness, and wanting to be liked a bit too much. One can easily pass over such flaws in a common person, but at the wrong place and time, those in power with such flaws receive no mercy from history.

One can see this crucial difference between the three monarchs in their portraits. First, Louis XIV, then Louis XV:

Louis XV would have washed out as anybody but a king. His flaws would have overborne him as a blacksmith, lawyer, or baker. But . . . he could fill the royal robes. Whatever one can say about him, he cared little what others thought.*

Louis XVI in the same pose

comes up short. He shows the required leg, with none of the confidence. While Louis XIV and XV seem to leap out of the frame, Louis XVI wants us to go away so he can go back to fixing his clocks. Alas that 1789 came for such a decent, normal person. Pressed in trying times to puff out his chest and stand firm, he could not. Let us not say that he lacked the courage for this, for he proved at his trial and death to have plenty of it. Rather, we might say that leopards cannot change their spots. Faced with situations entirely unsuited to his temperament, he blundered into bad move after bad move, vacillating here and there in the process.

Some years ago I came across Edward Luttwak’s Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire, a title that, at the time, struck me as bizarre yet intriguing on its face. I thought, like many, that the Byzantines blundered around willy-nilly for some centuries, with their hesitations and diplomatic ploys betraying a complete lack of strategy. But Luttwak masterfully pointed out that

  • Most wars of any people are unnecessary, and should be avoided if possible. Investing in diplomacy as the Byzantines did costs far less in cash and in human lives.
  • The Byzantines faced enormous problems of different kinds on. multiple fronts for centuries that called for flexible and careful thought.
  • Like anyone, they made mistakes, but their survival for 1000 years as essentially 1/2 of the Roman Empire shows that they had great success overall in managing their resources with accuracy and effectiveness.

Luttwak performs a similar turn with his The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire. Emperors of varied quality came and went over the centuries. But, the Romans had a method to how they comprised and used their army. Again, having a strategy won’t always mean that one stays faithful to it, or even that they have a good strategy. But a method, unconscious or no, existed for the Roman Empire, independent of good generals and emperors.

His introduction lays out his basic approach regarding the use of force:

The superiority of the empire, and it was vast, . . . derived from the whole complex of ideas and traditions that informed the organization of Roman military force and it harnessed the power of the empire to a political purpose. The firm subordination of tactical priorities, martial ideals, and warlike instincts to political priorities was the essential condition of success. . . . In the imperial period at least, force was recognized for what it is, an essentially limited instrument of power, costly and brittle. Much better to conserve force, and use military power indirectly.

As an example . . . Romans considered the loss of a military standard something akin to a national tragedy. The Parthians captured a few such standards at Crassus’ disaster at Carrhae. Luttwak writes,

Augustus did not try and avenge the great defeat inflicted by the Parthians . . . in 53 B.C. Instead, in 20 B.C. he reached a compromise settlement under which Armenia was to be ruled by a king of the Arascid family, who would receive his investiture from Rome. Behind the neatly balanced formula there was strategy, for Parthian troops would thereby be kept out of a neutralized Armenia and far from undefended Anatolia and valuable Syria. There was also politics. The standards lost at Carrhae would be returned to Rome and received with great ceremony. Augustus issued coins falsely proclaiming the “capture” of Armenia.

Not very dramatic or inspiring, but Sun Tzu proclaimed that the best generals win without fighting.**

Luttwak organizes the book into a few different eras, i.e., the Julio-Claudians, the Flavians to the Severi, and so on. He examines the military composition at the time, what that should mean for how they used those forces, and to what degree the tactical situation on the ground matched policy in Rome. Certain eras interested me more than others, so what follows reflects that.

During the heyday of the Republic era, Rome’s legions had some variety and flexibility built within them, with light infantry (effective) and cavalry (not as much) attached to the standard Roman heavy infantry. As Rome underwent political changes, so too its army changed. During the early years of the principate they coalesced their forces to make them “heavier”–gone more or less were the javelin throwers and the horses. Exactly why this happened is hard to say, but interestingly, the centralization of political power mirrored itself in the centralization of the army.

However true this may be, it cannot explain everything–a diplomatic method existed behind it. Rome used client states to aid in their security, and used the militaries of the client states to supplement their own. So–Rome provided the main course, so to speak, and their clients the rest. Luttwak writes,

It is the absence of a perimeter defense that is the key to the entire system of Roman security during this period. There were neither border defenses nor local forces to guard against the “low intensity” threats of petty infiltration, transborder incursions, or localized attack. . . . such protection was provided, by indirect and non-military means. By virtually eliminating the burden of maintaining continuous frontier defenses, the net “disposable” military power generated by the imperial forces was maximized. . . . Thus, the empire’s potential military power could be converted into actual political control at a high rate of exchange.

Luttwak adds the following visual, which helps explain the idea of what he calls the “Hegemonic Empire.”

The weakness of such a system lies in that it requires someone with deft political skills to manage it, but Augustus possessed these in abundance. Some of his successors entirely lacked anything like it, but they ruled for a short time–i.e., Caligula. Others, like Tiberius, had sufficient ability, even if they lacked brilliance. Rome all in all prospered under this system because they had “good enough” emperors rule long enough to cover over the disasters. Rome tended to trust its clients and spent few resources watching over them. In turn, this meant that Rome made itself vulnerable to collapse if multiple clients rebelled at once. But again, the strength of the system and the overall competence of leadership made such a result quite unlikely.

In turn, the structure of the army and the attending political realities mean that,

the Roman army was clearly best equipped to serve an an instrument of warfare against enemies with fixed assets to protect–primarily cities, but also such things as arable lands or even irrigation systems. Conversely, Roman capabilities [declined] when enemies assets were not fixed, or at any rate, not concentrated.

This makes Roman disasters like Teutoburg Forest more understandable. You had Varus in command, one who lacked sufficient political ability in Germany. Perhaps more importantly, you had the Roman army far from any help from client states to supplement their ranks, and thus, able to fight well only against fixed assets. When the Germans under Arminius made his own army less “fixed” by “retreating” into the forest, the Romans got mauled. Rome won battles in subsequent years against certain German tribes, but the lack of fixed assets explains why they never could really conquer Germany, nor Parthia and the Sassanids. Grand strategic nuggets like this make Luttwak’s book a real gem.

Luttwak adds that at times the army could prevail in battle even against those lacking a majority of fixed assets. But such situations called forth the dark side of Roman power, writing that

the Romans could [not] apply their strength effectively against the widely dispersed rural base of warrior nations whose strength did not depend on the survival of city-based economic and social structure. Consequently, if the Romans persisted in their efforts, their only real alternative meant attacking the population base itself, in a war of extermination. . . . Thus at the conclusion of Domitian’s campaign against the Nasamones of North Africa, he reported to the Senate that the war had been won, and that the Nasamones has ceased to exist.

