Task of The Bow: Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language

The Task of the Bow: Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language
Author(s): Carol Poster

Source: Philosophy & Rhetoric, Vol. 39, No. 1 (2006), pp. 1-21
Published by: Penn State University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/20697131
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The Task of the Bow:
Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language
Carol Poster
Before the leaves can mount again

To fill the trees with another shade,
They must go down past things coming up.
They must go down into the dark decayed.
They must be pierced by flowers and put

Beneath the feet of dancing flowers.
However it is in some other world
I know that this is the way in ours.
?Robert Frost, "In Hardwood Groves"
The rhetorical theory and form of Heraclitus' work and the relationship of
his manner of exposition to his ideas have vexed critics from Plato and
Aristotle through the present. Although Heraclitus has not been studied
frequently in rhetorical scholarship, it can be argued that his work is criti
cally important for understanding developments in early rhetorical theory
and practice, especially as background to the Gorgianic account of logos,
Protagorean hermeneutics and epistemology, and the Platonic account of
Protagoras in the Theaetetus. The neglect of Heraclitus by rhetoricians is
due to a phenomenon, which Edward Schiappa (1991, 1999) has cogently
analyzed, of contemporary rhetorical theorists bringing to bear anachro
nistic assumptions about disciplinarity on "predisciplinary" ancient
thought, especially about relationships among "philosophy," "sophistic,"
and "rhetoric," terms which, in antiquity, demarcated fluid rhetorical po
sitions rather than fixed concepts.1
Perhaps the most important reason for rhetoricians to study
Heraclitus, however, is not merely his subsequent influence on those writ
ers who form part of the contemporary canon of ancient rhetorical schol
arship, but the ways in which his work both presents and enacts the
Philosophy and Rhetoric, Vol. 39, No. 1, 2006.

Copyright ? 2006 The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA.
2 CAROL POSTER
rhetorical and hermeneutic consequences of an ontology of flux within a

tradition of religio-philosophical rhetoric. Heraclitus is a pivotal figure in
a thread of mystical thinking about production and interpretation of dis
course that runs through the Orphics (especially as exemplified in the
Derveni papyrus), Pythagoreans, Empedocles (particularly as he has been
reinterpreted in light of the Strasbourg papyrus), Plato, the Stoics, and
Platonists. This tradition, other parts of which I have discussed elsewhere
(1993, 1998, 2001), exemplifies a way of thinking about production and
reception of discourse distinct from, and complementary to, the more
widely studied rhetorics of assembly and courtroom.
This essay investigates Heraclitus' theories of style, meaning, and
persuasion in light of his critiques of epic language and worldview and
explores the consequences of his theories concerning interpretation of lan
guage for his practices of production of discourse. I begin with a prelimi
nary methodological discussion, then explicate Heraclitus' rhetorical and
hermeneutic theories by close reading of DK22b48 and related fragments,
and conclude with a discussion of the implications and reception of
Heraclitean hermeneutic s.
Interpreting Heraclitus: Problems and Methods
Heraclitus is one of several archaic thinkers who wrestled with the prob
lem of expressing ideas in verbal genres belonging to a cultural tradition
that they were criticizing. They had available the discourses of ritual, tra
ditional epic, and ordinary speech, but none of these were precisely com
mensurable, formally or ideologically, with their radically new conceptions
of the world, which were in accord neither with traditional religion nor
with "common sense."2 This sense of inadequacy of existing forms of dis
course can be seen in the critiques of epic by Xenophanes and Heraclitus,
which challenged not only the contents but the very semantic habits and
literary devices of the traditional epic itself.3 At the same time, as new
theories concerning the human, physical, and divine worlds demanded new
verbal forms, so new modes of expression themselves functioned to cast
doubt on conventional views of these matters and how they could be known.
As rhetoricians, for example, argued both sides of a case equally well,4 it
became more difficult for their hearers to accept unproblematically the
stability of universal natural or social laws grounded in fixed standards of
THE TASK OF THE BOW 3
absolute truth and articulated in a homeostatic body of epic tradition. Re

