Week Five

Sophocles, Antigone

Where do we find good advice?

What are the symptoms of tyranny?

The life of Sophocles spans most of the fifth century B.C. (497/6-406/5), which sees the rise of Athenian hegemony in Greece due to its leadership in resisting the invading Persian Empire, the cultural efflorescence of democratic Athens in the age of Pericles, and the catastrophic Peloponnesian War. The poet-statesman Solon would lay the groundwork for democracy with his constitutional reforms, enacted a little before Thales’ philosophical breakthrough in the early sixth century B.C. Athens was to become the most radical of the ancient democracies, eventually with every freeborn native male of military age a citizen. Democracy, rule by the people (demos), was a natural way for the Greekpolis to develop, each one being fairly compact and possessing an autonomous, distinctly constituted, regime or way of life: each with its own law code, political system, religious observances, socioeconomic structure. There were eventually around one thousandpoleis across the Greek-speaking world, maybe half of which were democracies. This political way of life proved superior in war to the autocratic regimentation of the Persian Empire, a victory inaugurating the Classical period. Athens assumed leadership of the Delian League, a confederation of city-states formed to counteract any future Persian attempts on Greek liberty. Unfortunately, Athens eventually transformed the League into its own empire, robbing its confederates of their liberty. Exacted tribute funded Athenian democracy (making possible payment for jury and other civic service), as well as Pericles’ great building projects, including the Parthenon.

Sophocles was the preeminent playwright of the century. He was also a leading citizen, serving a term as one of the ten treasurers of the Delian League and elected astraegos (general) along with Pericles during the Samian War (440-39) and again at the beginning of the Peloponnesian War. He was chosen as one of the ten commissioners responding to the disastrous Sicilian expedition. Sophocles was also a priest of a minor hero cult and helped introduce the cult of Asclepius to Athens, housing his image until a proper place could be prepared—for which role he was posthumously honored as a hero under the title of Dexion (“receiver”). His Antigone grapples with what the higher law (and that of the household or oikos) might require of us in contradiction to the apparent demands of the polis.

- David Franks