Show full text25 pages
Page 1
View in PDF(opens in a new window)8379 Federica Montevecchi
Amore e odio: Empedocle e Freud,
In: Il senso degli opposti, a cura di F. Andolfi, pp. 97-111, Diabasis, Parma, 2014
8380 Sharon Mooney
Hypatia of Alexandria
http://www.edwardtbabinski.us/history/hypatia.html
23p
2005
8381 Moro Tornese, S.F. Lyra and aulos in the Neoplatonic allegorical interpretation of
myths
p 307 - 325
In: TRA LYRA E AULOS, TRADIZIONI MUSICALI E GENERI POETICI, 2016
8382 Moro Tornese, S.F. Cyphi in the Hermetic and Pythagorean traditions
Gifico. Entry in the database Simon Online, a collaborative edition of Simon of Genoa's clavis
sanationis, a medical dictionary from the late thirteenth century.
http://simonofgenoa.org/index.php?title=Gifico
8383 Moro Tornese, S.F. The Metaphysical Meaning of the Musical Scale of Plato's
Timaeus in Proclus
p 79 - 104
In: Reason and No-Reason from Ancient Philosophy to Modern Neurosciences. Old
parameters, new perspective, Academia Verlag, 201
8384 Platt, V. Virtual Visions: Phantasia and the Perception of the Divine in Philostratus’
Life of Apollonius of Tyana
In: Philostratus, Cambridge University Press, 2009: 131-54.
8385 Poulle, B. De la musique sur le forum.
In: Antiquité et citoyenneté. 2002. pp. 283-292.
8386 Pearse, R. Pythagoras in India? –
18p
http://www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2009/11/17/pythagoras-in-india/
8387 Pearse, R. Pythagoras is full of beans!
5p
http://www.roger-pearse.com/weblog/2011/05/17/pythagoras-is-full-of-beans/
8388 Raddato, C . The Painted Tombs of Paestum
Internet – FOLLOWING HADRIAN. 2014
18 p
8389 Rashed, M. Boethus’ Aristotelian ontology p 53 - 77
In: Aristotle, Plato and Pythagoreanism in the 1th century 2013
8390 Reedy, L. The Shadow of Croton: Epicureanism's Concept of Religion and the
Necessity of Asceticism
Internet 10 p
8391 Rivera, A. MARCION AND EMPEDOCLES: THE GNOSIS OF LOVE AND DISCORD
Internet, the aeon eye. 18 p 2015
8392 Rivera, A. THEURGY AND KNOWLEDGE IN THE CHALDEAN ORACLES, IAO
AND HEKATE
Internet, the aeon eye. 16 p 2016
8393 Rivera, A. BRINGING DOWN THE HEAVENS
Internet, the aeon eye. 14 p 2016
Page 2
View in PDF(opens in a new window)QUADERNI DELLA
«RIVISTA DI CULTURA CLASSICA
E MEDIOEVALE»
Collana diretta da Liana Lomiento
Page 3
View in PDF(opens in a new window)TRA L Y R A E A U L O S
TRADIZIONI MUSICALI
E GENERI POETICI
a cura di luigi bravi, liana lomiento,
angelo meriani, giovanna pace
PISA · ROMA
F A B R I Z I O S E R R A ED I T ORE
MMXVI
Page 4
View in PDF(opens in a new window)Pubblicato con un contributo del prin 2010/11
Agoni poetico-musicali nella Grecia antica
Dipartimento di Scienze della Comunicazione e Discipline Umanistiche
Università di Urbino Carlo Bo.
A norma del codice civile italiano, è vietata la riproduzione, totale o parziale
(compresi estratti, ecc.), di questa pubblicazione in qualsiasi forma e versione
(comprese bozze, ecc.), originale o derivata, e con qualsiasi mezzo a stampa
o internet (compresi siti web personali e istituzionali, academia.edu, ecc.),
elettronico, digitale, meccanico, per mezzo di fotocopie, pdf, microfilm, film,
scanner o altro, senza il permesso scritto della casa editrice.
Under Italian civil law this publication cannot be reproduced, wholly or in part (included oπprints, etc.), in any form (included proofs, etc.), original or derived, or by any
means: print, internet (included personal and institutional web sites, academia.edu, etc.),
electronic, digital, mechanical, including photocopy, pdf, microfilm, film, scanner or any
other medium, without permission in writing from the publisher.
*
Proprietà riservata · All rights reserved
© Copyright 2016 by Fabrizio Serra editore, Pisa · Roma.
Fabrizio Serra editore incorporates the Imprints Accademia editoriale,
Edizioni dell’Ateneo, Fabrizio Serra editore, Giardini editori e stampatori in Pisa,
Gruppo editoriale internazionale and Istituti editoriali e poligrafici internazionali.
www.libraweb.net
Uffici di Pisa: Via Santa Bibbiana 28, I 56127 Pisa,
tel. +39 050542332, fax +39 050574888, fse@libraweb.net
Uffici di Roma: Via Carlo Emanuele I 48, I 00185 Roma,
tel. +39 0670493456, fax +39 0670476605, fse.roma@libraweb.net
isbn 978-88-6227-825-6
e-isbn 978-88-6227-826-3
Page 5
View in PDF(opens in a new window)SOMMARIO
Liana Lomiento, Angelo Meriani, Premessa
performance musicale e generi poetici
Andrew Barker, Plutarch, Quaestiones convivales, 704c4705b6: The Host and the Musician
Luca Bettarini, Non solo syrinx: la presenza dell’aulos e
degli strumenti a corda nella tradizione della poesia bucolica
Claude Calame, Generi poetici e circostanze della performance musicale: una rete di poesia melica?
Mariella De Simone, Gli strumenti musicali della lirica arcaica greco-orientale: svalutazione e riattivazione di paradigmi
sonori e pratiche performative
Serena Ferrando, La performance citarodica e aulodica nel
banchetto funebre locrese di vi sec. a.C.