Though Luttwak’s analyzes almost everything dispassionately, one can see an example of the truth of St. Maximos’ dictum that man is a macrocosm of the universe, and that we should therefore interpret history through the lens of the human person. For example, I remember years ago when I tried my hand at fixing a plumbing problem in our house. I have no plumbing skills, but the problem seemed simple enough for me to try. Three trips to Home Depot and various tirades worthy of the dad in A Christmas Story later, I called a plumber, who humored me when he arrived by saying that he had seen worse.

My point here is that it would have been much better for me had the plumbing issue been bad enough that I never would have tried to fix it at all. Instead, it hovered in a tempting in-between space. Having waded in, I lost perspective and my cool. The same thing happened more or less to Roman armies in Parthia. And I can remember feeling akin to the Romans against the Nassamones–that if I bashed the pipes to oblivion, I could tell my wife that we had no more problem with the sink. Louis XVI had courage, and humility as well. In the case of serious invasion of France by a foreign enemy, I can imagine him deferring entirely generals while standing firm in an appropriately kingly way. In that case, the situation would have had clarity for him. When he tried to wade into managing internal social and political dynamics, he stumbled badly and tens of thousands died.

In time, Rome switched from a “Hegemonic Empire” to a “Territorial Empire,” to use Luttwak’s term. They switched from a “defense in depth” to having all the eggs in the “border security” basket. This mean that Rome either annexed, absorbed, or abandoned client states. Luttwak masterfully helps us not attach moral categories to this choice, or even to judge immediately the effectiveness of the switch. Rather, this choice involved different risks and problems.

The most common fallacy of analyses is the tendency to evaluate defensive systems in absolute terms. . . . Defensive systems should instead be evaluated in relative terms: their cost in resources should be compared to their military “output.”

Luttwak, p. 61

One can surmise that the “Territorial Empire” had the advantage of simplifying certain problems. More unity meant more control over various factors of defense. Rome need not have emperors equipped with cunning and subtlety to manage the empire effectively. A bulldog would do just fine. But–any penetration of the line brought a significant crises, and if the armies got either lazy or turned on each other–as (the latter) happened frequently in the 3rd century A.D., disaster would follow.

In my view, we should see the “Hegemonic” model of empire as a holdover from the Republic era. It’s flexible fringe with its solid core mirrors that of the structure of the Republic itself. We can see with hindsight that he principate system inaugurated by Augustus fell in between the stools of Republic and Empire, for which the Territorial model makes more sense.

For our own time . . . the NATO alliance in theory projects maximum deterrence and maximum fragility, akin to the Territorial model above. If someone does anything to any member of NATO, all in theory will respond. Possibly, the penetration of one of its members (by Russia) would rally everyone in the ranks for a defense. Possibly as well, an attack at any point might actually reveal the fragility of the system. NATO might abandon one of its own to prevent a general war, which would effectively end NATO as a viable entity.

A third possibility exists . . . one that shows that NATO in facts functions hegemonically. Perhaps the U.S, acting as NATO’s hegemon, might instead delegate defense based on complex diplomatic relationships. Such a move offers us a way out of the either/or of our current situation, and prevent a general war. But it also requires better political leadership than either or current or previous president could provide. If no one more deft arrives on the scene in 2024, we are stuck with the pro’s . . . and con’s of having all of our eggs in the “Territorial” basket.

Dave

*Incidentally, Charles II of England, a distracted (though certainly intelligent) debauchee much like Louis XV, also could transform himself. He knew how to be a king when it really counted, as this brief clip perfectly captures. If Louis XVI could have acted similarly in 1789 with the Estates General, perhaps things would have been different.

**I have nothing to add to the Russia-Ukraine situation except to say that hopefully, Ukraine can find something akin to a military standard to offer to Russia. It would have be something of little value to them, enormous value to Russia. I don’t know if anything like that exists between them.

8th Grade: The Values of the Republic, The Practice of the Army

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

This week we continued our look at Rome by looking at the establishment of the Republic in 508 B.C., and how that related to power sharing between Patricians and Plebians.

We can see a variety of similarities between Rome’s revolution, and our own, and this comparison surely would have pleased on our own founding fathers.  But that does not necessarily mean that we should see democracy, in the technical sense of the word, in either time.    The Romans came to object to their kings for the following reasons:

1. Arbitrary and Personal Power

Ultimately, Roman kings did not have to use law as the basis of their rule.  They could, in the end, do as they pleased.  Law had the advantages of being public and stable.  Rulers could now be accountable to something outside of themselves

2. Secret Power

When kings make decisions, they often do so in secret,  perhaps with a few advisors.  Whether he took counsel or not, the reasons behind the decision would be unknown.  The Romans wanted to create a government where decisions got made in an open forum, with open debate.

3. Concentrated Power

In the pure monarchies all power flows from one source at all times.  The Romans took political power and divided it among various offices and branches.  They then made sure that they always had more than one person serving in a particular office.  Finally, each of their offices had only one year terms, and while they did not outright forbid serving multiple terms, they frowned sternly  upon it.

The best way to think about what the Romans did is to go to the technical definition of a Republic – a “Res Publica” – a “Public Thing.”  Laws, expectations, debates, all these things were out in the open for the Romans.  We should not expect to see the kind of democracy that Athens practiced here, though Rome’s republic certainly had democratic elements.  Their main priority lay in making sure that the government was “public” — open to debate, open to observation, etc.

This does not mean that the Romans established a democracy, though they did broaden the base of political power.  Still, for the most part power stayed in the hands of the Patricians, Rome’s aristocracy.  This happened not necessarily by design, but certain factors heavily contributed to it.

  • The Senate (comprised almost entirely of Patricians) had almost complete control of War and Peace.  Rome was often at war, and often won, which naturally enhanced the prestige and power of the Senate.  We have seen in our own democracy that whenever a foreign policy crisis strikes, domestic issues invariably take a back-seat.  Such was the relationship between the Assembly and the Senate in Rome.
  • As we noted last week, Rome was strongly traditional in its cultural leanings, and the Patricians had a vested interest in maintaining tradition.
  • The differences in wealth between Patricians and Plebians remained modest for most of the Republic’s history.  As we shall see in a few weeks, when this begins to change the Patricians faced more challenges to their power.
  • Finally, nothing succeeds like success.  For centuries, Rome grew and prospered under the general guidance of patricians.

The argument went deeper than this, however.  At root the question of, “What is Rome,” ran underneath the surface arguments.  For Patricians, Rome was an idea.  Rome’s ideals made Rome great, and Rome could only stay great if the people who led had dedication to those ideals.  For Plebians, Rome’s people made Rome great, and so Rome’s people deserved a greater share of power.  This tension would bubble beneath the surface for a long time, and how Rome eventually dealt with the problem would contribute to the unraveling of the Republic itself.

