Aristotle was a phony

On the matter of Aristotle, I am in a minority of one. Or at least very few. I am one of that small minority of people who is prepared to ask the unthinkable: are the works of Aristotle forgeries? In one respect, it is a question that hardly matters. No one denies the depth and profundity of the works of Aristotle. But were they really by Aristotle and was this Aristotle who we suppose he was? I am a sceptic. I am inclined to question some of the basic features of what I call the Aristotle myth. In particular, I question the supposition - and it is a supposition - that this Aristotle was a student of Plato and a member of Plato's Academy. And I doubt, furthermore, the story that Aristotle was the teacher of Alexander the Great. I detect a mythology in these stories rather than historical fact. Regarding the works of Aristotle, the whole story of how they were preserved and how they were subsequently found and published is inherently fishy. I smell a forgery. There have been scholars throughout history - notably in the Renaissance - who have raised such questions. I think they are good questions.

It is my view, in any case, that the extant works of Aristotle are the product of the first century BC and not much earlier when they were supposedly "found" in Athens and taken back to Rome by Sulla. Regarding the character known as "Aristotle" - I regard it as a myth, the purpose of which was to connect Alexander the Great to the Divine Plato. The Aristotle myth, that is, grew along with the mythology of Alexander. There was, I believe, an early poet named Aristotle. This character has been engrandized during the myth-making surrounding Alexander. A large body of work - sort of a counter-Plato - was composed/collected and attached to this name in the first century BC. I therefore see the works of Aristotle as Roman productions.

Here are some points:

*According to the traditional account the works of Aristotle, student of Plato, were "lost" after his death and "preserved" in a cellar until the first century BC. This story explains why we have no notices of Aristotle before this time. Aristotle goes missing for two hundred years. Then his works turn up intact having been preserved in a cellar. Is this likely? It is an inherently dubious tale. I invite readers to check it out. It's a very fishy story.

*The man credited with "discovering" the works of Aristotle, Apellicon of Teos, was a complete rogue. He was a book collector. It is said that he purchased the manuscripts of Aristotle from a Neleus of Scepsis. It is said they were hidden in a cellar to keep them away from the princes of Pergamon. Then we are told that because Aristotle's manuscripts were in poor shape, Apellicon made his own copies and filled up the gaps himself. So, in fact, our Aristotle - we are to believe - is Apellicon's free-and-easy rendering of the concealed manuscripts of Neleus. This entire story is suspect, frankly.

*Next we are told that Apellicon's library was carried back to Rome by Sulla. This is in 84BC. This is actually the first time Aristotle's works ever appear anywhere in public. They are part of the spoils of Sulla. This was a major Roman acquisition of Greek heritage. I argue that large amounts of this heritage was fabricated for Roman purposes.

*The circle who did the fabricating is identifiable: along with the library of Apellicon, the Romans also acquired such Greek scholars as the accomplished scribe and grammarian Tyrannoin of Amisus. He was employed by the Romans, we are told, to organise Apellicon's library. He then worked in the circle of Cicero. This is a circle of people, I maintain, who were more than capable of forging the works of Aristotle. These were deeply learned men and men of great literary power. We underestimate the philosophical and literary genius of that period. Moreover, it is Cicero who provides us with the list of heads of the Academy down to the Roman period. Cicero crafts this myth.

*The literary form of the works of Aristotle is strange and un-Hellenic. We are told that what has survived are his "notebooks". They do not resemble other works of Platonic philosophy or any other production of the Academy. I argue that their form is more distinctly Roman than Platonic Greek. The best way to explain the peculiar literary features of Aristotle's works is to see them as late productions.

*There are many, many strange and unaccountable misrepresentations of Plato in the works of Aristotle. Did he really know Plato? How close was he to Plato? The extant Aristotle does not seem like a close companion of Plato. He misunderstands basic points and misrepresents Plato on fundamental matters. Countless scholars have tried to reconcile the two philosophers on the assumption that they were close companions. But perhaps they weren't. Perhaps there is a good reason why our Aristotle seems so askew about Plato. There are too many clangers in Aristotle. I am not convinced that the person who wrote the works of Aristotle was a personal student of Plato of Athens.

Again: this does not change the intrinsic value of the Aristotelean corpus.  I am not proposing that they are worthless forgeries. But I doubt the standard story about the origins of the works of Aristotle. I especially doubt the proposal that our Aristotle was a student of Plato. His works say otherwise. I suspect they are forgeries of the first century BC, a direct product of the Roman acquisition of Greek learning under Sulla. This would explain much. My explanation: "Aristotle" is a mythic production that accompanied the growth of the Alexander myths. The character of Aristotle was necessary to graft Alexander - the "philosopher king" - onto the Academy.

The important thing, in any case, is not to read Plato through Aristotle.








- Harper McAlpine Black

Plato as Grasshopper

Reading through Diogenes Laertius' Life of Plato I found the following epigram by Timon:

A man did lead them on, a strong stout man,
A honeyed speaker, sweet as melody 

Of tuneful grasshopper, who, seated high 

On Hecademus' tree, unwearied sings.

Hecademus, as Diogenes notes, is now called the Academy, so the image we are given here is of Plato as a grasshopper seated high in the olive trees of the Academy. 

In my studies of Plato, grasshopper (cicadas) are emblematic of autochthony. In ancient mythology, grasshoppers are born from the earth. Plato uses this reference several times. Note, in this context, the reference to the cicadas singing in the tree tops in the Phaedrus dialogue. Timon's image of Plato as the grasshopper in the tree tops alludes to it. 

The Canon of Plato (Thrasyllus' Attestation)

The canon of Plato's works has been supplied to us by a certain ancient authority named Thrasyllus, about whom we know very little. He is the source quoted by Diogenes Laertius in his life of Plato and this provides a list of thirty-six works grouped together into nine tetralogies as follows:

THE NINE TETRALOGIES

*Euthyphro, Apology, Crito, Phædo
*Cratylus, Theætetus, Sophist, Statesman
*Parmenides, Philebus, Symposium, Phædrus
*Alcibiades, 2nd Alcibiades, Hipparchus, Rival Lovers
*Theages, Charmides, Laches, Lysis
*Euthydemus, Protagoras, Gorgias, Meno
*Hippias major, Hippias minor, Ion, Menexenus
*Clitophon, Republic, Timæus, Critias
*Minos, Laws, Epinomis, [Letters]

THE THIRTY-FIVE WORKS

Note that the final tetralogy includes the Letters, which is not a dialogue. So, in total, there are thirty-five dialogues or philosophical works ascribed to Plato by this ancient attestation, leaving the Letters aside. (Actually, some of the "dialogues" are not dialogues, but that is another matter. See below. Collectively, we call them "dialogues".) 

Modern scholarship questions the authenticity of some of these works, but usually on the basis of a preconceived idea of what is and is not Plato. This is always an open question. Take a work such as Rival Lovers. Modern scholars agree that in terms of literary style and its Greek it seems on a par with the other works in the canon; it is rejected because its content is deemed "unworthy of Plato's philosophical mind." That is, its' content conflicts with our idea of who Plato was and what he believed and what he taught. This, however, is highly debatable in itself; it is hardly a sure criterion by which to decide authenticity, all other things being equal.

We can be much less sure about this distinction than we can be sure of the fact that these works are all, at least, in the school of Plato. That is, among all the philosophical works of Greek antiquity, there is a set of thirty-five works which, ancient testimony attests, are definitely Platonic if not by the hand of Plato himself. For the ancients, that is a less important question. Regarding the works that modern scholars deem spurious: if they are not by Plato then they are by his immediate followers such as Philip of Opus. For the ancients, that was good enough. The subsequent Platonic tradition, in any case, accepted these thirty-five works and regarded Thrasyllus' list as canonical and was not too concerned with strict standards of authorship. 