Egert Pöhlmann, The Hymnus on the Holy Trinity from
Oxyrhynchos (POxy 1786) and its Environments
Antonietta Provenza, Sirene nell’Ade. L’aulo, la lira e il
lutto
Kamila Wyslucha, Cano versus lego. A characteristic of some
Augustan poetic genres in connection to the manner of their performance
Amir Yerucham, Music and Cult Foundation in Euripides
Bakchai
15
29
41
56
72
85
103
119
138
lyra
Stefan Hagel, An invention worth fifty cows: Evidence for
157
supra-regionality in tortoise shell lyre construction
András Kárpáti, Thamyras’ Song Contest and the Muse Figures 167
Claudina Romero Mayorga, Mercury with lyre: a new inter199
pretation of a Mithraic sculpture found in Hispania
aulos
Nadia Baltieri, Aulós e ‘Nuova’ Danza. Una rilettura di
Melanippide PMG 758 e Teleste PMG 805
Page 6
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sommario
Adelaide Fongoni, Atena e l’aulos nel Marsia di Melanippide (fr. 758 Page/Campbell) e nell’Argo di Teleste (fr. 805 a-c
233
Page/Campbell)
Sylvain Perrot, «A Lydian pipe and the Lydian tunes of the
lyre serve me»: the Anonymous Aulodia (POxy xv, 1795) and
246
the Genre of Aulody
tradizioni musicali
Tosca Lynch, Why are only the Dorian and Phrygian Harmo267
niai accepted in Plato’s Kallipolis? Lyre vs. Aulos
Joan Silva Barris, No Linos-song in Achilles’ shield
285
Andrea Tessier, La colometria di Pindaro e il peri; mevtrwn
297
del Vat. Gr. 896: notitia editionis partim principis
tra lyra e aulos: letture filosofiche
Sebastian F. Moro Tornese, Lyra and aulos in the Neopla307
tonic allegorical interpretation of myths
tra lyra e aulos: la tradizione iconografica
Theodor E. Ulieriu-Rostás, Dionysiac strings? Towards an
iconographic reassessment of late 5th and early 4th Century Athenian
perceptions of mousikē
Alexandra Goulaki-Voutyra, Singing to the lyra or the
auloi
327
Indice dei passi citati
Page 7
View in PDF(opens in a new window)LYRA AND AULOS
IN THE NEOPLATONIC ALLEGORICAL
INTERPRETATION OF MYTHS
Sebastian F. Moro Tornese
Abstract
This article studies diπerent Neoplatonic views on the opposition and
complementarity between lyra and aulos in the context of the allegorical
interpretation of myths. The symbolism of the musical instruments is
related to the contrast between the Apollonian, anagogic music (a music
that liberates the soul from attachment to the passions) and another kind
of music (connected to Marsyas) which is tied to the world of generation and the phenomenal illusions of the particular self. This imitative
music is attached to the sensible world and oriented towards competitiveness and the achievement of egotistic results, proper to the dualism
of “mine” and “yours”. However, the Neoplatonists present also a more
positive interpretation of the music of Marsyas and the Phrygian harmonies in the context of Dionysian mysticism. This kind of music and
its dynamic character serves as a catalyst for turning the soul towards
divine inspiration.
Keywords: Neoplatonism, music, allegory, symbolism, Apollonian and
Dionysian.
I
propose to study diπerent Neoplatonic views on the opposition between lyra and aulos in the context of the allegorical interpretation of myths. The symbolism of the musical instruments
is related to the contrast between the Apollonian anagogic music
(a music that liberates the soul from attachment to the passions)
and another kind of music (connected to Marsyas) which is tied
to the world of generation (genesis) and the phenomenal illusions
of the particular self or ‘ego’. This imitative music is attached to
the sensible world and oriented towards competitiveness and the
achievement of egotistic results, proper to the dualism of ‘mine’
and ‘yours’. 1
Olympiodorus characterizes the world of becoming and the opposition between mine and yours in the context of the level of virtues which correspond
Page 8
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
However, music is able to go beyond imitation 1 and oπers a
‘space’ beyond oppositions and shows at the same time a coordination or complementariness between Marsyas and Apollo, and at
a higher level, between the Dionysian and the Apollonian.
Proclus says that the most divine part of ourselves, «the intellect
in us is Dionysian and a true statue of Dionysus.» (in Cra.,133,
p. 77, 24). However, this inner essence is torn apart by falsehood
and our passions, which depend on the world of becoming. In the
Orphic myth, the Titans distracted Dionysus with a mirror and
toys, tore him into seven pieces and devoured him. 2 Zeus struck
the Titans with his thunderbolt and all human beings were created
from their ashes (which contained the Dionysian element as well).
Athena rescued the heart of Dionysus, carrying him back to his
original home, to his father Zeus, where the god was reintegrated. In other version, Apollo collected the pieces and carried them
to the life within a world where greatest separation takes place: «Finally, the
soul lives by ethical and physical virtues, symbolized by the reign of Dionysus; hence he is torn to pieces, because these virtues do not imply each other;
and the Titans chew his flesh, mastication standing for the extreme division,
because Dionysus is the patron of this world, where extreme division prevails
because of ‘mine’ and ‘thine’. In the Titans who tear him to pieces, the ti
(‘something’) denotes the particular, for the universal form is broken up in
genesis, and Dionysus is the monad of the Titans.» (Olymp., in Phd., 1,5,7;
trans. by Leendert Gerrit Westerink, The Greek Commentaries on Plato’s Phaedo:
Olympiodorus, Westbury, Prometheus Trust, 20092, p. 44). Olympiodorus and
other Neoplatonists arranged virtues according to diπerent levels; the highest
are the theurgic, followed by contemplative and purificatory virtues, while
lower levels include: political (civic or constitutional) virtues and the two
more derived degrees of virtue mentioned here, which correspond to a world
more removed from Unity.
1
Cf. Procl., in R., 1, 60, 6-13. For Proclus, an art based on mimesis (imitation, representation) is a kind of art that stays attached to the world of manifestation; music «prefers to snatch itself out (anharpazein) of copies in order
to ascend towards the divine models of harmony and rhythm for all in this
world». However, even mimesis can lead to the archetypes, if it is accompanied
by a proper ‘allegorical’ interpretation, because visible realities ‘imitate’ their
invisible models, and the soul can ascend from the veils towards the interior
causes of manifestation (Cf. Procl., Inst., 209 and in Ti., ii, 246, 4-9).
2
Cf. O. Kern, Orphicorum Fragmenta, Berlin, Weidmann, 1922, p. 210. See
Rene van den Berg’s explanation of Proclus’ Hymn to Athena, in Robert van
den Berg, Proclus’ Hymns: Essays, Translations, Commentary, Leiden, Brill, 2001,
p. 288. Cf. Procl., in Ti., 2, 197, 15-30; ii, 28, 1; cf., also in Prm., 808; in Ti., ii,
145, 18 ff. See also, Fritz Graf, Sarah Iles Johnston, Ritual Texts for the
Afterlife: Orpheus and the Bacchic Gold Tablets, London-New York, Routledge,
Page 9
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
to Delphi. For Proclus (in Ti., ii, 197, 15-30), this symbolizes the
harmonization of the seven portions in the cosmic musical scale
of the World-Soul, depicted in the Timaeus.
