Empedocles

God’s Imperfect Consciousness

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« F.W.J. Schelling »

Plato claims that the oldest inhabitants of Greece, the Pelasgians, gave their gods the name ‘Runners’ (θεούς, theous), because they saw the stellar and planetary gods ‘running’ across the sky. The name is said to come from the verb θέω, theo, ‘to run’.i The Cratylus abounds in somewhat fanciful etymologies, in the service of Platonic verve and irony. However, one of the meanings of the verb θέω is indeed ‘to run’. But there is a second, no less relevant: ‘to shine’.

The first meaning (‘to run; to rush; to extend, to develop’) allows Plato to consider this link, established by the Pelasgians, between the name of the gods and their celestial ‘course’. According to Chantraine’s Greek dictionary, this meaning of the verb θέω is etymologically related to a Sanskrit verb, dhavate, ‘to flow’. However, the second meaning of θέω, theo, ‘to shine’, would also be compatible with the ancient way of representing the divine essence. It is closer to another Sanskrit root, dyaus, द्यौष्, which is in fact the origin of the French word ‘dieu’, the English word ‘divine’ and the Greek name ‘Zeus’. In the Veda, the word ‘god’ (deva) meant the ‘Brilliant One’.

In other, even older traditions, the orderly march of the stars has been interpreted as an immense ‘army’ setting out to battle. This metaphor combines the two meanings of the verb θέω, evoking both the regular ‘course’ of the starry vault and the brilliant ‘brilliance’ of the ‘gods’ in arms. Schelling proposed giving the name ‘Sabaeism’ to this ‘astral’ religion, which he said should be recognised as the oldest religion of mankind. « This astral religion, which is universally and unquestionably recognised as the first and oldest of mankind, and which I call Sabaeism, from saba, army, and in particular the celestial army, was subsequently identified with the idea of a kingdom of spirits radiating around the throne of the supreme king of the heavens, who did not so much see the stars as gods, as vice versa in the gods, the stars ».ii In other texts, Schelling calls it « sabism » (Zabismus), retrospectively considering that the word sabism (Sabeismus) could lead to misunderstanding by implying that the name could come from the Sabaeans, the people of happy Arabia known for its astrolatry.iii The word saba, which Schelling mentions in passing without giving any further details, certainly refers to the Hebrew word צָבָא, tsaba‘, « army ». This word is actually used in the Hebrew Bible to denote the stars, tsaba ha-chamaïm, as being « the army of heaven » (Jer. 33:22), an expression that is also applied to denote the sun, the moon and the stars (Deut. 4:19). It also refers to the angels as the « host of heaven » (1 Kings 22:19). In the Hebrew Bible, the Lord is often called « YHVH of hosts » (YHVH Tsebaoth), or « Lord of hosts » (Elohim Tsebaoth), and even « YHVH Lord of hosts » (YHVH Elohim Tsebaoth).

The expression « the armies from the height », in Hebrew צְבָא הַמָּרוֹם , tseba ha-marom, is also used by Isaiah, but in an unexpected, paradoxical context. For Isaiah, the « armies from the height » will not be used by YHVH to punish the kings of the earth on the day of judgement, but they themselves, just as much as the latter, will be the object of His wrath: « On that day, YHVH will punish the armies of heaven in heaven and the kings of the earth on the earth. » (Is. 24:21). Be that as it may, a kind of historical and conceptual continuity links the « astral armies » of ancient religions and the « armies (tsebaoth) », celestial or angelic, gathered under the law of YHVH in Hebrew tradition.

In parallel, so to speak, in the Greek world, the mythological tradition portrayed the intense, passionate and exuberant lives of the gods. Hesiod’s Theogony describes in detail their war against the Titans, and their final victory, under the aegis of Zeus. Homeric polytheism presented many aspects of the divine pleroma, while also recognising the primacy of the greatest of them all, Zeus, in terms of power, intelligence and wisdom. In the Mysteries of Eleusis or Samothrace, it has been said that the initiation was in fact about the esoteric revelation of the supreme God, subsuming the exoteric multiplicity of gods and their various figures or attributes.

The unity of the Divine, insofar as it is called the One, was undoubtedly evoked very early on in the Greek tradition by pre-Socratic philosophers such as Heraclitus, Parmenides and Empedocles.

