Marcilio Ficino, a "neo-Platonist" in the Renaissance, first put forward "Platonic love". He believes that love is the longing and yearning between the soul and the soul, which also makes future generations think of spiritual love when they mention "Plato-style love" and think that this is the love model put forward by Plato. In fact, Plato's understanding of "love" has surpassed the simple love of the same sex or the opposite sex. He also raised love to the height of philosophy, thinking that "love" is the eternal pursuit of "beauty" or "goodness". Next, let's really go in and find out what the great ancient Greek philosophers thought of "love".
Schools in Athens
1. A cocktail party about "love" Plato's view of "love" is mostly reflected in the "drinking articles" in his book Plato's Dialogue. Plato expressed his thoughts by discussing love and Cupid at the reception.
This reception is actually a celebration dinner. Agathon, a tragic playwright, specially invited several friends to celebrate the award of his works. After the ceremony, everyone sat around the table, but they were all in trouble. The reason is that Bauza Virginia, Auric Mareuse and Agathon, the three biggest drinkers, were still dizzy last night and could not party for another night. Therefore, it is suggested that the party time can be entertained by discussing problems. Rhetoric expert Roger Federer is very active. He pointed out that poets and wise men praised all kinds of gods, but no one ever praised eros, the great god of love. He suggested that this wine party should be used to pay tribute to the god of love, and we should discuss God's love and love together. Therefore, a grand reception on "love" was held among the wise men in ancient Greece.
Pictures of cocktail parties on ancient Greek pottery bottles
Fidel, Bauza, Auric HiMarcus, aristophanes, Agathon and Socrates all expressed their views in turn. Their expression from the shallow to the deep is actually the progress of Plato's thinking logic and the deepening of thinking. The whole reception discussion is divided into three stages. First of all, Fidel, Bauza and Auric Himarcus expressed their views. They discussed the difference between the object of love and love. Later, aristophanes and Agathon deepened their dialogue and discussed the quality of love. Finally, Socrates brought the dialogue to a climax. He not only refuted Agathon's point of view, but also raised "love" from concrete to abstract, and summarized the true essence of love from single love.
2. Noble and despicable love In the conversation of the first five people, we can clearly feel that they are discussing different love, that is, noble and despicable love. And this kind of love is connected with the love of the same sex and the love of the opposite sex. It contains a lot of our understanding of "platonic love" today.
The highest happiness of young people is to have a lover who loves them, and the highest happiness of lovers is to have a young lover. Gay men prevailed in ancient Greece, and older men loved younger teenagers. The former was called lovers, and the latter was called lovers. The relationship between lovers is very complicated. They may be teachers and students or friends. In short, they love each other and appreciate each other. The prevalence of homosexuality is probably related to the low status of women in ancient Greek society and the friendship cultivated by men fighting side by side.
In such a relationship between lovers, the older one actually plays an educational role in guiding young men to acquire morality and knowledge. For example, Socrates and Alkki Buades are very different in age, but Alkki Buades admired Socrates' talent and regarded him as a mentor. On the other hand, women lack knowledge and the right to speak in public life. For the ancient Greeks who attached importance to spiritual "beauty" and ideological and moral exchanges, same-sex love naturally played a more important role in spiritual life.
parthenon
In the ancient Greek concept, same-sex love is not only shameful, but also noble and beautiful. At the reception, aristophanes told a fairy tale, which laid the foundation for the affection between the same sex. He said that a long time ago, there was a third kind of human in the world-hermaphroditism. Born in the moon, there are both male characteristics represented by the sun and female characteristics represented by the earth. Because they are energetic and strong, they even try their best to fight against the gods. This annoyed Zeus. Zeus, in a rage, split them in half. As a result, once a person becomes two, this half often misses the other half and constantly pursues the other half. There are many combinations, between men, between women and between the sexes. In aristophanes's view, the combination between people is the noblest. Because, two men must be the most masculine and outstanding, and they will attract each other. They are politically gifted and will look for men like themselves in the other half. This myth undoubtedly gives a reasonable explanation for men's love-seeking their own integrity, and also endows this emotion with noble quality.
* * * Ancient Greek soldiers who fought side by side.
