In the past it was often necessary to keep certain things concealed to avoid persecution and censorship. That is no longer as much of a problem, but if we are to read and understand these works it is necessary to read between the lines and make connections. We no longer have to worry about explicit discussions of atheism or nihilism either, at least in most communities. The cat is out of the bag.

Are there still reasons to write or speak esoterically? Perhaps, but in my interpretive practice I do just the opposite. I attempt to bring things into the light.

I'm not entirely sure what point you're making.

Hey, I'm just a simple minded skeptic. I often think that many of the stories human tell each other (especially in the realm of meaning) are just narratives to fill the time and make us feel better.

To sum things up, I damn well want my parents, my teachers, etc., and the philosophers I read to be better than me in terms of what they have, or had, to teach. And they ought to confidently known this before attempting to impart lessons to me. But if any were to think of me as an inferior in terms of the value of my life, they could then stick it where the sun don’t shine as far as I care. — javra

So this isn't a frame I use. If I am assessing someone as 'better than me' then we run into the problem that it is my assessment that has determined this judgment. How can I reliably judge who I should listen to or read? How can I identify, from a foundational bedrock of inadequacy, that which is better than me? This is probably going to come down to how someone impacts me emotionally and whether their style captures my imagination.

But my concern is simply with the old trope - "I have a secret that the ordinary pissants don't know about.' Having kicked around in Theosophy circles for some years I know that genre of person well and how they disparage the average person for their 'crass materialist consumerism' yet all the while they are obsessed with material things, status, and are subject to all the same issues of substance abuse, relationship breakdowns and petty rivalries. In other words, they are just crass materialist consumers - just another pissant with a little secret...

In the past it was often necessary to keep certain things concealed to avoid persecution and censorship. That is no longer as much of a problem, but if we are to read and understand these works it is necessary to read between the lines and make connections. We no longer have to worry about explicit discussions of atheism or nihilism either, at least in most communities. The cat is out of the bag.

Are there still reasons to write or speak esoterically? Perhaps, but in my interpretive practice I do just the opposite. I attempt to bring things into the light. — Fooloso4

Wow, that's the basis for a massive conversation right there. Thanks. This is probably not the right place.

But just quickly: can you sketch how ones read between the lines? I've read some of what you have written about Plato - in what sense can this (between the lines) be applied to his understanding of the good, for instance? You seem to prefer a secular reading. Is that a modern cultural reading, or are you making some additional judgements?

'Esoteric' is not a school of thought or a philosophy in its own right. Many different philosophical traditions have esoteric schools, be they Buddhist, Platonist, Christian, or Vedanta. The dictionary definiton of 'esoteric' is 'intended for or likely to be understood by only a small number of people with a specialized knowledge or interest.' It applies to other disciplines as well, like mathematical physics and other specialised subjects, although what is spiritually esoteric includes an existential dimension that may be absent from them (although as is well-known Einstein and many of the first-gen quantum physicists had their mystical side.) It might be a ‘religious’ dimension, but at issue in that categorisation, and of special relevance in this topic, is what religious means. Spinoza, for instance, being discussed in another thread, is claimed as one of the founders as secular culture, but he’s also been described as ‘God intoxicated’ (as was Krishnamurti after the legendary encounter under the tree in his first visit to Ojai.)

I'm reading a very hard-to-find textbook, Thinking Being, by Eric D Perl, 'metaphysics in the classical tradition'. The whole point of the book is 'the identity of thought and being'. He starts with Parmenides, then Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus and Aquinas, and claims to be explicating a common theme found in all of them. But it occurs to me that it's not at all clear what 'thought' means in this context. I'm sure it doesn't mean the ordinary 'stream of consciousness' that occupies our mental life from moment to moment - what we generally understand by ‘thought’ It’s much nearer in meaning to the Sanskrit 'citta' which is translated 'mind', 'heart', or 'being', depending on the context. Perhaps it’s nearer in meaning to the idea that ‘the thought of the world is the world’.

Speaking of Krishnamurti (and of esoteric teachings), here is a characteristic remark:

What is the basic reason for thought to be fragmented?

What is the substance of thought? Is it a material process, a chemical process?

