Since a decisive duel is about to be arranged, Iris–the messenger/rainbow of the gods–flies to Troy to prepare Helen. The face that launched a thousand ships is engaged in the entirely domestic task of weaving, but the design is of the Trojans and Greeks fightin
Barack Obama has managed to sneak back into the news. The occasion was an interview with Christiane Amampour in which he compared the modest media response to the death of 700 illegal immigrants, whose boat sank before they could enter Greece, with the hysteria over the fate of 7 rich tourists who tried to visit the Titanic.
But if I am correct in saying we are beginning afresh, would that not imply that the Trojans must be guilty, a second time, of a criminal act that defies the laws of gods and men? Exactly.
Many an ambitious ruler, seeking to extend his power, has stubbed his big toe on the brute facts of family and kinship, and many an ideological revolution that failed to reckon with the bind forces of greed and competition has been brought down by the primitive passions and instincts they had hoped to eliminate or at least suppress.
Now, “brother” and “friend” are or at least used to be rather exclusive terms. They did not refer to just anyone, much less everyone.
This is the text of a talk presented at a conference, in Waterford, Wisconsin, attended by mostly Lutheran pastors plus a sprinkling of heretics and one papist, arranged by my friend Pastor David Ramirez.
David Hume’s essay on The Original Contract has been added. Passages Added from Plato and Aristotle. In addition to the assigned readings, the following passages and fragments will be referred to. More will be added in the coming days. P
Instead of meeting with a massive protest, there is a stampede to the ships that is stopped, just in time by wiser heads. Old Nestor advises him to muster the troops according to tribes (phyla) and clans (phretres)
I am a little tired of hearing white Republicans complaining about reparations. Most of them supported discriminatory wealth transfer programs and did little or nothing to oppose affirmative action.
My father was a scholar and knew Greek.
When I was five years old, I asked him once
“What do you read about?”
“The siege of Troy.”
“What is a siege, and what is Troy?”
