Little is known of Heraclitus's life. He wrote a single work, of which onlyfragments survive. Even in ancient times, hisparadoxical philosophy, appreciation forwordplay, and cryptic, oracularepigrams earned him the epithets "the dark" and "the obscure". He was considered arrogant and depressed, amisanthrope who was subject tomelancholia. Consequently, he became known as "the weeping philosopher" in contrast to the ancientatomist philosopherDemocritus, who was known as "the laughing philosopher".
The central ideas of Heraclitus's philosophy are theunity of opposites and the concept ofchange. Heraclitus sawharmony andjustice instrife. He viewed the world as constantly in flux, always "becoming" but never "being". He expressed this in sayings like "Everythingflows" (Greek:πάντα ῥεῖ,panta rhei) and "No man ever steps in the same river twice". This insistence upon change contrasts with that of the ancient philosopherParmenides, who believed in a reality of static "being".
Heraclitus believed fire was thearche, the fundamental stuff of the world. In choosing anarche Heraclitus followed theMilesians before him —Thales of Miletus with water,Anaximander withapeiron ("boundless" or "infinite"), andAnaximenes of Miletus with air. Heraclitus also thought thelogos (lit. word, discourse, or reason) gave structure to the world or existed as a kind of divine law.
Theater inEphesus on the coast ofAsia Minor, birthplace of Heraclitus
Heraclitus, the son of Blyson, was from theIonian city of Ephesus, aport on theCayster River, on the western coast ofAsia Minor (modern-dayTurkey). In the 6th century BC, Ephesus, like other cities inIonia, lived under the effects of both the rise ofLydia underCroesus and his overthrow byCyrus the Great c. 547 BC.[2] Ephesus appears to have subsequently cultivated a close relationship with the Persian Empire; during the suppression of theIonian revolt byDarius the Great in 494 BC, Ephesus was spared and emerged as the dominantGreek city in Ionia.[2]Miletus, the home of the previous philosophers, was captured and sacked.[3]
The main source for the life of Heraclitus is thedoxographerDiogenes Laërtius.[a] Although most of the information provided by Laertius is unreliable, and the ancient stories about Heraclitus are thought to be later fabrications based on interpretations of the preserved fragments; the anecdote that Heraclitus relinquished the hereditary title of "king" to his younger brother may at least imply that Heraclitus was from anaristocratic family in Ephesus.[2][note 1] Heraclitus appears to have had little sympathy fordemocracy orthe masses.[d][e] However, it is unclear whether he was "an unconditional partisan of the rich", or if, like thesageSolon, he was "withdrawn from competing factions".[2]
Since antiquity, Heraclitus has been labeled a solitary figure and an arrogant misanthrope.[6][a] TheskepticTimon of Phlius called Heraclitus a "mob-abuser" (ochloloidoros).[a] Heraclitus considered himself self-taught.[f] He criticized fools for being "put in a flutter by every word".[g] He did not consider others incapable, but unwilling: "And though reason is common, most people live as though they had an understanding peculiar to themselves."[h] Heraclitus did not seem to like the prevailing religion of the time, criticizing the popularmystery cults,blood sacrifice, andprayer to statues.[7][i][j][k][note 2] He also did not believe infuneral rites, saying "Corpses are more fit to be cast out than dung."[10][l] He further criticizedHomer,[m][n]Hesiod,[o]Pythagoras,[p]Xenophanes, andHecataeus.[a][q] He endorsed the sageBias of Priene, who is quoted as saying "Most men are bad".[r] He praised a man named Hermodorus as the best among the Ephesians, who he says should allkill themselves for exiling him.[s][t][note 3]
Heraclitus is traditionally considered to haveflourished in the 69thOlympiad (504–501 BC),[12][a] but this date may simply be based on a prior account synchronizing his life with the reign ofDarius the Great.[2][note 4] However, this date can be considered "roughly accurate" based on a fragment that references Pythagoras, Xenophanes, and Hecataeus as older contemporaries, placing him near the end of the sixth century BC.[2][14][15]According to Diogenes Laertius, Heraclitus died covered in dung after failing to cure himself fromdropsy. This may be to parody his doctrine that for souls it is death to become water, and that a dry soul is best.[16][17][u][v][w]
A modern reconstruction of the EphesianTemple of Artemis, located in modern Istanbul. According to Diogenes Laertius, Heraclitus deposited his book in the temple.
Heraclitus is said to have produced a single work onpapyrus,[a] which has not survived; however, over 100 fragments of this work survive in quotations by other authors.[note 5] The title is unknown,[20] but many later writers refer to this work, and works by other pre-Socratics, asOn Nature.[21][a] According to Diogenes Laërtius, Heraclitus deposited the book in theArtemision as a dedication.[a] It was available at least until the 2nd century AD, whenPlutarch andClement quote directly from it, if not later.[22] Yet by the 6th-century,Simplicius of Cilicia, who mentions Heraclitus 32 times in hisCommentaries on Aristotle, never quotes from him, implying that Heraclitus's work was so rare that it was apparently unavailable even to theNeoplatonist philosophers at the Platonic Academy in Athens.[23]
Of thelogos being forever do men prove to be uncomprehending, both before they hear and once they have heard it. For although all things happen according to thislogos they are like the unexperienced experiencing words and deeds such as I explain when I distinguish each thing according to its nature and declare how it is. Other men are unaware of what they do when they are awake just as they are forgetful of what they do when they are asleep.[x]
ScholarMartin Litchfield West claims that while the existing fragments do not give much of an idea of the overall structure,[24] the beginning of the discourse can probably be determined.[note 6]
Diogenes Laërtius wrote that the book was divided into three parts: theuniverse,politics, andtheology,[a] but, classicists have challenged that division. ClassicistJohn Burnet has argued that "it is not to be supposed that this division is due to [Heraclitus] himself; all we can infer is that the work fell naturally into these parts when theStoic commentators took their editions of it in hand".[25] The Stoics divided their own philosophy into three parts: ethics, logic, and physics.[26] The StoicCleanthes further divided philosophy intodialectics,rhetoric,ethics, politics,physics, and theology, andphilologistKarl Deichgräber has argued the last three are the same as the alleged division of Heraclitus.[27] The philosopher Paul Schuster has argued the division came from thePinakes.[28][29]
Heraclitus's writing style has been compared to asibyl, as depicted here by Domenichino.