On this matter I follow the ancient tradition. I'm not very interested in modern squabbles about what is and is not by Plato the man and I mistrust the process by which these matters are decided. I want to avoid debates about authenticity and I want to have a secure canon with which to work. Thrasyllus gives us a secure canon. He tells us what works the ancients, (within the next two hundred or so years after Plato) reckoned Platonic. This is the accepted ancient (and medieval) canon and so - by tradition, if for no other reason - these are all works by "Plato". The name "Plato" may, I admit, refer not only to Plato the man but also, in some cases, to his school. The Epinomis is a good example. Modern scholarship says it is by Philip of Opus. Maybe so, but for our purposes he is still called "Plato". For practical purposes here Plato is somewhat interchangeable with his school; when we say "Plato" we may mean, in fact, "Plato and his school". The canon, that is, may include faithful pseudepigrapha. I am less perturbed about this prospect than I am about imposing an inappropriate and debilitating historicism.

This, I think, is the only way to approach a canon. Otherwise, you get bogged down in disputes about what is authentic and what is spurious and the business of philosophy never begins. The best approach is to draw a line and embrace a canon and be done with it. In this case, I see no compelling reasons to draw the line anywhere other than where it was drawn by ancient attestation.

I therefore take and recommend the following stance:

Of these thirty-five works we say: whoever wrote them was Plato!

***

There is some basis for the general notion that the works were written in groups in Plato himself: in the Timaeus, for example, there is a projected scheme of three dialogues, a trilogy. So we know that Plato at least sometimes conceived of ensembles of dialogues - trilogies - rather than conceiving of the dialogues each as a stand alone work. 

The arrangement into groups of four imitates the known practice in Athenian drama: four plays (three tragedies and a comedy) form a single dramatic group. The assumption is that Plato conceived of his dialogues as philosophical dramas and wrote them in programmes of four in the same way as the dramatists. This doesn't conflict with the abode-mentioned trilogy structures because the dramatic tetralogy is three tragedies plus one comedy, a trilogy plus an addendum. 

Clearly, some extant dialogues belong together. But which dialogues belong with which? It is a very complex question. Is there, moreover, a single over-arching scheme uniting the tetralogies or whatever other groupings we discern in the canon?

Here are a few useful points about the thirty-five dialogues:

Performed dialogues = 26
Narrated dialogues = 9

Narrated dialogues narrated by Socrates = 6
Narrated dialogues narrated by other than Socrates = 3

Narrated to a named person = 2
Narrated to an unnamed person = 2
Narrated to an indeterminate audience = 5

***

Regarding the over-all organizing principle of the canon, it is my contention that the dialogues are grouped around various Athenian religious festivals and that the various dialogues are related to one or more deity. I am especially interested in the time signatures in the dialogues. I think that Plato wrote works for particular times in the Athenian calendar. Sometimes this is explicit but often it is just hinted at. For instance, in the Parmenides we are explicitly told that it is set on the Greater Panathenaea. In the Phaedrus, on the other hand, it is only the chirping of the cicadas in the trees that lets us know it is high summer.





- Harper 

Vampire myths as counter-Islamic

It has long been my surmise that the vampire myths, even as they have formed in the popular imagination, are essentially anti- or counter-Islamic in origin. I mentioned this in a class recently and it reminded me that I am yet to make a case for this in writing. I have talked about it and described it to people for years, but not put it in writing. In all the literature I have perused regarding vampires I have never seen anything of this mentioned. I think it is obvious. (There are lots of things in Western culture that are anti-Islamic in this way.)

It is a simple proposal. I am saying that the vampire myths are an expression of a dark mythology that comes out of Christo-Islamic demonization of religious opponents; in this case, a product of Romano/Turkish tensions. Almost all of the various motifs that assemble around the figure of the vampire can be explained in this way. This is on top of the historical and geographical elements that form the basic structure of the thesis.

The vampire, I maintain, is a complex of ideas and motifs growing out of Christian demonization of the Muslim Other. It is a mythology about Otherness. It was this before it was developed into its familiar form by Bram Stoker, but I maintain that his agenda - conscious or unconscious - was counter-Islamic too. Stoker was close friends with Gladstone. It was Gladstone, let us recall, who turned British foreign policy against the Ottoman Empire. Gladstone and his circle, among them Stoker, were viciously and axiomatically anti-Turk. Stoker's myth grows from anti-Turk soil.

Some basic points:

Vampires come from Transylvania

Geographical proximity. These myths come from the border of Christendom and the Islamic world. They are the product of the tensions between the two civilizations. The vampire legends move into western Europe from the Balkans and other eastern European Christian/Islamic borderlands.

The Vampire myths are based on Vlad the Impaler

The history behind the myth points to Christian/Muslim origins. Vlad's infamous cruelty was dedicated to the protection of Christianity in Eastern Europe from the Turks. This cruel figure is projected onto the vampire. The demonization of the victim.

No reflection in a mirror

Vampires have no reflection in a mirror because they are already reflections. This mythology is about Otherness and projection. One thing going on here is the demonization of Islam's similarities to Christianity. The Christian response is: whatever the Muslims have in common with us is a diabolical inversion. Inversion of symbols is a key move in this mythology.

Vampires hate Crucifixes

Plain enough. Vampires are antithetical to Christianity. The Muslim conceived as the exactly anti-Christian.

Burnt by Holy Water

Plain enough.

Vampires come out at night

This important motif concerns the Muslim fast of Ramadan. The vampire sleeps all day and emerges when the sun goes down. So do Muslims during the fast, or so it can seem to outsiders. In Islam, the darkness of night (and night vigil) is characteristic of piety. Here we see that element of Islamic spirituality cast as satanic.

The Black Cape

Muslims - both male and female - wearing black capes is a common sight in traditional Islamic culture.  Travellers often describe them as bat-like. Indeed, I have seen this myself. At Ramadan, the movement of women (and men) draped in black around the streets. In a Turkish context, see the capes worn in the Mevlevi Order, for example. The Sufi murid is often described as "dead" and, indeed, as "living dead" and wears a black cape (hirka) to signify the tomb. The distinctive Mevlevi fez (kulah or sikke) signifies the tombstone, as Rumi and other Mevlevi authorities tell us. The vampire as the "living dead" is specifically counter-Sufi in this context.

The gnostic elements in vampire mythology, to which some like to point, should always be understood through the mediation of Sufism here.

Vampires drink blood

A play on the idea that the Turks are "blood-thirsty" but also a parody of the fact that Muslims don't drink blood. Blood is forbidden under halal food laws. Thus do vampires drink blood. More generally, this motif reports the actual savagery of battle in such borderlands; war often degenerates into cannibalism (vampirism is a type of cannibalism, after all), even in our own times.

The metal silver

The metal silver appears in many vampire motifs. Silver is the characteristic sacred metal of Islam. (Muslim men, for instance, are forbidden from wearing gold. Silver is much more common.)

There are, of course, deeper pre-Christian foundations for the idea of the vampire - a vitality-sucking demon is a common motif in mythologies everywhere, no doubt; I am talking about the specifically Western manifestations of this mythology in relatively modern times.

I have much more to say about this. Another time. In general though, if you don't appreciate that the historic Christo-Islamic tensions are "a battle raging in a single system", as Hichem Djait put it, then you are only considering half of the equation. Any account of the underside of Western mythology that neglects the construction of the "Saracens" and "Turks" as Other and ignores the impact of that upon "occult" themes in Western culture is naive.

Importantly, this argument shouldn't be seen as just another recital in liberal Islamophobia apologetics - the argument is that the vampire myths are myths of the borderlands, the fault lines. So, for example, it suggests that Islam and the West do not mix as readily as the multiculturalists suggest. There are real, structural divisions. These border myths reveal the darker side of these tensions.

On a personal note, this thesis is important to me. I've spent thirty years as a Westerner exploring Islam. This is not a thesis formed on a whim. The mutual demonization of Islam and Christendom (to say nothing of the Jews) is potent and forms the substrata of our entire psychic make-up. Islam is what is on the other side of the mirror. 

This thesis should not be construed as just an instance of "Islamophobia". On the contrary, it admits the deep and fundamental, visceral, unconscious tensions that operate in Christian/Islamic discourse - these are tectonic pressures. These are myths of the fault line.







- Harper McAlpine Black

The Hemlock Appreciation Society

I think it is very Platonic to have an ironic facade to a serious enterprise. That is the inspiration behind the Hemlock Appreciation Society. (The Society began among a few friends from the University over coffee and lamentations about intellectual life in this town.) We're working on developing this idea in creative ways, most of them in the off-line world.

