Pythagoras of Samos (US /pɪˈθæɡərəs/;[1] UK /paɪˈθæɡərəs/;[2] Greek: Πυθαγόρας ὁ Σάμιος Pythagóras ho Sámios "Pythagoras the Samian", or simply Πυθαγόρας; Πυθαγόρης in Ionian Greek; c. 570 – c. 495 BC)[3][4] was anIonian Greek philosopher, mathematician, and has been credited as the founder of the movement calledPythagoreanism. Most of the information about Pythagoras was written down centuries after he lived, so very little reliable information is known about him. He was born on the island of Samos, and traveled, visiting Egypt and Greece, and maybe India, and in 520 BC returned to Samos.[5] Around 530 BC, he moved to Croton, in Magna Graecia, and there established some kind of school or guild.
Pythagoras made influential contributions to philosophy and religion in the late 6th century BC. He is often revered as a great mathematician and scientist and is best known for the Pythagorean theorem which bears his name. However, because legend and obfuscation cloud his work even more than that of the other pre-Socratic philosophers, one can give only a tentative account of his teachings, and some have questioned whether he contributed much to mathematicsor natural philosophy. Many of the accomplishments credited to Pythagoras may actually have been accomplishments of his colleagues and successors. Some accounts mention that the philosophy associated with Pythagoras was related to mathematics and that numbers were important. It was said that he was the first man to call himself a philosopher, or lover of wisdom,[6] and Pythagorean ideas exercised a marked influence on Plato, and through him, all of Western philosophy.
Contents
[hide]Biographical sources
The stories which were created were eagerly sought by the Neoplatonist writers who provide most of the details about Pythagoras, but who were uncritical concerning anything which related to the gods or which was considered divine.[7] Thus many myths were created – such as that Apollo was his father; that Pythagoras gleamed with a supernatural brightness; that he had a golden thigh; that Abaris came flying to him on a golden arrow; that he was seen in different places at the same time.[8] According to Sir William Smith, with the exception of a few remarks by Xenophanes, Heraclitus, Herodotus, Plato, Aristotle, and Isocrates, we are mainly dependent on Diogenes Laërtius, Porphyry, and Iamblichus for biographical details.[9] Burkert (1972, p. 109) states that Aristoxenus and Dicaearchusare the most important accounts.[10]
Aristotle had written a separate work On the Pythagoreans, which is no longer extant.[11] However, the Protrepticus possibly contains parts of On the Pythagoreans. His disciples Dicaearchus, Aristoxenus, and Heraclides Ponticus had written on the same subject. These writers, late as they are, were among the best sources from whom Porphyry and Iamblichus drew, while still adding some legendary accounts and their own inventions to the mix. Hence, historians are often reduced to considering the statements based on their inherent probability, but even then, if all the credible stories concerning Pythagoras were supposed true, his range of activity would be impossibly vast.[12]
Life
See also: Pythagoras (sculptor)
According to Clement of Alexandria, Pythagoras was a disciple of Soches, the Egyptian archprophet, and Plato of Sechnuphis of Heliopolis. Herodotus, Isocrates, and other early writers agree that Pythagoras was the son of Mnesarchus, born on a Greek island in the eastern Aegean called Samos.[13] Pythagoras's father was a gem-engraver or a merchant fromTyre.[14][15] Pythagoras's name led him to be associated with Pythian Apollo; Aristippus explained his name by saying, "He spoke (agor-) the truth no less than did the Pythian (Pyth-)", and Iamblichus tells the story that the Pythia prophesied that his pregnant mother would give birth to a man supremely beautiful, wise, and beneficial to humankind.[16] A late source gives his mother's name as Pythais.[17] As to the date of his birth, Aristoxenus stated that Pythagoras left Samos in the reign ofPolycrates, at the age of 40, which would give a date of birth around 570 BC.[18]
Pythagoras's later fate is unknown and inconsistent among ancient sources. Some say that he perished in the temple with his disciples,[19] others that he fled first to Tarentum, and that, being driven from there, he escaped to Metapontum, and there according to Diogenes Laërtius, starved himself to death.[20] His tomb was shown at Metapontum in the time ofCicero.[21]
According to Walter Burkert (1972)[10]
- "Most obvious is the contradiction between Aristoxenus and Dicaearchus, regarding the catastrophe that overwhelmed the Pythagorean society. One of the two reports must be basically wrong: either Pythagoras withdrew to Metapontum before the outbreak of the unrest and died there (as Aristoxenus says) or he and his followers were hounded from city to city (as Dicaearchus has it). Like his doctrines, the life of Pythagoras also becomes a mirror image of real controversies in the schools. On the one hand there is the controversy over the primacy of the theoretical or practical life. In this respect Heraclides thinks Pythagoras as the apostle of pure 'theory'."
