GREEK PHILOSOPHY

The argument of the first Discours is governed by the antithesis between the ‘original’ nature of man on the one hand and the corruption of modern civilisation on the other; this antithesis is developed in terms of a contrast between the freedom implied by true being and the enslavement and estrangement which is the human condition in the modern world. Rousseau is concerned not so much with historical details as with the moral theme which allows him to separate the original elements of man’s being from the artificial elements added by the process of civilisation. By ‘original’ Rousseau means ‘what belongs incontestably to man’. Rousseau is therefore concerned to distinguish the essential and authentic as given by true original being from the accidental and artificial elements added by civilisation.

The establishment of reason as the primordial source of force for better existence by Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle was a significant contribution to humanity. Their emphasis on intelligence as a path of analysis that leads to empirically accurate and profound knowledge has had a profound impact on future religious traditions.

Greek thought, with its concept of pure first order, influenced the polytheistic cults, eventually leading them towards a monolithic direction that later influenced Islamic and Christian monotheism.

Résumé : Apollon et Orphée ont tous deux le dauphin comme animal-totem. Le nom de celui-ci, en grec delphis, se prononce comme le mot « utérus » et comme Delphes, le temple qui abrite l’oracle d’Apollon. Dans la mythologie grecque, le dauphin est le symbole du lien entre les hauteurs de l’Olympe et les profondeurs de l’Hadès. Apollon, le musicien, est un dieu-animus, tout en force et en éclat, mais fragile sur le plan du sentiment et malheureux en amour. Orphée, le visionnaire, est un dieu-anima ; ses chants inspirés font pleurer jusqu’aux pierres, mais il n’aura pas le courage de ramener son Eurydice vers la vie.
Deux visages du masculin qui nous habitent encore aujourd’hui.

The journal publishes scientific articles on the problems of the Greek language, literature and culture throughout their historical existence: from Ancient Greek and Byzantine literature, culture and language to the Modern Greek period. The papers cover a wide range of topics on history, literary criticism, linguistics, ethnolinguistics, folklore and post folklore of Greece, as well as on the reception of Greek images and ideas in Russia and Europe.

Contents
О.А. Bakuleva
Baptizing ritual as part of the birth rite in Cyprus 14

I.V. Verner
The Greek language and the Greek source of the interlinear translation of Psalter
1552 by Maximus the Greek 20

M.S. Gladkaya
On the origin of the mother of Prince Vsevolod the Big Nest 41

A.Yu. Grishin
“Appropriate action under certain circumstances” as a factor of the Stoic sage’s
socialization 51

Ya.L. Zabudskaya
The concept of «ideal translation» and «Oedipus the King» of Olga Weiss 57

M. Casas-Olea
Some remarks on the origin of the spiritual verse “Golubinaja Kniga”
and Byzantine infl uence on it 71

K.A. Klimova
The devil as an out-of-the-system character of Modern Greek demonology 93

Yu. B. Mantova
Miraculous travelling in Mid-Byzantine hagiography 101

E.A. Nesterova
Antiquity as a source of imagery of fantasy literature 112

T.A. Oparina
Little-known name of a Greek in the cadre of the Diplomatic Department
in the 17th century: Dmitrij Pervanov 122

E. V. Palamarenko
Hellenism against Judah in I century BC — in I сеntury AC 129

S.A. Sidneva
The motif of Christ on a tree in Modern Greek folklore 138

A.A. Stolyarova
Genre and stylistic features of the texts of pharmaceutical instruction leaflets
in Modern Greek 148

O.V. Tchoekha
Family and filiation within the Modern Greek folk calendar 157

Z. B. Šljivančanin
Reception of F.M. Dostoyevsky as a political thinker in Greece 167

K.T. Yusupova
Biography and work of Arsenios of Elassona 176

M. Varvounis
Fieldwork in Greek folklore 187

Μ. Varvounis, Ν. Macha-Bizoumi
Modern Greek literature and Greek traditional culture: two-way relations 200

G. Iordanidis
The life of Saint Anthony Kievopecherskij in Greek bibliography 212

J. Calvié
Byzantium and Russian wonder tales 220

F. Lambiris
Byzantium-Russia cultural relations in the 14 century 226

D. Maroulis
Wirkung and Rezeption of Cavafy’s work in Russia 235

N. Mavrelos
M. Schendos — N. Mavrocordatos: the rivals and the movement of texts,
words and ideas in the early 18th century through a libel 247

