Where the Greeks Learned Wisdom

The Greeks say that after Orpheus and Linus and the oldest of the poets who appeared among them, the seven men called wise were the first to be admired for their wisdom. Four of them were from Asia — Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Pittacus of Mytilene, and Cleobulus of Lindos; two from Europe — Solon of Athens and Chilon of Sparta; and for the seventh some name Periander of Corinth, others Anacharsis the Scythian, others Epimenides the Cretan, whom Paul knew as a Greek prophet and mentions in the letter to Titus, where he says: “One of them, a prophet of their own, said, ‘Cretans are always liars, vicious beasts, lazy gluttons.’ And this testimony is true.” You see how he grants even the prophets of the Greeks some share of the truth, and is not ashamed, when he is speaking to build some people up and to shame others, to make use of Greek poetry. Take the Corinthians, and this is not the only case: arguing about the resurrection of the dead, he uses a line of iambic verse from the stage when he says: “What good does it do me, if the dead are not raised? Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die. Do not be deceived: bad company ruins good character.” [a]

Others count Acusilaus of Argos among the seven wise men, and others Pherecydes of Syros. Plato puts Myson of Chen in Periander’s place, judging Periander unworthy of wisdom because he had ruled as a tyrant. That the wise men of Greece came after the time of Moses will be shown a little further on. But their manner of philosophizing, which is Hebrew in character and given to riddles, is what we must look at now. They took up brevity, as fit for exhortation and most useful. Plato himself says that in the old days this style was deliberately in fashion among all the Greeks, and above all among the Spartans and the Cretans, who had the best laws.

The saying “Know yourself” some supposed to be Chilon’s. But Chamaeleon, in his book On the Gods, ascribes it to Thales, and Aristotle to the Pythia. It may be a call to the pursuit of knowledge, since it is not possible to know the parts without the being of the whole; and one must study how the universe came to be, so as to learn from that what human nature is. Again, to Chilon of Sparta they attribute “Nothing in excess.” Strato, in his book On Inventions, assigns that saying to Stratodemus of Tegea, and Didymus gives it to Solon, as he gives to Cleobulus the saying “Moderation is best.” As for “Give a pledge, and ruin is at hand,” Cleomenes says in his book On Hesiod that Homer said it before, in the line:

The Aristotelians judge it to be Chilon’s, but Didymus says the advice was Thales’. Next in order comes “All men are bad,” or “Most men are bad” — the same saying put two ways — which Sotades of Byzantium says was Bias’. The saying “Practice masters everything” they will have to be Periander’s, and likewise the advice “Know the right moment” to have been Pittacus’. Solon made laws for the Athenians, Pittacus for the people of Mytilene. And at a later date Pythagoras, the pupil of Pherecydes, was the first to call himself a philosopher.

So after the three men just named there were three schools of philosophy, called after the places where they lived: the Italic from Pythagoras, the Ionic from Thales, the Eleatic from Xenophanes. Pythagoras was a Samian, the son of Mnesarchus, as Hippobotus says; according to Aristoxenus in his life of Pythagoras, and to Aristarchus and Theopompus, he was a Tuscan; and according to Neanthes, a Syrian or a Tyrian. So by most accounts Pythagoras was of foreign descent. Thales too, as Leander and Herodotus report, was a Phoenician, though some suppose he was a Milesian. He alone seems to have met the prophets of the Egyptians. But no one is named as his teacher, and no one is named as the teacher of Pherecydes of Syros, who had Pythagoras for a pupil. The Italic philosophy, the philosophy of Pythagoras, grew old at Metapontum in Italy. Anaximander of Miletus, son of Praxiades, succeeded Thales, and was himself succeeded by Anaximenes of Miletus, son of Eurystratus; after whom came Anaxagoras of Clazomenae, son of Hegesibulus. He moved his school from Ionia to Athens. He was succeeded by Archelaus, whose pupil was Socrates.

so Timon says in his Satirical Poems, because Socrates left natural science for the study of conduct. Antisthenes, after being Socrates’ pupil, brought in the Cynic philosophy, and Plato withdrew to the Academy. Aristotle, after studying philosophy under Plato, withdrew to the Lyceum and founded the Peripatetic school. He was succeeded by Theophrastus, Theophrastus by Strato, Strato by Lycon, then Critolaus, then Diodorus. Speusippus was Plato’s successor, and his successor was Xenocrates, and after him Polemo. The pupils of Polemo were Crates and Crantor, with whom the old Academy founded by Plato came to an end. Arcesilaus was Crantor’s associate, and from him down to Hegesilaus the Middle Academy flourished. Then Carneades succeeded Hegesilaus, and others came after in succession. The pupil of Crates was Zeno of Citium, the founder of the Stoic school. He was succeeded by Cleanthes, and Cleanthes by Chrysippus, and others after him. Xenophanes of Colophon founded the Eleatic school; Timaeus says he lived in the time of Hiero, lord of Sicily, and of Epicharmus the poet, while Apollodorus says he was born in the fortieth Olympiad and lived on into the times of Darius and Cyrus. Parmenides, then, was the pupil of Xenophanes, and Zeno of Parmenides; then came Leucippus, and then Democritus. Democritus’ pupils were Protagoras of Abdera and Metrodorus of Chios, whose pupil was Diogenes of Smyrna, and his Anaxarchus, and his Pyrrho, and his Nausiphanes. Some say Epicurus was a student of Nausiphanes.

