Plato Reconsidered: Planinc-Rhodes Correspondence
This exchange has been assembled from an email correspondence between Zdravko Planinc and James M. Rhodes that occurred in August and October 2007, and which both men have graciously agreed to allow us to publish. While the order of the correspondence has been maintained, the layout has been altered for clarity and simplicity. The content of the text has been left substantially unchanged. Abbreviations have been replaced with full names, titles, and references. Any deletions or additions to the text beyond this have been indicated in square brackets.
First Exchange, August 2, 2007
Zdravko Planinc:
I shouldn’t be asking this question, Jim, for fear of precipitating something. But I will. How’s work on the Sophist going? And in particular, have you given much thought to the Homeric references? I ask because I’m struggling with Cyclopean themes myself and I think I’m just one spark short of a prairie fire.
James Rhodes:
My thinking on the trilogy Theaetetus-Sophist-Statesman has not advanced beyond the paper that you already have. As I mentioned previously, I have been bogged down in Heidegger’s commentary on the Sophist. It is extraordinarily tedious. It puts me to sleep every five pages. I think it is a magnificently meticulous, line-by-line analysis, its one great error being that Heidegger attributes the Eleatic Stranger’s doctrine to Plato whereas I judge the Stranger to be spouting Protagorean doctrine that Plato is criticizing by showing its aporia. The surface drama of the three dialogues clearly is the philosophical equivalent of the legal trial of Socrates, with Socrates condemned by the Protagorean seduction of the jury (the two boys), the Stranger and Theodorus acting the parts of Meletus and Anytus, in which order I am not sure. (I think the Eleatic Stranger is Meletus dramatically but he might be Anytus intellectually.)
Now, just as the Symposium had the surface drama of two trials of Socrates intertwined with the deeper drama of the descent of Odysseus into Hades, the trilogy might be the surface drama of the trial again with another deeper Homeric drama. Being bogged down in Heidegger, I have not begun to look for the deeper Homeric drama yet. I have to cover some other secondary sources too before I return to the dialogues themselves. If you decide to beat me to the punch (again, as usual), be sure that your Homeric drama embraces the whole trilogy, which is a unit, and not just the Sophist.
J
ZP:
Thanks Jim. I won’t share my uncertainties about Theaetetus-Sophist-Statesman with you, then. I’m not working on Theaetetus-Sophist-Statesman per se, but I find myself being sent all over the place by trying to figure out how the Republic works with Homer. Just yesterday, by the way, I came across another recent article by X doing the Republic and the Odyssey, and read it with the usual mix of annoyance and relief – he can’t plagiarize properly because he wants to insist, with the Straussians, that the Republic is a self-contained book. My own plugging away at Cyclopean themes in the Republic, though, continues the previous work, all of which says it’s incomplete. And hence, I’m looking at the Stranger as Cyclopes and whether that works out consistently – but I won’t work on it seriously for quite some time, if I even live that long.
Cheers, Z
JR:
As I point out in my paper, I think that the Eleatic Stranger surreptitiously vindicates the Protagorean view that knowledge is perception. Would that fit the Cyclops somehow? Seems like it might, at first glance at least. Requires much thought.
J
Second Exchange, August 4, 2007
James Rhodes:
I leave for Detroit tomorrow and don’t return until Thursday night. I finished Heidegger finally, for my sins, and I picked up the Odyssey to start thinking about your questions. But that will be interrupted by my five-day trip.
Zdravko Planinc:
Heidegger is as much a stand-in for the Eleatic Stranger as he is the Wizard of Ousia. Since you’re taking the Odyssey, here are a few parts of the bigger sketch I’ll try to finish while you’re away.
The direct quote of the Odyssey at the beginning of the Sophist sets the question for both Eleatic Stranger dialogues. (The second Odyssey quote to a later book is another, related issue.) It compares Socrates vs. the Eleatic Stranger to Odysseus vs. Polyphemos. And the question is: Who’s in which role? Or who’s the sophist? The philosophical/metaphysical trial of Socrates that parallels the political trial for sophistry is on, as you point out. So, for the Eleatic Stranger, Socrates might be a sophist; whereas, for Plato/the dialogue, the charges are wrong, and the Eleatic Stranger is, if not a sophist, then at least part of the problem.
Now, in the scene in the Odyssey, Odysseus himself is not quite at his best – still a lot to learn. Nevertheless, consider the Eleatic Stranger = Cyclops parallels: if Socrates = Odysseus, then Theaetetus and young Socrates = the two men the Cyclops eats; the search for the (definition of the) sophist, which pens him, is Polyphemus’ entrapment and search for Odysseus; the manner in which Odysseus = a sophist is the trick of “nobody” (i.e., logic games involving misplacing negative terms); the manner in which the Eleatic Stranger = Polyphemus is the technique of division (i.e., an aspect of the division/collection part of dialectic that resembles Polyphemus’ chopping up of human beings – he’s all division, eh?).
There’s a quote to the Iliad at the end of the Sophist that keys the relation of the Eleatic dialogues to the Parmenides (more on that later). But the relation of the Eleatic dialogues to the Theaetetus is by way of the parallels to the Seventh Letter I mentioned some time ago: the similarity of the characters to the parts of inquiry leading up to the spark of philosophy. The Eleatic Stranger works with only a few of the characters in a way that never gets to the whole; and he cuts up the group, using the method of division on a larger scale, so he’ll never get there either.
That will have to do for now – I’m being called to dinner, and I might not get back to the computer in semi-sobriety tonight.
Cheers, Z
Third Exchange, August 10, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
Just [got] back and have read your musings. They are fascinating and worth pursuing. I shall leave it to you to pursue them. You are good at that sort of reading and I am not. I’ll quote you when and if my book on the trilogy proceeds, just as I did in my last one.
Some questions are occurring to me. I’ll think about them and send them if I decide they have merit.
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Welcome back, Jim. I’m glad you’re intrigued. That means I can pester you with more musings . . . And I’m looking forward to doing some serious puzzling over the Theaetetus–Phaedo sequence. It’ll be my last chance for quite some time. I’ve been given a ton of administrative duties for the coming year and there won’t be a moment to reflect for months, starting rather soon. So I’m going to woodshed this project for a few days and you’ll be the only one to hear the results – lucky you. Not to worry, no long missives – just sketches, once they’re clear.