There is a total perception, which is truth. That perception acts in the field of reality. That action is not the product of thought.

Thought has no place when there is total perception.

Thought never acknowledges to itself that it is mechanical.

Total perception can only exist when the centre is not. — J Krishnamurti

Now, I would contend that what is referred to as ‘’thought’ in Perl’s ‘Thinking Being’, and what Parmenides means by ‘thought’, is exactly what K. means by ‘total perception’. It is an insight into the whole of existence. Not a scientific insight, obviously, as scientific knowledge of reality far, far exceeds what any one individual may know or comprehend. Rather it is the ‘unitive vision’ of both mysticism and philosophy. Krishnamurti often refers to an insight which acts ‘at a glance’, as it were (I think a term for this is ‘aperçu’.) It is distinct from deliberation or a gradual process of disclosure, but a sudden insight which reveals a hitherto unseen vista, like a lightning bolt (that being one of the seminal images of Tantra.) ‘When the centre is not’ means what is seen when all sense of ‘I am seeing this’ is in abeyance.

And I think that insight shows that what we take to be thought, and what we take to be reality, are themselves states of misunderstanding (avidyā) - which modern culture takes as normality. So, it is to be expected that very few see it.

Which is what makes it ‘esoteric’.

'Esoteric' is [ ... ] an insight into the whole of existence — Wayfarer

This "insight" is partial because existents are only part(icular)s of – ineluctably encompassed by – existence and is, therefore, only "a glance" of an illusion of "the whole". However much a lightning flash momentarily illuminates in the night, the enveloping darkness – the unknown unknown – always remains; an existential reminder that one always already knows that one cannot know ultimately (e.g. Socrates, Pyrrho, Epicurus, Montaigne, Spinoza, Hume-Kant-Wittgenstein ...), which is why philosophy, consisting of questions we do not know (yet) how to answer, always only begins. Btw, Wayf, I don't think it's helpful to further conflate, or confuse, philosophy with mysticism (or with woo :sparkle:) as @Jack Cummins' OP suggests.

The idea of known unknowns from Socrates to Wittgenstein may be seen as a form of mysticism. The danger of 'woo' may be more connected with concrete thinking, especially in organised religious movements. For example, the esoteric tradition of Gnosticism looked at a more symbolic way of thinking than taught within mainstream Christian thinking.

The whole area of metaphorical thinking is so wide and expansive, as is speculation. It may be why some people are put off philosophy entirely. I have come across a few people who began studying philosophy and changed courses because they preferred facts. Of course, it may not come down to the esoteric, or hidden; because the outer aspects of 'reality' and life dramas are important. It may be about different layers of meaning and interpretation in thinking.

But just quickly: can you sketch how ones read between the lines? I've read some of what you have written about Plato - in what sense can this (between the lines) be applied to his understanding of the good, for instance? — Tom Storm

One does it by the example of others and practice. In the Phaedrus Socrates says:

... every speech must be constructed just like a living creature with a body of its own, so that it is neither headless nor footless; instead it should be written possessing middle and extremities suited to one another and to the whole.

(264c)

Plato is telling us how to read him. His dialogues are like living creatures. Each part has a function and plays a role within the whole. He is to be read accordingly. As with a living creature, it moves. There are no fixed doctrines in Plato. The movement is dialectical. From hypothesis to hypothesis. "Stepping stones and springboards (Republic 511b). The Forms are these hypotheses.(Phaedo 105c)

But as any reader off the Republic knows the Forms are presented as the fixed unchanging truth. Clearly, we have not arrived at the truth. And that, odd as it may seem, is the key. Socrates, who tells this story of transcendent knowledge, does not know. His human wisdom is his knowledge of ignorance.

in what sense can this (between the lines) be applied to his understanding of the good, for instance? — Tom Storm

Quick answer, the Good cannot be known. The best we can do is determine what through inquiry and examination seems best to us while remaining open to the fact that we do not know.

Not so quick answer:

Socrates Argument For Why the Good Cannot Be Known

The argument is not easily seen because it stretches over three books of the Republic, as if Plato wanted only those who are sufficiently attentive to see it.

I begin by collecting the releverent statements. Bloom translation.