- "There is not a single detail in the life of Pythagoras that stands uncontradicted. But it is possible, from a more or less critical selection of the data, to construct a plausible account."
According to Iamblichus (ca. 245-325 AD, 1918 translation) in The life of Pythagoras, translated by Thomas Taylor[22]
- "Twenty-two years Pythagoras remained in Egypt, pursuing closely his investigations, visiting every place famous for its teachings, every person celebrated for wisdom. Astronomy and geometry he especially studied and he was thoroughly initiated in all the mysteries of the gods, till, having been taken captive by the soldiers of Cambyses, he was carried to Babylon. Here the Magi instructed him in their venerable knowledge and he arrived at the summit of arithmetic, music and other disciplines. After twelve years he returned to Samos, being then about fifty-six years of age."
Family
According to some accounts Pythagoras married Theano, and it has been said that she was first his pupil, a lady of Croton. According to Mary Ritter Beard, Theano told Hippodamus of Thurium (may be Hippodamus of Miletus, who according to Aristotle planned the city of Thurium in 440 BC),[23] the treatise On Virtue, she wrote, contains the doctrine of the golden mean.[24]
According to Thesleff, Stobaeus, and Heeren, Theano wrote in On Piety:[25]
- "I have learned that many of the Greeks believe Pythagoras said all things are generated from number. The very assertion poses a difficulty: How can things which do not exist even be conceived to generate? But he did not say that all things come to be from number; rather, in accordance with number - on the grounds that order in the primary sense is in number and it is by participation in order that a first and a second and the rest sequentially are assigned to things which are counted."
Their children are variously stated to have included a son, Telauges, and three daughters, Damo, Arignote, and Myia (married to a famous wrestler, Milo of Croton). Milo was said to be an associate of Pythagoras. One story tells of the wrestler saving the philosopher's life when a roof was about to collapse.[26]
Arignote wrote a Bacchica concerning the mysteries of Demeter, and a work called The Rites of Dionysus. Among the Pythagorean Sacred Discourses there is a dictum attributed to Arignote:
- "The eternal essence of number is the most providential cause of the whole heaven, earth and the region in between. Likewise it is the root of the continued existence of the gods and daimones, as well as that of divine men."[25]
Brewer (1894) mentioned "Pythagoras taught that the sun is a movable sphere in the centre of the universe, and that all the planets revolve round it." Thus, it would appear that Arignote's quote above is not entirely in alignment with his model of the universe, since it is limited to Earth orbit.[27]
Influence
Before 520 BC, on one of his visits to Egypt or Greece, Pythagoras might have met the c. 54 years older Thales of Miletus.[28]Thales was a philosopher, scientist, mathematician, and engineer,[5] also known for the Thales' Theorem. Pythagoras' birthplace, the island of Samos, is situated in the Northeast Aegean Sea not far from Miletus.[29]
In the absence of reliable information, however, a huge range of teachers were assigned to Pythagoras. Some made his training almost entirely Greek, others exclusively Egyptian and Oriental. We find mentioned as his instructors Creophylus,[30]Hermodamas of Samos,[31] Bias,[30] Thales,[30] Anaximander (a pupil of Thales),[32] and Pherecydes of Syros.[33]
Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers, Diogenes Laërtius (3rd century CE) cites the statement of Aristoxenus (4th century BCE) that the Delphic Themistoclea (also known as Aristoclea) taught Pythagoras his moral doctrines:[34][35][36]
- "Aristoxenus says that Pythagoras got most of his moral doctrines from the Delphic priestess Themistoclea."
- "He (Pythagoras) taught much else, which he claimed to have learned from Aristoclea at Delphi."
The Egyptians are said to have taught him geometry, the Phoenicians arithmetic, the Chaldeans astronomy, the Magians the principles of religion and practical maxims for the conduct of life.[39] Of the various claims regarding his Greek teachers,Pherecydes of Syros is mentioned most often.
According to R.D. Hicks (1972) Pythagoras not only visited Egypt and learnt the Egyptian language (Antiphon in book On Men of Outstanding Merit), but also "journeyed among the Chaldaeans and Magi." Later in Crete, he went to the Cave of Idawith Epimenides; and entered Egyptian sanctuaries for the purpose to learn information concerning the secret lore of the different gods.[40] Plutarch asserted in his book On Isis and Osiris that during his visit to Egypt, Pythagoras received instruction from the Egyptian priest Oenuphis ofHeliopolis.[41] Other ancient writers asserted his visit to Egypt.[42] Enough of Egypt was known to attract the curiosity of an inquiring Greek, and contact between Samos and other parts of Greece with Egypt is mentioned.[43]
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