1. The crisis of leadership. The subject of leadership has many times aroused in numerous ancient books. The following are the most demonstrative examples of leadership crisis.
Moses, the main Bible hero, was chosen by God to take Hebrews from Egypt. Most of the people trusted and followed him. However, after many days of traveling being chased by Pharaoh Army Hebrew people disappointed in Moses and fell into despair.
The severe leadership crisis may also come from family members. It happened to Creon, an ancient king of Thebes, who led his sons, daughters, and wife to murders and suicides.
Odysseus, another ancient hero, was one of the well-known literature leaders. However, he also suffered from a crisis of leadership when his sailors disobeyed him after years of sailing and fell asleep at the island of Lotus-Eaters.
2. Virtues in cultures. For many years different cultures praise entirely various human qualities. Hebrew culture gives central role to morale and righteousness. Moses is never described as masculine man, great warrior, or excellent lover. His essential attributes are humility and nobleness. On the contrary, Greek culture praises excellence. Odysseus is considered a brave warrior and man, despite his moral principles. For instance, he often makes love to numerous women and it never decreases his excellence. Therefore, the range of virtues in diverse cultures may be enormously wide.
3. Offensive behavior. There is an essential element in the ancient culture that complements the fact of distinction in the understanding of virtues (previous paragraph). Of no doubt some displays of behavior in ancient and medieval culture may seem unusual and even offensive for modern morale. For example, in Hebrew texts, the Pharaoh of Egypt smoothly orders to kill all new-born children. This could never happen in our era. Ancient Greek literature is also full of such offensive facts. Odysseus made love to every woman he liked, and Creon ordered to bury his daughter alive. The significant factors that conditioned such amoral behavior in ancient culture were to my mind low level of social development and different system of values. The attitude to behavior was changed from old to our times with a growth of civilization and society.
4. Involvement of Gods. Gods played significant roles in ancient text and affected lives of human beings oftentimes. The most illustrative purpose of God is portrayed in Hebrew culture. God changed life of Abraham, made him travel in other land and gave him a child for his deep faith. Moses trusted God as well and was told to lead Hebrew people from Egypt. The most acute God’s deed in Moses’ story is dividing sea waters. Odysseus’ relationships with Gods are drastically diverse. For instance, the God of sea Poseidon hates Odysseus for defeating Cyclopes, his son. Numerous Greek Gods possess common human weaknesses like hate, love, or offence. On the contrary, Hebrew culture draws the only one God as the supreme creature.
Bibliography
Lamsa, George. Holy Bible: From the Ancient Eastern Text. HarperSanFrancisco, 1985.
Homer. The Odyssey. Puffin Classics. 1997.