interpreting natural phenomena and using new verbal modes were not in
dependent activities; the means and the ends of intellectual inquiry were
constantly interacting with and reshaping each other. Ontology could only
be discussed in words; and words, in some manner, not only signified things
but served to construct phenomena by reshaping the way in which raw
sense data were conceptualized and interpreted.
Archaic speculative thought, by distancing itself from both tradi
tional and common-sense beliefs and their associated discursive practices,
literally became ineffable, unable to be uttered within preexisting struc
tures of discourse. For their intellectual activities, archaic thinkers needed
to create new verbal genres, or at least to appropriate and modify existing
ones. These thinkers' use and abuse, as it were, of generic conventions
provides information about their attitudes toward existing beliefs as well
as toward the literary forms in which beliefs were instantiated. Thus to
interpret Heraclitus requires close attention to how he positioned himself,
both polemically and practically, with respect to his literary generic con
text.
The point that Heraclitus and other early Greek thinkers were rein
venting language and/or literary genre is a truism of modern scholarship,5
based on the overt critiques, especially by Xenophanes, Parmenides, and
Heraclitus, of earlier thinkers.6 It has been claimed quite plausibly (e.g.,
by Most 1999) that the early Ionic use of prose was itself a polemical
device used to distance an innovative and anti-epical manner of thinking
from earlier ideas and genres. Beyond the claim that Heraclitus' use of
prose aligns him with the Milesian tradition of speculative thought against
epic tradition, little can be asserted broadly of the overall shape of
Heraclitus' work with any certainty.
The "Heraclitus" that has been transmitted to the present consists of
some 120 to 130 short (fewer than eighty word) quotations embedded in
the work of later writers7 and various accounts of his life and beliefs that,
in their present form, date to a period from one to seven centuries after his
death. It cannot be determined beyond doubt whether his work consisted
of a book of continuous discourse, discontinuous written sayings, or tran
scriptions of oral discourse, from which the most striking sententiae were
later compiled into written form by him or others.8
More certain claims, however, can be made about the local stylistic
features of Heraclitus' prose, namely that it is both difficult and dense.
The difficulty not only with respect to meaning but also with respect to
4 CAROL POSTER
syntax is agreed upon almost unanimously by both ancient and modern

commentators.9 That readers so uniformly consider Heraclitus obscure sug
gests that either Heraclitus was an incompetent writer, something that i
improbable in light of the nuanced and sophisticated nature of his style,
or, more plausibly, that the obscurity was deliberate (as argued, e.g., in
some detail by Dilcher 1995 and in a typically balanced fashion in Guthri
1967, 410 sq.). Assuming the latter and more plausible account to be the
case, one major task for those interpreting Heraclitus' work is to analyze
the reasons for and rhetorical effects of this obscurity. Something that con
tributes to the difficulty of reading Heraclitus is what Kahn has termed his
linguistic density, which he defines as "the phenomenon by which a mu
tiplicity of ideas are expressed in a single word or phrase" (Kahn 1979,
89). In the close analysis of Heraclitean fragments below, I will argue tha
the intent behind both density and obscurity is to make Heraclitus' audi
ence, if intent on understanding his meaning, engage in a complex and
iterative hermeneutic process of both literal and allegorical reading.
Where to Begin
The White Rabbit put on his spectacles. "Where shall I begin, please
your Majesty?" he asked.
"Begin at the beginning," the King said gravely, "and go on till
you come to the end: then stop."
?Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland, Chapter 12
Although the King's advice appears sensible and obvious, one can onl
follow it, as Alice discovers as the trial proceeds, if the material one is
trying to narrate has a coherent temporal and logical structure. Because
interpretation is a process that requires the interpreter to shift constantly
between considering part and whole, text and context, and purposes an
product, it is difficult to select any particular starting point, whether an
assumption about the material to be interpreted or a place within the mate
rial at which to start. This general problem is, in the case of Heraclitus,
complicated by the material itself being fragmentary, disordered, and o
uncertain accuracy and authenticity. If one is concerned with the problem
of Heraclitean interpretation, both in the sense of how contemporary schol
ars can interpret Heraclitus and Heraclitus' own theories of interpretation,
it is important to begin with material that is:
1. Very well attested as to authenticity and accuracy;

2. Syntactically and semantically unambiguous;
3. Consistently embedded in relatively straightforward contexts; and
4. Able to provide information about Heraclitus' own methods of com
position and interpretation.
The most common starting point for Heraclitean interpretation,