Heraclitus said, for example:

« The One, the only wise One, does not want to be called and wants the name of Zeus. »iv

« Law too, obey the will of the One.v

He wrote these lines, which earned him the epithet Obscure:

« Embracing all and not all

In tune and out of tune

Consonant and dissonant

And of all things the One

And from the One all things ».vi

He was aware of the esoteric nature of divine truths:

« The Logos, that which is, men are always unable to understand, either before hearing it or after hearing it for the first time ».vii

As for Parmenides, he was the first philosopher to assert that the path to Divinity is that of ‘it is’.

« But now there’s only one way left

Of which we can speak; it is that of ‘it is’.

As for the path of non-being, it leads nowhere. »viii

For his part, Empedocles, in the first book of his Physics, dialectically combines the being of the One and the being of the Multiple:

« I have two points to make. Indeed, sometimes the One

Increases to the point of existing alone

From the Multiple; and then again

Divides, and so out of the One comes the Many ».ix

In archaic times, long before the pre-Socratics, human consciousness was undoubtedly still undivided and fundamentally unified. The idea of divine multiplicity was meaningless then, compared with the immediate intuition of cosmic unity, the unity of the human world, nature and spirit. In ancient times, people worshipped rough stones or meteors as sacred images. This original cult symbolised the divine as a formless material, a ‘raw’ material, lithic, unalterable, shapeless stone, which sometimes fell from the sky. It corresponded to an immanent, muted, auroral consciousness. It represented the divine presence, unique, undivided, unbroken.

Originally, man’s first religion was naturally oriented towards the One and the All. Later, the cult and contemplative erection of individual sculptures, detached from the mass of the mountains or carved into the walls of caves, and the staging of idols made by human hands, visible and tangible, corresponded to another stage in religious awareness. The more visible the idols, the more paradoxically people became aware of the mystery hidden in the invisible.

Consciousness became freer, because it became more aware of its capacity to apprehend the existence of mystery behind the appearance of symbols, and all the more so because it had visible symbols in front of it. Visible, and therefore powerless to show the hidden, the concealed, the buried, the invisible essence. In so doing, consciousness began to divide itself; it oscillated between the exotericism of the visible, accessible to all, to ordinary mortals, and the esotericism of the ineffable, the indescribable, which only the rare initiated could conceive and contemplate. For the uninitiated, the multiplication of visible representations diffracted the light of the divine down here. They were specific, singular, vernacular, linked to the countless needs and vicissitudes of human existence.

Much later, other, more abstract ideas appeared, enriching the conception inherent in the single idea of « the One », with which they were associated. They represented the divine powers that accompanied the One, even before the Creation of the world. These powers were called ‘Wisdom’, ‘Intelligence’ or ‘Finesse’, and they are respectively quoted in the Hebrew Bible as חָכְמָה, ḥokhmah, בִינוּ , binah, and עָרְמָה , ‘ormah, The Scriptures also revealed that these divine powers were created before all things: « YHVH created me in the beginning of His ways »x . From this verse, we deduce that there was a time when YHVH began in his ways. So, before the world began its genesis, after having been created by Elohim, there was another « beginning » (rechit), a beginning of the « ways » (darakh) of which YHVH was the author.

To sum up: at the very beginning of the history of human consciousness, there was the intuition of the embracing of the One and the All. Then, after the muted intuition of this divine and immobile unity of the Whole, came the idea of the divine in movement, in action, in this world and in the next. This idea spread to the Vedic, Egyptian and Greek worlds, as well as to the Hebrew world. From this we can infer the genesis of a similar, overarching idea, that of the movement or overcoming of human consciousness, in its relationship to the divine and in its relationship with itself. What does this overcoming of consciousness mean? How can consciousness abandon itself and go beyond itself? For consciousness to be able to surpass itself, it must make itself surpassable, it must prepare to welcome within itself a power greater than its essence. ‘Rebirth’ could be an image of this potential overcoming.

The history of the divine in consciousness has only just begun. The next steps may seem all the more obscure for being so far away. But some Prophets see far ahead. David sung that, one day, « it will be said that in Zion every man is born' »xi . One may add: one day, every man will be born again, in consciousness, and will surpass himself by being « reborn ». All consciousness is both ‘in act’ and ‘in potential’. In essence, it is an « intermediary being », a metaxuxii , meaning that its function is « to make known and transmit to the Gods what comes from men, and to men what comes from the Gods »xiii . This ability to link worlds can be interpreted as belonging simultaneously, and without contradiction, to different orders of reality. An intermediate being is a ‘being’ from one point of view and a ‘non-being’ from another.