Heraclitus's style has been compared to aSibyl,[4][30][31] who "with raving lips uttering things mirthless, unbedizened, and unperfumed, reaches over a thousand years with her voice, thanks to the god in her".[y][note 7]
Heraclitus also seems to have patterned his style afteroracles.[33] Heraclitus wrote "nature loves to hide"[z] and "a hidden connection is stronger than an obvious one".[aa] He also wrote "The lord whoseoracle is inDelphi neither speaks nor conceals, but gives a sign."[34][ab] Heraclitus is the earliest known literary reference for theDelphic maxim toknow thyself.[35][ac]
Kahn characterized the main features of Heraclitus's writing as "linguistic density", meaning that single words and phrases have multiple meanings, and "resonance", meaning that expressions evoke one another.[36] Heraclitus usedliterary devices likealliteration andchiasmus.[37]
Aristotle quotes part of the opening line of Heraclitus's work in theRhetoric to outline the difficulty in punctuating Heraclitus without ambiguity; he debated whether "forever" applied to "being" or to "prove".[37][ad] Aristotle's successor at thelyceumTheophrastus says about Heraclitus that "some parts of his work [are] half-finished, while other parts [made] a strange medley".[a] Theophrastus thought an inability to finish the work showed Heraclitus was melancholic.[a]
Diogenes Laërtius relays the story that the playwrightEuripides gaveSocrates a copy of Heraclitus's work and asked for his opinion. Socrates replied: "The part I understand is excellent, and so too is, I dare say, the part I do not understand; but it needs aDeliandiver to get to the bottom of it."[38]
Also according to Diogenes Laërtius, Timon of Phlius called Heraclitus "the Riddler" (αἰνικτής;ainiktēs).[note 8] Timon said Heraclitus wrote his book "rather unclearly" (ασαφεστερον;asaphesteron); according to Timon, this was intended to allow only the "capable" to attempt it.[a]
By the time of the pseudo-Aristotelian treatiseDe Mundo, this epithet became in Greek "The Dark" (ὁ Σκοτεινός;ho Skoteinós).[40] InLatin this became "The Obscure". According toCicero, Heraclitus had spokennimis obscurē ("too obscurely") concerning nature and had done so deliberately in order to be misunderstood.[41][42] According toPlotinus, it was "probably with the idea that it is for us to seek within ourselves, as he sought for himself and found".[43][f]
The hallmarks of Heraclitus's philosophy are theunity of opposites and change, orflux.[45][46] According to Aristotle, Heraclitus was adialetheist, or one who denies thelaw of noncontradiction (alaw of thought or logical principle which states that something cannot be true and false at the same time).[47][48][ae] Also according to Aristotle, Heraclitus was amaterialist.[49] Attempting to follow Aristotle'shylomorphic interpretation, scholarW. K. C. Guthrie interprets the distinction between flux and stability as one betweenmatter andform. On this view, Heraclitus is a flux theorist because he is a materialist who believes matter always changes.[50] There are no unchanging forms like with Plato or Aristotle. As one author puts it, "Plato took flux as the greatest warning against materialism".[51]
Several fragments seem to relate to the unity of opposites.[46] For example: "The straight and the crooked path of thefuller's comb is one and the same";[af] "The way up is the way down";[ag] "Beginning and end, on acircle's circumference, are common";[ah] and "Thou shouldst unite things whole and things not whole, that which tends to unite and that which tends to separate, the harmonious and the discordant; from all things arises the one, and from the one all things."[ai]
Over time, the opposites change into each other:[52][53] "Mortals are immortals and immortals are mortals, the one living the others' death and dying the others' life";[aj] "As the same thing in us is living and dead, waking and sleeping, young and old. For these things having changed around are those, and those in turn having changed around are these";[ak] and "Cold things warm up, the hot cools off, wet becomes dry, dry becomes wet."[al]
It also seems they change into each other depending on one'spoint of view, a case ofrelativism orperspectivism.[54][55] Heraclitus states: "Disease makes health sweet and good; hunger, satiety; toil, rest."[am] While men drink and wash with water,fish prefer to drink saltwater,pigs prefer to wash in mud, andfowls prefer to wash in dust.[an][ao][ap] "Oxen are happy when they find bittervetches to eat"[aq] and "asses would rather have refuse thangold".[ar]
Diogenes Laërtius summarizes Heraclitus's philosophy as follows: "All things come into being by conflict of opposites, and the sum of things (τὰ ὅλαta hola ('the whole')) flows like a stream."[a] ClassicistJonathan Barnes states that "Panta rhei, 'everything flows' is probably the most familiar of Heraclitus's sayings, yet few modern scholars think he said it".[56] Barnes observes that although theexact phrase was not ascribed to Heraclitus until the 6th century bySimplicius, a similar saying expressing the same idea,[56]panta chorei, or "everything moves" is ascribed to Heraclitus by Plato in theCratylus.[as]
TheHalys River, Turkey's longest. Heraclitus's theory of flux has been associated with the metaphor of a flowing river.