DK22M, which was considered the opening of Heraclitus' book by sev
eral ancient sources and is the starting point of many contemporary read
ings of Heraclitus, fails to meet several of these criteria. Not only is it is
syntactically ambiguous, but its meaning is far from obvious (as evidenced
by the tremendous variations in translations as well as commentaries on
it).10 As both ancient and contemporary scholars have found this text per
plexing, it is not a particularly satisfactory starting point for interpreta
tion; instead, it is something that needs to be interpreted in light of less
difficult material. Thus, this study will begin by examining a somewhat
less problematic fragment, DK22b48.
Heraclitean and Epic "BIOS"
The fragment that will be examined first in this study, while not as imme
diately obvious or significant a choice as DK22bl, is DK22b48, "For the
bow (toxon), its name is life {bios) but its task is death" (t(S ovv ro^cp
?vofia ?iog, epyov 8e Qdvaioq). Its semantic and syntactic surfaces are not
particularly complex; it is well attested with only trivial variations; the
contexts in which it occurs, namely, commentaries on Homeric vocabu
lary, are consistent and do not suggest immediate motives for misquota
tion or distortion; and it provides useful information concerning Heraclitean
methods of reading earlier authors. DK22b48 is paradigmatic of the way
in which Heraclitus uses language to enact as well as represent arguments.
Four typically Heraclitean themes can be found in this fragment:
1. It attacks epic for misusing language (using the wrong term for
"bow").
2. It leads readers to question the relationship of names to things, and
particularly whether names can be correct in a nonarbitrary manner.
6 CAROL POSTER
3. While it criticizes epic for errors in language and ideas, at the same
time, its very use of epic as a starting point suggests that epic can
still be valuable.
4. Finally, although it somewhat overtly suggests epic read literally is
erroneous, it covertly shows that behind these errors are truths that
can be discovered by allegorical reading, albeit truths that were
not necessarily apparent to the epic authors.
Several versions of DK22b48 have been preserved, primarily in ancient

works on Homer and Homeric language. Since the context of the quota
tions is lexical and grammatical rather than philosophical or theological,
there would have been no particular reason for deliberate or tendentious
misquotation or misinterpretation by ancient authorities, and in fact, the
versions we have of the fragment are identical except for some variations
in particles that are of no particular interpretive consequence.11
Despite its apparent simplicity (a pun on the similar sounds of Greek
words for bow and life), this fragment introduces several of Heraclitus'
central philosophical themes and has been used as crucial evidence in schol
arly discussions concerning how the works of Heraclitus were composed
and disseminated, i.e., whether they were essentially oral or literate pro
ductions or some combination of the two. Those who argue for Heraclitus
as a primarily literate author claim that the crucial pun works only visu
ally and not aurally.12 Comparative evidence, however, suggests that this
is not the case. In DK22b48, Heraclitus first refers to the bow with the
unambiguous term "toxon" He then states its name is "BIOS." As it would
have been written in his time, in all capitals with no accent, one cannot
determine whether the name indicated is "bios" (life) or "bios" (a word
for bow used primarily in epic). In Homer, both terms, "toxon" and "bios,"
are used interchangeably, e.g., when the bow of Odysseus is referred to
first as one and then the other {metri causa) in two successive lines of the
Odyssey (21:74-75):
6r\G(0 yap fieya ro^ov 'O?vcjcjrjog Oeioia

dg Se K? priirar' evravvar] ?idv ev naXa\ir\ox...
I will set before you the great bow (toxon) of the god-like Odysseus
And the one who most easily shall string the bow (bios) in his hands ...
It can be argued that Heraclitus' pun on "BIOS" is evidence that his

work was read rather than heard, as the pun depends on there being two
possible pronunciations and meanings of the same letters. It is not, how
ever, a purely literate joke, like the mythic park bench inscription "ORE
STABIT FORTIS ARARE PLACET ORE STAT," which depends on char
acter spacing to mislead the reader. Puns on similar sounding names were
common in Greek oratory and drama. Aristotle, in his Rhetoric (1400b20
sq.), gives several examples from tragedy and oratory of puns on the rela
tionship between names and meaningful words similar to those names,
quoting, among other examples, how Euripides' Hecuba points out that
"Aphrodite" sounds like "aphrosune" ("folly"). An almost identical ex
ample occurs at Wasps 38-41, where Aristophanes makes a pun based on
a character mishearing "Srjpov" as "Srj?ov" an example that, like "bios" I
"bios," depends exclusively on accentuation.13 The "bios" Tbios" pun it
self appears in several other works (Marcovich 1967, 192) that normally
would have been heard rather than read, most notably in Sophocles'
Philoctetes (931-33):
?neotepriKccg r?v ?iov x? t6%' kXcov.

anoboq, iKvovpodct, ?noboq, iketevco, xekvov
npoq de&v narpcQcov, r?v ?iov \ie /if) dcpeXr].
You take away my life (bws), by seizing my bow (toxon).

