Disappointment

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  When Socrates was put to death by the democracy of Athens in 399, his pupil Plato was thirty years old. The tragedy made an indelible impression on the young man and profoundly affected his philosophy. 75 Plato had hoped for a political career. Unlike his hero Socrates, he came from a rich, aristocratic family: his father was a descendant of the last king of Athens; his stepfather had been a close friend of Pericles; and two of his uncles had been active in the government of the thirty tyrants after Athens’s defeat in the Peloponnesian War. They had invited Plato to join them. It seemed a great opportunity, but Plato could see the flaws of this disastrous administration. He was delighted when the democracy was restored, and believed that his time had come, but the trial and death of Socrates so shattered his hopes that he became disillusioned and withdrew from public life in disgust. Wherever he looked, in any polis, the system of government was bad: Hence I was forced to say . . . that the human race will not see better days until either the stock of those who rightly and genuinely follow philosophy acquire political authority, or else the class who have political control be led by some dispensation of providence to become real philosophers. 76 How could the insights of the Axial Age be integrated into the violent and dishonest world of politics? Plato’s philosophy often seems to be otherworldly and to involve a flight from the mundane to the cold purity of abstraction. Yet Plato did not want his philosophers to retire from the world. Like the Confucians, he believed that a sage should be a man of action and influence public policy. Ideally, a philosopher should rule the people himself. Like the Buddha, Plato insisted that after achieving enlightenment, the sage must return to the agora and work there for the betterment of humanity. After the death of Socrates, Plato traveled in the eastern Mediterranean, hoping for inspiration. He stayed for some time in Megara with Euclides, one of the Eleatic philosophers who had been a disciple of Socrates; he shared Plato’s fascination with Parmenides. Plato was also attracted by the Pythagorean communities, with whom he forged lifelong friendships. He was especially inspired by their passion for mathematics, which trained their minds away from the confusing morass of the particular to a world of pure numbers and geometric forms. He traveled in Egypt and Libya, and in the court of the tyrant Dionysius I of Syracuse, he met Dion, who became very enthusiastic about Plato’s ideas. Plato may have hoped that Dion would become a philosophical activist in Sicily, but his first visit to Syracuse ended badly.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  But Solon had no time for this. Nature was governed by its own laws, which could not be affected by the actions of men and women. The Greeks were beginning to think in a new, analytic way, separating the different components of the problem, giving each its integrity, and then proceeding to find a logical solution. The circle of wise men had begun to study the process of cause and effect that would enable them to predict the outcome of a crisis. They were learning to look beyond the particular problems of a polis and find abstract general principles that could be applied universally. 65 Solon’s principle of eunomia was not only decisive in Greek political thought, but would help to shape early Greek science and philosophy. It was based on the idea of balance. No one sector of society should dominate the others. The city must work in the same way as the hoplite phalanx, in which all the warriors acted in concert. The farmers must be freed of the burdens placed upon them, so that they could counter the powers of the aristocrats who oppressed them. So Solon canceled the farmers’ debts; the Popular Assembly of all the citizens, which went back to the old tribal days, must balance the aristocratic Council of Elders. He also created the Council of Four Hundred, to supervise all the official assemblies of the polis. To further dilute the power of the aristocracy, Solon defined status by wealth rather than by birth: anybody who produced over two hundred bushels of grain, wine, or oil each year was now eligible for public office. Finally, Solon reformed the judiciary, and permitted any citizen to prosecute the city magistrates. 66 He had the new laws inscribed on two wooden tablets, so that any literate Athenian could consult them. Solon probably imagined that once the imbalance in society had been rectified, the aristocrats would automatically rule more justly. But of course, they resented their loss of privilege, and when the new measures were not fully implemented, there was unrest and disappointment among the poorer classes. Many urged Solon to establish a tyranny in Athens, so that he could enforce his reforms, but he refused because tyranny was an unbalanced polity. In the short term, Solon failed: the people were not yet ready for his ideas. But the widespread interest in his reforms had put Athens, which had fallen behind the other poleis, in the vanguard of progress. By rejecting tyranny, Solon had also set a new standard of the ideal citizen, who served without hope of personal reward and did not seek to become superior to the ordinary people. 67 But in 547 a tyrant did seize power in Athens. Peisistratos, from the nearby city of Brauron, whose family controlled the northern plains near Macedon, became the champion of many disaffected people in Athens. He and his sons would govern the city until 510.