Since Plato, Heraclitus's theory of flux has been associated with the metaphor of a flowing river, which cannot be stepped into twice.[57][as] This fragment from Heraclitus's writings has survived in three different forms:[56]
"On those who step into the same rivers, different and different waters flow" –Arius Didymus, quoted inStobaeus[at]
"We both step and do not step into the same river, we both are and are not" –Heraclitus Homericus,Homeric Allegories[au]
"It is not possible to step into the same river twice" –Plutarch,On the E at Delphi[av]
The classicistKarl Reinhardt identified the first river quote as the genuine one.[58] The river fragments (especially the second "we both are and are not") seem to suggest not only is the river constantly changing, but we do as well, perhaps commenting onexistential questions about humanity and personhood.[59]
Scholars such as Reinhardt also interpreted the metaphor as illustrating what is stable, rather than the usual interpretation of illustrating change.[60] ClassicistKarl-Martin Dietz [de] has said: "You will not find anything, in which the river remains constant ... Just the fact, that there is a particular river bed, that there is a source and an estuary etc. is something, that stays identical. And this is ... the concept of a river."[61] According to American philosopherW. V. O. Quine, the river parable illustrates that the river is a process through time. One cannot step twice into the same river-stage.[62]
ProfessorM. M. McCabe has argued that the three statements on rivers should all be read as fragments from a discourse. McCabe suggests reading them as though they arose in succession. The three fragments "could be retained, and arranged in an argumentative sequence".[18] In McCabe's reading of the fragments, Heraclitus can be read as a philosopher capable of sustainedargument, rather than justaphorism.[18]
Dike depicted on theVermont state house. Heraclitus considered strife fundamental to a just world.
Heraclitus said "strife is justice"[aw] and "all things take place by strife".[ax] He called the opposites in conflictἔρις (eris), "strife", and theorized that the apparently unitary state,δίκη (dikê), "justice", results in "the most beautifulharmony",[ax] in contrast toAnaximander, who described the same as injustice.[31][63][64]
Aristotle said that Heraclitus disagreed with Homer because Homer wished that strife would leave the world, which according to Heraclitus would destroy the world; "there would be no harmony without high and low notes, and no animals without male and female, which are opposites".[ay] It may also explain why he disagreed with the Pythagorean emphasis on harmony, but not on strife.[50]
Heraclitus suggests that the world and its various parts are kept together through thetension produced by the unity of opposites, like the string of abow or alyre.[65][az] On one account, this is the earliest use of the concept offorce.[66] A quote about the bow shows his appreciation for wordplay: "The bow's name is life, but its work is death."[ba][note 9] Each substance contains its opposite, making for a continual circular exchange of generation, destruction, and motion that results in the stability of the world.[67][68] This can be illustrated by the quote "Even thekykeon separates if it is not stirred."[bb]
According to Abraham Schoener: "War is the central principle in Heraclitus' thought."[69] Another of Heraclitus's famous sayings highlights the idea that the unity of opposites is also a conflict of opposites: "War is father of all and king of all; and some he manifested as gods, some as men; some he made slaves, some free";[bc] war is a creative tension that brings things into existence.[67][70] Heraclitus says further "Gods and men honour those slain in war";[bd] "Greater deaths gain greater portions";[be] and "Every beast is tended by blows."[bf]
A core concept for Heraclitus islogos, an ancient Greek word literally meaning "word, speech, discourse, ormeaning". For Heraclitus, thelogos seems to designate the rational structure or ordered composition of the world.[71][72] It also seems to be a kind of divine law, which one hears.[73] As well as the opening quote of his book, one fragment reads: "Listening not to me but to thelogos, it is wise to agree (homologein) that all things are one."[bg] Another fragment reads: "[hoi polloi] ... do not know how to listen [toLogos] or how to speak [the truth]."[74][bh]
The wordlogos has a wide variety of other uses, such that Heraclitus might have a different meaning of the word for each usage in his book. Kahn has argued that Heraclitus used the word in multiple senses,[75] whereas Guthrie has argued that there is no evidence Heraclitus used it in a way that was significantly different from that in which it was used by contemporaneous speakers of Greek.[76]
Heraclitus'slogos doctrine may also be the origin of the doctrine ofnatural law.[80][81] Heraclitus stated "People ought to fight to keep their law as to defend the city walls. For all human laws get nourishment from the one divine law."[bi] "Far from arguing like the latter Sophists, that the human law, because it is a conventional law, deserves to be abandoned in favor of the law of nature, Herakleitos argued that the human law partakes of the law of nature, which is at the same time a divine law."[82]
Heraclitus believed the cosmos "no god nor man did create, but it ever was and is and will be: ever-living fire".
The Milesians before Heraclitus had a view calledmaterial monism which conceived of certain elements as thearche – Thales with water, Anaximander withapeiron, and Anaximenes with air. Since antiquity, philosophers have concluded that Heraclitus construed of fire as thearche, the ultimate reality or the fundamental element that gave rise to the other elements.[83][bj][bk] Pre-Socratic scholarEduard Zeller has argued that Heraclitus believed that heat in general and dry exhalation in particular, rather than visible fire, was thearche.[84] In one fragment, Heraclitus writes:
This world-order (kosmos), the same for all, no god nor man did create, but it ever was and is and will be: ever-living fire, kindling in measures and being quenched in measures.[bl]
This is the oldest extant quote usingkosmos, or order, to mean the world.[85][86] Heraclitus seems to say fire is the one thing eternal in the universe.[87] From fire all things originate and all things return again in a process of never-ending cycles.[87] Plato and Aristotle attribute to Heraclitus a periodic destruction of the world by a great conflagration, known asekpyrosis, which happens everyGreat Year – according to Plato, every 36,000 years.[88]
Heraclitus more than once describes the transformations to and from fire:
Fire lives the death of earth, and air lives the death of fire; water lives the death of air, and earth that of water.[bm]
The turnings of fire: first sea, and of sea half is earth, half fireburst. [Earth] is liquefied as sea and measured into the same proportion as it had before it became earth.[bn]
However, it is also argued by many that Heraclitus never identified fire as thearche; rather, he only used fire to explain his notion of flux, as the basic stuff which changes or moves the most.[89] Others conclude he used it as the physical form oflogos.[90]
On yet another interpretation, Heraclitus is not a material monist explicating flux nor stability, but a revolutionaryprocess philosopher who chooses fire in an attempt to say there is noarche. Fire is a symbol or metaphor for change, rather than the basic stuff which changes the most.[91] Perspectives of this sort emphasize his statements on change such as "The way up is the way down",[92][ag] as well as the quote "All things are an exchange for Fire, and Fire for all things, even as wares for gold and gold for wares",[bo] which has been understood as stating that while all can be transformed into fire, not everything comes from fire, just as not everything comes from gold.[93]
Heraclitus held all things occur according tofate.[97][bk] He said "Time (Aion) is a child playingdraughts, the kingly power is a child's."[b] It is disputed whether this means time and life is determined byrules like agame, by conflict like a game, or by arbitrary whims of the gods like a child plays.[98]
Similar to his views on rivers, Heraclitus believed "theSun is new each day."[99][bp] He also said the Sun neversets.[100][bq] According toBertrand Russell, this was "obviously inspired by scientific reflection, and no doubt seemed to him to obviate the difficulty of understanding how the sun can work its way underground from west to east during the night".[101] The physicianGalen explains: "Heraclitus says that the sun is a burning mass, kindled at its rising, and quenched at its setting."[102][103][104]
Heraclitus (named outlined in red) in a fragment of Oxyrhynchus Papyri discusses the Moon.
