Poet-Thinker of Ancient Greece
An Essay in Philosophy and Cross-Cultural Dialogue

(by Nguyễn Đăng Trúc)

This essay is framed within a perspective of intercultural dialogue.
It first proposes an approach to Antiquity imbued with poetic and supra-historical resonance, from which emerges the “original miracle” manifested both in Greek history and in many other cultural traditions. This “miracle,” understood as an unprecedented and inaugural event, embodies the advent of human consciousness of being. It constitutes a fundamental opening to an experience of transcendence, even to the divine dimension inherent in this being.

Secondly, the study seeks to interrogate dominant contemporary thought. From the Modern Age to the present day, this thought has drawn extensively on the authority of Heraclitus -recognized as one of the major figures and, in several respects, the emblem of the “Greek miracle” – notably through his discourse, often described as prophetic, concerning the Logos and Polemos.

However, beyond this traditional philosophical reception, the essay aligns Heraclitus with contemporary poet-thinkers, whether of Greek origin or from other cultures. Through the prism of their message, nourished by the ancient Cronos – a source of inspiration emerging from beyond the known, from the “there” of humanity – this essay highlights a previously unrecognized aspect of Heraclitus. Humbly appearing among his contemporaries such as Aeschylus, Sophocles, Parmenides, or Socrates, as well as other poet-thinkers from diverse cultures, he emerges as a messenger of the oracle concerning the transcendent and mysterious being of man.

TOWARDS A RETURN TO HERACLITUS’S LOGOS, THE INSPIRING SOURCE OF MAN’S TRANSCENDENT BEING

(Nguyễn Đăng Trúc)

Νόσημα γὰρ  αἴσχιστον εἶναί φημι συνθέτους λόγους – There is no evil more repulsive than an artificial Logos

(Aeschylus, Prometheus Bound, lines 685–686).

Through expressions more or less imbued with poetry – such as ζῷον λόγον ἔχον, animal rationale, rational living being, or thinking being – our dominant philosophical tradition constructs an implicit conception of human being. Moreover, it maintains that man—as a living being endowed with the Logos (generally interpreted through the notions of speech, reason, and thought)—constitutes a universal definition that ought to be recognized and shared by all cultures across the globe.

In reality, however, it is not this widely prevalent conception that characterizes traditional philosophy. Rather, the essential trait defining our dominant cultural world lies in the figure of homo philosophicus, through whom the specific meaning of the Logos—the inspiring source of human being—is interpreted.

To regard man as ζῷον λόγον ἔχον is to assert that, without the Logos, man would lose his identity. Thus, to equate ζῷον λόγον ἔχον with homo philosophicus is to maintain that this homo draws inspiration from the authentic meaning of the founding Logos in order to bring human being to its fulfillment.

Furthermore, by tracing the advent of this homo philosophicus to the Greek miracle that emerged in the 4th and 5th centuries BC, our philosophical tradition characterizes this exceptional moment as a transition from Mythos to Logos—or even as humanity’s emergence from darkness into the light of reflective reason, to use later philosophical terminology. Georges Gusdorf aptly describes this philosophical Logos (or reflective reason) as a “Sophistic Aufklärung”, thereby recalling the maxim “to know oneself” – an aphorism regarding the nature of human existence proposed by the Greek Sophists of that era.

Indeed, in Plato’s dialogue Charmide (dating to the late 5th century BC), Socrates—a figure often overlooked or even rejected by our Western tradition—critiques the wisdom advocated by the Sophists and reveals, through concise remarks², that this Logos (synonymous with the Sophistic Aufklärung) is the distinctive human faculty. It enables man not only to know objects external to himself but, crucially, to “know himself.”

As Socrates tells Critias, a representative of the Sophists of his time: “In that case, the person who possesses this wisdom is the only one who will know himself; he alone will be capable of examining his own discernment regarding what he happens to know or not know.” …he alone will be capable of similarly inquiring into others to verify what they know and what they think they know (…) No one else is capable of this ! That is precisely what it means to possess wisdom—what wisdom is!

In his comprehensive inquiry into the history of the dominant Western cultural tradition, illuminated by that Sophistic Aufklärung as well as the more radical Aufklärung of our own era, the same author precisely summarizes the profound meaning of the Logos, that power intrinsic to the essence of homo philosophicus :

Every human assertion is, in the final analysis, a human assertion. It must return to the human being of whom it is a part; only then will it have acquired the fullness of its meaning. Human judgment possesses universal jurisdiction.