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  It was only his resurrection that made his death available for our atonement, justification and salvation; without the resurrection, his death would be the grave of our hopes; we should be still unredeemed and under the power of our sins. A gospel of a dead Saviour would be a contradiction and wretched delusion. This is the reasoning of St. Paul, and its force is irresistible.211 The resurrection of Christ is therefore emphatically a test question upon which depends the truth or falsehood of the Christian religion. It is either the greatest miracle or the greatest delusion which history records.212 Christ had predicted both his crucifixion and his resurrection, but the former was a stumbling-block to the disciples, the latter a mystery which they could not understand till after the event.213 They no doubt expected that he would soon establish his Messianic kingdom on earth. Hence their utter disappointment and downheartedness after the crucifixion. The treason of one of their own number, the triumph of the hierarchy, the fickleness of the people, the death and burial of the beloved Master, had in a few hours rudely blasted their Messianic hopes and exposed them to the contempt and ridicule

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  buried at Gnesen (whence they afterwards were carried to Prague), and founded here an archiepiscopal see, around which the Polish church was finally consolidated. The Christian mission, however, was in the hands of Boleslav, just as it often had been in the hands of the German emperors, and sometimes even in the hands of the Pope himself, nothing but a political weapon. The mass of the population of his own realm was still pagan in their very hearts. Annually the Poles assembled on the day on which their idols had been thrown into the rivers or burnt, and celebrated the memory of their gods by dismal dirges,132 and the simplest rules of Christian morals could be enforced only by the application of the most barbarous punishments. Yea, under the political disturbances which occurred after the death of Mieczyslav II., 1034, a general outburst of heathenism took place throughout the Polish kingdom, and it took a long time before it was fully put down. § 35. The Conversion of the Bulgarians. Constantinus Porphyrogenitus: Life of Basilius Macedo, in Hist. Byzant. Continuatores post Theophanem. Greek and Latin, Paris, 1685. Photii Epistola, ed. Richard. Montacutius. London, 1647. Nicholas I.: Responsa ad Consulta Bulgarorum, in Mansi: Coll. Concil., Tom. XV., pp. 401–434; and in Harduin: Coll. Concil., V., pp. 353–386. A. Pichler: Geschichte der kirchlichen Trennung zwischen dem Orient und Occident. München, 1864, I., pp. 192 sqq. Comp. the biographies of Cyrillus and Methodius, mentioned in § 34. The Bulgarians were of Turanian descent, but, having lived for centuries among Slavic nations, they had adopted Slavic language, religion, customs and habits. Occupying the plains between the Danube and the Balkan range, they made frequent inroads into the territory of the Byzantine empire. In 813 they conquered Adrianople and carried a number of Christians, among whom was the bishop himself, as prisoners to Bulgaria. Here these Christian prisoners formed a congregation and began to labor for the conversion of their captors, though not with any great success, as it would seem, since the bishop was martyred. But in 861 a sister of the Bulgarian prince, Bogoris, who had been carried as a prisoner to Constantinople, and educated there in the Christian faith, returned to her native country, and her exertions for the conversion of her brother at last succeeded. Methodius was sent to her aid, and a picture he painted of the last judgment is said to have made an overwhelming impression on Bogoris, and determined him to embrace Christianity. He was baptized in 863, and entered immediately in correspondence with Photius, the patriarch of Constantinople. His baptism, however, occasioned a revolt among his subjects, and the horrible punishment, which he inflicted upon the rebels, shows how little as yet he had understood the teachings of Christianity. Meanwhile Greek missionaries, mostly monks, had entered the country, but they were intriguing, arrogant, and produced nothing but confusion among the people.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  Mrs. van Daan is by no means a wonderful person, yet half the arguments could have been avoided if Mother hadn’t been so hard to deal with every time they got onto a tricky subject. Mrs. van Daan does have one good point, though: you can talk to her. She may be selfish, stingy and underhanded, but she’ll readily back down as long as you don’t provoke her and make her unreasonable. This tactic doesn’t work every time, but if you’re patient, you can keep trying and see how far you get. All the conflicts about our upbringing, about not pampering children, about the food -- about everything, absolutely everything -- might have taken a different turn if we’d remained open and on friendly terms instead of always seeing the worst side. I know exactly what you’re going to say, Kitty.

• From Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence (2014)