When YHVH revealed his name: « I will be who I will be »xiv , did He not imply that He too was both, in a sense, « being » and « non-being »? This name, « I will be » (Ehyeh), is grammatically, in Hebrew, the first person of the verb to be, conjugated in the imperfect (used generally to describe actions that are not completed or actions that occur in the present or future). One could argue that the Hebrew grammar then recognizes that God’s name is in essence ‘imperfect’ or ‘uncompleted’xv . As a being, He is still a non-being in relation to what He will be. But is not God also the Whole? We could conjecture that this Whole does not yet exist in its entirety, and that it is not entirely in action. In essence, a large part of the Whole remains unfinished, imperfect, and is perhaps still inconceivable, given the freedom of the actors who contribute to it and will contribute in the future. All that can be said is that the Whole exists partly « in act » and partly, « in potential ». The Whole is therefore also an « intermediate being », a metaxu.

As for God, what we can say is that there is a principle in Him according to which « He is who He is », and there is another principle, according to which « He will be who He will be », which the grammar of biblical Hebrew expresses by the imperfect conjugation of the verb to be, as we said.

Could it be that the very existence of everything God is not contributes to the emergence of His ‘power’, as yet unfulfilled and always in the process of becoming?

Creation evolves in temporal tandem with the timelessness of divine eternity. Does temporal creation play a role in God’s timeless ‘power’?

In consciousness there is already a substantial principle at work, which literally underlies consciousness (the English word ‘sub-stantial‘ comes form the Latin sub-stare, « to stand under »). It can be considered as a material principle, to which consciousness adds a formal principle. It is also a maternal principle (etymologically, mother = matter = matrix), through which consciousness generates a new principle, succeeding the previous one, and through which consciousness increases and surpasses itself. The feminisation of consciousness is the occasion for a transition from the old to the new, from the virgin to the wife, from the wife to the mother, and from the couple to the new-born child.

The separation of consciousness between a masculine and a feminine aspect (symbolised in mythology by the contrast between the male gods and the virgin goddesses, the wives and mothers goddesses) has been the occasion, in certain cultures, for the emergence of the idea of dualism, which links in absolute unity two apparently opposed principles, – one excluding the new creature and being hostile to it, and the other being benevolent to it.

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i« The men who first lived in Hellas knew no other gods than those who are now the gods of most Barbarians: Sun, Moon, Earth, Stars, Sky. Also, because they saw them all running in an endless race, theonta, they took this property, the property of ‘running’, theïn, as the basis for calling them ‘gods’, theoï. » Plato , Cratylus, 397d

iiF.W.J. Schelling. Philosophy of Revelation. Translation edited by J.F. Marquet and J.F. Courtine. PUF, 1991, Book II, p.244

iii F.W.J. Schelling. Philosophy of Mythology. Translated by Alain Pernet. Ed. Millon, Grenoble, 2018, Lesson 9, p.119

ivHeraclitus, Fragment XXXII. The Presocratics. Gallimard, 1988, p.154

vHeraclitus, Fragment XXXIII. The Presocratics. Gallimard, 1988, p.154

viHeraclitus, Fragment X. The Presocratics. Gallimard, 1988, p.148

viiHeraclitus, Fragment I. The Presocratics. Gallimard, 1988, p.145

viiiParmenides. Fragment II, Les Présocratiques. Gallimard, 1988, p. 257-258

ixEmpedocles. Fragment XVII. The Presocratics. Gallimard, 1988, p.379

x יְהוָה–קָנָנִי, רֵאשִׁית דַּרְכּוֹ: (Prov. 8,22)

xiPs 87,5 : וּלְצִיּוֹן, יֵאָמַר– אִישׁ וְאִישׁ, יֻלַּד-בָּהּ; Vé l-Zion yamar – ich v-ich youlad bah « And they will say of Zion, every man was born there ».

xiiPlato, The Symposium, 201d-212c

xiiiPlato. The Symposium, 202nd

xivEx. 3,14

xvIn his Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, Paul Joüon explains: « The temporal forms of Hebrew express both tenses and certain modalities of action. As in our languages, they mainly express tenses, namely past, future and present; but they often express them less perfectly than in our languages because they also express certain modes of action, or aspects. These aspects are 1) the unicity and plurality of the action, depending on whether the action is represented as unique or as repeated; 2) the instantaneity and duration of the action, depending on whether the action is represented as being accomplished in an instant or over a more or less prolonged period of time. » Paul Joüon, Grammaire de l’hébreu biblique, Rome, 1923, p. 111 c

Divine Splinters

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Orpheus and Euridyce

In ancient Greek dictionaries, just right after the name Orpheus, one may find the word orphne (ὄρφνη), « darkness ». From a semantic point of view, orphne can be applied to the underworld, the « dark » world. Orpheus, also descended into the Underworld, and was plunged into orphne.