Although male love also has physical factors, it is more often considered as "spiritual love". Because this attraction is more because of the quality and morality of the other party than lust. This kind of emotion combines the pursuit of emotion and moral quality, that is, as aristophanes said, their souls call their combination. On the contrary, the love of the opposite sex, in the eyes of the ancient Greeks, is only despicable physical love. They believe that the combination of men and women is only an instinctive act of reproduction, not a true love of the soul. Therefore, these two kinds of love often existed at the same time in ancient Greece. One was to pursue spiritual communication, and the other was just to breed one's own blood. Noble love is a lover who loves good character, while inferior love is attached to the body rather than the soul.
But this is not the end of Plato's concept of love. Socrates started from the same-sex "spiritual love" and revealed the true meaning of love at the reception.
3. Metaphor of God's love-the eternal pursuit of "beauty" Before Socrates spoke, he refuted Agathon's assertion that God's love is perfect in his own unique and almost annoying way. Then, through the mouth of a woman named Diotima, he told the origin of God's love-the eternal pursuit of "beauty".
Cupid loves beautiful things, but a person loves what he lacks and doesn't have. Isn't Cupid just lacking in love? If Cupid is not perfect, is he ugly and bad? Obviously not, so what is Cupid? This may start with the birth of Cupid.
At a gathering of the gods, Borodo, the god of abundance, took a few sips of nectar and fell asleep. At this moment, the goddess of poverty Li Bingran passed by. She is poor, so she wants to have a baby with Bo. So they got together and gave birth to the god of love-Elo. That's right, if love combines the dual characteristics of wealth and poverty. Sometimes, like his mother, he is slovenly, barefoot and homeless. It seems that he has never seen the beauty in this world. But he inherited his father's attributes, and he will always be active and seek the beautiful things in the world. Even though he often loses everything, he never gives up. I see. Love is in between. He is not an ordinary god. He is an elf, between man and God. Just like lovers and pursuers have two sides, God's love itself is between beauty and ugliness, good and evil, knowledge and ignorance, and it is the unity of richness and scarcity. Love is the eternal pursuit of beauty!
Plato
What we often feel and pursue may be a "beautiful" body. But we can't stop there. If we move on, we will find a type of beauty from this beauty. From one type of beauty, we will find all the beauty by constantly receiving the education of love. In the end, what we love is actually beauty and goodness itself. From the initial stage of life, we may be fascinated by jewels, treasures and beautiful teenagers. Stepping into the next stage, they may become indifferent and find a spirit in it. At this time, the "spiritual love" between men becomes more important. But in the end, when we find the pure, true and out-and-out beauty behind all the beautiful things, this kind of "love" that transcends individual things becomes our own yearning for beauty, and we also know what the true meaning of love is.
Ancient Greek gods
Different from God, as ordinary people, our flesh will disappear one day, so how can we make our "love" last forever? At the banquet, Socrates also gave us the answer. The pursuit of "beauty" makes us eager to inherit. The natural union between men and women is a physical continuation. At a higher level, for the continuation of morality, reputation and noble honor, we need to pursue knowledge and leave behind achievements that future generations admire. For example, Homer's immortal poems and Solon's great laws. When it comes to pursuing beauty itself, you will be integrated with beauty and goodness, and your soul will be immortal.
Wen said: As Socrates said at the reception: "Beauty is not manifested in a face, hands or some other part of the body, nor in language or knowledge, nor in something in a certain place, not in animals, not on the ground, not in the sky, not in anything else, but in itself and itself."
It seems that we misunderstood Plato. Influenced by his idealism, we naturally think that the so-called "Platonic love" is purely rational "spiritual love". This is not the case. The love in his heart can even make people despair. Plato did not oppose physical love, and even advocated "same-sex love" to some extent. But this is by no means the end of his perceptual knowledge of "love". His love has long gone beyond concrete feelings and reached the eternal pursuit of beauty and goodness. And such a pursuit may give us an eternal direction in today's era of emotional flooding.
Reference: Translated by Wang Taiqing: Plato's Dialogues, Commercial Press, 2006.
Tu Jiangbo: Discrimination of "Platonic Love" —— Based on the text interpretation of "Drinking", Journal of Xi University, No.02, 2009.
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