The Greeks and Democracy

Below is a short commentary from the teacher's manual to A Reading Course in Homeric Greek, by Raymond Schoder and Vincent Horrigan (Lesson 119). This course is terrific, not only for its teaching of Homeric Greek, but for its insightful and informative commentary on Greek culture. This is a good example.

The second paragraph is especially apropos given the current state of our republic.

It is important here neither to exaggerate nor underestimate the historical importance and later influence of the Greek experiment in democracy. Be sure, then, that this essay is read carefully, then re-read to get things in balanced perspective. The Greeks certainly had for a considerable period an exalted and authentic ideal of democracy; but they also lacked all too commonly the moral fiber and selfless generosity to make the ideal work out effectively in practice. Some of their exaggerated steps in pursuit of the ideal in abstraction from other

factors inextricably bound up in concrete human behavior and social problems resulted in debasing the principle and reducing it in the eyes of many to absurdity (whence Plato's and Aristotle's severe censures of much in the democratic process, which had in their day gone to pitiable seed). But the fundamental fact is that the Greeks did conceive so high an ideal of human liberty under beneficent law, and did struggle to achieve it. They broke a very solid mass of ice in this matter in the pre-Greek world, and contributed enormously important impetus to the ideal's subsequent development. Thus, even at Rome, where the democratic system had an independent origin and initial growth, Greek influence was definite. In the early stages, a commission of three outstanding Roman leaders was sent to Greece in 454 B.C. to study at first hand the democratic processes there after Solon's reform, in preparation for promulgating the Twelve Tables, the primary code of Roman Law (see Livy, 3.31-32). Later, too, the extensive impact of Greek thought on the Roman outlook and conduct exerted itself in the field of democratic theory and practice also.

Yet only Christianity finally succeeded in establishing a truly workable democratic order by its teaching on the nature and inherent rights of man, the real function of the state, the ultimate objective foundation of all law, and by its inspiration and supernatural assistance toward acting out in practice democracy's high ideal of responsibility and mutual cooperation in matters of collective public welfare. This is a fact which those concerned with the preservation of our democratic heritage dare not allow to be overlooked.

A good and very readable treatment of Greek democracy in all its aspects, not too technical, is Walter R. Agard's What Democracy Meant to the Greeks (Univ. of N. Carolina Press, 1942). The book is not strong or deep in philosophical analysis of the issues involved, but otherwise may be recommended.