Udupi - Notes on the Symbolism of the Number 108

Vast and variegated, the great lands of Hindoostan are a rich patchwork of local traditions even though, together, they accumulate into a single edifice of belief and practice that may reasonably be designated by the term ‘Hindooism’, especially as seen from the outside (things being less clear when standing in its midst.) From north to south, east to west, local traditions, flavours and colourings vary, yet somehow they converge into a single stream, a unified tradition. Do not expect consistency or system, though. There is no Pope of the Hindoos to bring the swarming variations into a coherent orthodoxy. Very wisely, the Hindoo cherishes variation and tolerates a very wide range of religious expression. This fact has become very noticeable to the present writer in his current sojourn across the Indian sub-continent. Any expectation of consistency or system is foiled at every turn. Just when he thinks he has a handle on some aspect of Hindoo religious life, he moves on to a new town, a new location, and there different traditions and ways prevail, even though they are in some way entirely apiece with the whole. Reflecting on Hindooism is an object lesson on the problem of the one and the many.

The western coast of India is very different to the north and one encounters there, sure enough, a different assembly of myths and legends and accompanying practices. The author arrived in the temple town of Udupi several days ago and since then has been observing the local religious life, especially as it is centred on the great Krishna temple complex that makes the town a centre of pilgrimage. A full description of the rites and mysteries of this temple will have to be postponed until a later post: they are very complex and very profound and would require a long and detailed exposition.

Instead, the purpose of this current post is simply to record an observation concerning the symbolic powers of the celebrated number one hundred and eight (108). The meaning of the number – or at least something of its essential symbolism – has become obvious to this writer since arriving in Udupi and becoming immersed in the local traditions of the place. A group of connections have come together. A particular order of symbolism has become plain. The purpose of this post is just to make note of that symbolism. How it fits into the greater symbolism evident in Udupi and its surrounds is another matter and must wait for another time.

* * *

The author has long observed the special character of the number 108 in certain religious contexts. It is an important number with symbolic import. Most notably, there is the fact that the rosary beads – or japa beads (japa mala) – commonly employed by both Hindoos and Boodhists consist of 108 stones or seeds or peas strung on a string which are then counted with the fingers. Thus, in any cycle of prayer the Hindoo or Boodhist makes 108 utterances or mantras of some sacred name or phrase. The author, indeed, has purchased a set of the said beads at the store in the Udupi temple where they hang on wracks in great profusion. Everywhere about, one can see Hindoos fingering their beads and muttering their mantras – one of the most common and easiest forms of devotion. There are no Boodhists to be seen in Udupi but elsewhere they use the rosary of 108 beads as well. (The Mahometan tesbe is different since it consists of 99 beads – a decimal rosary, as it were – being based on the literal – and quite mistaken – reading of a certain hadeeth in which the Prophet declares that God has ninety-nine names. This is just an instance of semitic hyperbole and it means that God has a large or indefinite number of names, but Mahometans, stupidly, draw up a litany of ninety-nine names, even though there are clearly more than that number given in the Holy Koran.)

Nor, however, is 108 only a preferred number in oriental symbolism. The author, being a student of the Greeks, knows also that in Homeric myth the number of suitors of Penelope is very specifically 108. And it is found in many other contexts besides. It is a auspicious number which occurs in certain symbolically significant contexts in traditions east and west.

But why 108? Why this particular number? What particular symbolism is attached to this number? What are its traditional powers?

The answer to this presents itself in Udupi. The name of the town is said to come from two roots signifying the idea “Lord + Stars” = “Lord of the Stars”. A local myth relates that, once upon a time, the “twenty-seven stars” were dimmed by decree of a certain king. Thereupon, the “Lord of the Stars” – that is, the Moon – appealed to Lord Shiva to restore their brightness, and Lord Shiva looked favourably upon this request and did so. Consequently, Shiva came to be worshipped locally and the place became known as Udupi – the land of the Lord of Stars, which is to say a land of the Moon. Shiva, of course, is himself a lunar deity and wears the lunar crescent as a crown. It is one of his chief emblems. He is essentially a time god, and the Moon, in this context, is the marker of time. Thus, in the Udupi temple complex the oldest temple, called ‘Chandramauleshvara’ belongs to the Moon-crowned Shiva (Chandra = Moon). The restoration of the twenty-seven stars for the Lord of the Stars is celebrated in this temple in this town.

