Editing Parmenides (section)

=== ''The Way of Truth'' ===
In the ''Way of Truth'', an estimated 90% of which has survived,{{sfn|Palmer|2020}} Parmenides distinguishes between the unity of nature and its variety, insisting in the ''Way of Truth'' upon the reality of its unity, which is therefore the object of knowledge, and upon the unreality of its variety, which is therefore the object, not of knowledge, but of opinion.<ref name="Cornford p. 100">Cornford, "Parmenides' two ways", p. 100</ref>

==== B2 ====
[[Proclus]] preserves, in his commentary on ''Timaeus'' I 345, 18–20, two lines of Parmenides's poem, which together with six lines transmitted by Simplicius, in his commentary on Aristotle's ''Physics'', 116, 28–32–117, 1, form fragment 2 (28 B 2). There the goddess speaks of two "paths of inquiry that there are for thinking (nous)". The first is named as follows: "which is, and also cannot be that it is not" (v. 3); the second: "which is not, and also, must not be" (v. 5). The first way is "of persuasion", which "accompanies the truth" (v. 4), while the second is "completely inscrutable" or "impracticable", since "what is not" cannot be known, nor expressed (vv. 6–8).

==== B3 ====
Fragment B3<ref>[[Plotinus]], ''Enneads'' V, 1, 8</ref> is just a part of dactylic verse:{{langx|grc|...τὸ γὰρ αὐτὸ νοεῖν ἐστίν τε καὶ εἴναι}}. Following the order of the words and the literal meaning of each word, it could be translated (and understood) as follows: "the same thing is to think and to be". [[Plotinus]], who cites the text, believes he finds in it support for his idea of the identification of being with thinking, a fundamental idea of [[Neoplatonism]]. However, some modern scholars{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=28,31}}<ref>Burnet, ''Early Greek Philosophy'', p. 173ss</ref> have interpreted it as closer to "the same is to be thought and to be" For Jaeger, the semantic value of νοεῖν is not identical to that used later by [[Plato]], who opposes it to sensible perception. Rather this is an "awareness" of an object in what it is. The νοεῖν is not really νοεῖν if it does not know the real.<ref>*Werner Jaeger, ''The theology of the first Greek philosophers''</ref> Guthrie adds that the action of the verb cannot suggest the image of something that does not exist. In Homer it has a similar meaning to "see" (''Il'' XV, 422), rather it is the act by which someone receives the full meaning of a situation (''Il'' III, 396), not through a process of reasoning, but a sudden illumination. Subsequently, νοῦς (''noûs'') is conceived as a faculty that cannot be subject to error, as [[Aristotle]] will later say in ''Posterior Analytics'', 100b5.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|pp=31-34}}

==== B6 ====
In fragment B6, nine verses preserved by Simplicius,<ref>''Physics'' (86, 27-28 and 117, 4-13)</ref> Parminides continues to speak of the ways of thought. The first three verses argue against the second way, presented in B 2, v. 5: Postulates that it is necessary to think and say that "what is" is, since it is possible that it is, while it is impossible for "nothing" to be. And this is the reason why the goddess removes the "man who knows" from the second way. Immediately, the goddess speaks of a third path that must be left aside: the one in which mortals wander, wandering since they are dragged by a wavering mind, which considers that being and not being are the same, and at the same time it is not the same. himself (vv. 4–9). It is the way of opinion, already presented in B 1, v. 30. Fragment 6 has been interpreted by some philologists as a reference to the thought of [[Heraclitus]]. There it speaks of the "two-faced" (δίκρανοι v. 5), those who believe that "being and not being is the same and not the same" (vv. 8–9). This appears to be a criticism of the Heraclitean doctrine of the unity of opposites.{{efn|DK 22B88}} Verse 9 "from all things there is a retrograde way" (πἄντων δὲ '''παλίντροπός''' ἐστι κέλευθος), seems to point directly to an idea present in a fragment of Heraclitus: (22 B 60): "the up way and below is one and the same»; and to the same letter of another fragment (22 B 51): "...harmony of that which turns back» ('''παλίντροπος''' ἁρμονίη).<ref>Diels and Kranz, ''Fragments der Vorsocratic'' I, p. 162, app. cr. Cf. Guthrie, ''Greek History and Philosophy,'' II, p. 39</ref>

