[lit-ideas] Re: Help with Hegel Quote (Was: "SM" -- and Aristotle on slavery
- From: Robert Paul <rpaul@xxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 18 Oct 2007 17:09:31 -0700
I never read -- in German -- that passage where Hegel speaks of the
master and the slave. I suppose he is also quoting from Aristotle who
thought that 'barbarians' were a necessity in Athens (therefore
justifying slavery in ... "Ethica Nichomachea"?
I know little Hegel and less Greek, but a 'barbarian' and a slave were
not the same thing for Aristotle. A barbarian was originally simply a
non-Greek, so-called because of his unintelligible speech:
barbarbarbar...and so on. 'Barbarian' was originally neutral; I don't
think Aristotle ever uses it pejoratively. Athenians had no need for a
supply of barbarians.
'Natural slaves' (doulos) are discussed near the beginning of the
Politics; such people are slaves by nature, minimally rational, and
minimally virtuous—rational and virtuous only to the extent that they
are capable of understanding and carrying out the despotes' requests.
Natural slavery is different from legal slavery, e.g. captives and
prisoners of war who are set to work in the lead mines and elsewhere. It
was in principle possible to escape from legal bondage, but not to
escape from one's natural state as a slave.
Slaves are probably mentioned somewhere in the NE, but the Politics is
usually considered the main source for Aristotle's views on natural and
legal slavery.
Robert Paul
The Reed Institute
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