Apollo, is cause of unity and leads multiplicity up to the One
and his musical activity symbolizes the harmonization of the whole
cosmos into a single unity. This harmonization is also represented
with the chorus of the Muses established around the god. 1 Proclus
explains that «All the Apollonian series depends on the demiurgic
hegemony (direction/leadership) of Zeus» (in Cra., 15, p. 5, 23-24
Pasq.). The coordination between the activity of Apollo and that
of Zeus, as the demiurgic Intellect (cf. in Cra., 174, p. 99, 30), entails that Apollo provides unification at a level which has suπered
multiplication. Zeus corresponds to the paradigmatic aim towards
which Apollo’s concentrating and mediating/anagogic power is
directed: this is manifested as music, medicine, prophecy, etc. 2
Dionysus in turn, being another kind of Intellect, more immanent and specific, provides us with the particular intellect, symbolized with the gift of wine (Procl., in Cra., 180).
Marsyas, as a Satyr or Silenus of the retinue of Dionysus, presents on one side, the externalizing aspect of multiplicity and generation (with its confusion/seduction/division), and on the other
side, the direction towards the inner heart of Dionysus and his
inspiration expressed by the immediacy of the power of sound.
1
Proclus expands his depiction of Apollo’s activity at in Cra., 176, p. 101, 20:
«From the supercelestial order above he sows all the cosmos with channels and
the rays of light from Zeus; for his ‘darts’ symbolize his rays of light. That he
is God of music demonstrates that Apollo is cause of all harmony, both invisible
and visible, through his directive powers, by which with Mnemosyne and Zeus he
engenders the Muses, and he cooperates in organizing the perceptible universe with
his demiurgic powers, which the sons of the theurgists call ‘hands’, since indeed the
activity of harmony is dependent upon the motion of the hands». (transl. by Brian
Duvick, Proclus. On Plato Cratylus, London, Duckworth, 2007).
2
Cf. Procl., in Cra., 174, pp. 99, 8 π. Pasq.: «The power of medicine eliminates the disparate aspect of illnesses, and bestows the gift of unitary health.
For health is symmetry and accords with nature, whereas what is variegated
is unnatural. And again, the power of prophecy, in revealing the simplicity
of truth, destroys the variety of falsehood. And that of archery, as it destroys
everything errant and beastly, and gives control to discipline and refinement,
cleaves to unity and dissolves the disordered nature which is carried into
multiplicity. And as for music, through rhythm and harmony it instils a bond,
friendship, and unity in the universe, and everything opposite to these it removes» (transl. by Brian Duvick).
Page 10
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
One version of the myth (Pl., Euthd., 285c-d) says that Marsyas
was converted into a “wineskin”. This reference to Marsyas in
the Euthydemus (cf. also Smp. 215a) can be interpreted in terms of
the relationship between the ‘inner’ and the ‘outer’ man (cf. R.,
9, 589a). 1
When Marsyas is skinned, Apollo reveals the inner essence/
space of the satyr, which becomes filled up with divine inspiration. This corresponds to Dante’s interpretation of the myth in
his invocation to Apollo at the beginning of the Paradiso (1,13-21). 2
The allegorical interpretation explains the mythical figures as
tendencies that compete within the human soul; one is a titanic
descending tendency, which corresponds to ‘extreme division’ (at
the lowest level of the Dionysian manifestation and identified with
Dionysus’ opponents; cf. Olymp., in Phd., 1, 5, 10) and another is
a tendency towards the Heavens, the anagogic power of Apollonian music. Marsyas, in his confusion, identifies himself with the
negative tendency of egotism, but because he is a musician and
loves music, he can be saved by this love, if he recognizes that the
origin of music resides above/beyond the limited ego.
The context of the Apollonian maxim ‘know thyself’, which
invites the soul to pursue a path of self-transformation towards
the universal Self, together with the Platonic account of divine
inspiration, gives us a clue to examine in depth the meaning of
the myth. 3 Accordingly, the cruelty of the punishment of Marsyas
1
See Mary M. McCabe, Protean Socrates: Mythical Figures in the Euthydemus,
in Ancient Philosophy of the Self, edited by Pauliina Remes, Juha Sihvola, New
York, Springer, 2008, p. 109 π. (especially pp. 111 and 114). On the notion of
‘inner man’ in Platonism see Pauliina Remes, Inwardness and Infinity of Self:
From Plotinus to Augustine, in the same volume, p. 155 π.
2
The influence of this Platonic conception of ‘inspiration’ and ‘enthusiastic
music’ can also be seen in Neoplatonic Renaissance philosophers and artists
such as Marsilio Ficino, Pico della Mirandola, Raphael and Michelangelo. See
Robert Hollander, Marsyas as figura Dantis: Paradiso 1.20 (http://www.
princeton.edu/~dante/ebdsa/hollander042710.html; accessed August/2014).
Cf. Edgar Wind, Pagan Mysteries in the Renaissance, New Haven, Yale University Press, 1958, chapter The Flaying of Marsyas. Raphael situated his painting of
the musical contest between Apollo and Marsyas on the side of the representation of inspired poetry in the Stanza della Segnatura.
3
Cf. Plu., Mor., De E apud Delphos, 392A, where Plutarch interprets the ‘E’
carved on stone at the Temple of Apollo as meaning «Thou art», which is
the reply to the question about self-knowledge proposed by the God. Instead
of asserting the ‘ego’, the true answer is to identify oneself with the univer-
Page 11
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
should be understood in terms of one of the aspects of Apollo,
namely his destructive/transformative power, represented especially with the ‘arrow’ and the ‘sunray’ as having a kathartic/
cosmogonic influence over the world. What is it that is destroyed?
The false ego, its attachments and its illusions are destroyed, when
the passional ego-centric man is burned up and the ‘inner man’ is
liberated from the skin of the external man.
The name of Apollo means the negation of multiplicity, A-pollon [a = not; pollon = many]. 1 Apollo identified with the One,
corresponds to a mystical silence and hesychia (inner peace), where
duality and all oppositions are transcended. However, according
to Proclus, Apollo’s activity, is mainly manifested at a level in
which Unity has already been broken or polarized. Therefore, he
is a god of Music and Medicine, a god that produces the recovery of unity and harmonization within the realm of multiplicity.
Then, this aspect of non-multiplicity means concordia discors or
coincidentia oppositorum. Therefore the cohesive activity of Apollo is
double: 1) firstly, it is the re-integration related to a middle/intermediary stage or to a centre of unification (concentration towards
a hêgemonikon, or cosmic leading potency, residing at the Omphalos
= symbolized by the Sun, the musical note mesê as hêgemonikon of
the melody, and the Dorian scale as hesychastic); 2) secondly it supposes an ‘anagogic’ dimension, which corresponds to the vertical
ascent of the soul through levels (the harmony of the spheres) and
the axial unification of those multiple levels, thanks to the mediation of music. The lyre is Apollonian and represents the pure,
dry, luminous regions of ether and a spiritual harmonization of
duality. The inscription on the Tempietto delle Muse at the Palazzo
Ducale in Urbino, mentions the Kithara as the instrument proper
to the purest space of ether: «Whoever you are, be glad and pure
for the Muses and skilled on the lyre, for purity alone is here». 2
On the other hand, Marsyas’ aulos represents human and cosmic
sal source of the Self. Cf. Frederic M. Schroeder, The final metamorphosis,
narrative voice in the prologue of Apuleius’ Golden Ass, in Reading Ancient Texts:
Aristotle and Neoplatonism, edited by Suzannne Stern-Gillet, Kevin Corrigan,
Leiden, Brill, 2007.