[[File:Lions-Gate-Mycenae.jpg|300px|thumbnail|Gate of Lions, [[Mycenae]]]]
In the Fragment 2, Parmenides presents two{{efn|Which are two is indicated by the beginning of v. 3 and 5, μέν (''mén'') – δέ (''dé''), particles that introduce in Greek a disjunction and not an enumeration.}} paths of inquiry, δίζησις (''dizēsis'' , v. 2), mutually exclusive: one must be followed and the other is inscrutable. In fragment 6, however, a third path appears from which one must turn away (v. 4ff). The characterization of these paths has initiated a discussion about the amount of paths presented and on the nature of these. [[Werner Jaeger]] says that throughout the writing the meaning of «path» is that of «salvation path». That is why he compares this disjunction of the paths with those of the religious symbolism of later Pythagoreanism, which presented a straight path and a path of error, in the sense of morally good and bad paths. The choice of one of them is made by man as a moral agent. He also offers as background a passage from ''Works and Days'' (286ff) where [[Hesiod]] presents a flat path, that of wickedness, and a steep one, that of virtue. Either way, he accepts that there is in the poem a transfer from religious symbolism to intellectual processes. In this sense, compared to the two exclusionary paths of fragment 2 (he calls them that of "being" and that of "not being"), the third path of fragment 6 is not a different path, but rather an inadmissible combination of these two, followed by those who have not noticed their mutual exclusion.<ref>Jaeger, ''The Theology of the First Greek Philosophers, pp. 101–103''</ref> Raven points out that the third way is that of mortals, who wander "two-headed" (δίκρανοι, ''díkranoi''), because they combine opposites, as Simplicius had noted.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} Schofield argues that this third way had not been shown in fr. 2, since there were coherent alternatives between which a researcher must decide, while this is a path that anyone who does not make this decision and does not use his critical faculties finds himself on (fr. 6, vv. 6 –7), following both contradictory paths at the same time.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} For Guthrie there are effectively three ways, the second is discarded and the third, which arises from the use of the senses and habit, includes the belief that "things that are not are" and "that being and not being are the same and not the same” (fr. 6, v. 8).

==== B7 ====
Another fragment, B7<ref>B7:cited in part by [[Plato]], ''Sophist'' 242a (the first two lines), and in part by [[Sextus Empiricus]], in ''Adversus Mathematicos'', VII, 111 (the next five verses)</ref> the next seven verses follow this reflection and concludes it: there is no way to prove "what is what is not" (v. 1). For this reason, the goddess indicates that it is necessary to deviate from this path of inquiry, going even against custom, which leads to the "inattentive gaze" and the "rumbling ear and the tongue", that is, to the senses (vv. 2 -4). Instead, she recommends following her controversial argument with reason (vv. 5–6). Part of line 6, and what remains of line 7, connects the theme of the paths of inquiry with fragment A8: only the path discourse dealing with 'what is' remains.

==== B8.1-4: Signs about "What is" ====
In the longest surviving fragment, B8,<ref>Simplicius ''Physics'' 145, 1–28 and 146, 1–24</ref> the goddess(v. 1-4) describes a series of "signs" about "what is": “unbegotten and indestructible” (ἀγένητον καὶ ἀνώλεθρον, v. 5-21), “whole and unique” (οὔλοε μοέον, v. 22-25), “immovable” (ἀτρεμής, v. 26-33) and “perfect” (τελεῖον, v. 42-49), which are along the path and which come to be a set of attributes of "what is".

