Of late, I have been reading about the Romans, a group of exceptionally creative — if frequently cruel — lawyers with a really good army. What is not to like? It has got me thinking a bit about patriotism.<\/p>\n
The Romans took patriotism very seriously, and it was tied up with their religion. Loyalty to the Republic and its constitution and traditions was tied up with loyalty to the gods. Civic rituals were religious rituals and vice-versa. It is not that the Roman Republic was a theocracy subject to the rule of its priests. It was a thoroughly legalistic oligarchy and interestingly much of its law was frankly secular and was placed outside of the control of the priests. Indeed, the earliest Roman law code that we have — the Twelve Tables — was a self-conscious attempt to take law away from the priests by promulgating it on tablets in the market place rather than in sacred, esoteric books under the sole control of the clergy. Still, sacrilege, blasphemy, divine retribution and blessing, religious oaths, and liturgical rituals were all concepts that had frankly civic and political meanings. Which leads me to flags.<\/p>\n
Flags are a symbol that comes to us directly from the Romans. Our flags are the genetic decendents of the standards carried into battle by the Roman legions. Unlike the Greeks, the Romans didn’t conceive of their gods in necessarily personal terms, but rather thought of them as vital forces animating the world. The point is important for understanding the significance of the standard for the Roman legions. The standard was, quite literally, an idol. It was the embodiment of the god — the vital force — of the legion. It was never to fall into the hands of the enemy. Roman commanders and soldiers alike took this extremely literally, and there are numberless accounts of Roman legionaries doing impossible things in order to preserve their standards from the enemy. When the Roman general Varrus was massacred by the Germans, the Emperor Augustus was inconsolable until a second Roman army had destroyed the German tribes responsible and recaptured the lost standards.<\/p>\n
In a sense the fact that the symbol of nationhood is an idol captures for me the dilemma that I face as a Mormon in a liberal society. On one hand, an idol is the antithesis of true religion, a blasphemy far from the true things of God. The nation holds itself out as a community with claims upon us, but if Zion is the true model of community, the nation is always a second-rate imitation: a dumb idol with no soul. Yet at the same time, the integrated Roman Republic is extremely attractive in many ways, and the unity of spiritual and civic life is something to be envied and hoped for. In a sense, I want to believe in the gods of the standards. Yet it is not clear to me that the modern nation still breathes life into them. If there are still gods in the flags then it seems to me that they lack something of the naive and integrated self-confidence of the deities housed in the Roman standards.<\/p>\n
And so I read books and enjoy shuddering at and envying the Roman Republic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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