Return it, I beg you, return it, I beg, O son.
By the ancestral gods, do not take my life (bios) from me.
In this speech, Philoctetes specifically identifies his bow with his

life, and in the one phrase in which he asks "do not steal my 'BIOS' (bow/
life)," he uses the word so that it could be read with either meaning equally
well. Like Heraclitus, Sophocles uses "toxon" when he wishes to refer
unambiguously to the bow to set up the pun, suggesting that in oral per
formance it was possible to confuse the two. The pun relies on the signifi
cation of "bws" and its cognates "biote" "biotes," and "biotos" as
sustenance or livelihood (i.e., that which is needed to sustain life). If
Philoctetes is deprived of his bow and can no longer hunt to obtain food,
he will die by starvation. It is worth noting that the sense of "bios" as
sustenance appears at several points in Hesiod's Works and Days, the wis
dom section of which contains loosely connected gnomic statements that
are somewhat similar in form to the Heraclitean ones (if not as paradoxi
cal). The use of "bios" for bow is also primarily epical, i.e., occurring
8 CAROL POSTER
overwhelmingly in epic or in poetic works borrowing epic diction. Thus

any criticism of the term can be read as criticism of epic language.
Heraclitus' statement that "For the bow (toxon), its name is life {bios)
but its task is death," thus criticizes epic language on even the minute
level of word choice; the poets use the wrong word for the weapon. The
position of the two terms, "toxon" and "bios" is significant. "Toxon," which
we encounter first for the bow, is a common term occurring in both Homer
and other Greek texts. It is the term used by Heraclitus in the other frag
ment in which he discusses the bow, DK22b51, and apparently (insofar as
one can draw conclusions for what is clearly too small a sample to be of
any statistical significance) Heraclitus' preferred term for "bow." The name
of the bow that appears second in the fragment, bios, is a specifically epic
usage; in fact, this fragment is preserved in commentaries on Homer and
archaic language.14 In saying that Homer misuses the term "bios" for bow,
which could be mistaken for life (bios), since the bow's task is death,
Heraclitus is criticizing epic language, but with an interesting twist. For
although the task of the bow is death, in one sense, the purpose of the
death caused by the bow, is life, in another sense, just as in Sophocles'
Philoctetes. Although Sophocles' play postdates Heraclitus' work, the story
of his bow and its role in the Trojan stories would have been well-known
to Heraclitus' audience.
Sophocles makes clear the connection between Philoctetes' bow and
his sustenance in 162-68, where Neptolemus describes Philoctetes hunt
ing for his sustenance (biotes) with arrows, a sense of "bios" and its cog
nates that we find occurring frequently in Hesiod as well (e.g., Erga 31,
42, 232, 307, 476, 499, 501). The parallel suggests that Heraclitus, like
Sophocles, has in mind specifically that the task of the bow is to provide
sustenance (bios) for humans by the death of animals. Thus, paradoxi
cally, the death of the animal enables the hunter to live but the survival of
the animal may cause the death of the hunter (the unsuccessful hunter will
starve).
As well as providing sustenance, the bow also serves as a weapon.
Perhaps the most notable Homeric example, and one that would have been
very familiar to the Heraclitean audience, is the bow with which Odysseus
kills Penelope's suitors at the end of the Odyssey. As all weapons do, it
preserves the life of the person who wields it by causing the death of the
person against whom it is wielded. In the case of Odysseus, since the suit
ors are consuming food in his house,15 it saves his bios (life, livelihood) in
the immediate sense of personal survival and the transferred sense of the
storehouse of wealth that enables him to survive. It is this connection that
Heraclitus adumbrates in DK22b48. For Heraclitus, the interdependence
of life and death extend from the human to the cosmic realm, as illustrated
especially in the following three fragments:
For souls it is death to become water, and for water death to become earth.
Water comes into existence out of earth, and soul out of water. (DK22b36)
Immortals are mortal, mortals immortal, living their death and dying their
life. (DK22b62)
Fire lives the death of earth and air lives the death of fire; water lives the
death of air, earth that of water. (DK22b76a)
For even the cosmos itself, the life of one thing is the death of an
other?fire consumes wood and air, air condenses into rain, water evapo
rates into air, and so forth. Like the cosmos, the bow has a physical harmony
dependent on tensions between opposites (the string and the wood), as
Heraclitus seems to be suggesting in DK22b51.
The connection between DK22b48 and DK22b51 is obvious, in that
they both talk about bows; a less apparent connection is that both do so in
a way that comments on Homeric language. DK22b5116 runs:
ov t^vviaaiv ?Kcog Siacpepojievov ecovtco bfxoXyeevnaXivzponoq an\iovir\

