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From Vice to Christian Sin
The story is told of an exchange between the legendary economic historian Jack Fisher and an importunate pupil who was pressing him for a reading list on sixteenth-and seventeenth-century English economic history. [Fisher] said, âIf you really want to understand the period, go away and read the Bible.â
â Christopher Hill, The English Bible and the Seventeenth-Century Revolution
[God] reprocheth Adamâs miserie, whereinto he was fallen by ambition.
â Genesis 3:22, Geneva Bible, marginal note
The word ambition reaches English directly through Latin or sometimes by Latin through Old French. Ambition is derived from the Latin compound verb ambire, âgo round.â Does this mean that the concept that we attach to the word ambition did not exist before the Latin word emerged as its etymological root? Of course not. Scholars have recognized ambition as present throughout history. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, perhaps the oldest written story, from the ancient tablets of Sumeria, we learn of the king of Uruk, Gilgamesh. Gilgamesh is driven by the âspur on the ⊠ambition to leave an enduring nameâ and enters the Cedar Forest guarded by Humbaba the terrible.1 For eminent archaeologist and historian Nancy Sandars, Gilgamesh embodies our modern conception of ambition. But reading modern notions of ambition into ancient endeavors is a risky business and should be resisted to avoid the pitfalls of reifying the concept.
The ground in ancient Greece might seem steadier, as many sources on ambition in this period were those read and studied in Anglo-America.2 Thucydides, popular among the Founders and listed in the libraries of Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, among others, wrote of the Athenians with a word translated into English as âambitionâ: âFrom motives of private ambition and private interest they adopted a policy which had disastrous effects in respect both of themselves and of their allies; their measures, had they been successful, would only have brought honor and profit to individuals, and, when unsuccessful, crippled the city in the conduct of war.â3
Robert Faulkner, in his work on noble ambition, considers Alcibiades as a Greek example of âunbounded ambition.â4 John Dryden, too, in his English translation of Plutarchâs Alcibiades, writes: âHis conduct displayed many great inconsistencies and variations, not unnaturally, in accordance with the many and wonderful vicissitudes of his fortunes; but among the many strong passions of his real character, the one most prevailing of all was his ambition and his desire of superiority.â5
The problem is that there is no one Greek word for ambition. Rather, three Greek words have been translated into our English word ambition. Just as historians must accept the change in the meanings of words through time, so they must not fall prey to assuming a stasis in translations of ancient concepts into contemporary parlance.
The three Greek words that have been translated into the English word ambition are: philotimia (alternatively philotimeomai), literally âthe love of honorâ; eritheia, ârivalryâ or âstrifeâ; and philodoxia, âlove of acclaim.â
Philotimia, love of honor, was a central theme in Greek life and culture. It was widely considered to be among the driving forces of Greek achievement, and therefore conveys much of the contemporary sense of ambition.6 But philotimia was not as invariably positive, as many scholars assume. The word was originally imagined to be a negative personal attribute, âambition for a personâs own profit and private prestige.â7 But by the mid-fourth century, it began to be understood as âprivate contribution for the benefit of the polis, for which the contributor was rewarded with public gratitude, charis.â8 One wonders if part of ambitionâs later duality might have been informed by a similar change through time in ancient Greece. Or, perhaps, as Greek culture became more fluid, a demos (the âpeopleâ) spurred by philotimia like-wise became more accepted.
The second word often translated into ambition is philodoxia, love of acclaim. In Plutarch, Alcibiades is characterized by both philotimia and philodoxia.9 But philodoxia, like philotimia, can have a negative aspect. In addition to stating that love of acclaim can drive an individual to recognition aligned with the public good, Plutarch also calls philodoxia a âmalady of the soul.â10
The third word, eritheia, ârivalry or strife,â is also translated into English as ambition or selfish ambition. The New International Version of the Bible, for example, defines eritheia as âselfish ambition.â Strongâs concordance defines eritheia as ârivalry, hence ambition,â and the âseeking of followers and adherents by means of gifts, the seeking of followers, hence ambition, rivalry, self-seeking; a feud, faction.â11
In Aristotle, eritheia denotes âa self-seeking pursuit of political office by unfair means.â12 The origin of the word is debated. Some scholars argue that it derives from eris, âstrife,â the name of the Greek goddess of discord, who possesses a golden apple that she throws to engender enmity among friends and war among enemies, notably the Trojan War.13 Others argue that the word finds its roots not in eris but in erithos, âcommon laborer.â They explain that the Greeks used the word to mean working in oneâs self-interest for a wage.14 Yet perhaps a third possibility, not ventured in the literature, is the source.
We know that there had been a momentous change in ancient Greece during the eighth, seventh, and sixth centuries. During this period a âpopular movementâ of demiourgoi (âcraftsmenâ) and thetes (literally, âdoersâ) arose to form a new order and garner political power. These âdemocratsâ demanded political recognition and reform, challenging the aristocrats. As people of humble origins vied for political power, upheaval, rivalry, and strife ensued.15 I would argue that eritheia has its origins not in eris (rivalry, strife) or erithos (common laborer) but in both. The confusion over its origins is resolved if we look at this period of extraordinarily violent and tumultuous internal struggle, an era of the assertion of prerogative by the craftsmen and doers.16 The rise of the common laborer was seen as the origin of rivalry and strife.
The Latin origins of the English word are decidedly less mysterious. Ambitio was originally used to describe Roman candidates for office who would canvass or solicit votes. There were no dictionaries of Latin usage per se during the Roman Empire. Modern Latin dictionaries look back and attempt to reconstitute meaning based on usage. For our purposes, this is extremely helpful in mitigating the risk of confusing linguistic similarity with conceptual similarity. It is not just the word. It is a concept reflected by the word.