"So, do we have an adequate grasp of the fact—even if we should consider it in many ways—that what is entirely, is entirely knowable; and what in no way is, is in every way unknowable?" (477a)

"Knowledge is presumably dependent on what is, to know of what is that it is and how it is?"
"Yes."
"While opinion, we say, opines." (478a)

"If what is, is knowable, then wouldn't something other than that which is be opinable?" (478b)

"To that which is not, we were compelled to assign ignorance, and to that which is, knowledge."

"Opinion, therefore, opines neither that which is nor that which is not." (478c)

“... although the good isn't being but is still beyond being, exceeding it in dignity (age) and power."(509b)

"You," I said, "are responsible for compelling me to tell my opinions about it." (509c)

“... in applying the going up and the seeing of what's above to the soul's journey up to the intelligible place, you'll not mistake my expectation, since you desire to hear it. A god doubtless knows if it happens to be true. At all events, this is the way the phenomena look to me: in the knowable the last thing to be seen, and that with considerable effort, is the idea of the good …” (517b-c)

He makes a threefold distinction -

Being or what is
Something other than that which is
What is not

And corresponding to them

Knowledge
Opinion
Ignorance


The middle term is somewhat ambiguous. What is not is something other than that which is, but to what is not he assigns ignorance. Opinion opines neither what is nor what is not. Between what is entirely, the beings or Forms, and what is not, is becoming, that is, the visible world. Opinion opines about the visible world. But the good is beyond being. It is the cause of being, the cause of what is. It too is something other than what is and what is not.

What is entirely is entirely knowable. The good, being beyond being, is not something that is entirely. The good is then not entirely knowable. As if to confirm this Socrates says that he is giving his opinions about the good, but that what is knowable and unknowable is a matter of fact. As to the soul’s journey to the intelligible and the sight of the idea of the good, he says that a god knows if it happens to be true, but this is how it looks to him. He plays on the meaning of the cognate terms idea and look, which can be translated as Form. A god knows if it “happens to be true” but we are not gods, and what may happen to be true might also happen to be false.

The quote at 517 continues:

"… but once seen, it must be concluded that this is in fact the cause of all that is right and fair in everything—in the visible it gave birth to light and its sovereign; in the intelligible, itself sovereign, it provided truth and intelligence —and that the man who is going to act prudently in private or in public must see it." (517c)

But it is not seen, for it is not something that is and thus not something knowable, and so no conclusion must follow. In order to act prudently, he says, one must see the good itself. Whether one is acting prudently then, remains an open question. The examined life remains the primary, continuous way of life of the Socratic philosopher. A way of life that rejects the complacency and false piety of believing one knows the divine answers.

Btw, Wayf, I don't think it's helpful to further conflate, or confuse, philosophy with mysticism (or with woo :sparkle:) — 180 Proof

Truths is knowledge which is usually hidden away from us according to ancient Greek philosophers.
Truth in Greek is Altheia, i.e. something to be revealed from what is hidden.

Hence truths require verification and proof in philosophy. What is obvious and apparent in daily perception are not qualified as truths. In that sense, isn't mysticism usually related to religious sense? You wouldn't say that a sceptic and mystic are the folks whose beliefs are the same kind.

The idea of initiation does seem essential to many forms of esoteric thinking, including both secret societies, like the Freemasons, as well as theosophy. The tradition which I am most familiar with is theosophy, especially the ideas of Blavatsky and Alice Bailey. These were also developed in a different direction by Benjamin Creme.

I spent some time reading Creme's writings, which were also about initiation through personal evolution through many lives. He also spoke of the coming of Maitreya, who was supposed to 'emerge' from the East End of London until Creme died in the middle of the last decade. Creme took many ideas literally, including the belief in a hierarchy of invisible Masters.

I did consider his literal perspective, but do wonder if a more symbolic interpretation is more useful, such as Rudolf Steiner's, idea of the cosmic Christ, rather than Maitreya as a specific person. However, I have attended transmission meditation workshops by Share international, the group founded by Creme and have found it the most helpful of all meditation practices. One idea, which I found interesting too was Creme's controversial suggestion that Jesus was only the Christ during his ministry, and he also saw parallels between Jesus as Christ and the Buddha. I believe that the Theosophical Society rejected the ideas of Creme but Share international continues on after Creme's death.