Orpheus was « orphic » par excellence. He sought revelation. He ventured without hesitation into the lair of death, and he came out of it alive – not without the fundamental failure that we know well. But later, the shadows caught up with him. A screaming pack of Thracian women tore him apart, member to member.

Only his severed head escaped the furious melee, rolled ashore. The waves swept him across the sea, and Orpheus‘ head was still singing.

He had defeated death, and passed over the sea.

The myth of Orpheus symbolizes the search for the true Life, the one that lies beyond the realm of Death.

The philosopher Empedocles testifies to the same dream: « For I was once a boy and a girl, and a plant and a bird and a fish that found its way out of the sea.”1

In tablets dating from the 6th century BC, found in Olbia, north of the Black Sea, several characteristic expressions of Orphism, such as bios-thanatos-bios, have been deciphered. This triad, bios-thanatos-bios, « life-death-life », is at the center of orphism.

Orpheus, a contemporary of Pythagoras, chose, contrary to the latter, to live outside of « politics ». He refused the « city » and its system of values. He turned towards the elsewhere, the beyond. « The Orphics are marginal, wanderers and especially ‘renouncers‘ », explains Marcel Detiennei.

Aristophanes stated that the teaching of Orpheus rested on two points: not making blood flow, and discovering »initiation ».

The Greek word for initiation to the Mysteries is teletè (τελετή). This word is related to telos, « completion, term, realization ». But teletè has a very precise meaning in the context of Orphism. Among the Orphic mysteries, perhaps the most important is that of the killing of the god-child, Dionysus, devoured by the Titans, – except for his heart, swallowed by Zeus, becoming the germ of his rebirth within the divine body.

Several interpretations circulate. According to Clement of Alexandria, Zeus entrusted Apollo with the task of collecting and burying the scattered pieces of Dionysus’ corpse on Mount Parnassus.

According to the neo-Platonic gnosis, the Mysteries refer to the recomposition, the reunification of the dismembered body of God.

The death of Orpheus is mysteriously analogous to the more original death of the god Dionysus, which probably derives from much older traditions, such as those of the ancient Egyptians, who worshipped Osiris, who was also torn to pieces, scattered throughout Egypt, and finally resurrected.

For the comparatist, it is difficult to resist yet another analogy, that of the sharing of Christ’s « body » and « blood, » which his disciples « ate » and « drank » at the Last Supper just before his death. A scene that has been repeated in every Mass since then, at the time of « communion ».

There is a significant difference, however, between the death of Christ and that of Osiris, Dionysus or Orpheus. Contrary to the custom that governed the fate of those condemned to death, the body of Christ on the cross was not « broken » or « dismembered, » but only pierced with a spear. The preservation of the unity of his body had been foretold by the Scriptures (« He keeps all his bones, not one of them is broken », Psalm 34:20).

No physical dispersion of the body of Christ at his death, but a symbolic sharing at Communion, like that of the bread and wine, metaphors of flesh and blood, presented at the Last Supper, symbols of a unity, essentially indivisible, universally shareable.

This makes all the more salient the search for the divine unity apparently lost by Osiris or Dionysus, but found again thanks to the analogous care of Isis, Zeus, or Apollo.

Beyond the incommensurable divergences, a paradigm common to the ancient religions of Egypt and Greece and to Christianity emerges.

The God, one in essence, is dismembered, dispersed, really or symbolically, and then, by one means or another, finds Himself unified again.

One, divided, multiplied, dispersed, and again One.

Again One, after having been scattered throughout the worlds.

So many worlds: so many infinitesimal shards within the divine unity.

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1Empedocles F. 117

iMarcel Detienne. Les dieux d’Orphée. Gallimard. 2007

Godhead’s Wisdom

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Athena’s Birth from Zeus’ Head.

What was it that Empedocles did refuse to reveal? Why didn’t he tell what he was « forbidden to say »? What was he afraid of, – this famous sage from Agrigento, this statesman, this gyrovague shaman and prophet? Why this pusillanimity on the part of someone who, according to legend, was not afraid to end up throwing himself alive into the furnace of Etna?