Here is our charter:

CHARTER

ὁ δὲ ἀνεξέταστος βίος οὐ βιωτὸς ἀνθρώπῳ

The Society exists for the study of Platonic philosophy as a body of perennial wisdom.

We read the dialogues of Plato.

Membership is by invitation only.

The motto of the Society is: 'Philosophy begins in wonder!'

The oath of membership is 'By the dog!'

Members are required to keep their membership concealed from casual inquirers.

The duration of membership is the next three lifetimes or until the member achieves the Vision of the Good, whichever comes first.

The proceedings of the Society are conducted in the memory of our comrade and friend in philosophy Algis Uzdavinys (1962-2010)

Prosperity. 

CONDUCT

Proceedings of the Society shall be conducted as follows:

Quorum - Quorum is two or more members of the Society.

The Reading - One of the members shall read a passage from the Phaedo.

The Toast - One of the members shall propose a toast "By the dog" to which all members in attendance shall drink.

Thereafter, philosophy. 

The Equality of Women in the Republic

The Straussian reading of Plato depends upon knowing irony when you see it. Infamously, Straussians view the doctrine of the equality of women as presented in the Republic as a case of irony: it is a joke, they say, among gentlemen. Strauss finds it impossible to believe that Plato, given his historical context and the sociology of ancient Greece, was being serious.

Once again I find this a case where my reading of Plato resolves questions that others find confounding. To spell it out, my reading of Plato goes like this (in brief):

I suppose that Plato was a loyal, noble-born son of Athens, a patriot, and, as such, a dedicated devotee of the traditional religious cultus of the polis. He lives, however, in a turbulent age when the authority of traditional religion is waning and the traditional gods are being undermined by new thinking and increasing cosmopolitanism. 

I suppose that Plato saw in Socrates someone who was attempting to understand the traditional polis religion (Athenian religion) through the lens of new thinking; not to undermine it, but to defend it. (This is what is lampooned in Aristophanes' The Clouds.) The Platonic enterprise is an extension of this Socratic one; Plato wants to revivify the Athenian religion and explain its profundity in a new mode of understanding.

The wider background to the tumult of this period is the collision of Hellenic and Persian civilizations. The crisis in Athenian polis religion is signalled in Aristophanes' Clouds as an illicit change to the lunar calendar. 

The specific cultus to which Plato is referring is that of the gods of the Acropolis and Athene herself. Plato's philosophia is the religion of Athene recast. Plato's Republic is an idealised (antedeluvian) Athens. Plato's cosmology is a recasting of the foundation myths of the city. Plato's metaphysics is an explanation of the theology of Athene. In Plato, the philosophical path is a means of becoming "earthborn" like the golden souls of ancient Athens. What we find in Plato are the ancient (esoteric) teachings of the Acropolis. 

Plato looked to several sources beyond Athens for the revivification of the traditional polis religion, with three chief ones: 

1. Egypt, and the parallel traditions of the sister city, Sais, (a Solonic heritage), 

2. the young polities of Magna Grecia (Pythagoreans, Parmenides, Timaeus of Locri) where the religious and cultic foundations of polities were being newly enacted. 

3. Persia, in the application of Persian sexigesimal mathematics to Attican mythology.

We could also mention Orphism in this context. But all of this was in the service of his city and his goddess. 

I therefore see the figure of Athene, and the other deities of the Acropolis, shining in the background of all the Platonic dialogues. I think the works of Plato need to be read in this context.

But we also need to bear in mind that Plato's enterprise - an Athenian Reformation - is a delicate and dangerous undertaking, as Socrates discovered. In Plato, much is concealed. When I read Plato I do so as a detective, hunting for the hints and clues and symbols and allusions he has left for readers who would have known the polity religion well. 

Therefore: if the Republic is an idealised Athens, then the citizens of the Republic are idealised Athenians who are perfections of Athenian values. These are the values of the goddess Athene. Philosophy. Defensive warfare. And - the subject of this post - female equality. Athene, indeed, is as great as Zeus to Athenians. She is the most masculine of the goddesses. She embodies the equal female.  It is not surprising then that this is what we find in the Republic. It is not a joke. Nor is it even a radically new idea, in some respects. It is an extrapolation of ideas inherent in the theology of Athene. Note that the equality of women in the Republic is mentioned pertaining to military service, and again in the Timaeus and then explicitly in the Critias:

the figure and the image of the goddess, whom they of old set up in armor, according to the custom of their time, when exercises of war were common to woman and man alike. (110B)

The source of this "radical" idea of female equality is the "goddess" herself, namely Athene. It is a distinctly Athenian concept.

So much else in Plato can be explained in exactly this way. I simply read Plato in relation to the religion of the polis of which he (and Socrates) was a citizen. Then begins the tension between the local and the universal.






- Harper

Reading Plato

The refreshing thing about Leo Strauss is that he resists a merely chronological reading of Plato. Equally, he puts into sharp contrast the general tendencies in modern Platonic scholarship to impose a chronological framework upon the Platonic dialogues. Recently, I borrowed several works by English Platonic scholars, as well as the Cambridge Companion to Plato, and was immediately struck by the pervasive assumptions of chronological reading. It has given me new insights into exactly why I have for so long found the academic study of Plato so utterly irksome. When I was much younger Plato was my passion. I dreamed of going to an academic life and spending my days immersed in Platonic philosophy. The reality turned out to be much different. I found the academic establishment - the classicists - profoundly uninspiring. I wondered how and why it was that so many intelligent people - scholars, and Oxford dons - could turn Plato into such a boring old drudge. Very quickly I recoiled from the prevailing academic discourse and moved into other fields. Now I have a fuller view of why this was and what had caused me to recoil; it was the chronological framework through which virtually all academic scholarship on Plato, at least in the English tradition, is conducted. It is, as I say, refreshing to encounter Strauss because he is not part of that tradition and because he offers new and fertile ways of looking at Plato.

It's a question of how to read the Platonic dialogues. In the English tradition, the first thing you do arrange them in chronological order. Then the game becomes plotting Plato's "evolution"  from his "early" phase, through his "middle" phase to his "late" phase. That is, the English study Plato through time, through the lens of history. The distinction between the early "Socratic" dialogues and the later "Platonic" ones is the mainstay of this framework. But this is not really the practice of philosophy. It is, rather, a "history" of philosophy. The English tradition is pervaded with historical thinking and historical assumptions. It is everywhere in English Platonic scholarship. And it is immensely dull. After a short exposure to it, one never wants to read Plato ever again. This is how I feel about scholars like Vlastos, too (an American). Great erudition, tight scholarship, painstaking study - all to reduce Plato to an historical curiosity of little or no value outside of his time period. I started off loving Plato; if I had followed Vlastos and co. I would have ended up hating the entire endeavour. It is good to discover that others feel the same and that there are alternative ways of reading Plato.

I felt refreshed when I discovered the works of the German scholar Friedlander. Here was a reader of Plato who viewed the dialogues as literary creations, not as signposts on a road of historical "evolution". More recently, I found the writings of Bernard Suzanne. He wants to consider the dialogues as a single edifice and not as a stream of "development". He proposes that the dialogues were written in a much shorter period of time than do the English developmentalists. That strikes me as a wise move. He wants to consider all the dialogues as a single body of work. That is how I always regarded them, and still do. The basic approach is this: the Platonic philosophy, or the Platonic viewpoint, is complete and intact, in toto, right from the beginning - it is then extrapolated and "unpacked" in multiform encounters through the various dialogues. It is not a case that Plato "developed" or "evolved" - he has a single view and it is expanded and exposed through his works. That is, all the dialogues are a singular conception, not a development of ideas from immature to mature.

