From Plato to the Brahmins

Plato holds that there are three originating principles of the universe: God, matter, and the pattern. God is the maker and orderer of this universe, the one who exercises providence over it. Matter is what underlies everything, and he calls it both a receiver and a nurse; out of the arranging of matter came the four elements the world consists of — fire, air, earth, water — and out of these came all the rest of what are called composite substances, along with animals and plants. And the pattern, which he also calls the ideas, is the mind of God: God attends to it as to an image in the soul, and by it made all things. [a]

God, he says, is without body and without shape, and can be grasped by wise men alone; whereas matter is body potentially, but with its potential not yet passing over into act. For being itself without form and without quality, it became body by taking on forms and qualities. Matter, therefore, is an originating principle, and as old as God himself, and in this respect the world is uncreated — for Plato says the world was made out of matter. And imperishability necessarily follows upon what is uncreated. But so far as body is taken to be compounded out of many qualities and ideas, so far it is both created and perishable.

Some of Plato’s followers combined the two positions, using an illustration like this. A wagon can go on forever undestroyed while being repaired piece by piece, so that although the parts perish one after another, the wagon itself always stays whole. In the same way the world perishes in its parts, but since what is taken away is repaired and equivalents are put in, it remains eternal.

Some maintain that Plato asserts God to be one, ungenerated and incorruptible, as he says in the Laws: “God, therefore, as the ancient account has it, holds the beginning and the end and the middle of all things.” In this way he shows God to be one, on the ground that God has pervaded all things. Others, however, maintain that Plato affirms an indefinite number of gods, when he uses these words: “God of gods, of whom I am both maker and father.” But others say he speaks of a fixed number of gods in this passage: “Therefore the mighty Zeus, wheeling his swift chariot in heaven” — and where he counts up the offspring of the children of Heaven and Earth.

Others again assert that Plato made the gods generated, and that, having been produced, they were altogether subject to the necessity of corruption, but that by the will of God they are immortal. They argue it from the passage already quoted, where to the words “God of gods, of whom I am maker and father” he adds “indissoluble through the decree of my will” — so that if God were minded to have them dissolved, they would be dissolved easily.

He also allows that there are such natures as spirits, and says that some of them are good and others worthless.

Some affirm that he states the soul to be uncreated and immortal, from these words of his: “Every soul is immortal, for what is always in motion is immortal” — and from the place where he shows that the soul moves itself and is able to start motion. Others, however, say that in his account the soul is created, but made imperishable by the will of God. But some will have it that he took the soul to be a composite thing, generated and corruptible; for he supposes there is a vessel to hold it, and that it possesses a body of light, but that everything generated carries with it a necessity of corruption.

Those who assert the immortality of the soul are especially strengthened in their opinion by the passages where he says that there are judgments after death, and courts of justice in Hades, and that the virtuous souls receive a good reward while the wicked ones receive a fitting punishment. Some, notwithstanding, assert that he also acknowledges a passing of souls from one body into another, and that different souls, being fixed in number, pass into different bodies according to what each deserves, and that after fixed periods they are sent up into this world again to give a fresh proof of their choice. Others, however, do not admit this to be his teaching, but will have it that in his account souls obtain a place according to what each deserves; and they use as evidence his saying that some good men are with Zeus, and that others range abroad through heaven with other gods, whereas others are caught in everlasting punishments — all who during this life have committed wicked and unjust deeds.

And people affirm that Plato says some things are without a mean, that others have a mean, and that others are a mean. Waking and sleep and the like are conditions with no state in between; but there are things that have means, for instance good and evil; and there are means between extremes, for instance gray between white and black, or some other color. And they say he affirms that the things belonging to the soul are alone good in the full sense, but that the things belonging to the body and the things outside it are no longer good in the full sense but reputed blessings; and that he frequently calls these too means, since it is possible to use them both well and badly.

The virtues, therefore, he says, are extremes in point of intrinsic worth, but in their essential nature are means, for nothing is more valuable than virtue; and whatever goes beyond these or falls short of them ends in vice. For instance, he says there are four virtues — prudence, temperance, justice, and courage — and that each of them has two vices attending it, one by excess and one by defect. On prudence attend recklessness by defect and cunning by excess; on temperance, self-indulgence by defect and dullness of feeling by excess; on justice, giving up a claim by defect and pressing it too hard by excess; and on courage, cowardice by defect and rashness by excess. And these virtues, when they are in a man, make him complete and afford him happiness. And happiness, he says, is being made like God, so far as this is possible; and being made like God takes place when a man combines holiness and justice with prudence. This he supposes to be the end of the highest wisdom and virtue. And he affirms that the virtues follow one another in turn, and are of one kind, and are never opposed to each other, whereas the vices are of many kinds, and sometimes follow one another and sometimes are opposed to each other.

