Tag: Right and Wrong

Justice & Real Estate

~ lawrencebenn ~ Leave a comment

Aeschylus, Agamemnon, 763-781

Chorus:
Old wrong has a way of begetting new wrong
In the lives of bad people.
It happens unexpectedly,
Whenever the day marked for the birth comes.
Old wrong then begets a god
Indomitable and unyielding;
black Calamity for houses,
Profane in her audacity.
She is the image of her parents.

In contrast, Justice shines
In smoke-choked homes
and honors the upright man.
Gold-daubed mansions, unclean hands within,
These she quits, eyes averted, for pious houses.
She does not honor wealth’s tinsel might with praise.
She brings all things to their conclusion.

φιλεῖ δὲ τίκτειν ὕβρις
μὲν παλαιὰ νεά-
ζουσαν ἐν κακοῖς βροτῶν
ὕβριν τότ ἢ τόθ, ὅτε τὸ κύ-
ριον μόλῃ φάος τόκου,
δαίμονά τε τὰν ἄμαχον ἀπόλεμον,
ἀνίερον θράσος μελαί-
νας μελάθροισιν Ἄτας,
εἰδομέναν τοκεῦσιν.

Δίκα δὲ λάμπει μὲν ἐν
δυσκάπνοις δώμασιν,
τὸν δʼ ἐναίσιμον τίει.
τὰ χρυσόπαστα δʼ ἔδεθλα σὺν
πίνῳ χερῶν παλιντρόποις
ὄμμασι λιποῦσ ὅσια προσέβα
του δύναμιν οὐ σέβουσα πλού-
του παράσημον αἴνῳ:
πᾶν δʼ ἐπὶ τέρμα νωμᾷ.

color photograph of oil painting. a ramshackle old house at twilight, in mostly yellows and browns
Vincent van Gogh. The Cottage.
Oil on Canvas. 1885.
Van Gogh Museum. Amsterdam.

Larry Benn has a B.A. in English Literature from Harvard College, an M.Phil in English Literature from Oxford University, and a J.D. from Yale Law School. Making amends for a working life misspent in finance, he’s now a hobbyist in ancient languages and blogs at featsofgreek.blogspot.com.

Corrupt Leaders Make Corrupt Countries: Hesiod, Works and Days, 217-229

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

“Oath runs right alongside crooked judgments.
But a roar comes from Justice as she is dragged where
bribe-devouring men lead when they apply laws with crooked judgments.
She attends the city and the haunts of the hosts
weeping and cloaked in mist, bringing evil to men
who drive her out and do not practice righteous law.
For those who give fair judgments to foreigners and citizens
and who do not transgress the law in any way,
cities grow strong, and the people flourish within them;
A child-nourishing peace settles on the land, and never
Does wide-browed Zeus sound the sign of harsh war.”

αὐτίκα γὰρ τρέχει ῞Ορκος ἅμα σκολιῇσι δίκῃσιν·
τῆς δὲ Δίκης ῥόθος ἑλκομένης ᾗ κ’ ἄνδρες ἄγωσι
δωροφάγοι, σκολιῇς δὲ δίκῃς κρίνωσι θέμιστας·
ἣ δ’ ἕπεται κλαίουσα πόλιν καὶ ἤθεα λαῶν,
ἠέρα ἑσσαμένη, κακὸν ἀνθρώποισι φέρουσα,
οἵ τέ μιν ἐξελάσωσι καὶ οὐκ ἰθεῖαν ἔνειμαν.
οἳ δὲ δίκας ξείνοισι καὶ ἐνδήμοισι διδοῦσιν
ἰθείας καὶ μή τι παρεκβαίνουσι δικαίου,
τοῖσι τέθηλε πόλις, λαοὶ δ’ ἀνθεῦσιν ἐν αὐτῇ·
εἰρήνη δ’ ἀνὰ γῆν κουροτρόφος, οὐδέ ποτ’ αὐτοῖς
ἀργαλέον πόλεμον τεκμαίρεται εὐρύοπα Ζεύς·

Hesiod’s Works and Days, 265: on Justice

~ sententiaeantiquae ~ Leave a comment

“The man who does evil against another harms himself.”

οἷ αὐτῷ κακὰ τεύχει ἀνὴρ ἄλλῳ κακὰ τεύχων

 

 

Perhaps (Plato’s) Socrates was thinking of this when he said “doing wrong is worse than suffering it“.

 

Of course, Hesiodic poetry is not always consistent (Fr. 286):

 

“If someone sows wrongs, he will reap wicked profits.

If he suffers what he has wrought, now that is straight justice.”

 

εἰ κακά τις σπείραι, κακὰ κέρδεά <κ’> ἀμήσειεν·

εἴ κε πάθοι, τά τ’ ἔρεξε, δίκη κ’ ἰθεῖα γένοιτο

 

But this description is not completely opposed to the first: one is about personal morality and the other is about a wish for punishment for someone else.

This eye-for-an-eye take on justice is one of the traditional notions epic poetry investigates and Plato’s interlocutors debate. Another, also from Plato, is the idea that justice is relative, merely the hegemonic privilege of those in power.