Aristotle’s Politics and the Problem of Male Rule in the Family

A version of this paper was presented at the Southern Political Science Association Annual

Meeting

Savannah, Georgia 1999

©David W. Livingstone, 1999

Do not distribute or reproduce without written permission from the author

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Abstract

In book one of the Politics, Aristotle claims that political rule consists in the alternation of the

ruling offices among free persons. For some reason this alternation of rule does not occur in the

household. Men always have the prerogatives of household rule, Aristotle claims, even though women

are free persons who are ruled politically (Politics, 1259a39-b10). Sophocles’ Ajax, to which Aristotle

refers in this context, holds the key to Aristotle’s puzzling discussion. Manly spiritedness causes Ajax to

ignore Tecmessa’s superior deliberations regarding the family’s common good. The continuous

dominance of males in the household is a perversion of the natural rule of intellect that the city more

truly imitates through the rule of law. Nevertheless, the family should not be destroyed nor should the

relations among its members be fully equalized. Thus the family and the city are in tension with one

another, and the family cannot serve as a model for political rule. Aristotle subtly suggests that the

polis moderate this tension by honoring those families that cultivate moral virtue among their

members.

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In book one of the Politics, Aristotle claims that political rule in a city consists in the alternation

of the ruling office among free persons.1 But despite that women are described as free persons who

are ruled politically, Aristotle says household rule is never alternated (Politics, 1259b5). Aristotle’s

reference to Sophocles’ Ajax in chapter fourteen points to the reasons why Aristotle believes males

dominate in the household association. It is because they have a higher degree of spiritedness which

inclines them to an inordinate love of honor and the trappings of rule. Aristotle’s discussion of slavery,

which precedes the discussion of the husband-wife relationship, establishes that deliberative capacity,

not spiritedness, is the natural principle which legitimates rule in human associations. Aristotle

signifies that he believes women have the deliberative capacity on which to found a legitimate claim to

rule. They are eclipsed in the household because of male spiritedness, but Aristotle is neither hopeful

nor desirous that this spiritedness be done away with. At best it can be moderated by the polis. By

examining and comparing the Ajax with what Aristotle has to say about the family, the household’s

limitations come to light and reveal why this form of association cannot provide the model for political

rule.

Insofar as Aristotle leaves the traditional structure of the family undisturbed his discussion

itself seems to be unjust to women. After all, Aristotle’s discussion brings to light, but then apparently

ignores, the women’s natural and legitimate claim to rule and be ruled in turn in the family. His

argument might be, and in some cases has been, brushed off as a species of outdated male

chauvinism better left forgotten. But by proceeding in the way he does, Aristotle acknowledges that

the household is both the basis of political order and, at the same time, it harbors a danger to that

order. Its hierarchical organization is in tension with the equality of free persons which the rule of law

represents. On the other hand, if polities seek to extend this admirable principle of equality to all

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? By spiritedness I mean the element of the soul which sometimes allies with reason, especially when reason successfully rules the appetitive part of the soul. Spiritedness is also the source of the desire for recognition and honor as well as anger and indignation. In these last forms it can lead to harshness and injustice. Yet it also provides the source of courage with which freedom is defended. For a rich and complex discussion of the problem of spiritedness and its manifold character in Plato, see Leon Craig’s The War Lover: A Commentary of Plato’s Republic (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1994) especially chapter 6 “Heart of Darkness.”

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aspects of the life of its citizens, the hierarchy of the family, and therewith the family itself, is

endangered. For the sake of health civic life, the household cannot be abandoned or abolished;

therefore it must be harmonized with the polis. The manifestation of spiritedness that Aristotle

believes is unavoidable in the household must somehow be directed by the polis toward ends that are

less dangerous to the family and the political association.

To begin to understand the polis and the place of the family within it, Aristotle tells us in book

one, we must break it down into its constituent elements; the polis must be analyzed. But it quickly

becomes apparent that mere analysis is not sufficient because Aristotle adds in chapter two that “...it

is by looking at how things develop naturally from the beginning that one may best (nobly) study

them” (1252a25). Book one will show both the elements of the household and how they develop

naturally together in the polis. These two ways of looking at the household yield different results.

Because, for Aristotle, nature properly understood provides a standard to strive toward, this book is

about how the household’s basic elements should be transformed by the political community. This is

not a transformation that does violence to the family, but neither is it one that strives to leave the

family in its most rudimentary or “natural” (i.e. original) form. It tries, instead, to bring the family to

completion as much as can be expected in light of the broader goal of man’s complete happiness.

The first chapter begins the analysis of the polis with the statement that "we see" the polis is

some sort of partnership, and that “every partnership is constituted for the sake of some good for

everyone does everything for the sake of what is held to be good”(1252, a1). Although the polis is

itself an association, it is made of other smaller associations, each aiming at some particular and

limited good. Because the polis embraces all the other smaller associations it can be said to aim at the

most authoritative good, which is happiness. The family is one such smaller association and is itself

further constituted by a pair of relations: the male-female relation and the naturally ruling-naturally

mastered relation (1252a27-34). Aristotle does not indicate how compatible he believes the lower

associations are with the more authoritative good of the polis. We should not assume that what is good

for the smaller associations is also, or simply, good for the polis or vice versa.