This Logos, viewed as the foundational source (that is, the vital and transcendent source) of the being of the human identified as homo philosophicus, is thus deciphered as a supposedly divine force that endows every human being with an archetype known in philosophical language as the original and fundamental self. This self, solitary and self-sufficient, is constituted by a foundational relationship known as the principle of identity: “each is, to himself, the same as himself”, or rather, “each is, with himself, the same as himself”. This principle, which underpins the maxim “to know oneself,” is accepted by our homo philosophicus as the supreme law of being and thought.

Faced with this presupposition, first sophistic, then philosophical,which asserts that the self, standing alone and sufficient, is the archetype of human being, and that the Logos founding this being and thought is deciphered within the allegedly irrefutable power of a fundamental relationship constituting the principle of identity (the principle of knowledge of all things), dare we ask the following questions:

• Is this Logos founding human being, which our philosophical tradition intrinsically links to this principle, the true Logos that inspired the message of the ancient Greeks, upon whose authority this tradition relies to enthrone its homo philosophicus?
• In other words, does the “Greek miracle” evoking an exceptional moment in the awareness of human being, a moment in which these sages were key figures, symbolize man’s emergence into the light of a Logos that allows him to know himself as a self -standing alone and sufficient ?
• Can the Logos, which appears as the guiding term of Heraclitus’s message (he being widely acknowledged as one of those eminent figures), be equated with the Logos of the homo philosophicus that characterizes our own cultural tradition ?

By setting aside the commonly held, unquestioned assumption regarding this matter and closely examining the foundational texts of the Greek sages – the very texts upon which the philosophical tradition has built and revised its doctrines – we arrive at a surprising revelation : there has been a profound misunderstanding, if not an inexplicable distortion, of the ancients’ original message, alongside a persistent and total lack of awareness of this error among philosophers throughout the ages.

Indeed, when considering the texts in their entirety and the coherence of their contexts, it is undeniable that the era of the ancient Greeks, specifically the 6th and 5th centuries BCE, witnessed an exceptional historical event marked by the emergence of several eminent figures whom the ancient sages themselves described as scholars and highly skilled professionals. This phenomenon was accompanied by a dramatic transformation in social life.

It is worth noting, however, that the canonical texts of various cultures reveal that this type of event—often perceived as miraculous—occurred among other peoples as well. Thus, it was not a phenomenon unique to Greek society.

Essentially, what matters is that this same period saw the emergence, among other peoples just as among the Greeks, of sages who were widely recognized as the primary guardians of their respective cultural traditions. These sages are contemporaries not merely in a chronological sense, but also in relation to the ancient Cronos, the common source of their message, which springs from the “it was,” from “yore,” from the other shore of the “human There.”

Inspired by this mysterious source, which eludes all human power, the utterance of these sages (no longer ordinary human language) is termed an oracle or a poetic saying, provided it conveys nothing other than man’s supernatural or divine being : a being inspired and constituted by a divine relationship uniting him with the Unknown Other, the author of the divine power and the source of both that being and the message in question. Moreover, the man to whom this oracular and prophetic utterance is addressed is that specific “man-of-the-There,” revealed as bound to a dual condition marked by two contradictory possibilities.

This dual condition appears so incomprehensible that, from the very moment the extraordinary power from the other shore, and the “oracular” utterance embodying it, emerges, both power and utterance are immediately distorted by the exploits of Tέχνη (know-how) and Πολυµαθία (polymathy) wich man can deploy, interpreting them as signs of his own exceptional power and autonomy.

Last but not least, in connection with the human essence inherent in this specific condition, the message of the ancient sages consists essentially of a call, exhorting man to make his existence a struggle that is both painful and transcendent : that is to say, an Ethic, a combative Path he must follow to fulfill his supernatural being.

This precise and exclusive message – a message inspired by Cronos, antiquity with poetic resonance, which the Greek thinker-poets Heraclitus, Aeschylus, and Sophocles call the All-One or the coherent totality regarding the revelation of divine humanity, and which Socrates later describes as wisdom concerning the humanity of man, inspired by the twofold oracle of Delphi – effectively aligns with the teachings of sages from other cultures, particularly those of the ancient Greeks.

However, Heraclitus is the first Greek sage to explicitly refer – through the term Logos – to the source of this message, identified with the transcendent power emanating from the Master or God of Delphi, as well as to the “oracular” utterance that expresses it : a Logos absolutely inaccessible to any human power and to all human language,  an eternal Logos which teaches the truth about the divine being of man.

