|
| immortality |
Date:
Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
"Terry L. Papillon"
Subject:
Immortality
When Isocrates praises Helen in his "Praise of Helen," he
claims (60) that an argument for the importance of beauty is that
more mortals have become immortal "because of beauty" [dia
to kallos] than because of "all other excellences" [dia
tas allas aretas hapantas]. two questions: 1. What is the truth of
this statement? Are most immortalized humans given this gift because
of beauty? Herakles wasn't. Neither were the examples he himself
gives in sections 61-2 (Dioscuri and Menelaos, those who got it
through Helen). What is your opinion? 2. In spite of Smyth 1174, can
I take the last clause, "dia tas allas aretas hapantas,"
as "more than all other aretai combined"? I know it should
mean all other aretai taken as individual qualities, but I want to
lump them. Does that seem acceptable? This is a footnote of a paper
I'm giving at a rhetoric conference (ISHR) in Turin in 10 days, so
prompt expression of opinions (or episteme, sorry for the Isocratean
assumption there) will be greatly appreciated.
From: Robin Mitchell
Subject: Re: Immortality
Well,
there's Ganymede who certainly got it for his looks.
Date:
Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
Kevin Clinton
Subject:
Re: Immortality
Plato's
Symposium will help you understand what Isocrates means by "immortal"
here.
Date:
Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
"Terry L. Papillon"
Subject:
Re: Immortality
Kevin
Clinton Please elaborate. Do you mean that Isocrates thinks that
Helen achieved immortality because of her recognition of eternal
beauty? BTW, do you put Symposium (384-79 acc Dover) before or after
the Helen of Isocrates (380 is my best guess)?
Date: Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
Carl Conrad
Subject:
Re: Immortality
Shouldn't
dia tas allas aretas hapantas mean "all of them for their
excel- lences"? I think there's a gender difference there,
isn't there?
Date:
Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
"Terry L. Papillon"
Subject:
Re: Immortality
I
must have written "hapantas" by accident instead of "hapasas"
as Isocrates did. It IS fem acc pl and agreeing with aretas. Sorry
for the confusion.
Date:
Fri, 9 Jul 1993
From:
"Carl W. Conrad"
Subject:
Re: Immortality
Okay, now that the text is cleared up, let me say something about
the sugges- tion of the relevance of Plato's Symposium. First,
though, with *hapasas", wouldn't it be "than for all the
other aretai one-and-all"? Secondly, the relevant theme in the
Symposium would be, I think, the proposition that the yearning of
all honorable persons is to unite with the beautiful, to become
immortal through it, and to generate through it. There is the scale
of beautiful things grading all the way up to auto to kalon, and
Diotima certainly insists that moral beauty transcends physical
beauty. Furthermore, the common usage of *kalos* as in *kalos te
k'agathos* involves, does it not, the notion that one is "seemly"
through one's behavior. It has often seemed to me that from the
classical Greek perspective ethics is a subspecies of aesthetics.
Having said that, I really have my doubts if that's what Isocrates
means and whether he would really share such ideas with Plato. I
rather wonder whether the clue must come from Gorgias' earlier
Encomium of Helen, where beauty seems, among other things, to
represent all that seduces: physical beauty, but especially
seductive logos. Gorgias used this little piece to advertise his own
educational wares, I think; might Isocrates have a similar end in
view. I don't know whether that's right or not, but I do suggest
looking at what Gorgias in his Encomium says about doxai and their
allurement and seeing if it relates to the Isocratean argument (I
confess, I haven't read the Isocratean "Praise of Helen."
|
|
Culled from
classics.log9307.
|
|