7. Relevant Hellenic Factors Favoring Effective Dialogue and Peaceful Coexistence

7Relevant Hellenic Factors Favoring Effective

Dialogue and Peaceful Coexistence

By LEONIDAS BARGELIOTES*

ABSTRACT. The paper presents and analyzes the war/peace issue inthe Hellenic tradition and its relevance to the contemporary world.It is focused on some of the Hellenic factors that were successfullyused in antiquity to overcome conflicts and war and to achieve aharmoniously existing world. The factors that can be used as para-digmatic cases are the conceptions of divine kosmos and of polis;effective dialogue; the education of rulers and of citizens so as to beable to govern themselves and use their power in order to preservecivilization for posterity and to sustain their values, to oppose stasisand to embrace homonoia, to overcome conflicts and to preservepeace in more than two hundred city-states. In addition, I argue thatthe long and rich Hellenic experience is relevant to our epoch inthe sense that it is universally known for its anti-polemic policy andits peace movements. Conceptions such as kosmos and organismicpolis, the practice of laws and of homonoia, or friendship, can

*Leonidas Bargeliotes is Professor Emeritus of the University of Athens, Greece. He is

President of the Olympic Center for Philosophy and Culture in Ancient Olympia.

Currently, he is Secretary General of the International Society for Universal Dialogue. He

attended the Gymnasium of Zacharo and the Theology and the Philosophy Schools at

the University of Athens, and further pursued postgraduate studies in philosophy at the

Universities of Norma and Emory (USA) from which he received the degrees of Master

of Arts and Ph.D., respectively. Since 1975 he has been teaching philosophy at the

Philosophy Department at the University of Athens. He is the author, among others, of

Pletho’s Criticism of Aristotle, of Philosophy and Scientific Research, and of Philosophy

of Science. At present he is General Editor of the journals Skepsis and Celestia.

American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Vol. 68, No. 1 (January, 2009).© 2009 American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Inc.

contribute to the solution of our local and world problems and theprevention of contemporary violence, terrorism, and wars. They canbe used by future generations as a model of how to prevent therepetition of another holocaust, of any extermination of humanbeings by human beings (Dachau), or of any war tragedies(bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki). They show, above all, howhumanity can achieve a lasting world peace.

I

Introduction

LIVING THE EVERYDAY drama within our “global village” and in adubious age, unable to handle the multicultural problems and tounderstand a global world, the aspirations of national and worldcitizens, their pains and calamities, their faith and fears, it may bequite helpful to lay out some of the Hellenic factors that contributedto dialogue and peaceful coexistence. These have been successfullyused in the past in order to avoid conflicts and to achieve a har-moniously existing world, to practice an efficient dialogue, and toovercome disagreements and misunderstanding, to defend Concordia(homonoia)1 and to oppose stasis, to educate rulers and citizens andto avoid misconceptions and deterioration, to oppose strife amongthe city-states, and to preserve peace.2 It could be also helpful toturn to the modern Hellenic State, which has faced similar massivedestructions during the first half of the last century: the catastrophicWorld Wars I and II, the Balkan wars, the catastrophe of Asia Minor,and the fratricidal civil war. These are some of the experiences inour epoch that make the recourse to anti-polemic policy and move-ments for peace more than necessary. These Hellenic factors, there-fore, seem to be timely and constructive. As we shall see in whatfollows, Hellenic conceptions like those of kosmos and of the organ-ismic polis, of the development and the use of the art of dialectic,and of the practice of laws and of homonoia, or friendship, cancontribute to the solution of our local and world problems. Eventheir failures can teach us ways of avoiding further suffering and ofshowing us the way out of it.

206 The American Journal of Economics and Sociology

II

The Divine Kosmos, the Politeia, and the Organismic Polis

A. The Divine Kosmos

The formation of the divine kosmos, to begin with, was based on thelong and complex Hellenic tradition. On the mythical level, there wasthe story of the generations of gods. The gods represent what Platoand Aristotle eventually called the powers of nature and the humansoul. The basic succession of these ruling powers of kosmos was thetriad: Cronus succeeded Uranus and was succeeded by Zeus. But thesuccession was anything but peaceful. Cronus mutilated by castrationhis father, Uranus, to be in turn overthrown by mighty Zeus, who tiedup his father and threw him into the Tartarus. Zeus then ruledsupreme, until he was overthrown by the incarnated “Son of Yahweh,”in Jesus Christ, the founder of Christianity.

At the level of the so-called Pythagoreans and Platonists and,consequently, the Neopythagoreans and Neoplatonists, there was atendency of the leaders of these philosophical schools to follow theirmasters, Pythagoras and Plato, in conceiving kosmos as harmoniousand divine and contrast their own religious-like dogmas with those ofthe Ionians and, particularly, with Aristotle’s half-de-divinized worldand organismic polis. According to their arguments, the latter weresearching for “material” causes and for better human organizationsand civilized life.

Undoubtedly, behind the Platonic—and the Neoplatonic—conceptions of kosmos has been Heraclitus’s “invisible harmony,which is better than the visible” one.3 The Pythagorean philosophers,who were traveling qewr�hς

�ενεκεν and were friends of Sophia in adeeper meaning, considered the goal of life to be the assimilation toGod and as an inspiration rooted in the limit and order of the kosmos.For them, kosmos unites the notions of order and of perfection so thatthings are interconnected and all nature is akin, and the human soulis intimately related to the living and divine universe. In short, thephilosopher who contemplates the kosmos becomes kosmios in his orher own soul.4 In addition, these “best spectators” are known forimportant advances in the science of mathematics and its relation to

Hellenic Tradition and the Contemporary World 207

harmonia. For the Pythagoreans, number had a mystical significanceand an independent reality. As W. K. C. Guthrie puts it: “Number wasresponsible for ‘harmony,’ the divine principle that governed thestructure of the whole world.”5