The program itself, however, concludes with an inexplicable "endless (in time)" (ἠδ᾽ ἀτέλεστον) which would contradict verse 5, which indicates that "what is" is foreign to both the past and the future.<ref>Owen, "Eleatic questions," p. 101</ref> Owen offers the following conjecture as a solution to this difficulty: the reading is a copyist's error, seduced by the reiteration of negative prefixes in the poem (ἀγένητον... ἀνώλεθρον... ἀτρεμές) and by the influence of a Homeric cliché,.<ref>(''Il'' IV, 26)</ref> and should read ἠδὲ τελεῖον, "perfect." With this amendment a complete correspondence between the program and the arguments is achieved.<ref>Owen, "Eleatic Questions", p. 102</ref> Guthrie nevertheless decides on the original reading (the only one attested in the manuscripts) and rejects Owen's emendation, understanding this "infinity" in a new sense, different from the Homeric use of the term, which precisely means "incomplete", "unfinished" and that contradicts the ideas presented in the poem about the attributes of perfection of the entity.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=41}} Raven follows the reading of Diels,<ref>Kirk and Raven, ''The Presocratic Philosophers'' fr. 347, p. 382</ref> but Schofield follows Owen's conjecture.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}}

==== B8.5-21 "What is" cannot be begotten or destroyed ====
From verse 5 to 21 a lengthy argument is developed against generation and corruption. Verse 5 posits  On the other hand, if nothing can be understood or said about "what is not", then there is no possibility of finding out from where it would have been generated, nor for what reason it would have been generated "before" or "after", emerging from nothing. (verses 6–10). It is necessary that it be completely, or that it not be at all, therefore it cannot be admitted that from what is not something arises that exists together with "what is" (vv. 11-12). Generation and corruption are prohibited by Justice, by virtue of a decision: "it is or it is not", and it has been decided to abandon this last path as inscrutable, and follow the first, the only true path (vv. 14-18) . Nor can the entity, being, be born. And if he was born, he is not. Nor can it be if it is going to be. Therefore the generation is extinct, and perishing cannot be known (vv. 19–21). The first sign that the goddess deals with is the one related to the entity's relationship with time, the generation and corruption. In verse 5 of fragment 8 she affirms that the entity was not in the past nor should it be in the future, but is entirely now (νῦν ἔστι ὁμοῦ πᾶν). The past and the future have no meaning for the entity, it ''is'' in a perpetual present, without temporal distinction of any kind.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} What follows (vv. 6–11) is the argument against the birth or generation of what is. The first words (“one”, ἕν, and “continuous”, συνεχές) advance the content of another argument located later on unity and continuity (vv. 22–25). From there, she wonders what genesis would you look for? It denies the possibility that "what is" arises from "what is not", since one cannot think or say “what is not” (vv. 7–9) there would be no need for something "that is" to emerge from "what is not" (vv. 9-10). Schofield has interpreted Parmenides here as 'appealing to the [[principle of sufficient reason]]. He supposes that everything that comes to be must contain in itself a principle of development ("necessity", χρέος) sufficient to explain its generation. But if something does not exist, how can it contain such a principle?»{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} The meaning of lines 12–13 is ambiguous, due to the use of a [[pronoun]] (αὐτό) that can be interpreted as referring to the object that has been spoken of for nine lines, “what is”, or as referring to the subject of the sentence in which it appears: «what is not». The first alternative and the final meaning of the sentence would be: from "what is not" something cannot arise that becomes together with "what is", that is, something other than "what is". This sentence would have the same content as that of verse 36–37: "nothing can exist apart from what is." This interpretation has been followed by Raven,{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} but rejected by Guthrie, because it introduces, according to him, elements alien to the argument about generation and corruption that dominates the section as a whole. He interprets as follows: 'what is not' can only be generated from 'what is not'.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=41}} In this sense, it would be one of the first versions of the phrase ''[[ex nihilo nihil fit]]'', "from nothing nothing arises", which is also an axiom already accepted by the "philosophers of nature', as [[Aristotle]] observes (''Physics'' 187a34).{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=43}} Throughout the fragment there is no direct argument against corruption, but it can be deduced from postulating as exclusive the "is" and the "is not" (v. 16), and rejecting the "is not" (vv. 17– 18): perishing involves accepting that "what is" might "not be" in the future. Likewise, the generation implies that "what is" has not been in the past (vv. 19–20).{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} From the point of view of the history of thought, Parmenides achieves a true intellectual achievement by distinguishing here the ''enduring'' from the ''eternal''. What is ''enduring'' is in time: it is the same now as it was thousands of years ago, or in the future. This is how the ancients thought of the perdurability of the cosmos or physical universe, as distinct from the eternity of what it is (Plato, ''Timaeus'' 38c2, 37e–38a). While eternity was posited by the Ionians—[[Anaximander]] said that their ἄπειρον was immortal, eternal, and ageless—they had also thought that their respective principles were starting points of the world. Parmenides, on the other hand, shows that if it is accepted that what is is eternal, it must be one, and cannot be the beginning of a multiform world, of an order of plural elements. Much less of a world subject to becoming, as Aristotle also expresses as the opinion of the ancient philosophers: "what is does not become, because it already is, and nothing could come to be from what it is not" ('Physics' ' 191a30).{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=44}}