He asserts that fate exists — not, to be sure, that all things are produced according to fate, but that there is also something in our power, as in the passages where he says, “The fault belongs to the one who chooses; God is blameless,” and “the following law of Adrasteia.” And so some contend that his system is one of fate, while others say it is one of free will.

He asserts, however, that sins are involuntary. For into the most glorious of the things within us, which is the soul, no one would deliberately admit what is vicious, that is, transgression; but out of ignorance and a mistaken notion of virtue, people suppose they are achieving something honorable and so pass over into vice. And his teaching on this point is clearest in the Republic, where he says: “But again, you presume to assert that vice is disgraceful and hated by God. How then, I may ask, would anyone choose such an evil thing? He would do so, you reply, who is beaten by pleasures. Therefore this too is involuntary, if to gain a victory is voluntary; so that from every point of view reason proves that the committing of a shameful act is involuntary.”

Someone, however, sets the contrary statement against this: “Why then are men punished, if they sin involuntarily?” But he replies that a man may himself be freed from vice as soon as possible, and undergo punishment; for undergoing punishment is not an evil but a good thing, if it is likely to prove a cleansing of evils, and so that the rest of mankind, hearing of it, may not transgress but guard against such a mistake.

Plato maintains that the nature of evil is neither created by God nor possesses any existence of its own, but that it derives its existence from being contrary to what is good and from following upon it, either by excess or by defect, as we said before about the virtues. Plato, then, as we have already stated, collected together the three departments of the whole of philosophy, and in this way formed his speculative system.

Aristotle, who was this man’s pupil, reduced philosophy to an art, and was distinguished rather for his proficiency in logic. He supposed the elements of all things to be substance and accident: that there is one substance underlying all things, but nine accidents — namely quantity, quality, relation, where, when, having, position, acting, and being acted upon. And substance is of some such description as God, and man, and each of the beings that can fall under a similar name. [l]

But as for accidents: quality is seen in, for instance, white and black; quantity in, for instance, three feet long, four and a half feet long; relation in, for instance, father and son; where in, for instance, at Athens, at Megara; when in, for instance, during the tenth Olympiad; having in, for instance, to have acquired something; acting in, for instance, to write, and in general to show any practical power; position in, for instance, to be lying down; and being acted upon in, for instance, to be struck.

He also supposes that some things have means but that others are without means, as we declared about Plato likewise. And on most points he is in agreement with Plato, except the opinion about the soul. For Plato affirms it to be immortal, but Aristotle that it merely persists, and that after this it too vanishes into the fifth body, which he supposes along with the other four elements — fire, earth, water, and air — and takes to be something finer than they are, of the nature of breath.

Plato, therefore, says that the only really good things are those belonging to the soul, and that they are sufficient for happiness; whereas Aristotle introduces a threefold classification of good things, and asserts that the wise man is not complete unless both the good things of the body and the things outside it are present to him. The former are beauty, strength, keenness of the senses, and soundness of health; while the things outside the body are wealth, good birth, reputation, power, peace, and friendship. And the inner qualities of the soul he classifies, as it was Plato’s opinion, under prudence, temperance, justice, and courage.

This philosopher also affirms that evils arise from an opposition to the things that are good, and that they exist beneath the region around the moon but reach no farther than the moon; and that the soul of the entire world is immortal, and that the world itself is eternal, but that the soul in an individual, as we stated before, vanishes into the fifth body.

This thinker, then, held his discussions in the Lyceum, and there drew up his system of philosophy from time to time; but Zeno held his school in the porch called Poikile. And Zeno’s followers got their name from the place — that is, from the stoa, the porch — and were styled Stoics; whereas Aristotle’s followers were named from the way they occupied themselves while teaching. For since they were accustomed to walk about in the Lyceum as they pursued their investigations, they were on this account called Peripatetics. These, then, were the doctrines of Aristotle.

The Stoics too gave growth to philosophy, in that they developed the art of the syllogism further and included almost everything under definitions, Chrysippus and Zeno agreeing on this point. They likewise supposed God to be the one originating principle of all things, a body of the utmost fineness, and held that his providential care pervaded everything. And these men were positive about the existence of fate everywhere, using some such illustration as this: that just as a dog tied to a cart, if he is disposed to follow, is both drawn along and follows of his own accord, exercising his own free power in combination with necessity — that is, with fate — but if he is not disposed to follow, will be coerced into it altogether. And the same, of course, holds good in the case of men. For though they are unwilling to follow, they will altogether be compelled to enter upon what has been decreed for them. [o]

The Stoics, however, assert that the soul abides after death, but that it is a body, and that such a body is formed from the cooling of the air around it — which, they say, is why it was called psyche, soul. And they acknowledge likewise that there is a passing of souls from one body into another, since the souls are fixed in number. And they accept the doctrine that there will be a conflagration, a cleansing of this world — some say of the whole of it, others of a portion — and that the world itself is purged part by part; and they give the name purgation, more or less, to its destruction and to the generation of another world out of it. And they assume that all things are bodies, and that body passes through body, but that a resistance takes place, and that all things are full, and that there is no void. The foregoing are the opinions of the Stoics also.

