Heracleidae

Responding to Plato's challenge to defend the political thought of poetic sources, Marlene K. Sokolon explores Euripides's understanding of justice in nine of his surviving tragedies. Drawing on Greek mythological stories, Euripides examines several competing ideas of justice, from the ancient ethic of helping friends and harming enemies to justice as merit and relativist views of might makes right. Reflecting Dionysus, the paradoxical god of Greek theater, Euripides reveals the human experience of understanding justice to be limited, multifaceted, and contradictory. His approach underscores the value of understanding justice not only as a rational idea or theory, but also as an integral part of the continuous and unfinished dialogue of political community. As the first book devoted to Euripidean justice, Seeing with Free Eyes adds to the growing interest in how citizens in democracies use storytelling genres to think about important political questions, such as "What is justice?"

Because of the didactic nature of the historical genre, many scholars ancient and modern have seen connections between history and rhetoric. So far, discussion has centered on fifth-century authors -- Herodotus and Thucydides, along with the sophists and early philosophers. Pownall extends the focus of this discussion into an important period. By focusing on key intellectuals and historians of the fourth century (Plato and the major historians -- Xenophon, Ephorus, and Theopompus), she examines how these prose writers created an aristocratic version of the past as an alternative to the democratic version of the oratorical tradition. Frances Pownall is Professor of History and Classics, University of Alberta.

The book rediscovers two of the main seeds of Western Culture – the Exodus and the Odyssey, which are entwined within the book by both a common link with Egypt and a review of ancient chronology. They were both antecedents to the rise of Christianity, which is at the heart of Western Culture. It was inspired by a desire to understand the spiritual message of the Odyssey, which required both geographical and spiritual interpretations of the poem. Linked to this was a desire to understand the political context of the Trojan story, which required resolving the false hiatus in the archaeology of Troy. This resulted in a new paradigm for understanding ancient chronology, which revealed the stories behind the Exodus and the location of the Garden of Eden. Writing the book has been a long and eventful journey, longer than Odysseus’ 19 years away from home. The book is written in five parts: • Low Chronology - Based on the identification of Menophres with Thutmose III and of the Bubastite Portal’s reference to Shoshenq’s participation in the Battle of Qarqar, the Egyptian Third Intermediate Period is shortened by 120 years, with a pharaoh ruling from Tanis and subordinate kings at Bubastis and Thebes. • The Exodus - Using the Low Chronology and genealogical information and dates provided by the Bible, it is demonstrated that the story of the Exodus is a combination of two events, being the exodus of the Hyksos led by Abraham in 1406 BC following the eruption of Thera, and the exodus of the Atenist (Levite) priests led by Moses in about the first year of Tutankhamun - 1204 BC. The story of Abraham also reveals the location of the Garden of Eden in the heartland of the Levant. • Radiocarbon Dating – The process that created the dendrochronology-based radiocarbon calibration curve is demonstrated to be a flawed non-scientific process that relied upon circular arguments. • The Odyssey – By comparing the life and work of Archilochus to both the Odyssey and the Iliad, it is shown that Archilochus must have been the author of the Odyssey. The allegory within the Odyssey is also discussed to provide both geographical and spiritual interpretations of the poem. • Western Culture - The two main streams of Western Culture (Ancient Greece and Christianity) are shown to have had their foundations in the stories surrounding the Trojan War, the spiritual message of the Odyssey and the influences of Egypt on Greece and Judaism. It is shown how Greek and Jewish religions were fused to create the Gospels and contributed towards modern astrology.