From: Elizaphanian (Elizaphanian@members.v21.co.uk)
Date: Sat Dec 14 2002 - 09:36:28 GMT
Hi David,
> "...Phaedrus was clearly a Platonist by temperment and when the classes
> shifted to Plato he was greatly relieved. His Quality and Plato's Good
were
> so similar that if it hadn't been for some notes Phaedrus left I might
have
> thought they were identical" (331-2)
I've been doing some work on neo-Platonism, and it is remarkable how strong
the continuities of thought are between Pirsig and someone like Plotinus.
Pirsig - or is it Phaedrus? - does seem to fit neatly into the mainstream of
Western 'philosophical mysticism', although he has changed and tweaked
things. (Mainly due to incorporating an evolutionary perspective, I think.)
The 'church fathers' (early Christian mystics, eg Origen, culminating in
Dionysius) worked out of a neo-Platonic background, but became distinctly
different; in particular they developed a detailed critique of 'intellect'
in the neo-Platonic sense. The 'One' and 'God' are radically different. In
particular, the One doesn't care if you approach it or not; the journey of
philosophical mysticism is 'from the alone to the Alone'. Needless to say
the God of christian mysticism, met in the cloud of unknowing (and through
the liturgy), is rather different. That's where I'm coming from.
As time goes on, I become less and less a 'MoQite'. An intriguing start
anyhow. I look forward to the next bit.
Sam
The actual outlook is very dark, and any serious thought should start from
that fact. (George Orwell)
MOQ.ORG - http://www.moq.org
Mail Archive - http://alt.venus.co.uk/hypermail/moq_discuss/
MD Queries - horse@darkstar.uk.net
To unsubscribe from moq_discuss follow the instructions at:
http://www.moq.org/md/subscribe.html
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Dec 14 2002 - 09:32:55 GMT