The Figure of Nature

On Greek Origins

John Sallis

• Publisher: Indiana University Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9780253023124
• eBook ISBN: 9780253023360
• Topic: Philosophy
• Subtopic: Aesthetics in Philosophy

One of America's preeminent philosophers "has produced a book with fascinating new insights into the ancient conception of nature" ( Choice).
Broaching an understanding of nature in Platonic thought, John Sallis goes beyond modern conceptions and provides a strategy to have recourse to the profound sense of nature operative in ancient Greek philosophy. In a rigorous and textually based account, Sallis traces the complex development of the Greek concept of nature. Beginning with the mythical vision embodied in the figure of the goddess Artemis, he reanimates the sense of nature that informs the fragmentary discourses of Anaximenes, Heraclitus, Parmenides, and Empedocles and shows how Plato takes up pre-Socratic conceptions critically while also being transformed. Through Sallis's close reading of the Theaetetus and the Phaedo, he recovers the profound and comprehensive concept of nature in Plato's thought.

1	THE REIGN OF ARTEMIS

She reigned with such sovereignty that her rule extended even into the beginning of the Christian era. It is reported that when Paul came to Ephesus, the site of the great temple of Artemis, he encountered such resistance that he dared not enter the theatre where the Ephesians were assembled. A surrogate named Alexander was thus put forth to offer a defense to the multitude assembled there. Yet when the crowd recognized that he was affiliated with Paul, then “for about two hours they all with one voice cried out ‘Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!’”¹

Her reign extended throughout Greece, from Ephesus, Miletus, and Samos, the three sites where what would be called philosophy had its beginning, to the Greek mainland and on beyond to Magna Graecia. In the μῦθος recounting the deeds through which she exercised her sovereignty, her bond to ϕύσις, to what would come to be called nature, was paramount. In this μῦθος the figure of nature was already drawn before philosophy came onto the scene and set about interrogating nature as such. When philosophy appeared on the scene, it took up this figure in which a certain sense of nature was already gathered. Even though the name Artemis goes largely unmentioned by the early Greek thinkers, the disclosure of nature sustained by her μῦθος remained directive for Greek thought from its beginning on.

Homer calls her “Artemis of the wild, the mistress of wild beasts,”² thus declaring her reign in the sense both of her sovereignty, her rule, and of the domain over which she rules, her kingdom or realm. She may seem to be a kind of goddess of nature, and yet, at best, the genitive expression only defers a proper characterization of the bond between Artemis and nature, of the manner in which she carries out her reign. Her rule bears little resemblance to that of a human monarch: whereas a mortal queen will always be intent on displaying herself in all her glory before those whom she rules, Artemis, as a goddess, is never to be directly beheld. Even her most devout follower, Hippolytus, declares that he cannot see her face to face.³ Though indeed he has the unique privilege of hearing and answering to her words, for all other humans she appears only from within her realm, only in and through what she effects in the wild places over which she reigns, but in which, nonetheless, she remains withdrawn from the sight of mortals. Yet precisely as reigning—while remaining withdrawn—over the domain in which things are begotten and come to be born (ϕύομαι), Artemis is set apart as one who does not give birth. She is ἁγνή, pure, chaste. She is an inviolable virgin.

She reigns over the wild regions beyond the cities and beyond the cultivated fields. When her ardent disciple Hippolytus returns from her meadow and approaches her altar, he declares:

My Goddess Mistress, I bring you ready woven

this garland. It was I that plucked and wove it,

plucked it for you in your inviolate meadow.

No shepherd dares to feed his flock within it:

no reaper plies a busy scythe within it:

only the bees in springtime haunt the inviolate meadow.⁴

Her reign takes two forms, which, though apparently opposed, are in fact intrinsically connected. First of all, she is a huntress. Vase paintings portray her as the beautiful virgin huntress clad in a short tunic and carrying a bow and a quiver of arrows; often she is accompanied by a stag or a doe. The Homeric Hymn dedicated to her describes her in these words: “I sing of Artemis, whose shafts are of gold, who cheers on the hounds, the pure maiden, shooter of stags, who delights in archery, sister to Apollo with the golden sword.”⁵ Along with her twin brother, Apollo, she was born on the island of Delos, the daughter of Zeus and Leto. In the Odyssey there is a more extended portrayal of her, which provides the context in which the beautiful maiden Nausikaa is compared to her:

As Artemis, the archer, roves over the mountains,

along the ridges of Taygetus or on lofty Erymanthus,

delighting in the pursuit of boars and swift deer,

and the nymphs, daughters of Zeus who bears the aegis,

share her sport and Leto is glad at heart—

high above them all Artemis holds her head and brows,

and easily may she be known, though all are beautiful—

so this one shone among her handmaidens,

a virgin unwedded.⁶

Ranging across Taygetus, a high range of mountains on the western border of Laconia, or climbing to the top of Erymanthus, a lofty mountain in Arcadia that was the haunt of the Erymanthean Boar, Artemis and her nymphs pursue their wild prey. Yet it is not only to wild beasts that she is a threat, not only at them that she aims her arrows, but also at women. The passage in the Iliad in which she is described as “Artemis of the wild, the mistress of wild beasts” tells of an episode in which she scolded her brother for having yielded in a quarrel with Poseidon. Though—as the account continues—Apollo said nothing in his defense, Hera, full of anger, set upon Artemis with these words:

It will be hard for you to match your strength with mine

even if you wear a bow, since Zeus has made you a lion

among women, and given you leave to kill any at your pleasure.

