He who does not justly perform his appointed duty may appear as a violator of the whole order of the Universe. ~ Pythagoras In The Ancient City, Fustel de Coulanges begins in the middle of things, at the point when religion had already been established. To get to the beginning … Continue reading →

Blind love vs Justice Continue reading →

The City was hierarchically arranged under the leadership of the King, and under him, the leaders of the tribes, clans, and families. The religion was based on ancestor worship. Continue reading →

Each family in the Ancient City had its own religion, gods, and rites based on its ancestors, with the head of the family as its priest. Families could unite, called a phratry or curia, in a common worship without eliminating the family rites Continue reading →

The “presence” of the genio, the lares or the penates in the group to which it corresponded, was made aware and symbolized by the fire, the sacred flame, that had to burn uninterruptedly in the center of the patristic houses, in the temple placed in the atrium, the place where the pater familias celebrated the rites and in which the various members of the domestic or aristocratic group were gathered for meals. Continue reading →

The single, atomic, deracinated individual does not exist. When he presumes to be a being in itself, he is deceived in the most pathetic way, because he cannot even name the last of the organic processes that condition his life and finite consciousness. The individual is part of a group, a folk, a gente. He is part of an organic unity. Continue reading →

There is a loose group of spiritual ideas that have a large influence in Western, particularly American, culture, that go by the name of “New Age” spirituality. Furthermore, they derive their validity from the claim that they are updated versions of Traditional wisdom. While there is certainly some basis for … Continue reading →

The first question must be, “Is the City just because it was constituted by the gods?” This justice was simply assumed, but that is not acceptable to the philosopher. After many long dialogues, Plato’s conclusion is that there is an idea of Justice that is independent of both man and gods. Continue reading →

The deceased are around us and participate in our lives. Even our thoughts, desires, insights are influenced by them. We have to be aware of this. Continue reading →

When a fire of desire to know has been lit, a human being begins to move towards the Self, that is, towards Unity and Paradise. Reaching it, a human being becomes once again what the human being was before forgetting. Continue reading →