The Death of Marcus Aurelius

The Death of Marcus Aurelius

Saturday, September 19, 2020

Musonius Rufus, Lectures 16.1


Lecture 16: Must one obey one’s parents under all circumstances?

A certain young man who wished to study philosophy, but was forbidden by his father to do so, put this question to him "Tell me, Musonius, must one obey one's parents in all things, or are there some circumstances under which one need not heed them?"

And Musonius replied, "That everyone should obey his mother and father seems a good thing, and I certainly recommend it. However, let us see what this matter of obedience is, or rather, first, what is the nature of disobedience, and let us consider who the disobedient person is, if in this way we may better understand what the nature of obedience is.”

The customs of the ages will come and go, but back when I was a child, in those glorious yet cringeworthy 1970’s, there still seemed to be a general consensus that if your parents told you to do something, you would have the good sense to go ahead and do it.

Maybe it was just from a fear of the painful consequences, and maybe we sometimes cheated a bit when they weren’t looking, but we knew not to mess too much with Mom and Dad.

Before you think I am waxing nostalgic, I remind you that I am hardly a fan of any blind obedience to authority. I once got myself into hot water when a friend’s mother scolded me for doing something foolish, and she then asked me the usual question from back then: “If all your friends jumped off a cliff, would you do it too?”

I was sadly always a smartass. “I don’t really know. Would it be different if you told me to do it?” There was the point when the one mom called the other mom, and the dads dealt out the appropriate punishments. Ah, good times!

I don’t mean to be flippant, yet I can’t help but struggle, decades later, with many of the same problems. Somehow, they put people “in charge”, for whatever reason or by whatever means, and they give them power over others in whatever way, and there is still this thoughtless assumption that we must all obey them without question.

I do commit myself to a respect for my betters, and I do dedicate myself to an obedience to what is right and good. Working that out is not always easy. How am I to distinguish between the person and the principle, between loyalty and truth?

After many years as a Yankee, I eventually found myself in Dixie. I did not know the customs, but a fellow of the old school set me straight about one important point.

“I notice people often address one another as sir or ma’am. Is there a rule for that?”

“Yes, sir, there is. You speak to anyone older, wiser, or better than you as sir or ma’am. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. You can never be a Southern gentleman without those rules.”

“By those standards, I would probably have to refer to most anyone as sir or ma’am, barring children or criminals.”

“Well done, sir, you’re learning!”

The world has been changing, of course, and those rules are no longer socially required in the South. I will go out on a limb, however, and suggest that they are still morally required everywhere.

So many of us have lost a sense of respect and decency. That is a crying shame.

Now does this mean I must follow any commands from those supposedly older, wiser, or better?

How does that relate to the dictates of my own conscience?

Is it acceptable for me to merely follow all orders? They execute people for doing that.

Is it better for me to follow my own sense of right and wrong? The execute people for doing that too.

When asked where his loyalties lay, Robert E. Lee spoke both with both firmness and with subtlety:

I shall never bear arms against the Union, but it may be necessary for me to carry a musket in the defense of my native state, Virginia, in which case I shall not prove recreant to my duty.

There is an intersection of the duty to my superiors and the duty to myself; it is a complementarity, and not a contradiction.

Written in 3/2000

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