The recent podcast from Auron MacIntyre featuring Professor Chad Pecknold on “Religion and Politics in the Ancient City” was a fantastic listen. In case you’re unfamiliar, MacIntyre is a podcaster and commentator at Glenn Beck’s The Blaze network where his show focuses on current politics with an emphasis on political theory.
In this episode, MacIntyre and Pecknold discuss Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges and his book on religion and politics in the ancient world, primarily focused on the Greeks and Romans pre-Christianity.
In the discussion, they discover that the politics and policies that were advocated in the ancient world revolved entirely around religion. For example, when the Greeks and Romans developed a robust system of private property, a system which we enjoy today, the reason for those rights stemmed from the fact that according to Greek and Roman religion, the spirits of the departed literally resided in the earth. Not only were you required to work the land as an upstanding member of society, but you had a deep religious burden to keep the family land so that your ancestors’ spirits were preserved.
When Christianity stepped onto the scene, the power of the gospel did not destroy that tradition of private property, but reformed it unto the one true religion, that is Christ. They Christianized the natural realities that the people were facing. Now we have Christian burial where we do not believe that the spirits of our ancestors live in the ground, but that their bodies will be rejoined with their spirits in the bodily resurrection.
Christianity took the best of the western traditions and perfected it with the grace of the gospel. The Greeks and Romans were great, powerful societies, but Christianity came and made them Christian.
It was a fantastic listen. Enjoy.
Grant Allen can be reached by email at grantallen@iheartmedia.com. If you’re interested in reading his other posts, check out his archived content or learn more about him by checking his short bio here.