OKCOGKEp TO^OV KOtl Xvp7]g.
They do not understand how, while differing from, it is in agreement with

itself. There is a backward turning congruence like that of the bow and the
lyre.17
The central problem for interpreting this fragment is textual. The

second half begins with "palintropos" (back-turning) in some sources and
"palintonos" (back-stretching) in others. If we can assume, as is the some
what more likely case, "palintropos" (the lectio difficilior) then we could
read DK22b51 as a criticism of the Homer epithet (palintonos) for the
bow. By substituting the similar but not identical "palintropos," Heraclitus
seems to suggest that the epic poets chose a misleading epithet (as well as
erring in naming the bow "bios"). Although the meaning of the two terms
is not entirely clear, the Homeric epithet emphasizes the shape of the bow
and lyre and the tension of their strings; the Heraclitean epithet empha
sizes motion or direction.
In DK22b48, the bow also exemplifies a harmony based on tension.
The purpose of the bow depends on a balanced tension between life and
death, simultaneously causing and sustaining each other. All life depends
10 CAROL POSTER
on the constant consumption (or death) of other things. Carnivores eat

herbivores, herbivores eat plants, plants consume earth, and dead animals
rot into the earth providing food for plants, which in turn feed animals,
and so on, ad infinitum. This cycle of consumption is one of constant ac
tivity?all living beings must continue to take in nourishment or die. Even
the earth itself is constantly engaging in a cycle of consumption and growth.
Water erodes mountains, carrying them down to rivers. Rivers carry silt to
the sea but create new land when they redeposit it. Tides build up some
beaches and tear down others. Life is a matter of flux and strife, some
thing Heraclitus considered inadequately realized by the epic poets. The
rhetorical problem is how one can articulate this flux and strife without
removing oneself from it into a stable subject position or authority. For
Heraclitus, the position of stable authority from which Homer spoke and
in which he was interpreted was problematic.
Aristotle provides useful evidence for Heraclitus' criticism of the
Homeric view of strife. In a passage in the Eudemian Ethics on the nature
of friendship, Aristotle discusses whether like is attracted to like or whether
opposites attract. He examines natural philosophers' views of the cosmos
as well as poets' views of the natural world. For examples of like hating
like, he quotes Hesiod (Erga 25), concerning potter striving against pot
ter, and then gives his own parallel from nature concerning similar ani
mals competing for the same food (EE 1235el5-0), and thus striving
against each other. Next, in considering those who think that opposites are
friends, Aristotle introduces Heraclitus:
Heraclitus rebukes the poet [Homer, Iliad 18.107] who wrote?

Would that strife might perish out of heaven and earth,
for, he says, there would be no harmony without high and low, and no animals
without male and female, which are opposites. (Aristotle, EE 1235a26-8)
Aristotle's account appears to be a relatively accurate paraphrase or

explanation of some opinion of Heraclitus, echoing themes we find in well
attested fragments and linking them together. That the survival of indi
viduals and the cosmos are both functions of continual strife and opposition
is articulated throughout both fragments and testimonia of Heraclitus. Even
the "being" of the individual is a misleading description of constant be
coming. All animals must breathe, blink eyes, circulate blood, and per
form various other physical activities to survive. On a slightly longer time
scale, plants must somehow take in water, earth, and sunlight (fire), or
die. Tides ebb and rise. The day dawns, brightens, fades to night, and dawns
again. The moon waxes and wanes and the seasons change from winter to
spring to summer to fall, and then back again to winter. The natural world
presents to us a dynamic tension between these opposites, in which no
given opposite triumphs completely: just as the summer gets too hot or
the winter gets too cold, the sun passes through a solstice and the seasons
slowly begin to change again, as if constrained by some external force:
"The sun will not overstep his measures. Otherwise the Furies, ministers
of Justice, will find him out" (DK22b94).
It is this balance of opposites and the necessity of strife (within con
straints) that, according to Heraclitus, Homer misunderstands. When
Heraclitus says "Homer is worthy to be thrown out of the lists and thrashed,
and similarly Archilochus" (DK 22b42), he is not suggesting thrashing
merely as appropriate punishment, but also as a remedy for their igno
rance of strife. The epic poets, despite their reputation for wisdom, misun
derstand strife, seeing warfare only as destruction to be resolved by peace
rather than as a necessary and desirable state of affairs, something that
would be remedied by their having more extensive personal acquaintance
with being thrashed. Poets, who themselves seem to claim wisdom about
strife, as they make verses about war, misunderstand its nature. That is
why Homer cannot even answer a children's riddle that depends on killing
one thing (lice) to maintain the health of another (humans):
Homer, who was wiser than all the Greeks, was deceived. For he was de
ceived by the words spoken to him by some boys killing lice: "What we saw
and caught we leave behind, while what we do not see and catch we take with
us." (DK22b56)
If Homer's understanding of strife was insufficient, one might think