  131 Northerners and Southerners both believed that God was on their side and that they knew exactly what he was doing. 132 And when it was all over, Southerners would see their defeat as divine retribution, while Northern preachers would celebrate their victory as God’s endorsement of their political arrangements. “Republican institutions have been vindicated in this experience as they never were before,” Beecher exulted; “God, I think, has said, by the voice of this event to all the nations of the earth: ‘Republican liberty, based upon true Christianity, is firm as the foundation of the globe.’ ” 133 “The Union will no more be thought of as a mere human compact,” exclaimed Howard Bushnell at the Yale Commencement of 1865. “The sense of nationality becomes even a kind of religion.” 134 In fact, however, the outcome had been decided not by God but by modern weaponry. Both sides were armed with Minié rifles, which made it impossible for either to charge—the traditional mode of engagement—without being vulnerable to the gun’s substantial range and suffering horrific casualties. 135 Despite the appalling loss of life—two thousand men could be lost in a single charge—generals continued to order their men to take the offensive. 136 As a result, in eight of the first twelve battles of the war, the Southern Confederacy lost 97,000 men, and in 1864 the Northern general Ulysses Grant lost 64,000 men in the first six months of his campaign against Robert E. Lee in the Wilderness. 137 The infantrymen caught on to this problem before the political or military leaders. Because one had to fire the Minié standing up, foot soldiers on both sides started to dig the trenches that would become the hallmark of early industrialized warfare with its protracted stalemates. 138 With both sides “dug in,” unable to advance decisively, modern wars would drag on battle after battle. After the war, the more reflective leaders—such as Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Andrew Dixon White, and John Dewey—retreated from the certainties of Enlightenment Protestantism. 139 In Europe too, Enlightenment confidence had been undermined.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  The establishment of a community that could resist its neighbors and rivals had not always been peaceful. Village communities had often been forced to join a polis against their will. Synoeicism (“unification”) had meant uprooting, resistance, and a good deal of misery—a birth agony reflected in many of the founding myths of the poleis. 61 The city had drawn people together, but had all too often achieved this violently. Each polis also had to compete constantly with the other poleis for power and wealth. But the Greeks were also proud of their cultural unity, and celebrated this in Panhellenic festivals and institutions. One of the most famous was the athletics competition at Olympia, which was first recorded in 776 and was attended by aristocrats from all over Greece. Competing at the games was a political act: it put your polis on the map, and an Olympic victor achieved legendary fame when he returned home. But like all things Greek, the games had an uncanny, chthonian side. The earliest athletic competitions had been held during the funeral of a great warrior. 62 The extraordinary physical feats performed by the mourners had been a defiant assertion of life in the presence of death, and expressed the rage, frustration, and grief of the bereaved. Eventually the games became a religious rite, performed in a sanctuary in honor of a local hero. The Olympic games were held in honor of Pelops, the legendary lover of Poseidon, who had also been a great athlete. At Olympia, athletes were not simply competing for personal fame, but were making a symbolic rite of passage from death to life. 63 At the western end of the stadium was the tomb of Pelops, a dark pit leading down to the depths of the earth. It faced the altar of Zeus in the east, a huge pile of earth and ash, the residue of innumerable sacrificial pyres. The god and the hero were like night and day, death and life. On the night before the race, the athletes sacrificed a ram in the precinct of Pelops, pouring its blood into the chthonian depths. On the next morning, they sprinted from Pelops’s tomb to the summit of the Zeus altar, into the rising sun, running away from death and bloody sacrifice toward the purifying fire. Like Pelops, the Olympian champion would eventually die, but his victory in the agon gave the victor a glory (kleos) that lived on in the memories of future generations. The cult of the hero was a unique feature of Greek religion. 64 The mortal hero was the chthonian counterpart of the immortal gods. By the end of the eighth century, the grave of an outstanding warrior would occupy a place of honor in most of the poleis. A constant reminder of the superior race of mortals who had lived in the heroic age, the hero was revered as a demigod.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  Our requirements in the way of reality terminate in our own acts and emotions, our own pleasures and pains. These are the ultimate fixities from which, as we formerly observed, the whole chain of our beliefs depends, object hanging to object, as the bees, in swarming, hang to each other until, de proche en proche, the supporting branch, the Self, is reached and held. BELIEF IN OBJECTS OF THEORY. Now the merely conceived or imagined objects which our mind represents as hanging to the sensations (causing them, etc.), filling the gaps between them, and weaving their interrupted chaos into order are innumerable. Whole systems of them conflict with other systems, and our choice of which system shall carry our belief is governed by principles which are simple enough, however subtle and difficult may be their application to details. The conceived system, to pass for true, must at least include the reality of the sensible objects in it, by explaining them as effects on us, if nothing more. The system which includes the most of them, and definitely explains or pretends to explain the rest of them, will, ceteris paribus, prevail. It is needless to say how far mankind still is from having excogitated such a system. But the various materialisms, idealisms, and hylozoisms show with what industry the attempt is forever made. It is conceivable that several rival theories should equally well include the actual order of our sensations in their scheme, much as the one-fluid and two-fluid theories of electricity formulated all the common electrical phenomena equally well. The sciences are full of these alternatives. Which theory is then to be believed? That theory will be most generally believed which, besides bring us objects able to account satisfactorily for our sensible experience, also offers those which are most interesting, those which appeal most urgently to our æsthetic, emotional, and active needs. So here, in the higher intellectual life, the same selection among general conceptions goes on which went on among the sensations themselves. First, a word of their relation to our emotional and active needs—and here I can do no better than quote from an article published some years ago: [329] "A philosophy may be unimpeachable in other respects, but either of two defects will be fatal to its universal acceptance. First, its ultimate principle must not be one that essentially baffles and disappoints our dearest desires and most cherished powers. A pessimistic principle like Schopenhauer's incurably vicious Will-substance, or Hartmann's wicked jack-at-all-trades, the Unconscious, will perpetually call forth essays at other philosophies. Incompatibility of the future with their desires and active tendencies is, in fact, to most men a source of more fixed disquietude than uncertainty itself. Witness the attempts to overcome the 'problem of evil,' the 'mystery of pain.' There is no problem of 'good.'