Cheers, Z
Fourth Exchange, August 11, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
One big question has been nagging at me. I remember Oona [Eisenstadt’s] treatment of the Gospel story. She matched virtually every event in the Gospel story with an event in the Odyssey.[1] Is it your intention to do the same with the trilogy? Or would it be reasonable to demand this of you? If so, where, for example, would the trilogy (or the expanded last days of Socrates series) be prefigured by the escape [that Odysseus makes by] hanging under the sheep? (I could go through all the events but one is enough to make the question clear.)
Best regards from the Troublemaker,
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Good timing Jim. The question you ask is basically the question I set myself to address today. Yesterday it was the Theaetetus; tomorrow, the Statesman; and so on until the Phaedo around Wednesday.
Here’s an initial, tentative reply, though, with more to follow. The John/Odysseus comparison was a hoot: it took us an evening to figure it out because it was a simple, straight-up rewrite. Plato’s a lot smarter. There are lots of things going on in the trilogy, the Odysseus rewrite only being one of them, so I’m having to take my time sorting the clues out. I don’t think all the details of the Cyclops story are being used, but I’m still not sure how many are; and I think the Odysseus uses are limited because they’re subordinate to references to the Seventh Letter, the Republic and the Phaedrus.
I’m going to nibble something and ponder further how best to state what I’ve figured out from yesterday’s puzzling. It should be a good exercise.
Z
Fifth Exchange, August 11, 2007: “Musings (1)”
Zdravko Planinc:
Sorting out the Theaetetus–Phaedo sequence is archeological work; and rough chronology comes into play. I assume that the Apology and Phaedo (in some form) were written early on; maybe the Crito and the Euthyphro at the same time. Anyway, the Apology and Phaedo make Socrates a new hero; but the big plan to use the [Odyssey] as a template hadn’t occurred to Plato yet, it would seem. Later on he writes the Republic, Symposium, Phaedrus, et al, showing Socrates’ philosophy as erotic ascent; and also Timaeus–Critias to show the antithetical descent. Then, there’s the back and fill: returning to the Apology/Phaedo, etc., and adding the Eleatic trilogy to get the overall sequence of dialogues to do roughly the same thing as the earlier ascent/descent comparison.[2] But no need to do it in exactly the same way. His readers could be assumed to have seen the more important middle period works.
One of the keys to how the sequence works is the contrast between the narrative framing stories of the Theaetetus and Phaedo.The question is something like: Who loves Socrates most? Euclides and Terpsion were at Socrates’ execution; so too were Phaedo and the Pythagoreans Simmias and Cebes. Phaedo remembers everything himself (orally, anamnetically); the Megarians have an almost forgotten book around, and they’re mostly interested in the teachings/doctrines that suit them (and they’re reputed to have moved from Eleatic philosophy to eristic rather quickly). By the way, Phaedo is a freed slave and the Megarians keep a slave to read for them. The dramatic fight for the souls of the promising [youth] involves trying to free Theaetetus from the influences that end up in Megarian doctrines and Phaedo from Pythagoreanism (as well as similar tendencies in Plato’s readership).
Concerning the Theaetetus and its trilogy: The drama of all three dialogues, but mainly the Theaetetus, is amazingly parallel to what Plato writes in the philosophical digression of the Seventh Letter. (I’ll expect you to hear all the resonances without explanation. And I hope I’m not simplifying things too much – I don’t have your chapter on the [Seventh Letter] handy.) All three address the questions: What is philosophy? and Who is a philosopher? or What does a philosopher do? First off: philosophy is not a book – so much for Megarians, Protagoras, etc. It’s a relation between teacher and student (who both have to have the right qualities), a relation that can be corrupted. Cue the contrast between Theodorus’s pedagogy (and Protagoras’, and the Eleatic’s) and the way Socrates deals with Theaetetus. I’m especially amazed by the similarity between the description of the right qualities of a good student in the Seventh Letter and the description of Theaetetus himself in the dialogue.
There are obvious dramatizations of Plato’s “true doctrine” of “the five,” including the ambiguity of the fourth. But first things first: “the three” appear at the beginning of the Theaetetus and the Sophist. Theaetetus looks like Socrates, the young Socrates has the same name, and there’s the multifaceted question of the logos/definition. In the Theaetetus, there’s a group of at least three who approach (because Theaetetus is in the middle); and in the Sophist, there’s a similarly dramatic reference to the two stand-ins for Socrates and the Eleatic’s logos addressed to them. At the end of the Theaetetus, there are three discarded definitions of episteme: all of them are mentioned in the Seventh Letter as imperfect ways of getting to episteme (in the case of perception) or consolidating episteme (in the true opinion variations) as wisdom by taking it up to the fifth noetically. In the Seventh Letter, philosophy is a teacher and student ascending and descending from the three to the fifth, testing the various ways seriatim, avoiding pitfalls, etc. – and that’s what the Theaetetus is.
Now, the Theaetetus also redoes some of the Republic (I’ll assume that the similarities of midwifery and the Symposium’s/Phaedrus’ erotics.) If Theaetetus is Glaucon done right, then Theodorus is geometric thinking personified. The argument between Socrates and Glaucon on ascending vs. descending from the premises/hypotheses of the various disciplines of the higher education (from math to harmony) becomes an argument between Socrates/dialectic vs. Theodorus/geometric thinking (which always descends) over the way Theaetetus understands his studies. Theodorus is an okay geometry teacher, I assume, but he insists on the downward way, having no facility for dialectic ascent; and worse, he extends this bad habit to all realms of human existence. So, Protagoras is his man for the application of geometric thinking everywhere; and the Eleatic Stranger is his man for everything else – because in the realm in which Socrates engages in ascent dialectically, the Eleatic shows it’s possible to descend in a lecture format. (The Eleatic Stranger is un-erotic in the same way that Timaeus is un-erotic.)
And that brings me to the beginning of the Sophist, when Theodorus brings in the “refutative god” to counteract Socrates’ influence on Theaetetus et al. And that brings me to your original question: how much of the Cyclops episode is being used? I’m still not sure. I’ve got to distinguish between the suggestiveness of the Eleatic as Cyclops snatching two of Odysseus’ men and the implications of the Eleatic addressing the image and the name of Socrates with logos as if it were philosophy (which still works with the imagery of Cyclops eating Odysseus’ men, saving him for last). Obviously – I think, obviously – the Odyssey imagery is being used to amplify the use of the Seventh Letter’s doctrine of the five. It makes it vastly richer and more detailed. And it suggests some sort of continuum of errors and deformations, the specifics of which I’m not yet certain about. Something like: Parmenidean philosophy at the top; Zeno’s development tending toward sophistry one way, into eristic; the intrinsic geometrical thinking of Parmenideanism tending toward sophistry generally – hence the compatibility of Theodorus being a good geometer and a fan of Protagoras; and everything getting tediously bookish with the Megarians. Maybe also a decline from the mind’s eros for abstraction to un-erotic thinking to abstract thinking suffused with other sorts of eros.
