ABSTRACT
Heraclitus of Ephesus was in his prime in the 69th Olympiad, that is, 504-501 bc.1 Of his life we know very little apart from the fact that his family was very influential in the political life of his home town Ephesus. He is placed a generation later than Pythagoras and Xenophanes, whom he opposes, and a generation earlier than Parmenides, who in turn opposes his philosophical views. These views were stated in his lone book, which covered all knowledge, metaphysical, scientific and political, and were formulated in an almost oracular style, for which reason he obtained the epithet the obscure (ὁ Σκοτεινός).2 Instead of a normal, straightforward philosophical argumentation, his text consists of enigmatic or aphoristic utterances, interwoven with poetical and rhetorical figures-for example, parallelisms, chiasms, plays on words-and one might say that the structure of the language itself unveils the meaning and system of his thought. Apparently, he had no philosophical teacher, but learnt everything by independent study. His work survives only in fragments.3 Diogenes Laertius remarks about this: “The book said to be his is called ‘On Nature’
1 Diogenes Laertius, 9.1 (cf., for example, Strabo, 14.25). This acme of Heraclitus, that is, the age of 40, was presumably taken from the chronographer Appolodorus. The prime about 500 bc is generally agreed upon, as well as the supposition that his main philosophical activity had ended by 480, cf. G.S. Kirk, J.E. Raven, and M. Schofield, The Presocratic Philosophers: A Critical History with a Selection of Texts, 2nd ed., Cambridge: Cambridge University Press 1983 or later, p. 182. 2 The epithet is first found in Aristotle’s De mundo, 396b 20. Cf. Cicero, De finibus, 2.15. According to Diogenes Laertius, 9.6, Heraclitus was also called “riddler” by a thirdcentury satirist, Timon of Phlius. 3 Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker. Griechisch und Deutsch, vols. 1-3, ed. by Hermann Diels and Walther Kranz, 6th ed., Berlin: Weidmann 1951 or later; vol. 1, pp. 150-82 (DielsKranz is abbreviated DK; in the following the fragment numbers of Heraclitus all refer to DK, Section 22, B). English translations are found in Kathleen Freeman, Ancilla to The Pre-Socratic Philosophers: A Complete Translation of the Fragments in Diels, Fragmente der Vorsokratiker, Oxford: Basil Blackwell 1948, pp. 24-34 (cf. Freeman, The Pre-Socratic
[Περὶ φύσεως], from its chief content, and is divided into three discourses: On the Universe, Politics, Theology. He dedicated it and placed it in the temple of Artemis, as some say, having purposely written it rather obscurely so that only those of rank and influence should have access to it and it should not be easily despised by the populace.”4 Heraclitus was both an aristocrat and a misanthrope; not only was he contemptuous of his fellow citizens, he even refused with scorn an invitation from the Persian king Darius. His deep disdain for democracy is reflected clearly, for instance, in Fragment 49: “One man to me is [worth] ten thousand, if he is the best.”5