Moreover, it is this same wise Heraclitus who denounces the fundamental falsification of this Logos by the expression κακοτεχνία (deceptive manipulation), which consists of reducing this divine power emanating from the “Unknown Other” and inspiring wisdom relating to the transcendent being of man, to a human reason supposedly capable both of measuring objectifiable things, and of defining this being.

In reality, while the Logos, as the divine source of inspiration for the message of the ancients, constitutes a shared locus of wisdom across various civilizations, this falsification which clings to the “man-There” as a grave, mortal peril leading to the loss of divinity or the transcendence of humanity,  also appears throughout the teachings of the masters of these cultures. It manifests notably in the messages of the ancient Greeks through various poetic terms :

• In Aeschylus’s Prometheus Bound (line 82), the term ὑβρίζειν denotes insolence or the usurpation of another’s prerogative : to take the stolen fire, that is, to conflate one’s desire for the self with the Celestial Fire, the Desire of the Unknown and Other God.

• In Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex (line 873), the term Ὕβρις evokes excess, immoderation, and the usurpation of a right belonging to another – illustrated here by the act of killing Laius (the Unknown, his father and king) –  in order to take his place.

• In Socrates’s words in Plato’s Protagoras (343b) : the term ἄγαν (excess) designates the reduction of the personal “you” – as called upon by the Other in the oracle “know thyself” to an anonymous “self,” solitary and self-sufficient, as expressed in the Sophist maxim “to know oneself.” Similarly, in the Apology of Socrates (22d), the term ἁμάρτημα (fault) characterizes the inappropriate pretension of relying on knowledge of all things to define the divine essence of man.

Ultimately, in light of the message from the inspired sages of ancient times – that “it was” synonymous with a poetically resonant antiquity – a fundamental question arises :

• By identifying human being with homo philosophicus, whose foundational source is the Logos, interpreted as reflective reason, a reason unique to man that allows him to conceive of himself as a solitary, self-sufficient self, does our philosophical tradition not rest, from its inception to the present day, upon a death-dealing fiction – what the ancients termed Ὕβρις or ἁμάρτημα – that is, upon a deceptive manipulation ?

• In other words, in light of the foundational texts of our ancient sages, texts regarded as canonical, does this tradition not contradict their original message by reducing it to a misleading manifesto projected by humans, which those ancients themselves denounced as a death-dealing Logos ?

A few examples illustrate this issue :

• Much like a sophist reducing the “you” called upon by the Unknown Other – a “you” bearing a divine and personal being born of the relationship uniting man with the Unknown Other – to a self-sufficient self, Plato, the first to systematize philosophical thought, transforms Socrates in his Late Dialogues. Socrates is no longer a messenger of the oracle but the protagonist of a humanity defined by a Logos that establishes man as a “self” grounded in the same principle of identity as knowable objects.
• In the modern era – echoing the Greek sophists described by the wise Socrates in Plato’s Charmides (who sought to access knowledge of things and of man through human reason alone, grounding both in the same principle of identity – the philosopher Kant defines the dignity, or divine essence, of homo philosophicus through the autonomy of human reason, the light of truth. Logos, as reason, thus constitutes man’s exceptional power, enabling him to give himself his own law.

• Much like the “false” Prometheus of Aeschylus’s tragedy, – the Prometheus who definitively eclipsed the ancient Cronos, symbol of the Celestial Fire representing the Unknown God’s heart, burning with love for man  and elevating him to a glorious, conjugal relationship with the Divine – the philosopher Nietzsche ushered in a new homo philosophicus. This figure embodies the stolen fire, that is, the self’s desire and will to power, in the service of the Übermensch (Overman), the alleged herald of a new human era.

• Mirroring the self-satisfied Oedipus Rex – who remained utterly oblivious to his hidden identity stemming from his paternal bond with Laius, a figure of the Unknown Other – a new homo philosophicus has emerged in our contemporary history, asserting himself as the true ζῷον λόγον ἔχον (rational animal) of the era of the great Greek thinkers. Presented as the most authentic and primordial Da-sein of fundamental ontology, this thinking being-there, new homo philosophicus as conceived by the philosopher Heidegger, constantly seeks to fulfill its being within a self-sufficient and radically solitary self.

These few examples belong to a body of work encompassing various philosophical doctrines and the different forms of humanity that stem from them. Indeed, throughout the history of a world inspired and illuminated by the philosophical Logos – a Logos taken a priori as the foundational source of a unified humanity whose invariable archetype is the solitary, self-sufficient self – human identities and their “false hopes” proliferate endlessly, only to fade away with the passage of time.