Moreover, a second myth told in this same region concerns the axe-wielding avatar Parashurama who, it is said, severed the land from the sea. The whole coast of western India – Goa, Konkan, Karnataka, Kerela – is collectively known as the Land of Parashurama. He split the land from the sea with his axe, and then – it is said – he established 108 statues of Shiva throughout the land. Indeed, these 108 statues or linga – Shiva shrines - still exist today, distributed along the coastal lands with the shrines in Udupi being prominent among them. Now, the axe of Parashurama is without question itself a symbol of the crescent Moon – the crescent shaped axe is lunar wherever it is found - and so once again in this myth we have a lunar motif associated with Udupi and with the lunar deity Shiva, and the number 108 is explicitly given in this context.

Furthermore, as this present writer notes in a casual observation that turns out to be relevant, Udupi is a thriving centre for Hindoo astrology, particularly in its lunar mode. There are astrologers on every street corner, and many astrologers have set up practice in the confines of the temple complex itself. It might seem that there are more astrologers in Udupi than in the rest of India combined. The signs and shops throughout make it clear that it is nothing less than an astrological centre. Pilgrims who come to Udupi to make observances at the temple also take the opportunity to have an astrological reading since here, as elsewhere in India, astrology is indeed regarded as a sacred art and an important feature of the Hindoo religion. As it is practiced, it is based upon the twenty-seven lunar mansions (nakshatra) and the sub-division of those mansions into astral regions known as pada. Typically, the Hindoo takes a name from the pada in which he was born. (Typically, also, astrologers inform inquirers that this was done in error and that the error can only be corrected by prayers and generous donations to the temple – such being the way of seers.)

* * *

Let us now string all of these factors together. Udupi is a charming town and the temple is a place of remarkable fascination. There is much that can be said but, again, it will need to wait for another post. What is important at this time is that in Udupi, and its local myths, the nature and import of the number 108 becomes obvious. Even in this there is much to say, but for now it suffices to point to what is plain.

Most crucially, let us note that 27 x 4 = 108. That is, there are 27 lunar mansions each divided into four parts. This is essential to Hindoo astrology. This makes the number 108 symbolic of the lunar zodiac. It is a number that represents the whole cosmic cycle considered by its lunar delineations. It is a lunar, not a solar number. Many numbers measure time (cycles) by solar measures – the number 360, for example. But the number 108 is resoundingly lunar in its essential meanings. In the foundation myth of Udupi, the “twenty-seven stars” dimmed by the evil king and restored by “Moon-crowned” Shiva are the twenty-seven lunar mansions. When, in the other myth, the axe-wielding Parashurama separates the land and the sea and establishes the 108 Shiva shrines, we have the finer division of the pada. The rosary of 108 beads, then, represents the year, and by extension the cosmic cycle (since an annual year is a reflection of the Great Year.) The Moon, in this scheme, is the measurer of time – a function of Lord Shiva – and so it is with lunar time reckonings, great and small, that we are concerned. The beads (japa mala) is a device symbolic of the full lunar cycle. To prayer the japa is to be united with and contextualized by that cycle.

The same significance prevails, surely, in Homer. Penelope’s weaving and unweaving as she awaits the return of Odysseus in the epic poem is, surely, itself a lunar motif. This has been widely observed from ancient times to modern. Just as the moon waxes and wanes, so Penelope weaves and unweaves. But now we can understand why there are 108 suitors seeking her hand. The number is the number of the lunar cycle (and it is furthermore no accident that the total journey of Odysseus is nineteen years, the number of the metonic or lunar eclipse cycle.) Penelope will not submit to any particular division of the small cycle. Odysseus himself, and his journey, signifies the greater cycle. Let us also note, in a Greek context, that 108 is a number relevant to the Platonic Nuptial Number, the calculation of the Great Year given in the Republic: the figures are 12,960,000 = 108 x 120,000.

In any case, 108 is the number of the lunar cycle. Wherever it is found it is likely to have this significance. It features in Udupi because Udupi is the land of the “Lord of Stars” i.e. the Moon. This is an old layer of symbolism in the Udupi temple. The associations of the temple with Krishna are much more recent – medieval rather than ancient. The oldest layers of the Udupi cultus go back beyond this association to Shiva as “Moon-crowned” or “Moon-faced”. It is a cultus that is particularly cosmological and in which an ancient cosmological symbolism has been well preserved. A more detailed description will be given some other time. For now, it is enough to note that 108 is a lunar number – the number of the cosmic cycle in its lunar mode.

