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{{short description|Transmigration of the soul}}
{{about|the Greek conception of the transmigration of the soul|the general concept|Reincarnation}}
[[File:Metempsychosis by Yokoyama Taikan (National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo).jpg|thumb|
'''Metempsychosis''' ({{lang-grc-gre|μετεμψύχωσις}}), in philosophy, refers to transmigration of the [[soul]], especially its [[reincarnation]] after death. The term is derived from [[ancient Greek philosophy]], and has been recontextualised by modern philosophers such as [[Arthur Schopenhauer]]<ref>Schopenhauer, A: "Parerga und Paralipomena" (Eduard Grisebach edition), On Religion, Section 177</ref> and [[Kurt Gödel]];<ref>[http://www.goedelexhibition.at/goedel/goedel.html Gödel Exhibition: Gödel's Century<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> otherwise, the term "[[Reincarnation#Conceptual definitions|transmigration]]" is more appropriate. The word plays a prominent role in [[James Joyce]]'s ''[[Ulysses (novel)|Ulysses]]'' and is also associated with [[Friedrich Nietzsche|Nietzsche]].<ref>Nietzsche and the Doctrine of Metempsychosis, in J. Urpeth & J. Lippitt, ''Nietzsche and the Divine'', Manchester: Clinamen, 2000</ref> Another term sometimes used synonymously is [[palingenesis]].
== European antiquity ==
It is unclear how the doctrine of metempsychosis arose in Greece. It is easiest to assume that earlier ideas which had never been extinguished were utilized for religious and philosophic purposes.
=== Orphism ===
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The earliest Greek thinker with whom metempsychosis is connected is [[Pherecydes of Syros]].<ref>Schibli, S., Hermann, Pherekydes of Syros, p. 104, Oxford Univ. Press 2001</ref> However, [[Pythagoras]], who is said to have been his pupil, is its first famous philosophic exponent. Pythagoras is not believed to have invented the doctrine or to have imported it from Egypt. Instead, he made his reputation by bringing the Orphic doctrine from North-Eastern Hellas to [[Magna Graecia]], and creating societies for its diffusion.
▲The earliest Greek thinker with whom metempsychosis is connected is [[Pherecydes of Syros]].<ref>Schibli, S., Hermann, Pherekydes of Syros, p. 104, Oxford Univ. Press 2001</ref> However, [[Pythagoras]], who is said to have been his pupil, is its first famous philosophic exponent. Pythagoras is not believed to have invented the doctrine or to have imported it from Egypt. Instead, he made his reputation by bringing the Orphic doctrine from North-Eastern Hellas to [[Magna Graecia]], and creating societies for its diffusion. {{cn|date=May 2021}} Legend has it that Zalmoxis and Pythagoras taught metempsychosis in 600 BC that was sourced from Indian monks.<ref>{{cite book | title=Short studies in the science of comparative religions | last=Forlong | first=J. G. R. | url=https://www.google.com/books/edition/Short_Studies_in_the_Science_of_Comparat/rntIAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&bsq=Zalmoxis | pages=35-36 | date=1897 | publisher=B. Quartich}}</ref>
=== Platonic philosophy ===
The real weight and importance of metempsychosis in the Western tradition are due to its adoption by [[Plato]].<ref>{{cite book | title=Republic, Book 10, section 620 | last=Plato | url=https://scaife.perseus.org/reader/urn:cts:greekLit:tlg0059.tlg030.perseus-grc2:10.620/}}</ref> In the eschatological myth which closes the ''[[Republic (Plato)|Republic]]'' he tells the myth how Er, the son of Armenius, miraculously returned to life on the twelfth day after death and recounted the secrets of the other world. After death, he said, he went with others to the place of Judgment and saw the souls returning from heaven, and proceeded with them to a place where they chose new lives, human and animal. He saw the soul of Orpheus changing into a swan, Thamyras becoming a nightingale, musical birds choosing to be men, the soul of Atalanta choosing the honours of an athlete. Men were seen passing into animals and wild and tame animals changing into each other. After their choice, the souls drank of [[Lethe]] and then shot away like stars to their birth. There are myths and theories to the same effect in other dialogues, the [[Phaedrus (dialogue)|Phaedrus]], [[Meno]], [[Phaedo]], [[Timaeus (dialogue)|Timaeus]] and [[Laws (dialogue)|Laws]]. {{Citation needed|date=February 2009}} In Plato's view the number of souls was fixed; birth, therefore, is never the creation of a soul, but only a transmigration from one body to another.