Online research in philosophy

The Concept “hope,” (Greek), appears in two of Heraclitus’s fragments. This essay offers an attentive reading of these fragments and examines the role of hope in Heraclitus’s thinking. The essay is divided into two parts. The first part examines the meaning of the Greek notion for hope, (Greek), by looking into archaic and classical sources, particularly the myth about the origin of hope in Hesiod’s Works and Days. Based upon the renewed understanding of the concept, the second part of the essay examines Heraclitus’s use of the concept of hope and demonstrates the central role of hope in Heraclitus’s thinking.

The article sets out to reinterpret Heraclitus' views on religion and, by implication, his position in the context of the Presocratic philosophers' relationship to the Greek cultural tradition. It does so by examining the fragments in which Heraclitus' attitude to the popular religion of his time is reflected. The analysis of the fragments 69, 68, 15, 14, 5, 96, 93 and 92 DK reveals that the target of Heraclitus' criticism is not the religious practices themselves, but their popular interpretation. Heraclitus' fragments are simultaneously shown to identify the underlying structure of the 'unity of opposites,' inherent in various religious practices. Heraclitus appears to reinterpret religious practices in terms of the conceptual structures of his own philosophy. On the other hand, religion provides him with the categories for the construction of his philosophical theology. Thus Heraclitus' treatment of religion is shown to be analogous to his treatment of ethics and politics, which he also tries to incorporate into his highly integrated vision of reality. In contrast to Xenophanes' radical critique of the traditional religion, Heraclitus emerges not as a reformer or an Aufklärer, but as an interpreter, who tries to discern the structures of meaning inherent in the existing practices, and to assume them into his own philosophical project.

The article sets out to reinterpret Heraclitus' views on religion and, by implication, his position in the context of the Presocratic philosophers' relationship to the Greek cultural tradition. It does so by examining the fragments in which Heraclitus' attitude to the popular religion of his time is reflected. The analysis of the fragments 69, 68, 15, 14, 5, 96, 93 and 92 DK reveals that the target of Heraclitus' criticism is not the religious practices themselves, but their popular interpretation. Heraclitus' fragments are simultaneously shown to identify the underlying structure of the 'unity of opposites,' inherent in various religious practices. Heraclitus appears to reinterpret religious practices in terms of the conceptual structures of his own philosophy. On the other hand, religion provides him with the categories for the construction of his philosophical theology. Thus Heraclitus' treatment of religion is shown to be analogous to his treatment of ethics and politics, which he also tries to incorporate into his highly integrated vision of reality. In contrast to Xenophanes' radical critique of the traditional religion, Heraclitus emerges not as a reformer or an Aufklärer, but as an interpreter, who tries to discern the structures of meaning inherent in the existing practices, and to assume them into his own philosophical project.

Because of a widespread criticism of the Enlightenment sense of reason for its unilateral privileging of unity and its solipsistic conception of the thinking subject, many turn to postmodern difference as a remedy. But an alternative can also be found in a renewed appropriation of the tradition. This essay is an attempt at such an appropriation, through a philosophical analysis of Heraclitus' conception of logos. A new interpretation of Heraclitus is offered, which affirms the equiprimordiality of unity and difference. This view is shown to have implications first of all for the mode of reasoning: thought, in its most genuine sense, cannot be accomplished in isolation but is an essentially joint act. Further, the view has implications for the content or object of thought: the 'seat' of intelligibility is not the abstract idea which the mind assimilates to itself but rather the concrete whole, the complex 'one-many' structure in the world, in which minds constitutively participate. An attempt is made, at the end of the essay, to show how the convergence of form and content, and the concrete sense of rationality it implies, comes to dramatic expression in Heraclitus' style.

Behind the superficial obscurity of what fragments we have of Heraclitus' thought, Professor Kahn claims that it is possible to detect a systematic view of human existence, a theory of language which sees ambiguity as a device for the expression of multiple meaning, and a vision of human life and death within the larger order of nature. The fragments are presented here in a readable order; translation and commentary aim to make accessible the power and originality of a systematic thinker and the first great master of artistic prose. The commentary locates Heraclitus within the tradition of early Greek thought, but stresses the importance of his ideas for contemporary theories of language, literature and philosophy.

Professor Kahn pieces together the fragments of Heraclitus' thought and philosophy.