We also looked the basic grid plan of Roman cities, and discussed what they reflect about Rome.

Nothing shocks us here, but the methodical nature of the design reflects a few key Roman values, such as simplicity and unity.  The design pushes people toward the center, with an emphasis on togetherness.  The grid plan may also hint at the idea of equality, or at least equality under the law.

As Rome expanded they “cut and pasted” their city design into the conquered areas.  Rome valued habit, tradition, and togetherness.  They tended to look down on “going your own way” in general, and as we might expect, in the army as well.  The key to their military success lie in the fact that everyone stayed together, everyone did what they were told.

The values that went into the formation of their government and city design also went into their army, whether consciously or not. The standard Roman military formation looks somewhat like its city design, with the men spread out in checkerboard fashion:

Rome’s design gave them more flexibility of movement in the field, but each “maniple,” or individual grouping, had a high level of discipline.  This clip below, manages in 1:30 to show some of those values (warning: not bloody, but violent).

Greece, being a more individualistic society, had a long history of heroic individuals.  In Roman stories, the hero is Rome itself.  The clip illustrates a few key ideas along these lines:

  • When the whistle blows, the front lines move back, and others move up.  Normally soldiers would fight in front for much longer than the clip shows, but the principle is clear: we all share the burden equally.
  • Roman tactics, like their other values, were simple.  Block with the shield, strike with the sword around the enemy’s waist, step back into formation.  With this basic move they conquered much of the world around them.
  • No one gets out of line.  They do not tolerate even the successful “hero.”  Rome itself will always get the credit.  The cohesiveness of the line reflects the cohesive nature of their society.  And these cohesive military formations gave them a great advantage over other less cohesive, more heroically oriented tribes surrounding them.  In these kinds of circumstances, Rome simply did not lose.

Here is a clip from Stanley Kubrick’s Spartacus, where you see the Roman army advance in their maniples.  The message seems to be that the city of Rome itself has come to fight as they fan out into their grid pattern.

Next week we will begin to look at Rome’s conflict with Carthage, a struggle that would define the destinies of both societies.

Have a great weekend,

Dave

The Secret of Fiery Women

by Dave Mathwin

Though issues surrounding COVID and race occupy our present discourse, we will likely see the question of women in our society revisited soon. Questions about patriarchy and equal pay have not played themselves out yet, and democracy, which often favors abandoning tradition and rapid change, will likely provide a platform for us to hash these issues out more fully.

Camille Paglia–certainly no conservative–has argued that women in traditional societies actually had a great deal of power, maybe even more than in the modern west. Coming from an Italian background, she observed large family gatherings and saw women deciding the course of events, the menu, etc. while the men mostly stood around and looked under the hoods of cars.*

We think of Rome as a masculine society, with its emphasis on conquest, the ‘pater familias,’ and their Senate. And yet, it appears that the most important job in Rome belonged to women–their Vestal Virgins.

We moderns might blanch at such a statement. We rarely talk about the importance of religion, and certainly never would dream of thinking about virginity as even remotely resembling a civilizational issue. But Robin Lorsch Wildfang (who doesn’t wish that their own name was Robin Lorsch Wildfang?) reminds us in her useful book Rome’s Vestal Virgins: A Study of Rome’s Vestal priestesses in the late Republic and early Empire, that the Romans were not moderns. We have borrowed so much from Rome for our political and legal system. And yet, anyone perusing this book knows a vast gulf separates our two civilizations.

I give credit to Wildfang for telegraphing exactly the nature of her work. As a reader, one knows that the author will give you densely packed facts with gobs of footnotes, with little overall agenda. We read these books for enjoyment no more than we eat those sawdust-like “power bars” for the taste. But both deliver on their promise. So many other books fail on this account.

Several times Wildfang mentions that, “Without the Vestals and their cult, in the eyes of Romans there would be no Rome.” Roman Vestals had unique privileges among women in Rome especially regarding their property rights. They could also suffer the most severe forms of punishment. But their duties seem to boil down to:

  • Their maintenance of the sacred fire, which always had to stay lit
  • Their oversight of a secret storeroom/offerings of basic crops
  • The continuation of the virginity as long as they served (Vestals usually began their service between 8-10 years old, and had to serve for 30 years at least, but could leave after that time).

How we interpret these duties will say much about how one interprets the past.

For the fire . . .

Ovid, Cicero, Dionysius of Hallicanarsus, and Plutarch all agree that the Vestals maintained the sacred fire because fire consumes rather than bears fruit. The “dryness” of fire would be linked then with their virginity. The ancient authors talk of two fires, one of Vulcan, the other of Vesta, goddess of the hearth.

But Wildfang looks for an alternative explanation. Rather than delve into the symbolism here for an explanation, she stresses the antiquity of the rite. Since the Vestal cult predated Rome’s founding, we should see only Rome’s desire to maintain its ties to antiquity, and the various associations some make to virginity and fruitfulness (or its lack) become unnecessary.

I admire Wildfang’s thoroughness and academic integrity, but I rarely approve of Occam’s razor as it applies to historical conclusions. Here at least, it just seems to convenient, too much of an “easy out” for us moderns.

I think that we gain interesting insights by taking these sources along with the scope of Rome’s history. This in turn might lead to understanding the sources in a different way. Wildfang mentions in a few places that Vestals entered into the order via “abduction” somewhere between 6-10 years old. This abduction rite happened with the father’s consent, as the girls were taken from their families in front of their father in a prepared ceremony of sorts. We may blanch at the fact that the girls likely rarely consented themselves, but this in itself gives an important clue as to the meaning of their order for Rome.

Of all the peripheral clues she gives as to the meaning of the abduction ceremony, Wildfang never deal with the story of Rome’s founding, which happened in part through the abduction of Sabine women. Romulus and his male cohorts invite a variety of women on the pretext of a religious festival. They then basically kidnap them and “marry” them–no doubt forcibly for many of them. In the telling Livy refuses to sugarcoat or condemn the deed. He seems to shrug his shoulders over it. Simply put, the Roman state could not have a future without families and children. Maybe this tale has within it some deep symbolism. Maybe the practical Romans just stated the facts and expected one to deal with it. Whatever the case, the abduction into the Vestal order mirrors this event rather evenly. This comparison makes more sense to me when we recall that Romulus’ mother Rhea was a Vestal herself, and begat her twin boys either through the rape/seduction of Mars or some other guy, depending on the tale.