Yours,

Harper McAlpine Black

Notes on Plato's Parmenides

By common agreement the dialogue entitled Parmenides is the most profoundly perplexing work in the Platonic corpus. It presents a situation in which the ageing sage, Parmenides, visits Athens and engages in discourse with a very young Socrates. Chronologically, according to conventional dates, this meeting was just barely possible, although it is almost certain that the encounter as Plato presents it is a fiction. All the same, as usual, we should note carefully Plato concern for verisimilitude. He does not engage in idle or baseless fictions. He very deliberately wants to raise the question in the reader’s mind as to whether or not this meeting really did take place. It seems not, but then again, maybe it did…

The dialogue has confounded readers throughout the centuries and has given rise to the most diverse interpretations. The present writer (in his academic guide) has himself indulged in this and has an interpretation of his own – one radically different to those commonly peddled in philosophical circles. His interpretation is based on two peculiarities of the work.

First, Plato has based the dialogue upon the festival of the Panathenea, the great festival of Athena. In this, the author notes, it forms a pair with the dialogue called the Timaeus. The author then supposes that this setting is significant and that the two dialogues, Parmenides and Timaeus, concern matters relevant to that festival. He therefore reads the two works together as a pair. This indeed was a common practice in the ancient world because the ancients considered the Parmenides Plato’s premier metaphysical world and as such it complements the Timaeus, his work on phusis. The present author goes further. He reads both works in the light of the mythological background of the Panathenaeic festival.

Second, he notes a few peculiar signals (clues) in the text which are generally ignored and treated as mere padding. In particular, there are some tell-tale references to a young character named Antiphon. We are told that he has learnt the whole of Parmenides’ speech by heart, yet he is now busy shoeing horses. Imagine: the one person in the dialogue who has fully internalized the teachings of Parmenides has retired to attend to the most menial of tasks. The present author is strongly of the view that there are no accidental details in a Platonic dialogue. These details, therefore, are of significance and are part of the dialogue for a very good reason. Moreover, concerning horses, we encounter a strange mixed metaphor in the text: horses and ships. This, to the present author, and in this mythological context, points to the god Poseidon. Poseidon and Athena: these dialogues concern this mythological pairing.

The author’s notes on the Parmenides are presented below. Since the Parmenides is the most dense and most wordy and most difficult of dialogues, he offers his interpretation in cartoon form:

Yours,

Harper McAlpine Black

Some Guidelines for Reading the Divine Plato

The author is often asked how one should approach the works of Plato. Where to begin? The following notes were prepared for that purpose: some guidelines for reading the Divine Plato.

Platonic philosophy is a different undertaking to other forms of philosophy. The works of Plato offer a “jnana yoga”, an intellectual path of attainment. Philosophy (philo + sophia), in Plato, is a higher wisdom and should not be confused with “philosophy” in the modern profane sense. Platonic philosophy is a sacred activity. Plato should be read in this spirit. If not, the study will be fruitless. 

The works of Plato are so masterful they could only have been written by a man of supreme intellectual and spiritual attainment. This is the demonstrable fact that qualifies Plato for the ancient title ‘Divine’ or ‘God-like’ – ho theios Platon – and for the belief that his works are divinely inspired. The works of Plato should be approached with this in view. Their author was a master, a saint, a prophet. They are inspired works.

The object of the Platonic path is the ‘Vision of the One and the Good’. The proper purpose for reading Plato is the pursuit of this end. It is attained through reflection on the very nature of thought itself.

The deity presiding over the works of Plato, and over philosophy (properly understood as a Wisdom Tradition) is Athena, the patron goddess of Athens (‘Neith’ of the Egyptians). Plato is a representative of her city and of her tradition. His teachings and his writings expound sacred traditions, both inner and outer, of this goddess. Note that most of the dialogues are set in Athens – her city – and that Socrates is very reluctant to ever leave Athens. Plato’s Academy was located in an olive grove sacred to Athena. Athena looms in the background of the entire Platonic enterprise. When reading Plato, make Athena your guiding spirit.

For the most part the works of Plato take the form of philosophical dialogues, usually with Socrates conversing with various interlocutors. Modern readers are not accustomed to reading dialogues. Reading dialogues requires a certain skill – just as reading a play is different to reading an essay. You must become accustomed to the dialogue form, hearing the several voices in conversation and giving each speaker, and each viewpoint, its proper turn.

