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RAY SUAREZ: Some closing thoughts now about the Olympics. They belong
to essayist Richard Rodriguez of the Pacific News Service. (Band playing
Olympic theme)
RICHARD RODRIGUEZ: Every four years, in summer, the runner enters the
stadium, carrying the eternal flame, and with his torch he ignites the
pagan dream of immortality. The crowd cheers. (Cheering) Am I alone
in feeling so ambivalent toward this spectacle we call the Olympics?
On the one hand, as much as any, I am thrilled by the athletes, their
bodies so poised, and their prowess. On the other hand, I withhold myself
from this, the largest pagan celebration in the world.
(Speaking German) Most notoriously in our times Hitler understood the
advertisement of a parade of perfectly-formed athletes. Simone Weil,
the French Jewish philosopher, admitted that the pageantry of Hitler
youth was wonderful to her, their banners and their music. One had to
remind oneself that the parade meant to trample all who were not in
it. Here they come now, from every nation, Olympic runners and wrestlers
and jumpers. They parade, smiling, and waving at us. How should we not
cheer? Yes, we cheer lustily as he flies through the air; cheer to see
her run against time. This Hellenic ideal made flesh. The Hellenistic
idea was the perfectibility of flesh. In America and those parts of
Europe we call the West-- two competing influences have always been
at play. Our civic life is described by Hellenism, the cult of the individual
to become, and to say, and to be. The competing religious impulse, call
it Hebraic, characteristic of Jew and Christian and Muslim, describes
life as bounced by obedience, alone, I can do nothing.
Matthew Arnold in "Culture and Anarchy" distinguishes Hellenism
-- spontaneity of consciousness-- from Hebraism, a strictness of conscience.
These two influences intersect in America. In the Hellenistic ideal
the forum, the gymnasium, and the university are in harmony. In America,
there is disharmony. The architecture of our intellectual life is Greek
or Greco-Roman. Fraternity row has long chosen to name itself "Greek,"
harkening to Athens. The architecture of official Washington is Greek,
because the documents of our country are shaped by Hellenism. But in
America the common, religious piety is Hebraic or tribal, which is why
there is a constant hunger in America for public prayer-- at the football
game, at the high school graduation, and why the justices in their Greek
temple keep telling us that such prayer is impossible in America-- the
Constitution protects the individual from the tyranny of the group.
Hard to imagine the freedom of worship in America for Buddhist and Scientologist
and Sufi, were it not for our Hellenistic adherence to this cult of
the individual. But it is impossible to imagine in ancient Greece such
a thing as the special Olympics-- cripples and the disabled running
enabled. The danger of Hellenism is that it leads to a cult of the hero,
who vanquishes all lesser beings. Recently, the Olympic altar has begun
to crack. Gold medals have had to be stripped from athletes who could
not pass drug tests. Then Tonya Harding's ex-husband and his band of
goons assaulted a competing athlete. Then, several members of the International
Olympic Committee resigned after five-star extortion of host cities.
Historians tell us that the ancient Greeks attached no glory to losing.
So, also, today: Only gold will get you onto the box of Wheaties. Only
gold, not silver, not bronze, not a good try, will get you immortality.
Only gold is immortal. As someone who feels his soul more Hebraic than
Hellenic, I keep thinking that what is eternal about the eternal flame
is the wish for immortality. The Olympics is a celebration of youth,
of ripeness, of summer. It is the most sublime and foolish of human
romances, and this is its liturgy. Appropriate now to the neo- paganism
of today's America, where one senses everywhere the obsolescence of
a word like "soul." The body is all, health is all, and death
is the defeat of all. Let the games begin. I'm Richard Rodriguez.
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