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The Ethical Concepts of Judaism and of Ancient Greece

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2024

Mordecai Roshwald
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The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast some salient, though not always clearly recognized and acknowledged, aspects of the ethical perception characterizing the Judaic and the ancient Greek civilizations. To allow a succint treatment, a topic of this range imposes selectivity which, in turn, involves a subjective judgement in making the choices of representative expressions of these vast cultures. While this limitation is readily admitted, our selections are not made from marginal or esoteric texts, but rely on central and mainstream sources that are well known or easily accessible.

Type
Research Article
Information
Diogenes , Volume 39 , Issue 156 , December 1991 , pp. 115 - 139
Copyright
Copyright © 1991 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

References

Notes

1. Aboth, Chapter II, 1. The tractate is also widely known as The Wisdom of the Fathers. An English translation by Judiah Goldin under the title The Living Talmud is available in paperback (New York: Mentor Books, New American Library, 1957).

2. Genesis 3:22.

3. Deuteronomy 30:15.

4. Plato, Apology 20. All the quotations from Plato follow the Jowett trans lation. In exploring the exact meaning of some Greek texts I had the advice of my son, Dr. Aviel Roshwald.

5. Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics I, vii, 1097b-1098a. The text used is J.A.K. Thomson's translation (Penguin Books revised edition, 1976).

6. Ibid. IX, ix, 1170a, 252.

7. To be sure, Aristotle, who coined the dictum that "man is a social (or political) being," could not ignore the normative aspect of human rela tions. Thus, in discussing justice in Ethics V, i, he states that "justice is the only virtue that is regarded as someone else's good" (1130a). Yet, characteristically, even here the stress is on the agent's virtue rather than on the right action, interlinked though these may be. Cf. W.F.R. Hardie, Aristotle's Ethical Theory, 2d ed., Clarendon Press: Oxford, 1980, 182 ff.: "While Aristotle's main object is to describe justice as a virtue of character, the book deals also with a number of connected topics" (which involve action affecting others).

8. Cf. Plato, Republic X, 609, where vice is said to affect the soul as disease does the body. See also Republic IV, 444. Yet elsewhere, in Phaedrus 253-254, Plato speaks of the evil in the soul as a force opposed to the good.

9. See Plato, Republic III, 410-411, where the physical and "musical" educa tion is discussed. The wider issue of the education of body and soul is discussed by Plato primarily in the Republic, but also in other dialogues.

10. Exodus 20:13-17. In the case of adultery, the blemish on the person committing it may be an element in the disapproval, but the offense to the third party certainly plays a major role in the censure of such behavior.

11. Apology 29. The concern of Socrates with one's "improvement of the soul," rather than with good deeds toward others, should not be con fused with egoism. For, as will be pointed out later, Socrates is commit ted to have the citizens of Athens at large pursue this objective, which implicitly suggests altruism. Cf. W.F.R. Hardie, op. cit., 216, where he attempts to refute the characterization of Aristotle's ethics as egoistic. The source of such an allegation is, in my opinion, the confusion of ethics focusing on the agent, and not on the consequences of his action for others, with egoism.

12. Psalms 1:6.

13. The question and the answer are formulated in Aboth, Chapter II, 13.

14. See Plato, Gorgias, 469-480.

15. See Exodus 22:4, 7 (22:3,6 in the Hebrew Bible).

16. See Republic IV, 420-421.

17. See Meno 88-89.

18. See Republic IX, 571-573. Cf. also Republic IV, 439ff. See also Phaedrus 253ff.

19. Republic V, 473.

20. Nicomachean Ethics X, viii, 1178a, 1178b-1179a. Cf. Hardie, op. cit., 218-219, where reference is made to Aristotle's perception of the human soul, including its physiological elements, in De Anima.

21. Ibid. X, vii, 1177a.

22. Ibid. 1177a-b.

23. Leviticus 19:9-10

24. Leviticus 19:15.

25. Isaiah 1:17.

26. Leviticus 19:18.

27. Leviticus 19:17. The translation does not follow the King James version but attempts to convey the meaning of the Hebrew text more faithfully. "Carry a grudge against him" may, however, not be beyond controver sy. The literal translation would be "carry sin on him," which has been open to various interpretations. Our own translation is consistent with the commentary of Rashbam (Rabbi Shmuel ben Meir, 1080-1158), who comments: "'And thou shalt not carry sin on him'-in your heart."

28. Micah 4:3-4.

29. The Babylonian Talmud, Sanhedrin, 37.

30. Ethics I, xiii, 42.

31. Ethics II, i, 1103a-b.

32. Republic III, 411.

33. Ibid. III, 399.

34. Ibid. III, 414-415ff.

35. Deuteronomy 6:6-7.

36. Deuteronomy 17:18-20.

37. Aboth, Chapter IV, 7.

38. Aboth, Chapter III, 12.

39. Deuteronomy 11:13-14, 16-17. The King James Version is somewhat modified to render the Hebrew text more exactly.

40. Deuteronomy 9:5.

41. See, as one prominent example, Amos, Chapter 1.

42. Jeremiah 12:1. Translated from the Hebrew text. The King James Version is inaccurate.

43. Cf. David Hume, Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, 1779, Part X.

44. Genesis 18:25.

45. See Encyclopaedia Judaica, 1971, Vol. 10, 3, the article on "Jeshua ben Judah."

46. Deuteronomy 10:12-13.

47. Micah 6:8. The King James Version modified.

48. Apology 20-21.

49. Aristotle, Ethics X, vii, 1177b-1178a.

50. See Aristotle, Metaphysics 1072-1074.

51. Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound. A recent translation by Philip Vellacott in a volume with three other plays by Aeschylus, published by Penguin Classics, 1961.

52. Cf. op. cit., 24 (75-126) and 35 (484-521).

53. Job 9:22.

54. Satires X, 356.

55. See the classical expression of this ideal in Baldassare Castiglione, Il Cortegiano (The Courtier), 1528.