Oddcast episode

June 5, 2025

Coming Back for More, Part II: Platonic Reincarnation

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Having discussed the earliest-known stirrings of reincarnation in the west (or rather in the intellectual lineage which would eventually become the west), we turn to the formative author of metempsychotic theory: Plato. Four major dialogic passages are discussed, problems raised, questions asked, and the way down becomes the way up.

Works Cited in this Episode:

Primary:

Aristotle: The so-called Pythagoreans claim that heaven has a right and left: De cælo 284b6 ff.

Plato:

The ‘main’ passages on reincarnation: Phædo 80e-83e, 107c-114c; Phædrus 248-249, roughly; Republic 614 ff, the ‘Myth of Er’; Timæus 41e-42c, 90b-92c. Other crucial sources include Laws 870d-e, Statesman 272e (mentioned in passing), Menexenus 81a, Gorgias 525c.

Phd:

  • Philosophy as Bacchic initiation: 69c2-d2. Other references to ‘initiated wisdom’ vel sim: e.g. e.g. 63c6: the teaching that the post-mortem state is better for the good than for the wicked is `as was said of old’ (ὥσπερ γε καὶ πάλαι λέγεται). 69c2-d1: the founders of the mysteries were no fools when they hinted that the souls of the uninitiated will lie in the mud. 70c5-6: the teaching that souls go to Hades and are then reborn is an `ancient teaching’ (παλαιὸς μὲν οὖν ἔστι τις λόγος). 81a8-9: the pure dwell eternally with the gods, `as the initiated say’ (ὥσπερ δὲ λέγεται κατὰ τῶν μεμυημένων). 108a5: rites and ceremonies (τῶν θυσιῶν τε και νομίμων) have instructed Socrates about the forks and divergences along the path leading to the lower world. 108c 10: Socrates has confidence in the myth of the Τrue Εarth on the authority of a mysterious `someone’ (ὑπό τινος πέπεισμαι). 70c 4-8: The argument from opposites as ancient wisdom: ‘For there is an ancient teaching which we recall, that from here they arrive there, and they arrive back here and come to be from the dead’ (Σκεψώμεθα δὲ αὐτὸ τῇδέ πῃ, εἴτ᾽ ἄρα ἐν Ἅιδου εἰσὶν αἱ ψυχαὶ τελευτησάντων τῶν ἀνθρώπων εἴτε καὶ οὔ. παλαιὸς μὲν οὖν ἔστι τις λόγος οὗ μεμνήμεθα, ὡς εἰσὶν ἐνθένδε ἀφικόμεναι ἐκεῖ, καὶ πάλιν γε δεῦρο ἀφικνοῦνται καὶ γίγνονται ἐκ τῶν τεθνεώτων).
  • Argument from recollection/anamnesis: 72e-76c.
  • The afterlife guides are daimones: 108b3.
  • Long cycles (περιόδοις) of time: 107d5-e3.

Phdr:

