The Development of the λόγος Concept in the Early Greek Thought. Part I: Epics and Lyrics

Abstract

The paper is the first part of a longer cycle; its subject matter is the evolution of the λόγος concept in early Greek epics and lyrics, namely in Homer's and Hesiod's poems, in Homeric Hymns, and in the texts of lyrical poets who had been writing since the beginning of the seventh century B.C. until the times of Heraclitus of Ephesus, in whose thought λόγος plays a prominent role as a technical term. On our list we find the following names in a chronological order: Archilochus, Tyrtaeus, Semonides of Amorgos, Alcman, Stezychor, Alcaeus, Xenophanes, Ibycos, Theognis, Anacreon, Hipponax, Simonides, Bacchylides, Pindar and Ion of Chios. There is an urgent need in science to trace the development of the word λόγος, for it enables the contemporary researchers to understand Greek texts. The word in question plays a particular role in Heraclitus, and later in Plato and Aristotle, in the thought of Stoics, Philon of Alexandria or Plotinus, to mention just the most prominent figures. The word played a principal role to the extent that in some texts written by the above mentioned philosophers we deal even with an idea or doctrine of λόγος. However, before λόγος had come to be the key word of a philosophical concept at least three- four centuries passed. It is this period of time, in principle omitted in modern studies, that constitutes the space which contains our studies. Their aim is above all to 1) find the primitive sense of λόγος through etymological analysis, 2) interpret and define its semantic development, 3) turn our attention to the philosophical meaning of λόγος, i.e. a meaning in which the rational element prevails: λόγος as a manifestation, result or tool of the activity of human intellect.

At the bases of all the meanings of λόγος we find their etymological, that is rational and declarative (enunciative) value of the core leg- of the word λέγω from which the verbal noun λόγος is derived. In Homer's poems we deal with a transition from the act of "collecting", which lego primarily means, to "speaking", that is from the rational and distributive value to the declarative value. In the same way as somewhat physically traversed a certain number of objects to collect them, he may perform the same action in a discursive manner, that is he may by means of reason traverse (trace) some series of words, to bind them in the act of "speaking". Now "speaking" (similarly as "collecting") becomes, starting from Homer, a synthetic action, derived from the etymological meaning of λέγειν and binding the two semantic values: rational and declarative. It is from these two that the history of the development of the concept λόγος begins, and − as our studies have proven − these values decide about the character of the majority of distinguished meanings. However, in the latter meanings there prevails the element of expression. No wonder that about the destination of λόγος decides its communicative function, a function of conveying some contents clad in various forms, dependent on the purpose which the poet has assumed. Λόγος may take on the following forms: speech, story, history, tale, maxim, lecture, work, appeal, statement, instruction, lesson, verdict, composition, and treatise. The poet may deliberately mislead people, deceive or conceal the truth, as it takes place especially in the early epic of Homer and Hesiod (αἱμύλιοι λόγοι), or later in the poetry of Theognis (σκολιὸς λόγος). In the case of Stezychor, Alcaeus, Bacchylides and Pindar, who stress the true character of applied λόγος, we find its clear contrast to falsehood (οὐκ ἔτυμος, οὐκ ἀπάλαμνος, οὐκ ὑπόκλοπος or in opposition to ψεῦδος, μῦϑος). Their predecessor in this respect was Hesiod in whose writings the word λόγος, used for the first time in singular, takes on the form of a true "story", well and wisely composed, therefore it extremely diverges from the hitherto, well-known mythical stories. It seems that in the true Hesiod's λόγος (= story) there is made manifest one of the characteristic features of his poetry, i.e. its didactic aspect. It is the same aspect which we find later in the λόγος of Alcaeus, Xenophanes, Ibycos, Anacreon and, above all, in Pindar. The latter uses λόγος as a real fact and, accordingly, attempts to give credence to it in many ways. Pindar gives it the form of a "true counsel, lesson and statement", and poses before his addressee, as worthy of imitation, a life wisdom bearing non-temporal dimension. From the dawn of its history λόγος has played, due to its peculiar primitive meaning, the function of a means of communication. We bear in mind here the relation: poet−recipient (reader), and that is why this function bears also an entertaining and aesthetic character. This takes place in such meanings of λόγος as "speech" − nice, sweet, delusive (e.g. in Homer, Hesiod, Theognis: μαλακοί, α ἱ μύλιοι λόγοι), long (μακρὸς λ. − Semonides), right (δίκαιοι λ. − Bacchylides), "story, history, tale, legend, poetic or prosaic work, appeal, apology" (Hesiod, Archilochus, Alcaeus, Ibycos, Theognis, Anacreon, Simonides, Bacchylides, and Pindar). The only testimony of some devaluation of λόγος is its application by Theognis in the sense of "affair, object". This isolated case may be a testimony that λόγος was often used daily language, though we are short of broader premisses in the shape of a greater number of texts from that period, i.e. the 6th century B.C. Nevertheless the new meanings of λόγος, as early as Theognis' poetry, support the thesis that λόγος becomes a more and more popular and fashionable concept. Its semantic field is rich and capacious, therefore it is a proper word to create new shades of meaning. The most interesting among them are those in which the rational element prevails or is entirely dominant, excepting its expressive (i.e. enunciative) character. Tracing chronologically the list of the meanings of λόγος, we find its first use in Tyrtaeus in the idiomatic expression ἐν λόγῳ τιέϑναι, where λόγος is translated as "value, recognition, respect". Further we have "arguments" in Stezychor and Theognis. This meaning is, as it seems, a development of a "rhetorical" (that is persuasive) function of "tricky words", reaching back to the very origins of literature, that is in Homer and Hesiod. Λόγος in Theognis merits our particular attention; there it is a "ratio, relation, proportion". This meaning paves the way for the Pythagorean, Plato's and Aristotle's mathematic or geometric "proportion". The use of λόγος by Theognis to denote an "ability to reason, to think" is equally interesting and has a purely rational character. It denotes the processes which occur inside man, in his intellect. The following three meanings of λόγος in Pindar's poetry are a visible manifestation of its (i.e. reasons's) activity. We have in mind here: 1) "number", 2) "essence" or else "principle" as the leading idea expressed in a maxim, and 3) "justification" or, in other words, "cause, reason". It seems that Pindar's poetry is perhaps the best proof, having an etymological justification, twofold character of the development of the concept λόγος. On the one hand there is the whole range of meanings which bear a typically expressive character: λόγος as a widely understood verbal statement (although this does not in the least mean that there is no rational element); on the other hand one may notice an opposite tendency to express, by means of the same word, the rational grounds of the same statement in the form of "thinking, calculating and justifying", the activities which human intellect performs. The conclusions presented here cannot claim a right to be exhaustive and complete, for their basis is only the texts of epics and lyrics, coming from the early period of the development of Greek literature. We have some reasons, however, to assume that the preserved fragments of the Presocratics, whose analysis we shall make in a further paper, will confirm the above conclusions. The latter conclusions in fact come down to a statement that the Greek oratio has always been subordinated to its ratio.