classics digests, reflections and reviews
A Personal Backstory When I was a child, I used to asked my mother, Why do women willingly go through the troubles of pregnancy, the agony of birth pangs, only to give birth to a child at the risk of their own lives? I asked because the only idea I had of childbirth came from the movies, where childbirth was almost always the cause of pain and death for women. […]
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For those interested in the devotional practices of earliest Christians, in particular, whether, how and why they worshipped Jesus. this is a valuable read. Prof. Dunn, in dialogue with Profs. Larry Hurtado and Richard Bauckham, presents the complexity and richness of New Testament Christology. Although answers provided by these scholars are far from satisfactory — partly because they all disagree with one another on certain points, it is very interesting […]
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The Sacrificial Death of Marcus Curtius That same year, whether owing to an earthquake or to some other violent force, it is said that the ground gave way, at about the middle of the Forum, and, sinking to an immeasurable depth, left a prodigious chasm. This gulf could not be filled with the earth which everyone brought and cast into it, until admonished by the gods, they began to inquire […]
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Disclaimer I recently read a blogpost titled Kierkegaard is wrong in which the author critiques Kierkegaard’s notion of “faith” in Fear and Trembling. In short, he argues that the notion of a God who demands the sacrifice of one’s child by faith is not only absurd, but also immoral. It is a very thoughtful and balanced article. As I’m somewhat of a fan of Kierkegaard, and have pondered the subject, […]
Read moreAfter the death of Heracles, his children were persecuted by his enemy Eurystheus, King of Argos, who had imposed Twelve Labours on Heracles. They sought protection at Athens from King Demophon, son of Theseus, who initially agreed to defend them but later was informed by an oracle that they could not defeat Eurystheus unless they sacrifice a child of noble birth. Macaria, Heracles’ daughter, offered to sacrifice herself to save […]
Read more“Imagine there’s no countries It isn’t hard to do Nothing to kill or die for … Imagine no possessions I wonder if you can No need for greed or hunger A brotherhood of man Imagine all the people Sharing all the world” I wonder if John Lennon would still have imagined “brotherhood of man” if he had read this play: Two sons of Oedipus, Eteocles and Polynices, two brothers killed […]
Read moreThe Meaning of Sacrifice In Fear and Trembling, Kierkegaard compared Abraham’s sacrifice of Issac to Agamemnon’s sacrifice of Iphigenia, the former as the Knight of Faith and the latter the Tragic Hero; In this play, Euripides presented Agamemnon in a rather different light, not so much a hero who sacrificed his most beloved daughter to perform the duty dictated by a sacred oath and defend the honor of the whole […]
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