For me, a very helpful encounter was the works of the great French metaphysician, Rene Guenon. He is a writer - a mathematician - who composes essays and books over some 40 years and yet there is virtually no development in his ideas. His point of view is exactly the same at the end as it was at the beginning, and yet his works are fascinatingly rich explorations of the same viewpoint applied to various religious and philosophical traditions. After reading Guenon I felt more secure in my assumptions about Plato. Plato also is a metaphysician, and a mathematician. Why is it not possible that Plato had a firm position from the outset and that he has explored it in sundry ways and various contexts in his many works? In that case, reading Plato through a historical or chronological lens is as radically wrong as looking for "development" in Guenon. In both cases, whatever "development" there is is hardly the important thing and it is quite wrong to place it at the centre of our studies.

Plato, though, is a more complicated case. This is because the man himself nowhere appears in his writing and because, as Strauss wants to emphasize, the voice through which we might assume Plato speaks - namely Socrates - is not a plain speaker but rather an "ironical man". That is, the above mentioned "firm position" that I suppose Plato held from the outset is not given voice; it is hidden, indeed carefully hidden. I acknowledge all the difficulties this presents, but I don't think that those difficulties are better resolved by a chronological reading. Nor is this to avoid the difficulties posed by the question of historical consciousness in Plato. Clearly, Plato knows himself to be a man on the cusp of history - even his fictions are presented with the semblance of history. It is significant, for example, that there appear to be no fictional characters in the dialogues. The dialogues are not a-temporal but rather seem suspended in a tension between inside and outside of time. No doubt an entirely a-historical reading of Plato would be wrong too.

All the same, I see no compelling reasons to suppose that, for example, the Laws should be regarded as Plato's final work, or even as a late work, or why the Apology should be regarded as the first or an early work. The question of the relationship between dialogues is a complicated one. Disparate dialogues clearly allude to one another (the Timaeus to the Republic, for example) in ways that are altogether confounding. Imposing a chronological structure based on a supposed relationship of the author to Socrates does nothing to resolve such difficulties but it destroys much along the way. It is better to consider the intractable nature of such difficulties as part of the design and to deal with them in that way.

We find an instructive parallel - albeit from a very different tradition - in the Koran. It is a work consisting of visionary narrations from over several decades but it is not arranged chronologically - there is some other ordering principle. The very first move that Western scholars make, however, is to try to rearrange the surahs (chapters) in chronological order on the basis of the Prophet's presumed growing and changing sense of mission. This does violence to the text; it denatures it. This is how I feel about attempts to read Plato chronologically - it denatures the text. The Koranic revelations are thoroughly shuffled. I think that Plato has deliberately shuffled his dialogues and is working to quite different ordering principles. What those principles are is another matter, but we can be sure they go beyond and are much more interesting than flat, prosaic chronology.




- Harper McAlpine Black

The Gardening metaphor in Plato

Leo's Strauss' reading of Plato is based in an important passage in the Phaedrus where, we are told of the deficiencies of the written text. A written text is deficient, Socrates and Phaedrus agree, because it always says the same thing and it says it exactly the same to everyone. Living speech is not like that.

Strauss, quite correctly I think, detects in this section of the Phaedrus a key to understanding Plato's own works. Not all texts are equal. The best sort of text counters the inherent deficiencies of writing. Such texts don't say the same thing to everyone; they are designed to be read differently by different types of readers. This is the foundation of Strauss' notion of the "esoteric text."

It is a very important passage for me, though, because of its reflections in the opening passages of the Timaeus-Critias ensemble. By extension, I am also interested in the horticultural metaphor that runs through this passage but about which Strauss says nothing. By my reading, the mythological underpinnings of the Timaeus cosmology is based in the Athenian cultus of autochthony. Here in the Phaedrus Socrates is comparing philosophy to the growing of plants from the soil.

Moreover, I follow the Phaedrus passage to the same metaphor in the Theaetetus, and there we find the soil/gardening metaphor explicitly combined with the midwife metaphor. This is a very important passage for my reading of Plato over-all. Midwifery and horticulture are collapsed together. Here we have philosophy as autochthony. Here it is:

***

Soc. Did you ever remark that they [midwives] are also most cunning matchmakers, and have a thorough knowledge of what unions are likely to produce a brave brood? 

Theaet. No, never. 

Soc. Then let me tell you that this is their greatest pride, more than cutting the umbilical cord. And if you reflect, you will see that the same art which cultivates and gathers in the fruits of the earth, will be most likely to know in what soils the several plants or seeds should be deposited. 

Theaet. Yes, the same art. 

Soc. And do you suppose that with women the case is otherwise? 

Theaet. I should think not.

***

Here is the extending text of the passage in the Phaedrus:

Soc. I cannot help feeling, Phaedrus, that writing is unfortunately like painting; for the creations of the painter have the attitude of life, and yet if you ask them a question they preserve a solemn silence. And the same may be said of speeches. You would imagine that they had intelligence, but if you want to know anything and put a question to one of them, the speaker always gives one unvarying answer. And when they have been once written down they are tumbled about anywhere among those who may or may not understand them, and know not to whom they should reply, to whom not: and, if they are maltreated or abused, they have no parent to protect them; and they cannot protect or defend themselves.

Phaedr. That again is most true.

Soc. Is there not another kind of word or speech far better than this, and having far greater power-a son of the same family, but lawfully begotten?

Phaedr. Whom do you mean, and what is his origin?

Soc. I mean an intelligent word graven in the soul of the learner, which can defend itself, and knows when to speak and when to be silent.

Phaedr. You mean the living word of knowledge which has a soul, and of which written word is properly no more than an image?

Soc. Yes, of course that is what I mean. And now may I be allowed to ask you a question: Would a husbandman, who is a man of sense, take the seeds, which he values and which he wishes to bear fruit, and in sober seriousness plant them during the heat of summer, in some garden of Adonis, that he may rejoice when he sees them in eight days appearing in beauty? at least he would do so, if at all, only for the sake of amusement and pastime. But when he is in earnest he sows in fitting soil, and practises husbandry, and is satisfied if in eight months the seeds which he has sown arrive at perfection?

Phaedr. Yes, Socrates, that will be his way when he is in earnest; he will do the other, as you say, only in play.

Soc. And can we suppose that he who knows the just and good and honourable has less understanding, than the husbandman, about his own seeds?

Phaedr. Certainly not.

Soc. Then he will not seriously incline to "write" his thoughts "in water" with pen and ink, sowing words which can neither speak for themselves nor teach the truth adequately to others?

Phaedr. No, that is not likely.

Soc. No, that is not likely-in the garden of letters he will sow and plant, but only for the sake of recreation and amusement; he will write them down as memorials to be treasured against the forgetfulness of old age, by himself, or by any other old man who is treading the same path. He will rejoice in beholding their tender growth; and while others are refreshing their souls with banqueting and the like, this will be the pastime in which his days are spent.

Phaedr. A pastime, Socrates, as noble as the other is ignoble, the pastime of a man who can be amused by serious talk, and can discourse merrily about justice and the like.

Soc. True, Phaedrus. But nobler far is the serious pursuit of the dialectician, who, finding a congenial soul, by the help of science sows and plants therein words which are able to help themselves and him who planted them, and are not unfruitful, but have in them a seed which others brought up in different soils render immortal, making the possessors of it happy to the utmost extent of human happiness.

Phaedr. Far nobler, certainly.

Soc. And now, Phaedrus, having agreed upon the premises we decide about the conclusion.

Phaedr. About what conclusion?

Soc. About Lysias, whom we censured, and his art of writing, and his discourses, and the rhetorical skill or want of skill which was shown in them-these are the questions which we sought to determine, and they brought us to this point. And I think that we are now pretty well informed about the nature of art and its opposite.

Phaedr. Yes, I think with you; but I wish that you would repeat what was said.

Soc. Until a man knows the truth of the several particulars of which he is writing or speaking, and is able to define them as they are, and having defined them again to divide them until they can be no longer divided, and until in like manner he is able to discern the nature of the soul, and discover the different modes of discourse which are adapted to different natures, and to arrange and dispose them in such a way that the simple form of speech may be addressed to the simpler nature, and the complex and composite to the more complex nature-until he has accomplished all this, he will be unable to handle arguments according to rules of art, as far as their nature allows them to be subjected to art, either for the purpose of teaching or persuading;-such is the view which is implied in the whole preceding argument.

