HERACLITUS OF EPHESUS
HERACLITUS OF EPHESUS
Fragments
Fragments
The philosopher who saw the world as an ever-living fire
Discover what’s inside the box
Discover what’s inside the box
Details that make
the difference:
Details that make
the difference:
Bilingual edition
Ancient Greek and English, fragment by fragment: Diels's 1922 Greek first, the English translation after it, and the commentary right below, so every word discussed can be checked.
Ancient Greek and English, fragment by fragment: Diels's 1922 Greek first, the English translation after it, and the commentary right below, so every word discussed can be checked.
Supporting texts
The nine pseudo-Heraclitean epistles in Greek and English, apocryphal but the first portrait antiquity left of him, alongside the author's prologue and an epilogue tracing the logos after Heraclitus.
The nine pseudo-Heraclitean epistles in Greek and English, apocryphal but the first portrait antiquity left of him, alongside the author's prologue and an epilogue tracing the logos after Heraclitus.
Editorial apparatus
273 endnotes identifying ancient sources and textual variants, a commentary on each of the 150 fragments, an appendix in Diels-Kranz order with each fragment's ancient source, a bibliography and an index.
273 endnotes identifying ancient sources and textual variants, a commentary on each of the 150 fragments, an appendix in Diels-Kranz order with each fragment's ancient source, a bibliography and an index.
Translation
Augusto C. Fleck's translation and commentary, rendered into English with his interpretive choices preserved and checked against Diels's 1922 Greek text printed here.
Augusto C. Fleck's translation and commentary, rendered into English with his interpretive choices preserved and checked against Diels's 1922 Greek text printed here.
Hardcover binding
Durable, premium hardcover with a ribbon marker, designed for sustained reading and a lifetime on the shelf. [Page count TBD] pages, [22 cm tall; final format TBD].
Durable, premium hardcover with a ribbon marker, designed for sustained reading and a lifetime on the shelf. [Page count TBD] pages, [22 cm tall; final format TBD].
Logos Reader included
The River and the Flame, Logos Reader vol. 1, no. 11. A companion text to deepen your reading.
The River and the Flame, Logos Reader vol. 1, no. 11. A companion text to deepen your reading.
Fragments
Fragments
The book that turned change into a law of the world
The book that turned change into a law of the world
The book that turned change into a law of the world
Written in Ephesus around 500 BC and, legend says, laid in the temple of Artemis, Heraclitus's book is lost. What survives are about 150 sentences, quoted by Aristotle, Plutarch, Hippolytus and others, that still read like riddles.
Written in Ephesus around 500 BC and, legend says, laid in the temple of Artemis, Heraclitus's book is lost. What survives are about 150 sentences, quoted by Aristotle, Plutarch, Hippolytus and others, that still read like riddles.
His argument starts from a simple claim: the world is not made of things, but of exchanges. On those who step into the same rivers, other and other waters flow. The river stays a river by changing, and the world is an ever-living fire, kindling and going out in measures.
His argument starts from a simple claim: the world is not made of things, but of exchanges. On those who step into the same rivers, other and other waters flow. The river stays a river by changing, and the world is an ever-living fire, kindling and going out in measures.
Behind the flux he found a measure, a Logos: opposites held in tension, like the bow and the lyre. Day and night, war and peace, the way up and the way down are one and the same. He says more: strife is not a flaw in the world but its father.
Behind the flux he found a measure, a Logos: opposites held in tension, like the bow and the lyre. Day and night, war and peace, the way up and the way down are one and the same. He says more: strife is not a flaw in the world but its father.
Heraclitus doesn't call this chaos. He thought the order was there for anyone awake enough to see it, though most people live as if asleep. Plato would build his Forms against the flux, Hegel would call him the source of his Logic, and Nietzsche would call him a kindred spirit. He said what he meant to say anyway: A man's character is his fate.
Heraclitus doesn't call this chaos. He thought the order was there for anyone awake enough to see it, though most people live as if asleep. Plato would build his Forms against the flux, Hegel would call him the source of his Logic, and Nietzsche would call him a kindred spirit. He said what he meant to say anyway: A man's character is his fate.
Heraclitus of Ephesus: The philosopher of the Logos.
