 |
|
|
HUMANITAS
---------------------------------------------------------------
NCIENT GREEK PHILOSOPHERS
PRE-SOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY
The entire first period of ancient Greek Philosophy, the pre-Socratic is characterized by an agonized effort to determine the first principle and substance of the cosmos. This determines the need for the creation of the sciences.
(Click on the philosopher you are interested)
- THALES (624 - 548 B.C.)
- ANAXIMANDER (610 - 546 B.C.)
- ANAXIMENES (598 CA- 525 B.C.)
- PYTHAGORAS (580 - 500 B.C.)
- XENOPHANES (580 - 485 B.C.)
- PARMENIDES (540 - 480 B.C.)
- ZENO (490 - 430 B.C.)
- EMPEDOKLES (495 - 435 B.C.)
- ANAXAGORAS (496 - 428 B.C.)
I) SOCRATES (470 - 399 B.C.)
II) PLATO (427 - 347 B.C.)
III) ARISTOTLE (384 - 322 B.C.)
 |
 |
THALES (624 - 548 B.C.) Thales opens for the first time the path to philosophical thought by holding that the origin of all beings is the wet element, water, and identifies it as matter and energy together. This principle presupposes the unity of all beings that compose the Universe, their production from a single physical cause and the ceaseless transformation of the phenomena of "substance", thus explaining their cause. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
ANAXIMANDER (610 - 546 B.C.) Anaximander sensed a "general Law" that governs all parts of the Universe and this he called "indefinite substance", indefinite in its form and magnitude. The Universe for Anaximander is "incorruptible and immortal". It will never be destroyed; that is, it is eternal. Man, on the planet Earth, is found ready-made without being a product of evolution, for the simple reason that he is the only animal that requires a long period of maternal care and is not self-sufficient at birth. Hence the mother, father, and child exist simultaneously, and their soul has an "airy nature". back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
ANAXIMENES (598 CA - 525 B.C.)
Anaximenes identifies air with the soul as a "genetic cause" of the universal world. In this way he inaugurates the theory of the "microcosm" and "macrocosm" which will prevail in the following century. Air is the "infinite cause". From air all things are produced. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
PYTHAGORAS (580 - 500 B.C.) Pythagoras discovered that the harmony of music, the harmony of the functioning of nature and the cosmos and the harmony of the laws that govern the structure and function of all beings depend on certain mathematical relations. He concludes that the basic principles of the cosmos are numbers, and he identifies the "excellent" number with "infinity" and the "superfluous" with the "finite". He believes that harmony is engendered by the coupling of opposite forces, and he urges man to align his inner life in accordance with the arithmetic codes of harmony. This gives rise to the Pythagorean Ethic. According to the Orphic religion, the soul derives from a divine origin, it derives, that is, from a universal soul and is therefore immortal. The Pythagorean conception of the Universal soul constitutes the initial worldview that the matter of the cosmos is spiritualized and is subject to a psychic totality that manifests the Universal divinity. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
XENOPHANES (580 - 485 B.C.)
Xenophanes exercises a harsh criticism of the human form attributed to the gods of the era and the fallacy of the priesthood in identifying the gods with human measures. Ionian physics which discovered the concept of the Unity and Wholeness of the cosmos, aided Xenophanes in the conception of the divine and the concept of god is defined as the principle and substance of the Universal world. This revolutionary idea raises divinity to the peak of spiritual alignment of man, and its "flow" forms the basic principles of the history of Hellenism and Christianity. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
PARMENIDES (540 - 480 B.C.)
The philosophy of Parmenides is synopsized in his teachings on Being. This Being, the existence and substance of the cosmos, presupposes the concept of the cosmos as discovered by the hylozoists and the concept of god according to t6he theory of Xenophanes. Parmenides" Being is static and Unmoved. Every form of motion is found solely within it. True knowledge is only knowledge of Being. Every other form of knowledge is false and illusory. At every moment nature teaches us that Being is unborn and immortal. Because it constitutes a whole it is Immovable and without end. It never was and never will be in the future, because now in the present it is whole, it is one and has its continuity within it. In this way Parmenides synopsizes the All, that is, Man, Nature, and the Universe within the same sphere in which God exists and altogether form a unity. With this theory the gate is open to Metaphysical knowledge till the end of Neo-Platonic philosophy. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
ZENO (490 - 430 B.C.)
