RECENTLY while going through the seasonal ritual of “decluttering”, I came across a copy of Aesop’s Fables, a collection of cautionary tales by that mere slave from the 5th century.
Remembering some of the tales was enough to make me pause in the midst of my cleaning.
So I sat there surrounded by the confusion of a dismantled room and flipped through the brown pages of a still treasured book.
On the inside cover was my name, a date and a note along with markings in the margins of several pages. In the back were some stick figures drawn by my daughter during that period of innocence when mummy was always right.
Sigh! You just can’t get that kind of sentimental feeling from a Kindle or an iPad. But sentimentality is not the point of today’s column.
Since 2011 ended on a rather active political note re: the DLP’s Eager 11 and 2012 started on a similarly lively note with the BLP’s Arthur/Mia/St James North battle, I’ve been thinking that neither party ever learns from the other.
The social and political fallout from the trade union divide over the Alexandra School issue at the start of the year also highlighted how strange human relations can be.
I found that all the above scenarios easily fit within several of the morals for which Aesop had become famous.
But I might be taking it for granted that everyone is familiar with Aesop, so I’ll briefly digress from the political point for a crash course.
It should be enough to know that some of the modern day sayings are derived from Aesop’s Fables such as “sour grapes”, “familiarity breeds contempt”, “crying wolf” and “catching at the shadow”.
Generally, the collection has appealed to both children and adults.
In the case of children, the animal portrayal is used to entertain while teaching the young ones about right and wrong and being practical.
For the adults the lessons of political wisdom are a bit harder to instil.
Most of the fables carry a political and social message in which animals – both the strong and the feeble – are personified to convey the intention of the author.
However, there is one that I find particularly instructive in the political context as well as human affairs in light of everything that is unfolding presently.
I believe the following synopsis of Aesop’s The Lion And The Three Bulls is best applied to the earlier mentioned political scenarios.
Three bulls were grazing in a pasture watched by a lion who longed to capture and devour them. He felt that he was no match for the united three. So he began by false whispers and malicious hints to foment jealousies and distrust among them.
He succeeded so well that the bulls grew cold and unfriendly, and finally avoided each other and ate alone. No sooner had the lion seen this than he fell upon them one by one and killed them in turn.
In a perfect world the above account would be enough said, but politicians are a stiff-necked group on which criticism is often lost. And I quite understand that the arrogance by which the political beast is fuelled takes more than a morality story to dilute it.
If that is the case, then most assuredly the moral intimated by Aesop’s fable will not be enough motivation.
In most cases, the fables of Aesop cannot be broken down into a more simple way. They rely on the basic principle of inspiring good or facing the fact that retribution catches up with us at some point.
Both parties have had enough upheaval in the past to learn from each other or from within, but members do not seem to grasp it.