==== B8.22-25: "What is" is whole ====
From verse 22 to 25, the poem deals with the condition of integrity of "what is". No parts can be distinguished in it, since it is uniform: there is no more and less in it, it is simply full of "what is", and is alone with itself. In this passage Parmenides denies two ideas present in the cosmogonies and in the speculations of thinkers before him: the gradation of being and the [[emptiness]]. Anaximenes had spoken of the condensation and rarefaction of his principle (13 A 7), actions that, in addition to generating movement (which has already been rejected by Parmenides), supposes assuming certain degrees of density, but strictly adhering to "what is" prevents this type of gradual differences of existence.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} In this cosmogony, for the cosmos to emerge from the beginning, it must have some unevenness of texture, lack of cohesion or balance.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=47}} It also prevents differentiating things according to their nature, as Heraclitus had intended (22 B 1). Guthrie rejects the reference to Anaximenes exposed above.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=46}} But above all he seems to reject here the idea of emptiness, which the [[Pythagoreans]] considered as necessary to separate the units, physical and arithmetical at the same time, from which the world was composed.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}}{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=47}} Apart from these historical considerations, the passage has generated some controversy regarding the dimension that Parmenides mentioned when referring to continuity. Owen interpreted this continuity of being to refer exclusively to time,<ref>Owen, ''Eleatic questions'', p. 97</ref> but Guthrie understands that the beginning of the passage ("neither differentiable is...", οὐδε διαρετόν ἐστιν, v. 22) introduces a new and independent argument from the previous one, and that the predicate of the homogeneous ("is a uniform whole", πᾶν ἔστιν ὁμοῖον, same verse), even based on what is said in verse 11: "it must be completely, or not be at all", that is, in a part of the argument against the generation, has a further consequence: in the present continuous of "what is," he exists fully, and not in varying degrees.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=47}} Schofield indicates that Parmenides thinks of a continuity of what is, in whatever dimension he occupies, and this quote also refers to a temporal continuity.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}}

==== B8.26-33 "What is" is motionless ====
[[File:Odysseus Sirens BM E440 n2.jpg|thumb|200px|right|[[Odysseus]] and the sirens. Detail of an Attic [[stamnos]] of [[red-figure pottery|red-figure]] from [[Vulci]], 480–470&nbsp;BCE, [[British Museum]]. Illustrates the passage from ''Odyssey''. XII where the hero is ''immobile'', constrained by the ''bonds'' that hold him to the mast of his ship.]]
Immobility is treated from verses 26 to 33. This is understood first as a denial of transit, as generation and corruption, which have already been repelled by true conviction (vv. 26-28). Then he says that "what is" remains in its place, in itself and by itself, compelled by necessity, which holds it "with strong ties" (vv. 29-31). An additional reason for his immobility is that he lacks nothing (v. 32), since, lacking something, he would lack everything (v. 33).

==== B8.42-49: "What is" is perfect ====
[[File:Being Parmenides.png|thumb|Parmenides describes "what is" as a rounded ball, with its entire surface equidistant from the center.{{efn|{{harvnb|DK 28B8}}.42-49}}]]
In verse 42,{{efn|''What are given as verses 34-41 in [[Diels-Kranz numbering]] have been displaced from the original position after verse 52 (See {{harvnb|Palmer|2020|loc=2.3}})''}} the discourse deals with the attribute of perfection: "what is" is similar to the mass of a well-rounded ball, it cannot be less somewhere and more somewhere else, all of it is equidistant from the center (vv. 43–44) Remaining identical to itself, it fulfills its own limits.(vv. 45–49).