1
Cf. Plot., 5, 5, 6; Plu., Mor., De E apud Delphos, 393C, 394A, 388F (cf. also
De Iside et Osiride, 381 and Clem. Al., Strom., 1, 164.
See Joscelyn Godwin, The Pagan Dream of the Renaissance, Grand Rapids,
mi, Phanes Press, 2002, chapter v: Private Microcosms.
Page 12
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
duality, because he plays a double-reed/double pipe instrument,
which, according to Aristides Quintilianus (2, 18, 90, 10 π.), corresponds to the element ‘air’ (or humid air) and the lowest humid
and obscure regions of the universe. 1
Neoplatonists, following the Orphic and Pythagorean tradition,
considered music as an essentially contemplative art and a vehicle
for returning to the celestial levels of reality, which are hidden
from the senses. In Platonism, there is also a contrast between
the philosopher and the sophist. The philosopher makes an eπort
to integrate harmoniously the faculties of perception and action
around the Intellect as intuitive and contemplative faculty. The
Sophists, on the contrary, were engaged in a search for power
within the visible world and at the same time claimed to be guides
of souls, but for Plato, they were mere politicians using psychagôgia, which is a kind of incantation that oπers false promises, – like
that of the Sirens –, especially connected to a materialistic/utilitarian view of the world.
The aulos is in a sense the instrument of that theatrical and political psychagôgia, which aims to flatter the popular majority in hopes
of gaining personal power, but not interested in real education
or guidance. This corresponds to the sophistic manipulation of
art, for the sake of the politicians’ own private profit, by oπering
panem et circenses.
1
Marsyas’ aulos, represents duality and water as the element of generation,
also identified with the horns of the Moon and the Zodiacal sign of Cancer,
from where the soul descends into the world. Accordingly, the aulos, corresponds to the descending cosmic direction (the path of the Sun from Cancer
to Capricorn). Capricorn corresponds to Kronos (or Saturn, representing the
Intellect, for Plotinus) and the feast of the Saturnalia represents a new life
for the soul and a hope of liberation in the ascending path of the Sun in the
year. The Gate of Cancer, corresponds to the octopus as enemy of the dolphin
(salvific animal sacred to Apollo, this symbolism can be seen in representations
of Apollo’s Tripod). The dolphin represents the direction towards the Gate of
Capricorn, and the laps in the chariot-races were marked by dolphin-counters
(and also egg lap counters symbolizing re-birth or Castor and Pollux) at the
Circus Maximus in Rome, which represent spiritual victories over the obstacles
in the interior path of the soul.
The Universe has two Gates (mentioned by Numenius, Porphyry, Proclus
and Macrobius) and the lyre/kithara has two ‘horns’ and they are successfully
unified by the mediation of harmony. Proclus (Chr., 320a Bekker) also refers
to diπerent etymologies of the word ‘dithyramb’ and one of them is related to
the cave where Dionysos was raised in Nysa, which had two doors (di = two
and thyra = door).
Page 13
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
The sophistic auletic appeals to the passions and in Platonism,
corresponds to ‘political’ bewilderment. That perplexity is a reflection of a wider, macrocosmic confusion, and for that reason the
music of the aulos symbolizes too, the cosmic ‘illusion’, proper to
the thorybos (Pl., Ti., 42c) that initially produced the passions of the
soul, represented with the image of a tumultuous/clamorous ‘sea’,
source of the materialistic approach to reality. For Proclus (in R.,
1, 17, 4 π.), the image of the sea is connected to the clamorous
and multiple way of life (thorubôdês kai poikilê zôê), also depicted
as representing the sophistic life of «multiple heads» (1, 17, 19),
in opposition to a pure region of ether where the soul founds the
inner contemplative peace of the philosophical life (1, 17, 22). 1 In
this context, the sound of the aulos is depicted as tumultuous and
noisy (noise, confusion = thorybos), in contrast to the sound of the
lyre, which is an instrument related to the ether and conducive to
inner peace.
The Sophists wanted to charm and bewilder their audiences by
auditory means, like the Sirens. In Plato’s Symposium (215b), Alcibiades says that Socrates, the Silenos, is an aulêtês like Marsyas,
but instead of using a musical instrument, he enchants his audience with auletic words. Certainly for the Platonists, there is a
great diπerence between Socrates and the Sophists, but they both
used similar methods. For Proclus (in Alc., 229-233), the diπerence
resides in the fact that Socrates can be compared to a Hermetic
guide who oπers true education. Socratic (and Platonic) education
is founded upon disinterested love (and a love for the inner man
and essence of Alcibiades, cf. Procl., in Alc., 25, 4; 37, 1; 108, 23;
157, 10 and 251, 12), while Sophistic flattery exploits the ambitions
and self-conceit of the ‘exterior’ Alcibiades, for reasons of self-interest.
Proclus emphasizes the fact that inner Hermetic education and
self-knowledge are connected to music and lyre playing (in Alc.,
195 π.). He also says that Socrates’ voice can be compared to the
1
In this passage, Proclus is commenting on the place/time setting of the
Republic: ascending from the Piraeus to Athens and between the Bendidea and
the Panathenaea festivals. The former has a Thracian character (the Thracian
Bendis) and is connected to the sea-port, while the latter represents for Proclus the life of the return towards the self and the Intellect, proper to Athena
(contemplative life).
Page 14
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
voice of the good genius that guides the soul of Alcibiades. Thus,
in this case, the powerful auditory enchantment of the voice can
be identified with divine inspiration, awakening noble aspirations
and leading to self-transformation. The Sophists are like magicians or illusionists (goêtai, cf. Pl., Sph., 234c-235a) and their magic
is connected to mimesis, because they are fake politicians and create
false imitations of truth (cf. also Plt., 303c).