• From Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence (2014)

  Indeed, a mufti in Oran in North Africa issued a fatwa permitting Spanish Muslims to conform outwardly to Christianity, and most Spaniards turned a blind eye to Muslim observance. A practical convivencia had been restored. The first twenty years of the Spanish Inquisition were undoubtedly the most violent in its long history. There is no reliable documentation of the actual numbers of people killed. Historians once believed that about thirteen thousand conversos were burned during this early period. 26 More recent estimates suggest, however, that most of those who came forward were never brought to trial; that in most cases the death penalty was pronounced in absentia over conversos who had fled and were symbolically burned in effigy; and that from 1480 to 1530 only between 1,500 and 2,000 people were actually executed. 27 Nevertheless, this was a tragic and shocking development that broke with centuries of peaceful coexistence. The experience was devastating for the conversos and proved lamentably counterproductive. Many conversos who had been faithful Catholics when they were detained were so disgusted by their treatment that they reverted to Judaism and became the “secret Jews” that the Inquisition had set out to eliminate. 28 Spain was not a modern centralized state, but in the late fifteenth century it was the most powerful kingdom in the world. Besides its colonial possessions in the Americas, Spain had holdings in the Netherlands, and the monarchs had married their children to the heirs of Portugal, England, and the Austrian Habsburg dynasty. To counter the ambitions of its archrival France, Ferdinand had campaigned in Italy against France and Venice and seized control of Upper Navarre and Naples. Spain was, therefore, feared and resented, and exaggerated tales of the Inquisition spread through the rest of Europe, which was itself in the violent throes of a major transformation . By the sixteenth century a different kind of civilization was slowly emerging in Europe, based on new technologies and the constant reinvestment of capital. This would ultimately free the continent from many of the restrictions of agrarian society. Instead of focusing on the preservation of past achievements, Western people were acquiring the confidence to look to the future. Where older cultures had required people to remain within carefully defined limits, pioneers like Columbus were encouraging them to venture beyond the known world, where they discovered that they not only survived but prospered. Inventions were occurring simultaneously in many different fields; none of them seemed particularly momentous at the time, but their cumulative effect was decisive. 29 Specialists in one discipline found that they benefited from discoveries made in others. By 1600 innovations were occurring on such a scale and in so many areas at once that progress had become irreversible.

• From A History of Christianity (1976)

  from the Mongols before the end of the century. Missions to Moslem and pagan Africa also proved ephemeral. In the late thirteenth century Raymond Lull worked out the first modern missionary programme, and established a college of oriental languages in Majorca. In 1311 the Council of Vienne asked the European universities to provide courses in modern oriental tongues. But very little came of these plans. There were Christian posts on the south side of the Straits of Gibraltar in 1415; in 1444 contact was made with the negro races of tropical Africa, in 1482 with the Congo, and five years later there was a landing at the Cape of Good Hope. In 1518 it appears that an African was consecrated a titular bishop and Vicar-Apostolic of West Africa; but we do not know whether he ever returned there. Virtually all the African missions seem to have died out by the mid sixteenth century. The papacy took little part in these ventures. Indeed, it had no motive other than a purely altruistic one. In an age when power over the national churches was passing to princes, early missions, associated with trade or colonization, came under the crowns, and papal interference was almost invariably ruled out. It was a different matter for the great ‘imperialist’ orders, the Franciscans, Dominicans, Augustinians and, later, the Jesuits. To them missionary work was an enormous and valuable extension of their activities. They dominated the first phase of Christian colonization. The Protestants, having no orders, lacked the personnel and the means to undertake missionary work. And they were not sure of its value. Luther’s mind was limited by national, almost provincial, horizons. He scarcely thought in continental, let alone global terms. He thought ‘the faith of Jews, Turks and Papists is all one thing.’ He was interested in reforming Christians rather than converting pagans. And the Calvinists were preoccupied with the élite. Their faith did not focus on the heathen masses. With some justice Cardinal Bellarmine attacked Protestants for their lack of missionary activity: ‘Heretics are never said to have converted Jews or pagans, but only to have perverted Christians.’ Some Protestants argued that the command of Christ to preach the gospel ceased with the apostles: the offer had been made once and for all, and there was no need to make it again. But this was a minority opinion. Donne’s sermon reflects Anglican orthodoxy. Many of the English seamen and Atlantic traders were pious, even fanatical, Protestants who felt an obligation to proselytize. Sir Humphrey Gilbert’s charter of 1583 refers to the compassion of God ‘for poor infidels, it seeming probable that God hath reserved these gentiles to be introduced into Christian civility by the English nation’. Many early company

• From Available: The unfiltered and empowering new memoir for women about sex, dating and divorce after 40 (2021)