Hesiod's position would appeal to Heraclitus, as Hesiod allows for a good
as well as a bad type of strife (Erga 11-26), but such was not the case. For
Heraclitus there are not two strifes but only one; what Hesiod sees as op
position is, in fact, unity. By not understanding that all strife and opposi
tion are good, Hesiod also fails to see the hidden harmonies underlying
them, and also the unity in other apparently opposing phenomena. Thus
"Hesiod is the teacher of very many people. They believe he knew many
things, he who did not understand day and night?for they are one"
(DK22b57). Just as Hesiod does not recognize the unity of the two strifes,
so he does not perceive that day and night are two necessary parts of a
12 CAROL POSTER
single changing whole. Like the Homeric poems, and the epic tradition in
general, Hesiod's teachings mislead people, in precisely the same way as
does the naming of the bow.
The critique of the epic "bids" in DK22b48 thus addresses two is
sues simultaneously, first whether the poets are using the wrong word (as
bios [bow] has the wrong connotation due to its similarity in sound to bios
[life]) and second whether the epic misuse of the term is indicative of a
misunderstanding of the thing in particular and the nature of weapons and
strife in general.19 It is relatively clear (from the preceding discussion)
that Heraclitus considers the epic poets both to have misused the term
"bios " and to have misunderstood the nature of bows (synecdochally for
strife, and thus the role of strife in the cosmos and the ordering of the
cosmos). That these two positions are connected is also apparent, but the
precise nature or logic of the connection is unapparent, possibly due to
accidents of reception (that we have only disconnected gnomic fragments
remaining of Heraclitus) or possibly because Heraclitus considered unap
parent connections superior (DK22b54) and/or wanted his audience to work
out these unapparent connections for themselves.
If interpretation of Heraclitus were restricted entirely to making our
own contemporary connections among ipsissima verba isolated from his
torical context, this problem would need to stand as irresolvable. There is,
however, a quite plausible solution, which can be found in classical testi
monia. Plato, Aristotle, and other ancient sources portray Cratylus as a
Heraclitean. In Plato's dialogue, Cratylus is portrayed as advocating the
position that there are correct names with an intrinsic connection to those
things with which they correspond. Moreover, Cratylus is also portrayed
as believing that any incorrect names can often be resolved etymologi
cally into historical corruptions of true names.20 The Cratylean notion of
true naming makes explicit what would be a logical connection between
Heraclitus' critiques of epic vocabulary and his objections to epic
worldviews, namely, that if words are intrinsically connected to things,
using the wrong word entails or derives from misunderstanding the things
themselves. The possibility of etymological recovery of correct names can
also explain why there is value to investigating epic names despite their
inaccuracy. Because epic would have been the oldest form of the Greek
language known to Heraclitus, it would have been his only access to a
crucial stage in the corruption of names, one in which true names are still
present in allegorical residues even if the literal epical usages are incorrect.
Using Cratylean evidence to supply unapparent connections among