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We know, for instance, that Aristotle believes the family can appear in different forms. To ask

which of these forms of association is right for the polis becomes a question that can only be answered

in light of one’s understanding of the proper end of the polis. The overly-spirited barbarian family is

ruled by the male who makes no distinction between his wife and his slave (1252b5). The Cyclopes

presented by Homeric poetry rules the family according to his will without recourse to law (1252b23).

These may be possibilities for the family as such, but they are defective. The fact that these

possibilities occur outside of the polis indicates that Aristotle believes the family needs to be

completed in some way by the polis in order to be properly civilized.

That the basis of the polis is an association (the family) suggests not only that man is social by

nature but also that he is a radically dependent being. The “natural” beginning point for thinking about

politics is not with the isolated individual but rather with the most basic associations and with how they

generate the polis. The individual is not a suitable starting point for understanding politics because any

given individual (as opposed to a theoretical abstraction) must be either male or female. Taking either

one of these as the exemplar for the species as a whole would unnecessarily blind one to their natural

complementarity, at least with respect to sexual reproduction, and therefore also to any political

ramifications this difference may entail.2 In order to arrive at an adequate account of politics one

would have to begin with the phenomenon as given, realizing that there is no single being that one can

point to and “see” human being as such. Likewise all the parts of the household—and for Aristotle this

includes the master, slave, husband, wife, father, and children—are to be understood in their relations

to one another, not in isolation. What it is to be a human being first comes to light in the Politics as a

complex association which aims toward some good.

Not only do associations aim at some good, they also exhibit both a ruling and a ruled element.

What can be (and has been) described as the cardinal question in politics—namely “who ought to

rule?”—already asserts itself in the most basic associations of society.3 Aristotle’s first mention of this

2 Cf.Craig, The War Lover chp.6, “The Portrait of a Lady."3 William J. Booth, "Politics and the Household. A Commentary on Aristotle's Politics Book One," History of Political Thought, Vol.II, No.2, Summer, 1981, 206. See also John Locke, Two Treatises of Government, ed. Laslett, (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1960) I, §106.

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topic of the natural basis of rule occurs in the context of the master-slave relationship. This is the first

of the two constituitive relationships within the household to be discussed in detail. Why this

association should be discussed prior to the other household relationships is not immediately clear.4

Perhaps it is for this reason: if there is a principle of natural rule, one would expect it would be most

evidently shown by the character of the relation between the natural master and the natural slave.

With this principle elucidated, one could, it seems, apply it to other associations and evaluate their

proximity to the natural standard. Aristotle’s discussion leads one to confront the question of the

legitimacy of slavery in light of this standard.

Rather than begin his discussion of slavery with an examination of masters and slaves,

however, Aristotle asserts instead that nature has provided the model for the master-slave relationship

in the case of the well-ordered human being. It is natural and advantageous for the soul to rule the

body which it does despotically. Likewise, the master naturally rules the slave because "that which can

foresee with the mind is the naturally ruling element, while that which performs work with the body is

naturally ruled"(1252a31). Therefore, he concludes, if two people differed from each other so greatly

that they corresponded respectively to the difference between the soul and the body, it would be

natural and mutually advantageous for the person who can foresee to rule the one who can not. Quite

simply, as Catherine Zuckert observes with respect to this passage, “the principle of rule we articulate

when we understand natural slaves is that superior foresight ought to rule.”5

When Aristotle speaks of the master’s rule over a slave he models it on the soul-body

relationship, but in so doing he is silent about the role that spiritedness plays in the rule of the soul

over the body. He neglects to speak of spiritedness both as it relates to the proper ordering and

maintenance of the parts of the individual’s soul and as it relates to the rule of one person over

another. If the omission of spiritedness in the first case (the individual) is not immediately suspicious,

4 Booth, 212. “...Aristotle says that household management is more concerned with human beings than with property and more with freemen than slaves. Yet, of the eight pages (1255b-1260b) devoted to the household, only two treat of what, on Aristotle’s account, ought to be the most important subjects.”5 Catherine Zuckert, "Aristotle on the Limits and Satisfactions of Political Life," Interpretation, Vol.II, No.2, May, 1983, 191.

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surely its omission from the second case (master-slave) ought to strike one as puzzling. One would

have expected the question of force to enter the discussion of ruling so-called natural slaves. Why

should one expect natural slaves to desire their own enslavement, even if enslavement could be said

to benefit them? Belatedly, Aristotle reminds us of the problematic aspect of the master-slave relation

by including war and hunting of human beings as one of the modes of natural acquisition. Aristotle

says that this kind of war is natural precisely because even those who are naturally suited to be ruled

are unwilling (1256b23). This unwillingness to be enslaved can be linked to spiritedness and the desire

for freedom. That the natural slave, who by definition lacks the rational capacity to deliberate,

nevertheless desires freedom implies that Aristotle believes spiritedness and intellect are theoretically

separable to some degree. But when we are reminded of the problematic character of spiritedness

(that it does not automatically follow reason) and the physical force which can attend its displays in

practice, the neat divisions made in theory between the ruler and the ruled, a division that was initially

based on their respective differences in intellect, is disturbed. The gap which has opened up between

the theoretical distinction between master and slave and the practical working out of this distinction

suggests that intellect alone is not sufficient in practice to guarantee the kind of rule which accords

with nature. It is spiritedness which here at least prevents intellect from successfully establishing its

claim to rule.

