Abstract
Ancient philosophy sees its own origin in wonder. Although this mood is central for both Plato and Aristotle they nevertheless say very little about the affective dimension of wonder. If wonder is philosophy’s essential mood, how does the philosopher experience it? How exactly is wonder transformed into reflection, philosophical thought or speech? How is a philosopher born? This essay attempts to answer these questions by reading Book One of Aristotle’s Metaphysics against the background of Hesiod’s Theogony. Its central claim is that for the ancients wonder is tied to an experience of arche. The essay explores the manner in which wonder evokes an experience of arche in Hesiod’s treatment of the creation of the first woman and suggests that the Hesiodic position carries crucial implications for our understanding of philosophical wonder.
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Notes
- 1.
All translations are by Richard Mckeon, The Basic Works of Aristotle, New-York: Random House, 1941. Hereafter mentioned by text title and pagination.
- 2.
Aristotle’s insights regarding wonder and philosophy are inspired by Plato in the Theaetetus 155d.
- 3.
Clearly, this question should be preceded by the question whether we hear in Plato’s wonder the reverberation of his eros.
- 4.
- 5.
This is also Plato’s view on wonder, Theaetetus 155d.
- 6.
Aristotle is inaccurate. Hesiod says in Theogony 116–122: “In truth, first of all Chasm came to be, and then broad-breasted Earth … and Eros, who is the most beautiful among the immortal gods, the limb-melter – he overpowers the mind and the thoughtful counsel of all the gods and of all human beings in their breasts” (Hesiod, Theogony). Hereafter: Hesiod: Theogony. All translations of Hesiod are taken from Glenn Most, Hesiod I, Loeb Classical series, 2006.
- 7.
For example, after referring to matter as an aition, Aristotle relates to the source of motion as the other type of cause: hetera arche. Metaphisics 1.3.984a.
- 8.
“Of the first philosophers, then, most thought the principles which were of the nature of matter were the only principles (archas) of all things. That of which all things that are consist, the first from which they come to be, the last into which they are resolved (the substance remaining, but changing in its modifications), this they say is the element and this the principle (archen) of things.” Metaphysics 1.3.983b.
- 9.
Aristotle explains that “the magistracies in cities, and oligarchies and monarchies and tyrannies, are called archai and so are the arts, and of these especially the architectonic arts.” Metaphysics 5.1.
- 10.
The proverb Aristotle refers to is “second thoughts are better.” See the note in Aristotle (1980).
- 11.
But even if the mystery of sight remains, it does not quench the quest for meaning that wonder incites. Hanna Arendt comments that “what we marvel at is confirmed and affirmed by admiration which breaks out into speech, the gift of Iris, the rainbow, the messenger from above.” Her interpretation relies on the Cratylus where Plato suggests that “Iris” derives from the verb to tell (eirein.) (Arendt 1977: 142–3).
- 12.
Hesiod, however, depicts the encounter with the Muses on Mount Helicon as wonderful to gaze on (theeton Th. 30–31). For a further discussion of the transformative encounter with the Muses, see Lev Kenaan (2008: 44–46).
- 13.
“One time, they taught Hesiod beautiful song while he was pasturing lambs under holy Helicon. And this speech the goddesses spoke first of all to me, the Olympian Muses, the daughters of aegis-holding Zeus: “Field–dwelling shepherds, ignoble disgraces, mere bellies: we know how to say many false things similar to genuine ones, but we know, when we wish, how to proclaim true things” (Theogony: 22–28).
- 14.
The significance of the first woman as an artifice carries heavy misogynist connotations. The narrative presents her as a cunning device and a divine punishment contrived by Zeus as a retribution for Prometheus’ theft of the fire. The Greek imagination makes the first woman’s secondariness an unnecessary addendum, an afterthought that means punishment, catastrophe, pema, for mankind. This misogynist framework does not overshadow, however, the illuminating force that the wonder of the first woman bestows on mankind.
- 15.
In the case of the first woman, this specifically involves the recovering of one of the first cosmological principles. As the final link in the erotic development of the cosmos, the creation of the first woman manifests a family resemblance to the cosmos’s erotic forces. Beginning with the primordial erotic principle, continuing with its concretization in the divine Aphrodite, the creation of the Woman is a human embodiment of both the divine Aphrodite and the abstract Eros. Her striking appearance is a visual reminder of the hidden existence of Eros as a cosmological arche.
- 16.
In Theogony, the intrinsic connection between the telos of the first artwork and that of the universe is couched in the image of the first woman as a miniature of the world. The first woman is composed of earth, her head wreathed in grass and flowers. Her clothing and adornments shine by virtue of the earth’s golds and silvers. The creatures represented on her diadem not only populate the world, but are themselves metonymic of earth, sea, and sky. Eros, the fourth primordial element, is represented by a reference to first woman’s erotic qualities of charm (charis).
Seen as a miniature of the world, the significance of the wonder of the first woman becomes obvious. Nowhere else does the text of Theogony present the world to the reader as an object of admiration, or meditation. Only with the appearance of the first woman is it possible for us to break from the flux of phenomena. Her appearance therefore marks a crucial turning point in the cosmogony. It undergirds a provisional substitute, functioning as a visual reflection of the untitled cosmos. For further discussion of how the appearance of the first woman incorporates the cosmological picture, see Lev Kenaan (2008: 39–47).
References
Arendt, Hannah. 1977. The Life of the Mind. Orlando: Harcourt.
Aristotle. 1941. The Basic Works of Aristotle. Trans. Richard Mckeon. New-York: Random House.
Aristotle. 1980. The Metaphysics I-IX. Trans. H. Trendennick. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, Loeb Classical Library.
Hesiod. 2006. Hesiod I. Trans. Glenn Most. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, Loeb Classical Library.
Lev Kenaan, Vered. 2008. Pandora’s Senses: The Feminine Character of the Ancient Text. Madison: Wisconsin University Press.
Plato. 1980. Symposium, ed. Kenneth Dover. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Kenaan, V.L. (2011). Thauma Idesthai: The Mythical Origins of Philosophical Wonder. In: Kenaan, H., Ferber, I. (eds) Philosophy's Moods: The Affective Grounds of Thinking. Contributions To Phenomenology, vol 63. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1503-5_2
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