Heraclitus also believed that the Sun is as large as it looks,[96][note 10] and said Hesiod "did not knownight andday, for they are one."[bs] However, he also explained the phenomenon of day and night by if the Sun "oversteps his measures", then "Erinyes, the ministers of Justice, will find him out".[105][bt] Heraclitus further wrote the Sun is in charge ofthe seasons.[bu]
On one account, Heraclitus believed the Sun andMoon werebowls containing fire, withlunar phases explained by the turning of the bowl.[95][102][bv] His study of the moon near the end of the month is contained in one of theOxyrhynchus Papyri, a group ofmanuscripts found in an ancientlandfill.[106] This is the best evidence of Heraclitean astronomy.[107]
Heraclitus said "thunderbolt steers all things",[bw] a rare comment on meteorology and likely a reference toZeus as the supreme being.[85] Even his theology proves contradictory: "One being, the only wise one, would and would not be called by the name of Zeus."[85][bx] He invokes relativism with the divine too: God sees man the same way man sees children and apes;[81][by][bz] and he seems to give atheodicy, "for god all things are fair and good and just, but men suppose that some are unjust and others just".[85][ca] Yet another interpretation for Heraclitus's use of fire is it refers to the sun god,Apollo;[108][109] "The lord whose oracle is in Delphi."[ab]
According to one writer, "When Heraclitus speaks of "God" he does not mean a single deity as an omnipotent and omniscient or God as Creator, the universe being eternal; he meant the divine as opposed to human, the immortal as opposed to the mortal, and the cyclical as opposed to the transient. Thus, it is arguably more accurate to speak of "the Divine" and not of "God".[110]
InParts of Animals, Aristotle relays this story: "Heraclitus, when the strangers who came to visit him found him warming himself at the furnace in the kitchen and hesitated to go in, reported to have bidden them not to be afraid to enter, as even in that kitchen divinities were present, so we should venture on the study of every kind of animal without distaste; for each and all will reveal to us something natural and something beautiful."[111][cb][note 11]
The phrase ἦθος ἀνθρώπῳ δαίμων (ethos anthropoi daimon) is attributed to Heraclitus. It is variously translated as "a man's character is his fate", "character is destiny", or perhaps most literally as "a man's character is his guardian divinity."[113][114][115][note 12] The wordethos means "character", whiledaimon has various meanings, one of which being "the power controlling the destiny of individuals: hence, one's lot or fortune."[117]
Heraclitus believed thesoul (psyche) was complex, stating: "The limits of the soul you could not discover, though traversing every path."[118][cc] Heraclitus regarded the soul as a mixture of fire and water, and believed that fire was the noble part of the soul and water the ignoble part.[u] He considered mastery of one's worldly desires to be a noble pursuit that purified the soul's fire,[119] whiledrunkenness damages the soul by causing it to be moist.[cd][v][w] Heraclitus seems to advise against anger: "It is hard to fight with anger, for what it wants it buys at the price of the soul."[120][ce]
Heraclitus associates being awake with comprehension;[35] as Sextus Empiricus explains "It is by drawing in this divine reason inrespiration that we become endowed withmind and in sleep we become forgetful, but in waking we regain oursenses. For in sleep the passages ofperception are shut, and hence the mind ... the only thing preserved is the connection throughbreathing."[121][cf] Heraclitus stated: "If all things should becomesmoke, then perception would be by the nostrils".[cg]
Heraclitus compares the soul to a spider and the body to the web.
Heraclitus compares the soul to aspider and the body to theweb.[ch] Heraclitus believed the soul is what unifies the body and also what grants linguistic understanding, departing from Homer's conception of it as merely thebreath of life.[122][123] Heraclitus ridicules Homer's conception of souls in the afterlife asshades by saying "Souls smell inHades".[ci][note 13] His own views on the afterlife remain unclear,[95] but Heraclitus did state: "There await men after they are dead things which they do not expect or imagine."[cj]
The Aristotelian tradition is responsible for a great part of the transmission of Heraclitus's physical conception of the soul.[124] Aristotle wrote inDe Anima: "Heraclitus too says that the first principle—the 'warm exhalation' of which, according to him, everything else is composed—is soul; further, that this exhalation is most incorporeal and in ceaseless flux".[ck]
Heraclitus's originality and placement near the beginning of Greek philosophy has resulted in several writers looking for possible influence from the surrounding nations.