There are other (intended) complications with Aristotle’s analysis of slavery. For instance, could

there even be a master-slave relationship such as he defines it? If the relationship depends on there

being such a difference between the master and the slave that it parallels the difference between the

soul and the body, there would be very few, if any, natural slaves. More importantly for this study,

however, is the fact that the differences between masters and slaves cannot be so marked as Aristotle

suggests. After all, the slave must have a soul if he is to perceive reason and the master certainly has

a body, presumably one which is strong enough for household work, if not for hunting and war. War is

the method by which the master comes to have slaves (1256b 24-26). As such both masters and

slaves each partake of the other's essential quality to some degree. This again compromises the clear-

cut distinction which should exist between the two if they are to be easily recognized as master and

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slave. Furthermore, distinguishing between those who are by nature slaves from those who are by

nature masters is made difficult by the fact that nature often fails in its intention to mix the “proper”

soul in the “proper” body. Appearances alone cannot determine masters and slaves, and getting

beyond appearances to "see" souls is difficult (to say the least) since "it is not as easy to see the

beauty of the soul as it is that of the body"(1255a1). Therefore one strongly suspects that Aristotle is

primarily interested in using this discussion of the natural master and natural slave heuristically so that

we can discover the nature and limits of political rule rather than to defend conventional slavery as it

was practiced in Athens. To the extent that the type of soul determines who ought to rule, it can be

said that "We [all] see" that politics is an association that has a ruling and ruled element, but not

everyone can see the proper principle of rule nor who embodies that principle, and this myopia leads

to political conflict.6

Aristotle points out some of the practical political consequences of this difficulty of not seeing

the soul. Some people who are considered to be "best born" may become slaves if they happen to be

taken prisoner in war. Therefore, he says, it is easy to see that even those who say that the slavery

resulting from war is just implicitly deny that it is in fact always just, for even they do not go so far as

to assert that a person who does not merit enslavement ought ever to be a slave. Instead, they try to

argue that the person who is in fact enslaved has been shown by that very fact to be inferior. They

assert that virtue, when it has "equipment," prevails in matters of force, and “to the victor goes the

spoils,” as it were. Those who would argue this way would no doubt acknowledge, however, that the

vicissitudes of war are such that it can never be guaranteed that virtue will always obtain equipment.

Therefore, the possibility remains that those who are considered "best born" will become slaves if by

chance they happen to be captured in war. Aristotle suggests that all would agree that such a situation

would be unjust. He makes it clear, then, that force alone cannot establish a legitimate claim to rule:

only intellect can. Secondly, force is not always on the side of right. Nevertheless, we must also

recognize that in political affairs there will always be those who prefer to use force without right. To

ignore their presence or to hope they will not appear in any given community may be too much to

6 Booth, 218-219.

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expect. It may even blind us to the necessity of providing some way for the community to be protected

against the threat they pose. To say that force, and the spiritedness it depends upon for its exercise, is

not a sufficient condition of just rule is not to say it is not a necessary condition of good rule.

Thus there may in fact be a natural basis for rule, but it does not provide men with a

straightforward and easy to implement solution to the political question “who should rule?” Therefore

this principle of natural rule cannot, without qualification, be made the basis of the ordering of the

polis. To finalize the point, Aristotle clearly distinguishes despotic rule from political rule. The rule of

the slave, like the rule of the soul over the body, is despotic. The rule among free men who are equal is

essential to the definition of political rule. If the master-slave relationship is the model of natural rule,

then strictly speaking the type of rule that obtains in the polis is unnatural if it is not in fact the

despotic rule of intellect.7 However, Aristotle does not reject the idea that the principle of natural rule

can be applied in some way to the polis; he has only denied the possibility that it can find unmitigated

application there.

The alternative to natural rule is rule that is conventional or at least partly conventional. Rule

based on convention is not the same as ideology or defacto rule by force under the cover of specious

rhetoric. We have seen that Aristotle criticises rule established by force because force and right are

not always joined. Michael Davis, in his commentary on the Politics, explains that “Aristotle begins the

Politics by reflecting on the necessity of combining two things not easily combined: freedom, and the

equality it suggests, and the good, and the hierarchy it demands.”8 One alternative to natural rule, one

which may approximate nature’s intentions best, is rule based upon consent. This kind of rule

presupposes a basic equality among those who consent. If the natural slave presents us with the

principle of natural rule, and that principle is not carried over directly into the polis, then politics is an

attempt to utilize convention, artifice, “nomos,” to bring about nature’s intention while, at the same

time, respecting the limits which nature imposes on such attempts.

7 Cf. Plato, The Laws of Plato, ed. with introduction and interpretative essay by Thomas Pangle, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), 713c-714a.8 Michael Davis, The Politics of Philosophy: A Commentary of Aristotle’s Politics, (Lanham, Maryland: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 1996), 7.

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Nonetheless, as Catherine Zuckert notes, "The excellence of a ruler, as Aristotle presents it, is

primarily intellectual."9 It would seem to follow from this that if one man was wiser than all of his

country men, he should rule absolutely, for “It would pervert the end of the association entirely,

moreover, if the better were subordinated to the worse.”10 Monarchy would seem to solve the problem

of combining nature’s intention with rule in the polis. Nevertheless, this monarchical arrangement

means that “citizens” are treated as though they were, at best, permanent children (1285a33). In fact,

children in the family are said to be ruled in a kingly fashion, which differs from the despotic rule over

natural slaves. It differs from such rule because children have the potential to develop reason, whereas

the natural slave, by definition, does not have this potential (1260a10). The father ought to rule royally

over his children with this development in mind. In the polis, on the other hand, the natural king rules

absolutely, and the development of the citizens’ deliberative capacity is not said to be the focus of his

rule. His rule does not permit other citizens to participate in political deliberation. We know that for

Aristotle, moral virtue requires moral action, and so it is not sufficient to say that the king’s rule is

legitimate provided only that the citizens have the unrealized human potential to deliberate. By

restricting their role in the deliberations of the association he is preventing them from being full,

participating members of a community which deliberates about matters such as justice and injustice.

