"Man is a sacred thing to man."

In July 1941, a prisoner escaped from the Auschwitz concentration camp. To punish the remaining prisoners, the Nazi deputy commander chose ten men at random to die of starvation. One of the selected men was Franciszek Gajowniczek. When his name was called, he cried out in terror, "My wife! My children!"

Suddenly, another prisoner stepped forward from the ranks. He was a frail man wearing glasses. His name was Maximilian Kolbe, and he was a Catholic priest. He walked straight up to the Nazi commander. He pointed at the crying man and said, "I am a Catholic priest. I wish to die for that man. I am old; he has a wife and children."

The commander was stunned but he agreed. Gajowniczek was returned to the line, and Kolbe was thrown into the starvation bunker. He lived for two weeks without food or water, comforting the other dying men, until the guards finally killed him with an injection.

Maximilian Kolbe was in a place designed to strip human beings of all dignity. The Nazis treated people like garbage to be burned. Yet, in the middle of that hell, Kolbe performed an act of supreme reverence. He treated a stranger—a man he didn't even know—as something "sacred." He decided that this other man's life was worth more than his own survival.

Seneca lived in a time when slavery was common. Romans often treated their slaves like farm tools. They threw them away when they got old. Seneca was making a radical claim. He argued that every human being has a spark of the divine inside them.

To say a person is "sacred" means they have a value that you cannot measure with money. You can't use them like a tool. You can't discard them like trash. Even the poorest person or the lowest criminal has a "ruling faculty" that connects them to the universe.

When we forget this, we start to use people. We see them only for what they can do for us. We see the waiter as a food-delivery machine. We see the employee as a profit-generator. Seneca demands that we look deeper. We must see the human being behind the function. We must treat every interaction as a meeting between two sacred things.

Errors & Corrections

• Don't confuse "sacred" with "perfect." A person can be flawed, annoying, or even criminal and still possess the basic sanctity of human life.
• Don't treat people as "human resources." Resources are things you use up and throw away; humans are ends in themselves.
• Don't limit reverence to your own tribe. The quote says "Man," meaning the entire species of mankind, not just your family, your political party, or your countrymen.

Applications to Modern Life

Work

Corporate language often dehumanizes people. We talk about "headcount", "human capital", and "burn rates". This makes it easy to fire people via email or overwork them until they break. A Stoic leader remembers that every "headcount" is a person with a mortgage and a soul. You can make tough business decisions, but you must execute them with the respect due to a sacred thing.

Social Media

There is a trend to call other people "NPCs" (Non-Playable Characters). This suggests that other people aren't real and don't have inner lives. This is dangerous. It turns bullying into a game. Remember that the person you are mocking on Twitter feels pain just as vividly as you do.

Politics

When we debate immigration or war, we often use words like "swarm", "flood", or "collateral damage". These words hide the human reality. We are talking about fathers, mothers, and children. If you view them as sacred, you can still debate policy, but you can no longer view their suffering as irrelevant.

Interpersonal Relationships

It's easy to objectify the people we date. We might value them because they are good-looking (a trophy) or because they have money (a wallet). This violates the sacred bond. You are using them. True love is respecting the person for who they are, not for what they provide for you.

Maxims

• Not a tool, but a temple.
• Reverence for the rational.
• People are ends, not means.

In-depth Concepts

Anthropocentrism (Human-Centeredness)

While modern science tells us we are just one species among many, the Stoics believed humans were unique because of our ability to reason. This reason (Logos) connects us to the gods. Therefore, harming a human is a form of sacrilege. It's like smashing a statue in a temple. You are defacing something that belongs to the divine order.

Cosmopolis (The World City)

The Stoics believed the world is one giant city. We are all citizens of this Cosmopolis. Just as you wouldn't harm a fellow citizen of your own town, you shouldn't harm any human being. We are bound together by the law of reason. This is the ancient root of what we now call "human rights".