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Essay on Nomos-Physis in relation to Apollo/Dionysos
The Greeks often thought of the world as being a fight, or an agon, between the two forces of rationalism and chaos, or between law and nature. The Greeks called these two forces "nomos", meaning law and order and rationalism, and "physis" (FU-sis), meaning nature (our word physics comes from this: physics is the study of nature).
Chaos is what there was before there were gods; the gods came to bring order to the world, and the gods like order and hate chaos. Pretty much everything was either on the side of nomos (order) or on the side of physis (nature). The god Apollo was the representative of nomos even among the gods; he was always fighting snakes and dragons and sea monsters, which represent physis for the Greeks.
The snake-woman Medusa, who cannot control her own behavior even in Athena's temple, is an example of physis. Women in general tend to be (in the view of Greek men) on the side of physis, while men are generally on the side of nomos: men can control themselves while women become hysterical (the word is Greek and it means to be taken over by your uterus). Men make and obey laws, but women do what comes naturally.
Both nomos and physis may be considered good or bad. Nomos brings progress in society but if laws are only valid by nomos they may be changed with circumstances, and may conflict with physis. Physis justifies universal laws ("honor thy father and thy mother") and the equality of rich and poor, men, women, and slaves; but can also justify considering the laws of the State an unnatural limitation on individuals, to be observed only when transgression is likely to be found out. For instance, I could justify breaking the law by appealing to some universal right or some universal law; when governments defend "freedom fighters" rebelling against other governments..........