εξωτερικός: that is outward, so as to be in contact with the space beyond the object
εσωτερικός: that lies inwards.

Aristotle works are divided into esoteric (or acroamatic) and exoteric (page 5). For much of the Ancient Age, the known works of Aristotle were the exoteric works, and the esoteric were only known by some inner circles. Today it is almost the reverse, as the exoteric works have been mostly lost.
Make of that what you will.

Tom, I doubt that you deem your views to be on a par in value to those views you vehemently disagree with and thereby are averse to. — javra

It feels to me as if people in the past had some modicum of honour. It was possible to respect, and even love, those that wanted you dead, because you also wanted them dead, so it was that history pitted us against each other. Or maybe I am romanticising the epics of the past.

That is no longer as much of a problem — Fooloso4

That statement is more about you than it is about the politics of our times.

I'm not entirely sure what point you're making. — Tom Storm

I’ll give it one last go: We all appraise ourselves as being better than some others in some respect, including that of comprehending something which these others seem hindered in grasping; but this does not entail that we thereby deem these others’ lives as being of lesser worth to our own or else in any way beneath us. This lack of entailment will then likewise apply to those philosophers - previously quoted - who have grasped something which the average man has not; something which is thereby esoteric to the masses. Hence, that a person A deems themselves better than person B in some respect doesn’t then necessitate that A finds themselves to be superior relative to B (such that B is then deemed inferior to A by A). In short, being “better than” does not entail being “superior to”. And we often want others to be better than us - this while likewise wanting that they not put themselves above us. Socrates, for example, was better than the masses in many respects but this does not then mean that Socrates found himself to be superior to the masses. The manner of his attested to death speaks to this. And, in for example addressing the Forms, Socrates had a lot of esoteric knowledge which he did his best to impart: by all appearances, he comprehended things which the average man was hindered in grasping.

So, yes, some philosophers are better than us in knowing things which we do not - things we have a hard time in grasping - but this betterness does not then necessitate they they're pricks which deem us as being beneath them.

Between what is entirely, the beings or Forms, and what is not, is becoming, that is, the visible world. Opinion opines about the visible world. But the good is beyond being. It is the cause of being, the cause of what is. It too is something other than what is and what is not. — Fooloso4

Can you expand on this? It so far seems to me to be contradictory: From my understanding, the Form of the Good is supposedly the most real of all givens that are or could be. As such, irrespective of how difficult the Form of the Good might be to know, the Form of the Good necessarily is and, hence, necessarily holds being (although of course not of a physical kind). This seems to me in part evidenced by your previous statement:

But as any reader off the Republic knows the Forms are presented as the fixed unchanging truth. — Fooloso4

It feels to me as if people in the past had some modicum of honour. It was possible to respect, and even love, those that wanted you dead, because you also wanted them dead, so it was that history pitted us against each other. Or maybe I am romanticising the epics of the past. — Lionino

Hard to say how much truth there is to its scenes of battle, but I greatly liked, and still greatly like, Homer's Iliad on this very count.

That is no longer as much of a problem
— Fooloso4

That statement is more about you than it is about the politics of our times. — Lionino

What topics or issues do you think should still be kept secret?

Is there an inner circle today?

Is the contemporary esoteric teachings to be found within the exoteric or separate written or oral teachings? Or do you think it is not to be found in what is said but in some experience most of us do not experience?

With regard to the course handout: The "Verstehen approach" is a caricature. A set of claims that neither Strauss nor his more capable students would support. They do not regard any of the philosophers they read as infallible. While they are careful not to use anachronistic terminology, it is not that we cannot put the works into our own terms. We cannot do otherwise. We do not speak or write in ancient Greek. We should, however, be careful not to rely on terminology that is conceptually foreign to the author. The facts are that language changes over time and that philosophers often use terms in ways that are different from more common usage even in the same language in the same period of time.

What topics or issues do you think should still be kept secret?