Socrates is also a magician in this sense (goês), but he uses magic,
not to create error and illusion in the soul, but in order to purify
the soul of them and to put it in contact with the source of a higher ‘magic’ based upon the ‘sympathy’ of the whole cosmos, which
resides in Love, the cosmic Magician. This was a central notion
for Ficino, who followed Plato’s depiction of Eros as «magician,
wizard and sophist» (see Smp., 203d and Ficino’s commentary ad
loc.). The world is a work of love and a work of art (dêmiourgia
and diacosmêsis). Nevertheless, its beautiful harmony would have
the eπect of a magical or sophistic ‘illusion’ if it were not seen
in relation to its higher causes, as a creation of unifying Love (it
is ‘illusory’ because as a work of art has a derived nature). Love
is a sophist because his eloquent works of beauty ‘persuade’ us;
however this kind of ‘erotic magic’ is a liberating one. The Socratic task is to use the same loving energy to look at the veil of
illusions without being entangled in its ‘relative’ nature, by using
the magic of speech and music (and loving attraction) to make a
journey towards the ‘absolute’ and intangible source of harmony
through the ladder of reality (whose connection and continuity
is also created thanks to a√nity and attractive sympathy). The
Sophists are false guides in that task because they want to stay
entangled within the world of illusions, in their egotistic chase of
power and aggressive pursuit of control over others and over the
world.
Conversely, for the Platonists, the Muses, are goddesses who
really guide the souls in their ‘sea journey’. They defeated the
Sirens in a musical contest, and crowned their heads with the Sirens’ feathers (see Procl., in R., 2, 238, 21-239, 14). For this reason,
the Muses are able to transfer an ‘anagogic’ power to the living
energy present within the manifested world, represented with the
‘feathers’ and the ‘wings’, by re-directing the sensible manifestation towards the Apollonian spiritual centre of reality (because the
Page 15
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
Sirens also correspond to ‘musical notes or strings’ and audible
sound). 1
For the uneducated soul, an art that exploits and excites the
emotions with poikilia, using polychordic and polyharmonious instruments (cf. Pl., R., 399d) and modulating scales (an art for arts’
sake and employed for psychagôgia) does not play a positive role
within the educative and therapeutic path of the philosophical
life. 2 The rejection of the aulos by the goddess Athena means for
the Neoplatonists that it is not suited for philosophy, especially in
its educative and therapeutic stages.
This view portrays Marsyas’ music and the aulos in a negative
way and indicates the reasons for the rejection of the aulos in the
context of Platonic education. 3
Proclus and Olympiodorus, in their commentaries on the Alcibiades i (cf. Procl., in Alc., 197, 17 π. and Olymp., in Alc., 65, 20 π.,
especially 66, 9-10), justify the rejection of the aulos in the context
of an educational programme understood as a preparation of the
irrational part of the soul, especially with the assistance of music,
in order to make it again receptive to reason. The Neoplatonists
follow Aristotle in saying that the aulos prevents the employment
1
For the connection between Sirens and musical notes see Martin L.
West, Ancient Greek Music, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1992, p. 224 and
note 38, p. 234.
2
There is a negative sense of poikilia (‘variety’) manifested in a multiplicity
of perceptible qualities separated from a unifying principle. At the same time,
for the Neoplatonists, poikilia and sensible qualities are in fact connected to
their Intelligible paradigms (or Forms); for example, in Plotinus (6, 1, 6, 3-8),
poikilia corresponds also to the «richness and diversity of a world which is
none the less all one, held together in the unity of life» (A. Hilary Armstrong, Plotinus on the Origin and Place of Beauty in Thought about the World, in
Neoplatonism and Contemporary Thought: Part Two, edited by R. Baine Harris,
Albany, State University of New York Press, 2002, p. 220). The Intelligible
unity of life is manifested also at the level of the Dionysian immanent life, coordinated with the mediating and anagogic Apollonian spiritual power, which
re-connects everything with the transcendent principle of Unity around the
‘heart’ of the dismembered Dionysus. For this reason the denial of multiplicity
does not mean rejection of the manifested world and the beauty of its multiple
qualities, because those qualities depend on the overflow of the richness and
Poikilia of Intelligible life and its source in the First Principle as well.
3
See Pl., R., 399d-e, [Pl.], Alc. 1, 106e and Plu., Alc., 2, 5-7, where Alcibiades, as a schoolboy, chooses the lyra and rejects the aulos; Arist., Pol., 8,
1341a-1342b, and Aristides Quintilianus’ negative account of the aulos, in 2,
17-19. The episode concerning Alcibiades’ education is also mentioned in [Pl.],
Alc. 1, 106e, where kitharizein is preferred over auleîn.
Page 16
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
of logos (both speech and other manifestations of reason). 1 Proclus (in. Alc., 198, 1) says that the aulos, with its moving power
(kinêtikos) and is tumultuous quality (thorubôdês), is not suitable for
education and its aim of awakening the logos and leading the soul
from agitation to harmony and tranquility (hêsychia).
Aristotle criticizes Plato for making Socrates say that he accepts
the Phrygian scale but rejects the aulos, when both have the same
power over the soul. However, Proclus tries to reconcile Plato and
Aristotle and concludes that Socrates/Plato accepted the Phrygian
mode in the context of kathartic/ritual music (such as the dithyramb) and in the divine mysteries. 2 Even though the aulos is kinêtikós
– and therefore not suitable for an agitated soul that needs education –, that same dynamic power is suitable if the educated person
has become, for instance, a cold rationalist (identifying logos – or
dianoia – with the highest faculty and understanding science as the
only access to reality, accompanied by an externalized and utilitarian world-view), which is another form of egotism (more civilized).
In this case, the aulos and the Phrygian scale are recommendable as
enthusiastic remedies, used to stimulate the soul’s discursive reason
(dianoia) towards divine reality (Procl., in Alc., 198, 5-6).
Proclus follows Plato’s more positive view of Marsyas (the aulos
and Phrygian scale) in the Symposium, 215c, which reappears in the
[Platonic] Minos, 318b. According to Proclus, Plato is not a rationalist philosopher and for that reason he does not reject the Phrygian mode. The whole search/love for knowledge (philosophia)
involves a wider search/love for the transcendence of the Good
or the Absolute, which inspires «those who are in need of the
gods» ([Pl.], Min., 318b7). The passage in the Minos imitates the
Symposium, 215c5, where Alcibiades depicts the already mentioned
ecstatic eπect of Socrates’ speech, comparing Socrates’ voice with
Marsyas’ aulos. Plato uses the word katechesthai which means divine
possession in the context of enthousiasmos (Arist., Pol., 8, 1340a11
and 1342a7; cf. Procl., in R., 1, 61, 25).
True inner peace is Apollonian, but it is also Dionysian, because
1
Cf. Olymp., in Phd., 64b3-4 (3, 10, 1).
On Proclus’ reconciliation of Plato’s and Aristotle’s views on music see
Anne D. R. Sheppard, Studies on the 5th and 6th Essays of Proclus’ Commentary
on the Republic, Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1980 («Hypomnemata»,
61), p. 113 π.
Page 17
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
inspiration reaches the whole being of the soul with its immanent
life, making it necessary to reconnect all the derived multiplicity again with its transcendent/spiritual principles. Inspiration, as
Beethoven expressed in the Ninth Symphony (with the words of
Schiller’s Ode to Joy), is related to the intoxication of a spark of
divine fire (Feuertrunken), which being re-kindled, energizes the
whole soul in its ascent to the divine source «above the canopy
of stars». This particular harmonization of the Apollonian and the
Dionysian is an Orphic theme, of which Plato and the Neoplatonists were very much aware.