Thus, I think we can say that the Vestals “married” Rome when they entered the order. So I am not sure that we should view the fire they had to maintain so precisely as “sterile.” If the Romans thought of this fire as “fruitless” why punish them so severely for letting it go out?**

If we think of fire as a “heavenly” substance of the “air” and we recall their duty to maintain the sacred storehouse of food, we might see these two elements as a reflection of marriage itself, a union of the masculine and feminine, of Sky father and Earth mother. Relations with another man would effectively then become adultery to Rome itself. The women maintain the fire possibly because women in general are the foremost keepers of the marriage institution. For example, Penelope worked harder to maintain her marriage than Odysseus did.

No Vestal rites means no marriage of heaven and earth, and so no families, and no “future” for Rome. Thus, the Romans took the extinguishing of the Vestal fire after the Battle of Cannae as a worse omen than the massive death toll of the battle itself.

We see Wildfang employ Occam’s razor again with another related issue. If the vestals had sexual relations, they faced a charge of “incestum.” Certainly by the time period covered in the book, the word had just the meaning we would assume–sex with a family member. Wildfang can’t grasp the sense of this. Why would having sex with average Joe Roman be specifically incestuous? Seeking clarity, she suggests that “incestum” didn’t mean “incest,” but “impurity.” The Latin for impurity is “incastum,” so it “makes sense” to Wildfang that, because incastum predates incestum as a word, “incestum” need not be a special, more horrible form of impurity. Best to translate “incestum” in this case as simply impurity, i.e., incastum.

Again, I protest. If “incestum” was not a such an unusual crime, why the unusual punishment of being buried alive? Also, let us assume the Romans meant what they said, when they said it. They had two different words, and distinguished between them. Whatever the original context, in the time period Wildfang examines they had different words with different meanings. Finally, I think the natural meaning of “incestum” could make sense within my interpretation of the vestals “marrying” Rome. Maybe, to have relations with any Roman meant, then, having relations with a family member.

Consider this line of thought above speculative. I am obviously no expert. But I think this makes certain odd pieces of the vestal puzzle fit together.

Wildfang talks briefly about the political influence vestals had on rare occasions. Normally they stayed out of politics, but every so often they intervened. Why didn’t the vestals intervene more, or if they had only a religious function, why intervene at all? If we think of the vestals as married to Rome, per my earlier suggestion, our own experience of family dynamics helps explain this difficulty Wildfang mentions.

I had one set of grandparents who had a lot of influence over family events and dynamics. This influence came not from frequent edicts. They had no need to issue them, and certainly they did not look to control anyone. Their influence came by our love and respect for them. My grandfather might occasionally make a pronouncement or two. Of course we listened, but with my grandfather, we might discuss or mildly argue with him.

My grandmother made “pronouncements” even more rarely than my grandfather, but when she spoke that meant the end of the matter. In my world, challenging or even disagreeing with my grandmother simply was not possible (though please understand that she was the sweetest person in the world–everyone she knew thought that they were her favorite person–she had that effect on people). When I found out that she was a Yankee fan around the age of 9-10 I could not have been more stunned, or had my world more shaken (my dad spent formative years in Brooklyn and we were Dodger fans by birth). With my grandfather, I might have argued the case. Yet, I received this news from my grandmother in silence. I could conceive of no other reaction.^

The vestals likely had a similar power, but if used too frequently it would likely have diminished. When a plant blooms, what secures its life lies hidden in the earth. So too, the vestals kept their symbolic fruits of the earth hidden as part of their duties. They likely thought that the power of women remained greatest when they chose to conceal rather than reveal. Even the masculine, patriarchal Romans seem to have understood this. Perhaps it was just this overt masculinity allowed them to see the importance of the feminine with clarity.

Dave

*Paglia, an self-described atheist and also a lesbian, can speak fondly of ‘tradition’ because of her appreciation for paganism. Perhaps these days, even a pagan could qualify as some kind of conservative.

**I criticize Wildfang for not trusting the ancient sources in regards to “incestum,” but one could throw a similar charge back at me in this instance. Ovid makes a direct reference to linking the flame with the fact that a vestal “yields no seeds.” Dionysius of Halicanarsus makes a similar suggestion, but asserts it only as a suggestion. Plutarch follows Dionysius in making this interpretation one option among many.

In my defense, I would say the following:

  • Ovid seems to play fast, loose, and as he pleases with his material. I see him as something of a prankster. This does not mean he lied or was inaccurate, but I would not trust him on a point of historical accuracy. That was not his aim.
  • Dionysius and Plutarch have more gravitas, but both of them give only “some say” credence to this interpretation.

I think that the general sense of the vestal’s history and Rome’s history guide us better than these texts by themselves. The “first” of Rome’s vestals, Rhea, did “bear fruit” in birthing Romulus. When we combine this fact with the parallel to the abduction of the Sabine women, well . . . that’s my argument for my interpretation. It may not fit with with Ovid, but I don’t think it absolutely goes against the others.

^Another story to illustrate this point . . . I collected baseball cards for a few years growing up. When my grandparents visited she would sometimes take me to the local baseball card shop to make a purchase for me. I remember driving home one day from such a trip–I was about 11 years old–and we saw a beautiful motorcycle pass us on the road. She asked if I liked the motorcycle and I said absolutely I did. She stated, “Those are not safe. If you decide to buy a motorcycle, no more trips to the baseball card store.”

In one sense her comment did not make much sense. By the time I was old enough for a motorcycle she would not be taking me to buy baseball cards (nor would I be collecting them).

But her comment absolutely stuck with me. I put all thoughts of motorcycle riding out of my head immediately. I still hear her voice whenever I take wistful middle-aged man glances at a Harley. But in my 30+ years of knowing her on Earth, this was one of only two times she ever told me not to do something. She shot very, very few “bullets” but those hit their mark and left an indelible impression

Just War as Christian Discipleship

by Dave Mathwin

Methodical.  Inexorable.  Annoying, sometimes provoking, and yet, ultimately convincing and convicting.  All these words sum up my 1441206817reaction Daniel Bell’s important book on the Christian just war tradition.

First the bad:

Bell could have used a better editor, and bears the hallmarks of a first book from the author.  He slides all too often into a repetitive and heavy didactic style, and uses paragraphs chock full of rhetorical questions that pile onto one another.  Not as bad as Mr. Chadband from Bleak House, but I might parody this habit of Bell’s thusly:

“And what are we to make of the Gadsden flag motto (used by Marines) “Don’t Tread on Me?”  Does it express a sentiment in line with the sacrificial love of Christ?  Does it encourage a transformative view of suffering?  Would such an attitude lead to just warriors?  What kind of motto’s should our soldiers use?  Is the church ready to inform the military about such things?”

So this was wearisome.

Bell also never applies his ideas to any particular conflict, which seems too easy for me.  Bell espouses some controversial ideas, but I wish he stuck his neck out a bit more and applied his thinking to some actual wars.  Granted, the reader can do this for himself, but Bell should have guided the reader a bit more in the interpretation of his ideas.