Such, in brief, is the succession of the philosophers among the Greeks. The dates of the men who began their philosophy are now to be given one by one, so that by comparison we may show that the Hebrew philosophy was older by many generations.

It has been said of Xenophanes that he founded the Eleatic philosophy. And Eudemus, in his Astrological Histories, says that Thales foretold the eclipse of the sun that happened while the Medes and the Lydians were at war, when Cyaxares, the father of Astyages, ruled the Medes, and Alyattes son of Croesus ruled the Lydians. Herodotus agrees with him in his first book. The date is about the fiftieth Olympiad. Pythagoras is found to have lived in the days of Polycrates the tyrant, about the sixty-second Olympiad. Mnesiphilus is described as a follower of Solon and was a contemporary of Themistocles, so Solon flourished about the forty-sixth Olympiad. For Heraclitus, the son of Bloson, persuaded Melancomas the tyrant to give up his rule; and he thought nothing of King Darius’ invitation to come and visit the Persians.

These are the dates of the oldest wise men and philosophers among the Greeks. And that most of them were barbarians by descent, and were trained among barbarians — what need is there to say it? Pythagoras is shown to have been either a Tuscan or a Tyrian. Antisthenes was a Phrygian. Orpheus was an Odrysian or a Thracian. Most accounts make Homer an Egyptian. Thales was a Phoenician by birth and was said to have kept company with the prophets of the Egyptians, as Pythagoras did with the same men — by whom he was circumcised, so that he might go into the inner sanctuary and learn the mystic philosophy from the Egyptians. He held conversation with the chief men among the Chaldeans and the Magi; and the common hall he kept was a hint of what is now called the church. [l]

Plato does not deny that he got everything most excellent in philosophy from the barbarians, and he admits that he came into Egypt. So in the Phaedo, writing that a philosopher can be helped from every side, he said: “Greece is a large place, Cebes, and there are good men everywhere in it; and the races of the barbarians are many.” So Plato thinks that some of the barbarians are philosophers too, while Epicurus, on the other side, supposes that only Greeks can do philosophy. And in the Symposium, praising the barbarians for practicing philosophy with conspicuous excellence, Plato says truly: “And in many other cases, both among Greeks and among barbarians, whose temples raised for such sons are already many.”

It is clear that the barbarians gave signal honor to their lawgivers and teachers, calling them gods. For according to Plato, “they think that good souls leave the region above the heavens and consent to come down to this Tartarus, and that taking on a body they share in all the ills that go with birth, out of their concern for the human race.” And these are the men who make laws and publish philosophy, “than which no greater good ever came, or will come, from the gods to the race of men.”

And as it seems to me, it was because they saw the great benefit that comes through wise men that the men themselves were honored and philosophy was practiced publicly by all the Brahmins, and the Odrysians, and the Getae. Men like these were strictly made gods by the Egyptian people, by the Chaldeans, by the Arabians called the Fortunate, by the people who live in Palestine, by no small part of the Persian people, and by countless other peoples besides. It is well known that Plato is forever praising the barbarians, remembering that both he and Pythagoras learned most of their teachings, and the noblest of them, among the barbarians. That is why he also called the races of the barbarians “races of barbarian philosophers,” acknowledging in the Phaedrus the Egyptian king and showing him to us as wiser than Theuth, whom he knew to be Hermes. And in the Charmides it is plain that he knew of certain Thracians who were said to make the soul immortal. Pythagoras is reported to have been a pupil of Sonches, the Egyptian chief prophet; Plato of Sechnuphis of Heliopolis; and Eudoxus of Cnidus of Konuphis, who was an Egyptian as well.

And in his book On the Soul, Plato again plainly acknowledges prophecy, when he brings in a prophet announcing the word of Lachesis and uttering predictions to the souls whose lot is being fixed. And in the Timaeus he brings in Solon, the very wise man, learning from the barbarian. What is said there comes to this: “Solon, Solon, you Greeks are always children. There is no Greek who is an old man. You have no learning grey with age.”