As we have seen, the immediacy of the sound of the aulos produces (like Socrates’ voice) an inspiration that in a sense transcends
reason. The aulos is a Barbarian/foreign, instrument, and when one
listens to a foreign language one might hear the sound but fail
to perceive its logos. This on the one hand, entails a danger: the
danger of what Plato calls the ‘barbarian mud’ in which the eye of
the soul is plunged (using an Orphic metaphor), which needs the
anagogic power (dialektikê methodos) of Apollonian self-knowledge,
philosophy and music, with the assistance of the hermetic sciences
(liberal arts) that rekindle and nourish the logos of the soul (cf. Pl.,
R., 533c-d). But on the other hand, there is another danger; that of
idolizing the relative and the self-divinization of human ‘reason’,
closed to the Apollonian transcendence and the Absolute.
As Iamblichus claims, the nomina barbara or ritual names of
the gods and utterances (voces mysticae), have a qualitative energy,
which depends on the vibratory nature of sound, and which is
lost if one translates them. 1 From this point of view, even Greek
philosophy is a ‘noise of discourses’, which can only achieve rational demonstrations. On the other hand, sacred, theurgic sounds
(phônai) accomplish an active transformation, which is deeper than
rationality (cf. Corp. Herm., 16, 2, 2). Iamblichus, as a Neo-Pythagorean, tries to harmonize the Apollonian and the Dionysian,
according to which, science, reason and knowledge have also a
spiritual/artistic counterpart. He rejects both the rationalism of
Aristotelianism and the sophistic abuse of reason (used to achieve
the sophist’s own egotistic aims).
See Iamb., Myst., 7, 5, 257-259, Orac. Chald., 150 and Gregory Shaw,
Theurgy and the Soul, the Neoplatonism of Iamblichus, University Park, pa, Pennsylvania State University Press, 1995, pp. 181-182.
Page 18
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
Neoplatonic philosophy is an application of accurate thought,
combined at the same time with an intuitive openness toward the
‘mysteric’ dimension of reality. In this context, the Neoplatonists
value the aulos and the dythiramb, if one orientates their energy
towards Apollonian ideals. There is an interior aspect of ignorance and confusion, which is barbarian in a negative sense = the
barbarian warriors whose hearts are softened and pacified when
they listen to the civilizing music of Orpheus’ Lyra:
«his playing and singing won over the Greeks, changed the
hearts of barbarians and tamed wild beasts» (Ps. Callisth., 1, 42, 6,
7 = Kern, test.144). 1
But ignorance can be civilized too, as when Plato connects the
pursuit of strength and power with mere brute force (even manifested in a more subtle way, as persuasion), proper to the sophistic/civilized way of life, which is based on the active pursuit of
political power. In Grg., 506b (cf. 489e), Plato compares Callicles,
the Sophist, with Zethus and Socrates, the philosopher, with Amphion. Callicles believes in the natural right of the stronger to seek
power and pleasure for themselves, while Socrates proposes the
Apollonian/philosophical path of self-examination. The comparison is based on the contrast between the twin legendary brothers:
the practical herdsman Zethus (active/strong athlete) against his
musical brother Amphion (contemplative/poet), whose music at
the end is stronger than the brute force of Zethus, because the
walls of the city/culture and civilization depend on the Lyre of
Amphion’s and its Cosmic model (seven strings/seven gates of
Thebes/the number 7 devoted to Apollo, seven planets, etc.).
The Neoplatonists presented a marriage between philosophical
method and the glimpse of inspiring wisdom that awakens the
interior life, which combines the immediacy of primordial sound
(essentially connected to the nature of the soul) and a re-directing
process (in a cyclical turn or epistrophê, both anagogic/ascending
and concentrating) that orientates the soul towards the source of
divine sound and Logos present in the depths of its heart.
In this scheme, the Apollonian is intermediary, both understood
as middle between the extremes and also as centre (within the
Quoted by William Keith Chambers Guthrie, Orpheus and Greek Religion: a study of the Orphic Movement, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1993,
Page 19
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
circle of manifestation): the omphalos of peace and cohesion represented in the cardinal centre of the musical melos (the Dorian/
hesychastic mode and the mesê string or note as hêgemonikon of the
melody).
The warmness of the ‘heart’ of Dionysian enthousiasmos and inspiration, present within the soul, needs, at the same time, the
re-awakening and re-orientation provided by the mediation of
Apollo’s art. For Proclus, the ‘hands’ of Apollo symbolize the mediation of skill, art and harmony (in Cra., 176, p. 101, 25). 1 Accordingly, the divine Lyra is a guiding/salvific companion that opens
the way of return for the soul symbolized by Orpheus (returning
not from the underworld to this world, but from this world to the
celestial/divine origin of the soul = Euridice). There is a scholium
on Virgil’s Aeneid, in connection to Orpheus’ attempt to recover
Euridice from the underworld that contains the following reference to the lyre and the kithara:
But some say that Orpheus’ lyre had seven strings corresponding to the
seven circles of heaven. Varro says there was an Orphic book about
summoning the soul, called the Lyre. It is said that souls need the cithara in order to ascend (transl. Martin L. West). 2
The Lyre is like the arrow of Apollo, the solar ray that pierces
1
This symbolism could be compared to that of the ‘solar’ spider (the lycosa tarantula, or wolf spider). In general the web of the spider and its centre
connected to the vibrations of the whole web, symbolizes the solar rays and
cosmic sympathy.
2
Cf. Martin L. West, The Orphic Poems, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1983,
p. 30 and Francisco Molina Moreno, Non-musical notes on the Orphic ‘Lyra’
(OF 417), in Tracing Orpheus. Studies of Orphic Fragments in honour of Alberto Bernabé, edited by Miguel Herrero de Jáuregui et alii, Berlin-Boston, de Gruyter,
2011, pp. 147-151. Molina Moreno interprets literally the myth of Orpheus, as
if it meant that Orpheus’ aim was only to help Euridice with his lyre-playing
in her return to the earth (as the place of the living). However, if the myth
has any sense at all, it should be interpreted allegorically, as the Neoplatonists
did, representing the ascent of the soul (soul = Euridice, cf. Boeth., Cons.
Phil., 3, 12), not to the surface of the earth, but to the higher, celestial levels of
being above the visible heaven. The rationalist interpretation presented by the
modern scholarly study of myth concludes that that kind of interpretation can
only be «Pythagorean and Platonic» but not Orphic (denying any allegorical/
metaphysical meaning to the Orphic myths). Nevertheless, the Pythagoreans
and Plato could be transmitting the genuine interpretation of the Orphic
mysteries, and scholars cannot establish the contrary, because of the unwritten
character of these mysteric doctrines.
