Origins of the "double-truth"

[Venkatraman Iyer]

The Gorgons with tilakam on their foreheads, the one-eyed
Cyclops have been suggested to come from Hindus. And, this
predates Plato.

a) A. David Napier, 1986. Masks, Transformation, and
Paradox.

b) A. David Napier, 1992. Greek Art and Greek Anthropology:
Orienting the Perseus-Gorgon myth, 77-111,
Foreign bodies: Performance, Art, and Symbolic
anthropology, Univ. of California press.

--- John Richards <jhr at UNIVERSALIST.SCREAMING.NET> wrote:
>There is one unquestionable Greek use of the idea of a higher and lower
>truth, well before the influence of Buddhism is possible, and the source,
>of course, of most of the western usage of this theme - including later
>Greek thought, Philo and Sufism.
>
>Plato distinguishes consistently between the Truth of Being ("that which
>always is and never becomes") and the only apparent reality of
>becoming ("that which is always becoming but never is"). It is moreover the
>distinction between Mind (Nous itself) and the objects of the mind. Any
>attempt to juggle the "apparent" pieces into a logical system can be at
>best a symbolic approximation to the Truth.
>Nonetheless "popular" religion is forced to do just that. People demand a
>"system", and above a "saving of the appearances" on which morality itself
>rests.
>
>It would seem that every religion that expresses itself in analytic (as
>opposed to symbolic) terms makes this same distinction, at least
>in its mystical tradition - perhaps because it is the truth which they have
>seen.
>
>As being is to becoming, so is pure intellect (Nous) to opinion - Plato,
>Republic 534
>
>We must in my opinion begin by distinguishing between that which always is
>and never becomes, from that which is always becoming but
>never is - Plato, Timaeus 27
>
>What is at issue is the turning round of the mind from the twilight of
>error to the truth, the climb up into the real world which we shall call
>true philosophy - Plato, Republic 7.521
>
>What others call true reality, they (the wise) call, not real being,
>but a sort of moving process of becoming - Plato, Sophist
>
>"The One remains, the many change and pass.
>Heaven's Light forever shines; earth's shadows fly."
>
>is but the popular expression of this tradition.
>
>It has been suggested that Plato may have got the basis of this idea
>from Orphism, but so little is known about Orphism and its origins that
>even if this is true it hardly gets us any further. It does not
>rule out an ultimate "eastern" origin though. One thing is certain though,
>from the dates involved, that Plato could not have got this distinction
>directly from Buddhism.
>
>To suggest that it is merely a clever device to reconcile conflicting
>"commentarial" discrepancies is itself very clever, but hardly does the
>subject justice, even if there are cases when this is true.
>
>John Richards


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