The Philosophical Pleiad and College Teachers
Daniel B. Levine
-- University of Arkansas Teaching Academy Banquet --
November 13, 2002
Fellow teachers, I am honored to be asked to share a bit of wisdom with you tonight, and am humbled by the invitation.
Recently, I have been learning a little bit of Astronomy, following in the footsteps of Professor Dave Fredrick, my Classical Studies colleague, and member of the University of Arkansas Teaching Academy, whose generosity with his time and his telescope mean a great deal to me. The more I learn about astronomy and its related lore, the more I see the unity of all knowledge. Last Saturday night, from a campground at Devil's Den we looked at the Pleiades, up there past Orion -- in Taurus' shoulder. These "Seven Sisters" have a rich mythology of their own: daughters of Atlas and Pleione, all but one had affairs with the gods, and were put in the heavens either to follow their sisters the Hyades, who had been turned into stars earlier, or to save them from the unwanted advances of the hunter Orion, who still perpetually chases them through the heavens.
They have given to the English language a most useful word: Pleiad, a group of seven related eminent people or things. Thus, the 16th century French Pleiad of seven poets, including Ronsard and Du Bellay; the Philosophical Pleiad of the Seven Sages of Archaic Greece; the Alexandrian Peliad of Hellenistic poets; the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, Seven Against Thebes; the seven Kings of Rome (not to mention its seven hills); and we can make up our own: How about a "Hollywood Pleiad": The Magnificent Seven; or "The Kurosawa Pleiad": the Seven Samurai ... you get the idea.
I've always been interested in the Seven Sages of Ancient Greece, and would like to share some thoughts on their relevance to our own profession: teaching. Of course, you remember them all: Thales of Miletus, Bias of Priene, Pittacus of Mitylene, Cleobulus of Lindus, Solon of Athens, Chilon of Sparta, and Periander of Corinth. There was ancient argument about the list, of course, but this is the most "standard" one. Who were these guys, and why did the Greeks consider them so brilliant? They were men who lived in the sixth century BCE, most from Asia Minor, where eastern ideas were percolating in their fertile Greek imaginations and developing into what would later become 'Philosophy' and 'Science' as we know them today.
The Seven said important things. One ancient writer tells us that "in the fore-temple at Delphi are written maxims useful for the life of men, inscribed by those whom the Greeks called sages." To these men the Greeks attributed sayings such as "Know thyself," "Nothing in excess," "Too many workers spoil the work," and one which I need to remember tonight: "Control your tongue, especially at a banquet."
What did these Sages have in common? A fellow classics professor at Princeton, Richard Martin, has recently given the following three common characteristics of the sages: they wrote poetry (prose had not yet been invented), they were involved in politics (many in fact held high office), and they were what Martin calls "Performers of Wisdom," that is, they did things publicly that demonstrated their knowledge to others. They showed by example what it meant to be wise. And others remembered these public enactments, and learned from them. That makes them teachers -- like us. They were award-winning teachers, too. What they taught lives on, thousands of years later. They helped advance the cause of learning in all fields, from engineering to astronomy, meteorology, law, the arts, business, sociology, you name it. All of this several generations before the 'golden age'; more than a century before Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.
Consider Thales. The Greeks called him 'the sage astronomer,' and attributed to him treatises on the Solstice, and the Equinox, and said that he was the first Greek to predict solar eclipses. In addition, Thales was the original 'absent-minded professor.' Once, when an old woman took him outside at night to observe the stars, he fell into a ditch. She said, "How can you expect to know all about the heavens, Thales, when you cannot even see what is before your own feet?"
Thales demonstrated his knowledge of economics, too. In order to show how easy it is to grow rich, he rented all the local olive presses, since he foresaw that it would be a good season for olives, and thus amassed a fortune, because everyone had to come to him to make their oil. He measured the height of the pyramids in Egypt by measuring their shadow at the time when the shadow of everything was the same height as the figures themselves. When he once taught that living and dying were no different, one of the honors students raised his hand and said, "Why don't you just die then, Thales?" "Because," the Sage replied, it makes no difference. When asked which was older, night or day, he said "Night is older... by one day." This wise man was also a wise guy.
Consider Solon of Athens. Like a good Provost or College President, he curtailed honors for athletes, and argued that such sports heroes get too many rewards already, at the expense of more important people, namely the normal citizens who fall in battle, and whose children, Solon said, the State ought to educate with the money taken from the excessive gifts which had earlier been the athletes' privilege. He once pretended to be crazy in order to get the citizens' attention to a war which they had neglected to their peril. He recited an inspiring poem, and led the Athenians to victory. His clever performance of wisdom, we might say, got the class's attention and promoted active learning.
Consider Chilon, the Ephor of Sparta. He was a man of few words (a Laconic Spartan), but he always made his point. He was once asked what the difference is between the educated and the uneducated, and he answered: the ones who have an education have good hopes. He could have been a college recruiter. He also gave advice to lecturers (like College Teachers and after-dinner speakers): "Let not your tongue outrun your thought. Someone who is speaking should not move his hands around, for it is a mark of insanity."
