Ainigma : Plato’s esotericism in context

Show simple item record

dc.contributor.advisor Finamore, John F.
dc.contributor.coadvisor Ruttkamp-Bloem, Emma
dc.contributor.postgraduate Coombs, Wehan Murray
dc.date.accessioned 2023-02-08T07:26:31Z
dc.date.available 2023-02-08T07:26:31Z
dc.date.created 2023-04
dc.date.issued 2022
dc.description Thesis (PhD (Philosophy))--University of Pretoria, 2022. en_US
dc.description.abstract Based primarily on Aristotle’s testimony of the existence of ‘unwritten doctrines’ of Plato, alongside Plato’s comments on the issue in the Seventh Epistle and the critique of writing in the Phaedrus, the question of Plato’s esotericism, that is, whether he engaged in the conscious concealment of aspects of his philosophy, has been an enduring topic of Platonic exegesis. In modern times, the controversy has reached something of a stalemate between the esotericist versus anti-esotericist camps, being limited to, broadly, a widespread acceptance of Vlastos’ arguments against the existence of unwritten doctrines on the one hand, and the Tübingen-Milan school’s focus on oral, Pythagorean doctrines on the other. This thesis suggests a way out of this stalemate on several fronts. Firstly, by integrating the insights of the burgeoning field of Western Esotericism, so that Platonic exegesis may be brought up to speed with the latest developments in the field of esoteric studies. Secondly, by taking a contextual approach that seeks to identify esotericism in thinkers and traditions that had a clear influence on Plato on the one hand (such as the allegorical tradition of interpreting Greek mythic poetry, the ancient Greek Mystery traditions and the Presocratics), and esotericism in thinkers and traditions that were influenced by Plato on the other (such as the middle and late Platonists). Finally, with these tools in hand, I engage in a meta-textual analysis of the markers of esotericism in the Platonic dialogues in general and the Phaedrus in particular. In the process, I identify a particular kind of philosophical esotericism in the Platonic context that I term ‘dual esotericism’, the confluence of textual and extra-textual esotericism in a mutually supportive and recursive way. en_US
dc.description.availability Unrestricted en_US
dc.description.degree PhD (Philosophy) en_US
dc.description.department Philosophy en_US
dc.identifier.citation * en_US
dc.identifier.doi Disclaimer Letter en_US
dc.identifier.other A2023
dc.identifier.uri https://repository.up.ac.za/handle/2263/89290
dc.language.iso en en_US
dc.publisher University of Pretoria
dc.rights © 2022 University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria.
dc.subject UCTD en_US
dc.subject Plato en_US
dc.subject Platonism en_US
dc.subject Esotericism en_US
dc.subject Neoplatonism en_US
dc.subject Mythology en_US
dc.subject Mystery en_US
dc.subject Enigma en_US
dc.subject Phaedrus en_US
dc.title Ainigma : Plato’s esotericism in context en_US
dc.type Thesis en_US


Files in this item

This item appears in the following Collection(s)

Show simple item record