  I didn’t lose my sense of self all at once and I won’t find myself all at once either. It’s been a year since I started along this path, clumsily and impatiently stumbling along, desperate to reach the end of it. Now I finally see: there is no end, just forks, detours, hills and valleys, an ever-shifting footpath that I have time, freedom, courage and insatiable curiosity to amble along. Most importantly, I am willing to let whoever is inside me emerge without rushing her along. All my life I’ve been a fixer, doer, plan maker, strategist – needing to know what’s coming, and now, for the first time ever, I simply don’t need to know. I would even go so far as to say that I embrace not knowing and will tenaciously cling to the right to evolve as I go along. I think back to a recent conversation I had with #6 as I attempted to clarify our status, explaining that I love him and want him in my life, but not at the cost of my freedom. I had told him, you may not continue to be comfortable with my being with other men as we become more deeply invested in each other, and that’s a choice you have to make. He had misunderstood my meaning, thinking I was seeking his permission, that I was requesting that he allow me to be with other men. “No,” I had said, shaking my head, “my freedom is not yours to give me or withhold from me, it’s simply for you to decide if it works for your own needs.” I see now there can be commitment without monogamy and further that a lack of monogamy doesn’t signify that a particular relationship is not enough. No matter how fulfilling a relationship is, it doesn’t negate the part of me that still wants to be noticed and wanted, that enjoys the flirting and the hunt, as #6 likes to call it. I don’t know what I want in a relationship and why should I? I am privileged to be able to live by my own rules and standards and am surprised to realize that what I avidly pursued ever since I first started dating as a teenager – security, stability, a sure thing – is less important to me than what I gave up to have those things and have since reclaimed, namely my self-awareness, independence and choice. It’s no longer imperative that I understand what someone else can provide for me, but that I unflinchingly hold close what I can provide for myself. I am a woman and a mother, but no longer a wife, no longer looking for the sure thing that’ll keep my life tidy, my future certain. I thought that going off script would crush me, but instead it has freed me to be fully present in my other roles as a mother, a lover, as a friend and as the author of my own story.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  In a study of modern Jewish movements, the eminent scholar Haym Soloveitchik argues that the shift from oral tradition to written texts can lead to religious stridency, giving a student misplaced clarity and certainty about matters that are essentially elusive and ineffable. 133 The Deuteronomists were bold and creative thinkers but their theology was often strident. “You must destroy completely all the places where the nations you dispossess have served their gods,” Moses instructed the people. “You must tear down their altars; smash their pillars, cut down their sacred poles, set fire to the carved images of their gods, and wipe out their name from that place.” 134 Yahweh may have instructed Israelites to be kind to one another, but they must have no mercy on foreigners. The Deuteronomist historian described, with apparent approval, Joshua’s massacre of the inhabitants of Ai: When Israel had finished killing all the inhabitants of Ai in the open ground and where they followed them into the wilderness, and when all to a man had fallen by the edge of the sword, all Israel returned to Ai and slaughtered all its people. The number of those who fell that day, men and women together, was twelve thousand, all people of Ai. 135 Too much certainty and clarity could lead to cruel intolerance. The Deuteronomist probably ended his history with a description of the first Passover ever held in the Jerusalem temple. After Joshua had destroyed the temples of Samaria and killed their priests, he summoned the whole people to celebrate Pesach, “as prescribed in this scroll of the covenant.” This was another of the Deuteronomists’ innovations. Hitherto Passover had been a private, family festival, held in the home; now it became a national convention. 136 At last, the historian suggests, the people were celebrating Pesach in the way that Yahweh intended. No Passover like this one had ever been celebrated since the days when the judges ruled Israel or throughout the entire period of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah. The eighteenth year of King Josiah was the only time when such a Passover was celebrated in honour of Yahweh in Jerusalem. 137 It was the beginning of a new political and religious era. The little kingdom of Judah was about to pass over to a new golden age. But Josiah’s great experiment ended in tears. The map of the Middle East was changing. The Assyrian empire was in the final stages of its decline and Babylon was in the ascendant. In 610 Pharaoh Psammetichus died, and was succeeded by Necho III, who the following year marched through Palestine to come to the aid of the beleaguered Assyrian king. Josiah intercepted the Egyptian army at Megiddo, and was killed at the first encounter.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  When Plato died in 347, Aristotle left Athens. He may have been disappointed not to have been appointed head of the Academy, but he may also have become persona non grata in Athens because of his Macedonian connections. His friend Philip had succeeded his father in 360. A soldier and politician of genius, he had made the failing, backward, and isolated state of Macedonia a major power in the region, so that it now threatened Athenian interests. After a series of military defeats, Athens was forced to sign a treaty with Macedonia in 346, but remained hostile to and resentful of this dynamic new state, which was steadily expanding its territory and encroaching onto the mainland. In 342, Philip invited Aristotle to take up residence in Macedonia and educate his son Alexander. Aristotle remained Alexander’s tutor for at least three years, by which time Philip had become master of Greece, and after inflicting a decisive defeat on Athens in 338, he brought a new stability to the region. All the poleis benefited from the more peaceful conditions, and Athens in particular enjoyed a new period of prosperity. Philip had planned to invade Persia, but was assassinated in 336 and succeeded by his son Alexander. The following year, Aristotle returned to Athens and established his own school, known as the Lyceum because it was close to the temple of Apollo Lyceus. By this time he had become a biologist. He had spent some years in Asia Minor dissecting animals and plants and writing detailed descriptions of his investigations. Aristotle brought philosophy down to earth. He had become especially interested in the process of development and decay: he once broke an egg every day to chart the growth of the chick embryo. Where Plato and other Axial sages had been disturbed by flux and mutability, Aristotle was simply intrigued by the whole process of “becoming.” Change was not dukkha; it was natural to all living beings. Instead of seeking meaning in the immaterial world, Aristotle found it in the physical forms of transformation. For him, a “form” was not an eternal reality beyond the realm of the senses. It was an immanent structure within each substance that controlled its evolution until it attained maturity. Each person or thing had a dynamis that impelled it to grow into its form, as the acorn contained within itself the “potential” to become an oak tree. Change was not to be feared but celebrated; it represented a universal striving for fulfillment. But this was a purely earthly achievement. Aristotle had no ambition to leave Plato’s cave. There was much beauty to be found in the phenomenal world, if a philosopher knew how to use his reason.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  as desperately as I ever did. Peter is kind and good, and yet I can’t deny that he’s disappointed me in many ways. I especially don’t care for his dislike of religion, his table conversations and various things of that nature. Still, I’m firmly convinced that we’ll stick to our agreement never to quarrel. Peter is peace- loving, tolerant and extremely easygoing. He lets me say a lot of things to him that he’d never accept from his mother. He’s making a determined effort to remove the blots from his copybook and keep his affairs in order. Yet why does he hide his innermost self and never allow me access? Of course, he’s much more closed than I am, but I know from experience (even though I’m constantly being accused of knowing all there is to know in theory, but not in practice) that in time, even the most uncommunicative types will long as much, or even more, for someone to confide in. Peter and I have both spent our contemplative years in the Annex. We often discuss the future, the past and the present, but as I’ve already told you, I miss the real thing, and yet I know it exists! Is it because I haven’t been outdoors for so long that I’ve become so smitten with nature? I remember a time when a magnificent blue sky, chirping birds, moonlight and budding blossoms wouldn’t have captivated me. Things have changed since I came here. One night during the Pentecost holiday, for instance, when it was so hot, I struggled to keep my eyes open until eleven-thirty so I could get a good look at the moon, all on my own for once. Alas, my sacrifice was in vain, since there was too much glare and I couldn’t risk opening a window. An- other time, several months ago, I happened to be upstairs one night when the window was open. I didn’t go back down until it had to be closed again. The dark, rainy evening, the wind, the racing clouds, had me spellbound; it was the first time in a year and a half that I’d seen the night face-to-face. After that evening my longing to see it again was even greater than my fear of burglars, a dark rat-infested house or robberies. I went downstairs all by myself and looked out the windows in the kitchen and private office. Many people think nature is beautiful, many people sleep from time to time under the starry sky, and many people in hospitals and prisons long for the day when they’ll be free to enjoy what nature has to offer. But few are as isolated and cut off as we are from dle joys of nature, which can be shared by rich and poor alike. It’s not just my imagination -- looking at dle sky, dle clouds, dle moon and dle stars really does make me feel calm and hopeful. It’s much better medicine than valerian or bromide.