Aristotle also realizes a difficulty with this form of rule insofar as he points to the fact that even

this superior man, the natural king, requires force to back up his rule. Men demand recognition and

freedom and this leads in turn to a demand for equality. All large communities tend eventually toward

equality, Aristotle says at one point (1286b19). This demand for freedom is tied more to spiritedness

than to intellect, however. Aristotle says that, "For all men, both ruling and freedom derive from this

power: for spirit is something inclined to rule [or command] and unbeatable"(1328a7). This

spiritedness was characteristic of the northern European tribes, whom Aristotle describes as being free

because of their spiritedness. According to Herodotus, they lack civilization for this same reason.11

9 Zuckert, 197.10 Zuckert, 203.11 Herodotus, The History, trans. David Greene (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,1987), II, 167; IV,

127-128.

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Again, this spiritedness makes its political claim, and does so at the expense of the natural principle of

rule.

It is interesting to note in this context that Aristotle lays out at history of regimes, beginning

with households which join together to form villages and then grow into cities. “By nature the village

seems to be above all an extension of the household (1252b 16-17). Households have an element of

kingly rule, as we have noted. Villages are explicitly based on this monarchical principle, as if, or rather

because, they have simply grown by the simple addition of households into one larger household

connected by kinship (1252b 20-23). The bonds between the king and the men in the different

households of the village would be different in character than the relation between fathers and sons in

the family, and one would expect such monarchical rule to become less stable as the village grows. At

a certain point, one can imagine, the king will succumb to pressures for political reform (if he is not

overthrown altogether) on the grounds that the men who are his equals in many respects, and his

superiors in other respects, deserve to share in ruling. They demand to be recognized as equals. What

can serve in the family as a natural basis of rule (monarchy) becomes severely attenuated in the

village. We can understand why this principle cannot be applied. Man’s spiritedness resists rule by

others, especially when this rule demeans them.12 It is no accident then that Aristotle says “for it is

peculiar to man as compared to the other animals that he alone has a perception of the good and bad

and just and unjust and other things [of this sort]; and partnership in these things is what makes a

household and a city” (1253a15-18 emphasis added). The village is conspicuously absent from this

formulation. Familial rule too imperfectly represents either a principle of freedom (equality) or a

principle of hierarchy (the good) for it to become the basis of an association larger than the household

itself.

This moment when the village gives way to the polis is also the same moment when money

(the first convention or nomos spoken of in the Politics) comes into being. Money is said to facilitate

natural acquisition, which is directed to the limited end of providing what the family needs in order to

12 Even in our age, when so many individuals profess a kind of moral relativism, nothing slights them so much as to say they lack discernment with respect to important issues.Cf. Descartes’ ingenious first sentence in the Discourse on Method trans. Donald Cress (Indiana: Hackett Publishing Co., 1980), 1.

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live well. Properly speaking, however, natural acquisition requires only a barter economy and not the

invention of money. Money facilitates trading because it is more easily transported than bulky goods

and because it can be stored without perishing. Money poses a danger, however; it comes to be

desired for its own sake quite apart from the things that it was originally intended to procure. In a “pre-

money,” barter economy, on the other hand, each item traded is still regarded by both the “seller” and

the “buyer” as being a specific, definable object of use or enjoyment. Shoes which are traded for

barley always remain what they are, i.e. shoes. They remain items which serve a particular need and

for that reason have value. As William J. Booth says, “In sum, the exchange [in barter economies] is

natural because on both sides of the transaction, a specific need tied to an individual item and its

characteristic use has dissolved, to be replaced by another specific need for an item not at hand. On

neither side of the exchange is the characteristic use of the property, its end, and that which

distinguishes it from other kinds of property, abolished.”13 With the introduction of money, this “telos

specific” valuation of things changes.

In a sense, money obscures or ignores the natural differences among the items which the

household needs, such as shoes and barley or meats and relishes. It homogenizes disparate things

under the common aspect of numerical value. By suggesting that the invention of money occurs at the

point when the village gives way to the emergence of the polis, Aristotle draws a parallel between the

homogeneity that money brings about with respect to things and equality of citizens in the polis which

replaces monarchical hierarchy in the village.14 But just as money poses a threat to the household

when it abstracts from the different, natural uses of things—and especially when it unleashes greed

and unlimited acquisition—so the principle of equality in the polis might be thought to be in tension

with the natural relations among its individual members, including the members of the family. If it is

true that heterogeneity is natural to the family organization, and equality is what characterizes the

polis ruled by law when it is constituted of free citizens, then, oddly, the very basis of the polis, the

13 Booth, 221.14 We have to bear in mind that Aristotle lays out various definitions of citizens and therefore of citizen equality. I will not be considering these variations in this paper.

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family, is not entirely compatible with political society. I will explore this incompatibility as it comes to

light in Aristotle’s discussion of the other relations within the family.

