First Lines:
Hospitality is the act of meeting and mutual recognition requiring at least two people as well a space in which to take place. We call that place home, whether it refers to a built dwelling, a neighborhood, a city, a country, or the Earth.
Hospitality is a major value, carrying a powerful evocative force stemming from ancient Greek and Roman body of ethical thought, the foundational philosophical, ethical, and theological texts of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament. The figure of Abraham remains a guiding reference and a living part the monotheistic traditions as he embodies unconditional hospitality through his tent’s four openings at the four cardinal points to welcome any traveler arriving from all directions, extending full and fearless hospitality to unknown people, showing complete discretion as to their origins, affiliations, or reasons for their travels, and eagerness to bring material and spiritual comfort to them. Hospitality remains a forceful part of our living humanistic worldview. It is, indeed, understood as an ethical risk taking. Few ever confess that they are not hospitable and routinely assume the quasi-synonymy between hospitality and warm welcome.