Wayman in love - the sociological gaze

One of my all-time favourite poems is by the Canadian poet Tom Wayman and its called Wayman in Love. It's a funny poem about a very serious matter - the intrusion of what I call the "sociological gaze" into the intimate lives of ordinary people. Sociologists think they have a right to study everything and everyone. Nothing is sacred. Everything is reduced down to power relationships. It is an ugly, impoverished vision of human beings. The politicisation of sexuality is by far its ugliest and most destructive manifestation. Poor Tom Wayman...

WAYMAN IN LOVE

At last Wayman gets the girl into bed.
He is locked in one of those embraces
so passionate his left arm is asleep
when suddenly he is bumped in the back.
"Excuse me," a voice mutters, thick with German.
Wayman and the girl sit up astounded
as a furry gentleman in boots and a frock coat
climbs in under the covers.

"My name is Doktor Marx," the intruder announces
settling his neck comfortably on the pillow.
"I'm here to consider for you the cost of a kiss."
He pulls out a notepad. "Let's see now,
we have the price of the mattress, this room must be rented,
your time off work, groceries for two,
medical fees in case of accidents..."

"Look," Wayman says,
"couldn't we do this later."
The philosopher sighs and continues: "You too are affected, Miss.
If you are not working, you are going to resent
your dependent position. This will influence
I assure you, your most intimate moments..."

"Doctor, please," Wayman says, "All we want
is to be left alone."
But another beard, more nattily dressed,
is also getting into the bed.
There is a shifting and heaving of bodies
as everyone wriggles out room for themselves.
"I want you to meet a friend from Vienna,"
Marx says. "This is Doktor Freud."

The newcomer straightens his glasses,
peers at Wayman and the girl.
"I can see," he begins,
"that you two have problems..."


- Tom Wayman

This is a poem just waiting for feminist analysis, isn't it? You don't need to go any further than the first line. At last Wayman gets the girl into bed. Clearly, Wayman is a sexual predator. The words "at last" are a confession that he has, in fact, stalked this poor woman. And the words "gets the girl" tell us that he thinks of her as an object to be possessed. There ought to be laws against it! Oh wait! There are! Just ask Julian Assange...

There's nothing more intrusive but less sexy than sociology. In all seriousness, the intrusion of the sociological gaze into the intimate lives of human beings is one of the most abhorrent and appalling aspects of the times in which we live. Wayman speaks for the common man...

"Doctor, please," Wayman says, "All we want is to be left alone."



- Harper McAlpine Black

Socrates as Daedalus

Since I identify autochthony as the central (but “secret”) theme of the Platonic dialogues, it is a reasonable question to ask: if so, where does Socrates fit in? How does the central character in Plato’s dialogues, Socrates, fit into the theme of autochthony? The identity and meaning of the character of Socrates is not something I have addressed.

My reading of Plato, it might be objected more generally, is anti- or at least non-Socratic. Following ancient tradition, I usually put the Timaeus and the Parmenides at the centre of the dialogues, a cosmology and a metaphysics. But Socrates is not the primary speaker in either of those works, both of which are usually designated as “late” in the supposed chronology of Plato’s works. They are not “Socratic” dialogues like the supposedly early works. My autochthony theme is largely extracted from a reading of the Timaeus and Critias ensemble. What of Socrates? If my larger reading of Plato has any merit then I must explain the place of Socrates in the Platonic autochthony.

My first response to this is to emphasize all the ways in which Socrates was an Athenian and, I would argue, Plato presents him as the archetypal Athenian. Only the archetypal Athenian could describe the archetypal Athens, as Socrates does in the Republic. There is a wealth of evidence in the dialogues in support of this view, but Crito 52b and 53a are enough. Socrates was a loyal son of Athens, who never left Athens for any other land. Autochthony is the boast of the Athenians. There is no one more Athenian than Socrates. He is autochthonous in that general sense just because he is a native born Athenian.

More specifically, though, in Euthyphro, 11c and 15b we are told that Socrates’ genealogical claim is through Daedalus. This is why ancient tradition tells us that Socrates was a stonemason. The name Daedalus means “skilful worker”. Socrates was a craftsman. The Daedalus from whom he claimed ancestry, though, is specifically the Athenian, and not the Cretan, Daedalus. The Athenians had acquired the Daedalus mythos from Crete. In this appropriation, Daedalus becomes a native of Athens, the grandson of Erectheus, the autochthonous line.

In Euthyphro 15b, moreover, Socrates is not merely in the line of Daedalus but is portrayed as Daedalus (sort of). I think this is the key to understanding the character of Socrates in Plato. He is a Daedalus figure. He is, pre-eminently, the “skilful worker”. In this we must understand “skill” as an aspect of “sophia” (wisdom) and as an attribute of the goddess Athena.

Objection: why would this "key" to Socrates be hidden in the Euthyphro and not be mentioned, for example, in the Phaedo?

Answer: The "fortunate coincidence" at Phaedo 58a by which Socrates' execution is delayed concerns the story of Theseus. This puts the whole of the Phaedo in the context of the Theseus/Daedalus mythos. 

Further: to consider Socrates as Daedalus casts new light on the dialogue called the Laws, the only dialogue in which Socrates does not appear and the only dialogue not set in Athens. Instead, we find an unnamed generic "Athenian" in Crete. This Platonic configuration of references surely alludes to the shared mythology of Athens and Crete.

By extension, Socrates in the Phaedo is the man who knows his way through the labyrinth, the minotaur being in this analogy the fear of death.

No doubt Socrates-as-Daedalus is a well-covered motif. My specific interest here is the connection to autochthony.

I point out, too, that the reference at Euthyphro 15b reminds us of the beginning of the Timaeus. In the Euthyphro Socrates is Daedalus, he says, because he is bringing Euthyphro's ideas into motion. But in the Timaeus he asks Timaeus to do this: the Locrian answers Socrates' request to see his ideal state in action. The Locrian, therefore, plays the demiurgic role there, not Socrates. It seems, then, that this is the role of the central figures in Plato's dialogues, both the Socratic and the non-Socratic dialogues. The central figure, in all cases, uses "skilful means'.





- Harper McAlpine Black




 

The Remembered Text

The text is too much with us. We are all much too bookish. I am, anyway. After long years teaching University courses, I'm saturated in text. I've read enough books to sink a ship. In all likelihood, I'd read more books by the time I was twenty years old than Saint Augustine read in his entire life, and now, decades later, it is just ridiculous. This is not a boast, it's a confession of a sin, and it's a sign of the times in which we live. Too much text. Too many books.

I recall the first time I experienced the horror of books. I was a new employee in a city bookstore. The boss delegated me to 'General Fiction' and my task all day was to clean and dust and alphabetize. I stood before the 'General Fiction' section and beheld the rows and rows of shelves jam-packed with endless novels. It suddenly struck me that there were more books in the world than the world could ever possibly need, and I wondered why anyone would spend their lives reading such a mountain of fiction or even more why anyone would spend their lives writing this stuff. It was my first sense of living in a text flood. All the same, I've loved books and devoted my life to books in one way or another.

After a while, though, the mere textuality of text is deadening. I go looking for ways to bring the text alive. One of the best ways - the most obvious really - is simply to put the text aside. Stop reading it. Only think about what you remember of the text. Because, I realise, the remembered text is that version of the text that is alive. The words on the page are dead. When we read, we internalise the book and so we weave it into ourselves. This internal book is a living thing. I've come to appreciate the remembered text and come to dislike and have an aversion to the textual text.

By the Remembered Text,  I don't mean the memorized text. The memorized text is a different thing again, although it might be considered a type of Remembered Text. Muslims have the Koran as a memorized text. I don't mean that. The Remembered Text is the text as the reader remembers it and with all the deficiencies and quirks of our puny faculties. The Remembered Text is a mottled and variegated thing.

We can identify many diverse things of which it will ordinarily consist:

(a) aspects of the text remembered correctly,
(b) aspects of the text mis-remembered to a greater or lesser degree,
(c) impressions (that join the gaps between facts)
(d) completely erroneous memories
(e) accidental importations from other texts
(f) related memories

Every text points to a lived truth beyond itself. The valuable part of a text is what you can carry with you.