Heraclitean ideas, does, of course, depend on two assumptions, namely,
(1) that the Cratylean position does in fact reflect a Heraclitean one in this
matter and (2) that the Platonic account portrays Cratylus' theory of names
with some degree of accuracy. These are not, however, insuperable objec
tions. While Plato's dramatic portraits are not accurate by the standards of
twenty-first-century biography, nor can they normally be assumed to con
tain verbatim quotations, the better known characters of the dialogues are,
in broad strokes, recognizable. Protagoras charges for instruction, Gorgias
holds the young spellbound with his magical rhetoric, Lysias' speech is
graceful and fluent, Parmenides and Zeno are austere logicians who doubt
appearances, and so forth. The Platonic Cratylus, likewise, presents a
Cratylus accurate at least in broad outline, and general in accord with other
ancient testimony. There is no reason to insist, contra uniform ancient tes
timony, that Cratylus did not believe in the correctness of names. More
over, there is nothing in what we know of Cratylus' theory of naming that
contradicts authentic Heraclitean fragments; and there are suggestions in
Heraclitus that imply a concept of true naming (see Poster 1996, 2005).
Thus there is no reason to suppose that the Cratylean theory of true nam
ing did not reflect an authentic Heraclitean position.
Whether the Cratylean account is or is not accurate, it is still the
case that there are, in the fragments themselves, two main targets at which
the critique of epic in DK22b48 is aimed:
1. The epic term for bow (bios) is incorrect. (Epic language itself is
misleading)
2. The epic understanding of the bow's function (and the function of
weapons and strife in general) is incorrect.
The question remains, though, whether the bad instruction received from
epic is solely a function of the specific author or text (i.e., that Heraclitus
could conceivably have written a better epic than the ones he criticizes) or
whether it depends on the ways in which readers approach and understand
epic. In other words, Heraclitus is presenting his readers with the idea that
any hermeneutic analysis or critique of received compositions (oral or writ
ten) requires one to reflect upon rhetorical practices.
14 CAROL POSTER
The Rhetoric of Heraclitean Hermeneutics
Heraclitus, in fact, has as much to say about how language is understood

as about epic language itself. Just as he discusses who or what to read (or
listen to), he also indicates how to read?or how not to read. His book (or
collection of sayings) traditionally is held to begin:21
rod 8e Xoyov rov?' eovrog aiei d^vveroi yivovmi ?vOpomoi Kai npooOevr)
dcKovaai Kai aKovaavteg to KpSnov.
Of the logos that exists always uncomprehending are men, both before they
have heard it and after having heard it. (DK22M)22
Simply hearing words, in a physical sense, is not the same as listening or

reading well, as it does not necessarily lead to correct understanding or
interpretation, a position Heraclitus reiterates in two other fragments,
DK22M7 and 19.23 The meaning of words, like the double meaning of
"BIOS" or the ambiguities on which are based riddles such as DK22b56
(the children and the lice),24 can be both literal and figurative, a point
Heraclitus brings out in both figurative and literal senses in DK22b59:
"The way of writing is both straight and crooked." On a physical level,
writing moves across parallel lines down a page, but the letters themselves
are crooked, in the sense of having shapes that are not simply straight
parallel lines. Hermeneutically, writing can be interpreted both directly
and indirectly. Sometimes, the indirect or figurative sense is the more im
portant one, as is the case with oracles: "The lord whose oracle is in Delphi
neither indicates clearly nor conceals but gives a sign" (DK22b93). In
other types of sign, both literal and figurative senses are present. Odysseus'
bow, for example, serves as a weapon with which Odysseus kills the suit
ors who consume his storehouse of goods (sustenance) and thus as the
instrument of his own restoration. It also serves figuratively as a sign of
his identity. The epic name of the bow, "bios" is false on the literal level
insofar as its name is life but its task is death (it is used to kill things in
hunting or war). On a figurative level, the epic name is true, for the death
caused by the bow has as its purpose life, and, more profoundly, life and
death are interdependent, a harmony or unity produced by strife between
apparent opposites. Allegorical or figurative readings of epic produce an
unapparent truth from an apparent falsehood. The indirect or nonliteral
readings are, for Heraclitus, the superior ones, as he states explicitly: "An
unapparent connection is stronger [or better] than an obvious one"
(DK22b54).25 If epic language and doctrine are false on one level, we can
still learn truths from them if we read them nonliterally, something that
the many for whom Homer and Hesiod are teachers fail to do. This dual
method of interpretation allows Heraclitus to simultaneously describe
Homer as "wiser than all the Greeks" (DK 22b56) and Hesiod as "teacher
of very many people" who "believe he knew many things" (DK22b57),
but at the same time criticize them for not recognizing riddles or hidden
unities in opposites. Whatever wisdom they have is knowledge of sur
faces, of literal facts, things that do not bring about understanding: "Much
learning does not teach understanding. For otherwise it would have taught
Hesiod and Pythagoras and also Xenophanes and Hecataeus" (DK22b40).
The writers of epic and other apparently wise men do not themselves un
derstand unapparent harmonies or truths, and their audience, interpreting
them literally, misses the unapparent wisdom that can be found if one in
terprets them in a nonliteral fashion.
Conclusion
Heraclitus' objections to epic language are part of both a wider disagree