M. Bibikov
Athonias (1848–1865) of Jacobus Neaskytiotes 255

I. Sarandakis
The first contacts of the Russians with the Byzantine Empire and the historic
development of their relationships up to the 10 century 262

G. Trimpou
Byzantine princesses in Russia: the case of Anna Porphyrogenita 272

Ch. Charalambakis
Neologisms in the Practical Dictionary of the Modern Greek language
of the Academy of Athens 279

Contrary to what skeptics believed, there is Filipino philosophy in the Western
traditional sense that should be distinguished from ethnophilosophy or cultural philosophy. This
paper tries to elucidate this philosophical development by identifying the Western model of
philosophizing, by clarifying the meaning of “Filipino philosophy,” by giving examples from the
history of Filipino philosophers, and by mentioning the significance and prospects of Filipino
philosophizing.

This article marks the first in a series in which the author will publish famous phrases attributed to ancient Greek philosophers. Afier a brief introduction in wich details of the proposed study are given, the anide examines phrases by Thales, Anaximandre and Anaximenes. I. INTRODUCCIÓN Pretendemos con este estudio iniciar la publicación de las frases más célebres pronunciadas por los filósofos griegos. Una primera dificultad surge a la hora de titular el estudio por cuanto que no es fácil expresar con un vocablo concreto el concepto que vamos a desarrollar. En efecto, son varios los términos que se aplican para referirse a aquellas expresiones atribuidas a personajes históricos o a la sabiduría popular y que resumen un pensamiento o una verdad. Esa dificultad también se encuentra cuan-1 Este estudio forma parte del Proyecto de Investigación «Selección temática de textos griegos», que ha contado con una subvención de la Universidad de La Laguna, siendo su Director el Dr. D. MARCOS MARTÍNEZ HERNÁNDEZ.

The late Antique mosaic of Orpheus decorated a small room, approximately 18 m2 in area, connected with two even smaller ones, in 4 m2 and the other 2 m2 in area, belonging most likely to a small funerary chapel (or tomb) discovered in the ancient necropolis by the Damascene Gate in Jerusalem; it was discovered in 1901 by H. Vincent.
The author proposes a new interpretation of the iconographic program of the Orpheus myth used by wealthy Christians in a sepulchral context (see Olszewski M.T. «Orphée endeuillé de la mosaïque funéraire de Jérusalem», in Rey Mimoso-Ruiz, B. ed., Actes du colloque «Orphée entre Soleil et ombre», à l’Institut Catholique de Toulouse du 16 au 17 novembre 2007, Inter Lignes, numéros spécial – mars 2008, pp. 205-214, 226). He also proposes a new interpretation of the role Orpheus played in Roman funerary art, concentrating on the importance of the play on words and the visual and textual punning that was popular in ancient art and especially in funerary art. He rejects the popular interpretation of Orpheus as Christ in the Roman catacombs and proposes to interpret the image as that of Orpheus, bard of the departed souls, without any ahistorical connection with Christ. The program of the mosaic from Jerusalem is thus explained as a play on the words Orpheus-orphanos and Chiron (Chi-Rho) and Pan [Παν(τοκράτωρ)].The frequently used Christian funerary formula of resting in peace, Christ or the Lord corresponds
perfectly with the mood created around the mythical bard.
Orpheus’ universal role as singer and musician moving even the most stony of hearts, extolling the beloved departed, is absolutely justified in the context of a 6th-century Christian tomb. Orpheus is a popular and neutral figure, meaning that in effect it does not constitute a threat to Christian theology and can be tolerated by the educated Christians of Jerusalem.

This paper focuses on one of the major criticisms made to Aristotle's virtue ethics, namely that it lacks explicit moral action guidance. The same criticism has been addressed to later developments of virtue ethics. There have been several attempts to overcome this objection and to demonstrate that modern theories of virtue ethics do provide principles of right action. In this paper, I discuss mainly two such major attempts: the exemplarist approach and the virtue rules approach. My aim is to examine whether, if applied to Aristotle’s virtue ethics, these two approaches can provide a convincing answer to the criticism that Aristotle’s ethics does not offer explicit moral action guidance .