Epicurus, however, advanced an opinion almost contrary to everyone’s. He supposed the originating principles of all things to be atoms and void. Void he considered to be the space that would contain the things that will exist, and atoms the matter out of which all things could be formed; and that from the coming together of atoms both God derived his existence, and all the elements, and everything inherent in them, and animals and other creatures as well — so that nothing was generated or existed unless it be from atoms. And he affirmed that these atoms were the finest-grained of all things, in which there could exist neither a center, nor any point, nor any division; and that is why he called them atoms. [r]

While acknowledging God to be eternal and incorruptible, he says that God has providential care for nothing, and that there is no such thing at all as providence or fate, but that all things are made by chance. For God, he said, reposed in the spaces between the worlds, as they are called by him; for outside the world he determined that there is a certain dwelling place of God, called “the spaces between the worlds,” and that God surrendered himself to pleasure and took his ease in the height of happiness, and that he neither has any concerns of business nor devotes his attention to any.

As a consequence of these opinions, he also propounded his theory about wise men, asserting that the end of wisdom is pleasure. Different persons, however, took the term “pleasure” in different senses: some understood it of the cravings, but others of the satisfaction that comes from virtue.

And he concluded that the souls of men are dissolved along with their bodies, just as they were also produced along with them, for they are blood, and when this has gone out or been altered, the entire man perishes. In keeping with this he maintained that there are neither trials in Hades nor courts of justice, so that whatever anyone may commit in this life, provided he escapes detection, he is altogether beyond any liability to trial for it. In this way, then, Epicurus also formed his opinions.

And another opinion of the philosophers was called the opinion of the Academics, on account of those who held their discussions in the Academy. Their founder was Pyrrho, from whom they were called Pyrrhonean philosophers, and he first introduced the notion that nothing at all can be comprehended, so that one is ready to attempt an argument on either side of a question but asserts nothing for certain. For nothing among things intelligible or things perceived by the senses is true, he said, but they only appear so to men; and all substance is in a state of flux and change, and never continues in the same condition. [t]

Some followers of the Academics, then, say that a man ought not to declare an opinion about anything at all, but simply to make the attempt and then give it up; whereas others added the formula “not rather” — not this rather than that — saying that fire is not fire rather than anything else. But they did not declare what a thing is, only what sort it is.

But there is also among the Indians a school made up of those who philosophize among the Brahmins. They spend a contented life, abstaining both from living creatures and from all cooked food, and are satisfied with fruit — and they do not gather even that from the trees, but carry off what has fallen to the ground. They live on this, drinking the water of the river Tazabena. But they pass their life naked, affirming that the body has been made by God as a covering for the soul. [u]

These men affirm that God is light — not such light as one sees, nor such as the sun and fire are, but that to them God is word: not the word that finds expression in spoken sounds, but the word of the knowledge by which the secret things of nature are perceived by the wise. And this light, which they say is word, their god, they assert that the Brahmins alone know, because they alone reject all vanity of opinion, which is the soul’s last covering.

These men despise death, and, as we said before, they always name God in their own language, and they send up hymns to him. But there are no women among them, nor do they father children.

But those from the country on the opposite side of the river who aim at a life like theirs cross over and stay there, returning no more; and these too are called Brahmins. They do not pass their life in the same way, however, for in that place there are also women, of whom those who dwell there are born, and who in turn bear children.

And this word which they name God they assert to be bodily, and wrapped in a body outside himself, just as if one were wearing a sheep’s skin; but that on stripping off the body he would appear clear to the eye.

But the Brahmins say that there is a conflict in the body that surrounds them (and they consider that the body is for them full of conflicts); and against it, as if drawn up for battle against enemies, they contend, as we have already explained. And they say that all men are held captive by their own inborn enemies — the belly and the private parts, gluttony, anger, joy, sorrow, craving, and the like. And he who has reared a trophy over these, he alone goes to God. That is why the Brahmins treat Dandamis as a god, the man Alexander the Macedonian paid a visit to, as one who had proved victorious in the conflict of the body; but they bear down on Calanus as having profanely deserted their philosophy. And the Brahmins, putting off the body like fish jumping out of the water into the pure air, see the sun.