<ref>"That is the conclusion, I said; and if a true conclusion, then the souls must always be the same, for if none be destroyed they will not diminish in number." Republic X, 611. The Republic of Plato By Plato, Benjamin Jowett Edition: 3 Published by Clarendon Press, 1888.</ref> Plato's acceptance of the doctrine is characteristic of his sympathy with popular beliefs and desire to incorporate them in a purified form into his system. {{Citation needed|date=February 2009}}
The extent of Plato's belief in metempsychosis has been debated by some scholars in modern times. [[Marsilio Ficino]] (''Platonic Theology'' 17.3–4), for one, argued that Plato's references to metempsychosis were intended allegorically.
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In later Greek literature, the doctrine appears from time to time; it is mentioned in a fragment of [[Menander]] (the Inspired Woman) and satirized by [[Lucian]] (Gallus 18 seq.). In [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] literature it is found as early as [[Ennius]],<ref>Poesch, Jessie (1962) "Ennius and Basinio of Parma" ''Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes'' 25(1/2): pp. 116-118, page 117, FN15</ref> who in his Calabrian home must have been familiar with the Greek teachings which had descended to his times from the cities of Magna Graecia. In a lost passage of his Annals, a Roman history in verse, Ennius told how he had seen [[Homer]] in a dream, who had assured him that the same soul which had animated both the poets had once belonged to a peacock. [[Persius]] in one of his satires (vi. 9) laughs at Ennius for this: it is referred to also by [[Lucretius]] (i. 124) and by [[Horace]] (Epist. II. i. 52). [[Virgil]] works the idea into his account of the Underworld in the sixth book of the [[Aeneid]] (Vv. 724 sqq.). It persists in antiquity down to the latest classic thinkers, [[Plotinus]] and the other [[Neoplatonist]]s.
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Metempsychosis was a part of [[Catharism]] in [[Occitania]] in the 12th century.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.therealpresence.org/archives/Heresies_Heretics/Heresies_Heretics_006.htm|title=Fr. Hardon Archives - Albigensianism|last=Hardon, S.J.|first=Fr. John A.|date=1998|website=www.therealpresence.org|language=en|access-date=2017-08-21}}</ref>
== Renaissance ==
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Created in the early 15th century, the [[Rosicrucianism|Rosicrucianist]] movement also conveyed an occult doctrine of metempsychosis.<ref>[http://www.sacred-texts.com/sro/sdr/sdr11.htm Part X Metempsychosis], ''Sacred-texts.com''</ref>
== In literature after the classical era ==
{{Trivia|date=January 2022}}
"Metempsychosis" is the title of a longer work by the metaphysical poet [[John Donne]], written in 1601.<ref>Collins, Siobhán (2005) "Bodily Formations and Reading Strategies in John Donne's ''Metempsychosis''" ''Critical Studies'' 26: pp. 191-208, page 191</ref> The poem, also known as the ''Infinitati Sacrum'',<ref name="Donne">[http://www.luminarium.org/editions/metempsycosis.htm full text of ''Metempsychosis'' or ''Infinitati Sacrum''] from Luminarium Editions</ref> consists of two parts, the "Epistle" and "The Progress of the Soule". In the first line of the latter part, Donne writes that he "sing[s] of the progresse of a deathlesse soule".<ref name="Donne" />
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