More than 20 years after presenting his first interpretation of the mosaic from the House of Aion in a paper entitled “Uwagi na temat mozaiki z Domu Aiona w Nea Paphos (Cypr)” (Meander 9/10, 1987, p. 421-438, in Polish, and translated to English: « The Immortality of the Human Soul and the Dionysiac Mysteries in the 4th Century Allegory [in Connection with the Interpretation of the Mosaic from the “House of Aion” at Paphos in Cyprus]»), where he proposed reading the five mythological panels (1. Leda and Zeus; 2. Dionysus on Mount Nysa; 3. The Dionysian thiasos; 4. Apollo and Marsyas; 5. The Apotheosis of Cassiopeia) as an allegory of the destiny of the human soul and body, starting with conception and ending with the liberation of the soul and its apotheosis, the author now enhances his initial interpretation with numerous reflections concerning the historical context of this work of art, created in the years 320-360.
If, according to the author, the mosaic is a “Hymn” in honour of the pagan gods, Man (his soul) and his place in the (pagan) universe, then at the same time it polemicises with the Christian faith and its God, Jesus Christ.
The author puts forward numerous new solutions relating to the mosaic’s iconography and iconology. Analysis of the mosaic also leads him to propose a solution to the as-yet unanswered question regarding the absence of images of the crucified Christ in Christian art of the 3rd and 4th centuries, up until 420/430, when the first images of Christ on the cross appear.
CONTENTS:
Introduction
1. Research to-date (recap)
2. Description of mosaic (recap)
2.1. Composition of five mythological scenes
2.2. Brief iconographic description of mythological panels
2.3. Outline of individual iconographic elements and their respective roles
2.4. The pagan gods’ air of majesty and dignity as an expression of piety
3. A few words about the pagan reaction
4. An apology of pious human life according to pagan principles and a polemic on the Christian model of Man and his theological idol, Jesus Christ
4.1. Divine intervention in the act of human conception (allusion to/polemic on the Annunciation to the Virgin Mary)
4.2. The Epiphany of Dionysus (an allusion to the Epiphany of Christ – Theou Pais)
4.3. The procession and dissemination of Dionysian order (allusion to/polemic on Christ’s entry into Jerusalem)
4.4. The error of Marsyas (polemic on/allusion to the error of Jesus the Messiah): arrest, sentencing for arrogance and lack of piety (asebeia) and condemnation to a martyr’s death
4.5. The anabasis (or anagoge psyches) of a ‘beautiful soul’ (allusion to/polemic on the Ascension of Christ)
5. A few words on the mosaic programme prior to final conclusions
Final conclusions

Rousseau’s attempt to combine authority and autonomy has led to him being described as both the theorist of the totalitarian state and as the exponent of the anarchist society. The complexities of Rousseau’s conception of self-legislation and self-government suggest both but, on closer analysis, involve neither. Rousseau is shown to develop an actively democratic principle of authority based on the principle of self-assumed obligation. This allows Rousseau to incorporate certain anarchist themes into a conception of government as the realisation of human freedom - the concern that freedom requires a more natural form of living, a simplicity of life and politics that suggests the small scale communities; so too does the justification of the small property of independent producers.

This is a comparison of Agathon’s role in Aristophanes’ Thesmophoriazusae and Plato’s Symposium. Firstly, I examine the Platonic version, and the unique, idiosyncratic part Plato gives Agathon to play, as a host to all, and a hostage to Socrates. Secondly, I discuss his interaction with Inlaw, the ordinary Athenian, in Aristophanes’ play. Such parallel reading allows us not only to refine our outlook on the dramatic construction both of the “talking party” and of the comic performance, but also to capture how really poikilos, for better or worse, that urban love could be. Finally, I analyze the significance of this juxtaposition, as an intertext. Plato, I argue, produces a proper palinode of Agathon, as an erotikos and a mimetic poet. By taking seriously the face-to-face between Agathon and Agathon, two dissonant and yet compatible variations on one man, our picture of Athenian erotic culture emerges sharper, and in greater detail. 
Key words:
Eros, sensuality, praise, blame, softness, manliness, effeminacy, body, language.

This paper explores aspects of "Socratic" rhetoric, which appear alongside "Sophistic" rhetoric in the Platonic dialogues, and focuses on Plato's rhetorical technique in Book I of the REPUBLIC, which gives a fine example of the way Plato dramatises the rejection of Sophistic rhetoric.

"Thaletas of Creta in Sparta
A. V. Zaikov (А. В. Зайков )
The ancient tradition names Thaletas “the man expert in the legislation” because he was the carrier of ancient secret knowledge allowed him to act in Sparta as a re-organizer of the Gymnopaediae and in this connection in the role of the founder of a new music and poetic direction, in the role of a healer who banished the plague, and also in the role of a suppressor of internal conflict and an installer of social order. The activity of Thaletas on making the social order completely coincided
with his activity in musical, poetic and ritual spheres. In other words Thaletas has expelled a sedition and has established the civil peace with follow modes: he united the citizens in choruses, has taugth them correct joint dancing movements, rhythms and songs, transformed street conflicts into the competitions made by precisely established rules within the framework of Apollo’s cult, and also forced the citizens to recognize that henceforth the annual performance of such uniting is the debt and indispensable duty of a community before Apollo – the god-purificator, healer and suppressor of strife. The close consideration and detailed analysis of the information kept in the ancient texts about Thaletas’ activity help to understand peculiarities of the constitutional experience of archaic
Sparta. Its characteristic feature was active and regular use of the potential of ecstatic religious cults with the purpose of preservation of the social peace and establishment eunomia."