Empedocles wrote:

« I ask only what ephemeral humans are allowed to hear. Take over the reins of the chariot under the auspices of Piety. The desire for the brilliant flowers of glory, which I could gather from mortals, will not make me say what is forbidden… Have courage and climb the summits of science; consider with all your strength the manifest side of everything, but do not believe in your eyes more than in your ears.”i

Empedocles encourages us to « climb the summits of science » …

The Greek original text says: καὶ τὸτε δὴ σοφίης ἐπ’ ἄίκροισι θοάζειν, that translates literally: « to impetuously climb to the summits (ἐπ’ ἄίκροισι, ep’aikroisi) of wisdom (σοφίης sophias) ».

But what are really these « summits of wisdom »? Why this plural form? Shouldn’t there be just one and only one « summit of wisdom », in the proximity of the highest divinity?

In another fragment, Empedocles speaks again of « summits », using another Greek word, κορυφή, koruphe, which also means « summit, top »:

« Κορυφὰς ἑτέρας ἑτέρηισι προσάπτων

μύθων μὴ τελέειν ἀτραπὸν μίαν.”ii

Jean Bollack thus translated this fragment (into French):

« Joignant les cimes l’une à l’autre,

Ne pas dire un seul chemin de mots. »iii, i.e.:

« Joining the summits one to the other,

Not to say a single path of words.”

John Burnet and Auguste Reymond translated (in French):

« Marchant de sommet en sommet,

ne pas parcourir un sentier seulement jusqu’à la fin… »iv i.e.:

« Walking from summit to summit,

not to walk a path only to the end…”

Paul Tannery adopted another interpretation, translating Κορυφὰς as « beginnings »:

« Rattachant toujours différemment de nouveaux débuts de mes paroles,

et ne suivant pas dans mon discours une route unique… »v

« Always attaching new and different beginnings to my words,

and not following in my speech a single road…”

I wonder: does the apparent obscurity of this fragment justify so wide differences in its interpretation?

We are indeed invited to consider, to dig, to deepen the matter.

According to the Bailly Greek dictionary, κορυφή (koruphe), means « summit« , figuratively, the « zenith » (speaking of the sun), and metaphorically: « crowning« , or « completion« .

Chantraine’s etymological dictionary notes other, more abstract nuances of meaning for κορυφή : « the sum, the essential, the best« . The related verb, κορυφῶ koruphô, somewhat clarifies the range of meanings: « to complete, to accomplish; to rise, to lift, to inflate« .

The Liddell-Scott dictionary gives a quite complete review of possible meanings of κορυφή: « head, top; crown, top of the head [of a man or god], peak of a mountain, summit, top, the zenith; apex of a cone, extremity, tip; and metaphorically: the sum [of all his words], the true sense [of legends]; height, excellence of .., i.e. the choicest, best. »

Liddell-Scott also proposes this rather down-to earth and matter-of-fact interpretation of the fragment 24: « springing from peak to peak« , i.e. « treating a subject disconnectedly ».

But as we see, the word κορυφή may apply to human, geological, tectonic, solar or rhetorical issues…

What is be the right interpretation of κορυφή and the ‘movement’ it implies, for the fragment 24 of Empedocles?

Peaking? Springing? Topping? Summing? Crowning? Completing? Elevating? Erecting? Ascending?

Etymologically and originally, the word κορυφή relates to κόρυς, « helmet« . Chantraine notes incidentally that the toponym « Corinth » (Κόρινθος) also relates to this same etymology.

The primary meaning of κορυφή, therefore, has nothing to do with mountains or peaks. It refers etymologically to the « summit » of the body, the « head ». More precisely, it refers to the head when « helmeted », – the head of a man or a woman (or a God) equipped as a warrior. This etymology is well in accordance with the long, mythological memory of the Greeks. Pythagorasvi famously said that Athena was « begotten », all-armed, with her helmet, « from the head » of Zeus, in Greek: κορυφἆ-γενής (korupha-genes).

If we admit that the wise and deep Empedocles did not use metaphors lightly, in one of his most celebrated fragments, we may infer that the « summits », here, are not just mineral mountains that one would jump over, or subjects of conversation, which one would want to spring from.

In a Greek, philosophical context, the « summit » may well be understood as a metaphor for the « head of Zeus », the head of the Most High God. Since a plural is used (Κορυφὰς, ‘summits’), one may also assume that it is an allusion to another Godhead, that of the divine « Wisdom » (a.k.a. Athena), who was born from Zeus’ « head ».

