Heracletus

Statue of Heracletus. Handmade of alabaster,and painted in museum patina.

Heracletus of Ephesus (l. c. 500 BCE) was one of the early Pre-Socratic philosophers who, like the others, sought to identify the First Cause for the creation of the world. Thales of Miletus (l. c. 585 BCE) claimed this cause was water while his student Anaximander (l. c. 610-546 BCE) concluded it was a cosmic force he called the apeiron (a boundless, infinite creative energy). Heraclitus rejected these suggestions in favor of fire as both a creative and transformative element. Along with the other Pre-Socratic philosophers, Heraclitus’ concept would eventually influence the works of Plato (l. 428/427-348-347 BCE) and Aristotle (l. 384-322 BCE) which lay the foundation of Western philosophy.

HIS PHILOSOPHY

Heraclitus was known to his contemporaries as the ‘dark’ philosopher, so-called because his writings were so difficult to understand. Seeming to hold the common understanding of the nature of life and the purpose of human life in contempt .  In fact, he seems to have regarded most of the human beings he came in contact with. Heraclitus compared most people’s understanding to that of those asleep. To Heraclitus, only the philosopher, the one who pursued Truth, was fully awake and fully alive .  And he seemed to consider himself the only philosopher of his time.

His central claim is summed up in the phrase Panta Rhei (“life is flux”) recognizing the essential, underlying essence of life as change. Nothing in life is permanent, nor can it be, because the very nature of existence is change. Change is not just a part of life in Heraclitus’ view, it is life itself. All things, he claimed, are brought into and pass out of existence through a clash of opposites which continually create and destroy. He is said to have severely criticized those who lamented strife and war because both, he claimed, were instrumental in transformation.

HIS DEATH

Heraclitus is said to have died either by suicide, because he could no longer bear living among others whom he felt were his inferiors, or in an attempt to cure himself of a disease he was suffering from. Based upon what others later wrote of him, either could be true but it is generally accepted that he died while attempting to cure himself as he placed no trust in doctors nor, it seems, in anyone but himself.