ABSTRACT
The two most philosophical Presocratics propound the two most radically different philosophies: Heraclitus the philosopher of flux and Parmenides the philosopher of changelessness. Clearly they occupy opposite extremes of the philosophical spectrum. But what is their historical relation? For systematic reasons, Hegel held that Parmenides preceded Heraclitus.1 But in a footnote of an article published in 1850, Jacob Bernays noticed that in the passage we now know as DK 28 B 6 Parmenides could be seen as criticizing Heraclitus.2 Bernays’ insight had already been widely recognized as the key to the historical relationship between the two philosophers3 when Alois Patin strongly advocated the Bernays view in a monograph published in 1899. But in 1916 Karl Reinhardt reasserted the view that Heraclitus was reacting to Parmenides.4 Others argued that no connection was provable.5 The Reinhardt view was never popular, while the Bernays-Patin view gradually came to be widely accepted.6 Twenty-five years ago Michael C. Stokes (1971) launched a devastating attack on the view that Parmenides was replying to Heraclitus. That attack has never been answered and the Bernays-Patin thesis at present remains undefended.7