Plato’s own aesthetic synthesis and heavenly politeia are rooted inthe conceptions of the world as kosmos of his predecessors, which hereshapes, transforms, and enriches in accordance with his IdealWorld. They express, as sculptors do in stone, the vision of a belovedworld.6 Eros, the love of the artist, is known to be the oldest divineartist, transforming chaos into kosmos, the outcome of love for ablessed, balanced, and harmonious achievement, the “telos of love,”which stands in contrast to the unbalanced and disharmonioushuman existence. Plato, again, has approvingly spoken about sacri-fices and monthly feasts, as well as games and athletic contests inorder to win the favor of the gods by delighting them: sacrificing,singing and dancing—so as to be able to win Heaven’s favor and torepel the foes and vanquish them in fight.7 As W. R. Connor pointsout, “the conciliation of the gods . . . was important in its own rightand might be expected to carry with it the blessing of prosperity andsecurity,” which means that, directly or indirectly, the political struc-ture strongly influenced the form of religious celebration within thecity and vice versa.8

B. The Elian Politeia

On the same line of arguing should be placed the anti-polemicpolicy of the Elians, which successfully and effectively was appliedin the local communities, in the city-states, in the national andinternational states, and in the global world today (for example, the2008 Olympic Games in Beijing). Their objective has been to protectthemselves and the rest of the world against arbitrary and violentinvasions. From this point of view, the way in which the Eliansresponded—and continue to respond—to the dramatic events oftheir time and the kind of solutions they put forward for the arrange-ment of every tension is extremely timely and useful. Their sugges-tions for religious devotion and of the armistice (ekecheria) are ofprimary importance.


Following the basic function of the Hellenic city during the earlyArchaic and early Classical periods, that is, asking for the favor of andconciliating with the gods through the establishment of games andsacrifices all the year round,9 and appeasing with song the distantarcher god by raising a ringing hymn in order to drive away theplague,10 the Elians went on to institutionalize the armistice during theconduct of the Olympic Games and to establish an act of peace, acease of hostilities. The best strategy to secure peace without wars wasekecheria. The harmonious outcome of ekecheria is not simply con-fined to the religious rites, but it is extended to the domain of politicsand of leadership. Aside from the political dimension, the principle ofekecheria is also applied to human relations. Their festivities were partof the ideology of the city’s religious and political life, a fact that hasplayed a basic role in shaping their own democratic and religious wayof life. Thus, the Olympic Games were connected with the worship ofthe gods, for the Games have been considered as an imitation of thedivine contests. No wonder the Elians fought wars in order to legislateand consecrate the Olympic Games, and why their place was sacredas well as the center, not only for the symmetrical formation of theathlete but also for the peaceful settlement of oppositions and ofdichotomies.

In addition, their suggestions for the skeptical way of life, theproduction of a country common to all and of the cosmopolitan man,of the cultural laws and of the institutions, of friendship and ofconcord (homonoia), are of utmost importance for world peace andcoexistence today.

It will suffice for our purpose to point out that Elis, as Pyrrho’sbirthplace, is widely known for the skeptical way of life and ofataraxia or mental tranquility, as well as for the liberal debates thatthe philosophical schools maintained and encouraged by their com-petitions and contradictions. The consecrated Olympic Games alongwith the suspense of conflict and discord, on the one hand, and withthe emulative, harmonious, and peaceful character on the other,seems to have played an important role in Pyrrhon’s philosophicalposition and in his moral and practical interests, for he “could bothdiscourse at length and also sustain a cross-examination,” and aboveall, he could lead a life “in accordance with his doctrine.”11


No wonder Elis, the country common to all (pagkoinos chora), oftogetherness and of connectedness, in which religion and politics,the cosmopolitan man and the cultural laws, the institutions ofekecheiria, of friendship and of homonoia were joined and formeda concrete whole, became a universal symbol of coexistence, tolera-tion, and peace movements. This intimate and culturally imbuedrelation of these elements was and continues to be the only meansand hope to overcome the continuous opposition and conflictsbetween cities, states, and global powers, religious wars and theincreasing threaten of globalization and of the phenomena of “ironnecessity.”

Cosmopolitism, in contrast to globalization—long reserved for eco-nomic purposes—had a cultural, positive connotation, referring topolitics as well as to what we call since Koraes “civilization.” Thecosmopolitan man, in spite of his differences with his fellow men,could compete and live peacefully with them. It is more like Iso-crates’s cultural universalism and cosmopolitism, whose political idealwas humanism, as expressed by the name Hellen, as a designation ofculture: “We call Hellenes more ones that share with us our educationand culture (paideia) rather than those who are only of the sameorigin with us.” Isocrates, as Ksenija Maricki Gadjanski has put it, “isagainst any closed society” like that of ancient Egypt12 or the “tightboundaries” of the extreme fundamentalism of the Arab Muslims, asFitz stated it.13 Isocrates was in favor of the common sense of thepeople (doxa ton pollon), and of the great Hellenic principles, likethose of homonoia and eirini, which were interwoven in the completeway of life of the Greeks. Isocrates, using Olympia as his platform,was searching for some practical guidance to achieve a Panhellenicunity rather than a theoretical Platonic statesmanship intended toachieve the perfect unity of polis.