  • Encomium of mania: 244a-245c.
  • Argument from motion: 245c5-246a1.
  • Giving an account of the soul too divine a task, but a simile can be given: 246a3-6: περὶ μὲν οὖν ἀθανασίας αὐτῆς ἱκανῶς: περὶ δὲ τῆς ἰδέας αὐτῆς ὧδε λεκτέον. οἷον μέν ἐστι, πάντῃ πάντως θείας εἶναι καὶ μακρᾶς διηγήσεως, ᾧ δὲ ἔοικεν, ἀνθρωπίνης τε καὶ ἐλάττονος: ταύτῃ οὖν λέγωμεν.
  • The chariot-myth: 246a6-250c6.
  • The Greek of 246b1-4 (καὶ πρῶτον μὲν ἡμῶν ὁ ἄρχων συνωρίδος ἡνιοχεῖ, εἶτα τῶν ἵππων ὁ μὲν αὐτῷ καλός τε καὶ ἀγαθὸς καὶ ἐκ τοιούτων, ὁ δ᾽ ἐξ ἐναντίων τε καὶ ἐναντίος: χαλεπὴ δὴ καὶ δύσκολος ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἡ περὶ ἡμᾶς ἡνιόχησις) seems to imply an initial state in which our souls are perfectly in balance, which situation later decays.
  • Gaining and losing wings: 246d6-e4.
  • Our long quotation: 246e4-247c2: ὁ μὲν δὴ μέγας ἡγεμὼν ἐν οὐρανῷ Ζεύς, ἐλαύνων πτηνὸν ἅρμα, πρῶτος πορεύεται, διακοσμῶν πάντα καὶ ἐπιμελούμενος: τῷ δ᾽ ἕπεται στρατιὰ θεῶν τε καὶ δαιμόνων, κατὰ ἕνδεκα μέρη κεκοσμημένη. μένει γὰρ Ἑστία ἐν θεῶν οἴκῳ μόνη: τῶν δὲ ἄλλων ὅσοι ἐν τῷ τῶν δώδεκα ἀριθμῷ τεταγμένοι θεοὶ ἄρχοντες ἡγοῦνται κατὰ τάξιν ἣν ἕκαστος ἐτάχθη. πολλαὶ μὲν οὖν καὶ μακάριαι θέαι τε καὶ διέξοδοι ἐντὸς οὐρανοῦ, ἃς θεῶν γένος εὐδαιμόνων ἐπιστρέφεται πράττων ἕκαστος αὐτῶν τὸ αὑτοῦ, ἕπεται δὲ ὁ ἀεὶ ἐθέλων τε καὶ δυνάμενος: φθόνος γὰρ ἔξω θείου χοροῦ ἵσταται. ὅταν δὲ δὴ πρὸς δαῖτα καὶ ἐπὶ θοίνην ἴωσιν, ἄκραν ἐπὶ τὴν ὑπουράνιον ἁψῖδα πορεύονται πρὸς ἄναντες, ᾗ δὴ τὰ μὲν θεῶν ὀχήματα ἰσορρόπως εὐήνια ὄντα ῥᾳδίως πορεύεται, τὰ δὲ ἄλλα μόγις: βρίθει γὰρ ὁ τῆς κάκης ἵππος μετέχων, ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν ῥέπων τε καὶ βαρύνων ᾧ μὴ καλῶς ἦν τεθραμμένος τῶν ἡνιόχων. ἔνθα δὴ πόνος τε καὶ ἀγὼν ἔσχατος ψυχῇ πρόκειται. αἱ μὲν γὰρ ἀθάνατοι καλούμεναι, ἡνίκ᾽ ἂν πρὸς ἄκρῳ γένωνται, ἔξω πορευθεῖσαι ἔστησαν ἐπὶ τῷ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ νώτῳ, στάσας δὲ αὐτὰς περιάγει ἡ περιφορά, αἱ δὲ θεωροῦσι τὰ ἔξω τοῦ οὐρανοῦ.
  • Ten-thousand year periodicity: 248e.

R:

  • Er awakens on his funeral pyre and tells of the sights he saw ‘there’: 614b-c.
  • Judgement of souls and the upward and downward chasmata: 614c-d.
  • Visions of pure beauty in the upper realm: 615a4: θέας ἀμηχάνους τὸ κάλλος.
  • Thousand-year cycle: 615b-c. Tartaros: 615c-616a.
  • Necessity plus ethicisation in choice of new life: 617e-619b.
  • The guardian daimones: 620d8-e1: ἐκείνην δ᾽ ἑκάστῳ ὃν εἵλετο δαίμονα, τοῦτον φύλακα συμπέμπειν τοῦ βίου καὶ ἀποπληρωτὴν τῶν αἱρεθέντων.
  • Socrates prays that we may always pursue the upward way (τῆς ἄνω ὁδοῦ ἀεὶ ἑξόμεθα): 621c.

Tim: Astral afterlife and reincarnation: 42b-c.

Secondary

J.D.P. Bolton. Aristeas of Proconnesus. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1962, we cite pp. 150-51.

Jan N. Bremmer. The Rise and Fall of the Afterlife. Routledge, London/New York, NY, 2002, citing pp. 91-2.

Walter Burkert. Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1972. Translated by Edward L. Minar.

Idem. Le Laminette Auree: Da Orfeo a Lampone. In Orfismo in Magna Grecia: Atti del quattordicesimo convegno di studi sulla Magna Grecia, pages 81–104. Arte Tipografica, Napoli, 1975, we cite p. 97.

Francis MacDonald Cornford. The Republic of Plato Translated with Introduction and Notes. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1941; citing p. 349.

Radcliffe G. Edmonds. Myths of the Underworld Journey: Plato, Aristophanes, and the “Orphic” Gold Tablets. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge,
2004; we cite p. 176-8.

Themes

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