Les Lois de Platon visent l’établissement de la constitution idéale d’une cité grecque et traitent une grande variété d’aspects nécessaires pour atteindre l’égalité et la vertu. Selon Platon, la première condition est d’avoir un partage équitable des espaces et des richesses.

Traduction entièrement nouvelle de l'Apologie, tenant compte des dernières éditions ainsi que des enseignements tirés de l'édition-traduction du Dialogue avec Tryphon publiée en 2003, avec les articles qui l'accompagnent. Bien que les destinataires ne soient pas les mêmes, le mode de composition de l'Apologie présente, dans le détail, d'évidentes analogies avec celui du Dialogue (démarche rigoureusement argumentée et solidement structurée, au sein de laquelle le passage d'un thème à un autre se fait souvent, de manière implicite, par glissements successifs). Dans l'Apologie comme dans le Dialogue, Justin raisonne à la fois de manière discursive (plan apparent)  et analogique (démarche sous-jacente).  L'ensemble des commentaires qui ne pouvaient pas trouver place dans cette édition Pléiade se retrouveront dans une prochaine monographie sur Justin de Naplouse tenant compte de l'ensemble des données révérées par l'analyse des textes qui lui sont attribués.

This thesis presents a comprehensive examination of the relationship between philosophy and comedy in 5th and 4th Century B.C.E. Athens – a project which has been lacking in the scholarship to date. The thesis is divided into two sections, the first of which analyses Plato’s use of comedy and the second devoted to a survey of representations of philosophy on the comic stage.

Section One is divided into four chapters which discuss the various techniques through which Plato employs allusions to comedy in his composition of certain characters. I argue that Plato’s intention here is to liken these persons to the alazonic philosopher of contemporary comedy, thus undermining the credibility of any doctrines they promote.

Section Two seeks to define the type of personality this ‘comic philosopher’ had and why Plato seemed so concerned with him. This will begin by analysing the portrayal of philosophy and the philosopher in Old Comedy, before advancing to the threshold of the Middle period with a discussion on the Ecclesiazusae, and conclude by looking at the philosopher in the fragments of Middle Comedy.

The results will show that although Plato seemed quite anxious about being likened to the philosopher of comedy, such worries may have been unfounded. The philosopher of Old Comedy was certainly an undesirable fellow with selfish, parasitic, and subversive tendencies; such qualities, however, are not universal in the genre and diminish when we approach the Middle period, where the philosopher is now depicted more as a haughty pedant devoting his life to trivial endeavours. It will be argued that this is due to the establishment of the first permanent philosophical institutions in Athens, which replaced the methods of the itinerant sophists of the previous century. The exception to this is the case of the Pythagorean, who – due to his reclusive lifestyle – generates the same suspicion as the philosopher of Old Comedy.

The present chapter aims at offering insights into Dionysius the Areopagite’s notion of theurgy, both with respect to the metaphysical principles that connect with “θεουργία” and the particular sacramental reality that emerges from it. Pavlos argues that despite the linguistic affinities and terminological appropriations - whether Iamblichean or Proclean - Dionysius’ premises on the matter remain radically different from that of Neoplatonism, both in terms of the sacramental tradition he recapitulates and the wider Christian metaphysical contours he adheres to. Of central importance in the argument is the striking fact that, throughout the Corpus Dionysiacum, “theurgy” is a term exclusively used by the author to refer to the works of Christ in His earthly historical presence, and to the whole divine providential, creative, sustaining, and divinising activity and work of God. Consequently, if for Dionysius a “theurgist” (θεουργός) could not be any human being, but only Christ Himself, the God-Man, Dionysian theurgy aims at the deification of man, which is nothing other than Christ-likeness.

