Abstract

The author analyzes the text of the Parmenides’ poem. He aims to explicate the ideas that express the views of this ancient philosopher on the ontological parameters of human existence and accentuates “optical” characteristics of Parmenides philosophical language. These characteristics express the key problem points in the process of understanding the mutual relations of sensually empirical evidence and theoretical scientific knowledge, of explicit “many things” and implicit “single”, of the physical dynamics and speculative statics, of “human” world and the “true” being. Having reviewed comprehensively and critically the situation of the subject of ontological discourse, described by Parmenides, I determine the original contexts of the philosopher’s speech about things. The prevailing context of the speech of Parmenides is a religious mythical context, which determines not only the plot and content of the philosopher’s text, but also its genre forms. At the same time I note the presence of an implicit realistic meaning of the poem, refers to the particular biography of Parmenides. It is my hope to demonstrate the relevance of Parmenides thought for the modern philosophical understanding of the essence of human being.