The formation and the observance of laws—the legal order—by theElians is another important contribution. Contrary to what we call todaythe impersonal, theoretical, and abstract system of equalization andhomogenization, the outcome of which is the uprooting of peoplefrom the position they have had within the locality, their home countryand their traditional and steady hierarchies, for Elians human laws fedby the divine could not be conceived as totally cut off from it. The Greek


tradition since the time of Homer has favored the cultural value of law,the humane “anthropeios” and the submission of all—the leaders, thepeople, even the gods—to the institution of law whether written orunwritten. The Elians could not be an exception. The way theyexperienced law and legal rules was closely related to their ecumenism,to international order, to morality, and to legal ties. The achievement ofthe aims of the city and of the society presupposed not only thelaw-abiding behavior but also the responsibility and the active partici-pation of the citizen. Their institutional structure and the existing systemof rules were the source of political order as well as political virtue.The efforts of securing human rights nowadays falls far behind thispractice, for one wonders whether the recent crises are ways of securingrights or of defending interests, like those of commerce of weapons, theprice of oil, or the suppression of those fighting for freedom. The firstcharter of human rights laid down by Solon, instead, would be betteroff. It reads:

These I completed and succeeded as I promised, after I had harmonizedthe force of law, with compulsion and justice. Similarly, I laid down lawsabout the evil and the good and every situation having harmonized a justdecision.14

Thucydides’s approach, however, is more relevant to the legal statusand practice of the Elians. The common good is, according to Thucy-dides, secured in a rationalistic manner, in the integrity of the city andin the ability of the citizens, that is, in “collective submission to therational judgment,” in the free “judgment” and in the responsible“opinion,” or even better, in the voluntary submission to the customsand the law of the autonomous city, where the law is “divine” and the“good government” a goddess. As we have seen, armistice (ekecheria)as a habit, a custom of the interstate law, manifests itself as a form oflaw with international character, as for its existence as a typical andsubstantial law there should be a contract-agreement, from which willarise the interstate law of those times. The armistice as an institutionwas created by unwritten laws and customs, on the basis of which wascreated the law of the treaty among independent cities (states), and acommon and generally accepted interstate act of justice is thuscreated.


The Elians, finally, have placed friendship and “homonoia” at thetop of their interests. The best treatment of these concepts, as we shallsee, is that of Aristotle when he expressed the view that friendship iswhat “holds together,” that is, what binds the city together.15

In other words, a city needs not only to have good laws andjustice, but there should also be friendship among its members sothat it can accomplish its natural end. In fact, reference is made tosome form of toleration between freely associating individuals who,whereas they are directed by their appetites and desires, are obligedby fear to adjust to the prohibitions of laws. By largely, weak statesthat are liable to compulsion are called “friendly states” by thestrong ones, whereas the weak and angered populations call“friends” all those with whom they share a common enemy. Usually,any bond whatsoever for acquiring common goods is exalted andcalled friendship.

These views are very useful today. The principles for the forma-tion of the bonds of friendship have degenerated and it is difficultto tell who is or who ought to be the real friend. Olympic armistice,again, gave the chance, by means of the truce between the enemies,to meet at the same place, forming thus the Pan-Hellenic politicalunity, and friendship. At the Olympic Games of today, it is notmanifested through any recognized political institution or any similarinternational institution. Nevertheless, a similar spirit is beingexpressed by the “Olympic Chart” as far as peace and friendship areconcerned.

C. The “Organismic” Polis

Aristotle’s polis, on the other hand, based upon his entelechia andteleological conceptions of man and of his polity, pointed to anorganismic polis. By rejecting Pythagoreanism and the dialecticaldiscussion about the Pythagorean-Platonic doctrines, according towhich the sciences of arithmetic, of geometrical knowledge, and ofastronomy draw the soul upward to the eternal, to the truth, and to therealm of real being,16 Aristotle has favoured a partly de-divinizedworld relying heavily on the spirit of Ionian thought. Some of hisconceptions of polis-politis-polity, which are applicable to our days as


well, concern the primacy of the polis based on common bonds, onthe civilized life, and on the political unity covering, among others, thesociety and the state, the political science and cultural aspirations ofits people, the biological and physical factors, as well as intellectualpotentials. As such, the polis has been the “focus” of the Hellenicexperience and the multifunctional entity that has exercised a decisiveinfluence on all levels of the Hellenic life: cultural, social, political, andso forth.17 In such a society the citizens know each other, behave asfellow men, and act in accordance with the established environmentof the polis, the common rules and laws. This familiar knowledge of“citizen by citizen” provides occasions of festivities and mutual friend-liness, familiarity, and acquaintance.

Aristotle, however, as a natural scientist and a social reformer,proceeded to a reexamination of the relation between individual andcollective values in the arena of moral and political action by avoidingthe extremes of the empirical relativism of the Sophists and thePlatonic lofty ideal, according to which all virtue and all knowledgeare one. His scientific inquiry into human behavior enabled him toinclude man in his views of nature, to find the mesotis of sensibilityand extend it to the panorama of polis, particularly to ethical andpolitical mesotis, which turns out to be an ideal guide for balanceand harmony, between means and ends, desires and ideals, opinionand knowledge, motivation and deliberate choice. And by seeking theultimate good, happiness, or eudemonia, he arrived at his ownconception of the virtuous life of the citizens in the polis.

Thus, Aristotle conceived the polis in terms of a natural organism,as a living being, which has the source of movement in itself, as aperfect “natural” organism, and, consequently, as the “natural home ofthe fully grown and natural man.”18 According to this organismicconception of unity, the parts of a substantial whole acquire theiridentity through the role they play in an organic whole.19 Without lifein them, they are not a part of it and cannot perform their function. Interms of the polis, the functioning relation of the individual with thepolis allows Aristotle to avoid the implications of his doctrine ofsubstance and its relation to organism or society.20

Aristotle’s definition of man as “zoon logikon kai politikon” meantthat for a man to be really human he had to be able to communicate


rationally and live in the polis. For Aristotle, as for Plato, man could bea complete person only within the polis. He took the polis, as hismaster had done, as the only independent political, economic, reli-gious, and social unit, with a limited population and a restrictedgeographical area, rather than the national state comprising all theGreeks. The “Cynic” characteristics of the brotherhood of man, ofthe unity of mankind, and of equal treatment of all peoples, includingthe barbarians, were the characteristics of the Pan-Hellenic and cos-mopolitan states that Philip and Alexander envisaged and promoted.21

Aristotle, however, recognized the importance of Pan-Hellenicunity, but could not accept the nation-state as an organismic politicalunit. For the same reason he had low regard for the attempts toconstruct federations of city-states or to reconstruct the polis intolarger political units. This explains his opposition to any politicalcentralization and cultural integration, as well as his unwillingness toparticipate actively in the Pan-Hellenic movement of his time or toengage himself with “the ensuing controversy.”22 The only enduringpolitical unit the Stagirite could imagine was that of the community ofthe polis based upon the national culture and ethnic fraternity. Andthe polis is the union of families and villages in a perfect andself-sufficient life, by which we mean a happy and honorable life.23

Hence his emphasis on the importance of homonoia and friendship.It follows the factor of the dialectic and its contribution to the peacefulcoexistence of people.