The Persian Empire had a close connection with Ephesus andZoroastrianism was the state religion of the Persian Empire. Heraclitus's emphasis on fire has been investigated for influence from Zoroastrianfire worship and specifically the concept ofAtar.[125] While many of the doctrines of Zoroastrian fire do not match exactly with those of Heraclitus, such as the relation of fire toearth, it is still argued he may have taken some inspiration from them.[125] Zoroastrian parallels to Heraclitus are often difficult to identify specifically due to a lack of surviving Zoroastrian literature from the period and mutual influence with Greek philosophy.[note 14]
The interchange of other elements with fire has parallels inVedic literature from the same time period, such as theUpanishads.[127] TheBrihadaranyaka Upanishad states that "Death is fire and the food of water" and theTaittiriya Upanishad states "from wind fire, from fire water, from water earth."[128] Heraclitus may have also been influenced by a Vedicmeditation known as the "Doctrine of the Five Fires."[129] West however stresses that these doctrines of the interchange of elements were common throughout written works on philosophy that have survived from that period; so Heraclitus's doctrine of fire can not be definitively said to have been influenced by any other particular Iranian or Indian influence, but may have been part of a mutual interchange of influence over time across the Ancient Near East.[130]
PhilosopherGustav Teichmüller sought to prove Heraclitus was influenced by theEgyptians,[131][132] either directly, by reading theBook of the Dead, or indirectly through the Greek mystery cults.[131] "As the sun of Heraclitus was daily generated from water, soHorus, as Ra of the sun, daily proceeded from Lotus the water."[131] Paul Tannery took up Teichmüller's interpretation.[133] They both thought Heraclitus's book was an offering to the temple to be read only by few initiates, rather than deposited in the temple to the public for safe-keeping.[134]Edmund Pfleiderer argued that Heraclitus was influenced by the mystery cults. He interprets Heraclitus's apparent condemning of the mystery cults[i][j] as the condemning of abuses rather than the idea itself.[135]
Heraclitus's writings have exerted a wide influence onWestern philosophy, including the works ofPlato andAristotle, who interpreted him in terms of their own doctrines.[136]
It is unknown whether or not Heraclitus had any students in his lifetime.[136] Diogenes Laertius states Heraclitus's book "won so great a fame that there arose followers of him called Heracliteans."[a] Scholars took this to mean Heraclitus had no disciples and became renowned only after his death.[140] According to one author, "The school of disciples founded by Heraclitus flourished for long after his death".[141] According to another, "there were no doubt other Heracliteans whose names are now lost to us".[142]
In his dialogueCratylus, Plato presentedCratylus as a Heraclitean and as alinguistic naturalist who believed that names must apply naturally to their objects.[143][144] According to Aristotle, Cratylus went a step beyond his master's doctrine and said that one cannot step into the same river once. He took the view that nothing can be said about the ever-changing world and "ended by thinking that one need not say anything, and only moved his finger".[145] To explain both characterizations by Plato and Aristotle, Cratylus may have thought continuous change warrants skepticism because one cannot define a thing that does not have a permanent nature.[146] Diogenes Laertius also lists an otherwise historically obscure Antisthenes who wrote a commentary on Heraclitus.[note 15]
ThePythagorean and comic writerEpicharmus of Kos has fragments which seem to reproduce the thought of Heraclitus, and wrote a play titledHeraclitus.[147][148]
Parmenides, a contemporary who espoused a doctrine of unchanging Being, has been contrasted with Heraclitus and his doctrine of constant change.
Parmenides of Elea, a philosopher and near-contemporary, proposed a doctrine of changelessness, in contrast to the doctrine of flux put forth by Heraclitus.[149][150] He is generally agreed to either have influenced or been influenced by Heraclitus.[136][150] Different philosophers have argued that either one of them may have substantially influenced each other, some taking Heraclitus to be responding to Parmenides, but more often Parmenides is seen as responding to Heraclitus.[150][151] Some also argue that any direct chain of influence between the two is impossible to determine.[150] Although Heraclitus refers to older figures such as Pythagoras,[a][q] neither Parmenides or Heraclitus refer to each other by name in any surviving fragments, so any speculation on influence must be based on interpretation.[150]
The surviving fragments of several other pre-Socratic philosophers show Heraclitean themes.[136]Diogenes of Apollonia thought the action of one thing on another meant they were made of one substance.[81] Thepluralists may have been influenced by Heraclitus. The philosopherAnaxagoras refuses to separate the opposites in the "one cosmos".[81]Empedocles has forces (arguably the first since Heraclitus's tension)[66] which are in opposition, known as Love and Hate, or more accurately, Harmony and Strife.[81] Democritus and theatomists were also influenced by Heraclitus.[136] The atomists and Heraclitus both believed that everything was in motion.[152][153][as] On one interpretation: "Essentially what the atomists did was try to find a middle-way between the contradictory philosophical schemes of Heraclitus and Parmenides."[154]
The sophists, includingProtagoras of Abdera andGorgias of Leontini, may also have been influenced by Heraclitus. Sophists in general seemed to share Heraclitus's conception of thelogos.[71] One tradition associated the sophists' concern with politics and preventing party strife with Heraclitus.[155][156]
Plato'sTheory of Forms was a result of reconciling Heraclitus and Parmenides.