Democritus took the Babylonian moral discourses for his own: he is said to have combined a translation of the column of Acicarus with his own compositions. You may find the distinction marked where he writes, “This is what Democritus says.” About himself too, plumed up over his own learning, he says: “Of all the men of my time I have covered the most ground, investigating the most distant parts. I have seen the most skies and lands, and I have heard learned men in the greatest numbers. In composition no one has surpassed me; in demonstration, not even those among the Egyptians who are called rope-stretchers — and I lived abroad among all of them for as much as eighty years.” For he went to Babylon, and to Persia, and to Egypt, to learn from the Magi and the priests.

Pythagoras showed Zoroaster the Magus to be a Persian. The people who follow the sect of Prodicus boast that they possess this man’s secret books. Alexander, in his book On the Pythagorean Symbols, relates that Pythagoras was a pupil of Nazaratus the Assyrian — some think this man is Ezekiel, but he is not, as will be shown later — and will have it that besides these Pythagoras also heard the Galatians and the Brahmins. Clearchus the Peripatetic says he knew a Jew who kept company with Aristotle.

Heraclitus says that the Sibyl spoke not by human power but rather with God’s help. They say, then, that at Delphi a stone was shown beside the oracle, and that on it sat the first Sibyl, who came from Helicon and had been reared by the Muses. But some say she came from Milea and was the daughter of Lamia of Sidon. And Serapion, in his epic verses, says that the Sibyl did not stop prophesying even when she was dead. He writes that what passed out of her into the air after her death was what gave oracular utterances in voices and omens; and that when her body was changed into earth, and grass grew from it as grass naturally does, whatever animals happened to be in that place and fed on it showed people exact knowledge of the future by their entrails. He also thinks that the face seen in the moon is her soul. So much for the Sibyl.

Numa, king of the Romans, was a Pythagorean, and with the help of the precepts of Moses he forbade the making of an image of God in human form or in the shape of any living creature. So for the first hundred and seventy years, though they built temples, they made no cast or carved image. For Numa showed them privately that the Best of Beings cannot be grasped except by the mind alone. So philosophy, a thing of the highest use, flourished long ago among the barbarians, shedding its light over the nations, and afterwards it came to Greece. First in its ranks were the prophets of the Egyptians; and the Chaldeans among the Assyrians; and the Druids among the Gauls; and the Samanaeans among the Bactrians; and the philosophers of the Celts; and the Magi of the Persians, who foretold the Savior’s birth and came into the land of Judea guided by a star. The Indian gymnosophists are in the number too, and the other barbarian philosophers. Of these there are two kinds, some called Sarmanae and others Brahmins. And those of the Sarmanae who are called Hylobii neither live in cities nor have roofs over their heads. They are clothed in the bark of trees, they feed on nuts, and they drink water out of their hands. Like the people called Encratites in our own day, they know nothing of marriage or of fathering children. Some of the Indians, too, follow the precepts of Buddha, whom they have raised to divine honors for his extraordinary holiness.

Anacharsis was a Scythian, and is recorded to have surpassed many philosophers among the Greeks. And the Hyperboreans, Hellanicus relates, lived beyond the Rhipaean mountains and taught justice; they do not eat meat, but live on nuts. Those who are sixty years old they take outside the gates and put to death. There are also among the Germans the women called holy, who by looking into the whirlpools and eddies of rivers, and listening to the noise of the streams, foretell and predict what is coming. These would not let the men fight against Caesar until the new moon shone.

Of all these peoples, by far the oldest is the Jewish people. That their philosophy, committed to writing, comes before philosophy among the Greeks is shown at length by Philo the Pythagorean, and besides him by Aristobulus the Peripatetic, and by several others whom I will not waste time naming one by one. Megasthenes, the contemporary of Seleucus Nicanor, writes very clearly in the third of his books On Indian Affairs: “Everything the ancients said about nature is said also by those who do philosophy outside Greece: some of it by the Brahmins among the Indians, and the rest by those called Jews in Syria.”

Some say, more in the manner of fable, that certain of those called the Idaean Dactyls were the first wise men; to them are attributed the invention of what are called the Ephesian letters, and of numbers in music, which is why dactyls in music got their name. And the Idaean Dactyls were Phrygians and barbarians. Herodotus relates that Heracles, having become a sage and a student of nature, received from the barbarian Atlas the Phrygian the columns of the universe: the story means that he received by instruction the knowledge of the heavenly bodies. And Hermippus of Berytus calls Chiron the Centaur wise; about him the man who wrote The Battle of the Titans says “that he was the first to lead the race of mortals to righteousness, by showing them the solemnity of the oath, and glad sacrifices, and the figures of Olympus.” By him Achilles, who fought at Troy, was taught. And Hippo, the daughter of the Centaur, who lived with Aeolus, taught Aeolus her father’s science, the knowledge of nature. Euripides also bears witness about Hippo as follows:

It was by this Aeolus that Odysseus was received as a guest after the taking of Troy. Set these dates side by side with the age of Moses, and with the great antiquity of the philosophy he gave out.