[[File: OdysseyNausikaa.png | thumb | 250px | Illustration of the game scene of Nausicaa and her handmaidens with a ball (σφαίρα), by [[John Flaxman]].]]
Parmenides (v. 43) describes what is as a "σφαίρης" (sphaires), which in classical Greek means "that which has a spherical shape" which in antiquity led some commentators to claim that Parmenides believed in a "spherical universe"<ref>Hippolytus, ''Refutation of all heresies'', I, 11 , 2 = DK 28 A 23</ref> or  a "spherical god"<ref>Aetius, DK 28 A 31.</ref> or even a statement about the roundness of the Earth.<ref>Theophrastus in Diog. VIII, 4 and Aetius, III, 15, 17 (for both citations, cf. DK 28 A 44).</ref> This interpretation has a parallel with the later geometrical model of the universe in Plato's ''Timaeus'', where the Demiurge makes the world spherical, because the sphere is that figure that contains all the others, the most perfect and similar to itself.<ref>Cornford, ''Plato and Parmenides'', p. 44.</ref> However, both Plato and Parmenides distinguished between the "sensible" world and the "intelligible" world, and, considering the world of the senses unreal, so it is unlikely either of them was intending to make a statement about the shape of the material universe.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|pp=39-40}}{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}} Additionally, in the [[Homeric Greek|Homeric language]] used by Parmenides, ''σφαίρα'' is nothing more than a ball, like the one they played with [[Nausicaa]] and her female servants upon reaching them [[Odysseus]].<ref>''Od.'' VI, 100</ref><ref name="Owenp95">Owen, «Eleatic questions», p. 95</ref>{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=57}} The Parmenidean entity could be thought of as a sphere, but it is ultimately neither spherical nor spatial, taking into account that it is a reality not perceptible by the senses, it is timeless, it does not change its quality and it is immobile. The "boundaries" are not spatial, but a sign of invariance.{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=59}} The limits are also not temporary, since this would involve accepting generation and corruption. The comparison with the sphere is required because it represents a reality in which every point is the same distance from the center, and therefore no point is more "true" than another. It is an image of the continuity and uniformity of the entity.<ref name="Owenp95" /><ref>Stokes, ''One and Many'', p. 140</ref>

Already [[Plato]] had understood that the Eleatics denied movement because the One lacked a place where it could move;<ref>(''Theaetetus '' 180de)</ref> this idea of the absence of a void was first expressed by [[Melissus of Samos]].<ref>Kirk & Strokes, ''Phronesis'' V , 1960, p. 1–4</ref>  In this attribute of what is, the idea of limit (πεῖρας) plays a fundamental role. It is associated with bonds or chains, such as those with which [[Odysseus]] was tied by his companions in ''Od.'' XII, 179. These uses maintain the idea of a certain deprivation of spatial mobility. The idea of limit is also related to "what is established by the gods." Because, in the poem, one of the arguments in favor of immobility is the fact that “what is” cannot be incomplete, this would be “illicit”: οὐκ ἀτελεύτητον τό ἐόν θἔμις εἶναι (v. 32). The term ἀτελεύτητον is used in ''Il.'', I, 527: there [[Zeus]] says that what he assents to «does not remain unfulfilled». This is equivalent to Parmenides' "is perfect" (τετελεσμένον ἔστι v. 42).{{sfn|Guthrie|1979|p=49}} The use of «limit» linked to the sense of «perfection» or «consummation» is also attested in ''Il''. XVIII, 501 and ''Od'' V, 289.<ref>Owen, ''Studies in Presocratic Philosophy'', II, p. 65</ref> The "limit" is, moreover, one of the fundamental principles of the [[Pythagoreans]], and heads the left column of their [[Table of Opposites]] (58 B 4–5 = ''Met''. 986a23), column in which were also, among others, the One, the Still and the Good.{{sfn|Kirk|Raven|Schofield|1982}}