Heraclitus and others used "measure" to mean the balance and order of nature; hence Protagoras' famous statement "man is the measure of all things".[157] In Plato'sdialogueTheaetetus, Socrates sees Protagoras's "man is the measure" doctrine andTheaetetus' hypothesis that "knowledge is perception" as justified by Heraclitean flux.[158]
Gorgias seems to have been influenced by thelogos, when he argued in his workOn Non-Being, possibly parodying the Eleatics, that being cannot exist or be communicated. According to one author, Gorgias "in a sense ... completes Heraclitus."[155]
Plato knew of the teachings of Heraclitus through the Heraclitean philosopher Cratylus.[159] Plato held that for Heraclitus knowledge is made impossible by the flux of sensible objects, and thus the need for the imperceptibleForms as objects of knowledge.[49][160]
Scythinus of Teos, a contemporary of Plato, wrote out Heraclitus's philosophy in verse.[161][109][cn] A four-volume work on Heraclitus was written by the academicHeraclides Ponticus, but has not survived.[162] Plutarch also wrote a lost treatise on Heraclitus.[163] The Neoplatonists were influenced by Heraclitus on the topic ofthe One; quotingPlotinus "Heraclitus, with his sense of bodily forms as things of ceaseless process and passage, knows the One as eternal and intellectual."[164][165]
Aristotle accused Heraclitus of denying the law of noncontradiction, and charges that he thereby failed in his reasoning.[ae] However, Aristotle's material monist and world conflagration (ekpyrosis) interpretation of Heraclitus influenced the Stoics.[88][81][166]
The Stoic Cleanthes wrote a lost, four-volumeInterpretation of Heraclitus. (1605 engraving)
The Stoics believed major tenets of their philosophy derived from the thought of Heraclitus; especially thelogos, used to support their belief that rational law governs the universe.[167][168] ScholarA. A. Long concludes the earliest Stoic fragments are "modifications of Heraclitus".[169] According to philosopherPhilip Hallie, "Heraclitus of Ephesus was the father ofStoic physics."[170]
A four-volume work titledInterpretation of Heraclitus was written by the Stoic philosopher Cleanthes, but has not survived.[136][171][a] In surviving stoic writings, Heraclitean influence is most evident in the writings ofMarcus Aurelius.[172] Marcus Aurelius understood theLogos as "the account which governs everything".[173][co] Heraclitus also states, "We should not act and speak like children of our parents", which Marcus Aurelius interpreted to mean one should not simply accept what others believe.[174][cp]
Many of the later Stoics interpreted thelogos as thearche, as a creative fire that ran through all things due to sunlight;[109][175] West observes that Plato, Aristotle, Theophrastus, and Sextus Empiricus all make no mention of this doctrine, and concludes that the language and thought are "obviously Stoic" and not attributable to Heraclitus.[176] Burnet cautions that these Stoic modifications of Heraclitus make it harder to interpret Heraclitus himself, as the Stoics ascribed their own interpretations of terms likelogos andekpyrosis to Heraclitus.[177]
TheCynics were influenced by Heraclitus, such as by his condemnation of the mystery cults.[27][178][j] According to one source, "the Cynic affinity with Heraclitus lies not so much in his philosophy as in his cultural criticism and (idealised) lifestyle."[179] The Cynics attributed several of the laterCynic epistles to his authorship.[8] Heraclitus is sometimes even depicted as a cynic.
Heraclitus' idea that most people live as if in a deep state of sleep resembles what the Cynics said about a cloud of mist or fog shrouding all of existence.[180]
Heraclitus wrote: "Dogs bark at every one they do not know."[cq] Similarly,Diogenes the Cynic, when asked byAlexander why he considered himself a dog, responded that he "barks at those who give me nothing".[181][182]
The skeptical philosophers known asPyrrhonists were also influenced by Heraclitus. He may be the predecessor toPyrrho's relativistic doctrine "No More This than That ", that nothing is one way rather than another way.[142] According to Pyrrhonist Sextus Empiricus,Aenesidemus, one of the major ancient Pyrrhonist philosophers, claimed in a now-lost work that Pyrrhonism was a way to Heraclitean philosophy because Pyrrhonist practice helps one to see how opposites appear to be the case about the same thing, leading to the Heraclitean view that opposites actually are true about the same thing.[183][184] Sextus Empiricus disagreed, arguing opposites appearing to be the case about the same thing is not adogma of the Pyrrhonists but a matter occurring to the Pyrrhonists, to the other philosophers, and to all of humanity.[184]
The Christian apologistJustin Martyr took a more positive view of Heraclitus.[186] In hisFirst Apology, he said both Socrates and Heraclitus were Christians before Christ: "those who lived reasonably are Christians, even though they have been thought atheists; as, among the Greeks, Socrates and Heraclitus, and men like them."[187] He was among those who interpreted thelogos as meaning the Christian "Word ofGod", such as inJohn 1:1: "In the beginning was the Word (logos) and the Word was God."[188]
Modern scholars such as John Burnet have viewed the relationship between Heracliteanlogos and Johanninelogos as fallacious, saying; "the Johannine doctrine of thelogos has nothing to do with Herakleitos or with anything at all in Greek philosophy, but comes from the Hebrew Wisdom literature".[20]
The Christian Clement of Alexandria notes Heraclitus's similarity to the Christian prophets, and is cited as a source for more Heraclitus fragments than any other author.[189][190]
Donato Bramante painted Heraclitus and Democritus as the weeping and laughing philosopher.
Heraclitus's influence also extends outside of philosophy. A motif found in art and literature is Heraclitus as the "weeping philosopher" and Democritus as the "laughing philosopher", which may have originated with the Cynic philosopherMenippus,[191] and generally references their reactions to the folly of mankind.[192][193][194]
Heraclitus inSchool of Athens
For example, inLucian of Samosata's "Philosophies for Sale", Heraclitus is auctioned off as the "weeping philosopher" and Democritus as the "laughing philosopher".[cr] The Roman poetJuvenal wrote: "Heraclitus, weep at life much more than you did while alive, for now life is more pitiable."[195]
Donato Bramante painted Heraclitus and Democritus (1486) as the weeping and laughing philosopher, and may have depicted Heraclitus asLeonardo da Vinci.[197] Heraclitus appears in painterRaphael'sSchool of Athens (1511), in which he is represented byMichelangelo, since they shared a "sour temper and bitter scorn for all rivals".[198]
Modern interest in early Greek philosophy can be traced back to 1573, when French printerHenri Estienne (also known as Henricus Stephanus) collected a number of pre-Socratic fragments, including some forty of those of Heraclitus, and published them inLatin inPoesis philosophica.[199]Renaissance skepticMichel de Montaigne'sessayOn Democritus and Heraclitus, in which he sided with the laughing philosopher over the weeping philosopher, was probably written soon after.[200][201][202] Heraclitus also influenced French poets Michel d'Ambroise and Etienne Forcadel.[203]Huguenot ministerPierre du Moulin wroteHeraclitus, or, Meditations vpon the vanity & misery of humane life in 1609.[204][205]
English playwrightWilliam Shakespeare may have known of Heraclitus through Montaigne.[206]The Merchant of Venice (1598) features the melancholic character ofAntonio, who some critics contend is modeled after Heraclitus.[194] Additionally, in one scene of the playPortia assesses her potential suitors, and says of one County Palatine: "I fear he will prove the weeping philosopher when he grows old".[207][208]
Kahn suggests Spinoza may have been influenced by Heraclitus via the Stoics.[212] According to one author "What Heraclitus really meant by the common was...nothing different from what bySpinoza was expressed by "sub specie aeternitatis".[213] According to German poetHeinrich Blücher, "If you read the whole system of Spinoza, it is nothing but the changed system of Heraclitus."[214]
Bishop andempiricist philosopherGeorge Berkeley claimed SirIsaac Newton'salchemy was influenced by Heraclitus. He remarked inSiris: "In Plutarch we find it was the opinion of Heraclitus, that the death of fire was a birth to air, and the death of air a birth to water.[bm] This opinion is also maintained by Sir Isaac Newton."[217] Scottish skepticDavid Hume seems to recapitulate Heraclitus while discussingpersonal identity: "Thus as the nature of a river consists in the motion and change of parts; tho' in less than four and twenty hours these be totally alter'd; this hinders not the river from continuing the same during several ages."[218][219][220]
Hegel said "there is no proposition of Heraclitus which I have not adopted in myLogic."
