Search results for: DISPUTATIONES SCIENTIFICAE in All Content

In vino veritas… Is there truth in wine? Drinking and intemperance in Great Moravian and Early Czech legislation

In vino veritas… Is there truth in wine? Drinking and intemperance in Great Moravian and Early Czech legislation

Author(s): Lubomíra Havlíková / Language(s): English / Issue: 1-2/2014

Grapevine cultivation and wine drinking in Great Moravia and Bohemia are attested by the Great Moravian legal manuscripts as Old Slavonic Nomokanonú, Zakonú sudnyi ljudümú and ZapovÏ di svÍ tyichú otücü, and Bohemian legal document as in Latin written Decreta Bretislai. In the wine-growing law the adoption of legal traditions of Byzantine origin or from classical Antiquity was reflected more noticeably than in the written historical sources or archaeological material.

Friendship as Virtue in De Amicitia of Cicero

Prietenia ca virtute la Cicero în De amicitia

Author(s): Lucian Voinea / Language(s): Romanian / Issue: 1/2014

Keywords: ethics; moral; Antiquity; virtue; friendship; Cicero;

Marcus Tullius Cicero is famous as orator, politician and author of rhetoric treaties but in this paper we also emphasize that he is at least equally philosopher and moralist. It is true, he is not a philosopher as Platon or Aristotel, but he bequathed us moral principles which are aplicable in our daily life, being a critic of the Stoics in issues such as ‘wisdom’, ‘virtue’ and ‘friendship’. Cicero is considered a representative of The New Probabilistic Academy, but in the issue of friendship he agrees more with Aristotel, for whom friendship is a virtue, or at least they are inseparable as he mentions since the beginning of The Book VIII of the Nicomachean Ethics. Cicero adopts Greek philosophical principles, but he adjusts them to the Roman reality, he is not only the creator of a Latin philosophical language that has been being bequathed till nowadays, but especially, the founder of the Roman philosophy. Laelius sive De amicitia (Laelius or About friendship) is a small treaty of moral practice conceived as a discussion among Laelius and his two sons-in-law, Q. Mucius Scaevola and Fannius, through which Cicero proposes to demonstrate that friendship after wisdom is the most valuable thing of humans.

F. SUÁREZ ON A NUMBER

F. SUÁREZ O POVAZE POČTU

Author(s): David Svoboda / Language(s): Czech / Issue: 2/2009

Keywords: Number; Quantity; Suárez Francisco

The paper deals with Suárez’s concept of a number as it is put forth in his famous Disputatines Metaphysicae. Suárez’s explanation is led by the standard scholastic question with regard to the nature of a number, namely whether a number is the real species of a quantity. Suárez answers the question in a negative way and his main opponents are in this respect Thomists. Suárez rejects the Thomistic concept of a number according to which a number is the real species of a quantity. Suárez’s argument is based on the claim that a number is not a being (ens) per se and that is why the Thomistic thesis is not valid. According to Suárez, a number is (broadly speaking) an aggregation of units, which of itself does not have a sufficient type of unity in order that it could constitute a being per se. However, a number has some kind of unity but the unity of a number comes from the cognitive act of our reason which subordinates an aggregation of units under some concept. Only if we consider an aggregation of units with this kind of unity can there be strictly speaking (or formally speaking) a number, e.g. the number of the apostles. A number taken in a formal way then somehow belongs (but not in the strict sense of a word) to the species of a quantity.

Feith – Science – Media. Prof. dr hab. Tadeusz’s Zasępa research activity

Wiara – Nauka – Media. Działalność naukowa ks. prof. dr hab. Tadeusza Zasępy

Author(s): Izabela Piątek-Belina / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1/2016

Keywords: academic achievements; the Chair of Modern Forms of Faith Transmission; Katolícka Univerzita v Ružomberku; The John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin; media; Tadeusz Zasępa

Science does not only not exclude faith in God, but it should lead to Him. The same media that are the fruit of human knowledge and skills, and in fact a gift of God, used with dignity can help their users to meet God, to discover Him in other people and bring closer the way of life which He offers to man in the 21st century. These contents belong to the area of research conducted by ks. prof. dr hab. Tadeusz Zasępa in the years 1984-2014, the results of which were presented in his numerous scientific publications.