Ambitio is used by the Romans almost exclusively for those with a public life.17 While the first use of ambition was rather neutral, canvassing soon became âinsistence in seeking favors, importunity,â which soon became âcorrupt practices in seeking honors, verdicts, graft and intrigue.â It is worth listing all the Latin uses because the multiple meanings provide insight into the complexity of the notion both in antiquity and in later periods. In addition, because early Anglo-American culture was preoccupied with the Romans, Latin usage is informative. At any rate ambitio is defined as in The Oxford Latin Dictionary as: â1. Canvassing votes; 2. A standing for public office, candidature; 3. Rivalry for honors, competition; 4. Striving after popularity, currying favor; 5. Desire for advancement; 6. Interested motives, self-interest; 7. Partiality, favoritism; 8. Vain display, ostentation, show.â
The Roman historian Titus Livius, known to us as Livy, uses ambitio in a neutral sense to mean âelectioneering,â although the negative connotations dominate his history of Rome.18 Ambitio is found throughout Livyâs work in his description of political evils. Livy considered ambitio an inescapable danger to concordia and libertas, a threat that when joined by the pernicious avaritia luxuriaque (avarice beyond bounds, luxurious avarice or greed), would destroy the Republic.19 Livy also identifies laws in Roman history (leges de ambitu) enacted to mitigate the destructive potential of ambitio, the first of which was the Lex Poetelia, enacted in 358 BCE.20 The law was specifically a restriction on the places where a candidate could canvass for votes, but it is generally agreed to have been passed to prevent the new men, the plebeians, from gaining political power.21
Not only Livy recognized the dangerous potential of ambitio. Of particular interest to late sixteenth- and early seventeenth-century Anglo-American culture are the works of the Stoics, much-studied ancient antecedents of early modern thought. Sallust (Gaius Sallustius Crispus), a Roman historian (86â35/34 BCE), takes up ambition in his War with Catiline, written around 40 BCE. In it, he portrays the struggle between civic virtue as embodied by Caesar and Cato and ambition and corruption as represented by the Roman patrician Catiline. Sallust warns that âambition drove many men to become false; to have one thought locked in the breast, another ready on the tongue.â22 He explicitly condemns ambition as a vice (vitium), though not quite as evil as the sin of avarice (avaritia).23
For Cicero, ambition is a âmalady,â but it is a malady that seems to draw âthe greatest soulsâ and âmost brilliant geniuses.â24 It is, therefore, both a blessing and a curse, a deluding self-absorption that can cause its victims to âlose sight of their claims to justice.â In his De officiis (On duties on obligations), Cicero writes an essay in the form of a letter to his son in which he elaborates on this virtuous vice:
The great majority of people, however, when they fall a prey to ambition for either military or civil authority, are carried away by it so completely that they quite lose sight of the claims of justice.⊠We saw this proved but now in the effrontery of Gaius Caesar, who, to gain that sovereign power which by a depraved imagination he had conceived in his fancy, trod underfoot all laws of gods and men. But the trouble about this matter is that it is in the greatest souls and in the most brilliant geniuses that we usually find ambitions for civil and military authority, for power, and for glory, springing; and therefore we must be the more heedful not to go wrong in that direction.25
Seneca, like Cicero, considers ambition one of the evils of the mind, a âmala mentis humanae.â26 He also alludes to the deceptive, seductive nature of ambition. While it appears to be a source of greatness, it is in fact a trap leading to misery.27
Quintilian, however, suggests an interesting departure from the dominant view and recognizes ambitionâs positive potential. He wrote, âThough ambition may be a fault in itself, it is often the mother of virtues.â28 But in Quintilianâs time, though he and Sallust both recognized ambitionâs duality, the dominant notion of ambition was still firmly vitium, âvice.â One can trace this emergent strain, ambitionâs dual nature, in Quintilian, later realized in Machiavelli, the seventeenth-century Puritan divine Bishop Manton, and as I illustrate in later chapters, in colonization and Republican revolution.
The next question is how this secular vice becomes Christian sin. The patristic texts provide answers and clues for our later understanding of ambition in Anglo-American thought. It has been noted that a feature of later English Protestantism is the weight of patristic writing, especially that of the first five centuries. This tendency has been noted both before and after the English Revolution of 1640.29
Augustine uses the word ambition in Confessions when he speaks of ambitio saeculi, âworldly ambition,â as the chief enemy of the good life. But it would be exceedingly narrow to exclude certain phrases that he uses synonymously with âworldly ambition.â In On True Religion, he expresses the similar idea of dominationis temporalis faustus, âhaughtiness of temporal dominationâ; in The City of God, he writes of libido dominandi, âlust for powerâ; and in Confessions, he uses libido principandi, âthe lust for being first.â30 Significantly, however, in ambition, we witness Augustine as the Western cultural âChristianizerâ of antiquity. In Augustine we see one path that ambitio makes from Roman vice to Christian sin.
In the Contra Julianum, written late in his life, Augustine directly links ambition and sin. Augustine imagines sin as âthree-headed,â using the word capita, âhead,â which leads one to speculate whether Augustine is evoking some monstrous beast of the sort found in medieval illuminations. One wonders, too, at his choice of three heads of sin. Augustine was a key figure in the Trinitarian debates, and it is tempting to speculate that âthreeâ answers the need for balance between distinct elements of the Trinity with their evil counterpart, but this is pure speculation.31 What is important is that the three sources are the lust for carnal experience, the lust for being first, and the lust for looking. This last one I have translated literally, but Michael Foley translates it âpernicious knowledge.â He makes the intriguing case that Augustine does not condemn these traits per se, only the ends to which they aspire, writing that Augustine tries to emphasize the âimportance of directing these desires towards their true fulfillment.â32
If by this Foley is arguing that the notion of somehow âharnessingâ or âchan...