Albrecht Dihle: Historical and Normative Reconstruction of the Golden Rule

Abstract

The article provides a critical analysis of the book The Golden Rule (1962) by the prominent German classical philologist Albrecht Dihle. The book, outstanding for its time, still retains its value due to the huge material from ancient literary sources, concerning the principle of retribution and the Golden Rule, as well as the commandment of love. In its entirety, this material, carefully analyzed by Dihle, allows us to take a fresh look at some aspects of the genesis of morality and the role of the principle of retribution in its evolution. Note­worthy is Dihle’s reference to the role of sophists and their philosophy of education in the formation of the Golden Rule, as well as his view of historically early examples of the Golden Rule formula. Dihle’s assessment of the Golden Rule as a peculiar, refined expres­sion of the principle of retribution, its defining role in the formation of the value standard as­sumed by the Golden Rule, led Dihle to conclude (contrary to traditional interpretation) that the Golden Rule was weakly associated with the commandment of love and, accordingly, its importance for Christian ethics was not so high. Based on the analysis of the views and the nature of the arguments presented in the book, the article concludes that Dihle had an in­sufficiently developed theoretical understanding of the Golden Rule, which did not take into account in its entirety the originality of the Golden Rule’s normative content and functional features, as well as its role in the formation of a moral (in the proper sense of the word) view of the world.