Consider Pittacus of Lesbos. He was a soldier and political leader. He made laws for the people of Mitylene: one was that the penalty should be doubled for an offence committed under the influence of alcohol. This was a local problem, because Lesbos was known for its most excellent wines. When his political enemy Alcaeus fell into his hands, Pittacus is reported to have spared him, saying " Pardon is better than revenge."
Consider Bias of Priene, in Asia Minor. He was an excellent lawyer, and won many cases. In fact, he died in the courtroom, before he could hear that he had won his last case. He was sitting with his head resting on his grandson's bosom, and just didn't get up. When asked what occupation gives a man most pleasure, he said: Making a profit. He wisely said that as a judge, he would rather decide a dispute between two of his enemies than between two of his friends. No matter what he ruled in the first case, one of the two enemies would become his friend, but in the second case, one of his two friends would become an enemy.
Consider Cleobulus of Lindus, on the island of Rhodes. He composed riddles, as did his daughter Cleobulina. Here's one of his:
There is one father, with twelve sons, and each of these has twice thirty daughters different in feature; some of the daughters are white, an others again are black; they are immortal, and yet they all die. (Answer: the year)
Here's one of his daughter's riddles:
Full on my ear with a horn-bearing shin did a dead donkey smite me. (Answer: Phrygian flute: So we may well be astonished that the ass, which otherwise is most gross and unmelodious, yet provides us with a bone with is most fine and melodious.)
Cleobulus was a great believer in education: he said that girls needed to be educated as well as boys: "We ought to give our daughters to their husbands maidens in years, but women in wisdom." He promoted life-long learning: we should, he said, listen more than talk, and be lovers of learning rather than ignoramuses.
Consider Periander of Corinth. Some sources leave him off the list of Sages because he was a tyrant who committed bloody crimes, but most people leave him on, though grudgingly. Paradoxically, one of his apothegms was "Democracy is better than tyranny." He was rich, so he could afford to say: ''Never do anything for money; leave gain to trades pursued for gain." He planned to dig a canal through the Isthmus of Corinth, a dream that was not realized until the 19th century of our era.
The most famous tradition that ties all the sages together has to do with their modesty and what we might call their collegiality. There are half-a-dozen versions of this story, but it basically goes as follows: some fishermen find a tripod, which was a valuable item, worth the equivalent of many thousands of dollars, traditionally given as a prize in the games. Of course, it was a source of contention. To whom should it be given? The people consulted Apollo's oracle at Delphi as to its rightful owner. The god replied that "whosoever is most wise" should possess it. So, they gave it to Thales, but he did not consider himself as wise as another of the sages, so he passed it to another, and that sage had the same humble opinion of his own wisdom, and so passed it to the next, and so on, until the tripod came back to Thales, who sent it to the shrine of Apollo, because, in truth, it is the god who is the wisest of all. In this world of competitive wisdom, it is good to remind ourselves of this example of humility.
What can we as teachers learn from the Seven Sages? We might consider their respect for each other in spite of their different ways of teaching, different areas of expertise, and different geographical regions. We might see that there are many ways to get at the truth, and we might recognize that no single person has all the answers. Large numbers of people embody wisdom. Remember: Education is important. Remember to teach with humor, to teach with humility. Share your wisdom, but keep your ears open to others, too. Perform your wisdom. Give your students the "good hope" of education. Know yourself. Do nothing in excess. Keep your eyes on the stars, and for goodness sakes watch where you're walking. Grant pardon more often than you take vengeance. Pass the tripod on.
Tonight, as we enjoy this food and good company, we should remember the tradition that on several occasions the Sages gathered at a banquet. At these times, they enjoyed conversation, food and drink. In fact, Plutarch wrote a long dramatic account of this event, called "The Dinner of the Seven Wise Men." In it, at the end, after a long evening of spouting clever sayings and considering the wisdom of Homer, Hesiod, and each other, Solon quotes Homer to bring the banquet to a close. He says:
"Well then, we should have faith in the very great wisdom of Homer who also says,
Nyx d' ede telethei; agathon kai nykti pithesthai.
Night-time advances apace: 'tis well to pay heed to the night time.
So, if it please the company, let us offer a libation to the Muses and Poseidon and Amphitrite (Poseidon's wife), and be going." And thus the Sages' dinner party came to an end.
And thus ours comes to an end, too.
I bid you good night, Sages. Teach wisely. Thank you.
Bibliography
Mark R. Chartrand, Skyguide: A Field Guide to the Heavens, revised ed. (New York, 1990).
Ivor H. Evans, Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. Centenary Edition, revised. (New York, 1981).
Diogenes Laertius, Lives of the Philosophers (Book 1) Tr . R. D. Hicks. Loeb Classical Library. Harvard UP, 1966 [1925].
Richard P. Martin, "The Seven Sages as Performers of Wisdom" in Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece (ed. C. Dougherty and L. Kurke) Oxford, 1998; pp. 108-128.
Pausanias Description of Greece (10.24.1) Tr. Perseus Digital Library.
Plutarch, Dinner of the Seven Sages (Moralia 146b ff) Tr. F. C. Babbitt. Loeb Classical Library. Harvard UP, 1928.
Edward Tripp, Crowell's Handbook of Classical Mythology New York, 1970.
Daniel B. Levine
Professor, Classical Studies
updated: November 13, 2002
http://www.uark.edu/campus-resources/dlevine/Vita.html