Better for you to hunt down the ravening beasts in the mountains

and deer of the wild, than try to fight in strength with your
betters.⁷

Whatever the measure of her strength against the likes of Hera may be, Artemis is—by Zeus’ decree—a lion among women, and as such she can inflict sudden death upon them with her golden arrows.

And yet, as she can bring death, so also can she offer protection to all creatures who are born and aid to those who bear them. She reigns not only as huntress among animals and lion among women, but also as one who gives succor to the young of wild beasts and comfort to women in childbirth.

In Aeschylus’ Agamemnon the chorus sings of her reign:

Beautiful you are and kind

to the tender young ravening lions.

For sucklings of all the savage

beasts that lurk in the lonely places you have sympathy.⁸

As protector of wild beasts, Artemis vents her anger when an animal is killed within her sanctuary. Especially loathsome to her is any slaying that interrupts the natural course of nativity. Thus the chorus tells also how her anger was provoked when a hare bearing its unborn young was killed and devoured.⁹

In the story of how, on its way to Troy, the Hellenic fleet commanded by Agamemnon was detained at Aulis, Artemis is identified as the one responsible for summoning the strong contrary wind that prevented the ships from sailing on. When Agamemnon consulted Calchas the soothsayer, the words he heard announced that the ships would be allowed to sail only if Agamemnon’s daughter Iphigenia were offered as a sacrifice to Artemis. There are at least two accounts of the reason this sacrifice was demanded by the goddess. One is found in Euripides’ Iphigenia in Tauris. At the outset of the drama, Iphigenia herself repeats the words that were addressed to Agamemnon when he brought his inquiry to Calchas:

Agamemnon,

Captain of Hellas, there can be no way

of setting your ships free until the offering

you promised Artemis is given to her.

You had vowed to render in sacrifice to the light-bringing goddess

The most beautiful one born each year.¹⁰

The sacrifice that is demanded by the goddess is to be carried out in belated fulfillment of a vow geared to natality. In this instance again what comes to light is the reign of the goddess over the domain of all that comes to be by way of birth, by being born (ϕύομαι), that is, the domain that also bears the name ϕύσις. As her reign comes thus to light, she is herself given the epithet “light-bringing” (ϕωσϕόρος).

The other account of Artemis’ demand is found in Sophocles’ Electra. The words are those of Electra, also a daughter of Agamemnon:

My father, as I hear, when at his sport,

started at his feet an antlered dappled stag

within the goddess’ sanctuary. He

let fly and hit the deer and uttered some boast

about his killing of it. The daughter of Leto

was angry at this and therefore stayed the Greeks

in order that my father, to compensate

for the beast killed, might sacrifice his daughter.¹¹

As the protector of wild beasts, as the goddess who grants them the refuge in her sanctuary, Artemis demands recompense from anyone who, like Agamemnon, violates that sanctuary.

Powerless against the demand of the goddess, Agamemnon had wily Odysseus bring Iphigenia to Aulis under the false pretense that she was to marry Achilles before the fleet sailed. In Aeschylus’ story of the events that followed, the sacrifice of Iphigenia was actually carried out. According to Euripides, however, she was snatched away at the last minute by Artemis, who substituted a deer for her. As she herself recounts it:

When I had come

to Aulis, they laid hands on me. The flame

was lit. The blow would have been struck—I saw

the knife. But Artemis deceived their eyes

with a deer to bleed for me and stole me through

the azure sky.¹²

Borne off to Tauris, Iphegenia became Artemis’ priestess, even—as some have declared—a second Artemis.¹³ Thus, in Euripides’ version of the story, there is a peculiar reversal. Having demanded the sacrifice of Iphigenia, Artemis then becomes her protector, whisking her away from the scene of death to the sanctuary of Tauris, where as priestess she is entitled to deliver to mortals the words of the goddess. This reversal is indicative of just how intrinsically connected the two forms of Artemis’ reign are.

Though a lion among women, Artemis was also often portrayed as coming to the aid of women, especially to those in childbirth. In such instances her intervention is not unlike that in the case of Iphigenia: at the very time when pain and the threat of death in childbirth are most intense, Artemis can be called on to bring aid and relief. Thus, in Hippolytus the chorus intones words that tell of the misery and helplessness of childbirth to which women are subject and of the aid that can be brought by Artemis:

My body, too, has felt this thrill of pain,

and I called on Artemis, queen of the bow;

she has my reverence always

as she goes in the company of the gods.¹⁴

Artemis is the maieutic goddess who brings her reign to the confluence of pain and deliverance, of the threat of death and the promise of new life. She is the goddess whose name invokes the realm of ϕύσις and who, herself unseen, reigns over all creatures that are born (ϕύομαι) and that accordingly belong to ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Prologue
• 1 The Reign of Artemis
• 2 Open Air. On Philosophy before Philosophy
• 3 Enshrouded Nature and the Fire of Heaven
• 4 Radical Gatherings. The Imperative of Philosophy
• 5 Monstrous Wonder. The Advance of Nature
• 6 Earthbound. The Return of Nature
• English Index
• Greek Index