The Remembered Text is an excellent teaching device. Here is a strategy for teaching philosophy to undergrads. The text in question, let us say, is the Apology of Socrates.

1. All students acquire a copy of the text and read it. If they read different translations, so much the better. We avoid the textual tyranny of everyone having the same translation.

2. Students are lectured briefly on the structure and technical characteristics of the text, but not on its themes or content.

3. Books away. Students must not bring the text to class, cannot have any notes and cannot access the text from laptops or iphones. No text.

4. Students discuss and debate the text from memory.

5. Students can consult the text after class, and can reread, but in all subsequent classes discussion and debate is from memory of the text. The text we use for philosophizing is the Remembered Text.

One of the peculiar joys of conducting classes like this is when the entire class, and the teacher, agree on a fabricated or mistaken reading. Someone says, "Socrates says..." and everyone either explicitly or tacitly agrees even though, as we find out later, Socrates said no such thing. A whole group of people, that is, can have a false memory, even of a very familiar text. In other cases, the Remembered Text is negotiated.

Better still, this is a method that completely cuts the grammarians among us off at the knees. Where students have a copy of the text there is always some bastard who says, "But Socrates uses the past participle in that sentence..." Not in the Remembered Text he doesn't. The grammar of the Remembered Text is fluid. Similarly, this method pulls the rug from under the budding lawyers among us. It puts an end to hair-splitting and finnicky textuality. Instead, it promotes living debate. You can't hide behind the text. You can't play games of "Plato says..." You can't trip people up with a destructive textual exactitude. There is more commerce in ideas.

I suspect this method would be useful in teaching or studying novels and fiction too. Students should be taught to identify and appreciate the Remembered Text, namely the text they have appropriated through reading and that they carry inside them. That, surely, is always the real treasure we extract from a book.

Living as we do in a flood of text, it is important - and vitally refreshing - to revisit earlier modes of life when the text was not so much with us. Once, the Remembered Text played a more important role for readers. You couldn't afford to own a book. you read it - devoured it - and acquired it through memory. Some people could memorize large amounts of text verbatim, but most readers had a highly polished and carefully acquired Remembered Text. We see a case of how formal this art could be in the early passages of Plato's Symposium where there is a discussion of various and contrasting rememberings of speeches which are carefully compared and that render the text of the Symposium as we have it related.

I'm inclined to think the Remembered Text is a healthy thing in religion too. I'm in rebellion against Protestant textuality and Rabbinical hermeneutics. The idea of putting a Bible in every hand and studying it in its every grammatical detail is horrifying. Far better if there was only a few Bibles here and there, and everyone was only allowed to read the text just once. For the most part, the text is inscribed in living memory, not marks upon a page.

An important instance of the Remembered Text is the synthetic "gospel" readers of the New Testament construct from the four parallel gospels. The reader collapses the four texts into a single Remembered Text which is at once all and none of them.





- Harper McAlpine Black

Athena scorning Hephaestus - Paris Bordone

This painting by Paris Bordone is an important item of evidence in my account of the mythology of Athena and its relation to the philosophy of Plato. It is important to me to identify Athena as a cloud goddess. Some people have questioned this aspect of my work and have suggested that this identification is idiosyncratic. I maintain it is a traditional interpretation. I point to this painting.

Although some have questioned it, the painting very plainly depicts the following scenario from Athenian mythology as described by Apollodorus:

Athena came to Hephaestus, desirous of fashioning arms. But he, being forsaken by Aphrodite, fell in love with Athena, and began to pursue her; but she fled. When he got near her with much ado (for he was lame), he attempted to embrace her; but she, being a chaste virgin, would not submit to him, and he ejaculated on the leg of the goddess. In disgust she wiped of the semen with wool and threw it to the ground; and as she fled, the ejaculate fell to the ground, and Erichthonius was produced.

In my interpretation of this myth, it is essentially an agricultural myth about rain and fertility. Hephaestus is a thunder god. His ejaculate is rain. The wool of Athena is the clouds. Wool = clouds. This is important symbolism to Athena as a weaving goddess.

Again, I have had people - indeed, classical scholars - intimate that my reading of this myth is "fanciful". But, as you can see, this painter and I are in agreement. Athena is here plainly depicted as a cloud goddess and the clouds take the place of the tufts of wool in the myth.

(There is another important symbolism to do with the thigh of the goddess, but I will leave that to another time. Thigh bone = earth.)

Paris Bordone was a Venetian mannerist painter from the sixteenth century. The date of the painting is about 1555-1560. Unfortunately, we know nothing more about this painting. We do not know for whom it was painted or for what location. But it definitely depicts the myth as told by Apollodorus: the chaste Athena scorning the advances of the blacksmith god. The Renaissance interest in the story is as an allegory of the productive power of unrequited love.

Socrates and Aristophanes

The relationship between Socrates and the comic playwright Aristophanes is central to Leo Strauss' reading of Plato. His view that the "secret" or "esoteric" doctrine of Plato was nihilistic atheism is confirmed for him in Aristophanes' depiction of Socrates as a scientific god-denier in the play The Clouds. I am slowly reading my way into these particular strata of Platonic philosophy, but my interests and direction are very different to those of Mr Strauss. My work on Plato has involved exposing a quite different "secret tradition", but I am led, nevertheless, to the same passages and the same dialogues as is Mr Strauss. It's an intriguing thing, and it is a very tangled tale, but I hope to get to the bottom of it.

Here is an example:

The speech of Aristophanes in the Symposium describes how originally human beings were spherical creatures of three types corresponding to Sun, Moon and Earth. As a punishment, Zeus then slices these spheres in two and at length mankind is reduced to his current shape.

I read this famous speech cosmologically and I regard it as a key text in what I take to be the "secret tradition" of Plato, namely an esoteric exposition of the gods and cultus of Athens, and the cultus of the Acropolis in particular and the goddess Athena in particular. I take the Timaeus as the central Platonic text and see it as having a cultic background that concerns the great festival, the Panathenaea. Further, this "secret tradition" has a distinct mythology and symbolism that stretches back to Egypt and forwards through alchemical and related traditions. A key symbol of this esoteric Plato is the metal gold. The mythology concerns the (Athenian) doctrine of autochthony and the birth of the "golden race".

Strauss reads the speech of Aristophanes in a very different way. He regards it as paradoxical. For him, the passage presents a contrast between the cosmic gods and the Olympians. The cosmic gods are spherical - Earth, Moon, Sun. But the Olympian deities are anthropomorphic. It is paradoxical that when Zeus punishes mankind, he transforms them from the form of the cosmic gods into the form of the Olympian gods. In punishing mankind, Zeus makes mankind more like the Olympians. That is, he punishes man by making him more theomorphic.

At this point Mr Strauss directs our attention to the play called 'Peace' by Aristophanes. He believes that the speech in Plato alludes to a particular passage in 'Peace'. In this passage, the playwright makes exactly the distinction between cosmic and Olympian deities. Mr Strauss maintains that the Greeks commonly drew the contrast and maintained that the Olympian gods are superior because they are anthropomorphic. Herodotus draws the distinction. The Persians, he says, worship the Sun and Moon and cosmic spheres, but the Greeks worship gods who have human form - and the Greek gods are superior therefore.

Mr Strauss has a strong argument. It is difficult to suppose that Aristophanes' speech in Plato does not allude to the distinction the real Aristophanes makes in 'Peace'.

Here is the passage from that play:

* * * 

TRYGAEUS [To HERMES]

And I shall reveal to you a great and terrible plot that is being hatched against the gods.

HERMES

Hah! speak and perchance I shall let myself be softened.

TRYGAEUS

Know then, that the Moon and that infamous Sun are plotting against you, and want to deliver Greece into the hands of the barbarians.

HERMES

What for?

TRYGAEUS

Because it is to you that we sacrifice, whereas the barbarians worship them; hence they would like to see you destroyed, that they alonemight receive the offerings.

HERMES

Is it then for this reason that these untrustworthy charioteers have for so long been defrauding us, one of them robbing us of daylightand the other nibbling away at the other's disk?