I noted earlier the somewhat curious fact that of the various relations among the household

members the master-slave association is spoken of before any of the others. Chapter twelve of book

one finally returns to those issues which Aristotle had put off in chapter three in order to discuss

slavery and acquisition. In this chapter, Aristotle says the rule of a wife and of children differs

fundamentally from mastery of slaves. Wives and children are to be ruled as free persons although

they are not ruled identically. Children, we have observed, are ruled in a kingly fashion, and kingly rule

is not between equals. A wife, on the other hand, is to be ruled politically (1259a 40), and this implies

equality since political rule is said to obtain among equals. Despite this equality it is more natural,

Aristotle says, that the male should rule just as it is more natural that the older should rule the

younger. But Aristotle immediately reminds us that nature does not always succeed in producing what

it intends.

Aristotle asserts that it is one of the defining characteristics of political rule (as opposed to

either despotic rule or kingly rule) that there is an alternation between ruler and ruled because they

tend by their nature to be on an equal footing and to “differ in nothing” (1259b6). In this case, the

ruler seeks to establish differences through conventional forms of address, external appearances or

other prerogatives which typically attend public offices, even democratically elected office (the

President gets to live in the White House during his term, for example). But in the household, Aristotle

says, this usual alternation between equals does not occur. One is left wondering why that should be

so, or at least why Aristotle raises the issue in a way that makes it difficult not to wonder why

household rule is not alternated.

The alternation of rule Aristotle says should occur between husband and wife is explicitly

paralleled with the alternation between free and equal members of a larger political community. By

choosing first to discuss political equality as it is found in the polis Aristotle raises the expectation in

the reader’s mind that this parallel will continue in the family. It does not seem possible to dispense

with the problem by suggesting that Aristotle means women are meant to rule in the family only “in

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part” or only with respect to those matters which are peculiar to women or which fall within the

purview of the female perspective.15 But even if this is so, and they in fact rule over a part of the

household matters, why are they denied the prerogatives of rule? Why do women not alternate places

with their husbands with respect to the recognized role as ruler?

Moreover, the alternation of rule is said to be important in the polis because it helps ensure

that those who are in office rule with the common good in mind. The ruler will, after all, have to step

down one day and live under the very laws he promulgated. This benefit is lost if the office never

changes hands.

Having raised these issues, Aristotle brings up the story of Amasis' footpan, implying that this

story is illustrative either of why the male always wants the prerogatives of rule in the household or of

how he attains these prerogatives. This story gives us some clue as to what Aristotle believes is at the

root of male dominance in the family. Amasis was an Egyptian king of low birth who was not held in

esteem by his subjects. He fashioned an image of a god out of the material from a golden footpan that

he formerly used to bathe his feet. His subjects, not knowing the lowly origin of the idol, worshipped it

as the representative of a god. Through a combination of art and kingly rule, something as low, though

useful, as a foot pan came to be regarded as something high (even "god-like"). Amasis then informed

his subjects that he was like that footpan. “For if he had been formerly a man of the people, he was

now and in the future their king, and so he bade them honor him and respect him.”16

What does this strange story suggest about Aristotle’s understanding of rule in the household?

Perhaps this is an analogy suggesting that men who rule in the family base their claim to rule on

something low (spiritedness) when compared with the natural claim to rule provided by intellect which

is nonetheless elevated by convention or political authority to give it sway beyond what it deserves by

right. And despite the implied equality between men and women, are their natures sufficiently

different such that they can "tend" toward equality and yet not share in the same qualities in the same

degree?

15 Mary Nichols, Citizen and Statesman: A Study of Aristotle’s Politics. (Savage, MA: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc.,1992) p. 33 .16 Herodotus, II.172.

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In answer to this last question, Aristotle says the latter is true and that the consideration of the

soul "leads straightaway to this conclusion" (1260a5). In accordance with the same general principle

that all associations have by nature a ruling and ruled element (1254a30), Aristotle asserts that, within

the soul, reason rules the non-rational part. We also know from the discussion of the natural slave that

the deliberative faculty is the only basis on which to claim legitimate, natural rule. The parts of the soul

are present in each member of the household but they are present in different ways. As we would

expect, the crucial difference turns out to be the deliberative element: “...the slave wholly lacks this

element; the female has it but it lacks authority; the child has it but it is incomplete”1260a11). It is

because the deliberative element “lacks authority in women” that they do not rule, even though,

Aristotle implies, their deliberative capacity seems to be equal if not better than that of men.17 If this

principle does not lead to women ruling, though they have this faculty, then it must be asked, “what

does it mean to say that a women's deliberations lack authority?" Aristotle does not explain.

It might be thought that Aristotle is asserting that a woman’s deliberations lack authority

within her own soul, in which case one might expect to see women equivocate on issues or be moved

by pity more than are men. But I suspect that this is not Aristotle’s point here. To illustrate his point

Aristotle quotes from Sophocles' tragedy Ajax: “to a woman silence is an ornament” (1260a30). The

quotation would appear to suggest that woman should be seen but not heard. But when we supply the

context to which Aristotle's quote (intentionally) directs us we discover that, in this instance at least,

the woman's counsels ought to have been heeded by her husband but were not, with disastrous

consequences for the family.