Abstract source: https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9780429440465

""This thesis approaches 'Marx's politics' from its 'rational' origins in ancient Greek thought. Stated briefly, ‘rational freedom’ affirms a socio-relational and ethical conception of freedom in which individual liberty depends upon and is constituted by the quality of relations with other individuals. Marx only used the term 'rational freedom' the once, in his early journalism, articulating an explicitly Hegelian view. However, the concept remains implicit in Marx’s critical perspectives throughout his later work.This thesis argues that Marx retained Hegel's principle of the state as ethical agency whilst rejecting the actual institution of the state.
The argument of this thesis is that Marx both transforms and incorporates the 'rational' themes and values developed by Plato and Aristotle, Rousseau, Kant and Hegel. Whereas the contemporary trend is to go 'beyond marxism' (Schecter 1994), the approach that this thesis takes is to go before Marx in order to locate communism as a 'true' public within a normative philosophical concern with the appropriate regimen for the human good. This reconstructs a tradition and a concept of 'rational freedom' around principles of reciprocity, mutual respect, communication, communality, solidarity. The 'rational' here comprehends subjectivity as an intersubjectivity which secures the unity of the freedom of each and the freedom of all. This tradition rejects the atomistic model of freedom as self-cancelling in equating freedom with unrestricted individual choice and the unregulated pursuit of self-interest (Marx Gr 1973:163/6). The 'rational ‘ conception defines freedom as conceivable only by locating individual interactions within a network of relationships. The failure of marxism to generate a true public life is part of a wider problematic - the failure to actualise 'rational freedom'. This failure is considered not to be a problem of the universal values and ideals – which traditional conservative and contemporary postmodern thought target – but existing relations, institutions and practices. Marx certainly realised that the automatic connection between reason and freedom under law could no longer be assumed in class society. But this led him less to abandon the 'rational' conception of freedom than to seek its material foundation in a classless society which has dissolved the abstracted legal-institutional form of reason into a self-organising democratic society. This thesis argues that Marx radicalised the 'rational' principle of collective and reciprocal freedom beyond the state in a new associational public. In transcending the legalistic and moralistic framework of the 'rational' tradition, This thesis demonstrates how Marx actualises rational unity of each individual with all individuals within the social world of everyday exchange, reciprocity and solidarity.


Ch 1 The Conception of Rational Freedom
Philosophy as the Rational Utopia – Ancient Greek Origins – Plato and Aristotle – The Good Life and the Common Good - Rousseau’s Democratic Social Contract - The General Will – Autonomy and Rational Authority – Sovereignty and Representation.

Ch 2 Kant’s Community of Ends
The Categorical Imperative – the Universal Law – the Realm of Ends – Political Peace – The Critique of Kantian Rationalism.

Ch 3 Hegel’s Embodied Freedom
The Grounding of Kant’s Morality and Rousseau’s Democracy – the Philosophy of Right – the Associative Civil Public.

Ch 4 Marx’s Normative Democratic Community
The Critique of Hegel’s State – the Critique of Atomistic Society – the Ontology of the Good Community.

Ch 5 The Ontology of Reason – the Concept of Active Materialism
Social Citizenship – Michel Foucault: Reason and Repression – the Realisation of Philosophy – Ontology: Praxis, Power and Nature – the Democratisation of Politics, Power and Philosophy.

Ch 6 Reason and Rationalisation
Weber: Modernity and Morality – Alienation and Separation as Key Figures – the Dialectic of Alien and Common Control – Individuality and Communality.

Ch 7 Human Organisation - The Cooperative Commonwealth
The Cooperative Mode of Production – The Political and the Public – The Democratic Transformation of ‘the Political’ – Commune Democracy as Social Self-Government.

Ch 8 Reason and the Communicative Community
Habermas: Autonomy and Solidarity - The communicative Reformulation of the Graeco-Germanic Conception of Rational Freedom – System World and Life World – the Ideal Communication Community – the Discursive Public Sphere

Ch 9 Rational Freedom and Contemporary Political Theory
Double-Democratisation and the Recovery of Liberalism (Held and Keane) – ‘Liberal Socialism’ (Norberto Bobbio) – Liberalism and Communitarianism – (Rawls, Sandel, Raz, Walzer, Finnis, Galston) – the Relational Turn of Feminism – Radical Democracy (Laclau and Mouffe, Hirst, Heller)..""

This book has now been published as "Marx and the Idea of Rational Freedom" and is available for purchase.