Heraclitus of Ephesus: The philosopher of the Logos.
Heraclitus of Ephesus: The philosopher of the Logos.
Heraclitus was born in Ephesus, on the Ionian coast, around 540 BC, and was at the height of his work around 504 BC. He came from one of the city's oldest families, and tradition says he gave the hereditary title of basileus, a largely priestly office, to his brother.
Heraclitus was born in Ephesus, on the Ionian coast, around 540 BC, and was at the height of his work around 504 BC. He came from one of the city's oldest families, and tradition says he gave the hereditary title of basileus, a largely priestly office, to his brother.
He set a high bar for what counts as wisdom. Knowing many things, he wrote, doesn't teach understanding, and he named Hesiod, Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hecataeus as proof. For him, wisdom meant grasping the logos, the order that runs through all things.
He set a high bar for what counts as wisdom. Knowing many things, he wrote, doesn't teach understanding, and he named Hesiod, Pythagoras, Xenophanes and Hecataeus as proof. For him, wisdom meant grasping the logos, the order that runs through all things.
His contemporaries called him "the Obscure." When Euripides gave Socrates a copy of his book, Socrates is said to have answered that what he understood was excellent, and what he didn't probably was too, but it would take a Delian diver to reach the bottom.
His contemporaries called him "the Obscure." When Euripides gave Socrates a copy of his book, Socrates is said to have answered that what he understood was excellent, and what he didn't probably was too, but it would take a Delian diver to reach the bottom.
What survives are about 150 fragments, short and dense, and endlessly reread. Plato argued with them, the Stoics built on them, and Hegel, Nietzsche and Heidegger each found their own beginnings in them. Twenty-five centuries later, they still haven't been exhausted.
What survives are about 150 fragments, short and dense, and endlessly reread. Plato argued with them, the Stoics built on them, and Hegel, Nietzsche and Heidegger each found their own beginnings in them. Twenty-five centuries later, they still haven't been exhausted.
Inside the Logos Reader
Inside the Logos Reader
The River and the Flame: Heraclitus and the Hidden Harmony
The River and the Flame: Heraclitus and the Hidden Harmony
This issue includes an original Logos essay, and three complementary historical texts:
This issue includes an original Logos essay, and three complementary historical texts:
Heraclitus and the Common Logos: A Logos Reader original in seven sections covering the Ephesian and his book, logos as speech and order, the one and the opposites, river and flame, soul, character and law, the One Wise, and the hidden harmony.
Heraclitus and the Common Logos: A Logos Reader original in seven sections covering the Ephesian and his book, logos as speech and order, the one and the opposites, river and flame, soul, character and law, the One Wise, and the hidden harmony.
The Language of Heraclitus, by Bruno Snell: Originally "Die Sprache Heraklits," Hermes 61 (1926), translated for this edition. Snell, later one of the century's most influential classical philologists, reads the philosopher through his words: the images, inversions, rhythms and wordplay are the thought itself.
The Language of Heraclitus, by Bruno Snell: Originally "Die Sprache Heraklits," Hermes 61 (1926), translated for this edition. Snell, later one of the century's most influential classical philologists, reads the philosopher through his words: the images, inversions, rhythms and wordplay are the thought itself.
The Meaning of Logos in Heraclitus, by Adolf Busse: Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 75 (1926), translated for this edition. A deliberate philological brake on turning Heraclitus into the prophet of a cosmic Reason.
The Meaning of Logos in Heraclitus, by Adolf Busse: Rheinisches Museum für Philologie 75 (1926), translated for this edition. A deliberate philological brake on turning Heraclitus into the prophet of a cosmic Reason.
The Logos of Heraclitus, by Marie-Joseph Lagrange: Revue biblique 32 (1923). The founder of the École biblique weighs the line from Heraclitus to the Stoics and the Fourth Gospel, and refuses to turn resemblance into genealogy.
The Logos of Heraclitus, by Marie-Joseph Lagrange: Revue biblique 32 (1923). The founder of the École biblique weighs the line from Heraclitus to the Stoics and the Fourth Gospel, and refuses to turn resemblance into genealogy.
Further Reading Academic references for deeper study.
Further Reading Academic references for deeper study.
Further Reading Academic references for deeper study.
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