17 I think Deborah K. W. Modrak dispenses with the problem of the supposed biological argument for male rational superiority often attributed to Aristotle. According to Aristotle’s Generation of Animals, most bodily functions, such as the function of the eye, develop during gestation by combining form and matter. During conception the male provides the form though his sperm and the female body provides the matter in the uterus. If the form giving sperm successfully transforms the material given to it by the female during conception, a male child results. If the sperm is weak then a female child results. From this it has been concluded that Aristotle believes women’s rational powers are a deficient form of men’s rational powers.

But nous, Aristotle says, “enters from the outside” and not because matter is undergoing change due to the form-giving role attributed to the male’s sperm. “It is enough to notice” Modrak concludes, “that if the material substrate of the embryo has no part in the process by which the rational capacity is acquired, then one should not look to biology for an explanation of the [supposed] weakness of the deliberative faculty in women.” Deborah K.W. Modrak “Aristotle: Women, Deliberation and Nature” in Engendering Origins: Critical Feminist Readings in Plato and Aristotle ed. Bat-Ami Bar On (Albany, N.Y.: The State University of New York Press, 1994), 210.

15

The quotation is taken from a speech made by Ajax's war-bride, Tecmessa. Her speech at this

point in the play recounts the events leading up to Ajax's shameful demise. Having been tricked by the

Achaens during the contest for the armor of Achilles, Ajax is bent upon avenging his personal honor.

With sword in hand, he gropes for the door in the middle of the night, inadvertently waking Tecmessa.

Ajax does not tell Tecmessa that he plans to kill his allies, the sleeping Achaens. Although she does not

know what he has in mind, she objects to his "pointless errand" and voices her suspicion about his

project by noting that no messenger has come, no trumpet has sounded and the rest of the army still

sleeps. Ajax tells Tecmessa to be quiet and utters what she calls the "well worn phrase" that Aristotle

quotes: a "woman's decency is silence."18 He would have succeeded in this plan if Athena had not

blinded Ajax, making him mistake sheep and cattle for Odysseus and the other men he set out to

slaughter. Ajax awakens to find that he has slaughtered domestic animals, not his enemies. The shame

he has brought upon himself leads him to suicide.

The undoing of Ajax is facilitated by delusions brought on by Athena who, it is said, can

"darken even the most brilliant vision."19 Odysseus himself admits that there is no man he knows of

"who was more full of foresight" than Ajax or "abler to act with judgment."20 These are precisely those

qualities which Aristotle says entitles someone to rule by nature. Later in the play, a messenger’s

report explains Athena's actions. Ajax had boasted—not once, but twice—that his fighting spirit did not

require the assistance of the gods, and especially not Athena’s.

And when once Athena stood

Beside him in the fight, urging him on

To strike the enemy with his deadly hand,

He answered then, that second time, with words

To shudder at, not speak: ‘Goddess,’ he said,

18 Sophocles, Ajax in Sophocles II: The Complete Greek Tragedies, ed. and trans. David Grene and Richmond Lattimore (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1957), ln.294. Subsequent references to Ajax will be to line numbers.19 Sophocles, Ajax, 87.

20 Sophocles, Ajax, 120.

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‘Go stand beside other Greeks; help them.

For where I bide, no enemy will break through.’

These were the graceless words which won for him

The goddess’ wrath; they kept no human measure. (770-778)

One might say that Ajax’s own silence would have proven golden at this moment. Be that as it

may, Athena punishes Ajax for his overbearing pride and “lack of grace.” Clearly his pride is connected

with his personal power and renown as a warrior. The warrior as such is ambivalent; he is both a

defender, but also a wrecker, of cities, families and households. In this case, Ajax's personal quest for

satisfaction of his desire for honors brings him into conflict with Tecmessa, who elevates the concerns

of the family above Ajax's individual claim to honor.21 In fact, Tecmessa protects their child from his

own father, fearful that the little one would have been slaughtered along with the animals by his

father. Ajax acknowledges that this might well have happened, and he commends her by saying, "You

did well and deserve credit for your foresight."22 Later when he is again bent upon a path of suicidal

destruction he does not communicate his intentions to Tecmessa. Nonetheless, his actions betray his

intentions, and when Tecmessa suspects that he is about to do something rash, she again objects. He

responds, "Don't probe and question! It becomes you to submit."23 It is precisely when Ajax's personal

plans to save his reputation are most in conflict with what is beneficial to his family that he hides his

faulty deliberations from her and commands that she not try to persuade him nor demand reasons

from him. In those instances Tecmessa does submit to Ajax’s faulty deliberations. Tragically, her

superior deliberations have no authority over Ajax.24

21 “Thumos gives rise to the individual’s honorable sense of dignity and independence—his belief in his own responsibility, or in a freedom derived not from rational calculation but from an originating motion akin to what latter thinkers call ‘will power.’” Thomas Pangle, “Interpretive Essay,” in The Laws of Plato, trans. T. Pangle (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988),500.22 Sophocles, Ajax, ln. 537. Emphasis added.23 Sophocles, Ajax, ln. 588.24 Ken Masugi comes to the same conclusion with respect to Tecmessa’s place in Sophocles’ Ajax. “Women may speak the truth, but they are not often in a position to make their truths more effectual” 282. “Another Peek at Aristotle and Phyllis: The Place of Women in Aristotle’s Argument for Human Equality” in Natural Right and Political Right: Essays in Honor of Harry V. Jaffa, ed. Thomas B. Silver, Peter W. Schramm (Durham, N.C., Carolina Academic Press, 1984.