Is there an inner circle today? — Fooloso4

I don't think any topic should be kept a secret, though some topics are a secret¹, it is a matter of us admitting that some are not accessible to us.

1 – How it is like to be a bat.

But my comment did not refer to that. Speaking of certain topics does result in persecution and censorship today.

From my understanding, the Form of the Good is supposedly the most real of all givens that are or could be. As such, irrespective of how difficult the Form of the Good might be to know, the Form of the Good necessarily is and, hence, necessarily holds being (although of course not of a physical kind). — javra

If there is a Form of the Good but we do not know what the Good is, what can we say about it that we know to be true? It is not that it is difficult to know but that if only what is entirely is entirely knowable and the Good is beyond being, beyond what is, then it cannot be known.

This seems to me in part evidenced by your previous statement:

But as any reader off the Republic knows the Forms are presented as the fixed unchanging truth.
— Fooloso4 — javra

As it is presented by Socrates is not the same as what is true. As he says:

A god doubtless knows if it happens to be true. At all events, this is the way the phenomena look to me. — Fooloso4

There is a play on words here. The Greek term eidos, means and can be translated as 'look'. But since he is ignorant he does not see the Forms themselves. How it looks to him is how it seems to him it must be if there is to be knowledge.

Hard to say how much truth there is to its scenes of battle, but I greatly liked, and still greatly like, Homer's Iliad on this very count. — javra

Plato's Timaeus begins with Socrates wanting to see the city he creates in the Republic at war. He wants to see the city in action. The fixed intelligible world, the world of Forms, is not the whole of the story. The Forms are part of a whole that is indeterminate, a whole in which there is contingency and chance.

Speaking of certain topics does result in persecution and censorship today. — Lionino

You are right. My statement was qualified:

We no longer have to worry about explicit discussions of atheism or nihilism either, at least in most communities. The cat is out of the bag. — Fooloso4

This does not mean that persecution and censorship does not exist, but the ideas that philosophers in the past thought they needed to hide are now spoken of openly. If not everywhere, at least in places where free speech is valued and practiced.

If there is a Form of the Good but we do not know what the Good is, what can we say about it that we know to be true? It is not that it is difficult to know but that if only what is entirely is entirely knowable and the Good is beyond being, beyond what is, then it cannot be known. — Fooloso4

That A cannot know what X is does not imply that A cannot know of X's occurrence and of certain properties by which X is delineated.

By analogy, we know that no one knows what takes place within a gravitational singularity and, hence, of what a gravitational singularity thereby in this sense is. Despite this, we do know via inference that gravitational singularities occur - with one such occurring in the center of the Milky Way - and likewise know of certain properties by which they are delineated (e.g., black hole event horizons that lead toward the black hole's gravitational singularity wherein all notions of spacetime break down). A gravitational singularity of itself is thereby an entirety which is not entirely knowable.

Suppose Socrates/Plato in fact had no inferential knowledge of the Good's occurrence as Form (which is other than having knowledge, of any type, regarding what the Good is as Form). Do you then take all of Socrates/Plato's accounts (dialogues) regarding the Form of the Good to be entirely BS (if not outright deceptions)?

As to the Good being beyond being, while I don't speak Greek, much less Ancient Greek, there seems to be something lost in translation. For example, when appraised via modern English, in claiming that "the Good is beyond space and time" the Good is nevertheless postulated to be (although this not in any manner requiring any type of distance or duration).

This latter aspect, however, might just remain a matter of disagreement. But if you can evidence to the contrary, I'd be interested in the evidence you'd have to present.

That A cannot know what X is does not imply that A cannot know of X's occurrence and of certain properties by which X is delineated. — javra

Socrates makes the distinction between things that we say are just or beautiful or good and the just or beautiful or good itself. Without knowledge of the thing itself we remain in the world of disputed opinion.

As to the Good being beyond being, while I don't speak Greek, much less Ancient Greek, there seems to be something lost in translation. — javra

In the Republic Socrates says that the Good: "provides the truth to the things known and gives the power to the one who knows". It is "the cause of the knowledge and truth". Further, "existence and being" are the result of the Good. (508e - 509b) And In the Republic Socrates says that the Good: "provides the truth to the things known and gives the power to the one who knows". It is "the cause of the knowledge and truth". Further, "existence and being" are the result of the Good. (508e - 509b)

For example, when appraised via modern English, in claiming that "the Good is beyond space and time" the Good is nevertheless postulated to be (although this not in any manner requiring any type of distance or duration). — javra

He does say that the Forms Just and Beautiful exist. But they do not exist in time and space.

