What Is the Metaxy? Diotima and Voegelin
The word “metaxy” (μεταξύ) is a Greek preposition, meaning “between.” Normally, Greek philosophers use “metaxy” much as we use “between” in numerous everyday settings, without great significance.…
One View of Zdravko Planinc’s Critique of Voegelin
A number of scholars whom I admire and who have been good friends to me have suggested that I would be a satisfactory respondent to another good…
The Uses of Plato in Voegelin’s Philosophy
Exegesis vs. Interpretation While it may be that God is the measure of human beings, Plato is certainly the measure of anything written about God, human beings,…
What is Nature?
Any assertion that this or that is, or is not, "right by nature" must remain void of meaning unless we know what nature is. In this matter…
Theology and Fools
As you know, the term theology was invented by Plato. There was no theology before him; it's a new term. (Every term was new at some time.)…
The Judgment of the Dead
The transfer of authority from Athens to Plato is the climax of the Gorgias. The meaning of the transfer and the source of the new authority, however,…
Political Corruption
In the present context we have to concentrate on the existential enmity between Callicles and Socrates-Plato and on the critical analysis of political corruption. Above all, Socrates…
Socrates Confronts the Smug Insider
[There is more] to the resistance of Callicles than the fear of a Socratic popular success. The situation of the dialogue is not that of an assembly…
Nature of Pathos
The violent reaction comes from the activist, from Callicles, the enlightened politician. He has followed the course of the debate with increasing astonishment and wrath and now…
The Failure of Immanentist Metaphysics
The Aristotelian speculation ends in a serious impasse, both practically and theoretically. Practically, the discovery of the truth seems to serve no other purpose than to forge…
The Insight into Being and Scientific Analysis
[The philosopher's] questioning leads to a conflict with opinion. This is quite another kind of conflict than that between differing opinions; for although the philosopher's questions are…
Socrates and the Media
We shouldn't pretend that in the course of a short lecture we can establish a foundation for media ethics. But we can move towards a foundation if…
Modern Views of Plato’s Silence (Part III)
Stanley Rosen Stanley Rosen himself is a grateful student of Leo Strauss who nevertheless announces: "I am in considerable disagreement with Strauss's general program." 115 His dissent…
Modern Views of Plato’s Silence (Part II)
Leo Strauss joins the debate about Platonic silence on the side of Gott-hold Lessing.60 Perhaps he also sides with Friedrich Nietzsche secretly. He opposes Friedrich Schleiermacher and…
Modern Views of Plato’s Silence (Part I)
Plato directly and indirectly cautions his students that he does not communicate with them straightforwardly. To repeat the warnings quoted previously, Plato fiercely denies in his Seventh…