Chapter Ten. The Central Question: Are The Gold Leaves Orphic?

Bernabé, Alberto; Cristóbal, Ana Isabel Jiménez San

doi:10.1163/ej.9789004163713.i-379.40

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“…For alternative (and to my mind less persuasive) views, see Janko (1997) and Kouremenos et al (2006) 52-59. For other instances where initiation seems to involve the acquisition of cosmological/theogonical knowledge, see, on the 'Orphic' gold tablets, Bernabé and Jiménez San Cristóbal (2008) 41-42 and Graf and Johnston (2013) 113-14; and the explanations of Eleusinian initiation espoused, for instance, by Richardson (1974) 24-28 and Bremmer (2014) 11-16. cosmology, and also why Parmenides and Empedocles use initiation as a metaphor for the process of getting to understand their explanations of the world. 65 In Antigone, the cosmological associations of Dionysiac initiation are activated by the description of the god 'leading a chorus of fire-breathing stars ' (1146-47), as if he governs the movement of the constellations and the cycle of the seasons.…”

Section: Dionysusmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rationality and Presocratic cosmology in Sophocles’Antigone

Mackenzie

2022

J. Hell. Stud.

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Scholars have occasionally noted that the Antigone’s abundant images of polar opposition bear resemblance to the fragments of Heraclitus and his doctrine of the ‘unity of opposites’. The present essay develops this comparison and explores its implications for our interpretation of the play, presenting a test case for the value of the Presocratics in the study of Attic tragedy. It argues that Heraclitus’ surviving work provides a valuable resource for elucidating the play’s ‘cosmology’, a term here used in its anthropological sense to refer to presuppositions, rather than explicitly articulated theories, concerning the structure of the universe and humanity’s place within it. This endeavour can affect our understanding of two points of intense interpretative disagreement: the rationality of the central protagonists and the role of polar oppositions in the play. A culturally sensitive evaluation of the characters’ rationality must take account of the rules of the cosmos they inhabit. The polar oppositions hint at a regular and systematic cosmology, but its finer details are ultimately kept obscure to the audience, and only Teiresias displays a substantial understanding of this underlying framework. Heraclitus thus enriches our understanding of the epistemological predicament in which the characters find themselves.

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Section: Dionysusmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rationality and Presocratic cosmology in Sophocles’Antigone

Mackenzie

2022

J. Hell. Stud.

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“…3297). See also Bernabé and Jiménez San Cristobal (2008) 51. Pherekydes 3 F 84 sees Hermes taking Alkmene after her death to become Rhadamanthys’ wife, at Zeus’ instigation.…”

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“… 65 All numbers for gold leaves refer to the edition of Bernabé and Jiménez San Cristobal (2008). On the characteristics of the afterlife in the gold leaves, see ibid.…”

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Utopian Motifs in Early Greek Concepts of the Afterlife

Burton¹

2016

Antichthon

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This paper explores the use of utopian motifs in early Greek concepts of the afterlife. The notion of a paradisiacal existence for selected heroes after death is widespread in Greek thought, going back at least as far as Hesiod, and appearing in such diverse sources as Pindar, the Orphic gold leaves, Attic comedy, and Lucian. Such idyllic afterlives share various features common to Lewis Mumford’s ‘utopias of escape’ (The Story of Utopias, London, 1922, 15), such as the absence of pain and toil, plentiful and self-supplying food and drink, the company of one’s peers, and so forth. They also share the utopian ideals of selective and restricted citizenship – although the requirements for entry may vary. The popularity of eschatological utopias is associated with the theme of a lost ‘Golden Age’ and the consequent assumption of the inevitable decline of human societies. Although often regarded as escapist fantasies, eschatological utopias do react, often critically, to perceived issues in the societies that constructed them. Their unreal nature is regarded as problematic, and through their association with Kronos and the Golden Age they exemplify the dangers of anomia. But they also provide a means by which an individual can preserve his consciousness and identity in death.

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Chapter Ten. The Central Question: Are The Gold Leaves Orphic?

Cited by 2 publications

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Rationality and Presocratic cosmology in Sophocles’Antigone

Rationality and Presocratic cosmology in Sophocles’Antigone

Utopian Motifs in Early Greek Concepts of the Afterlife

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