Armonia, concordia e politica in Eraclito e nei Pitagorici

Rincon, Diego Garcia (2021): Armonia, concordia e politica in Eraclito e nei Pitagorici. In: Eirene-Studia Graeca et Latina, Vol. 57: pp. 93-118

Abstract

This paper examines the relation between Pythagorean and Heraclitean political views. I argue that for Pythagoras, Heraclitus, and Archytas the cosmological and musical notions of harmony ((sic)) and the related notion of concord ((sic)) have an intrinsic political significance. These thinkers variously reflect upon political harmony and concord, and agree that a crucial condition for it is law ((sic)), which according to Pythagoras and Heraclitus has a divine origin. I begin with the Heraclitean fragments 22 B51, 54, 72, and 114 DK, in which social and political reflection is connected with the theory of the harmony of opposites. In the case of Pythagoras and early Pythagoreanism, the intense, albeit indirect political influence in Magna Graecia - as transmitted by Iamblichus and Porphyry - offers evidence for social and political ideas determined by a reflection on the cosmological role of harmony and number. Finally, Archytas' political application of rational calculation in fragment 47 B3 DK, which aims at producing concord by establishing the just measures of wealth in the city, together with the testimony on Archytas' intense and fruitful political activity, can be taken as confirmation that the thinker's wider cosmological views were indeed intertwined with his political reflection and action.

• Item Type: Journal article
• Faculties: Philosophy, Philosophy of Science and Religious Science
• Subjects: 100 Philosophy and Psychology > 100 Philosophy
• ISSN: 0046-1628
• Language: Italian