But I must work a bit more on the Sophist and Statesman; and I suspect I’m not going to have enough time to do it properly (in extensive detail). More news as I have it.
Zdravko
Sixth Exchange, August 11, 2007: “Musings (2)”
Zdravko Planinc:
The Sophist begins with a calling of the question: Who is the real philosopher? For Theodorus, it’s the Eleatic, because he’s a Parmenidean; for Plato, it’s Socrates. There is no missing dialogue called “The Philosopher,” not only because of the Seventh Letter’s proscriptions, but also because we have it: for Megarians, it’s Sophist/Statesman; for Plato, it’s the Theaetetus. The calling of the question is double-sided because whoever is not the real philosopher must be something else, but what – sophist? dilettante? pedant? So the dispute is an intellectual equivalent to the political trial of Socrates in which Socrates is accused of sophistry and Plato shows that his accusers, if [they are] not sophists, have [nonetheless] been corrupted by them. There is a symmetry between the two trials: Socrates is charged by Meletus, but things get serious when Anytus and Lycon join in; and Socrates is charged by Theodorus, but things get serious when the Eleatic and Protagoras join in. I’m not sure that the symmetry is anything other than formal, though.
Socrates says the Eleatic might be a refutative god (theos elenktikos) and one of the Mightier (kreittonon), the latter being a reference to Euthydemus 291a that establishes the opposition of dialectic to eristic (of the most extreme sort). Theodorus defends the Eleatic by saying that he’s measured, not zealous. But as we know from the Seventh Letter, one must have both good character and good teaching. The Eleatic’s method is the same as the eristics’ method, and when someone wields it without his personal moderation, lunacy becomes possible. His method is “splitting” – and always in two, not even at the joints like a good butcher (as described in Phaedrus). He’s not even a splitter and a joiner, though both those methods together aren’t enough for a Socratic dialectic (also in Phaedrus).
Socrates’ initial references to the Odyssey give all this a literary-critical aspect. His line about gods accompanying strangers cites (1) Odysseus speaking to the Cyclops (about himself, perhaps hybristically) and (2) someone warning Antinous (who’s the political equivalent of the Cyclops) about the disguised Odysseus; however, it also suggests the series of references to following in the footsteps of a god that are central to the description of dialectic in the Phaedrus. So who is who? It’s the same calling of the question, this time playing with the ambiguities of Odysseus’ character in the Cyclops scene. Benardete reads the reference as a comparison of Socrates and the Cyclops (and Antinous), so we know which way he leans; but we know better. Earlier today, you asked how many of the details of the Cyclops scene correspond. I still don’t know and I probably won’t be able to work that out until I have much more time to read the Eleatic dialogues slowly – I’m just skimming.
For now, it’s just the obvious stuff: the Eleatic takes two companions (in the two dialogues); the Eleatic begins with hunting of animals and moves to hunting of men; Odysseus uses a sophistic technique in the “Nobody” trick, and the sophist being hunted uses the misplacing of negative terms to confuse things; Odysseus hides in the darkness, and so does the sophist (in nonbeing); the Eleatic only chops up, as the Cyclops does too (though he’s also a good shepherd in the Odyssey). (But I haven’t found anything like a blinding or an escape – though I haven’t [finished] riffling the Statesman yet. I’m still lacking the moment of illumination about all the usages because I haven’t collected them yet.) There’s one more link to the Phaedrus early in the Sophist. It’s in Socrates’ reference to the philosopher appearing to be a sophist, a statesman and [a] crazy [person] (manikos) – the latter is straight [from the] Phaedrus. And Socrates’ reference is comparable to the Eleatic’s procedure of distinguishing (differentiating?) sophist, statesman and philosopher – no erotic or manic ascent for him.
There’s a reference to the Iliad at the end of the Sophist that’s important. The Eleatic tells Theaetetus that the sophist is “of this generation and blood,” a line used by Glaucus when he identifies himself to Diomedes (before he unwisely exchanges his gold armor for Diomedes’ bronze). Who is who again? It would seem the Eleatic puts himself in the position of Diomedes when he makes the sophist (in speech) into Glaucus. However, the Eleatic cites the line himself, so he could be Glaucus to Socrates’ Diomedes. A bit of fun.
But the line has greater significance. In the Iliad, Glaucus gives his genealogy. He’s descended from a great-grandfather Glaucus through Bellerophon and Hippolochos. The Eleatic has a genealogy too. He’s descended from Parmenides and Zeno. There’s an interesting correspondence. Old Glaucus is said to have fed his mares on human flesh and they turned on him, killing and eating him. (There might have been some duty to Aphrodite he neglected, too.) If Parmenides is old Glaucus, then Zeno is the mares. And when one turns to the Parmenides, the story is made metaphysical: Parmenides’ One is torn apart into Zeno’s many, using a technique that the Eleatic inherits directly. The Eleatic genealogy is direct. It skips the intermediary generations of the mythological genealogy. And what’s missing is Bellerophon, the hero who rode Pegasus – another reference to the ascent of the Phaedrus that gives meaning to statements like “Theaetetus flies.”
The Parmenides links the Theaetetus–Phaedo sequence to the Republic and the Symposium as well, by way of the symbolism of the framing story. But that’s for another time.
Seventh Exchange, August 12, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
No grass growing under your feet.
My life yesterday and today has been and will be a mad social whirl. I have printed your musings out and will reflect on them when I have quiet leisure, tonight or tomorrow. Thanks for sending them. I hope to offer a worthy reply.
I spent much of yesterday with my favorite student, who came to visit. She is a lovely girl now a captain in the military. Has been in Iraq. Says it is a nightmare and that American news media report nothing like the reality. The only newspaper close to getting it right is the New York Times (which Bush has been bashing as failing to report the good news, of which she says she saw none while she was there).
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Gracias, Jim. No grass under my feet – because I’m sitting down a lot.
The morning’s musings have been very productive. More of a handle on the relation of Sophist to Statesman. I don’t know if I’ll be able to write them up before tomorrow, so wait a bit before thinking of replying.