17

If Aristotle wished to supply evidence of male superiority in the family, he could not have

selected a worse quotation to support his case. Furthermore, Tecmessa’s deliberations are not

restricted to merely one aspect of the family’s well being, something which could be said to be within

her realm of proper deliberations. She also wants her deliberations to have full sway over Ajax. She

wants to enlarge his concerns and to persuade him to think of the common good of the family.

Moreover, Ajax’s failure cannot be, as Nichols suggests, an over emphasis of his deliberative capacity

to the exclusion of the appetitive part of the soul.25 If anything predominates in the Ajax’s soul when

he makes his desperate plan, it is blind indignation. Ajax is governed here by the desire for honor and

recognition even at the expense of the good of his family.

We noted earlier Aristotle’s assertion that each member of the household has the same parts

of the soul only in different proportions. What Aristotle is suggesting is that men have a greater

proportion of spiritedness than women. Spirit seeks to rule and, other things being equal, is

indomitable. Perhaps, then, the prerogatives of rule in the household never alternate because men

have a natural "need" for recognition which women are willing to forgo out of indifference to such

concerns. In this case a lower, but nonetheless useful, part of the soul (i.e. spirit) results in the male

wanting, and in some cases obtaining, kingship over his children and permanent political rule with

respect to his wife. This provides a parallel with the Amasis story in Herodotus in which the king gains

respect and honor by making something low appear to be noble. Man's pride may be reluctant to

tolerate any other arrangement in the household. If women’s souls are less drawn to desire this type of

prestige, they may even be willing to relinquish the role to men.

But this working out of the question “who should rule” violates the legitimate claim to natural

rule. It is now not simply because of the deliberative element that the male rules but rather on account

of his spirit, a lower aspect of the soul. All the same, spirit is not an altogether unnatural basis for

determining who rules when the deliberative quality tends toward equality. It may even point to a

larger issue about how men are to be attracted to rule in the political community—or how one would

25 Nichols, 137.

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go about attracting the right men for office.26 An alternative direction for the inquiry would look to

what would attract men to take the rule of their households seriously. Apparently, if household

management is not generally regarded to be an honorable calling, it will be neglected by men, perhaps

to the detriment of the family and the regime. In fact, it seems that men are meant to see in Aristotle’s

discussion that it is for the sake of the regime that they ought to be brought back to a proper care of

the household.

The natural love and defense of one's own is intimately related to spiritedness. We might well

ask, then, why Ajax’s heightened spiritedness led him to forsake rather than defend his family’s best

interest. First, there does seem to be evidence for thinking that men are less attached to their family

than are women. If the spirited attachment the father ought to feel toward his own family is channeled

elsewhere or undermined, then one might expect fathers to become detached from the welfare of their

children.27 Thus, men in the family may need recognition as household leader beyond what they

deserve simply in order to assuage their spiritedness so long as this serves the interests of the family.

It may be for this reason that Aristotle says the prerogatives of rule remain with the man.

This elevation of spiritedness threatens deliberation, however, and, as with Ajax, it can

undermine the legitimate role women should play in ruling the family. The alternative solution seems

to be to equalize relations in the family for the sake of the principle of natural rule, but this may lead

men to no longer take their roles as fathers seriously because there is little honor to be found there. If

men are deprived of the prerogatives of rule, even if they do not in fact rule all of the time, Aristotle is

suggesting, it may prove detrimental to the family.

26 We can think of Publius’ reference in Federalist 72 to “the love of fame, the ruling passion of the noblest minds.” Hamilton, Madison, Jay, The Federalist Papers, ed. with an introduction Clinton Rossiter (New York: Penguin Books, 1961), 437.27 Allan Bloom discusses the effect modern egalitarianism has had on relations in the family. “The attachment of mother and child is perhaps the only undeniable social bond. It is not always effective, and it can, with effort, be suppressed, but it is always a force. And this is what we see today. But what about the father? Maybe he loves imagining his own eternity through the generations stemming from him. But this is only an act of imagination, one that can be attenuated by other concerns and calculations, as well as by losing his faith in the continuation of his name for very long in the shifting conditions of democracy.” The Closing of the American Mind (New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc, 1987), 115.

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The polis can combat this danger by elevating the status of the family to a political concern of

the first honor. We can see the shift in the importance of the family occurring in the first book of the

Politics. Originally the family was introduced as an association directed toward daily and necessary

needs. By chapter 13, Aristotle says that it is evident that household management is bound up with

the higher task of cultivating virtue in its members.

For since the household as a whole is a part of the city, and these things of the

household, and one should look at the virtue of the part in relation to the virtue of the

whole, both children and women must necessarily be educated looking to the regime,

at least if it makes any difference with a view to the city’s being excellent that both its

children and its women are excellent. But it necessarily makes a difference: women are

a part amounting to half of the free persons, and from children come those who are

partners in the regime. (1260a12-18)

