How Does Aristophanes Build Self-Awareness?

631 Words2 Pages

Exercise Self-Talk in Peer Assessment: Building Self-Awareness Greek people have a long, and rich, history in sarcasm; it is telling that the word itself is a loan from the ancient Greek verb σαρκάζειν, or to tear flesh. For example, look at the comedies of Aristophanes, where not even gods escaped his ridiculing. While acceptable and prevalent in modern Greek culture, sarcasm is no virtue but a sin based on a sense of self-superiority with a license to judge others. In truth, even if we are to make allowances for cultural upbringing, sarcasm is usually an indication of a severe lack of self-knowledge—the virtue that begets empathy and sympathy. This is a long way of saying that my biggest weakness is, indeed, sarcasm—even if, nowadays, it is mostly contained inside me. Given the above, it is no wonder …show more content…

Whether or not one waives their anthropology as metaphysics, one cannot deny that much of their ascetical works revolve around the guarding of the νοῦς, or mind. Their premise is that there is an obvious division between immanent reason and external speech; thus, external silence does not automatically imply an internal silence as well. In fact, the Fathers had noted that the human mind rarely, if ever, stays silent; as modern emotional psychology stresses, the human mind is constantly buzzing with thoughts. Furthermore, they had noted that thoughts can be “simple” as comprised by observation alone, or “complex” comprised of observation and desire and/or judgement (Βλάχος, 1989); in this, they were verified by emotional psychology which distinguishes between observations and judgement. Finally, the Fathers had noted that thoughts, in time, define a man’s personality; therefore, it is our duty to keep the good thoughts, and reject the

Open Document