But now, I have to go out to play handball with the youngster and pick up a Sunday Times.
Cheers,
Z
Eighth Exchange, August 13, 2007: “Musings (3)”
Zdravko Planinc:
The Eleatic dialogues are gradually beginning to separate themselves from the “last days of Socrates” sequence. The political drama of the Apology/Crito/Phaedo still sets the framework, of course; but the “last days” sequence seems looser than the dramatic dating initially suggested. In particular, the dramatic break at the end of the Statesman – though it does set up the Apology nicely – sends me in other directions too. It parallels – and I think deliberately so – the break at the end of the Critias; and it sends me to the Laws, as the Critias does, both directly and indirectly. In other words, the Statesman and the Critias are dead-ends that require the reader to back up through the dramatic sequence and find the right road. From the Timaeus/Critias, one returns quickly to the Republic; and from there, one moves through the Symposium and Phaedrus to the Laws. From the Sophist/Statesman, one also must return to the Republic, but it takes a bit longer: first to the Theaetetus (which serves well as “The Philosopher”), and then to the Parmenides, the beginning of which recalls the Republic and Symposium simultaneously. The Phaedrus/Laws as a Socratic, ascending reply to the descending Timaeus/Critias also works well as a reply to the descending Sophist/Statesman
The presentation of Socrates as the new hero in Apology–Phaedo supports the uses of the Odyssey in the later dialogues to elaborate what it means for the Athenians for Socrates to have lived among them as the new hero; but the earlier dialogues seem more centered on the comparison with and supersession of Achilles than with the prospect of having Socrates as a reformed Odysseus – it takes some time to figure out how to get the comparison out of Hades (in the future, as it were, after Socrates’ death) and bring it from the past into the present with substance and relevance. Anyway, the Achilles comparison is strong for the earlier dialogues, and I’ve got an article on the Crito to prove it: Thomas Payne, “The Crito as a Mythological Mime,” Interpretation 11/1 (1983). He shows that the dialogue rewrites Iliad IX, the embassy to Achilles. I don’t know if I’ll get around to looking at the Crito in the next few days, so I won’t be able to confirm my suspicion that the speaking Nomoi in the Crito are departing Athens with Socrates to end up in his new home, Magnesia, in the Nomoi.
While I’m thinking of other avenues to follow up – (1) There’s the issue of the Cratylus: does it belong to the Theaetetus–Phaedrus sequence or not? It seems to refer to the Euthyphro, some have said in support of the Yes side. But there’s no obvious relation to the dialogues that it might therefore accompany. I think it’s a loose fit, something like an optional reading. If the philosophical digression of the Seventh Letter is taken to be the key to the Eleatic dialogues, and if what is being discussed in those dialogues is how to go about exploring “the three/four/five,” including errors and deformations, then the Cratylus certainly fits as one of the possible deformations – the obsession with “the two,” i.e. definition and its consequences.
(2) And there’s the issue of the Euthydemus. It’s definitely not part of the “last days [of Socrates]” sequence, but there is the presence of Crito to link things. It’s the only dialogue in which he appears outside of Apology/Crito/Phaedo and it has a unique sort of framing story. I haven’t fully sorted that out yet, but come to think of it, that must be the solution! The reason why I’m on about it is that I’m certain the substantive account of eristic in the dialogue is based on the Odyssey, with lots of significance for the Eleatic dialogues. The eristic battles are structured on the brief but memorable account of Odysseus’ encounter with Skylla and Charybdis (= the two brothers, of course). If I recall – I’m not looking this one up either today – Odysseus loses six men to the beast; and there are six arguments in the Euthydemus that tear up Socrates’ boys. Lots of details correspond, but the main line is that eristic = tearing up argument = tearing up flesh.
And that gets us back to the uses of the Cyclops in the Eleatic dialogues, which establish a continuity between Parmenidean philosophy (including Zeno, who plays the role of Glaucus’ flesh-eating mares) and sophistic/eristic, by way of the seeming harmlessness of Theodorus’ geometric thinking and the Eleatic’s empty speculation. I’m going to send off this installment before taking a break and returning to Sophist/Statesman, but one more thing: You asked about the escape from the Cyclops’ cave. I’ve been turning over the possibility that there’s a hint – not a strong image – of Theodorus acting as the old ram to the Eleatic’s Cyclops. He’s subservient and supportive throughout. And the escape? Nothing explicit. One backs out, takes flight, etc. But what about Theodorus’ status as a competent geometer? One can ride geometry proper out of the cave of geometric thinking/sophistry/eristic toward philosophy.
Ninth Exchange, August 13, 2007: “Musings (4)”
Zdravko Planinc:
To pick up where I left off: At Statesman 287c, there’s a telling reference to tearing a sacrificial victim limb from limb. For some unspecified reason, the Eleatic can’t cut down the middle cleanly, so the messiness of his method is exposed as well as the direction in which it leads. The Cyclops eats men limb by limb; Skylla does so with even worse table manners; the Eleatic’s method, [although] it seems harmlessly artificial, leads to eristic and bloody politics. More along these lines to follow.
I’ve said that Sophist/Statesman is a dead-end from which one must back out. I’m not advocating reading the sequence backwards, but … There’s a lot more obvious usage of the Cyclops episode in the Statesman than in the Sophist, and it’s from the earlier part of the episode. Polyphemos is first described as a competent herder, and then he becomes the hunter of Odysseus and his men. The Statesman uses the imagery of Polyphemus as herder; the Sophist, the imagery of Polyphemus as cannibalistic hunter. And there’s another fine insight into the Odyssey in the Statesman. The Cyclops is related to Antinoos and the rival suitors in the Odyssey; that’s one of Homer’s ways of showing how the stories of the voyages “apply” to the world of everyday human experience and politics. In the Statesman, Plato uses the Cyclops/Antinoos/suitors link himself. The references to herding in the Cyclops story are related to herding in regimes; and the typology of regimes is a list of the rival suitors – with Penelope being the city, of course, waiting for the rightful ruler, Odysseus. (I’ve always thought that the list of inferior regimes in the Republic corresponded to the rival suitors, and now I see the way in which to sort out the relation of that part of the Republic [to] the Statesman and the Laws).