NB/ cultura CULTURA PRESOCRATICA ha preparato la strada a un volune che ora sta per essere pubblicato, RIPENSARE I PRESOCRATICI.
Di questo libro è disponibile una sinossi. Si trova qui:
https://www.academia.edu/82498263/Ripensare_i_presocratici_SINOSSI_2022

[ last update: 08.06.2020 ]       
INDICE:        Il programma (p. 1) ― An overview / Uno sguardo all'insieme (p. 2) ―  0. Preliminarmente (p. 9) ― 1. Omero (p. 12) ― 2. Saffo (p. 19) ― 3. Talete (p. 26) ― 4. Anassimandro (p. 35) ― 5. Anassimene (p. 46) ― 5bis. Ecateo (p. 55) ― 6. Senofane (p. 59) ― 7. Eraclito (p. 67) ― 8. Pitagora (p. 77)  ―  8bis. Alcmeone (p. 84) ― 9. Parmenide, I parte (p. 88) ― 10. Parmenide, II parte (p. 100) ― 11. Melisso (p. 109) ― Zenone (p. 117).
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Una intera serie di incontri sui Presocratici (e su un articolato insieme di altri intellettuali coevi) ha avuto luogo a Perugia tra il novembre 2017 e il maggio 2018.
Su Youtube sono disponibili sette video. Qui il settimo della serie:: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnG1hsGquYA
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A whole series of public talks, devoted to the Presocratics (plus other Greek 'intellectuals' who were active in the same period) took place in Perugia between November 2017 and May 2018..
On Youtube seven videos are available. Just digit 'Cultura presocratica'. The last one:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnG1hsGquYA

This thesis examines two conflicting images that can be presented in contemporary scholarship on
the classical Epicurean movement: that they are either a reclusive and isolated group, or that they
had a missionary dynamic/purpose akin to that seen in the later Christian missionary movement.
Sources for the first generation of the school are examined, and it is suggested that the Epicurean
movement held an ‘open-closed’ dynamic with regards to mission: incorporating features that both
expedite, but also restrict the inclusion of outsiders into the group. Epicurean doctrine is also probed
to find features that would either broaden or limited any missionary concept in the school.
The ‘closed’ dynamic is found to have come under pressure in subsequent generations, particularly
from Epicurean adherents on Roman soil; where popularisers, in conflict with earlier generations of
the school, sought to overtly proselytize their message. Lucretius’ intention as missionary to the
educated elite of Roman is explored, and a chapter examining the extent of Epicurean influence on
the Roman elite is also provided.

The masculine/feminine notional pair represents far more than a mere biological, anthropological and social reality. Its omnipresence qualifies it as a fundamental, structural, quasi-Kantian category, shaping the vast majority of (external and internal) phenomena, perceptions and representations. It is also the foundation of religious representations and ideas, and an essential conceptual tool in the history of philosophy. Unsurprisingly, therefore, at the dawn of Western thought, the Pythagoreans included it amongst the ten fundamental binary concepts alongside finite/infinite, impair/pair, unity/multiplicity, good/evil, light/darkness, right/left, rest/movement, straight/curved and square/oblong 1. It is from this very general and conceptual vantage point, as a metaphysical and ontological principle, that we will attempt to analyse the role and status of the feminine in the Kabbalistic tradition. For various reasons that will become self-evident at the end of this reading, a reflection upon the feminine principle offers privileged access to understanding the ontological tenets of this tradition and, at least partly and schematically, its genealogy.

"Rethinking the Presocratics" / "Ripensare i presocratici" is a book of mine, published by MIMESIS, Milano in July 2023..
A considerable discontinuity from the current image of most Presocratics marks it.
To begin with: it is still widespread the idea that Thales was all about water, Anaximander all about apeiron and Anaximenes all about air, while no fourth prominent Milesian happens to be at least mentioned in current surveys on the Presocratics. Parmenides, in turn, continues to be considered the great philosopher of being and nothing else, Zeno a volunteer fighter in defense of the honor of Parmenides, and so on.
As it will be apparent from the synopsis, I can no more adhere to such an orthodoxy. In my opinion these ancient intellectuals did much more and much better.
In previous books and papers I argued for individual points (on Thales, on Parmenides, etc.), while this time I tried to  look around and submit a whole group of ancient investigators (a 'world', one could say) to a renewed curiosity. As a consequence, their portrayals are becoming remarkably different from those that are in circulation. For example, a Presocratic Botany now surfaces for the very first time...
SINCE  MANY CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHERS AND SCIENTISTS, NOT UNLIKE ALMOST ALL TEXTBOOKS, SEEM TOO OFTEN PRONE TO THE MOST CONVENTIONAL PORTRAYALS OF THIS WORLD, MY BOOK IS PRIMARILY ADDRESSED TO ALERT THEM.

