Epimenides

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Epimenides, fantasy from the middle of the 16th century

Epimenides ( Greek  Ἐπιμενίδης ) lived in the 5th, 6th or 7th century BC. In Knossós on Crete and in Athens . He was a philosopher and the most famous seer and purification priest (" Katharte ") of his time as well as a contemporary of the Seven Wise Men , to whom he is also counted. He is also known as the pre-Socratics .

Live and act

Epimenides belonged to the enthusiastic cult of Zeus and the Curetes , with which a secret priestly wisdom was associated in Crete. He is said to have slept in the Diktaean Cave near Knossós and only woke up after 57 years.

His advice was sought after even by states. He made changes in the sacred customs of the Athenians and introduced simplicity and moderation in Athens; he is also said to have been the inventor of the plow . As a reward, he is said to have asked for a branch of the sacred olive tree in the castle. The altar of the “unknown God” in Athens, which the apostle Paul mentioned centuries later in his speech on the Areopagus , was erected on the initiative of Epimenides.

The Spartans are said to have captured him in a war with Knossós and, because he only prophesied harm to them, executed him and buried him in Argos. Epimenides was also often reborn, and he was also said to have a fabulous age, the information ranges from 150 to 299 years. He is credited with several poems and prosaic writings, some of which oracles and Atonement may actually come from him.

It is not certain whether the poetry ascribed to him was actually written by him or only published under his name. Some fragments of his statements and writings from the works of other ancient writers such as Aelian , Pausanias , Plutarch and Philodem have been preserved .

Epimenides

The best known is a hexameter , which is anonymously  quoted in Paul's letter to Titus 1:12 and which was ascribed to Epimenides by Clement of Alexandria around 200 AD :

Cretans are always liars, wild animals, lazy bellies.

The fact that Cretans lie is mentioned in a poem "Ad iovem" by Callimachos of Cyrene in the 3rd / 4th centuries. Century BC BC, but without a quote or reference to Epimenides. The hexameter is also quoted in a quatrain from the poem "Cretica", but this is a spurious later construction. The verse gained importance in logic because it relates to the liar's paradox ; it is referred to there as the paradox of Epimenides in the simplified reformulation "Epimenides the Cretans said: All Cretans are liars" .

Some cosmogonic teachings were also traced back to Epimenides.

reception

Goethe's patriotic festival play “ Des Epimenides Awakening ” (1815) ties in with the myth of Epimenides' sleep .

The lunar crater Epimenides was named after him in 1935.

literature

  • Carl Friedrich Heinrich: Epimenides from Crete. Leipzig 1801.
  • Karl Schultess: De Epimenide Crete. Bonn 1877.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Plato Nomoi (Laws) 642d – e.
  2. ↑ Diogenes Laertio's Life and Teaching of the Philosophers 1,110.
  3. ↑ Suda ε 2471 (eagle numbering).
  4. ↑ Diogenes Laertio's Life and Teaching of the Philosophers 1.109.
  5. ↑ Plutarch Great Greeks and Romans. Solon 12.
  6. ↑ Diogenes Laertio's Life and Teaching of the Philosophers 1,110.
  7. ↑ Pausania's description of Greece 2.21.
  8. ↑ Diogenes Laertio's Life and Teaching of the Philosophers 1,114.
  9. ↑ Suda ε 2471 (eagle numbering); Diogenes Laertio's Life and Teaching of the Philosophers 1,111.
  10. ↑ Diels-Kranz : The Fragments of the Pre-Socratics , 2005 edition, I 3B1.
  11. ↑ James Rendel Harris : The Cretans always liars , in: The Expositor, Volume II, 1906, pp. 305-317 ( Archive.org ). Harris: A further note on Cretans, in: The Expositor, Volume III 1907, pp. 332-337; there p. 336 ( archive.org ) the constructed quatrain was rated by the author himself as “Perhaps that will do for a first attempt to restore the lost passage of Epimenides”.
  12. ^ Russell: Mathematical logic as based on the theory of types (PDF; 1.9 MB), in: American Journal of Mathematics 30 (1908), page 222.
personal data
SURNAME Epimenides
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Επιμενίδης (Greek)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Greek philosopher
DATE OF BIRTH 7th century BC Chr.
DATE OF DEATH 6th century BC Chr.