III

The Art of Dialectic and Education

A. The Art of Dialectic

The Hellenic art of dialectic should not be seen simply and only as a“rhetoric” of self-expression and as a one-dimensional definitionalprocedure, but also as the meeting of minds on a plane of intellectualcontest for excellence of the whole man in soul and body. It has beena common “topos” of the Hellenic philosophers even before Socratesthat a logos between two persons, to be genuine and fruitful dialogos,presupposes first of all the ability of the partners to have a real


knowledge and understanding of what justice, virtue, and friendshipare like. This kind of dialectic provides the interplay of its ownconflicting opposites: philosophy and “doxosophia,” objectivity andsubjectivity, freedom and arbitrariness, deliberation of nous and mis-conceptions. The procedure for the formation of definition presup-poses not only the general concepts and laws of thought, but also themidwifery, “meeftiki,” movement from the particular to the generaland from the paradigm to the rule. In its negative movement, theelenchos and the refutation bring the interlocutor to recognition of hisor her ignorance, thus paving the way for an applied positive proce-dure of the method. This is the logic of growth by and through whichthe interlocutor becomes mature, responsible, and aware of his or herlimitations, and can therefore effectively criticize self and others.

Under this perspective, Socrates’s aim to define a concept or ameaning signified by a general term and the entity denoted by theterm is an effective means to resolve disagreements and opposites andto avoid relative and skeptical conclusions. This aim can be foundmainly in the Platonic dialogic writing (Aristotle’s ethical theoryincluded, somewhat modified) and also in the metaphysical-ontological dimension that is involved in and presupposed by theethical method of dialectical knowledge. As G. Meuller has put it,“Socrates’ life and philosophy become inseparable.”24

It is evident that this kind of dialogos is quite different from givinga simple definition of a term or reciting a poem, as the poet is so fondof doing, or from delivering an eloquent monologue on an issue, asit is the case with sophists, politicians, and other rhetoricians. The realknowledge of the interlocutors enables both parts and partners to giveand receive an account of the subject matter, to be involved in aprocess of questioning and answering, and to achieve a mutualunderstanding of their subject matter. This kind of activity of givingand receiving an account through which knowledge is achieved is thehighest of all studies, the peak of our education, and the “song” towhich all the other studies in which the guardians must be schooled(music, gymnastics, and mathematics) are a prelude.

Dialectic is the final passage up the divided line from thought(dianoia) to knowledge (noesis) of “the things themselves” (eide), or“that which is.” In and through dialectic, one is able to finally


distinguish, by means of discussion and argument, that “which is” fromall that participates in it, the one from the many,25 the just itself from themany just things. In Plato’s methodological procedure, there are certainpairs of opposites, and it would be very agreeable if we could seize theirsignificance in a scientific fashion.26 His dialectic is elaborated further asinvolving the so-called collecting and dividing (synagoge and dihaire-sis) processes essential to all account-giving. “Collecting” is describedby Socrates as that by which we bring a dispersed plurality under asingle form, so that by defining it “one can always make clear what oneintends to expound,”27 and “dividing” is described as the reverseprocess, namely, as “being able to dissect a thing in accordance with itsforms, following the natural joints and not trying to hack it apart like anclumsy butcher.”28 The one who is able to perform this collection anddivision, Socrates and Phaedrus agree, is properly called a dialectician,for he or she is able to see the natural unity and plurality of things, and,therefore, can follow his footsteps “as in those of a god.”29

The new method of dialectical art that takes place only through anarduous dialogical journey with another is the art that Socrateshimself, the philosopher and educator, utilizes throughout Plato’sdialogues in an effort to turn the souls of his interlocutors toward thetruth that will prove to benefit their souls the most. Discovering orreaching the essence of objects or “itself” is something perhaps thatcan be said to form the pivot of the entire history of philosophy. Onaccount of this, Plato in his thesis on Cratylus diverts our attentionfrom the actual status of language and the simple characteristics ofwords and phones and grammar to their origin and truths of wordsand has made us familiar with Logos, which is the talking andspeaking statue of the whole universe. Both education and philoso-phy, then, can truly be accomplished only in the back-and-forthmovement of dialogue. This genuine kind of speech is none otherthan (as Phaedrus puts it) “the living and ensouled speech of theperson who knows,”30 that is, the dialectical dialogue.

This is an important lesson, not only for the citizens of the ancientworld, but for us as well. We live in an era of “specialists” and of“experts” who make their various claims to wisdom upon us, espe-cially when we are dealing with matters of a highly technical nature,involving medicine, science, and technology, or a highly academic


nature involving law, philosophy, and psychology, which havebecome increasingly dominated by their own technical terminology.

B. Education

Hellenic mythology reveals, among others, the symbolic archetypalpatterns of human life and culture. As we have seen, the mytho-logical stories of the generations of gods and their struggle forsuccession and domination could be seen as the first attempt to unifythe many and disparate local cult religions of the eighth century B.C.Greece and to give a single account of the ruling powers of kosmos(Hesiod). It was Plato’s and Aristotle’s educational system, however,that made the difference and had—and still has—a worldwide andlasting application.