While Heraclitus seems to criticize people in general, at other times he also seems to supportcommon sense.[221] OnScottish common sense philosopherThomas Reid's account, Heraclitus was one of the first to extol a common sense philosophy with such quotes as "And though reason is common, most people live as though they had an understanding peculiar to themselves;"[h] and "understanding is common to all".[222][cs]
Ever since German philosopherImmanuel Kant, philosophers have sometimes been divided into rationalists and empiricists.[223] Heraclitus has been considered each by different scholars.[44] For rationalism,[224][225] philosophers cite fragments like "Poor witnesses for men are the eyes and ears of those who have barbarian souls."[cf][ct] For empiricism,[226] they cite fragments like "The things that can be seen, heard, and learned are what I prize the most."[cu] Gottlob Mayer has argued that thephilosophical pessimism ofArthur Schopenhauer recapitulated the thought of Heraclitus.[227][228]
The impression of Heraclitus onGerman idealistG. W. F. Hegel was so profound that he remarked in hisLectures on the History of Philosophy: "there is no proposition of Heraclitus which I have not adopted in myLogic."[229] Hegel interpreted Heraclitus as a dialetheist and as a process philosopher, seeing the flux or "becoming" in Heraclitus as a natural result of theontology of "being" and "non-being" in Parmenides.[136] He also doubted the world conflagration (ekpyrosis) interpretation, which had been popular since Aristotle.[85]
Schleiermacher was "the pioneer of Heraclitean studies".
The German theologianFriedrich Schleiermacher was one of the first to collect the fragments of Heraclitus specifically and write them out in his native tongue, the "pioneer of Heraclitean studies".[230][231][232] Schleiermacher was also one of the first to posit Persian influence upon Heraclitus, a question taken up by succeeding scholarsFriedrich Creuzer and August Gladisch.[233][231]
Classical philologistJakob Bernays also wrote a work on Heraclitus.[233] Inspired by Bernays, the English scholarIngram Bywater collected all fragments of Heraclitus in a critical edition,Heracliti Ephesii Reliquiae (1877).[238]Hermann Diels wrote "Bywater's book has come to be accounted ... as the only reliable collection of the remains of that philosopher."[238]
Diels published the first edition of the authoritativeDie Fragmente der Vorsokratiker (The Fragments of the Pre-Socratics) in 1903, later revised and expanded three times, and finally revised in two subsequent editions by Walther Kranz. Diels–Kranz is used in academia to cite pre-Socratic philosophers. InDiels–Kranz, each ancient personality and each passage is assigned a number to uniquely identify it; Heraclitus is traditionally catalogued as pre-Socratic philosopher number 22.[239]
French philosophersJacques Derrida andGilles Deleuze's "differential ontology" is influenced by Heraclitus.[249][250] According to Deleuze,Michel Foucault was a Heraclitean.[251][252] The idea that war produces order through strife is similar to Foucault's notion thatpower is a force dispersed through social relations.[253]
In the 1950s, a term originating with Heraclitus, "idios kosmos", meaning "private world" as distinguished from the "common world" (koinos kosmos) was adopted by phenomenological andexistential psychologists, such asLudwig Binswanger andRollo May, to refer to the experience of people with delusions.[254] It was an important part of novelistPhilip K. Dick's views onschizophrenia.[255] Those thinkers have relied on Heraclitus's statement that "The waking have one common world, but the sleeping turn aside each into a world of his own."[cv]
The Irish author and classicistOscar Wilde was influenced by art criticWalter Pater, a friend of Bywater's whose "pre-Socratic hero" was Heraclitus.[256][257][258]Harold Bloom noted that "Pater praises Plato for Classic correctness, for a conservativecentripetal impulse, against his [Pater's] own HeracliteanRomanticism."[259] Wilde is credited with the saying "expect the unexpected", though Heraclitus said "If you do not expect the unexpected, you will not find it; for it is hard to be sought out and difficult."[260][cw]
The Britishprocess philosopherA. N. Whitehead has been identified as a representative of the tradition of Heraclitus.[261][262][263] InBertrand Russell's essayMysticism and Logic, he contends Heraclitus proves himself a metaphysician by his blending of mystical and scientific impulses.[101]
Scholar Edward Hussey sees parallels between Heraclitus, thelogos, and the earlyLudwig Wittgenstein's linguistic philosophy in theTractatus (1922).[264] Wittgenstein was known to read Plato[265] and in his return to philosophy in 1929 he made several remarks resembling those of Heraclitus: "The fundamental thing expressed grammatically: What about the sentence: One cannot step into the same river twice?"[266] He then seemed to make a dramatic shift by 1931, saying one can step twice into the same river.[267]
Wittgenstein also uses a river image inOn Certainty (1950) to say even the river-bed may change as foundational logical principles might: "The mythology may change back into a state of flux, the river-bed of thoughts may shift ... And the bank of that river consists partly of hard rock, subject to no alteration or only to an imperceptible one, partly of sand, which now in one place now in another gets washed away or deposited."[268][269]
