Modern American English makes soldiers’ love for special comrades into a problem, because the word love evokes sexual and romantic associations. But friendship seems too bland for the passion of care that arises between soldiers in combat. Achilles laments to his mother that his philos, his “greatest friend is gone.” (18:89f) Much ink has been spilled over whether this word (and the abstract noun philia) and all its linguistic relatives should be translated under the rubric of “friend, friendship,” etc. or of “love, beloved,” etc. However, the difficulty of finding the right word reflects differences between ancient Greek and modern American culture that need to be made clear. “Philia includes many relationships that would not be classified as friendships. The love of mother and child is a paradigmatic case of philia; all close family relations, including the relation of husband and wife, are so characterized. Furthermore, our [word] ‘friendship’ can suggest a relationship that is weak in affect…, as in the expression ‘just friends’…. [Philia] includes the very strongest affective relationships that human beings form, …[including, but not limited to] relationships that have a passionate sexual component. For both these reasons, English ‘love’ seems more appropriately wide-ranging…. [The] emphasis of philia is less on intensely passionate longing than on… benefit, sharing, and mutuality….” Many individuals who experience friendship as one of the central goods of their lives find that their employers will not recognize philia between people whose relationship is not familial. Veterans have lost their jobs because they left work to aid another veteran, in circumstances where the same absence would have been “understandable” and charged against sick or vacation time had the other been a spouse, parent, or child. Many people today view friendship purely as a leisure activity, or a sweetener that with luck arises among co-workers, neighbors, or members of a voluntary association such as a church or club but which will be put aside if it gives rise to any conflicting claims at work. Many veterans have also alienated their spouses because they would leave home to go to the aid of fellow veterans. The ancient Greeks, perhaps because their societies were so highly militarized (every male citizen was also a soldier), simply assumed the centrality of philia.
–Jonathan Shay, Achilles in Vietnam