Despite these weaknesses, the book reminds us that the Church, nations, and militaries have almost completely lost touch with Christian concepts of “Just War” theory and practice.   Bell’s book does not condemn war outright.  Rather, he seeks to completely reframe the way we examine the issue, which may explain why both pacifist theologians and military chaplains have endorsed his work.

Speaking from a “Just War” tradition within the Church has its limitations.  Rarely did any accomplished theologian comment on the issue at length.  The Church’s most powerful voices on the topic, St. Augustine, and St. Thomas Aquinas, dealt with just war theory only in an in ad-hoc fashion.  Bell points out, however, that while the Church had few official individual voices on the topic, an agreed upon understanding more or less existed from the early days right up until the modern era around the 17th century.  Thus, Christians have access not just to Scripture, but also to an authoritative history of understanding of just war, what I will refer to as “The Tradition” in the rest of this post.

Bell’s main argument centers around his assertion that waging “Just War” has much more do with sanctification than a checklist of criteria that then give us justification to act as we please.  To fight justly means fighting as a Christian, with love for one’s neighbor and one’s enemy.  Fighting justly means not seeking to maximize personal well-being, or national safety, but working for the good of others.  Bell rejects pacifism.  There are times when acting faithfully might mean using force to achieve just ends.  But Bell argues well that if we cannot apply the central truths of the gospel message in how and when we fight, we have no business fighting at all.

This has many implications for us.

Self Defense

Modern understandings of just war often primarily focus on personal self-defense, or defending property, or maintaining a “way of life.”  But this approach puts ourselves, or our nation, before others.  Thus, “self-defense” can thinly disguise selfishness. As Augustine stated, “Christians should rather be killed than kill, rather suffer harm than harm others.”  Charity must prevail even under dire circumstances.

But as happens so often in this book, when you think Bell resolves the issue it deepens.  Christians can fight to defend others, particularly those who cannot defend themselves.  Christians can put others first by risking their own well-being to serve others.

If we wonder how we tell the difference between defense of self and others, Bell sympathizes.  The Tradition gives us no formula, no checklist, and this flows directly from the gospel itself.  For example, no checklist can tell you when you love your wife.  A husband cannot say, “I bought her flowers and watched the movie she wanted to see.  Therefore, I love her, and she should know I love her as long as I continue to do those things.”

What really guides the practice of Just War is not a list but just warriors themselves, who apply the gospel ethic to their situation.  This lack of black and white guidance may frustrate us at times, but Bell fears that the checklist mentality will give us carte blanche to do as we please once “the enemy” meets certain conditions.  I remember an anecdote about an ex-boxer bothered by a drunk. The drunk hit the boxer a few times, and the boxer responded, “The Lord told me to turn one cheek, and then the other.  He said nothing about a third time,” and proceeded to whale away on the unfortunate man.

The Purpose of War

From General Sherman we get the modern view that, “War is all hell.”  Those that follow Sherman believe that war remains essentially irredeemable, and making war as short as possible forms much of our strategy as to how we fight.

The Tradition offers another perspective.  In one sense we must treat fighting a war like any other activity.  We fight wars that we might grow in holiness, that we would grow closer to God.  For Christians war should develop the fruits of the Spirit.  If it can’t we have no business in it.

This may mean exercising patience.  It may mean that we fight in such a way where we give up physical advantages because of the moral problems that may result from our use of these advantages.  If we maximize the pain and suffering of our enemy in such a way that minimizes our own, we cannot claim to be just warriors following the call of Christ.

When We Fight

Following Christ means exercising charity towards one’s enemy, and charity requires us to give every reasonable chance to settle differences without violence through diplomatic pursuits.  We can use violence only when we know we have given other measures a fair try.  This raises questions about the impact of a large, professional, full-time standing army.  German theologian Karl Barth (no pacifist) argued that standing armies make it much easier for states to go to war than it should be.  Having an army always ready strongly tempts nations to use it much quicker than they ought.

We might reasonably ask whether or not one can exercise love and charity and kill another human being.  The Tradition says yes.  Justice can never rise to the dignity of the word if it stands separate from love.  “The Lord disciplines those He loves.”  Using force against another could be an act of charity.  You may be preventing them doing evil. Your “discipline” might move them to repentance.  Of course, once a person dies they cannot repent.  So the Tradition states that while we may at times use force, we must try not to kill our adversaries if we can avoid it.  Again Bell urges us to abandon the checklist in favor of Christ-like character.  Sometimes a just warrior may kill, but this killing must serve the gospel for the world and, crucially ourselves.  We cannot sacrifice our own souls or our own humanity in war.  One thinks, for example, of Joan of Arc, weeping over the English dead and praying over their wounded after a battle.

This might reduce the effectiveness of the military.  But it would be grossly uncharitable for us to urge that the military de-humanize itself and stand outside the Tradition so that we may be safer.  And–a dehumanized military would not serve us well in the long run anyway, and perhaps might even pose a threat to us.

Bell’s calls us all to own the call of “Just War.”  The military draws its direction from society, so the public must practice just policies if we want our military to do the same.  Again, the “just war” lifestyle is nothing less a Christian lifestyle, and we are all called to this.

In light of the witness of the Tradition, we have much to consider from not only our history (Sherman’s march through the South, carpet bombing in W.W. II, etc.) but also our current practice.  We already have extensive moral failures in how we use drones.  We waterboard but use the “checklist” mentality and avoid calling it torture.   The Guardian reports that we get doctors to harm prisoners by a perverse use of semantics.  The full articles is here, but the pertinent quote from it might be,

“Medical professionals were in effect told that their ethical mantra “first do no harm” did not apply, because they were not treating people who were ill.”

This does not mean that soldiers sin more than the rest of us.  Rather, soldiers sin in the same spiteful and selfish ways as all of us.  And this is part of the point Bell tries to make.  Fighting involves the application of our Christian faith just as much as teaching Sunday school.  Whatever, our problems as nation, whatever issues we have in the military,  all of us own them.

Bell touches on other topics, but at its core, the Tradition calls us back to our primary allegiance to Christ, not victory, the “mission,” expediency, country or tribe.  If our main concern is the salvation of our soul and the spread of His Kingdom, we will view war very differently than we do currently.  We may need to reevaluate why, when, and how we fight.  We may need to adopt the practice of  stepping outside our national context and ask if our side even represents justice in the first place.  This is what makes Bell’s book so necessary for us, and so difficult to accept.  As the Catholic theologian Jacques Maritain wrote,

We have no illusions about the misery of human nature.  But we have no illusions, either, about the pseudo-realists who cultivate and exalt evil in order to fight against evil, and who consider the gospel a decorative myth that we could not take seriously without throwing the machinery of the world out of order.

