Quote:
Originally Posted by TimMason
I was thinking of something Michel Onfray claims in his lectures on the history of philosophy. He says that the presocratics had made contact with the people that he calls 'yogis', and that their teachings were influential. In particular, if I recall correctly, he argues that the rejection of desire and passion that later was taken up by the Stoics comes from that source. Who exactly he means by 'yogis' isn't altogether clear - or at least wasn't clear to me when I listened to the lecture - but seems to be a general grab-bag of Otherness. |
I'm not sure I trust Michel Onfray very much. I read his book on presocratic philosophers, and of course I can only agree on his opinion of Plato
But I was a little doubtful as to the opinons he assigned the pre-socratic. Was he really talking on the basis of serious historical research (given that most of their writings are lost, much of what we know about them is hearsay, often from hostile witnesses), or was he projecting his own opinions on them? He admits himself that some of his assertions are subjective and emotional judgments, and he doesn't give any hints as to the facts they may be based on. That makes me feel a bit uneasy, and also his personality and the fact that he founded his own school of philosophy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by TimMason
So my point was a weak one. But I don't think this detracts from the main argument I wanted to make, which was that in Christian and post-Christian thinking desire is seen as taking the unclean as its object.
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Yes, I agree with this. Or is it that desire itself is unclean, regardless of its object? In any case, this is something that weighs heavily on us today still.