Aristotle's arguments for the law of non-contradiction, which he saw as refuting the position started by Heraclitus,[270] used to be considered authoritative, but have been in doubt ever since their criticism by Polish logicianJan Łukasiewicz, and the invention ofmany-valued andparaconsistent logics.[271][272]
TheBritish idealistJ. M. E. McTaggart is best known for his paper "The Unreality of Time" (1908), in which he argues that time is unreal. What he calls the "A theory", also known as "temporal becoming", and closely related topresentism, which conceptualizes of time as tensed (i.e., having the properties of being past, present, or future), is a view which has been seen as beginning with Heraclitus.[283][284][285] By contrast, his " "B theory", under which time is tenseless (i.e., earlier than, simultaneous to, or later than), has similarly been seen as beginning with Parmenides.[286][287][288]
^It may also be an unwarranted interpretation of the fragment from Heraclitus stating "the kingdom is a child's".[4][b] A similar story relates that Heraclitus persuaded the tyrant Melancomas to abdicate.[5][c]
^This condemnation of blood sacrifice led some to conclude Heraclitus was avegetarian.[8][9]
^Hermodorus may have given some laws to the Romans.[11]
^Two alleged letters between Heraclitus and Darius, quoted by Diogenes Laërtius, are later forgeries.[13]
^Some classicists and professors of ancient philosophy have disputed which of these fragments can truly be attributed to Heraclitus.[18][19]
^West suggests that the beginning may be tentatively ordered as follows:[24] B1; B114; B2; B89; B30; B31; B90; B60.
^This is the earliest reference to the Sibyl in extant literature.[32]
^A likely reference to an alleged similarity to Pythagorean riddles.[39]
^Biós with the accent on the O, is the Greek for "bow".Bίοs with the accent on the I, is the Greek for "life".
^A quotation onkarma from theBrihadaranyaka Upanishad seems to express a similar sentiment: "As your will is, so is your deed. As your deed is, so is your destiny."[116]
^AsMartha Nussbaum explains, Heraclitus may be asking "How can breath itself sniff?"[123]
^The 9th century CEDadestan i Denig preserves information on Zoroastrian cosmology, but also shows direct borrowings from Aristotle.[126]
^Priest agrees with Hegel's contradictory account of motion, based onZeno of Elea's Paradox of the Arrow, which is arguably Heraclitus's account of flux.[276] On this account of motion, to move is to be both here and not here.[276]
^Saxonhouse, A. W. (1995). Fear of Diversity: The Birth of Political Science in Ancient Greek Thought. United Kingdom: University of Chicago Press. p. 35
^"Hermodo'rus".perseus.tufts.edu – via A Dictionary of Greek and Roman biography and mythology.
^Fairweather, Janet. "The Death of Heraclitus." Greek Roman and Byzantine Studies 14 (1973): 233–239.
^Chitwood, A. (2004). Death by Philosophy: The Biographical Tradition in the Life and Death of the Archaic Philosophers Empedocles, Heraclitus, and Democritus. United States: University of Michigan Press. pp. 85–86
^The Cambridge Companion to Archaic Greece. (2007). United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. p. 183
^abRobb, Kevin (July 1986). "'Psyche' and 'Logos' in the Fragments of Heraclitus: The Origins of the Concept of Soul".The Monist.69 (3):315–351.doi:10.5840/monist198669320.JSTOR27902979.
^Vieira, Celso. "Heraclitus, Change and Objective Contradictions in Aristotle's Metaphysics Γ" Rhizomata, vol. 10, no. 2, 2022, pp. 183–214.https://doi.org/10.1515/rhiz-2022-0012
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^Quine, W. V. (1950).Identity, Ostension, and Hypostasis. The Journal of Philosophy, 47(22), 621.doi:10.2307/2021795
^Schoener, Abraham (1993). Heraclitus on War. Dissertation, University of Toronto (Canada)
^Curd 2020, Xenophanes of Colophon and Heraclitus of Ephesus.
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^Fairbanks, A. (1898). The First Philosophers of Greece; an Edition and Translation of the Remaining Fragments of the Pre-Sokratic Philosophers, Together with a Translation of the More Important Accounts of Their Opinions Contained in the Early Epitomes of Their Works. United Kingdom: K. Paul, Trench, Trübner & Company, Limited. p. 61
^Tor S. Heraclitus on Apollo’s Signs and his own: Contemplating oracles and philosophical inquiry. In: Eidinow E, Kindt J, Osborne R, eds.Theologies of Ancient Greek Religion. Cambridge Classical Studies. Cambridge University Press; 2016:89-116.
^abcSironi, Francesco, "Heraclitus in Verse: The Poetic Fragments of Scythinus of Teos," Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 59 (2019): 551–57.
^Darcus, Shirley. "'Daimon' as a Force Shaping 'Ethos' in Heraclitus." Phoenix, vol. 28, no. 4, 1974, pp. 390–407.doi:10.2307/1087545. Accessed 12 June 2024.
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^History of Philosophy, by Friedrich Ueberweg, p. 293
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^Andrew C. DinanFragments in Context: Clement of Alexandria's Use of Quotations from Heraclitus (Philo of Alexandria, Plutarch, Greece) 2005. DAI-A 65/11 (May 2005), p. 4184.
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A2.Strabo (1929)."Book XIV".Geographica (in Ancient Greek and English). Translated by Jones, Horace Leonard; Sterrett, J. R. Sitlington. London: Heinemann. pp. 632–633.
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