Yesterday, at a party, I met a prison guard who works at the Supermax. I was fascinated by his work and we started a lively conversation. We got into some deep topics such as the nature of evil and whether these prisoners could be rehabilitated. The bottom line was that most of these individuals were sociopaths and many had killed children without any remorse for their actions.
Then I started thinking about the fathers of these men. How sad it must be for a great dad to have a son or daughter turn out a murderer. Isn’t it puzzling to know a great father with a disappointing son?
Marcus Aurelius was one of these fathers. He was a great dad who happened to have a disappointing son.
He was a humble man who demonstrated the highest levels of integrity. He also believed in consensus and collaboration even though as Emperor he had the option of making absolute decisions. One of his biggest accomplishments is his Meditations, a compilation of his philosophy-still inspiring millions of people today. Here he addresses questions such as why are we here? How should we live?
How could a man like Marcus produce a son like Commodus? Commodus is the emperor in the film the Gladiator. In true history he did not kill his father since they were not in the same location when his dad died. He is remembered as a tyrant just as bad as Caligula and Nero. He was so different than his father that this emphasized his evil ways and lack of character. He murdered a lot of people and kept a list of those who were going to be next. One day his mistress found her name on the list and hired someone to have him strangled-and this was the end of Commodus.
Regardless of how his son turned out, I believe that it did not diminish Marcus Aurelius as a father.
Does a bad son determine whether a father did a good job or not?
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