Zeno passionately defended the theory of his teacher, Parmenides, and with a series of syllogisms proves that "plurality" has no basis, that is, in the totality of the cosmos the comparison of beings and phenomena has equal positive and negative forces and yields zero. In his theory motion is impossible. Zeno even denies the motion of Being in space and even denies space itself. Zeno says: If space is something, then where is it? If space belongs to being, then where can it "be"?But if Being is totally within space, then space would have to be in another space, and that other space in another space, ant that other in another and so on, which is impossible.Therefore, there is no space. The abolition of the concept of space and of time and the conditions of the limit of the principle of motion as conceived by Zeno, concern many cosmologists and theologians today and constitute items of scientific inquiries that involve the principle of Creation of the universe and the concept of God as Creator. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
EMPEDOKLES (495 - 435 B.C.)
For Empedocles, Being when viewed is immobile. Immobile, Whole and Eternal. It was never born and never dies. When we examine, however, the parts of Being, it is mobile in accordance with the conditions of the cosmology of Heraclitus. The basic elements that compose the world are earth, air, fire and water. Nothing comes from nonbeing and nothing becomes Nonbeing. According to this position what men call genesis and corruption is nothing but the combination and separation of the elements. The elements that compose the matter of the world are immutable, while the matter of the world itself is perpetually mutable. There is no beginning or end in Nature or the Universe. Both are eternal. The soul for Empedocles in this world is exiled. The only way it can be united with God is Love. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
ANAXAGORASΣ (496 - 428 B.C.)
Anaxagoras is a loyal ally of Eleatic ontology. Nothing in the Universe becomes nothing, and nothing comes from nothing. Being is without beginning, without end, and qualitatively immutable. What humans call life and death is but the separation of the elements of matter, which by their very nature are incorruptible. For Anaxagoras the word cosmos in its intrinsic meaning denotes "order within the cosmic system". The Creator of order is the divine spirit. This holds for the entire universe. Intellectual force and the soul he terms "Mind". And although the soul moves all things, Mind is infinite, self-subsistent, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. Anaxagoras is the first speculative thinker in world history who distinguished between matter and spirit, the animate and inanimate, and the cosmic Mind includes the totality of the laws that manifest the activity of God. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
SOCRATES (470 - 399 B.C.)
Socrates, that great lover of wisdom, teaches that the peak manifestation of mind is the quest for truth by means of dialogue for the achievement of virtue. Socrates was the first to discover the eternal and incomparable value of the soul and the union of the human soul with the soul of the world. His vision encompasses the stars, the totality of the world and within this lies human fate governed by a higher intelligence whose manifestation in us is our own intellect. With this conviction he grounds the divine activity that orders the world in a view that everything real is rational. The Socratic daemon is the voice of God within us, the echo of the voice that governs the universe and determines the operation of all things in the world. In this way, Socrates unites in a common essence, Man, the Universe and God. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
PLATO (427 - 347 B.C.)
In ceaseless search for Virtue, Plato becomes the founder of the rule of Ideas, and for him only Ideas are the living reality. The Idea of the Good is the totality of all causes, the absolute purpose of the world and its ultimate reason for being. What men call Concepts are for Plato eternal entities, with real substantiation, completely unbound by human thought. All phenomena of the world are illusory and what are perceived by human sense organs are illusions. Through Virtue Plato discovers the immaterial world, which he calls Idea and becomes thus the founder of the Theory of Ideas. The interpretation of matter in this world is a deception. The real universe and its eternal substantiation without beginning or end is the reality of the Ideas from which human nature derives and returns. The soul has divine origin; it is akin to the ideas but it is the only thing in this world that resembles the Ideas. As the Soul recognizes the divine, it itself becomes divine and likens itself to God. Dialectics is the queen of the sciences and the only true path to knowledge. The world can only be interpreted by a process of investigating from the part to the whole, from the leaf to the tree, the tree to the forest, the forest to nature, from nature to the cosmos, and from the cosmos to the universe. The observation of the whole in ignorance of the part is illusory. back ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
 |
ARISTOTLE (384 - 322 B.C.)
As to the creation and function of the cosmos Aristotle establishes his scientific view and supports the eternal becoming. Matter cannot be thought of without form, nor form without matter. The relation of matter to form is immediate. Matter is as ungenerated as form. Both are eternal. Whatever is born already exists in Becoming and constitutes the operation of proceeding from a combination of form and matter to a new combination of form and matter. Becoming, the Universal mechanism, is the transformation from a potentiality to an actuality by means of motion. This process is eternal. The principle of motion has no beginning; it is a law that has always existed and has as its essence pure activity. This principle is completely immaterial, absolutely pure, perfect and complete in its control of the operation of all things. This is the absolute spirit that determines the properties of God. But what is this eternal activity of the principle of motion? It is the pure knowledge of itself. The Universal Mind understands itself when it focuses on itself. It is the "thinking of thinking". God can only contemplate the divine, only, that is, Himself. The world comes solely from the divine and belongs to it. The life of each type of matter is an activity of the spirit, and man is the only animate being that participates in the spirit of creation and is therefore a participant in God. back |