The historical Socrates, it is believed, wrote nothing. In the dialogues Socrates (Plato’s Socrates) voices a deep suspicion of the written word. The dialogue form accommodates this; it is a form of writing that approximates living speech. In the dialogues we encounter the paradox: Plato doesn’t like writing yet is himself a master of it. The dialogues should be read with this in mind. They are not fixed texts. They are designed to undermine their own authority as written text. The text is fluid. Never let the text ossify into a Bible-like ‘scripture’. That is not their nature.

The dialogues are full of play. Plato writes in a form of high playfulness, a divine playfulness. Readers need to enter into this spirit of play – it is the single-most important key to reading the dialogues aright.

At the centre of the dialogues is the tragedy of the death of Socrates, but the dialogues are comedies as well as tragedies. There are jokes on nearly every page. Be sensitive to the play of these jokes and to the tension between tragedy and comedy.

The dialogues are literary creations. As well as being works of philosophy, they are works of literature. They ought to be approached primarily as philosophical dramas and thus as works of art.

The dialogues are works of fiction, not reportage. All the same, there is a profound tension between fact and fiction at their heart. There are no fictional characters in the dialogues and every situation and encounter depicted might have happened even if, as is most likely, it didn’t. This tension between fact and fiction, history and myth, is itself a central concern of the dialogues and the dialogues themselves are a lesson in exactly that tension. The dialogues, that is, demonstrate this Platonic theme.

In the dialogues the city-state of Athens is an archetypal, eternal city and its citizens are archetypes more than they are historical figures. Readers should resist all attempts to overly historicize the dialogues and to reduce the characters of the dialogues to historical figures. Like Plato’s Socrates himself, though based on historical figures, they are idealized forms.

Plato was a dramatic and lyric poet and superb writer of unsurpassed literary skill. His Greek is the best Greek (outside of Homer.) If you are reading the dialogues in translation, be aware that they are works of great tonal beauty, often with hymnic, liturgical and dramatic qualities that are lost in translation. It helps to gain some acquaintance with Plato’s (Attic) Greek or at least to hear portions read in the original.

Do not assume that Socrates, or anyone else, speaks for Plato himself in the dialogues. Plato never appears or speaks in the dialogues. His absence and carefully crafted anonymity is itself part of his sanctity. The ‘Divine Plato’ is removed from the dialogues themselves. The question of how much Socrates speaks for Plato is known as the ‘Socratic Problem’ – it is a deliberate feature of the dialogues. Do not be too concerned with it since it is a problem without a resolution and was intended to be such.

We are not sure how the dialogues were used by Plato or by his students, or even why they were written. What was their purpose? We do not know. Do not assume that they were in any way “textbooks’ or ‘handbooks’ for Plato’s students. More likely they were puzzles, challenges, and designed to stimulate and guide more than to instruct.

Every dialogue is open-ended. Usually nothing is resolved. In general, the dialogues are more exercises on how to think rather than expositions on what to think.

The dialogues are internally inconsistent and contradictory. A point of view offered in one dialogue may be undermined and countered or refuted or modified in another. Do not expect consistency. The dialogues are not treatises that relate a single viewpoint and Plato was not a systemizer.

The dialogues are supremely artful. There is nothing in them that is accidental. Give particular attention to everything in them that strikes you as peculiar and unusual. Every word, every device, every turn of narrative, has its reason. It is intellectually (and often spiritually) constructive to contemplate those aspects of the dialogues that seem difficult to explain. 

Socrates is the master. You are supposed to fall in love with him. Love his love of argument. Love his love of Truth. Love his intellectual fearlessness. Love, in particular, the paradox: Socrates was the ugliest of men but had the most beautiful soul.

When reading the dialogues it helps to hear the voice of Socrates: nasal, high-pitched, whining and irritating. He may speak sweet words but he does not have a sweet voice.

Socrates speaks in an ironic tone. Throughout the dialogues there is a pervading undercurrent of ‘Socratic irony’. When is Socrates being serious and when is he being ironic? When is he testing your credulity? When is he pulling your leg? Be sensitive to Socratic irony.

Throughout the dialogues Socrates is always warning us about the deceptive nature of arguments that persuade yet are not true. Be sensitive to this trap, including – or especially – when considering the words of Socrates himself. Socrates may be “wisest and most just” but he is also supremely cunning, a trickster.

It is best to follow the ancient and accepted canon of Plato’s works and ignore the squabbles of modern critics as to what was and was not actually written by Plato. In the ancient canon there were thirty-five dialogues, plus the Letters, thus thirty-six works in all.

