In
the year 480 BC Athens was in trouble. Xerxes I had defeated the 300
Spartans at Thermopylae and had turned his attention to the next
obstacle, the men of Athens. In response to this threat the Athenians
did the only thing a Classical Greek person would do. No, not run, or
fly the white flag, they turned to the Oracle at Delphi. When the
envoys had arrived and as they walked in, they would have read the words
inscribed in the wall of the fore court, ‘γνῶθι σεαυτόν,’ gnothi
seauton, which would have commanded them, before they went in, to ‘Know
yourself.’
This
phrase was debated endlessly by men in antiquity, even Socrates weighed
in on what he thought it meant, but basically it seems to have been an
injunction to understand your own limitations in the face of the god
Apollo, the god who was the power behind the Delphic oracle, and to
accept his words without question. Those of you who have read any of
this blog before, particularly the DIY parts, or who have read the
‘About me’ page (go and have a quick look now if you want, I won’t go
anywhere), will know that I am quite familiar with a number of my
limitations, mostly because they are illuminated on a daily basis by my
wife and my daughter, mostly my daughter. Such an illumination took
place today when N and I went shopping.
