Italy is now a unified country and no longer dominated by Austrian, Spanish or French rulers. Why do we need only more foreigners to supervise Latin publishing and translations?

Or:

Greece is now a unified country and no longer dominated by Turk rulers. Why do we need only more foreigners to supervise ancient Greek publishing and translations?

What do you think? I, for one, would answer that the more and the better scholars engage with these world’s treasures, the better. I am not sure that having an Italian passports makes me a priori a better candidate.

Now, you might consider that I am also not an ideal candidate, since I do not share the same set of beliefs of Cicero or Catullus. However, I am not sure one needs to believe in Aphrodites in order to understand Catullus’ desperate love for Lesbia, nor does one need to believe in Zeus to understand Cicero’s quest for justice. One might say that I am allowed to study Catullus, etc., because no believers of his religion are left but that the principle of “insiders only” still applies in case of religions/political systems/langauges/… of which there is still a living tradition.

This is a legitimate point of view, but one needs to be aware of the fact that it leads to isolationism. One would only be allowed to study people whose religion/language/set of beliefs… she or he shares, with no adhikāra to look beyond his or her field. Moreover, I wonder how one would be able to look critically at his or her field, if she or he had had no chance to learn about how different the world can be.

Long story short: I am still a believer in the enriching power of saṃvāda, ‘dialogue’.