TRYGAEUS

Yes, certainly. So therefore, Hermes, my friend, help us with your whole heart to find and deliver the captive and we will celebrate the great Panathenaea in your honour as well as all the festivals of the other gods; for Hermes shall be the Mysteries. the Dipolia, the Adonia; everywhere the towns, freed from their miseries, will sacrifice to Hermes the Liberator; you will be loaded with benefits of every kind, and to start with, I offer you this cup for libations as your first present.

HERMES

Ah! how golden cups do influence me! Come, friends. get to work. To the pit quickly, pick in hand, and drag away the stones.

* * *

Notice, then, that the barbarians (non-Greeks) worship the spherical cosmic gods and these gods, says Trygaeus, are plotting against the Greeks. Such gods are the gods of foreigners, non-Greeks, barbarians, and they threaten the Olympian gods.

For Mr Strauss, the speech of Aristophanes in the Symposium swings on this passage from 'Peace'. He uses this passage in 'Peace' to illuminate the strange symbolism of Aristophanes' account of the creation of (or fall of) man. He sees irony. It is ironic that, in punishing man, Zeus makes man more god-like.

The passage from the play is highly suggestive to me, though, and is very interesting in view of my exposition of the esoteric Plato. I make a couple of observations:

*Trygaeus specifically mentions the festival of the Panathenaea here.

*There is specific mention of the metal gold. the golden cup. Hermes says 'Ah, how golden cups do influence me.'

*There is a discrepancy: in Plato the spheres are three: Moon, Sun and Earth. It is essential to Aristophanes whole speech that there be three spheres, not two. In 'Peace' there is only the Sun and the Moon, but not the Earth. I regard this discrepancy as very significant here.

I think Mr Strauss is, yet again, drawing attention to the right passages and the right connections between texts, but he is drawing the wrong conclusions. For me, the passage in 'Peace' further confirms that the symbolism of Aristophanes' speech in the Symposium concerns an esoteric doctrine about the cultus of Athens that specifically concerns the festival of the Panathenaea.

Regarding The Clouds, I draw attention to references to changes in the Athenian calendar that forms the background to the play. (The theme of debt concerns this too, because debts were settled at particular phases of the lunar month.) There is a whole configuration of references running through Plato concerning the festivals of Athens and the Panathenaea in particular. The 'coulds' in the play concern Athena as goddess of clouds and air.

George Dunlop Lesley

What an illustrious name is George. In previous posts I have revealed my abiding interest in traditions of autochthony, which I principally study through my reading of Plato. It was the subject of my PhD. In other contexts I have expressed the opinion that royalty and royal lines are, finally, a prolongation of autochthony myths. What name says this better than George. Geo = earth. George, Prince of Cambridge, was named today. 

It has prompted me to post a couple pictures of one of my favourite Victorian artists, George Dunlop Lesley. 

The Goldfish Seller

Winter Walk

Islamic Spirituality - Essay Topics

This is my final teaching expedition. Here is my vast array of essay topics for students for the coming semester. I might add a few more yet! The students are second and third year undergrads studying Religious Studies as a broadening elective subject. The subject is wide open. It's called ISLAMIC SPIRITUALITY 200/300. I've never taught this syllabus before. This is the one and only time the subject will be offered, so I've decided to give students the widest possible choice of essay assignment. Did I miss anything?


1. Jerusalem

Make a study of the place of Jerusalem and its sacred sites (the Furthest Mosque and the Dome of the Rock) in Islam and consider this in relation to contemporary disputes about the control of the city. Why did the early Muslims face Jerusalem, rather than Mecca, to pray? Consider the claims of the Muslims in relation to the claims of the Jews and Christians. What do you make of the so-called 'Third Temple' movement? Give some attention to the story of the 'Night Journey' of the Prophet and to the place of Jerusalem in the mystical life of Islam.

2. Mechanistic Prayer?

"The ceremonial character of the religion of the Musalmans is, in spite of its simplicity, carried to a pitch beyond the utmost demands either of Rome or of Russia...Prayer is reduced to a mechanical act as distinct from a mental act...it resembles the worship of machines rather than of reasonable beings."

Make a study of the Islamic understanding of prayer, comparing and contrasting with Christian understandings. You may, if you wish, make some reference to prayer in Judaism or other religions as well. What does each religion understand prayer to be?

3. The Green Man

Describe the place of the Green Man, al-Khidr, in Islamic spirituality. Explore traditions surrounding this figure. Do we find the same idea in other traditions?

4. Orientalism

Write an appreciation of the depictions of Islam by the so-called ‘Orientalist’ European artists in the 18th and 19th centuries. Discuss the proposition that this was the first time ever that Europeans looked upon Islam sympathetically. Your essay should also discuss the thesis of Edward Said in his famous book ‘Orientalism’. Does Said give a distorted, one-sided and resentful view of it?

5. Music

With particular reference to the Chisti Order of Sufis, make a study of the place of music in Islamic spiritual life. Why do some groups say that music is “haram” (forbidden)? Your essay should, in part, be an appreciation of Islamic spiritual music.

6. Hagar

Explore the place of the story of Hagar and Ishmael in Islamic spirituality. What does the story signify? Your essay should give some account of the symbolism of Hagar’s running between hills, and the story of the founding of the well of Zamzam. Do not treat these as historical stories; instead, what is the symbolic, cosmological and metaphysical significance of these things?

7. Ishmaili Islam

Make a study of the Ismaili sect of Shia Islam. Why do some Muslims not regard them as Muslims at all? What is the essential spiritual difference between the Ismailis and other Muslim groups?

8. Women, Perfume & Prayer

The Prophet loved three things: women, perfume and prayer. Discuss this as a theme in Islamic spirituality. What do “women, perfume and prayer” represent?

9. The Night of Power

Discuss the place of the ‘Night of Power’ during the fast of Ramadan in the mystical life of Islam.

10. Whirling Dervishes

Make a study of the spirituality of Rumi and the Mevlevi Sufi order or the so-called ‘Whirling Dervishes’. Why is Rumi the best selling poet in contemporary America? Describe the symbolism of the famous whirling dance. How does it work as a spiritual method?

11. The Occult

Discuss the role of Islam as 'Other' and "Shadow' in relation to Western culture with particular emphasis on Islamic elements in Western occultism. Many elements of Islamic civilization and spirituality were absorbed by the West through the agency of 'esoteric' associations and fraternities, or else they remained "dark' and sinister in the Western mind. Consider, for example, the Rosicrucian myths, or the infamous 'Necronomicon', or Aleister Crowley's 'Book of the Law' or other aspects of the occult in the West. How important is Islam (as Other, or Shadow) to the sociology and psychology and history of Western occultism?

12. Shahadah

‘There is no god but god.’ Analyse and discuss the depth of meaning in the Islamic Testimony of Faith, the Shahadah. Is it just an empty tautology? Why do Muslims regard it as profound and as containing all the secrets of Islam?

13. Christ in Islam

Closely examine the role and status of Christ in Islam and the Koranic critique of Christianity. Expose the main lines of doctrinal difference between the two religions. Give especial attention to the question of Unitarianism vs. Trinitarianism. Is God One or a Trinity of Persons, or both? Is there an orthodox perspective in either faith that transcends this most fundamental point of contention?

14. Sufism and Muslim Decline

It is sometimes argued by Muslims reflecting on the last few centuries of Islamic history that the reason Islamic civilization fell into decline and succumbed to Western colonialism was Islam's 'drift' into mysticism. The Sufis and mystics, it is argued, diverted the Muslim world into superstition and away from the maintenance of the essentials of civilization. On the strength of such arguments as this there has been a strong reaction against the Sufi brotherhoods in many parts of the Muslim world in recent times. Does Sufism belong to medieval Islam? What role does it have in modern Islam? Did Sufism contribute to the decline of Islam? Did al-Ghazzali make the wrong choice in championing the Sufis over the philosophers?

15. Sufi Tales

Select three or four Sufi teaching tales and explain what you take to be their spiritual significance. What is being taught? Are such stories really part of the Islamic religion, or are they better understood as reactions to and protests against Islamic orthodoxy?

16. Geometric Art

Creator of the heavens and the earth! When He decrees a thing He need only say 'Be!' and it is. (Holy Koran 2:117) Discuss Islamic geometric art in the light of this verse from the Koran. Is this Islamic art spiritual or is it just nice decoration?