The study of the Derveni Papyrus offered by Valeria Piano, Il Papiro di Derveni tra religione e filosofia, Florence, Olschki, 2016, presents considerable weaknesses in the reconstruction of cols. 0-IV and of specific lines of the following columns not only in terms of constitutio textus but also in terms of grammatical, theoretical and stylistic analysis. The author of the paper is in strong disagreement with previous reviews of Piano's volume.

How was the universe created, and what is our place within it? These are the questions at the heart of Plotinus’ Against the Gnostics. For the Gnostics, the universe came into being as a result of the soul’s fall from intelligible reality—it is the evil outcome of a botched creation. Plotinus challenges this, and insists that the soul’s creation of the world is the necessary consequence of its contemplation of the ideal forms. While the Gnostics claim to despise the visible universe, Plotinus argues that such contempt displays their ignorance of the higher realities of which the cosmos is a beautiful image.

Against the Gnostics is a polemical text. It aims to show the superiority of Plotinus’ philosophy over that of his Gnostic rivals, and poses unique challenges: Plotinus nowhere identifies his opponents by name, he does not set out their doctrines in any great detail, and his arguments are frequently elliptical. The detailed commentary provides a guide through these difficulties, making Plotinus’ meandering train of thought in this important treatise accessible to the reader.

450 π.Χ. Οι φιλόσοφοι δεν είναι οι εκπαιδευτικοί, οι ρήτορες, οι θεωρητικοί επιστήμονες με τη σημερινή έννοια. Είναι οι θετικοί, οι φυσικοί, οι κοσμολόγοι. Τι σχέση όμως μπορεί να έχει η σύσταση του κόσμου και του σύμπαντος, τα άτομα, τα μόρια, με την προσωπογράφηση και σκιαγράφηση των χαρακτηριστικών του ενάρετου, του δίκαιου, με την ιδανική πολιτεία;
Πώς ο Παρμενίδης ήταν αυτός που άνοιξε τον δρόμο για να "κατεβάσει" ο Πλάτωνας "τη φιλοσοφία από τα άστρα στη Γη";

Gavrilyuk attends to divine simplicity according to the third-century AD pagan philosopher Plotinus. He shows that Plotinus draws his doctrine of divine simplicity from the earlier Greco-Roman philosophical tradition, in which the nature of the “first principle” was highly contested. Aristotle offers a history of the early debate, with Anaxagoras being the first to glimpse the first principle’s simplicity. The Platonist philosophers conceived of the first principle as incorporeal, and on these grounds linked the first principle to simplicity. For his part, Aristotle associated simplicity with the absoluteness of pure actuality. The Stoics, with their essentially material understanding of the divine, ignored or denied divine simplicity. Plotinus draws upon the reception of Aristotle that is found in Alexander of Aphrodisias, Numenius, and Ammonius. According to Gavrilyuk, the signal contribution of Plotinus consists in setting forth the
strongest possible doctrine of divine simplicity. Indeed, for Plotinus God’s utter simplicity means that God cannot even be thought, because thinking requires the duality of subject-object. Plotinus conceives of the divine One as above divine Mind (nous), since the latter contains a unified plurality but not the perfect simplicity that marks the unknowable One. Gavilyuk ends his essay with an account of the qualifications made to divine simplicity by philosophers and theologians who are less radical in their doctrine than is Plotinus. He emphasizes that the Enneads’s key metaphysical insight, utterly ruling out any kind of composition from the One, has the benefit of being supremely intellectually coherent and elegant.

Βασιλείου-Δαμβέργης, Αλέξανδρος-Νεκτάριος, Ιω. «Η πολιτική φιλοσοφία του Δημοκρίτου και η ελληνική πόλις-κράτος: συγκριτική θεώρηση και επίκαιρες προεκτάσεις για την Ελλάδα και την Ευρώπη του 21ου αιώνα», Πρακτικά 3ου Πανελληνίου Συνεδρίου Πολιτικής Φιλοσοφίας, Θεσσαλονίκη 27-29 Απριλίου 2018, Καβάλα 2020, σ. 49-61.

This paper proposes a new interpretation of the famous fourth century A.D. mosaic of the “Seven Sages” and the “Anger of Achilles”. Discovered in Merida in 1982, this mosaic was previously analyzed and interpreted by J.M. Aharez Martinez and M.-H. Quet. The occurrence of these two iconographic themes in one mosaic tends the author to compare the description of the “Anger of Achilles” in the first book of the Iliad with the maxims of the Seven Sages of Greece. The study of both written and iconographic sources shows that he image of the “Anger of Achilles” evokes allusively the moral precepts of the Seven Sages. The mosaic constitutes therefore an example of the practical use of “artificiosa memoria “.