Plato’s main idea for his Academy was to present and preserve hiseducational views of civilization for posterity. His views on the role ofcultural studies in the education of the guardian class of his Republicare of paramount importance. The guardians were to receive two yearsof military training, followed by ten years of mathematical training, andthen five years of dialectical training.31 However, before the guardiansreceived the foregoing training, they would receive an education incultural studies, a program that includes the study of literature—poetryand the study of songs.32 Besides all these and behind the well-knowntheories of Thrasymachus’s force and morality-justice, Glaucon’s socialcontract, the parts of the soul, the allegory of the cave, the cognitionline, the analogy of the sun, dialectics, and the forms, lies the “mostimportant issue there is,” that is, “which kind of life is good, and whichis bad.”33 To “achieve or not to achieve” the good philosophical lifedepends, among other things, upon the role that the cultural studies(music and rhythm, harmony and disharmony) play in the education ofthe guardians. In short, the aim of cultural education is to create thegenerous and just man, as well as the self-disciplined and courageousman. Hence, Plato’s rhetorical question on the importance of culturalstudies:

Isn’t the prime importance of cultural education due to the fact that rhythmand harmony sink more deeply into the mind than anything else and affectit more powerfully than anything else and bring grace in their train?34


This question follows his final call to join him in “thinking that wehave completed our discussion in cultural studies.” Indeed, he has.What is left is to join him and side with him in his statement that theformation of his idealized community is the education of the rulers,that the factor of education determines a person’s subsequent direc-tion in life, and that the moral man, the man who leads the good life,will be found “throughout his life attuning his body in order to makemusic with his mind.”35

Besides, there was the military class as it is presented in Plato’sdialogue Laches (424 B.C), which shows that this class had lost thevision of the cultivated person, the goal of civilization. It shows howthe two leaders, Laches and Nikias, who had achieved high levels ofexcellence in military and political life, were out of balance. Lacheshas distinguished himself as a military hero and Nikias as a greatmilitary strategist and has been elected the Head of Athens. Both havebeen asked to discuss the education of youth. It appears that Lyci-machus and Melesias, who are involved in the discussion of theeducation of youth, want their sons to be educated to be successful,popular, and highly respected by the majority. They are looking forsomething other than what the sophists provide, but they only knowthat they do not know what. Actually, they want to know whetheryoung people should be taught how to fight in armor—an indicationof the declining spirit in Athens. None of the four interlocutors focuseson the cultivation of a public conscience and skill at making gooddecisions about the well-being of the city as a whole over time. Nikiasclaims that educating youth in the art of fighting in armor is related,in the last analysis, to being successful in war and, consequently, topreserving peace. Since the purpose of war is to create peace and theflourishing of the souls of the citizens, war is assumed to be bothnecessary and sufficient for freedom. Thus, if one wants freedom, onenecessarily will have to engage in victorious wars to be free. In fact,that was the value of Sparta’s militarism: “Freedom” means militarypower, rather than the Athenian freedom based on the cultivation ofthe human soul and the peace made through treaties (e.g., the NikianTreaty). Nikias contradicts himself and does not appear to be wise.

Laches, on the other hand, argues against the teaching of fighting inarmor to the youth for the following reasons: (1) the only concern of


militarism is to increase superiority in war;36 (2) “[n]ot a single prac-titioner in the art of fighting in armor has ever become renowned inwar”;37 and (3) the speech of the Sophists as “military” teachers doesnot conform to their deeds. For Laches, actions speak louder thanwords. According to his argument, learning the art of fighting in armorwill only increase the gap between appearance and reality, braveryand cowardice, real and apparent knowledge, aggressive and defen-sive wars, unjust and just wars. In short, Laches values only theactivities of the human soul that act bravely in battle. He thereforevalues experience more than thought. He has to have the capacity tolearn the appropriate lessons from experience in order to make thenecessary transition from action to thought. Without this capacity, hecannot teach the generations to come how to become wise and livewell. The opposite direction is that of ignorance and irrationaldrives—which inevitably lead to tragedies.

We know from history that both Nikias and Laches are themselvestragic figures. Socrates did his best to correct their imbalances andpurge them of their false opinions, but he failed. That was the priceof their choice to prefer the art of war and the ability to be suc-cessful in war as the highest virtue, instead of being able to educatethe youth and the citizens to rule themselves and choose goodleaders. Plato’s dialogues, using his experience with Socrates, devel-oped a system of education that was based on a view of the humansoul and intended to pass it down from one generation to the other.In Laches, particularly, he sets such a theory of the human soulfrom which derive a set of universal standards and a system ofeducation designed to cultivate real virtue in the souls of the youthand of the citizens at large.

Aristotle was aware of the Homeric stories concerning Athena, thegoddess of justice, usually dressed in helmet, and of Ares, the god ofwar. Athena, as a daughter of Zeus, the god of justice, defends justicethrough the use of war when necessary, but she is not dedicated towar, like Ares. The Homeric stories are trying to educate readers to beable to distinguish between just wars and unjust wars. Plato hadexpressed his doubts about the ability of the Athenians to distinguishbetween wars fought for the sake of power and wealth (e.g., the warsstarted by the giants) and wars fought for the sake of justice and


lasting peace. This has been shown by the mistakes they made injudging about the nature and value of courage. Their gradual focus onmilitary might and individual valor in war led them to vote in favor ofAlcibiades over Nikias, who was truly dedicated to minimizing war,setting up peace treaties, and not expanding into an empire. Theanswer of Plato’s Laches to the question, “What is courage?” was theact of facing danger and death in war, or false accusations, thus fullyexercising human excellence.

For Aristotle, just as for Plato, every virtue, including courage, is apower of the human soul. He defines, however, all the virtues asmeans between two extremes. In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotlesays that courage “is a mean with regard to fear and confidence (andthat) . . . the things we fear are terrible things” like “war emergen-cies.”38 For Aristotle, as for Laches, courage is demonstrated in actualbattle and situations of facing death. Truly courageous people arethose who act bravely when the threat of death is unexpected andhave to react by the trained ability, the so-called instinct, withouthaving to think about it. Aristotle, like Plato, considers the courage ofa citizen to be incomplete because it does not include an understand-ing of what is best by nature. There are other, higher virtues thancourage that just and wise rulers should be cultivating in the souls oftheir citizens so they can live a high quality of life without having toface the threat of death in war.