But if you can evidence to the contrary, I'd be interested in the evidence you'd have to present. — javra

I have no evidence beyond what can be found in the text. There certainly is disagreement regarding interpretation, but I do not know of one that I find more convincing.

There is, however, another problem. Something I already pointed out:

If there is a Form of the Good but we do not know what the Good is, what can we say about it that we know to be true? It is not that it is difficult to know but that if only what is entirely is entirely knowable and the Good is beyond being, beyond what is, then it cannot be known. — Fooloso4

If we cannot know the good then we cannot know that it is beyond being, or that it is the cause both of things that are and knowledge of them. All of this is entirely consistent with Socrates claim that human wisdom is knowledge of ignorance.

Thank you that's a great sketch. I will copy it and pop it in my collection of useful quotes.

Quick answer, the Good cannot be known. The best we can do is determine what through inquiry and examination seems best to us while remaining open to the fact that we do not know. — Fooloso4

:up:

Socrates, who tells this story of transcendent knowledge, does not know. His human wisdom is his knowledge of ignorance. — Fooloso4

I think that's a very delicate question of interpretation. Later in the tradition of Christian Platonism, there is the principle of 'un-knowing', apophatic theology and the 'way of negation'. It is a universal theme also found in Indian and Chinese philosophy ('he that knows it, knows it not. He that knows it not, knows it'; 'Neti, neti' ~ 'not this, not that'.) So perhaps 'ignorance' in this context means something different than what it is normally taken to mean.

(I also notice a remark in 'Thinking Being', that Parmenides' prose-poem has been given to him by 'The Goddess', and so 'this grasp of the whole (which is the subject of the proem) is received as a gift from the Divine'. Perl also mentions Heraclitus' dictum 'Human character does not have insights, divine has' - Thinking Being, Studies in Platonism, Neoplatonism and the Platonic Tradition, Eric D. Perl, Brill, 2014).

Perhaps this separation of the world from the Divine that we moderns axiomatically assume (if we even make room for the divine!) was not so stark for the Greek philosophers.

The danger of 'woo' may be more connected with concrete thinking, especially in organised religious movements. — Jack Cummins

It's more that as enlightenment is taken to be the universal panacea, the supreme good, then everyone wants it, or wants what they think it is. It is therefore ripe for exploitation by the cynical of the gullible, who exist in very large numbers. And it's also very difficult to differentiate actual mysticism from mystical-sounding waffle, so there's abundant scope for delusion in this domain.

But as Rumi said, there would be no fool's gold, if there were no actual gold.

“... although the good isn't being but is still beyond being, exceeding it in dignity (age) and power."(509b) — Fooloso4

As to the Good being beyond being, while I don't speak Greek, much less Ancient Greek, there seems to be something lost in translation. — javra

My interpretation of 'beyond being' is that it means 'beyond the vicissitudes of existence', 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'. That idea is made much more explicit in Mahāyāna Buddhism than in Platonism, but I believe there is some common ground. And that the reason intelligible objects such as geometric forms and arithmetic proofs are held in high regard (in Platonism, not so much in Buddhism) is that they are not subject to becoming and ceasing, in the way that sensible objects and particulars are. So they are 'nearer' to the ground of being, or 'higher' in the scala naturae, the great chain of being.

There's an account of this in John Scotus Eriugena, The Periphyseon, from the SEP entry on which this excerpt is taken. I have taken the liberty of striking out 'to be' and replacing it with 'to exist', as I think it conveys the gist better.

