LucidElement, on 18 August 2012 - 11:24 AM, said:
Plato only documented on Atantis what he heard through the family grapevine. I truly, don't believe he saw it with his eyes. (However, again, I am a believer and there sure as heck could be atlantis out there, but without getting OFF topic, because I hate that...) I just want to say, Plato and Atlanatis was just Plato expressing what he heard through his bloodline...
"According to Plato's Timaeus, Critias learned through his family that the Greek statesman Solon (a distant ancestor of Plato) heard about it from Egyptian priests during a visit to Saïs, Egypt in about 590 B.C. The priests claimed to have access to records about Atlantis written on pillars within the temple. Plutarch writes: "His [Solon's] first voyage was to Egypt . . . [where he] spent some time in study with Psenophis of Heliopolis and Sonchis the Saite, the most learned of all the priests; from whom, as Plato says, getting knowledge of the Atlantic story, he put it into a poem, and proposed to bring it to the knowledge of the Greeks." But a little further on: "Now Solon having begun his great work in verse, the history or fable of the Atlantic Island, which he had learned from the wise men of Saïs, and thought it convenient for the Athenians to know, abandoned it . . . because of his age, and being discouraged at the greatness of the task." (Life of Solon, 90 A.D.) "..... (BUT AGAIN, PLEASE ALL DO NOT GET OFF TOPIC..) Im more curious about the post at hand =)
I think you missed my point.
Plato was addressing an Athenian audience in Democratic Athens.....with its empire diminished since losing in the Peloponnesian War against the Spartans.
"How could the state have fallen so?".....would have been the sentiment that he's concerned most with.
After the war 30 oligarchs got together and took power, backed by the Spartans.....and a dark time of political killings followed...the 30 Tyrants were ousted...and democratic order restored.....
Since many of the 30 were students of Socrates (like Plato), the ugly thinker was put on trial for ungodliness and corruption of youth (a theme earlier exploited by Aristophanes).....and he was executed.
Socrates was anti-democratic......so was Plato.
So forget the whole "does Atlantis exist?" argument....Plato was using the story as a vehicle for his political theory.
He was explaining to the Athenians why they have suffered, and continue to do so.
Like Atlantis, Athens' purity in the eyes of the gods became corrupted by placing the 'helm' of the state at the hands of tradesmen and merchants, who greedily eyed the foreign markets of friends and foes alike; progressing to enforce their will on them, alienating itself, and inviting resistance, and the nemesis of the gods.
Hubris............believing they were destined to be 'protectors' of allied peoples
Ate.....exploiting allies, and using a powerful navy to force them to pay tribute, becomming the oppressors they once sought to protect their people from.
Nemesis.....the plague, numerous seiges, military disasters, final defeat to a more 'noble' State............and in the case of the story of Atlantis......Natural disasters at the hands of the gods.
This sentiment was one shared by other oligarchs and supporters of Oligarchy......most notably Thucidides in his "History Of The Peloponnesian War"
My point was that Plato's model can perhaps be applied in most, if not all, cases to some degree of Great Nations falling.
edited: for clarity and to add....
Quote
"Until philosophers rule as kings or those who are now called kings and leading men genuinely and adequately philosophise, that is, until political power and philosophy entirely coincide, while the many natures who at present pursue either one exclusively are forcibly prevented from doing so, cities will have no rest from evils,... nor, I think, will the human race." (Republic 473c-d)
Edited by The Gremlin, 18 August 2012 - 01:28 PM.
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