Another important contribution of Aristotle is that of purgation ofpity and fear from the souls of the audiences, which constitutes thegoal of tragedy as found in his Poetics. Such purgation also is relatedto character as well as thought, since particular characters expresstheir thoughts, which, in turn, reflect in many ways their characters.The tragic characters make mistakes in judgment in relation to seriousissues in life and because of those mistakes experience a reversal infortune from happiness to misery. Aristotle claims, as does Plato in hisdialogues, that tragedies are about people who are related to eachother through bonds of affection, particularly family relationships.

If Plato and Aristotle are correct about the importance of cultivationof the soul, about the power of mind, and the high quality of life, thenthe system of education they offer is still relevant today. Humanbeings today still possess power and still need to develop in order to


live well, to recognize what is best about their own societies, and toeliminate what is worst.39

IV

The Practice of Homonoia and Friendship

PERSONAL FRIENDS, guest-friends, and political friends are some ofthe examples of friendship that have been used for Hellenic com-munities since Homer and are still applicable in our own times asincentive for local community as well as for universal peacefulcoexistence. From the Homeric times, personal friends have had tocome to each other’s aid and share their property in common.Guest-friends have to exchange hospitality and show solidaritybetween kinsmen of guest-friends, even after generations. Theability to recognize political friends, finally, entails an ability todiscern the emergence of enmity and stasis. In addition to becominglike-minded, one has to recognize the divine element within himthat will elevate him to a sacred status that will guide his action.The sacred notion of polis by Homer will be brought to fruition inhomonoia, and the institutions of the polis expressed in active com-munion with the divine within himself and others, in contradistinc-tion with stasis and the acts of impiety. The practice of homonoia,unlike the term stasis, was a new word, and its use made itsappearance sometime in the fifth century. Plato and Aristotle hadanalyzed homonoia’s generic traits that were then in dispute, butthe word gained popular currency through the Sophists and orators,the Pythagoreans, the Stoics, and the Neoplatonists.

In heroic times, there is the example of the famous encounterbetween Diomedes and Glaucon in Homer’s Iliad,40 according towhich, the two warriors, fighting on opposite sides, put aside theirenmity and embrace on the battlefield when it is revealed that theirancestors were guest-friends. The heroes jump out of their chariots,clasp each other’s hands, exchange their armor, and pledge never tofight each other. In this example, two complete strangers, uponrecognition of each other as friends, have transformed murderoushatred and replaced it by friendly feeling; their friendship is furtherextended to future generations through family memory and recollection


of ancestral relationship, thus institutionalizing and keeping it alive asseen in the strong hold of feeling and its force that subdues the passionsof war and spurs the strangers to meet their promises and agreements.

Another model of friendship that Homer provides is the recognitionbetween complete strangers in his account of Odysseus’s reception bythe Phaeacians, when the wandering hero arrives as a shipwreckedstranger on the island of Scheria, alone, naked, and unable to establishhis identity. The Phaeacians, however, could offer hospitality only topersons who demonstrate a “homonoounton philian.” This shows thatthe polis is open to a person worthy of guest-friendship and ofcommunication through a language of excellence. It also shows thatit is the inner person of the Stranger that is under scrutiny by thePhaeacian noblemen, that is, the wanderer’s soul that it is recognizedand proclaimed to be a friend rather than his name, place, andhistory.41

Although homonoia is not a term of a single meaning,42 both Platoand Aristotle agree that this concept is neither an “agreement” (homo-logia), the minimum condition of polis life,43 nor a “common belief” or“consensus” (homodoxia),44 which may exist even among strangersinvolved in joint enterprise; it is, rather, bound to objective criteriaand, therefore, cannot be a vague “friendly feeling.”

Homonoia, or friendship, for Plato is an attendance that makes usbetter in justice and virtue.45 He defines it as the shared nous thatbinds the parts of the polis and the soul into a fundamental whole,which involves both expert knowledge as well as theoretical masteryof justice and a measure that attends to the well-being of the whole.The genuine dialogical endeavor, too, depends on genuine and truefriendship in which there is a reciprocal care for each other’s under-standing and a mutual love of truth. As we have already seen, asuccessful dialogue and understanding can only take place if bothparties are willing (a) to share a reciprocal openness toward eachother, that is, to speak, to listen, and to respond to one another in acareful, friendly, sincere, and cooperative way; and (b) to share amutual openness and disposition toward truth as an ultimate good—anultimate goal, which requires an incentive for feeling and of jointaction. No one can force friendship—or persuasion—if he or sherefuses to listen.46 One can see this kind of reciprocity in the Phaedrus,


where Socrates explains that the friend of wisdom can only regain hiswings and his knowledge in and through a loving friendship withanother and their shared “orderly life and friendship with wisdom.”47

It is the cultivation, therefore, of the shared “friendship” that isrequired for any genuine dialogue and movement toward truth, forany serious educational procedure, and for any development ofwisdom and virtue. If we are then friends of wisdom, and lovers of theadventurous dialogical journey toward understanding, let us go onand follow them.

For Aristotle, homonoia or political friendship entailing justice andreciprocated benefits stemming from mutual regard was the bestsafeguard for the prevention of civil strife or stasis.48 For the Stagirite:

friendship seems to hold states together [tas poleis synechein i philia], andlawgivers care more for it than for justice . . . aiming at most of all to expelfaction as their worst enemy [kai tin stasin echthran ousan malistaexelavnousin].

