09 May 2007
Others
Establishing a clear difference between free citizens and slaves, the Greek distinguished between chores and disinterested occupations. The latter were not free of effort, and hence the leisure Greek philosophers talk about is not as we understand it today, involving rest, free time, entertainment or wasting one?s time doing nothing. Today?s conceptions of leisure are corruptions of a meaning that has to do with virtue and that is the basis of happiness. For them, leisure did not mean "doing nothing" or "wasting one?s time", but it was an essential part of life understood as activity. From this point of view, leisure is an activity that does not seek anything outside itself, but an activity that is an end in itself, no other end but itself.
