Philosophy Between the Lines: The Lost History of Esoteric Writing
Arthur M. Melzer
Language: English
Pages: 464
ISBN: 022617509X
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Winner of a CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award in 2016
Arthur M. Melzer serves as our deeply knowledgeable guide in this capacious and engaging history of philosophical esotericism. Walking readers through both an ancient (Plato) and a modern (Machiavelli) esoteric work, he explains what esotericism is--and is not. It relies not on secret codes, but simply on a more intensive use of familiar rhetorical techniques like metaphor, irony, and insinuation. Melzer explores the various motives that led thinkers in different times and places to engage in this strange practice, while also exploring the motives that lead more recent thinkers not only to dislike and avoid this practice but to deny its very existence. In the book's final section, "A Beginner's Guide to Esoteric Reading," Melzer turns to how we might once again cultivate the long-forgotten art of reading esoteric works.
Philosophy Between the Lines is the first comprehensive, book-length study of the history and theoretical basis of philosophical esotericism, and it provides a crucial guide to how many major writings--philosophical, but also theological, political, and literary--were composed prior to the nineteenth century.
Second, more direct line of attack, ridiculing Plutarch’s reading of Aristotle and his testimony (just quoted) reporting the intentional obscurity or multileveled character of Aristotle’s writing. Grant asserts: “Such a statement does not require refutation.” The Testimonial Evidence for Esotericism 37 Here, he is drawing upon the deep and indignant skepticism that, as mentioned at the beginning, is aroused in modern times at the very suggestion of Aristotelian esotericism. Still, to.
Crucial point concerns what is meant by a “philosopher.”1 In the older view, it is not simply a person like “you and me,” only with a particular interest in philosophy (although there are such people too, of course), any more than a saint is a person with a peculiar liking for religion. Again, philosophy is not a specific subject matter like botany or geology, or a particular technique or expertise, as in the contemporary phrase “a professional philosopher.” It is above all a distinct way of.
Process of meddling with the originals [i.e., textual alteration] that began at the earliest possible moment. The opinion that the parables must originally have been thus, and only thus, is maintained with an expense of learning I can’t begin to emulate, against what seems obvious, that “parable” does and did mean much more than that. When God says he will speak to Moses openly and not in “dark speeches,” the Greek for “dark speeches” means “parables.” . . . “Speak in parables” is the opposite of.
In comparison with those from more persecutory environments, but they are for that very reason particularly revealing. They demonstrate something that one might otherwise never suspect: how very little adversity it takes—certainly much less than systematic or violent persecution—to move sincere and high-minded people in the direction of esoteric behavior of some kind. A correspondent for the New York Times once confided to me that when he first heard of the theory of esotericism it Fear of.
Esotericism and philosophical politics is essentially passive or defensive: to hide from persecution or hold it at bay. There is no thought of going on the offensive—to confront and permanently abolish it. Second, from the conflictual perspective, the persecution of philosophers is understood to stem not simply from ignorance and misunderstanding or from crude intolerance (although these play an important part), but also from an accurate intimation that philosophy is genuinely dangerous to.