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  Instead of looking forward to a period of universal peace and compassion, Second Isaiah’s aggressive deity looks back to the pre-Axial divine warrior: Yahweh advances like a hero, His fury is stirred like a warrior’s. He gives the war shout, raises hue and cry, Marches valiantly against his foes. 54 Unlike the self-emptying servant, this God cannot stop asserting himself: “I, I am Yahweh!” Where the servant refused to “break the crushed reed,” 55 this aggressive deity could not wait to see the goyim marching behind the Israelites in chains. Instead of recoiling from the violence, like so many of the other Axial sages, Second Isaiah gave it sacred endorsement. The prophet’s focus on the earthly city of Jerusalem also seemed to turn the clock back to an older, less developed theological vision. In India and China, the cult was being steadily internalized, and in Israel too Ezekiel’s mandala of a holy city had represented an interior, spiritual ascent to the divine. But the pivot of Second Isaiah’s hopes was the earthly Zion. Yahweh would work a miracle there, transforming its desolate ruins into an earthly paradise. The “glory” of Yahweh, which Ezekiel had seen leaving the city, would return to Mount Zion, and—most important—“all mankind shall see it.” 56 Second Isaiah was expecting something dramatic. Before the exile, the “glory” had been evoked and reenacted in the temple rituals, but in the restored Jerusalem (whose walls and battlements would be studded with precious jewels), the divine presence would be more tangible. The returned exiles would experience the glory directly, and because Yahweh would be with his people in such a public, incontrovertible way, they would be safe forever. No nation would dare to attack them again: Remote from oppression, you will have nothing to fear; Remote from terror, it will not approach you. . . . Not a weapon forged against you will succeed. 57 Second Isaiah’s promises were disconcertingly close to those of the “false prophets” who had predicted that Jerusalem could never fall to the Babylonians. What would happen if these very precise prophecies were not fulfilled? At first everything went wondrously according to plan. Shortly after Cyrus conquered Babylon, in the autumn of 539, he issued an edict ordering that the gods of the subject peoples, whose effigies Nebuchadnezzar had carried off to Babylonia, should be returned to their own lands, that their temples should be rebuilt, and their cultic furniture and utensils restored. Because gods needed worshipers, the deportees could also return home. Cyrus’s policy was tolerant but also pragmatic. It was cheaper and more efficient than the massive resettlement programs that had characterized Assyrian and Babylonian imperialism. Cyrus would not only earn the gratitude of his subjects, but would also win the favor of their gods. A few months after Cyrus’s coronation, a party of Jewish exiles set out for Jerusalem, with the gold and silver vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had confiscated from the temple.