The American “Prestige”

by Dave Mathwin

 

In our senior Government class, we spend a good amount of time discussing the question, “What is America?” throughout the year.  The question is deceptively simple, and we have a difficult time answering it.  We discussed Book 1, Ch. 4 from The Prince recently in class, and it spurred some interesting discussion.

The text reads as follows . . .

Why The Kingdom Of Darius, Conquered By Alexander, Did Not Rebel Against The Successors Of Alexander At His Death

CONSIDERING the difficulties which men have had to hold a newly acquired state, some might wonder how, seeing that Alexander the Great became the master of Asia in a few years, and died whilst it was yet scarcely settled (whence it might appear reasonable that the whole empire would have rebelled), nevertheless his successors maintained themselves, and had to meet no other difficulty than that which arose among themselves from their own ambitions.

I answer that the principalities of which one has record are found to be governed in two different ways: either by a prince, with a body of servants, who assist him to govern the kingdom as ministers by his favour and permission; or by a prince and barons, who hold that dignity by antiquity of blood and not by the grace of the prince. Such barons have states and their own subjects, who recognize them as lords and hold them in natural affection. Those states that are governed by a prince and his servants hold their prince in more consideration, because in all the country there is no one who is recognized as superior to him, and if they yield obedience to another they do it as to a minister and official, and they do not bear him any particular affection.

The examples of these two governments in our time are the Turk and the King of France. The entire monarchy of the Turk is governed by one lord, the others are his servants; and, dividing his kingdom into sanjaks, he sends there different administrators, and shifts and changes them as he chooses. But the King of France is placed in the midst of an ancient body of lords, acknowledged by their own subjects, and beloved by them; they have their own prerogatives, nor can the king take these away except at his peril. Therefore, he who considers both of these states will recognize great difficulties in seizing the state of the Turk, but, once it is conquered, great ease in holding it. The causes of the difficulties in seizing the kingdom of the Turk are that the usurper cannot be called in by the princes of the kingdom, nor can he hope to be assisted in his designs by the revolt of those whom the lord has around him. This arises from the reasons given above; for his ministers, being all slaves and bondmen, can only be corrupted with great difficulty, and one can expect little advantage from them when they have been corrupted, as they cannot carry the people with them, for the reasons assigned. Hence, he who attacks the Turk must bear in mind that he will find him united, and he will have to rely more on his own strength than on the revolt of others; but, if once the Turk has been conquered, and routed in the field in such a way that he cannot replace his armies, there is nothing to fear but the family of the prince, and, this being exterminated, there remains no one to fear, the others having no credit with the people; and as the conqueror did not rely on them before his victory, so he ought not to fear them after it.

The contrary happens in kingdoms governed like that of France, because one can easily enter there by gaining over some baron of the kingdom, for one always finds malcontents and such as desire a change. Such men, for the reasons given, can open the way into the state and render the victory easy; but if you wish to hold it afterwards, you meet with infinite difficulties, both from those who have assisted you and from those you have crushed. Nor is it enough for you to have exterminated the family of the prince, because the lords that remain make themselves the heads of fresh movements against you, and as you are unable either to satisfy or exterminate them, that state is lost whenever time brings the opportunity.

Now if you will consider what was the nature of the government of Darius, you will find it similar to the kingdom of the Turk, and therefore it was only necessary for Alexander, first to overthrow him in the field, and then to take the country from him. After which victory, Darius being killed, the state remained secure to Alexander, for the above reasons. And if his successors had been united they would have enjoyed it securely and at their ease, for there were no tumults raised in the kingdom except those they provoked themselves.

But it is impossible to hold with such tranquillity states constituted like that of France. Hence arose those frequent rebellions against the Romans in Spain, France, and Greece, owing to the many principalities there were in these states, of which, as long as the memory of them endured, the Romans always held an insecure possession; but with the power and long continuance of the empire the memory of them passed away, and the Romans then became secure possessors. And when fighting afterwards amongst themselves, each one was able to attach to himself his own parts of the country, according to the authority he had assumed there; and the family of the former lord being exterminated, none other than the Romans were acknowledged.

When these things are remembered no one will marvel at the ease with which Alexander held the Empire of Asia, or at the difficulties which others have had to keep an acquisition, such as Pyrrhus and many more; this is not occasioned by the little or abundance of ability in the conqueror, but by the want of uniformity in the subject state.

Machiavelli’s distinction helps make sense of other historical events.  We can look, for example, at Napoleon and Hitler’s invasion of Russia/Soviet Union.  At first glance, Russia must have seemed akin to Persia in Napoleon’s eyes.  After all, Czar Alexander I certainly looked like most other autocrats in history.  But . . . for most of Russia’s existence it resembled France.  Tales in the old Russian folk-epics reveal a shaky relationship of the people to their ruler, but more importantly, old Russia had several distinct provinces/cities that competed for precedence and had their own history and identity.  Napoleon found Russia easy to enter but hard to hold.  The Nazi’s found the same true even 130 years later.  When force no longer sufficed to hold the Soviet Union together ca. 1989-91, the old identities resurfaced almost immediately.

“Never get involved in a land war in Asia,” also has some of the same logic behind it.  A country like China has the appearance of resembling Persia, just as Russia did.  But most of China’s history reveals competing provinces, dialects, and an uncertain relationship to the emperor until later in its existence.

So we asked the question, “Which kind of kingdom is America?”  Does it resemble France, or Persia?  In contrast to Russia, China, or France,  Persia did not have a long, zig-zag run-up to the height of its power.  Their civilization had a jump-start, meteoric rise under Cyrus the Great, who immediately set a pattern of charismatic dominance over the whole of his empire.  In future generations the Persians took their cue it seemed almost entirely from future dynamic leaders like Darius.  Their reliance on this pattern shows even in the failed rebellion of Cyrus the Younger, who fit this mold of dynamic leader better than his brother Artaxerxes II.  The fact that he almost succeeded with no other claim to rule besides his personality says a lot about Persia.

Some students thought that America had a beginning akin to that of France or Russia.  We had different colonies in different parts of the Atlantic coast that developed entirely apart from each other.  These colonies came together only to fight against a common enemy, but essentially remained separate kingdoms until sometime after the Civil War — perhaps not even until into the Great Depression.

The majority thought otherwise.  True, the first colonies hardly interacted with one another, but they came to America with similar purposes from similar cultures.  At the core, they were about the same thing, which is why the French-Indian War could so easily unite them and start us thinking about the “people.”  When examining the history of China, Russia, or France one sees a host of regularly occurring rivalries, small conflicts, and so on.  But America we only see one big blowup  — the Civil War.  The Civil War showed that obviously, we differed on much.  But it was the kind of big blowup that occurs in families, when often unity exists. It was the exception that proved the rule.