17. Muslim/Christian Parallels

The Koran is to Islam what Christ is to Christians, and the Prophet Muhammad is to Islam what the Virgin Mary is to Christians. Discuss these parallels and comment on the proposition that all misunderstandings between Muslims and Christians start here.

18. Shia and Sunnis

Aside from the disputed claims to the leadership of the Ummah after the death of Muhammad, what are the main differences between Shia and Sunni Islamic spirituality? What deep, spiritual perspectives (rather than political differences) separate the two communities?

19. A Christian Heresy?

Christians have often portrayed Islam as a "heresy". What type of heresy? What is the basis for this portrayal? Explore the relationship between Islam's understanding of Jesus with that of various "heretical" forms of early Christianity. Consider the possibility that the Prophet Muhammad was influenced by various Christian sects in Arabia and/or Syria in the early years of his mission. What Christian influences was Muhammad under? What is the significance of the traditional stories that relate that a Nestorian monk was the first to acknowledge the young Muhammad as the long-awaited prophet?

20. Converts

Study written accounts of a diverse group of Western converts to Islam, such people, for example, as Michael Muhammad Knight (wrestler), Jemima Goldsmith (daughter of Jewish financier), Anthony Mundine (Australian boxer), Marmaduke Pickthall (novelist), Cat Stevens (pop musician), John Heirlihy (writer), Jeffery Lang (Professor of Mathematics), Colonel Donald S. Rockwell (poet), Michael Wolfe (journalist), Charles Le Gai Eaton (diplomat), Art Blakely (jazz musician), Pamela Taylor (science fiction writer), Wilfried Hofmann (social scientist), David Hicks (Australian mercenary) and others. Compare and contrast their experiences. Are there common factors in their personal stories? What difficulties do they encounter? What was lacking in their western/Christian background that they felt it necessary to convert to Islam? Which of them, do you think, makes the most convincing (complete or comfortable) Western Muslim?

21. The Maryamiyya

Investigate the origins, doctrines and legitimacy of the Sufi Order (tariqa) founded by the Swiss traditionalist and visionary Frithjof Schuon, the 'Maryamiyya' (originally the Alawiyya) giving consideration to the several controversies concerning this Order. Schuon, drawing upon his association with Rene Guenon, took on the role of 'Sheihk' in a branch of the Alawiyya Order. Then, in the 1960s, he claims that the Virgin Mary appeared to him and appointed him to a universal mission. Later, he moved to the United States where he had a close connection with tribes of American Indians. Find out what you can about the doctrines and practices of Schuon's 'Maryamiyya'. How 'traditional" is it? Does it depart from orthodox Sufism? Is it an example of a syncretic 'Western' or even 'New Age' style of Sufism?

22. Hijab

Explore the spiritual dimension of hijab or the veiling of women in Islam. Your essay should address theological and metaphysical issues more than sociological and political ones. Why is the feminine veiled? What does the veil symbolize? How is the feminine understood in Islamic spirituality?

23. The Hidden Imam

Explore the place of the Hidden Imam in Twelver Shia Islam and in Islam in general. What sort of spirituality follows from the doctrine of occultation?

24. First and Last: A Primordial Perspective

Consider the claim that the Islamic revelation is a both the last and the first revelation. What in Islam is “primordial”? How can it claim to be a return to the original, primordial religion of mankind?

25. Henri Corbin

With reference to the work of Henri Corbin, describe the place of the ‘Via Imaginativa’ (the path of the imagination) in Islamic (and especially Shi’ite) spirituality.

26. Isabelle Eberhardt and Feminist Converts

Why did early feminists like Isabelle Eberhardt convert to Islam? Why, in late 19th C. and early 20th C. photography, were “liberated” women depicted in “oriental” clothing? What is the connection between early feminism and Western perceptions of Islam?

27. Hadith

Write an appreciation of the Hadith literature of Islam as a body of spiritual guidance. What spiritual perspective welcomes a tradition that offers guidance on every detail of life, from how to pray to how to eat? What are some of the most profound and spiritual ahadith in your opinion? Your essay should give particular attention to the class of narrations called ‘hadith qudsi.’

28. Two Books

Read and review Frithjof Schuon's Understanding Islam along with S. H. Nasr's Ideals & Realities of Islam. Both works are considered among the best modern accounts of Islam written in European languages. What impressions of Islam do they leave you with? What aspects of Islam, as these writers present it, are most surprising to you? What work do you prefer, and why? (This topic does not require that you look at a wide range of resources. You can answer the topic adequately by just reading the two nominated texts.)

29. The Gospel of Barnabas

Make a study of the Islamic dimensions of the medieval Gospel of Barnabas. How much did the author(s) know about Islam? Your essay should discuss the identification of the Prophet Muhammad with the Paraclete from the Fourth Gospel.

30. Adam and Eve

According to Islamic legend, Adam and Eve met each other on Mount Arafat just outside of Mecca. Explore this and similar Islamic legends where Biblical stories are superimposed upon the Meccan landscape.

31. Michael Muhammad Knight

“He might be brash, provocative and offensive but people like Michael Muhammad Knight are stirring the roots of contemporary Islam, and that’s just what Islam needs right now.” Discuss. Is Knight just a self-promoting provocateur in search of headlines, or is he opening up new and legitimate dimensions of Islam spirituality?

32. The Mystic Letters

Examine the question of the meaning of the “mystic letters” with which many chapters (surahs) of the Koran commence. What spiritual significance is ascribed to these letters by the saints and sages of the Islamic tradition?

33. Slaves of God

In Islam believers are called ‘Slaves of God.’ Leaving aside the sociology and practice of slavery, examine the language and metaphor of slavery in Islamic spirituality. How can slavery be a spiritual state?

34. Seth Carney

“Seth Carney was just another self-important white guy presuming to tell Muslims how they should think and act.” Discuss.

35. The Kaaba

Make a study of the significance of the Kaaba in Islamic spirituality. What does the Kaaba symbolize? Why is it empty?

36. The Black Stone

Make a study of the history and significance of the black stone of Mecca in Islamic spirituality. What does it symbolize? Why are some contemporary groups hostile to it and urge pilgrims to Mecca not to touch it? Is the black stone a remnant of paganism?

37. The Night Journey

Make a study of the place of the Night Journey in Islamic spirituality. What are its precedents? Compare it, for example, to Jacob’s Ladder in Judaism. Outline the symbolism of the Buraq. Your study should include some account of the place of Jerusalem in the mystical life of Islam. Why did the early Muslims face Jerusalem, rather than Mecca, to pray?

38. American Groups

Make a study of one or more of the various Islamic “fringe” groups in the USA - the Nation of Islam, Moorish Temple, The Five Percenters, The International Submitters, and others. Are such groups best understood as symptomatic of racial tensions within American society or do they offer useful perspectives to Islam worldwide?

39. Fatima Zara

Giving a wider account of the place of the Divine Feminine in Islam, make a study of the place of Fatima Zara in the spiritual traditions of Shi’a Islam. Why is she called ‘Mother of Thy Father’? What does it mean?

40. Islam and Protestantism

"The rise of Islam was a shock from which Christianity never recovered. The challenge Islam posed to Christianity - doctrinally, politically, geographically, economically, culturally - disturbed Christianity to the roots. Christianity now had to adjust to a radically changed world. Its ultimate response was the Protestant Reformation. Protestantism, with its insistence on 'The Book', its rejection of an ordained priesthood and celibacy, its basis in a trading economy and its appeal to simplicity, fundamentals, and direct responsibility to God is a Christianity transformed - even if slowly and indirectly - by Islam." Discuss.

41. Muhammad and Ali

Discuss the relationship between the Prophet Muhammad and the Imam Ali, especially in Shia Islam. Explain how the two figures are two functions of the one revelation.

42. God

'God is Most Great!' Compare and contrast the Islamic understanding of God (Allah) with that of other religious traditions, especially Christianity and Judaism. What are the main differences? Is the Islamic God so great that He becomes more of a mathematical abstraction than a God suitable for worship?










- Harper McAlpine Black