Happy Twentieth and Happy Day of the Hegemon! This month, I published a book review of Uniqueness of Carvaka Philosophy in Indian Traditional Thought, and an essay On the Harm and Benefit of the Gods based on our sources, and also citing the essay Epicure, dieu et image de dieu: une autarcie extatique. My essay An Epicurean Perspective of Holiness was featured on the Spiritual Naturalist Society.

I facilitated last month’s Eikas meeting (the facilitator is chosen by rotation) where I focused on Epicurus’ book On moral development, and the many commentaries that Philodemus gave us on this subject. These insights are best studied through Tsouna’s book The Ethics of Philodemus, which teaches us many things about economics, visualization techniques, maximalism, and about the Epicurean theories about and methods of studying the virtues.

One of the insights I derived from a focused study of Epicurus’ theories on moral development is that the Epicurean Guides used SWEETNESS as an incentive for moral develop in the absence of supernatural claims about punishing gods, karma, reincarnation, or other such claims. Since there are no supernatural punishments, we use the natural faculty of pleasure, and we use sweetness, to encourage ourselves and our friends to engage in correct behavior and to become morally better.

This is by pure coincidence, I’m sure, but I recently noticed that the high holidays of both the Jews and the Epicureans fall on the tenth day of the seventh month in their respective calendars. In Laertius’ Book Ten, Fragment 18, we read:

And from the revenues made over by me to Amynomachus and Timocrates let them to the best of their power in consultation with Hermarchus make separate provision for … the customary celebration of my birthday on the tenth day of Gamelion in each year.

This is from Epicurus’ Final Will, and Gamelion is the seventh month in the Attic calendar. The tenth day of the seventh month (in a different calendar) also marks Yom Kippur, which is the Day of Atonement for Jews. In Leviticus 16:29-31 it says:

This is to be a lasting ordinance for you: On the tenth day of the seventh month you must deny yourselves and not do any work—whether native-born or a foreigner residing among you— because on this day atonement will be made for you, to cleanse you. Then, before the Lord, you will be clean from all your sins. It is a day of sabbath rest, and you must deny yourselves; it is a lasting ordinance.

Although the two High Holidays are of very different natures, they also share similarities other than their place in the calendar. Yom Kippur (“the Sabbath of Sabbaths”) is much more than a day of atonement, although rituals of atonement are prominent. Kippur means atonement, but also cleansing. It’s also a yearly renewal of a Jew’s commitment to his covenant, to his relation with his god, and to his identity. The entire community came together and people reconciled–the tribe or community became whole, healthy and happy again.

In modern times for Epicurus’ birthday, Epicureans in Athens hold their now-traditional annual symposium. Though not quite as intense as Yom Kippur (which was the only time the High Priest ever entered the Holy of Holies and uttered his god’s name, and these things were done quite dramatically), the symposium in Athens is, to date, the biggest gathering of kindred minds in the modern world. The symposia, like the Day of the Hegemon, are gatherings of the Epicurean communities that are marked in the calendar in memory of Epicurus and as a solemn observance of his birthday.

This year, the Greek symposium in Athens will be hosting an international portion where people from all other parts of the world (including the members of SoFE) will give short video presentations in English. The dream is to eventually have English-language international conferences beyond Greece in places like Australia and the U.S.

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We thank our Friend Beryl, who submitted a poem for Hegemon Day titled “Celebrate A Life”:

Can you accept friendship
At the gate of life
As the soil and green shoot grow together?

As the rains of life pour down
Can you smile
Knowing it’s just the weather?

When in learning, head bowed down,
Can you accept direction
Without a frown?

Like the bowing heads of trees
Accept correction
From the breeze.

Are you able to hold you gently
Compassion at the things you say
Treating others the same way?

In politics as in life
Can you cut through deception
To reality like a sharpened knife

In our work as in the bedroom,
Can you rejoice and be free
As the song bird alighting on a tree?

And when winter calls you home
Can you recall your friends delight
Closing eyes to enter night?

Come celebrate with me
And as the apple falls from the tree
Reside in pleasure and be free.