The 17th-century library inventories of the Dominican monasteries in Gidle, Łęczyca, Łowicz, Piotrków Trybunalski and Sieradz

Siedemnastowieczne inwentarze biblioteczne klasztorów dominikańskich w Gidlach, Łęczycy, Łowiczu, Piotrkowie Trybunalskim i Sieradzu

Author(s): Tomasz Stolarczyk / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 106/2016

Keywords: library inventories; the Dominican Order; 17th century; Gidle; Łowicz; Piotrków Trybunalski; Sieradz

The following article presents the 17th-century library inventories from the Dominican monasteries in Gidle, Łęczyca, Łowicz, Piotrków Trybunalski and Sieradz. The inventories of the monasteries from Łęczyca, Łowicz, Piotrków and Sieradz are part of the chartularies of the aforementioned monasteries, held today in the Archives of the Polish Province of the Dominicans in Krakow, while the inventory of the monastery in Gidle is part of a ledger of that monastery and is in the Diocesan Archive of Włocławek. The inventories of the Order of Preachers completely ignore the publishing addresses of the prints, sometimes they include the author's surname without his first name, or just the other way round; sometimes there is the author’s full name without the book title; if the title is included, it is always shortened and without the author’s name. In some cases only the nickname of the writer is mentioned. The inventories of the monasteries in Gidle, Łęczyca, Sieradz, Łowicz and older register of the Piotrków monastery do not have the numbering of the individual entries, only almost every entry begins with a new line. Such numbering was added to the newer inventory of the monastery in Piotrków Trybunalski. The older inventories of Łęczyca and Łowicz did not use any criterion for presenting the books (so it was probably the way the books were arranged on the shelves of the library). However, in the Piotrków inventory and both inventories of Sieradz, the books were divided according to the print format: in folio, quartq, octavo, sedecimo and duodecimo. The books within the formats were arranged randomly: the works of the same author were mentioned in several places. The newer inventories of these monasteries were better organized, as the works held in Łęczyca, Łowicz and Piotrków were also divided according to the print format. In the inventories of all these monasteries the books written by the same author were generally put in one place (although it was not always so), and there was also a tendency to put the works of the same type together: Bibliae and comments on the Bible, concordances, Summae, Sermones, Contiones, Postillae and Homiliae, history, legends of the saints, the books by the Fathers of the Church, liturgics, works of dogmatic, moral and speculative theology, polemics, dictionaries, works of philosophy and rhetoric, ancient authors. Moreover, the newer inventory of Łowicz includes Libri seculares, although among them are also church writings; and the inventory of Piotrków contains Libri oratorum. Almost all the inventories, except the Gidle one have the information about the manuscripts and damage of volumes. The inventories differ significantly in the number of works they include.

Scholastic Sources of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’s Treatise Disputatio metaphysica de principio individui

Scholastic Sources of Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz’s Treatise Disputatio metaphysica de principio individui

Author(s): Martyna Koszkało / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2017

Keywords: principle of individuation; individual; double negation; existence; haecceitas; total (whole) entity; metaphysical pluralism; metaphysical individualism; Leibniz; John Duns Scotus; Henry of Ghent; Suá

The object of this article is the scholastic inspirations found in the metaphysical disputation De principio individui by Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz. The purpose of this study was, on one hand, a reconstruction of Leibniz’s theory concerning the principle of individuation, and on the other hand, a presentation of some texts by medieval scholastic authors (Henry of Ghent, Peter of Falco, Thomas Aquinas, Aegidius of Rome, Robert Kilwardby, William of Ockham) to whose ideas Leibniz refers in the named work, even though he had, for the most part, only second-hand information concerning them. In his juvenile treatise, Leibniz states that the individuating principle has to be universal, which means relevant to all kinds of being; it has to be metaphysical in character and not merely epistemological. He regards individuality as synonymous with unity combined with difference. He resolutely takes sides with nominalism and rejects the reality of all kinds of universal beings and beings whose unity is weaker than numerical unity. As a consequence of this assumption, he rejects the conceptions in which the principle of individuation is formed by: double negation, existence or the haecceity. By contrast, he embraces the solution (close to the tradition originated by Ockham and also related to Suárez), according to which the whole entity (tota entitas) of an individual thing is the principle of individuation. In effect, for Leibniz, any real thing is simply singular, which comes down to the thesis that a thing is singular owing to its own metaphysical subcomponents, which are singular by themselves.

