The Veil of Isis: an Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature Pdf, Epub, Ebook
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
THE VEIL OF ISIS: AN ESSAY ON THE HISTORY OF THE IDEA OF NATURE PDF, EPUB, EBOOK Pierre Hadot,Michael Chase | 432 pages | 16 Sep 2008 | HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS | 9780674030497 | English | Cambridge, Mass., United States The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature PDF Book That is why the goddess's entire body bristles with a multitude of breasts placed close to one another [as in the case of Artemis of Ephesus], because all things are nourished by earth or by nature. From these kaleidoscopic exegeses and usages emerge two contradictory approaches to nature: the Promethean, or experimental-questing, approach, which embraces technology as a means of tearing the veil from Nature and revealing her secrets; and the Orphic, or contemplative-poetic, approach, according to which such a denuding of Nature is a grave trespass. Hadot does later mention a possible relation between poetic and natural secrets, in quoting Porphyry, who, in defending the Platonic use of myth against its Epicurean critics, says that the philosopher knows that Nature hates to expose herself uncovered and naked in view of all. Sort order. Isis Has No Veils. Related Articles. For Husserl, phenomenology is not opposed to "scientific knowledge," but is instead the most rigorous science strenge Wissenschaft there is. Will be a good Reading copy. Other Editions 7. The Study of Nature as a Spiritual Exercise Truth as the Daughter of Time Hadot discusses Goethe's view, in some sense opposed to both the Promethean and Orphic, that "Isis shows herself without a veil" p. In Aristotle, nature is defined as the "principle of inner motion inside each thing" p. Perhaps her name, if we were to speak Greek, is Baubo? He argues that, though it is taken by Philo and his successors to mean that nature hides, the aphorism originally most likely meant either: a what causes things to appear tends to make them disappear, or b form or appearance tends to disappear. Nature as Sphinx This oversight is important, not just because it reappears in the title of Chapter 11, but because Hadot is dealing with metaphors, i. Several terms redirect here. She added, "The soul within escapes their view; and the Divine Mother has no answer for them," implying that Theosophy would reveal truths about nature that science and philosophy could not. After this broad, nuanced, and scholarly discussion of Heraclitus' aphorism and its ancient metamorphoses, Hadot turns, in the midsection of VI , consisting of Parts IV-VI, to more speculative fare: a purported transformation in humanity's attitude s towards "nature," or "Being," or "beings," either as cause or effect of the rise of the modern exact sciences. VI , in fine, while full of often startling facts and insights, will perhaps be more useful to historians of philosophy and science and literature as a sourcebook than as a coherent interpretation of "the" idea of nature -- were such an interpretation even achievable. Return to Book Page. By contrast, Hadot's attention to the finer grain of fact reveals an intriguing and wholly unexpected dialectic between the technological and aesthetic interpretations of nature: dialectic not as successive sublimations or degradations, but as an unending conversation between two equal partners. Ciro rated it really liked it Jul 19, Nevertheless, I'm compelled to give it the absolute rating, because all these troubles are mostly due to my lack of historical and philosophical knowledge. No ratings or reviews yet No ratings or reviews yet. In the s, Athanasius Kircher 's Oedipus Aegyptiacus explicitly explained Isis's veil as an emblem of the secrets of nature. The sheer amount of referenced literature and analyzed sources is nearly inconceivable and so is the diversity of motives, theories and thoughts that he analyzes with unrivaled rigor of his long career. Meanwhile the pronouncement has been used to explain everything from the opacity of the natural world to our modern angst. A thoughtful and elegant exploration of the idea of Nature. Typically, Hadot then tracks this thought -- in just two pages! Jakes Christian Inspirational No ratings or reviews yet. Hadot carefully distinguishes various senses in which nature's secrets are secret. Error rating book. He is at his most philosophically provocative in the first three parts of the book Chapters , which deal with the reception and interpretation of Heraclitus' aphorism. He also said the statement " I am that I am ", spoken by the Jewish God in the Book of Exodus , meant the same as the Saite inscription and indicated that Judaism was a descendant of the ancient Egyptian belief system. Original Title. In Plato and Aristotle, Hadot argues, we see the "absolute" use of "nature" come to the fore. The subject of the verb, phusis , too, is not best translated as "nature. Want to Read saving…. The Veil of Isis: An Essay on the History of the Idea of Nature Writer Yet, the book contributes a learned synthesis of a conceptual and visual theme of great significance in the history of Western thought. Tamara Mikoto rated it it was amazing Aug 23, He also said the statement " I am that I am ", spoken by the Jewish God in the Book of Exodus , meant the same as the Saite inscription and indicated that Judaism was a descendant of the ancient Egyptian belief system. The exegete of a poem uncovers a secret doctrine hidden there, not by nature, but by the poet. In this moment, Hadot finds gathered the three threads that he will follow over the next pages. After the working is complete, the magician will typically perform the corresponding Sign of the Closing of the Veil, which has the same movements in reverse. No ratings or reviews yet No ratings or reviews yet. First published in by Editions Gallimard, it is now available in English through Michael Chase's adept and eloquent translation What Is Born Tends to Disappear. European art has a long tradition of personifying nature as a motherly figure. The Veil of Isis is a rewarding voyage through a multitude of texts, illustrations and historical figures that brings a set of complex and often contradictoryideas into a clear and compelling argument. Ivan Loginov rated it it was amazing Jan 31, Error rating book. I think, for my part, that by means of this repetition, Nietzsche wanted to renounce the metaphor ironically, after he had merely sketched it. Hadot identifies Plato's Timaeus as the exemplar of the Orphic approach, since it re creates a conjectural, verisimilar model of the world's genesis and structure, one that crucially differs from Promethean technique in being non-experimental and merely discursive. I can't reproduce the long extract Hadot cites, except to say that Nietzsche here argues that he, like "those Greeks! The work covers an enormous range, not only of years , but of genres: philosophy, theology, science, literature, and art. Aesthetic Perception and the Genesis of Forms. Nearly twenty-five hundred years ago the Greek thinker Heraclitus supposedly uttered the cryptic words "Phusis kruptesthai philei. The unveiling of the Isis-figure thus expressed the hope, prevalent during the Age of Enlightenment , that philosophy and science would triumph over unreason to uncover nature's deepest truths. The Study of Nature as a Spiritual Exercise In place of these two attitudes Hadot proposes one suggested by the Romantic vision of Rousseau, Goethe, and Schelling, who saw in the veiled Isis an allegorical expression of the sublime. Though Hadot comments on every period of thought — he considers Pre-Socratic, Socratic and 4th century, Hellenistic, late antique, medieval, early modern, late modern, and 20th century thinkers— he devotes most of his attention to Plato and Neoplatonism and to the Renaissance and early modernity, where Neoplatonism plays an important role. On the other hand, earlier Greek thinkers had already formulated an "analogical" scientific method, in which hidden causes can be studied through the phenomena they somehow produce p. The Sacred Shudder His books include Philosophy as a Way of Life and Plotinus. The first mention of the veil of Isis appears in On Isis and Osiris , a philosophical interpretation of ancient Egyptian religion by Plutarch , a Greek writer in the late first and early second centuries CE. The lowest-priced item that has been used or worn previously. Oddly, speaking of shudders, Hadot makes nothing of the remarkable fact that Nature as the many-breasted Isis or even more bizarrely, Nature as a many-breasted statue of Isis -- see pp. For Wittgenstein, however, it is not how the world is but that it is that is mystical Tractatus 6. For the Promethean and Orphic attitudes represent two opposed, yet simultaneous, historical developments, bound together like a double-helix around a single historical axis: the master-metaphor of Nature's secrets. Experimental Science and the Mechanization of Nature Philein may mean here not "to love… ," but "to be accustomed to verb ", "to habitually do verb ", in this case, kruptesthai. Criticism of the Promethean Attitude. In the s, Athanasius Kircher 's Oedipus Aegyptiacus explicitly explained Isis's veil as an emblem of the secrets of nature. Bill o'Reilly's Killing Ser. Other secrets do appear to us, but inexplicably, since their causes are hidden. This was to be a traditional argument of thinkers hostile to experimentation. He documents the ambiguous boundary between magic and science in the early modern period. Refresh and try again. In Schelling and Heidegger, and then in Sartre and Merleau-Ponty, Hadot locates its offspring: the notion of the "mystery of being," and the terror or even "anguish" that the human feels in its face. Secondly, he has become known outside the scholarly world of classics because of the influence of his work on Michel Foucault.