Page 20
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
the soul’s confusion and humid obscurity and attaches it again
to the chord or string that makes possible the way out from the
Labyrinth (Ariadne’s thread). The Apollonian mediation is also
represented by means of animal symbolism: we can see that the
constellations of the Lyra, the Swan, the Arrow and the Dolphin,
all belong to the same region in the sky, near the Milky Way (the
Summer Triangle).
The dolphin, summoned by Arion’s kithara, saves him from the
sea of genesis and gives him the opportunity of spiritual re-birth.
The hyperborean swans carry the Muses in Martianus Capella depiction of the Harmony of the Spheres. These swan-chariots can
also be seen in the frontispiece of Practica Musicae by Franchino
Gaπurio, where Apollo appears with his lyre and the serpent Python (= monochord/string) at his feet. 1
The dolphin sacred to Apollo is the enemy of the sea-monster
(octopus or dragon). 2 The dolphin is also related to Delphi and
the inner peace proper to the Apollonian omphalos, and the direction towards the metaphysical centre of reality. On the contrary,
the descending path of the Sun (from the zodiacal Gate at Cancer)
represents the gradual attachment/seduction of the soul following
a descending tendency, towards the periphery of manifestation
and the watery realm of genesis, which corresponds to the serpent
Python.3 However, the Serpent can represent also the continuity
of reality and the substantial aspect of the vibration that maintains
the diπerent levels joined together (for that reason it is conquered
and subordinated to Apollo, the principle of Universal Harmony).
The winding neck of the swan has the same symbolic meaning,
and consequently the swan represents the serpentine vibration
1
This representation is studied by James Haar, The Frontispiece of Gafori’s
Practica Musicae (1496), «Renaissance Quarterly», xxvii, 1, 1974, pp. 7-22 and
Edgar Wind, Pagan Mysteries in the Renaissance, cit., pp. 46-47, 50, 112-113. We
know that Gafori had read the Timaeus and Ficino’s Commentary on this dialogue. Cf. Gary Tomlinson, Music in Renaissance Magic, Chicago, University
of Chicago Press, 1993, p. 89.
2
The aulos is connected to the moon, the watery regions and Cancer is the
astrological house of the Moon; while the lyre is connected to the dolphin
(Capricorn), the swan, and to the path of the souls in the Milky Way.
3
In diπerent cultures, such as Hinduism, the positive aspect of the female
serpent, representing the energy of Life or the Śakti is more clearly stated. See
Alain Daniélou, The Myths and Gods of India, Rochester, Inner Traditions,
1991, p. 253. The Greek view presents a dualistic conception where the serpent
almost always appears as a negative principle or dragon.
Page 21
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
that connects diπerent separated levels, and in its close connection
with the harp or the lyre, the swan becomes a ship or a vehicle.
Both the swan and the swimming dolphin are animals that represent the salvific power of the Hyperborean Apollo.
The lyre and the harp are instruments connected to aquatic
birds (the swan, intermediary but unaπected, sliding serenely on
the surface of the waters) between the two worlds. The swan-lyre
represents the Universal Logos/Pneuma and also the Luminous
Ether, manifested at an intermediary-subtle world, between gross
material manifestation and spiritual higher levels.
The music of the Apollonian lyre is therefore a vehicle that
carries the soul, like a ship in the water, a swimming or flying
swan1 or like the dolphin that saves Arion (Hdt., 1, 23, 24), who
asks the help of the dolphin playing the Orthios Nomos, and sings
like a swan (Plu., Mor., Sept.Sap.Conv., 161B-162B) at the stern
of the ship.2 The dolphin saves Arion from the watery level of
1
Cf. the swan-boat of Wagner’s Lohengrin or the swan-boat of Galadriel
(and Eärendil) in Tolkien’s Lord of Rings. Musical instruments can include animal symbolism in their forms or represent a vehicle or vessel, like the lyres of
Ur, for example. Although I am not aware of any Greek or Roman instrument
designed with the shape of a vehicle, it is relevant to notice that lyres and
harps sometimes carry representations of birds, especially Apolline swans (see
e.g. the Cycladic statuette at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, n.
47.100.1). Apollo’s or Venus’ chariot pulled by swans can be connected to this
symbolism. Cf. Mart. Cap., De Nupt., 1, 27-29, pp. 19-20 Dick, where swans
carry the Muses to their place in the planetary scale of the harmony of the
spheres.
2
All these aspects correspond to a music dedicated to Apollo; as Proclus
says, the nomos is a calm and orderly composition proper to the Apollonian
manner. Procl., Chr., 320b12-30 (Bekker) quoted in Thomas J. Mathiesen,
Apollos’ Lyre, Greek Music and Music Theory in Antiquity and the Middle Ages,
Lincoln, ne, University of Nebraska Press, 1999, p. 62 (cf. p. 65 on the orthios
nomos). It is interesting to notice that Arion, is credited to be the inventor
of the Dithyramb, especially designed as a choral, cyclic, dance-song (Procl.,
Chr., 320a25-33 and 320b12-15 and 21-23). Cf. Thomas J. Mathiesen, Apollos’
Lyre, Greek Music and Music Theory in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, cit., pp. 7475. Plato alludes to the story of Arion in R., 453d, where Socrates says: «Then
we, too, must swim and try to escape out of the sea of argument in the hope
that either some dolphin will take us on its back or some other desperate rescue» (transl. Paul Shorey, Plato. The Republic, with an English translation by
P. S., London, i, Heinemann-Cambridge (Mass.), Harvard University Press,
1946, («The Loeb Classical Library»)). The «sea of argument» is proper to the
Sophists’ way of arguing, more interested in charming the soul with egotistic
arguments that in finding the common truth (cf. Pl., Prt., 338a).
Page 22
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
existence and the troubles derived from his pursuit of material
wealth (making money with his art and attachment to goods =
khrêmata). He arrives at Taenarum (a place connected with the
myth of Orpheus) and is reborn and saved from the tumult/
noise (thorybos) of the sea of manifestation (cycle of generation)
and the reality which become separated from its ordering/harmonizing causes.
As we have seen, Marsyas can represent the confusion of the
divided and material world, whose ego is inflated with the humid air of vanity. But one can use that same continuous energy
of the music of Marsyas and the immediacy of sound (proper to
the aulos) and subordinate it to the lyre and the divine models of
harmony, who belong to the Intellect and the Intelligible world,
where Apollo and the Muses create their celestial music.
Apollonian and Hermetic arts or disciplines (including lyre-playing, connected to both gods: Apollo and Hermes) are the vehicles
for inspiration and the corresponding transformation of the person. The visual and sonorous symbols and images of art, which
correspond to the intermediary faculty of imagination (phantasia)
are not mere imitations, or should not be, if they intend to free
the soul from the illusory aspect of those images and copies.
