Your Morning Strauss (Leo)

I’ve been re-reading my Locke recently, and have been struck at just how darned pleasant it makes things to assume that man is naturally born free, and that this natural right is a truth that can be divined through reason alone. At the same time, the whole natural right business struck me as irretrievably quaint and innocent, a way of thinking about the world which we’ve lost in bloodbaths of the twentieth century.

Consequently, I’ve turned to Leo Strauss, whose career was in large part devoted to the study of why modernity has lost its ability to properly appreciate concepts in political philosophy such as natural right. Perusing my copy of History of Political Philosophy, I re-read Strauss’ introduction. The following excellent passage leapt to the fore:

Nature, however understood, is not known by nature. Nature had to be discovered. The Hebrew Bible, for example, does not have a word for nature. The equivalent in biblical Hebrew of “nature” is something like “way” or “custom”. Prior to the discovery of nature, men knew that each thing or kind of thing has its “way” or “custom”—its form of “regular behavior.” There is a way or custom of fire, of dogs, of women, of madmen, of human beings: fire burns, dogs bark and wag their tails, women ovulate, madmen rave, human beings can speak.

Put aside how you react to this passage in general and save it for another conversation. Savor, rather, that women are placed square between barking dogs and raving madmen and made to ovulate. Good times in the mind of a famous thinker!