Xenophanes

Xenophanes

The Classical Mind
W.T. Jones
1980

Like Heraclitus, Xenophanes attacked the old Greek theology, calling it immoral and untrue. He attacked its anthropomorphic qualities. His famous quote about the anthropomorphic qualities of Greek religion is as follows, "Yes, and if oxen and horses or lions had hands, and could paint with their hands, and produce works of art as men do, horses would paint the forms of the gods like horses, and oxen like oxen, and make their bodies in the image of their several kinds" (Jones, 19).

Xenophanes, while attacking the old gods, was not atheistic. He had one God, which was neither like man in form or thought. While this seems to be a monotheistic notion, it was probably pantheistic like Heraclitus' religion.

The reason that the populace never took up the religions of Heraclitus or Xenophanes was that it was too abstract to replace the common religion. It didn't offer the necessary emotional connection to replace the old religion. It left a void.

The History of Western Philosophy
Bertrand Russell
1972

-Xenophanes falls between Pythagoras and Heraclitus. Xenophanes references Pythagoras and Heraclitus references Xenophanes.
-Xenophanes was an Ionian but lived in Southern Italy
-He believed that all things were made of earth and water
-He believed in one God, unlike man in thought or form
-He mocked the Pythagorean theological notion of the transmigration of the soul
-He believed that any theological knowledge was impossible. Even if man happened to say something correct about God, it was by accident.

Early Greek Philosophy
Jonathan Barnes
2001

-Xenophanes was a peripatetic poet from Colophon in Ionia.
-Despite being a typical poet, writing on drink, love, war and games, he was considered a philosopher and the teacher of Parmenides
-wrote against Hesiod and Homer for their teachings about the gods
-Stobaeus, quotes Xenophanes stating that the gods did not reveal things to mortals, but through inquiry man makes discoveries
-Xenophanes criticized Homer and Hesiod for ascribing to the gods shameful and blameworthy things like theft and adultery
-Claimed that one and all is god
-believed that the one god governed everything by thought
-believed that nothing comes into being or is destroyed or changes
According to Hippolytus, Xenophanes said "All men are destroyed when the earth is carried down into the sea and turns into mud; then they begin to be born again. And this is how all the worlds begin" (Barnes, 47).