Another important word in fragment 24 is the verb προσάπτω, prosapto.

Bollack translates this verb as « to join, » Burnet as « to walk, » Tannery as « to attach”, Liddell-Scott as « to spring »…

How diverse these scholars’ interpretations!… Joining the summits one to the other… Walking from summit to summit… Attaching new beginnings to a narration… Springing from peak to peak, as for changing subjects…

In my view, all these learned translations are either too literal or too metaphorical. And unsatisfactory.

It seems to me necessary to seek something else, more related to the crux of the philosophical matter, something related to a figurative « God Head », or a « Godhead »… The word koruphe refers metaphorically to something ‘extreme’, — also deemed the ‘best’ and the ‘essential’. The Heads (koruphas) could well allude to the two main Greek Godheads, — the Most High God (Zeus) and his divine Wisdom (Athena).

More precisely, I think the fragment may point to the decisive moment when Zeus begets his own Wisdom, springing from his head, all armed….

The verb προσάπτω has several meanings, which can guide our search: « to procure, to give; to attach oneself to; to join; to touch, to graze » (Bailly).

Based on these meanings, I propose this translation of the first line of fragment 24:

« Joining the [God] Heads, one to the other ».

The second verb used in fragment 24 (line 2) is τελέειν, teleein: « To accomplish, to perform, to realize; to cause, to produce, to procure; to complete, to finish; to pay; (and, in a religious context) to bring to perfection, to perform the ceremony of initiation, to initiate into the mysteries (of Athena, the Goddess of Wisdom) » (Bailly).

Could the great Empedocles have been satisfied with just a banal idea such as « not following a single road », or « not following a path to the end », or even, in a more contorted way, something about « not saying a single path of words »?

I don’t think so. Neither Bollack, Burnet, nor Tannery seem, in their translations, to have imagined and even less captured a potential mystical or transcendent meaning.

I think, though, that there might lie the gist of this Fragment.

Let’s remember that Empedocles was a very original, very devout and quite deviant Pythagorean. He was also influenced by the Orphism then in full bloom in Agrigento .

This is why I prefer to believe that neither the ‘road’, nor the ‘path’ quoted in the Fragment 24, are thought to be ‘unique’.

For a thinker like Empedocles, there must be undoubtedly other ways, not just a ‘single path’…

The verb τελέειν also has, in fact, meanings oriented towards the mystical heights, such as: « to attain perfection, to accomplish initiation, to initiate to the mysteries (of divine Wisdom) ».

As for the word μύθων (the genitive of mythos), used in line 2 of Fragment 24, , it may mean « word, speech », but originally it meant: « legend, fable, myth ».

Hence this alternative translation of μύθων μὴ τελέειν ἀτραπὸν μίαν (mython mè teleein atrapon mian) :

« Not to be initiated in the one way of the myths »…

Here, it is quite ironic to recall that there was precisely no shortage of myths and legends about Empedocles… He was said to have been taken up directly to heaven by the Gods (his « ascension »), shortly after he had successfully called back to life a dead woman named Panthea (incidentally, this name means « All God »), as Diogenes of Laërtius reportedvii.

Five centuries B.C., Empedocles resurrected “Panthea” (« All God »), and shortly afterwards he ‘ascended’ to Heaven.

One can then assume that the Fragment 24 was in fact quite premonitory, revealing in advance the nature of Empedocles’ vision, the essence of his personal wisdom.

The Fragment 24 announces an alternative to the traditional « way of initiation » by the myths:

« Joining the [God] Heads, one to the other,

Not to be initiated in the only way of the myths. »

Empedocles did not seem to believe that the myths of his time implied a unique way to initiation. There was maybe another « way » to initiation: « joining the Most High Godhead and his Wisdom …

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iEmpedocles, Fragment 4d

iiEmpedocles, Fragment 24d

iiiJ. Bollack, Empédocle. Les origines, édition et traduction des fragments et des témoignages, Paris, Éditions de Minuit, 1969

ivJohn Burnet, L’Aurore de la philosophie grecque, texte grec de l’édition Diels, traduction française par Auguste Reymond, 1919, p.245

vPaul Tannery, Pour l’histoire de la science hellène. Ed. Jacques Gabay, 1990, p. 342

viPythagoras. ap Plu., Mor. 2,381 f

viiDiogenes of Laërtius, VIII, 67-69