I acknowledge much merit in the “France” argument, but in this case I sided with the majority.  Tocqueville noticed back in the 1830’s the tendency towards centralization in our democratic experiment, and the already growing power of the majority.  He wrote,

The very essence of democratic government consists in the absolute sovereignty of the majority; for there is nothing in democratic states that is capable of resisting it.

We have different political opinions, but in no political election is any fundamental question of identity at stake.  Many rejoice/lament the election of a particular president.  But whoever may win the election, the next day our lives remain unchanged.

In Book Five of his Poliitcs Aristotle speculates that democratic constitutions* remain most safest when threats to said constitution remain either far away or very close.  The first seems obvious.  When nothing threatens us we live at ease, and it’s easy to have peace with others.  A very near threat like an invasion would bind us together quickly.    This kind of threat might also be merely an obvious one, like the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which immediately united a divided country in the war effort.

The in-between threats, however, pose a real challenge.  Since the danger is neither obvious or near, we can easily divide not just on how to respond but whether or not to respond.  We might think of the Vietnam War as an example of this, and sure enough, it brought on significant internal changes to our constitution.  The “War on Terror” fits into a similar mold. Should we intervene here or there?  Should we increase surveillance or not, what about privacy rights, and so on.  And, true to Aristotle’s form, we see increased political polarization with this “intermediate” threat.

But our class speculated on exactly what an “invader” — whatever form that might take — would find.  Once Cyrus the Younger died in the Battle of Cunaxa his cause died with him.  Once Darius III died, Alexander had essentially conquered Persia.  But at what would America’s enemies take aim?  Not the president, surely, for at any given time half the country will not like him.  Not the capital, either.  As the British discovered in 1813, burning D.C. did little to aid their war effort.  One could hypothetically detonate a strong EMP in the atmosphere to knock out our electrical system.  But that would take out any first or second world country and so that answer lacks enough specificity to the United States.  This “absolute sovereignty of the majority,” would be hard to pin down.  Where is it?  And how would one attack it?  Get too close, and the unity of the people to defend their “constitution” would quickly emerge.

The “prestige” in magic is the trick’s big reveal, and of course sometimes what is revealed is nothing at all.  This would happen perhaps to an invader, who might never find the rabbit inside the hat.  Rather, as Aristotle suggests, and the experience of Rome certainly plays out, democracies will be far more likely to erode themselves from within as opposed to without.

Dave

 

*By “constitution” he does not mean merely a written document, but our way of relating to one another in general.

 

 

The Mirror Crack’d

by Dave Mathwin

Some years ago I saw a video about the emergence of Greek culture and the talking heads discussed the magnificent achievements of Greek drama.  Before talking about the drama itself, they mentioned the origins of drama, though only very briefly.  After all, Greek drama began in the worship of Dionysius, a confusing and strange subject for modern ears. I found it fascinating to watch the speakers deal with this aspect of Greek civilization.  They hated being on unfamiliar territory — unfamiliar not so much intellectually, that is, but ideologically and experientially.

Briefly,

  • Dionysian worship started with women sneaking off illegally, or at least shamefully, for their rites. Dionysius himself occupied, at minimum, the barest fringe of Greek religion.  Some of the commentators latched onto this, for it promised a narrative we could identify with.  “Aha!  A sisterhood of oppressed women, sharing radical beliefs! And observe the vital contribution they made to their society and the world at large, etc.”  But Dionysian rites also involved men, too, so they couldn’t press that narrative too far.
  • The Dionysian rites for women also seemed to involve ecstatic experiences invoking bulls, snakes, wine, and so on. This too got the barest mention, for the “oppressed sisterhood” narrative didn’t really match the fact that Dionysius was a fertility god.  So the women may have been praying and dancing furiously for the chance to have children, a very traditional “role” (ha!) for women to play.
  • To add insult to injury, male Dionysian worship may have invoked blessings to “survive ordeals.”  This got no mention at all.  It appears that these “rebels” danced around madly and got drunk to attempt to fulfill the most prosaic of traditional gender roles of “tough guy,” and “nurturing mother.”  This square peg had no place in their round hole interpretations.

So, after passing over all this in the quickest fashion, finally smiles came to their faces as they talked about the drama itself. Here they felt far more comfortable.  Greek drama “allows for the community to come together and deal with issues of importance,” or something like that.  Ah, yes, the “humanism” of the Greeks.  This we understand, so this they talked about at length.  Gone were any of the unusual religious associations involving Dionysius.  The important thing to us is the emergence of drama, for without the emergence of drama, how could we watch Dumb and Dumber today instantly on Netflix?*  And we very naturally assume that what is important to us must have been of prime importance to the Greeks.  Dionysian worship, then, got relegated to a mere carrying device for what we understand and what we feel is important.  As a friend of mine stated, whenever we use a word to describe an ancient people that they themselves did not use (in this case, the word “humanism”), we will likely reach false conclusions. The talking heads are not unusual. Most of us unfortunately avoid confrontations with the “other.”

I’m not an Alfred Lord Tennyson fan (to be fair I’ve read hardly anything he wrote), but his poem “The Lady of Shallot” intrigues me in one way.  The Lady in question deals with a curse, and can only look at reflections in a mirror to ascertain reality.  The mirror of course serves as a poor substitute of reality, and later cracks upon her sad and untimely death.

Out flew the web and floated wide-

The mirror crack’d from side to side;

“The curse is come upon me,” cried

The Lady of Shalott.

Tennyson’s work came from the same spiritual place as the dreaded pre-Raphaelites, whose paintings reveal an intense desire to recover something of antiquity.  And yet the grossly over-dramatized version of the past in their eyes reveals far more about themselves, with their aspirations fit perhaps for the teenage soul more than an adult world (hence L.M. Montgomery has her young Anne of Green Gables grow fascinated with the “Lady of Shallot”).

All of us tend to distort reality to fit our own images of it, but the way the Parthenon has been interpreted over time stands as one of the more curious episodes of this typical human folly.  Joan Breton Connelly chronicles this and gives her own interpretation of the architectural masterpiece in her recent book, The Parthenon Enigma.  The building occupies pride of place in the history of western civilization.  Its marble facade inspired those who saw it to grand notions of ideal beauty.  The building’s perfect proportions inspired noble visions of clarity and a sense of true humanity.  Certain technical achievements of the building are practically unparalleled.

But we made the building in our own image, and Connelly writes to set the record straight.  Ever since the Enlightenment we have seen the Parthenon as reflecting the “humanism” of the Athenians.  We have some justification for this.  If you trace the religion of the Athenians one sees a clear descent from Aeschylus (who takes religion seriously) to Thucydides (who didn’t).  The Athenians elected Pericles to multiple terms of their highest office, and he certainly fits the humanist mold. Observers therefore assumed, as the Parthenon was Pericles’ project that it would reflect his values.  Then again, maybe not.

