SOURCE: "Religion and Politics," in Xenophon, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1974, pp. 34-45.

Working from Xenophon's writings and the little biographical material available, Anderson here reconstructs Xenophon's religious and political attitudes, which he characterizes as largely conservative.

I. Religion

Xenophon's education in religion and politics, whatever it may have owed to Socrates, was, like his moral instruction, not complicated by abstract speculations. Throughout his life, Xenophon remained the sort of conservative whose acceptance of the doctrines and principles that he has inherited seems either unintelligent, or dishonest, or both, to those who do not share them. Xenophon repeatedly represents himself as sacrificing before military operations, in order to determine, from the entrails of the victims, whether a projected operation would succeed or fail. At least once (Anabasis vi. 4.12ff.) he repeatedly delayed what seems to have been an absolutely necessary movement because the sacrifices had not turned out well, and...