According to Aristotle, it behooves a husband to help cultivate, not suppress, the virtues of his family

members. This argument would only carry weight, however, with those who already believe that what

leads to the excellence of the polis is for that reason alone worth pursuing. I suggest that this is a

perspective more likely to be held by men than by women. Aristotle holds out the possibility that men

can be attached to the family by their natural desire for public honor that the polis can direct by

deciding what will be honored.28

28 That this is not an entirely far fetched scheme, or at least not one which is peculiar to Aristotle, can perhaps be shown by the fact that John Locke employs a similar strategy. Nathan Tarcov notes that “Locke seems to attribute chiefly to fathers a satisfaction in copulation that is unaccompanied by concern for propagation” [Nathan Tarcov, Locke’s Education for Liberty, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 68]. But Locke wants fathers to take an active interest in their children’s education which they will do if they have a serious interest in their children. Locke begins Some Thoughts Concerning Education by asserting that it is “everyman’s indispensable duty” to do all the service he can to his country (ed. with introduction Ruth W. Grant and Nathan Tarcov, Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 1996),7. He does not make an argument for this point but merely leaves it that “I see not what difference he puts between himself and his cattle, who lives without that thought”(7). Whereas animals may be content to live quietly so long as their basic needs are taken care of, Locke implies that human dignity depends upon participation in political life. According to Locke, a true gentleman would be ashamed to disagree. Luckily for men, serving one’s country does not require them to leave their households since the “welfare and prosperity of the nation” depends upon the educating their children well. According to Locke, fathers can take the family economy seriously because it is a political concern of the highest order. Fear of shame should prevent them from shirking this responsibility.

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The polis elevates the role of the father in the family and attaches the father to his familial

concerns by making his pride and desire for honor depend directly upon the virtue and welfare of his

family. His concerns are now to become the concerns that Tecmessa was urging unsuccessfully on

Ajax. Her repeated pleas to his natural, paternal affection for their son’s welfare were not sufficient to

sway him from his quest to redeem his personal honor, even though he acknowledges that this quest

may leave both his immediate family and parents destitute and without protection.29 Tecmessa had

no other assistance from either customs or laws with which to make her deliberations authoritative

with Ajax. She could not shame him into obedience. In the properly ordered polis, Aristotle suggests,

things would have worked out differently. “Aristotle shows that the regime shapes and so infuses all

aspects of private life, especially the family—not through totalitarian controls, of course, but rather by

praise and blame expressed either in legislation or mere opinion.”30 Tecmessa’s superior deliberations

would have the authority with Ajax that they formerly lacked.

The polis, it seems, must preserve its foundation in the family by emphasizing different roles

for men and women. To the extent that a political community pays honor to men as “head of

households” it makes male spiritedness appear justified by giving in to its rather illegitimate demand

for prerogatives and honors in the family. The community thereby commits an injustice against

women. It does not appear to recognize their rightful claim to rule based on their deliberative capacity.

Spiritedness may be something low as compared with deliberation, and yet it is elevated through

customs into something honored. However, if the polis utilizes customs and laws in order to raise the

family to a concern which the father takes seriously because it pays him honor for doing so, this is

similar to the way art was used to raise the useful but low footpan of Amasis into something to be

honored. It is done for the sake of more than simply placating the desire for the honor itself, however.

It is a device by which the father is brought to consider the good of those around him. The task of the

29 Tecmessa laments the fate awaiting her and their son if Ajax is dead (Sophocles, ln497). Ajax does not correct her vision of the future and his silence may be interpreted as agreement with what she has said will happen to the family. Ajax names Teucer, his brother, to be his son’s guardian even though Ajax acknowledges in the same breath that Teucer is far away on a raiding expedition in enemy country (Sophocles, ln564). Ajax certainly has no good reason to think that Teucer will return in time, if ever, to effect his charge.30 Zuckert, 185.

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statesman is to give the family a sense of a common good arising out of the familial association. This

good disengages the male from his purely selfish pursuit of distinction and renders his spiritedness

more amenable to political life and the needs of the polis.

Aristotle shows the complexity of the political association, and especially the complexities

involved in attempting, through the manipulation of the prerogatives and honors of ruling, to bring the

deliberative element—the natural ruling principle to bear—in practical, political affairs. His purpose is

to make sound deliberation more authoritative. This means ameliorating the demands made by pride

and desire for honor, especially by men. Aristotle does not propose to do away with spiritedness, and

for that reason his “solution” is more of a compromise than a final answer to the tension between the

family and the community. It is a compromise which our democratic age will have great difficulty

taking seriously. To take it seriously is not the same thing as advocating for a return to the conditions

of Aristotle’s day. It is simply to acknowledge that if we choose to extend the principle of equality to

the family (as we have done and continue to do) we should be aware of the effects this will inevitably

have. If Aristotle is right, as complete equality takes hold in the family men will be more apt to walk

away from their responsibilities. Aristotle would be the last one to say such abdication of responsibility

is right, and he provides us with enough reasons to think he believed his solution to this problem was

less than satisfying precisely because it undermined the woman’s claim to equality. Aristotle clarifies

our choices, if nothing else. This clarity does not make the choice any easier, however.

Aristotle begins book one with the claims that all associations aim at some good. But this does

not necessarily mean that all the members of the association are motivated by the same

understanding of what that good is. Men are not transformed by Aristotle’s project into selfless

individuals who only think of the needs of others. To think that men could be so transformed may be a

dangerous myth which ignores the type of soul characteristic of males and the things to which their

soul attaches greatest importance. In Aristotle’s scheme, men may still be pursuing personal honor by

dedicating themselves to the family, but from their perspective, they are fulfilling their higher political

obligation to the community; according to Aristotle this both is and is not the aim of the family

association. It is partly an attempt to render male spiritedness less threatening to the polis. To use a

22

phrase from Tocqueville, this is a civilizing project that looks to the woman as the source of social

mores. It both undermines her overt claim to rule by taking away the mere prerogatives of ruling office

while it pays her the highest tribute by elevating her concerns for the family into a guiding political

concern.

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