As he points out:

When people are friends, they have no need of justice, but when they arejust, they need friendship in addition. In fact, in the fullest sense if regardedas constituting an element of friendship.49

Aristotle places homonoia within the sphere of action (praxis), delim-ited to those shared aspects of practical life, to what he calls “livingtogether.”50 Homonoia exists in a state when citizens agree on how toconduct political affairs:

we do attribute homonoia to states when the citizens have the samejudgment about their common interest, when they chose the same things,and when they execute what they have decided in common.51

The opposite of homonoia is faction, “when each of two personswishes himself to be the ruler.”52 People, that is, who have virtuousand just characters create homonoias in their states. On the contrary,people who do not possess the powers of virtue and justice in theirsouls make bad choices, abuse whatever power they have, and createfaction. Bad men cannot live in homonoia (tous de favlous ouch oionte omonoein).53 The corruption of their characters, their irrationaldesires lead them to the corruption of their cities and their relation-ships with other cities. This is due, no doubt, to the bifurcation of


thought and desire, according to which it is possible to think anddesire opposite things. The choosing of an action in anticipation ofconsequences is never only emotive or only intellectual but a com-bination of both. Thought by itself does not lead to praxis, but onlythought combined with desire and appetite. The distinction that wemake between these two does not exist in reality. For, as Aristotle putsit, “it is not just the intellect or just the appetite which cause motion.Rather it is both [orexis kai dianoia praktiki].”54 Intellect is not foundto cause motion apart from appetency. Actually, the faculty that allowsus to choose the cause of an action that will fulfill our desires Aristotlecalls prohairetikon and its operation prohairesis, that is, the delibera-tive appetition of things within one’s power. When the biologicallygrounded desire or appetite (orexis) is accompanied with the rationalfaculty of intellect (dianoisis) or deliberation (voulesis), then it isrational desire (voulesis). Orexis, in other words, is the term for thatwhich appears in the rational soul as voulisis and in the irrational soulas spirit (thymos) and desire (epithimia).55

The importance of the status of the relation of desire and intellectfor the peaceful or inimical relation of the citizens is, so far, evident.The desire, for example, to live a just life may be correct, but theintellect may be ignorant of what a just life is. Conversely, a judgmentabout the course of the action may be the wisest one, but the desiresmay select a different course based on pleasures. The fact that all ina community may have the same noble desires does not entail thatthese desires will be achieved apart from intellectual strategies andlegislation. All people may desire equality, but there is a universaldisagreement as to what constitutes equality. Hence, the greatestpolitical agreement may also be the greatest source of strife.

This can be applied to historical and contemporary conditionsshared by persons bound by emotional ties, common beliefs, andceremonies. Although the latter constitute a powerful binding elementin human life, a binding force in religious experience, as well as ameans for unifying churchgoers in a common faith, nevertheless allthese may not promote the welfare of the believers, and may not leadto joint action. Believers may remain one and united while remainingpolitically hostile and disjoined. Intellectual agreement on matters ofgreat importance in no way guarantees the solutions of the problems.


The same is true when desire is lacking. To move the Athenians toaction against Philip of Macedon, Demosthenes reminded them thatthey decide on the greatest matters with their votes, but in reality theydid not act even in small matters.56

This can be extended to the enactment of laws. The unrestrainedperson resembles a polis that passes all the right enactments and hasgreat laws, but never implements them, or, on the contrary, the badperson resembles a polis that implements these laws, but these lawshappen to be worthless.57 Akrasia may cause a failure to implementcorrect judgment, while lack of phronesis may prevent finding theright means for realizing correct desires. Aristotle’s model of omonoia,therefore, is the “self-liking” person, the person of complete virtue, theperson that he calls spoudaios, the educated and noble man, who isone with himself and has mastered his passions, one who wishes hisown good as an end and seeks it by action, one who is at peace withhimself, one whose mind we identify most with the self.58

Homonoia, then, is a consequence of a principle that comes togrow over both parts of the soul, so that the rational faculties becomethe subject of improvement, while the passions, formed into the stateof character (“hexeis”), function as rational principle. Given that thecommunity—polis, state—is an association of citizens, we can sayanalogically that they can recognize each other as political friendswhen nous, as cognitive and critical faculty, which culminates in logos,emerges as an end of the community.

V

Final Remarks

THE RELEVANT HISTORICAL FACTORS of the Hellenic experience outlined sofar can be used as paradigmatic cases for the interpretation of thehistory of Europe in the last fourteen centuries, and the history of theMediterranean Sea and the Middle East, and even what is convention-ally called “the West and the East,” which can be seen as prolongedstruggle between Islam and Christianity for world domination. Of noteis that the contemporary concept of so-called democratic peace alsotries to appeal to some of these factors, but, paradoxically, it argues for“global peace through the spread of democracy” by the force of


superpowers, thus justifying war in the name of peace. However, thisconcept is criticized by many philosophers. E. Demenchonok, forexample, points out in this concept the “discrepancy between itsdeclared goals (democracy and peace) and its means of implementingthese goals (economic coercion and military force),” arguing thatattempts at its political implementation are not conducive to anysolution whatsoever of the “global problems of war and human rights”and that it functions only as “an ideological justification for a policy ofglobal domination by the world’s only superpower.”59

The same factors can shed light on our paradoxical world: theachievements that are its glory threaten to destroy it. The nations withthe highest standard of living, the broadest education, and the mostenlightened morality and religion exhibit the least capacity to avoidmutual destruction in war. As F. S. C. Northrop puts it: “It would seemthat the most civilized we become the more incapable of maintainingcivilization we are.”60 This is clearly seen in World War II, which was nota war between the East and the West. Instead, it divided the East asmuch as it divided the West. Japan was with Germany; China with India;and part of India with Great Britain, the United States, and Russia. TheHellenic factors can be used positively, above all, for preventing anyrepetition of the Hiroshima tragedy, where the world’s first atomicbomb exploded over the city (August 6, 1945), burning most of the city’sbuildings and taking hundreds of thousands of lives. Moreover, thesefactors can be also used for achieving lasting world peace.

Generally speaking, the Hellenic factors, based upon humanisticecumenical values, can sustain the hopes and fears of the human racefor an effective dialogue, well-organized cities, and well-educatedrulers and citizens, and serve our world for a peaceful coexistence anda decisive practice of homonoia and friendship—a great relief fromthe constant conflicts and the earnest desire for a peaceful future.

Notes*

1. Plato Laches, 182e; Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1155a23–31, Politics,1279a25–31, 1287b39–41.

2. Arnopoulos (2001: 20).

*All the references to Aristotle in these notes are to Aristotle (1941), and the references

to Plato are to Plato (1988).


