"Modern" Issues

One of the advantages to learning ancient history lies in the fact that one really comes to understand just how unchanging people are. This can be encouraging or discouraging, depending on how you look at it, but I always find it fascinating. There are many issues that people generally think of as modern and current that actually have their roots way back in the ancient world. Economic issues such as inflation and the argument over free market / government controlled trade have, of course, been around forever, but it is amazing to see just how closely the ancient economy resembled our own. And here's another good one: abortion. My high school education generally saw the abortion debate as firmly linked in time to Roe v. Wade, but the struggle has actually been going on for thousands of years. This excerpt from my Roman history book is describing the fourth century (300s) AD:

"Both pagan and Christian moralists as well as Roman law condemned abortion and infanticide. Disagreement arose over what constituted abortion. Hippocratic medical writers did not think that conception was complete before the end of the first three months of pregnancy. Therefore, they considered ending a pregnancy in the first trimester contraception, not abortion. Christian writers, however, viewed voluntary termination of a pregnancy at any stage as murder."

Sound familiar? The truth is, people have been people for thousands of years!