The Path of Passion in Seneca's Phaedra

The Path of Passion in Seneca's Phaedra

Author(s): Panos Eliopoulos / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2016

Keywords: stoicism; virtue; vice; eudemonia; pananthropic phenomenon

In this paper I try to understand Phaedra in its own terms but not as aliterary critic. Starting from what Staley rightly confirms, that for the Stoics tragedy was not a form antithetical to philosophy, 1 I argue that philosophical concepts, such as passion, can be examined separately and ad hoc in each Senecan tragedy. This seems the only reliable method to distinguish whether they are employed as stoic concepts or not, despite Hine’s thesis that instead it should be shown that these concepts are more Stoic than Epicurean, Peripatetic, or anything else. In my view, Phaedra stands out as a unique demonstration of how Seneca comprehends passion in the form of love or desire.

Skeptical discourse. Cicero „On Fate“

Skeptiški svarstymai. Ciceronas „Apie Lemtį“

Author(s): Tatjana Aleknienė / Language(s): Lithuanian / Issue: 102/2020

Keywords: Cicero; fate; skepticism; stoics; academy;

The new translation of Cicero’s De fato (On fate), which was published a few months ago by Jonas ir Jokūbas publishing house, is here reviewed in the spirit of academic skepticism. The value of book is weighed in utramque partem. This edition is undoubtedly useful as an authentic historical and philosophical account of philosophical discussion and disputes regarding the question of fate in 3rd - 1st centuries BC. The cover and the front matter of the book lead us to believe that this is the first volume for a series of Cicero’s philosophical works. It is indeed commendable that a group of scholars of philosophy (or, in case of De fato – of logic) and those of ancient philology were involved in the process of laying the groundwork for the series. The value of the book is somewhat lessened by the translator’s neglect of the historical context of Hellenistic philosophy in the introduction and the commentary. In the translation itself, there are quite a few inaccuracies and errors; Review of: Cicero „ON FATE“; Translated from Latin and with Introduction and Commentary by Živilė Pabijutaitė Vilnius: Jonas ir Jokūbas, 2019, 80 p. ISBN 978-609-8236-07-1; Review by: Tatjana Aleknienė

“Many laughed at the thought of this illustrious young man reading books:” About Miklós Báthory’s Library and His Cicero-Codex

“Many laughed at the thought of this illustrious young man reading books:” About Miklós Báthory’s Library and His Cicero-Codex

Author(s): Dávid Molnár / Language(s): English / Issue: 3/2019

Keywords: Galeotto Marzio; Miklós Báthory’s library; Cicero codex; Platonic school

This paper pursues an anecdote of Galeotto Marzio about the erudite Miklós Báthory, bishop of Vác, who read Cicero’s Tusculan disputation while he was waiting with other noblemen for the royal diet in Rákosmező, and the mocking attitude of the Hungarian political elite toward any intellectual endeavor. The traces lead to the National Széchényi Library in Budapest which has in its holdings a manuscript of Cicero under Cod. lat. 150. This book might have been in the hands of Báthory at Rákosmező. The purpose of this paper is to confirm the scarcely known plans of Miklós Báthory, bishop of Vác, to found a Platonic school on the basis of what little remains of his library and, mainly, the notes of his Cicero codex. This information perfectly harmonizes with his well-known aspirations to found a Platonic school in Buda and later his gymnasium in Vác, which seems to have been permeated with a kind of Platonist spirituality. After a summary of the life of Miklós Báthory, the paper offers an outline of the remains of his once rich library and then finally an examination of the history of the Cicero codex and its marginalia.

Descartes et la scolastique sur la fausseté matérielle : perspectives sur les études récentes

Descartes et la scolastique sur la fausseté matérielle : perspectives sur les études récentes

Author(s): Ilaria Coluccia / Language(s): French / Issue: 2/2016

Pop Culture as an Effect of Modernity: A Different Way of Referring to Existence

Cultura pop ca efect al modernității: un mod diferit de raportare la existență

Author(s): Andreea Finichiu / Language(s): Romanian / Issue: 3/2019

Keywords: culture;philosophy;elitism;society;tradition;communication; globality;modernity;people;identity;