Eriugena proceeds to list “five ways of interpreting” the manner in which things may be said to be or not to be exist or not to exist (Periphyseon, I.443c–446a). According to the first mode, things accessible to the senses and the intellect are said to be exist, whereas anything which, “through the excellence of its nature” (per excellentiam suae naturae), transcends our faculties are said not to be exist. According to this classification, God, because of his transcendence is said not to be exist. He is “nothingness through excellence” (nihil per excellentiam). ¹


The second mode of being and non-being is seen in the “orders and differences of created natures” (I.444a), whereby, if one level of nature is said to be exist, those orders above or below it, are said not to be exist:

For an affirmation concerning the lower (order) is a negation concerning the higher, and so too a negation concerning the lower (order) is an affirmation concerning the higher. (Periphyseon, I.444a)

According to this mode (of analysis), the affirmation of man is the negation of angel and vice versa. This mode illustrates Eriugena’s original way of dissolving the traditional Neoplatonic hierarchy of being into a dialectic of affirmation and negation: to assert one level is to deny the others. In other words, a particular level may be affirmed to be real by those on a lower or on the same level, but the one above it is thought not to be real in the same way. If humans are thought to exist in a certain way, then angels do not exist in that way.

1. The sense in which is God is 'above' or 'beyond' existence, and, so, not something that exists, is central the apophatic theology. It was a major theme in the theology of Tillich, who said that declaring that God existed was the main cause of atheism. See God Does Not Exist, Bishop Pierre Whalon.

That SEP entry on Eriugena was written by Dermot Moran, who is also a scholar of phenomenology and Edmund Husserl. He has a book which argues that Eriugena's was a form of medieval idealism that was to greatly influence the later German idealists (via Eckhardt and the medieval mystics).

My interpretation of the forms/ideas is that they too are beyond the vicissitudes of existence and non-existence, that they don't come into or pass out of existence. And so, literally speaking, they don't need to exist! Things do the hard work of existence. Or, put another way, they exist 'in a different way' or 'on a different level' to material things. But modern ontology does not generally allow for 'different ways of existing' or 'different levels of existence'. It is strictly one-dimensional. That's the nub of the issue.

My interpretation of 'beyond being' is that it means 'beyond the vicissitudes of existence', 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'. — Wayfarer

:100: And I'm in agreement with your post in general.

If we cannot know the good then we cannot know that it is beyond being, or that it is the cause both of things that are and knowledge of them. — Fooloso4

As I previously mentioned via analogy of gravitational singularities, this conclusion is erroneous. Here's another example, Kant knew that he did not known what things-in-themselves are but nevertheless knew that they are, that they are not phenomenal, and that they are a necessary cause for our perceptions of objects. As this again evidences, to not know X does not mean that one does not know of X's occurrence and of at least some of X's properties (by which it can be differentiated from not-X).

I’ll give it one last go: — javra

My mistake. I did understand the point you were making what I wasn't clear about was its applicability to my initial comments. But I do get it: some people may know things we don't and that's no reason for them to be smug and disdainful. Agree.

I'm more interested in the common phenomenon in the world of esoterica where some people falsely think they have knowledge and consider anyone who isn't in their in-group to be a plonker. But it's a small point and not pivotal to Jack's OP.

My interpretation of 'beyond being' is that it means 'beyond the vicissitudes of existence', 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'.
— Wayfarer

:100: And I'm in agreement with your post in general. — javra

We can know nothing whatsoever about whatever might be "beyond being". The idea is nothing more than the dialectical opposite of 'being'. Fools have always sought to fill the 'domains' of necessary human ignorance with their "knowing". How much misery this has caused humanity is incalculable.

We can know nothing about whatever might be "beyond being". — Janus

The issue was how does one define, else understand, being - this, specifically, in terms of Plato's affirmations.

The idea is nothing more than the dialectical opposite of 'being'. — Janus

I happen to agree. Hence my contention that there is something lost in translation in saying that "the Good is beyond being". This would entail that the Good is not. Which is contrary to Plato's works.

We can know nothing whatsoever about whatever might be "beyond being". The idea is nothing more than the dialectical opposite of 'being'. Fools have always sought to fill the 'domains' of necessary human ignorance with their "knowing". How much misery this has caused humanity is incalculable. — Janus

:100: :fire:

1. The sense in which is God is 'above' or 'beyond' existence, and, so, not something that exists, is central the apophatic theology. — Wayfarer

I suspect this reflects the influence of Plato, but we should not conclude from what is in some way similar that they are the same.