As a coherent reading programme, read the dialogues in their traditional Tetralogies (sets of four), of which there are nine (9 x 4 = 36). Each Tetralogy (set) is regarded as being like a set of Athenian plays, which consisted of three dramas plus a comedy. It is constructive to consider the dialogues in this manner and after this model, at least as a starting point.

The usual place to start reading the dialogues is with those that relate the trial and death of Socrates, i.e. the Apology and the Phaedo. Note this fact well. We begin at the end. The dialogue in which Socrates is youngest, the Parmenides, is usually the last or one of the last dialogues to be read in the sequence. Ask: why this reverse chronology? Why has Plato done this? Why are we reading backwards in time?

Do not become distracted by modern speculation about the order in which the dialogues were written. In particular, the fond idea that the so-called ‘Socratic’ dialogues are “early” and those in which Socrates plays a lesser role or does not appear at all are “late” is not an especially helpful framework. Resist this sort of modern chronological reading.

Do not read the dialogues through the lens of the life of Plato. Extant biographies of Plato were written centuries after he died. In fact, we know very little for sure about him. He has deliberately made himself absent from the dialogues, so do not try to insert him on the basis of late and unreliable biographies.

Be aware that the dialogues do not stand alone. They are interconnected, either according to the traditional Tetralogy groupings, or according to other internal connections and allusions, according to theme, speakers or other factors. Noting and following these interconnections and cross-allusions is an important part of reading the dialogues in depth. 

Ancient readers nominated two works, the Parmenides and the Timaeus, as the central dialogues. The Parmenides, they thought, offers Plato’s metaphysics and the Timeaus offers his cosmology. This is a useful systemization. These two works are no doubt very important in the totality of the Platonic dialogues and should be given due attention as such.

It is commonly agreed by both ancient and modern readers that the masterwork among the dialogues is the Republic. It deserves appropriate study. Make the Republic the centerpiece of your reading. 

As well as constituting a “jnana yoga” in themselves, several Platonic dialogues – such as the Phaedrus and the Symposium - set out a spiritual path of love. It is in these dialogues that Platonism meets many later (Semitic) spiritual traditions such as Christianity and Sufism. These dialogues, which set out the doctrines of so-called ‘Platonic Love’, are highly esteemed for this reason and deserve particular attention. Socrates is a lover. In Plato – as in the person of Socrates – the path of the intellect and the path of love, nous and eros, converge. 

Give particular attention to the setting and location of a dialogue, if it is given. If it is, it is very important. On what festival in the Athenian calendar does it take place? That is a key. At which time of the year? Where and when? It is important, for instance, if a dialogue takes place within Athens or outside of Athens. 

The central doctrine of the dialogues – the so-called Theory of Forms – is nowhere stated outright. Rather, it forms a general trend in Socrates’ thought. But note well that the entire ‘theory’ is apparently demolished in the dialogue called the Parmenides, demonstrating that – although it is not at all obvious in other dialogues – Plato was fully cognizant of the shortcomings in and objections to the ‘theory’. And note that, although counted as a late dialogue, the Parmenides is the earliest in Socrates’ biographical chronology. We are to understand, then, that Parmenides demolished Socrates’ theory when Socrates was a young man and so the later dialogues, it follows, show him struggling with the theory in the shadow of that early rebuttal. The dialogue called the Parmenides – the most difficult of all the dialogues – is very important for this reason. It recontextualizes all the other dialogues. 

In many, if not all, dialogues there may be a hidden or ‘esoteric’ dimension or at least several layers of meaning to be discovered by diligent students. There are surface-level readings and deeper ‘initiated’ readings. The dialogues reward rereading and deep reflection even on matters that may seem straightforward.

In many dialogues Socrates, or other characters, often speak of myths as having a lesser status than rational thought, yet the dialogues are full of myths which often seem central to their meaning. The tension between muthos and logos is a central concern of the dialogues and the dialogues themselves illustrate this tension. Give particular attention to the Platonic myths and consider them in relation to the rational arguments that appear alongside them. The myths concern an ‘esoteric’ dimension of the dialogues. 

Plato includes various puzzles and riddles in the dialogues, usually of a mathematical nature. These are very important. They concern an ‘esoteric’ dimension of the dialogues.

Resist reading the ‘Introductions’ that accompany modern translations of Plato. Let Plato’s works speak for themselves.

Never read Plato through Aristotle. Aristotle is said to have been a student of Plato, but he is one of the worst and most unreliable commentators on Plato. Ignore Aristotle.

Yours

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