If we were to define the previous century, under the auspices of which the third millennium began, through a single, edifying word, it could be the adjective "dissentious". Of course, even a brief retrospective exploration of the cultural history of mankind immediately reveals that each new era has been delimited, at least in its initial affirmation phase, and at least at the declarative level, by an attitude of denial and opposition to that one which preceded it, not to mention inherent incongruities. The Renaissance opposed medieval asceticism and pessimism, and romanticism denied the conventionalism and rigid rationalism of classicism, asserting the primacy of subjectivity, while political liberalism contested the religiously legitimated absolutism. Attentive to the phenomenon of unprecedented relativisation of the values, concepts, conceptions or ideologies of all orientations, under which one century has ended and another has begun, someone could have said, reformulating one of Malraux’s famous sayings without the slightest risk of exaggerating, that the twenty-first century "will be one of contesting or will not be at all", perhaps having the feeling that he really lives in the temporal and ideological prolongation of the century which already ended two decades ago. Against the backdrop of endless conflicts of ideas, where "universalism", the ideology of cultural supremacy promoted by the West and its entire existential philosophy are strongly contested by non-Western communities, whose ideologies, both religious and political, have a strong ethnic stake that is still insufficiently evaluated, pop culture – defining an essential dimension of contemporary human society - which is equally contested by both sides, continues its upward trend started in the previous century, surpassing and ignoring borders of all kind.

Meditatio mortis. Meditating on Death, Philosophy and Gender in Late Antique Hagiography

Meditatio mortis. Meditating on Death, Philosophy and Gender in Late Antique Hagiography

Author(s): Marija Munkholt Christensen / Language(s): English / Issue: 2/2021

Keywords: Macrina; Marcella; Syncletica; Socrates; Plato; philosophy; gender; emotions; Gregory of Nyssa; Jerome

According to Socrates, as he is described in Plato’s Phaedo, the definition of a true philosopher is a wise man who is continuously practicing dying and being dead. Already in this life, the philosopher tries to free his soul from the body in order to acquire true knowledge as the soul is progressively becoming detached from the body. Centuries after it was written, Plato’s Phaedo continued to play a role for some early Christian authors, and this article focuses on three instances where Christian women mirror Socrates and/or his definition of philosophy. We find these instances in hagiographical literature from the fourth and fifth centuries at different locations in the Roman Empire – in the Lives of Macrina, Marcella and Syncletica. These texts are all to varying degrees impacted by Platonic philosophy and by the ideal of the male philosopher Socrates. As women mastering philosophy, they widened common cultural expectations for women, revealing how Christian authors in certain contexts ascribed authority to female figures.

Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski’s Cato (Lyr. II 6) and exercitia Seneciana

Katon Macieja Kazimierza Sarbiewskiego (Lyr. II 6) i exercitia Seneciana

Author(s): Iwona Słomak / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 1 (58)/2021

Keywords: Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski; odes II 6; II 5; II 7; Cato the Younger; reception of Seneca the Younger;

The starting point for the research presented in this article was an attempt to trace the literary tradition which inspired the creation of the lyrical subject and the titular figure of Maciej Kazimierz Sarbiewski’s ode II 6 (Cato Politicus). The presence of this name implies that the intertextual dimension of the poem should be taken into account in its interpretation, hence, the author of this article assumed that the question of the literary tradition should be addressed before a hypothesis about the meaning of the poem is put forth. A review of Sarbiewski’s potential sources of inspiration – primarily works that were included in the basic and supplementary reading lists in Jesuit colleges – brings satisfactory results. It turns out that the ancient author who often mentions Cato the Younger is Seneca Philosophus, moreover, there are numerous similarities between some passages in his works and ode II 6. Sarbiewski seems to have been especially inspired by his Epistulae morales ad Lucilium, and also by the Senecan Consolationes. However, rather than refer to the views attributed by Seneca explicitly to Cato, the Polish poet explores the thoughts of the Philosopher himself, possibly assuming that the views of the politician and the philosopher were similar; this assumption could be justified by the fact that Seneca not only repeatedly expresses highest praise of the republican hero, but he also openly recommends to treat Cato Uticensis as a role model. These issues are discussed in the first part of this paper. In the second part, the author compares selected passages from Seneca’s works and two poems (II 5 and II 7) adjacent to the ode Cato Politicus. The comparison shows that the convergences discussed above are not incidental. On the contrary, there is a series of Sarbiewski’s odes inspired by Seneca, and therefore the Roman philosopher and tragedian can be considered the next, after Horace, master of the Jesuit poet. It is postulated that these inspirations deserve more recognition in further studies on Sarbiewski’s poetry, as they may be helpful in the interpretation of some problematic passages of his odes.

Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio by Tomasz Treter as a 17th-Century Example of Emblematic Meditations. Graphic Sources and the Purpose of the Collection

Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio Tomasza Tretera jako siedemnastowieczna realizacja emblematycznych medytacji: źródła grafi czne i zamysł zbioru

Author(s): Alicja Bielak / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 4 (49)/2018

Keywords: meditation; emblem; Tomasz Treter; Claude Paradin; Junius Hadrianus; Aneau Barthélemy;

The aim of this paper is first of all to present graphic sources of Symbolica vitae Christi meditatio by Tomasz Treter in three 16th-century emblematic works from the French and Dutch circles, namely by Junius Hadrianus (Emblemata), Claude Paradin (Devises heroïques), and Aneau Barthélemy (Picta poesis). It also presents an analysis of the composition of Treter’s collection and situates it in the context of emblematic meditations, promoted by Jesuits in the 16th century. The following four emblems are analysed in detail: Nativitas, Manifestata veritas, Circumcisio, and Continentia. Th ey provide both a metacommentary on the role of image in cognition and an illustration of the relationship between pair of emblems throughout whole collection. The first hundred emblems in Treter’s collection are arranged in pairs, in which the first one shows an episode from the life of Christ, while the second one transposes the biblical story into a symbolic language. The quoted fragment of Jesus’ life is each time used to discuss a Christian virtue expressed through an abstract symbol. At the same time, the traditional tripartite construction of the emblem becomes less strict as in Treter’s collection emblems take the form of two icons sharing a single subscription.

Baltic *jūrā-/-(i)i̯ā- ‘sea’ & “*jaurā-̆ /-(i)i̯ā-̆” ‘wet soil, bog, deep water’

Baltic *jūrā-/-(i)i̯ā- ‘sea’ & “*jaurā-̆ /-(i)i̯ā-̆” ‘wet soil, bog, deep water’

Author(s): Václav Blažek / Language(s): English / Issue: 84/2021

Keywords: Baltic; Fenno-Volgaic; Fenno-Permic; Armenian; Thrace; Gaulish; appellative; hydronym; toponym; etymology; semantic parallel;

This article analyses the Common Baltic term *jūr- ‘sea’ with its vr̥ddhi-formation *jaur- ‘wet soil, bog, deep water’, their toponymic traces in the macro-Baltic area, probable borrowings identifiable in Fenno-Permic *jürɜ ‘deep place in water’ and Fenno-Volgaic *järwä ‘lake’, probable external cognates in Armenian ǰowr ‘water’, and in the hydronyms Iuras & Zyras from Eastern Thrace and the Gaulish oronym Jura with regard to the semantic connection of the meanings ‘deep’ and ‘high’. These partial steps lead to the final conclusion that the primary meaning of the Baltic root *jūr- was ‘deep water’.

Wishful Thinking; the Role and Development of Good Faith in the Roman Law of Contracts

Wishful Thinking; the Role and Development of Good Faith in the Roman Law of Contracts

Author(s): Philip Thomas / Language(s): English / Issue: 3/2021

Keywords: good faith; Roman Law of contracts; Jan Romein; Hoetink

The paper outlines the theoretical achievements of the work of the Dutch historian Jan Romein and the legal historian and romanist Hoetink, which have become common wisdom in time. However, application of new insights into historical narratives has often been hesitant because of the “anything goes” mentality. This paper approaches one of Roman law’s holy cows, namely the role and development of good faith in the Roman law of contracts and questions whether a move from historical interpretation to legal history may provide another narrative.

Quotations in Piotr Wolfram’s letters – between the Middle Ages and Renaissance humanism

Cytaty w listach Piotra Wolframa – między średniowieczem a renesansowym humanizmem

Author(s): Anna Horeczy / Language(s): Polish / Issue: 58/2020

Keywords: citation; humanism; letters; Petrarch; Piotr Wolfram;

The article is devoted to the role of quotations as a tool to measure the impact of humanism on the example of letters of Piotr Wolfram – a Polish lawyer educated in Italy, participant of the Council of Constance, and ambitious official of the curia. Wolfram’s borrowings from Petrarch, Cicero, Quintilian, and Ovid have been analysed and it has been indicated for the last three that they did not have to be borrowed directly from their authors’ writings but could have been taken from medieval anthologies.