Tillich — Wayfarer

I think Tillich got the idea of God as the ground of being from Meister Eckhart or perhaps Heidegger.

My interpretation of 'beyond being' is that it means 'beyond the vicissitudes of existence', 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'. — Wayfarer

But the Forms that are affirmed to exist, to be, are said to be 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'.

And so, literally speaking, they don't need to exist! — Wayfarer

In the Republic Socrates says that they are the only things that truly exist because they do not come into being or pass away.

I wasn't gonna comment, but:

Fools have always sought to fill the 'domains' of necessary human ignorance with their "knowing". — Janus

We seem to either be suffering from an absence of mirrors in which to see our own selves and conducts on this forum or else from a self-righteous arrogance of somehow being beyond foolishness. Or maybe both.

Because science and its paradigms does not seek to accomplish the exact same feat? Or any other field of human knowledge?

The proscription of thought, debate, and investigation on a philosophy forum by some is telling.

How much misery this has caused humanity is incalculable. — Janus

Pales by comparison to the view that ignorance is a virtue.

We can know nothing whatsoever about whatever might be "beyond being". The idea is nothing more than the dialectical opposite of 'being'. Fools have always sought to fill the 'domains' of necessary human ignorance with their "knowing". How much misery this has caused humanity is incalculable. — Janus

Nice. I was just thinking very similar thoughts. I suspect this goes to the core of the OP's question. The esoterica of the gaps....

As I previously mentioned via analogy of gravitational singularities, this conclusion is erroneous. Here's another example, Kant ... — javra

What is erroneous is importing ideas about gravitational singularities and from Kant in the attempt to understand Plato. You might conclude that Plato is wrong, but that is another story.

And yet you go on to say in another post:

I happen to agree. Hence my contention that there is something lost in translation in saying that "the Good is beyond being". This would entail that the Good is not. Which is contrary to Plato's works. — javra

The issue was how does one define, else understand, being - this, specifically, in terms of Plato's affirmations. — javra

See above:

The middle term is somewhat ambiguous. What is not is something other than that which is, but to what is not he assigns ignorance. Opinion opines neither what is nor what is not. Between what is entirely, the beings or Forms, and what is not, is becoming, that is, the visible world. Opinion opines about the visible world. But the good is beyond being. It is the cause of being, the cause of what is. It too is something other than what is and what is not. — Fooloso4

And:

If we cannot know the good then we cannot know that it is beyond being, or that it is the cause both of things that are and knowledge of them. All of this is entirely consistent with Socrates claim that human wisdom is knowledge of ignorance. — Fooloso4

But the Forms that are affirmed to exist, to be, are said to be 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away'. — Fooloso4

Right - but if they are 'beyond coming-to-be and passing away', then how can they be said to exist? Of all the things around us, which of them does not come into existence or pass away. Doesn't that apply to all phenomena?

An illustration: does the number 7 exist? Why, of course, you will say, there it is. But that's a symbol. The symbol exists, but what is symbolised? Are numbers 'things that exist'? Well, in a sense, but the nature of their existence is contested by philosophers - very much to the point. And it's also a point made in the passage from Eriugena, where things that exist on one level, do not exist on another. That's what makes all of this a metaphysical question.

My heuristic is that forms (etc) don't exist, but they are real, in an analogous sense to the way constraints are real in systems science. They are something like the way things must be, in order to exist - like blueprints or archetypes. Like, the form 'flight' can only be instantiated by wings that are flat and light. The form 'seeing' can only be instantiated by organs that are light-sensitive. And so on. But they don't exist as do the particulars which instantiate them.

Were Socrates/Plato to have understood "being" within the linguistic and cultural contexts of their time as consisting of that which comes into being and goes out of being, then the affirmation that the Good is not that just expressed would make sense.

By comparison:

It too is something other than what is and what is not. — Fooloso4

You affirm this conclusion as though it is true, or else as though it is the truth of what Socrates/Plato intended. Yet how is this affirmation not equivalent to the nonsensical statement that a certain given is neither X nor not-X? Or do you find this affirmation in any way sensible?