Consequently, the allegorical interpretation of art has the aim
of stirring within the soul the aspiration to look for a deeper
meaning hidden in the various visible-audible manifestations, now
understood according to their enigmatic value. Imitation maintains
the human soul within the boundaries of the perceptible world,
while the inspired art of Apollo and the Muses is depicted in the
following terms by Proclus:
The higher kind of life corresponds to this [higher] kind of music and
Plato separates it from poetics, because poetics is proper to imitation,
and this kind of music cannot follow an imitative life staying at this
level with copies; but music prefers to snatch itself out (anharpazein) of
copies in order to ascend towards the divine models of harmony and
rhythm for all in this world (in R., 1, 60, 6-13). 1
Other kinds of music are also imitative, such as the auletic Pythian Nomos. In order to ascend from copies to the divine models,
1
My translation following Proclus. Commentaire sur la République, traduction
et notes par André Marie Jean Festugière, i, Paris, Librairie Philosophique J.
Vrin, 1970 («Bibliothèque des textes philosophiques»), p. 77.
Page 23
View in PDF(opens in a new window)lyra and aulos
the soul must follow an educative and therapeutic programme, in
which the music of the kithara and the lyra dedicated to Apollo
and Hermes have a predominant role. As we have seen, in Proclus’ Commentary on the First Alcibiades, Hermes plays the role of
the good genius and guide of souls. Socrates also plays this role
and helps Alcibiades to find the real inner man, the true self, in
contrast to the terrestrial man. In this context, Socrates, who
himself looks like Marsyas (as Alcibiades says in the Symposium),
is the one who reveals the illusory character of the sophistic life
and the political pursuit of external materialistic values, as a false
path for the soul of Alcibiades. In this light, Socrates, represents
the ‘protreptic’ value of Platonic philosophy and music, expressed
in his concern that Alcibiades should turn towards the inner spiritual values instead of political ambition. In Plato’s Symposium, two
mythological characters represent the value of the interior life:
Silenus and Marsyas (Marsyas is depicted sometimes as a Satyr,
sometimes as a Silenus). Alcibiades compared Socrates to a Silenus
who has an interior full of beautiful images of Hermes and other
gods. This corresponds to the more positive interpretation of the
myth of the opposition between Marsyas and Apollo. As we have
argued earlier in the text, Marsyas represents the possibility of
emptying oneself from all vanities and becoming a clear receptacle of divine inspiration and celestial light, represented with wine
(Plato’s Euthydemus) or with the clear waters of the river into
which Marsyas was transformed in other versions of the myth,
while abandoning the exterior self (the skin).
The wine represents Dionysian life, inspiration and enthusiasm.
But since Marsyas is defeated by Apollo, the Dionysian aspect is
put into coordination with the Apollonian, which is the transcendent source of inspiration for the poet.
In his Commentary on the Alcibiades, after stating that the soul is
like a musical instrument, the lyre invented by Hermes, Proclus
goes on to explain what he calls the Hermetic (Hermaic) disciplines, which comprise gymnastics, music, and the mathematical
sciences and dialectics as the last stage of the educative process:
The mathematical sciences and dialectics awake and elevate our reason;
for the eye of the soul, which is asleep and obstructed, because of many
other occupations, under the influence of them is re-ignited and returns
towards itself and to self-knowledge. With these sciences our logos is
Page 24
View in PDF(opens in a new window)sebastian f. moro tornese
nourished and through them ascends towards the Intellect, as Socrates
says here. (Procl., in Alc., 195-196). 1
Apollonian music in coordination with philosophy represents the
crowning stage of music, art and science in the Neoplatonic view
of education:
We say that philosophy is the highest mousikê, as if you wanted to call
that music that is most uplifting with love (erôtikôtatê) the ‘science of
love’ (erôtikê). This music harmonizes not a lyre, but the soul itself,
with the most beautiful of all harmonies (La., 188d3), through which
the soul is able to put in order (kosmein) all human things and celebrate
the divine in a perfect way, imitating the Musagetes, who on one side
celebrates his Father with intellective hymns and on the other keeps
the whole world together (synechei) with indissoluble bonds, ‘moving
together’ all things, as Socrates says in the Cratylus (405c6). 2
The mind, disciplined with the Liberal Arts, does not stay attached to the surface of the visible images and sounds, but tries
to find a meaning behind them (hyponoia). This can be particularly
noticed in the design of the Palazzo Ducale in Urbino and especially of the Studiolo of Duke Federico da Montefeltro (which can
be compared also to the twin Studiolo in the palace of Gubbio).
These spaces, together with the Tempietto of the Muses represent
the Renaissance ideal of integral education based on the Liberal
Arts and Platonic Philosophy, with its intellectual richness and its
openness to inspiration.
1
My translation based on Proclus. Sur le premier Alcibiade de Platon, texte
établi et traduit par Alain-Philippe Segonds, Paris, Les belles lettres, 1985-1986.
2
The most beautiful of harmonies mentioned here corresponds to the
Dorian mode, the mode of the hesychia of the soul who has found the centre
or Apollonian omphalos of reality. Proclus (in Ti., 2, 234, 1) also says that the
World of the Soul is according to Plato’s Timaeus tuned to the Dorian scale
and its peculiar nature and power is represented with the interval between the
paramesê and mesê of the cosmic scale.
Page 25
View in PDF(opens in a new window)c omp o s to in ca ra ttere serra gar am ond d al l a
f abrizio serra editore, pis a · r oma.
impresso e rilega t o d al l a
ti pogra fia di a gn a n o, a gn ano pis ano (pis a).
*
Marzo 2016
(cz2/fg13)
Tutte le riviste Online e le pubblicazioni delle nostre case editrici
(riviste, collane, varia, ecc.) possono essere ricercate bibliograficamente e richieste
(sottoscrizioni di abbonamenti, ordini di volumi, ecc.) presso il sito Internet:
www.libraweb.net
Per ricevere, tramite E-mail, periodicamente, la nostra newsletter/alert con l’elenco
delle novità e delle opere in preparazione, Vi invitiamo a sottoscriverla presso il nostro sito
Internet o a trasmettere i Vostri dati (Nominativo e indirizzo E-mail) all’indirizzo:
newsletter@libraweb.net
*
Computerized search operations allow bibliographical retrieval of the Publishers’ works
(Online journals, journals subscriptions, orders for individual issues, series, books, etc.)
through the Internet website:
www.libraweb.net
If you wish to receive, by E-mail, our newsletter/alert with periodic information
on the list of new and forthcoming publications, you are kindly invited to subscribe it at our
web-site or to send your details (Name and E-mail address) to the following address:
newsletter@libraweb.net