A Chepni Center in Anatolia: Chepnis in Sinop and its Environs in the 13th-16th Centuries

Anadolu’da Bir Çepni Merkezi: 13-16. Yüzyıllarda Sinop ve Çevresinde Çepniler

Author(s): Kamil Yavuz / Language(s): Turkish / Issue: 2/2022

Keywords: Chepni; Sinop; Eastern Black Sea Region; Turkman; Empire of Trebizond;

The Turkification of Anatolia generally had an east-west axis of progress, but this line of progress was not valid in the Turkification of the Black Sea. The Turkification of the Black Sea began with the Oghuz-Turkmen masses reaching Central Anatolia, advancing to the Black Sea coastline, and gaining positions against the Greek Empire of Trabzon by building castles and defense lines in fortified positions along the valleys. In the Central and Eastern Black Sea Region, which became a field of war against the Trabzon Greek Empire, the flag bearer of the gaza was the Chepni, who came to the forefront among the Oghuz/Turkmen groups. Moving towards Sinop, one of the important port cities of the Central Black Sea, from the middle of the thirteenth century, the Chepnis transformed this place into one of the central fortified and main military bases of the Black Sea defense line. In this way, they increased the pressure against the Greek State of Trabzon and engaged in a long-term struggle with them. Over time, some migrated to the Crimea with Sarı Saltuk, and some migrated to the Ordu-Giresun line after the borders of the Trabzon Greek State were withdrawn to the east. Despite this, the power of the Chepni presence in Sinop and its surroundings continued in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Ottoman tahrir records strongly reveal the existence of Chepni in the region. In this study, the Sinop-centered gaza activity of the Chepni will be briefly discussed, and the role of the Chepni in the Turkification process of Sinop and its environs will be evaluated based on the information in the Ottoman cadastral registers.

The Doctrine of the Ordo Sclavoniae in Light of Western Sources and the Issue of the Origins of the Dualist Heresy in Bosnia

The Doctrine of the Ordo Sclavoniae in Light of Western Sources and the Issue of the Origins of the Dualist Heresy in Bosnia

Author(s): Piotr Czarnecki / Language(s): English / Issue: 12/2022

Keywords: Bosnian Church; Medieval dualism; Catharism; Bogomilism

The issue of the Bosnian church – or more precisely the dualist heresy in Bosnia – has caused serious controversies among scholars since the 19th century. The main aim of this paper is to shed new light on this controversial issue, through the analysis of the doctrine of Slavonic dualism (ordo Sclavoniae) based on Western sources. The subject of the analysis will be the sources concerning the contacts of the Cathars from France and Italy with the heretics from Sclavonia and especially the sources containing information on the doctrine, such as the 13th-century Italian sources presenting the doctrines of the Cathars belonging to ordo Sclavoniae (Cathar churches of Bagnolo and March de Treviso) and later, 14th and 15th-century sources presenting the teachings of the heretics from Bosnia. The aim of the analysis will be to reconstruct the doctrines of Slavonic dualism (ordo Sclavoniae) in order to find its distinctive features (especially comparing with two main forms of Bogomil-Cathar dualism – Bulgarian and Drugunthian) and to answer the following question: which doctrinal conceptions had the most significant influence on its formation? Knowledge concerning the sources of inspiration for the dualist doctrine of the ordo Sclavoniae will enable us to draw conclusions concerning the origins of Slavonic dualism, its evolution and to assume an attitude towards scholars’ conceptions concerning the character of the Bosnian heresy.

Barbarians No More. Revisiting the Eastern Contributions to Early Greek Philosophy

Barbarians No More. Revisiting the Eastern Contributions to Early Greek Philosophy

Author(s): Constantin C. Lupascu / Language(s): English / Issue: 1/2023

Keywords: Zoroastrianism; Magi; Plato; Ancient Greek Theology; Ancient Persian Philosophy;

We often assume that our present world alone has experienced the phenomenon of globalization and that it is necessarily a feature of the modern age. And in this we like to imagine the world of the past as made up of homogeneous monolithic blocks with rigid and well-defined impenetrable boundaries. Nothing could be further from the truth. The ancient world enjoyed an interconnectedness as tight if not tighter than ours is today. Nowhere do we see this connection better than between the Greek and the Persian world. The conflict between the two serves as the starting point of the archetypal conflict between the Orient and the Occident. However, at the same time, Persian culture served as a foundation for Greek moral philosophy and by extension, had a major influence on later Jewish, Christian and Islamic philosophy. The transition from mythological to philosophical knowledge occurs in Greek thought when it encounters these Magi. In this regard, we shall see that Plato had a special relationship with the Magi, and the Magi in turn held Plato in high regard. However, Plato’s example is by no means an isolated case. We have other equally famous examples of Greek philosophers who we are told went to study in Persia before Plato, namely Pythagoras and Democritus.