The first reference to the link between the Cyclops story and Antinoos/suitors comes at the beginning of the Sophist, though, as an early warning for the reader, in the explicit reference to Homer in Socrates’ first words. We’re always told everything up front by Plato, eh? And while I’m considering the first passages of the Sophist again, there’s the nice clue about the overall problems of the Eleatic’s method in the initial discussion of the philosopher et al. Socrates’ list includes the philosopher as manic, which the Eleatic can’t cover; and Socrates also distinguished the real (ontos) philosopher from the fabricated (plastos) one – something distinct from the sophist, and so the Eleatic in a word.
Plato’s presentation of the double-sidedness of Eleatic philosophy (partly good, partly bad) is slippery stuff. It’s as if that old commie Plato is proposing a United Front: Eleatics are on the right side in the fight against sophistry, but only if they accept the leadership of the Socratics; otherwise, their modest fence-sitting will end with immodest sophistry winning out. And the “primary contradiction” (that’s a Maoist term) is the Eleatic substitution of (fabricated) method for erotics. When Zeno tore Parmenides’ One apart into Many, the door to sophistry opened wide. The Eleatic seems to think that that fate can be avoided by fiddling with the terms, being tidy with the cutting into Many and thinking that the method of repeated cutting is itself a One – early games of the sort that make brilliant careers for dialecticians these days.
There’s a line in the Sophist in which you can hear the modern academic smugness: the Eleatic, I think, says that they’ve been searching for the sophist, but they’ve found the philosopher (i.e., his method). The Eleatic thinks, as does Theodorus, that Socrates’ craziness isn’t philosophy and will lead smart kids like Theaetetus to sophistry because it’s excessive; Plato thinks – though with more patience than I have – that Eleatic philosophy is tedious and will lead to sophistry eventually when the young [go] searching for the substantive stuff [that] the method doesn’t provide. All this makes for tricky references to the Odyssey, with the reader being left to determine which way they apply.
Now, about the Eleatic’s claim that a systematic method of splitting is itself joining (and hence dialectic, and hence philosophy). It seems to save the phenomenon of Parmenidean Oneness by getting rid of the problematic not-being – closing the door to sophistic chaos – and substituting some-other-being for not-being. The sophistic play with negatives to get to the proposition A = non-A (from which anything follows) is ostensibly shut down by the claim that the A/non-A distinction is actually the A/B distinction. The A/non-A distinction has the appearance of being universal (what doesn’t fit into non-A?). And the A/B distinction is made to seem equally (apparently) universal by (1) the trick of repeated subdivisions and (2) the strongly insisted upon requirement that a cut be down the middle – in other words, that the A and B of the cut create the appearance of being exhaustive in their span by being as antithetical as possible.
I think it’s crappy logic but I don’t want to master the field in order to demonstrate beyond doubt. I’ll just point to the reference in the Statesman’s Chronos myth in which it’s said that the daimonic realm is the realm of such distinctions between genera and species. Method taking the place of Socratic erotics again, as explained in the Symposium‘s account of the daimonic. And come to think of it, the sloppiness/bloodiness of the tearing mentioned at Statesman 287c might be compared to Aristophanes’ story of the much neater cutting of the double-beings (to create “whole” humans, not collections of limbs) in the genesis of eros.
As in the Timaeus, there’s a proto-Hegelian totalizing quality to the Eleatic’s assumption of comprehensive method. At Sophist 233a, the Eleatic raises the issue of whether it’s possible to know everything (panta epistasthai). Perhaps that’s the Cyclops’ single eye? Anyway, he’s thinking of and dismissing the sophists’ claim to know everything; but there’s a sense in which he might be raising the notion in the same way that a smug prof (who thinks he knows everything in principle, or could) raises it in dismissing sophomoric zealousness. How does this eye get blinded by Socrates? Maybe not at all? Socrates wouldn’t want to harm anyone, after all; and being a fool is its own punishment. So maybe he just leaves him be in silence and talks to Theaetetus and young Socrates later. But maybe there is a blinding too. Perhaps in the Republic, in the passages around the cave in which types of blindness are described, and Socrates and Glaucon both laugh at one another, thinking the other blind.
Perhaps there are hints of blinding in the Sophist itself? At 261a-c, there’s an interesting exchange: Theaetetus speaks (voluntarily) of “piercing [the] defenses” of sophistry – a “wall” of defenses, it’s even said – a phrasing that suggests he’s a resolute companion of Odysseus who is willing to pierce Polyphemus’ eye as the only way to get past the boulder sealing up the cave’s mouth. But is the Eleatic helping him to escape or keeping him in the cave? He prefers the statement “Theaetetus sits” to “Theaetetus flies.” That’s a clue. And then there follows a very interesting discussion of the Eleatic’s preference for a cosmology centered on a demiurgic “divine art” (265e) that seems similar to the one in the Timaeus – a preference that denies an alternative understanding to which Theaetetus admits an attraction, but from which the argument “drags” him away! Sounds like the Eleatic is keeping him in the cave to me.
More on the Statesman after a break.
Tenth Exchange[2], August 13, 2007: “Musings (5)”
Zdravko Planinc:
The Cyclops is a good herdsman. He separates the males, females and offspring, keeping them in their own pens, and arranges for the breeding and nursing of the young. The Eleatic thinks that politics is herding, the Cyclops’ art. This makes him either directly or indirectly Cyclopean. I think the indirect form is strongly indicated, in other words, the Straussian form that abstracts from politics [understood] as the cave (though Bloom might be more direct when he imagines arranging the breeding of the young).
Following the continuities in the Odyssey itself, from Cyclops to Antinoos and the rival suitors, the Eleatic’s elaboration of the herdsman’s art is the typology of regimes. But Odysseus himself doesn’t settle for politics as usual. When he returns to Ithaka, his rule isn’t Cyclopean – he’s over that temptation, though the Homeric imagery has him killing the rival suitors, true. As the new Odysseus, Socrates overcomes Odysseus’ residual love of honor; and the philosopher-king’s art of rule spins out of the erotics of recognition between Odysseus and Penelope, excluding the suitors.
What’s the hunt for the statesman, then? For the Eleatic, at best it’s searching for Odysseus and keeping him in the cave (or restricting him to the Cyclops’ art); or it’s deciding which of the rival suitors will marry Penelope and rule (and no matter which, Telemachus must die). For Plato, the search for the statesman requires Odysseus to escape the Cyclops and return home to Penelope (and his son). The role of young Socrates and Theaetetus is partly to serve as Socrates/Odysseus’ companions in the cave and partly to serve as Telemachus.