She has two main arguments, with the first drawn from the he Parthenon friezes, long thought to depict contemporary Athenians mingling with the gods.  Connelly has an ironclad argument that Athens instead hearkens to not to its present but its mythological past.  At Athens’ founding it had a king named Erechtheus, who had three daughters that sacrificed themselves that Athens might survive (images below on a Parthenon frieze).  Athens makes an explicit statement, and explicit prayer of hope, that death might come from life with the Parthenon.

Amidst our wondering at the architectural genius of the building and the democratic (and therefore mostly familiar) practices of the Athenians, we forget that the Parthenon was a temple to Athena.  Excavations show that they built the Parthenon on top of an older temple, so clearly the Parthenon was sacred space, and not merely civic space with a civic purpose.

Corinthian_Column_Head_JerashModern eyes miss many such death-life associations in Greece.  For example, look up any article on Corinthian columns and you will likely see something about their fancy, or perhaps excessive, ornamentation.  Certainly Corinthian columns do not fit with Enlightenment sensibilities about classical decorum and proportion — such people always prefer the Ionic column (I prefer the Ionic — to the right — as well so I don’t mean to cast stones).  But Connelly points out that the plants in Corinthian columns hearken back to ancient myths about death and rebirth in their city.  Articles may describe Corinthian columns as “one example of a Greek votive column” (as one site does) without paying any attention at all to the fact that “votive” columns, like votive candles, have a distinctly religious purpose.  It’s almost as if they use the big words to obscure the meaning.  We will have the Greeks be “humanists” by hook or crook.

A fascinating sub-plot is the length Victorian society went to deny that the Parthenon originally was painted.  Evidence after evidence turned up, mostly brushed aside and denied with too much protest.  A painted Parthenon would overturn all of their ideas of classical beauty and classical purity.  Whole artistic theories got erected on an unpainted Parthenon, and they could not let it go.  This in turn clouded their vision in other areas, and allowed false ideas about the Parthenon to persist well into the 20th century.

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Did the Parthenon have no contemporary political meaning?  Perhaps . . . perhaps Pericles wanted to heal the fractious wounds of a prosperous democracy.  Success has never sat well with democracies, and it would make sense that Athens would want to go back to its founding and a story of sacrifice for the common good.  All this rings partially true, but the bulk of the evidence makes the Parthenon an overtly religious shrine — one that seeks life from death.  Plenty of evidence exists that Athenians saw it this way themselves.  For example, during the plague that struck during the Peloponnesian War, sick Athenians came to the Parthenon for refuge, as well as for healing, and possibly, to die.  It would be hard to imagine them doing so if the Parthenon was their equivalent of our Capitol or Washington Monument.

But this interpretation also challenges my own thoughts regarding the Parthenon.  The “humanist” interpretation fit how I tended to see the late 5th century Athenians as essentially worshippers of themselves.  This view gets lots of support from seeing contemporary Athenians mixed with gods on the Parthenon friezes.  With the Parthenon cast in this new light, I think that interpretation gets challenged but not overthrown.  I think other evidence exists for seeing the Athenians as self-worshippers, and perhaps the Parthenon itself still supports that view.  But this will need rethinking on my part.

The lesson of this book is the peril of using history rather than receiving and letting it change you. Self-idolatry is alas, not only confined only to the Greeks, or the Enlightenment and Victorian eras.

Dave

*To be fair, this is actually a pretty good movie . . .

8th Grade: All Good Things Must Come to an End

by Dave Mathwin

Greetings,

This week we saw the great golden age of Periclean Athens collapse into the abyss of the Peloponnesian War.  We began the week by asking why “Golden Ages” tend to last not much longer than a generation.

  • Some suggest that the success and power a golden age brings would bring about the envy of others, and this envy could turn into a threat.
  • Another might suggest that the generation that grew up with the ‘golden age’ in place would likely have a much different experience than their parents.  I found this comment especially perceptive.  As we saw last week, golden ages usually arise from a creative response to a particular challenge.  Those that grow up without the challenge won’t have the experience or ‘training’ to continue what their parents started.
  • Last week we also noted how golden ages require a variety of factors coming together at once, some physical and others psychological.  No one can reasonably keep all the plates spinning for long.  Eventually nature dictates that something will begin to spin off the axis sooner or later, and this will drag other things down with it.

Some of their comments did in fact apply directly to the outbreak of the Peloponnesian War, especially#1.  Athens went from plucky underdog in 490 B.C. to the then equivalent of the New York Yankees or New England Patriots by 431 B.C.  Many city-states lined up against them with Sparta. We did not spend a great deal of time on the war itself, as during their senior year we devote a few weeks entirely to this conflict and the issues it raises, but we did touch on a few key points

1. How in war the unexpected and unforeseen can occur

Of course the unforeseen can always occur, in war or at any other point.  But since war requires a great deal of planning, many assume that the conflict will go as we wish.  The making of the plans itself creates that expectation.  Yet, in war as in life, things rarely go according to our preconceived version of events.

2. Peace treaties may not be what they seem

After 10 years of intermittent conflict, both Athens and Sparta signed a treaty called the Peace of Nicias.  But treaties in name may not be in fact.  Some treaties bring real peace, some only reflect a desire to call a ‘time out’ in the fighting.  Unfortunately for Athens, this treaty turned out to be one of the latter.

3. War Stresses Democracy

War will put stress on any form of government and any society.  Some wars brought down monarchies — like W.W. I.  We assume that democracies are more stable, but the Peloponnesian War brought out many weaknesses within Athenian democracy and for a time ended it within Athens.  We looked at how desperation and panic act on a democratic people in the battle of Arginusae.  The Athenians won this battle, but the generals failed to pick up the dead and give them proper burial, something that could be considered sacrilege, and sacrilege could be punished by death.  Grief stricken, the city put the generals on trial, found them guilty, and executed them.  A few days later they regretted their actions. They put the lawyer who prosecuted the generals on trial for murder, found him guilty, and executed him also.

Ostensibly, Sparta won the Peloponnesian War.  But in truth the war had no real winners in Southern Greece.  All exhausted themselves in the conflict.  Thebes, involved in the conflict but slightly to the north, emerged as the strongest party in the more immediate aftermath of the war.  But it would be Macedon, further still to the north, and never involved in the fighting at all, that would eventually assert absolute supremacy over Greece in the person of Phillip of Macedon and his son Alexander.  We’ll look at them next week.

You can see the geography of it below here, with everything pink or yellow caught up in the fighting (with even blue areas involved sporadically), and Macedon waiting patiently above in brown.

Peloponnesian War

For those of you who have seen From Russia with Love, the scene where “Number 1” talks about the Siamese Fighting Fish is a good parallel, if we think of Macedon as the fish who stays out of the fight.