The Sword of Damocles Source: Greek Legend

Literal Comprehension:

"The Sword of Damocles" is takne out from Greek legend. This story deals with an event that occurred in Greek to the king Dionysius who was a ruler famous for harsh treatment that he had given to his people and others who fell into his power. He was so tyrannical by his people. Even though he greatly enjoyed intellectual  society. He managed to surround himself with a very brilliant court of men who were famous for their skill in science, letters and the arts in general. Like all tyrants, he had a great numbers of flatters too. Among them, one was Damocles who was the most celebrated of the foolish folk . He often flattered Dionysius in his pleasure or in such a way that he could hear his admiration. He always said that it was great honor to be a king like king Dionysius. He believed that the kings life  was full of happiness and very comfortable fortunately, King Dionysius was never deceived   by such fool flatters rather he resolved  to teach him what it was to be a king. Once king Dionysius called Damocles and ordered him to be a king during the royal feast. Damocles agreed happily to be a king. The king Dionysius challenged him that he would resign the throne and become a common people before the end of the feast.
Next day, the high born guests all assembled in the banquet Damocles put on the royal dress and sat on the throne until the banquet was over. All the guest were suggested to give Damocles the same honor of the king that day used to give to king Dionysius. The heavy crown had already made his head ache. His mind was not in peace thinking that there might have been poison on the dish which was offered to him. The worst of all the  had a terrible shock when he was a sharp edged naked  sword suspended from the roof by single hair exactly over his own head. Realizing that the slender hair might break and that would kill him instantly, he asked permission from the tyrant to let him out from the throne. But the king Dionysius refused to do so rather he forced him to sit there throughout the feast because the intended to teach Damocles how foolish it was to sing of the happiness of Kings. Finally, when the banquet ended, he immediately came out of the throne. He happily returned   from the having learnt well the wise lesson that boundless wealth doesn't necessarily bring happiness and satisfaction.

Interpretation: 

 This story may be trying to tell us about something about threat and burden that the ruler has to face during his tenure. In fact, to be a ruler is a matter of burden oven  the duties and responsibilities. For example, king Dionysius was a famous ruler of sicily, he  used to keep brilliant and skillful person from different field to secure himself from the possible attack. In this way, this story deals with the wise lesson that boundless wealth doesn't necessarily bring happiness and satisfaction.

Critical Thinking:   

 Although this is an interesting story, there are many things in the story which we find disagreeable can a real king leave his throne to another person for a single day? Do people suspend a sharp naked sword by a single hair exactly over the king's head in reality? Can common man flatter the king in front of him? For those reasons, we totally don't agree with the ideas of the story.

Assimilation:

After reading this story, I remembered a real event that occurred in my life five years ago. I was very much jealous to the principal and whit his position. Further, I was interested to pass the time in the way he passed later on, I was really given a change to be the principal of Galyang Boarding School. After that the parents of the student and the staff of the school started to come with various types of problems and challenges. On the contrary of my expectation , I had to face different kind of challenges and obstacles to manage and run the school smoothly. In this way, having found such challenges, I wanted to leave the position of the principal as soon as possible.