The Meanings of Life: Ancient Visions

Catalog description

In Athens, over two millennia ago, Socrates raised what is perhaps the most important philosophical issue of all: How should we live? We will wrestle with this question through reading writers from the ancient world?Homer?s Iliad, Sappho?s love poetry, Plato?s Republic, Euripides? play Bacchae, Epictetus?s Enchiridion, and Saint Paul?s First Epistle to the Corinthians. Reading and discussing these texts will help us critically contemplate crucial questions at the heart of living a meaningful life: What is the best kind of human being? The hero, the lover, the creator, the philosopher, or the saint? What should be our compass guiding our life? Reason, emotion, love, desire, or faith? What should we ultimately live for? Fame, romance, vitality, wisdom, tranquility, or God? The goal of the class is to make our own lives more meaningful by engaging these questions?not to arrive at final answers to them.