3. Diels and Kranz (1951–1952) Fragment B 54: “� �ρμον η � �φαν ςfanerhς kre�ttwn.”

4. Plato Theaetetus, 176a.5. Guthrie (1971: 213).6. Mueller (1965: 143).7. Plato Laws VII, 803e; Plat. Polit., a–d.8. Connor (1987: 87).9. Rusten (1989) Thucydides 2.38.1 and I.70.8: “daily source of pleasure

and the banishment.”10. Homer (1969), Iliad I, 467–474: “and Apollo listened, his great heart

warm with joy.”11. Laertius, Diogenes (1925) (hereafter DL) IX 64; IX 62: “� �κ λουθος d’

hn kai hj hw” (“akolouthos d’ in kai to vio”).12. Gadjanski (2001: 50).13. Fitz (2004: 1–27).14. Fragment 36: “ �μου b�an te ka� d�khn sunarm�saς . . . qesmoς d’

omo�wς ρω κογω� � te k’�γαθω� i euqe�an e�ς kaston arm�saς d�khn, graya.”Cf. Aristotle Athenian Constitution, 12, 4.

15. Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1155 a 22–23.16. Plato Phaedrus, 265d.17. Bowra (1957: 77).18. Barker (1946: xlvii).19. Aristotle Metaphysics, 1036b 31–33; Cf. Politics, 1253 a 19–22.20. Whitehead (1938: 151).21. Cf. Solomou-Papanikolaou (1989: 75, 96); Tarn (1948: 400ff).22. Arnopoulos (1994: 86).23. Aristotle Politics, 1280b32–1261a2.24. Mueller (1965: 31–32).25. Plato Phaedrus, 265a–266c, 273e, 277b; Phil., 15e, 16eff.26. Plato Phaedrus, 265cd.27. Plato Phaedrus, 265d.28. Plato Phaedrus, 265e. Socrates’s definition of love as a kind of madness

is an example of “collection,” and his separation of the different kinds ofmadness into the kinds caused by human sickness versus the kinds caused bydivine intervention is an example of “division.”

29. Plato Phaedrus, 266b; Republic, 521c.30. Plato Phaedrus, 276a.31. Plato Republic, 535a.32. Plato Republic, 376d–412a.33. Plato Republic, 587c.34. Plato Republic, 401d.35. Plato Republic, 519d.36. Plato Laches, 183a.


37. Plato Laches, 183c.38. Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1115a11 and 1115a34.39. Beck (2007).40. Homer (1969) Iliad, II. 6. 119–236.41. Homer (1995) Odyssey, Books Z and H.42. Aristotle Eudemian Ethics, 1241a23–24.43. Plato Gorgias, 475e–476a.44. Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1167a.45. Plato Alcibiades, 126b, 127d, 134bc.46. Plato Republic, 327c.47. Plato Phaedrus, 256a-b.48. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1155a 23–31.49. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1155a22–30.50. Aritsotle Eudemian Ethics, 1241a 15–18.51. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1167a26–30.52. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1167a33.53. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1167b9.54. Aristotle De Anima, 433a9, 22–25.55. Aristotle De Anima, 414b2: “orexis men gar epithymia kai thymos kai

voulisis.”56. Demosthenes (1992) Orationes, Philippica, I. 20. 6–7.57. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1152a 19–23.58. Aritsotle Nicomachean Ethics, 1168b31–34.59. Demenchonok (2007: 27).60. Northrop (1968: 1).

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Arnopoulos, Paris. (1994). “Aristotelian Interstate Law and Politics.” Skepsis V:81–117.

——. (2001). Exopolitics: Polis-Ethnos-Cosmos; Classical Theories and Praxisof Foreign Affairs. Happague, NY: Nova Science Publishing. Rpt. as�xwpolitik�, P�liς, �qnoς, ��smoς. �xwterik� Politik� twn�ll�nwn. Trans. Christina Sinou. Athens: Leader Books.

Barker, Ernest. (1946). The Politics of Aristotle. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Beck, Martha. (2007). “Civilized Killing: A Reading of Plato’s Laches.” Unpub-

lished ms.Bowra, Cecil Maurice. (1957). The Greek Experience. Cleveland, OH: New

American Library.Connor, W. Robert. (1987). “Sacred and Secular.” Ancient Society 161–188.Demenchonok, Edward. (2007). “From a State of War to Perpetual Peace.” In

The Challenges of Globalization: Rethinking Nature, Culture and


Freedom. Eds. Steven V. Hicks and Daniel E. Shannon. Malden, MA:Blackwell.

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Diels, Hermann Alexander, and Kranz, Walther. (1951–1952). Die Fragmenteder Vorsokratiker, vols. I–II. Dublin—Zürich.

Fitz, Hope. (2004). “Extreme Fundamentalism in Islam: The Problem of the‘Other’ and Modernity.” Skepsis 15(1): 11–27.

Gadjanski, Ksenija Maricki. (2001). “The ‘Cosmopolitan’ Idea in 4th-Century BCAthens: The Case of Isocrates.” Iphitos 2(2): 49–52.

Guthrie, William Keith Chambers. (1971). History of Greek Philosophy. Cam-bridge: Cambridge University Press.

Homer. (1969). Iliad. Trans. R. Fagles. Oxford: Clarendon Press.——. (1995). Odyssey. vols. I–II. Revised by George E. Dimock, Classical

Library: Harvard University Press.Laertius, Diogenes. (1925). Lives of Eminent Philosophers, vols. I–II. Trans. R.

D. Hicks. Loeb Classical Library: Harvard University Press.Mueller, Gustav. (1965a). Dialectic. New York: Philosophical Library.——. (1965b). Plato the Founder of Dialectic. New York: Philosophical

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Tarn,William Woodthorpe. (1948). Alexander the Great, vol. II. Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.

Whitehead, Alfred North. (1938). Modes of Thought. Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.


Documents

7. Relevant Hellenic Factors Favoring Effective Dialogue and Peaceful Coexistence