More on the trope of the ram: When the Eleatic cites the story of Atreus and Thyestes, it’s young Socrates who recollects the golden ram, which the Eleatic says is irrelevant to his meaning. The Eleatic chops everything up, even myths, and throws away the good parts. When I looked up the golden ram story, I found that without the ram (designating authentic kingship), there’s cannibalism similar to the story of old Glaucus. In any event, when young Socrates thinks of the ram, he’s thinking of escaping from the cave, just as Theaetetus thought of piercing the wall.
I leave it to you to determine how similar the Eleatic’s Chronos myth is to Protagoras’s myth. My thoughts are about how Cyclopean it is. First, true to form, he cuts things in half and excludes the best part. The dichotomy of the two ages, presented as a pleasant story to mask what the cutting technique does substantively, has the past resembling Cyclopean shepherding and the present resembling the de-divinized realm of rival regimes. Two bits of sleight-of-hand: claiming that the daimonic is the Cyclopean (or the Eleatic); and claiming that nothing from that era matters anyway. But in the Odyssey, the experiences of Odysseus in the daimonic realm are brought home to Ithaka and have consequences for his rule – and [they do] in Plato’s rewrites of the Odyssey too.
The famous series of cuts by which the Eleatic defines human beings as featherless bipeds most similar to pigs is an easy one, eh? Human beings are categorically differentiated from birds; in other words, they can’t grow feathers, they can’t fly … there’s no eros here. And they’re most like pigs: like the pigs of the political reading of the story of Circe’s household (see my APSA paper), i.e., suffering from the wrong sort of magic; and like the herds in the Cyclops’ cave, too, tidily penned.
Another easy Odyssey link to trace: the trope of weaving. (Note that at 279 the Eleatic inverts/reverses what Socrates says in the Republic about starting with [the] big before moving to the little.) In primordial [male/female] symbolism, Odysseus is the ruler and Penelope is the city/household ruled. Penelope weaves. In part, the city is woven together from its parts. But in part, she weaves to delay the suitors while waiting for Odysseus to return. The weaving in the day is putting things together properly; the unweaving at night is the destruction of proper rule that would occur if any of the rival suitors prevailed – hence a shroud. Antinoos would also like to tear up the weaving – a quick destruction, not a patient unraveling. And I think the Eleatic’s division of the art of weaving is more like the former than the latter, but that’s another version of the judgment call on Eleatic philosophy in general. There’s no happy homecoming for Odysseus in the Eleatic dialogues: the true king and the weaver aren’t reunited. But weaving imagery is the basis of political rule in the Laws.
So, once again, a rumination on the dual sense of the Eleatic in this dialogue: Insofar as the Eleatic imagines himself a philosopher/statesman, he’s most like Antinoos in opposing Penelope’s weaving. Insofar as the Eleatic says anything right or true about politics in the dialogue, he’s most like Penelope. However, though he knows weaving and recognizes the different rival suitors, he doesn’t recognize the true statesman sitting in front of him and primps himself instead.
Eleventh Exchange, August 13, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
I have read all your reflections up to Monday [August 13, 2007], 11:00 a.m. Central daylight time [i.e., “Musings 1-3”]. I am tremendously excited by them. If you die before you can execute them I’ll try to plagiarize them but not before that. I am very pleased to see my L7 and Politikos essays playing small roles in your thinking. I can pride myself on having given you a few keys even if you now are sprinting far ahead of me.
A few thoughts before I head out on my day’s activities . . .
(1) Part of my research will involve reading all of Protagoras’s fragments I can get my hands on. I think that the Eleatic Stranger is heavily Protagorean.
(2) When we think about the issue of blinding/escape, we have to remember that what is important about an escape is not that Socrates triumphs in argument but that his soul is saved from the temptations of sophistry. I offer you two ideas that you may use free of charge if you see merit in them. (A) In the trilogy, Socrates might have blinded the Eleatic Stranger just by asking his original question about the distinction between philosopher–sophist–statesman. The sheep under which he exits the cave/pen silently might be the Eleatic Stranger’s own arguments. The Eleatic Stranger/Polyphemus might think he has Socrates/Odysseus left over in the pen after the arguments/sheep have passed out one by one, only to find Socrates isn’t there at the end. (Socrates goes on to the court unchanged.) (B) The dialectical exchanges in the Apology might be a blinding, and Socrates’ acceptance of death the saving of his soul.
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Our messages crossed, Jim. We were both thinking of blinding the bastard. Together, it shouldn’t be a problem. But the number of Cyclopes sure has grown over the centuries.
More later, Z
Twelfth Exchange, August 13, 2007
Zdravko Planinc:[3]
(A) In the trilogy, Socrates might have blinded the Eleatic Stranger just by asking his original question about the distinction between philosopher–sophist–statesman. The sheep under which he exits the cave/pen silently might be the Eleatic Stranger’s own arguments. The Eleatic Stranger/Polyphemus might think he has Socrates/Odysseus left over in the pen after the arguments/sheep have passed out one by one, only to find Socrates isn’t there at the end. (Socrates goes on to the court unchanged.)
Not bad. Socrates is just missed and walks away. In the Republic, there are no absolute obstacles to prevent anyone from leaving, though it might not be easy the first time.
(B) The dialectical exchanges in the Apology might be a blinding, and Socrates’ acceptance of death the saving of his soul.
Sounds too Christian for me. But I’ll see. I am too fried at the moment to know what (or if) I’ll read (or riffle) tomorrow, but the Apology is next up. I might go to the Phaedo though. Right now, it’s handball with the youngster and a hardy low-cholesterol dinner (including two glasses of red). Then a movie – maybe a samurai adventure.
Cheers, Z
Thirteenth Exchange, August 14, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
It isn’t too Christian. I didn’t mean saving his soul in the Christian sense. I meant it in the sense that you yourself evoke when you talk about the shaman traversing the axis mundi in the purification of his soul from evils.
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Ah, right! Sorry Jim – a knee-jerk reaction, probably the result of working in a Religious Studies department too long. I can name that tune – intimations of Christianity in the Greeks – in fewer and fewer notes, and the reading of the Apology as prelude to the Crucifixion is still around. Did I ever send you my account of the antithesis: that the visit to Athens in Acts is a plagiarism of the Apology?
I’m taking the day to do administrative things – I’m way behind. The Phaedo tomorrow, and then there’s no chance of thinking seriously until Chicago.
Z
Fourteenth Exchange, August 15, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
Your [musings 4 and 5] are impressive, as usual. My nitpicks follow.