Today, more than ever, homo philosophicus steadfastly maintains that his Logos, born of the “Greek miracle”, is the sole power capable of liberating humanity from myth and must therefore serve as the fundamental source for all mankind. The efficacy of the knowledge and expertise generated by this Logos undeniably lends strong support to this claim.

Yet, in this very present illuminated by that Logos – both in our own era and in those of his predecessors – this homo philosophicus, weary of a world void of meaning and standing at the zenith of his achievements, also harbors an inexplicable yearning to destroy the foundations of his world, hoping to allow a new form of self to emerge and to encounter a renewed sense of time.

However, from the other shore of the “There”, which man summons into being through his reason or philosophical logos alone, there emerges an entirely different miracle, marked by the advent of the transcendent Logos, the vital and illuminating divine source of man’s mysterious being.

Inspired by this Logos, ancients from various cultures reveal that the condition of human existence is such that man inhabits not only his own being but also a non-being of manifold monstrous forms, a non-being described through highly evocative expressions.

In the biblical image of the “Tower of Babel” lies a poignant reflection of this state of non-being, born from the presumption of man who relies solely on the strength of his own hands, struggling alone to muster the power necessary to recreate a humanity purported to self-divinize. This tower exemplifies the inexorable fate of every man who, through ignorance or bad faith, grounds his humanity in self-sufficiency. At the end of these blind ventures, he loses all connection to the original Logos that grants him a transcendent, authentic, and personal humanity – one founded upon a fundamental interpersonal bond that links him to the Transcendent, to the Other, to the Unknown, and to his fellows, his neighbors -.

In Indian wisdom, Saṃsāra designates the infernal and uninterrupted cycle of the manifold changing forms of non-being or of a singular fictive humanity projected by karma: a deathly action inspired by desire, imagination, and the sole knowledge intrinsic to every human being.

Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Parmenides represent this non-being in its many mutable forms through expressions such as: « ἐκκυλισθήσῃ τέχνης » (humanity bound by facticity); « δύστεκνον παιδουργίαν » (sinister progeny); or « Ἰὼ γενεαὶ βροτῶν, ὡς ὑμᾶς ἴσα καὶ τὸ μηδὲν ζώσας ἐναριθμῶ » (fictive generations of mortals); as well as « κέλευθος » (the labyrinthine path of human existence).

In a paradoxical discourse reflecting the dual condition of human existence, Heraclitus contends that within this fatal labyrinth of the “Here,” the forms of humanity are incessantly generated, projected by the totality of our knowledge (cf. Πολυµαθία). As numerous as they are opposed, these forms, for which day and night serve as archetypes, all arise from the same artificial and fictive humanity.

However, enlightened by the light of this Logos come from the other shore, or inspired by Cronos—an antiquity resonant with poetic and supra-historical significance—the message of the ancients concerning the being of man in his integral context conveys neither pessimism nor ontological nihilism. On the contrary, it is a proclamation of liberating truth, simultaneously revealing man’s transcendent and personal being, shaped by his relation to the Other and to others, as well as his divine dignity manifested through active participation with them to fulfill this supernatural existence.

In the light of this message, the “Greek miracle” truly appears as an unforeseen event, marking the passage from Muthos to Logos. Yet this passage is from a Muthos understood as a deceptive light that conceals truth, whose most fundamental and deadly aspect is the blinding pretension of self-sufficiency, towards the manifestation of a Logos inaccessible to human reason. This Logos discloses the mystery of a humanity intrinsically bound to the Unknown Other and to fellow beings; a Logos at once intimately near, dwelling in the depths of man, and yet utterly distant, concealed by that same man imprisoned by the fallacious light of his self-sufficiency.

Finally, in the light of this ancient message, especially of Heraclitus, it is only through the revelation of the Logos, inaccessible to human reason – this Celestial Fire, this Burning Heart of love from an Unknown God toward man – that this miracle can truly occur and liberate mankind. Not only the Western homo philosophicus, but also the human-being-that-is of all cultures, delivered from his condition enslaved to non-being.

Without this Logos, every attempt at liberation remains futile.

Without the Hope embodying the unwavering promise stemming from this Logos, this genuine miracle unveiling the mystery of divine humanity can never come to pass.

Yet this Hope can be fully realized only through a free and trusting assent, a suffering yet profoundly glorious ‘yes’, that man offers in response to the call of the Logos.