Parmenides

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Portrait bust of Parmenides, probably made in the 3rd century BC after Metrodoros of Lampsakos (Epicurean)

Parmenides of Elea (Greek: Παρμενίδης; * c. 520/515 BC; † c. 460/455 BC) was one of the most important Greek philosophers from the time of the Pre-Socratics and lived in the southern Italian city of Elea founded by Greeks. His friend and pupil was Zeno of Elea. At the centre of Parmenides' teaching, as well as that of all the other Eleatics, was the immutability of being; all change, all becoming and passing away, is for him only appearance, arising from the delusions of mortals.

On Nature

In his poem On Nature, Parmenides describes how he is led by a team of horses, escorted by maidens, to the gate guarded by Dike, the goddess of justice, where the paths of day and night part. He is let in and is to learn everything here through the goddess' "reliable speech and thought", "the well-rounded truth's unshakable heart and mortals' delusional thoughts, in which reliable truth is not inherent."[1] Thus he first learns:

„This is necessary to say and to think, that [only] the existing exists. For its existence is possible, while that of the non-existent is not; I would have you take this to heart.“

– Parmenides: On Nature, Fragment 6[2]

Rudolf Steiner remarks on the thinking of Parmenides:

„Parmenides sees in external nature, which the senses contemplate, the untrue, the deceptive; in the unity, the imperishable, which thought grasps, alone the true.“ (Lit.:GA 18, p. 57)

For Parmenides, thinking and being are one and the same:

„For to think [being] and to be are the same thing.“

– Parmenides: On Nature, Fragment 5[3]

„Thinking and the goal of thought are one and the same; for you cannot encounter thinking without the Being in which it finds itself expressed. There is nothing and will be nothing else outside of being, since fate has bound it to the indivisible and immovable being. Therefore, all that mortals have established [in their language] must be empty sound, convinced that it is true: becoming as well as passing away, being as well as non-being, change of place and change of luminous colour.“

– Parmenides: On Nature, Fragment 8[4]

„One will realise the significance of this worldview, which is called the Eleatic (Parmenides and Zeno are from Elea), if one directs one's gaze to the fact that its bearers have progressed so far with the formation of thought-experience that they have fashioned this experience into a special art, the so-called dialectic. In this "art of thought" the soul learns to feel itself in its independence and inner unity. Thus the reality of the soul is felt as what it is through its own being, and as what it feels itself to be through the fact that it no longer, as in the past, lives along with the general world-experience, but unfolds in itself a life - the thought-experience - which is rooted in it, and through which it can feel itself implanted in a purely spiritual world-ground. At first this feeling does not yet find expression in a clearly expressed thought; but one can feel it alive as a feeling in this age by the esteem in which it is held. According to one of Plato's "Conversations", Parmenides told the young Socrates that he should learn the art of thought from Zeno, otherwise truth would remain distant from him. This 'art of thought' was felt to be a necessity for the human soul that wants to approach the spiritual primordial grounds of existence.“ (Lit.:GA 18, p. 57)

Literature
References to the work of Rudolf Steiner follow Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works (CW or GA), Rudolf Steiner Verlag, Dornach/Switzerland, unless otherwise stated.
Email: verlag@steinerverlag.com URL: www.steinerverlag.com.
Index to the Complete Works of Rudolf Steiner - Aelzina Books
A complete list by Volume Number and a full list of known English translations you may also find at Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works
Rudolf Steiner Archive - The largest online collection of Rudolf Steiner's books, lectures and articles in English.
Rudolf Steiner Audio - Recorded and Read by Dale Brunsvold
steinerbooks.org - Anthroposophic Press Inc. (USA)
Rudolf Steiner Handbook - Christian Karl's proven standard work for orientation in Rudolf Steiner's Collected Works for free download as PDF.

Weblinks

References

  1. ↑ Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. Griechisch und Deutsch von Hermann Diels. 1. Band, Berlin 1922, p. 150
  2. ↑ Diels, p. 153
  3. ↑ Diels, p. 151
  4. ↑ Diels, p. 157
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