I think that the reason why the Eleatic can’t cut down the middle cleanly is that there is a disparity between his geometric view of reality, in which there is always a middle, and reality itself, which does not come with meaningful mathematical middles. (E.g., what is the “middle” of the human body, given the placement of the heart? What is the “middle” of society, given the artificiality of the upper–middle–lower schema? What is the “middle” or “mean” of an ethical dilemma, which normally has hundreds of sides unbalanced in all directions, as in the current Iraq mess? –Aristotle himself is much too geometric.) [The Eleatic Stranger’s] messiness is what comes of trying to force reality onto the Procrustean bed of a method. Plato is letting us see that.
In keeping with your earlier imagery of the journey along the axis mundi, it seems to me that the trilogy is not a dead end from which one must back out but a complex episode that Socrates–Odysseus must negotiate, escaping the dangers to his soul (one of many hair-raising close calls and narrow escapes) and then proceed to the next episode, with more dangers to face. It is a dead end philosophically – something which Heidegger misses completely because he is such a sophist himself. Strauss too. (Note: Journal X, under the leadership of Y, just asked me to rewrite my “What is the Metaxy?” piece from three or four APSA’s ago. Referees derided my reading of the Symposium as “idiosyncratic,” and demanded that I acknowledge Gadamer’s primacy. [They also] demanded that I prove the authenticity of the Seventh Letter. Obviously [they have] never seen my book. I refused to do the rewrite, and won’t try to publish the piece. Our world isn’t ready to see the dead ends.)
I like all your comments about the un-erotic character of the Eleatic Stranger. More proof of the un-Socratic nature of the Sophist–Statesman, which neither Heidegger nor the Straussians can see, all believing that the Eleatic Stranger perfects Plato’s philosophy. Down with poetry and up with science at last! I don’t understand how they can fail to recognize the Eleatic Stranger’s identification of nonbeing with otherness as one of the greatest sophisms ever perpetrated, beset with fallacies of misplaced middles (is this an ironic joke of Plato’s? showing up the Eleatic Stranger’s misplaced emphasis on middles?), instead taking the Eleatic Stranger seriously as Plato’s mouthpiece.
On Odysseus–Socrates blinding Polyphemus–Eleatic Stranger, and on killing the suitors: Odysseus blinds and Socrates is a torpedo fish: both are metaphors for neutralizing the intellectualism of sophistical seers. This isn’t harming, but helping, in the sense that punishments help. Odysseus kills and Socrates refutes, which is to kill the sophistical suitors’ arguments.
If you prove that the Eleatic Stranger is Cyclopean and I prove that he is Protagorean we might be proving the same point.
No happy homecoming for Odysseus in the Eleatic dialogues, but no happy homecoming for Odysseus in Homer either until the last episode but one. Socrates can’t have a happy homecoming in the Eleatic dialogues because his soul still has to traverse the challenges of the Apology, forsaking an extension of earthly life just as Odysseus does when he renounces Calypso’s promise of immortality.
I hope this helps. You are working a revolution in Plato scholarship. Of course, you won’t be widely recognized until you are long dead, if ever. That is the way of it.
J
Fifteenth Exchange, August 15, 2007
Zdravko Planinc:
I’ve been looking at the Phaedo this morning, Jim, and I have something for you. I’ll have to be brief, however. I’d expected X and Y to return late this evening, but I just got word they’re coming much earlier and I have to put everything aside for a while to prepare. I need a break from the Phaedo anyway. It has always irritated me. All those ghoulish Christian readings swarm around me and drive me away before I can put a little blood into the text and make it come to life; and even when I do, it’s still irritating – but more on that later.
Anyway, I’m following up Klein’s reading of the Phaedo as a mime of the Theseus story. He doesn’t take that very far, and it will go a long, long way. The general line that probably works is that the imagery of (Socrates as) Theseus vs. the Minotaur in the labyrinth becomes, in the later dialogues, (Socrates as) Odysseus vs. the Cyclops in the cave. Minotaur and Cyclops are comparably man-eaters, etc. Now, there’s a beautiful bit in the middle of the Phaedo on Phaedo’s hair (= Ariadne’s thread = erotics again). And in that important section, the Minotaur is antilogikos (related to misanthropy explicitly). It’s described in general terms that develop very nicely along the lines we’ve been exploring. I’m sending you separately a photographedd page of Hackforth’s commentary on the Phaedo in which he gives the textual links from the general features of Parmenideanism (especially Zeno) to Protagoras’s kind of sophistry and flat-out eristic. It all works, man.
A few quick one-liners in response to your previous [email]:
Aristotle, too geometric? I guess that’s why Plato named Parmenides’ interlocutor Aristotle.
Good distinction: a dialogue might be a dead end, but its episode isn’t.
Z
Sixteenth Exchange, August 16, 2007: “Musings (6)”
Zdravko Planinc:
Today, I think the Phaedo is perhaps a failure. Or maybe an early, less accomplished effort that couldn’t be redeemed in what seem to be extensive rewrites. I have no theory about layers of composition. It’s just that it seems a far too clever attempt to be deliberately simple. And I don’t think its unnecessary complexities can be explained away in the Straussian manner by justifying the cleverness behind it all. Know what I mean?
So much confusion comes out of this dialogue, and even though Plato can’t be blamed for nonsense centuries later, he might be blameworthy for not entirely overcoming it in later dialogues. For example: the collapsing of distinctions between visible/invisible and body/soul (give or take the mind). Plato’s got to have known that that’s nonsense, maybe Pythagorean or Orphic silliness, but he goes with it in the Phaedo. Perhaps the clue to his uses is in Socrates’ Aesopian poetry – not as good as lived philosophy, nor as good as poetry using other sources (i.e., Plato’s other dialogues) – or perhaps it’s in the fact that Phaedo narrates the story to Pythagoreans. But it’s still not worth the candle sorting out the simple moral; and the puzzles cause more confusion than they clarify.
. . .
Be that as it may, I was excited by a small discovery. The way I described the Eleatic’s method in previous e-mails (the intellectual who feigns philosophy, if not even wisdom, by descending in the noetic realm when he should be ascending) is presented by Socrates in the Phaedo as the method he follows, or rather followed, or rather, as something his audience might start with if they’re going to get somewhere. The method from hypotheses, the scholars call it, and they begin to spin theories of the theory of forms, ignoring explicit comments like Socrates’ insistence that words (thoughts, perceptions of the look/form of things) aren’t things/being (as per the Seventh Letter).