La lectura contextual.
Metodología para la lectura de fragmentos
de los filósofos presocráticos aplicada a la
tradición interpretativa platónica sobre Heráclito*
Liliana Carolina Sánchez-Castro**
Resumen: La lectura contextual es una metodología de estudio para estos testimonios fragmentarios que,
aunque no deja de lado los aspectos microtextuales, se concentra en las estructuras argumentativas de los textos
que portan los testimonios de los presocráticos (es decir, busca esclarecer a qué necesidades textuales responde
el uso del fragmento), buscando detectar sesgos y elementos paradigmáticos que sean dicientes a la hora de una
reconstrucción filosófica del pensamiento del autor en cuestión. En este caso me concentraré en el testimonio de
Platón sobre Heráclito, particularmente en el Crátilo, para mostrar cómo una lectura contextual da luces sobre
la construcción de una tradición interpretativa que ha resultado dominante en el caso de Heráclito: la doctrina
del flujo perpetuo. Dado que dicha interpretación ha sido puesta en duda por muchos estudiosos de Heráclito,
me propongo, como último paso, cotejarla con otra tradición interpretativa que nos muestre elementos en común
y nos permita hacer un uso global de los testimonios que conservamos sobre el filósofo de Éfeso.
Palabras clave: Lectura contextual, Heráclito, Crátilo, testimonio fragmentario.
Contextual Reading.
Methodology for Reading Fragmentary Texts of
Pre-Socratic Philosophers Applied to the Platonic
Interpretative Tradition on Heraclitus
Abstract: Contextual reading is a way of studying these fragmentary texts that concentrates on the structure
of the arguments put forth by pre-Socratic philosophers, without ignoring the microtextual aspects (in
other words, it seeks to clarify what textual needs use of the fragment responds to). This involves looking for
biases and paradigmatic elements that may be revealing when trying to reconstruct the philosophic thinking
of the author in question. In this case, I will concentrate on what Plato says about Heraclitus, particularly
Pensamiento y Cultura 134 Vol. 14-2 l Diciembre de 2011
in Cratylus, to show how contextual reading sheds light on the creation of an interpretative tradition that
gained predominance in the case of Heraclitus; namely, the doctrine of perpetual flux. Inasmuch as that interpretation
has been called into doubt by many Heraclitian scholars, I propose, as a final step, to compare it
to another interpretative tradition that reflects elements in common and allows us make universal use of the
testimonies we still have on the philosopher of Ephesus.
Key words: ontextual reading, Heraclitus, Cratylus, fragmentary testimony
La lecture contextuelle.
Méthodologie pour la lecture de fragments des
philosophes présocratiques appliquée à la tradition
interprétative platonique sur Héraclite
Résumé: La lecture contextuelle est une méthodologie d’étude pour ces témoignages fragmentaires qui,
même si elle ne laisse pas de côté les aspects microtexutels, se concentre sur les structures argumentatives des
textes qui comprennent des témoignages des présocratiques (c’est-à-dire que cette lecture cherche à savoir à
quels besoins textuels répond l’utilisation du fragment), en cherchant à détecter des tournures et des éléments
paradigmatiques pertinents au moment d’une reconstruction philosophique de la pensée de l’auteur en question.
Dans ce cas, je me concentrerai sur le témoignage de Platon sur Héraclite, en particulier dans le Cratylus,
afin de montrer comment une lecture contextuelle permet de comprendre la construction d’une tradition
interprétative qui fut dominante dans le cas d’Héraclite : la doctrine du flux perpétuel. Comme cette interprétation
a été remise en cause par de nombreux spécialistes d’Héraclite, je propose, comme dernière étape, de la
confronter avec une autre tradition interprétative qui nous montre des éléments communs et nous permet de
faire une utilisation globale des témoignages que nous conservons sur le philosophe de feso.
Mots-clés: ecture contextuelle, Héraclite, Cratylus, témoignage fragmentaire.

This article is focused on answering the question to what extent one can be a sceptic. Sextus Empiricus’s Outlines of Scepticism serves as a guide. In section 1, it is investigated whether three logical laws have a certain foundation or are subject to doubt. In section 2, Sextus’s way to deal with these laws is examined; the question arises how dogmatic his approach is. After that, a possible ‘reply’ by Sextus to the criticism receives attention. Section 3 is concentrated on a possible alternative to Sextus’s approach. Besides logical laws, some important methods are concerned.