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.
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. |
It's a shame that none of Michel Onfray's works seem to be available as e-books. I'm unfamiliar with him and would like to find out more than just the brief Google search I just did. His
Atheist Manifesto: The Case Against Christianity, Judaism, and Islam seems interesting, as well as do some of his political works and his thoughts on hedonism.
I wonder what he meant by contact with yogis? Since our knowledge of the presocratics is largely confined with a few exceptions to fragments and secondary sources, I wonder where he got that information?