Anyway, the tentativeness of Socrates’ offer of the method for their consideration is a key, I think. As well as the skepticism expressed, even by the discussants, toward the results of the method’s application in the dialogue itself. All this sort of stuff should work to establish the relation of the Phaedo to the Eleatic dialogues. Maybe there’s a consistency in Plato’s critique of Pythagoreanism and Megarianism, further symbolized by the presence of both Pythagoreans and Megarians at Socrates’ deathbed – and contrasted to other tendencies emerging from that scene, symbolized by some of the others present (including Apollodorus – [as in] the Symposium) and not present (Plato). There’s a line of argument there, but I wouldn’t want it to have to be so forced.
About the symbolism of the upper/lower worlds that concluded the Phaedo: Well, I’d rather not deal with it. What a symbolic mess. Sorting out its silly internal inconsistencies is going to require comparing it to all the other afterlife accounts in the dialogues and reestablishing Socrates’ reasonable statements in the Apology regarding death as dreamless sleep against his explicit statement in the Phaedo that he’s got a better idea today! You’d think a guy in a Religious Studies department would be eager to get at this project, but I really don’t want to be bothered.
And I’m not convinced Plato entirely gets over or beyond using some of the tricks that he thinks are clever in the Phaedo. The visible/invisible = body/soul trick, for instance. It’s obvious he knows it’s a gimmick in the later dialogues, but he still uses it – and leaves the door open for legions of misinterpreters. It’s going to take some work to show just how Plato’s not perfect, and the argument has to be made against the tradition that presents him as a perfect Platonist – a tradition that’s so easily defended from the texts.
No time to dream about an army of sharp graduate students eager to be given thesis assignments as part of a grand research program. I’ll settle for a good lunch today. Then it’s time to turn to administration.
Cheers, Z
Seventeenth Exchange, August 17, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
So far I only had time to skim your last musings. Extended birthday activities for X most of the day.
Just one note . . . It is getting to be [more and more] important to me to play the Breitnauer Walzer[4] correctly with my friends. The other night we had four zithers and two violins playing the piece together. I got all the way through without screwing it up and it was simply beautiful. I experienced intense joy.
You see, a voice came to me in a dream and said “Jim, practice music.” I thought that I always had been practicing the highest music in philosophy, but to make sure that I didn’t disobey the god, . . .
J
Eighteenth Exchange, August 21, 2007
James Rhodes:
Z:
I have been rereading the Odyssey and enjoying it because, in addition to everything else, it’s a damned good story.
My question to you remains relevant: If you want to claim that the Eleatic Stranger is Cyclopean, do you have a duty to show a one-for-one symbolic matchup between all of Polyphemus’ characteristics and all of the Eleatic Stranger’s? If so, here are some of the questions still floating around:
- Insolent.
- Lawless.
- Trusting in the immortal gods for food. (An easy one, I think.)
- No agriculture.
- No assemblies or council.
- That offshore island loaded with goats, not visited by Cyclopes who do not sail.
- The single eye. (Perhaps also an easy one.)
- Living in cave. (Very easy.)
- The mighty rock as door of cave.
- Although trusting in gods for food, heedless of Zeus and the Olympians, thinking themselves better than the gods. (Easy?)
- Polyphemus eats six of Odysseus’ comrades, not just two, although he does take them in pairs.
- The wine that drugs Polyphemus.
- The blinding.
- The ram that hides Odysseus on the way out.
- The two enormous rocks that Polyphemus hurls into the sea.
- The taunting of Polyphemus.
- The return to the goat island.
If not all are usable, needed is an explanation of why Plato’s selection [is as it is].
Hope this helps. Good luck with your administering.
J
Zdravko Planinc:
Right – it’s all in Plato’s principle(s) of selection for me. And I think that such interpretation works across the dialogues, i.e., some here, some there, so if one reads carefully, one learns how the dialogues are related. I must resist the temptation to go on because I have administration to do that’s so important that the department will grind to a halt if I don’t finish it before leaving next week.
Cheers, Z
Nineteenth Exchange, October 11, 2007
James Rhodes:
You should read Kenneth Sayre, Parmenides’ Lesson . . . The first thing I have ever seen that convincingly makes good sense of the dialogue.
Why was I waiting to finish the book before telling you? . . . Although the book argues persuasively that Parmenides’ reasoning is cogent given the successive assumptions in each of the hypotheses, it strikes me that something is still missing from Parmenides’ reasoning, perhaps a realization that he is engaged in an ungrounded Wortspiel that has a strange disconnect from reality, even though it presumably is Plato’s late ontology that is being worked out. Like you could work out the whole of metaphysics on the basis of word definitions. Thus, mathematical.
You could help the aging man some more by reading Sayre on Parmenides and letting me know what you think.
J
Zdravko Planinc:
For you, I’ll even read Sayre. But it will have to wait a bit. I’ll work on getting a copy and then I’ll put it in the Plato pile. It’ll be third, behind two by Kenneth Dorter. My latest hunch is that the Phaedo on hypotheses is the crux to sorting out the whole business of Platonism as the theory of the idea of the forms, blah blah. In other words, there’s something about what the classics types call the early method of hypotheses that’s going to crack the business open. So, [Dorter’s] book on the Phaedo and his recent one on the Republic await me; and perhaps I’ll then peek at his middle book on the Eleatic dialogues. But that’s some time from now . . .
Cheers, Z
Notes
[1] Oona Eisenstadt, “Jesus as the New Odysseus: An Analysis of a Literary Source of John 9 and 10,”American Academy of Religion, Philadelphia, November 1995. [2] Chronologically, this exchange came after the one that follows in this collection, i.e. this was the eleventh exchange. I have switched the ordering for the interest of clarity, as the next several exchanges that follow here are direct responses to one another, while this one belongs to the series of Planinc’s longer musings. [3] The paragraphs labeled (A) and (B) in this exchange repeat parts (A) and (B) of thought (2) in Rhodes’ previous email (eleventh exchange). Planinc copies them here to respond to them one at a time. [4] James Rhodes’ skill with the zither has continued to improve since his initial efforts to play the Breitnauer Walzer. Throughout his retirement he continues to feel intense joy in the practice of music.
Also available is “The Real Name of the Stranger: The Meaning of Plato’s Statesman,” “Plato’s Critique of ‘Platonism’ in the Sophist and Statesman,” “Challenging Plato’s Platonism,” “The Uses of Plato in Voegelin’s Philosophy,” and “One View of Zdravko Planinc’s Critique of Voegelin.”
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