• From The Diary of a Young Girl (The Definitive Edition) (2020)

  is gone, they should go back to Germany. When you hear that, you begin to wonder why we’re fighting this long and difficult war. We’re always being told that we’re fighting for freedom, truth and justice! The war isn’t even over, and already there’s dissension and Jews are regarded as lesser beings. Oh, it’s sad, very sad that the old adage has been confirmed for the umpteenth time: “What one Christian does is his own responsibthty, what one Jew does reflects on all Jews.” To be honest, I can’t understand how the Dutch, a nation of good, honest, upright people, can sit in judgment on us the way they do. On us-the most oppressed, unfortunate and pitiable people in all the world. I have only one hope: that this anti-Semitism is just a passing thing, that the Dutch will show their true colors, that they’ll never waver from what they know in their hearts to be just, for this is unjust! And if they ever carry out this terrible threat, the meager handful of Jews still left in Holland will have to go. We too will have to shoulder our bundles and move on, away from this beautiful country, which once so kindly took us in and now turns its back on us. I love Holland. Once I hoped it would become a fatherland to me, since I had lost my own. And I hope so still! Yours, Anne M. Frank THURSDAY, MAY 25, 1944 Dearest Kitty, Bep’s engaged! The news isn’t much of a surprise, though none of us are particularly pleased. Bertus may be a nice, steady, athletic young man, but Bep doesn’t love him, and to me that’s enough reason to advise her against marrying him. Bep’s trying to get ahead in the world, and Bertus is pulling her back; he’s a laborer, without any interests or any desire to make something of himself, and I don’t think that’ll make Bep happy. I can understand Bep’s wanting to put an end to her indecision; four weeks ago she decided to write him off, but then she

• From The Great Transformation (2006)

  But hundreds of other, smaller towns have also been excavated, extending 800 miles along the Indus River, and another 800 miles along the Arabian coast, all built on an identical grid pattern. The Indus Valley civilization had been a sophisticated and powerful commercial network, which exported gold, copper, timber, ivory, and cotton to Mesopotamia, and imported bronze, tin, silver, lapis lazuli, and soapstone. Sadly, we know next to nothing about either the Harappans or their religion, even though there are tantalizing hints that some religious cults that would become very important after the Axial Age may have derived from the Indus Valley civilization. Archaeologists have found figurines of a Mother Goddess, stone lingams, and three stamp seals depicting a figure sitting, surrounded by animals, in what looks like the yogic position. Was this the god Shiva? In classical Hinduism, Shiva is lord of animals and a great yogin, but he is not an Aryan deity and is never mentioned in the Sanskrit Vedas. In the absence of any hard evidence, we cannot prove continuity. By the time the first Aryans arrived in the region, the Harappan empire had practically disappeared, but there may have been squatters in the ruined cities. There could have been overlap and interchange, and some of the Aryans may have adopted elements of the local faith and merged it with their own. The Aryan immigrants had no desire to rebuild the ancient cities and revivify the empire. Always on the move themselves, they looked down on the security of settled life and opted for yoga, the “yoking” of their horses to the chariots at the beginning of a raid. Unlike the Zoroastrians, they had no interest in a quiet, peaceful existence. They loved their war chariots and powerful bronze swords; they were cowboys, who earned their living by stealing their neighbors’ livestock. Because their lives depended on cattle rustling, it was more than a sport; it was also a sacred activity with rituals that gave it an infusion of divine power. The Indian Aryans wanted a dynamic religion; their heroes were the trekking warrior and the chariot fighter. Increasingly, they found the asuras *2 worshiped by Zoroaster boring and passive. How could anybody be inspired by an asura like Varuna, who simply sat around in his celestial palace, ordering the world from a safe distance? They much preferred the adventurous devas, “who drove on wheels, while the asuras sat at home in their halls.” 32 By the time they had established themselves in the Punjab, the cult of Varuna, the chief asura, was already in decline and Indra was becoming the Supreme God in his place. 33 With his wild, flowing beard, his belly full of soma, and his passion for battle, Indra was the archetypal Aryan to whom all warriors aspired.

