Abstract

This dissertation presents a pedagogical reading of Parmenides' poem; the poem is read as an instruction of the youth by the goddess on how to think to eon properly. It reviews and critiques the main interpretations of the estin in Fragment B2. Mourelatos' conveyer sense of estin, however, is supported and transformed in order to show that the path of estin transports the thought of the youth toward to eon by the goddess' instruction. Within this ontological education, thought is turned toward to eon in order to think it in its presence with thought. The signs of Fragment B8 are read as signs that aid in turning thought toward to eon and not as arguments for the characteristics of to eon . After presenting this pedagogical reading, two questions are raised: "How can one reconcile the ontological education on the path of estin with its emphasis on movement and turning and the immobility of to eon?" and "How is one to think the education of the youth by the goddess as the disclosure of to eon at the final stage of the education ?" These last two questions are thought through by bringing in Heidegger's reading of Parmenides. We show that Parmenides experienced the disclosure of to eon as presence, but did not thematize it fully as disclosure itself, and we explain that to think the education as disclosure at the final stage of the education is, within the confines of the ontological education, to turn thought away from to eon