• From Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble (2014)

  I was overjoyed when I found out I would be reporting to her. We’re old friends. We’ve known each other for twenty years. As soon as she arrived we started talking about launching a tech blog, which I would run. I figured I would have a year, maybe more, to get the blog off the ground. That’s why I thought my job was secure and why I am now sitting here, staring out my window, feeling as if I have been clubbed over the head. “I think they just want to hire younger people,” Abby says. “They can take your salary and hire five kids right out of college.” “Sure.” I’m not angry. I’m just dumbfounded. “I get it.” From outside comes the roar of a lawnmower. I glance out the window and see that the guys who mow our lawn have arrived in their truck. I make a mental note that this is one small luxury that we now will have to live without, because surely an unemployed man cannot pay someone else to mow his lawn. I’m not even finished getting fired yet and I’m already thinking about ways to save money. Should we get rid of cable TV? Will we stop going out to dinner? Can we still go to Austria? Abby says she really likes me, and this was a really hard phone call for her to make, and she hates to do this because we’ve known each other for so long, and nobody ever wants to call up their friend and tell them this. In a way I actually start to feel bad for her, even though I’m the one getting fired. I tell her I understand. I’m a business reporter, after all. This is the stuff I write about—legacy companies getting disrupted by new technologies, slowly going under, laying off workers. If I were running a magazine that was losing money, I would be looking to cut costs, too. I’d get rid of the expensive old guys and hire a bunch of hungry young kids. It makes sense. I went into this job knowing that it probably wouldn’t last forever. Back in 2008, when I joined, Newsweek veterans were being offered buyouts and early retirement packages. And it wasn’t just Newsweek . Newspapers and magazines were dying out all over the place, disrupted by the Internet. Despite all that, Newsweek was still an amazing place, and even if the magazine only had a few years left in it, I still wanted to work there. Now, on this sunny Friday morning, it’s over. My last day will be in two weeks, Abby says. I will get no severance package, just two weeks of pay and whatever vacation time I’m owed. At the end of two weeks I’ll also lose my health insurance, but the HR people will help me figure out how to set up COBRA to continue my benefits.

• From Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble (2014)

  They also won’t acknowledge that my little sub-blog has been generating a lot of traffic. In terms of page views, the five biggest posts over the past ninety days have been from me. One of my articles generated 190,000 views in a single day. In the entire seven-year history of the company only two posts have ever generated more page views than that, and it took months for them to hit the number that my post hit in twenty-four hours. On the other hand, my stuff still isn’t converting well. I’m getting lots of traffic, but my readers aren’t clicking on the e-book offers or filling out forms. Nonetheless, Cranium notices the spike in traffic, and one week, at our marketing department meeting, he awards me the Golden Unicorn, a prize for being that week’s outstanding marketer. This is an actual tiny statue of a unicorn, in gold. I put it on my desk and take pictures of it. Maybe this is good! Maybe I’m learning how to do this marketing stuff after all. I’m still working in the boiler room, away from the other bloggers. From Marcia and Jan I hear not a peep. There are no little “You go girl!!!” emails being passed around the department for me. The women who run our email campaigns and social media feeds won’t promote my articles to their subscribers. Michael, the copyeditor who just got hired to work on the marketing blog, is not allowed to work on my posts; Marcia and Jan say they can’t spare him. Things are going to change, Trotsky assures me. He tells me that one of the biggest reasons he took the job was because he wanted to work with me. I don’t believe this for a second, but all those years of working in PR have taught Trotsky how to deal with journalists: A little bit of flattery goes a long way. “They’re wasting your talent,” he says. “You should be doing more than just banging out blog posts. I have some ideas for you. I think you should be doing much higher-profile stuff.” I leave dinner with Trotsky feeling cautiously hopeful. Maybe things really are taking a turn for the better. Maybe I’ll do some work that I actually enjoy. Maybe, when April arrives, I won’t want to leave. But soon enough, that changes. Ten days after my dinner with Trotsky, before he even arrives for his first day at work, I manage to shoot myself in the foot, and this time I do it in a very big, public way. Fifteen [image "image" file=Image00003.jpg] Grandpa BuzzI n the first week of December Spinner sends around an email informing us that Halligan has been written up in an awesome new story in the New York Times . She wants us all to promote the article on our social feeds and drive some traffic to it.

• From Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence (2014)

  Later generations would idealize the Conquest Era, but it was a difficult time. The failure to defeat Constantinople was a bitter blow. By the time Uthman, the Prophet’s son-in-law, became the third caliph (r. 644–56), Muslim troops had become mutinous and discontented. The distances were now so vast that campaigning was exhausting, and they were taking less plunder. Far from home, living perpetually in strange surroundings, soldiers had no stable family life.53 This disquiet is reflected in the hadith (plural: ahadith) literature, in which the classical doctrine of jihad began to take shape.54 The ahadith (“reports”) recorded sayings and stories of the Prophet not included in the Quran. Now that he was no longer with them, people wanted to know how Muhammad had behaved and what he had thought about such subjects as warfare. These traditions were collected and anthologized during the eighth and ninth centuries and became so numerous that criteria were needed to distinguish authentic reports from the obviously spurious. Few of the ahadith date back to the Prophet himself, but even the more dubious ones throw light on attitudes in the early ummah as Muslims reflected on their astounding success.