ment with epic and with literalist interpretation. The Heraclitean critique
of epic makes five main points that should inform our studies of early
Greek rhetoric:
1. Heraclitus focuses on the problem of correctness of names substan

tially before Prodicus and Protagoras. As Kirk (1962,116-22) dis
cusses, Heraclitus frequently comments on the relationships among
the meanings of words with similar sounds, an issue resurfacing
in Aristotle's treatment of homonymy in Categories (where
Aristotle argues for propositions rather than names as the proper
objects of truth judgments) and possibly in Prodicus in the context
of his examinations of synonymy. Heraclitus thus prefigures two
themes discussed more extensively by later writers. First, Heraclitus
seems concerned with the art of what came to be called orthoepeia
(the study of correctness of names) for which the sophists Prodicus
and Protagoras later became famous. Second, he at least considers
the possibility that one can learn something about the nature of
things by examining the nonliteral senses of their names, a posi
16 CAROL POSTER
tion that is articulated in its most extreme form by the Heraclitean

Cratylus in Plato's dialogue of that name.
2. Heraclitus is an early example of logos philosopher, in the
Gadamerian sense, in that he believes that investigation of lan
guage can provide information that is not exclusively or trivially
linguistic. He is an early example of the "linguistic turn" in Greek
thought.
3. For Heraclitus, the instability of language is part of a radical insta
bility of the world. Since things change too quickly to be exam
ined, their stable names are all that is available for investigation.
While surfaces change, hidden harmonies, which are both con
cealed and revealed in words, remain. And yet even names them
selves, if temporally fixed, are still interpretively unstable.
4. Each positively attributed name or statement should be read two
ways simultaneously in a sustained and irresolvable tension, liter
ally and nonliterally, with the opposing figurative statement both
contradicting and yet sustaining the literal one.
5. These considerations lead Heraclitus, in his own prose, to a con
stant tension between rejection of epic vocabulary and ideas as
inaccurate and frequent use of them; even when Homer and Hesiod
are partially rejected, inquiry into them remains a valid means of
investigation. Heraclitus does not simply suggest that epic should
be entirely ignored in favor, for example, of direct examination of
or experimentation on physical objects, nor purely internal (Car
tesian) meditation, but rather interpreted indirectly. To ensure such
a reading of his own work, Heraclitus writes a gnomic prose that
is often highly antithetical, with opposing ideas or concepts put
forth in parallel constructions. His particular phrasing often ech
oes epic, but is in prose, thus both recalling the insights of the
Milesian physiologoi (which bear literal but not allegorical truth)
and of traditional epic (containing allegorical but not literal truths).
Heraclitus himself should be read both literally and allegorically.
Since many of the issues rhetoricians discuss with respect to the genera
tions following Heraclitus (especially Gorgias, Protagoras, Prodicus, and
Plato) respond directly to Heraclitean formulations, it is important to avoid
letting anachronistic concepts of disciplinarity (of "rhetoric" versus "phi
losophy" or "pre-Socratic" versus "Older Sophist") oversimplify our ac

counts of ancient Greek rhetorical theory by exclusion of Heraclitus.26
English Department
York University, Toronto
Notes
1. The anachronism of applying contemporary disciplinary categories to archaic thinkers
and the associated problem of the generic preconditions against which their audiences would
have seen then are discussed cogently by Long (1999) and Mansfeld (1990). For editions
and translations of Heraclitus, see Diels-Krantz (1989), Kahn (1979), Kirk (1962), Marcovich
(1967), and Robinson (1987). I generally agree with Robinson's text, but discuss individu
ally texts over which there are substantial disagreements. I use my own translations for
passages that I discuss in some detail, albeit borrowing what seem to me strikingly good
solutions from others, e.g., George Kennedy's (1991) ingenious preservation of the syntac
tic ambiguity of DK22bl. For passages cited in passing, I use the translations cited below
where they seem adequate to my purpose, and either silent modifications or my own transla
tions otherwise. I have aimed at fidelity rather than elegance.
2. I have discussed this problem of the commensurability of new archaic ideas with older
literary forms in some detail in two earlier articles in Philosophy and Rhetoric (Poster 1994,
1996).
3. Havelock (1983) and Robb (1983) both argue for the pre-Socratic critique of epic as
part of a shift from oral to literate culture. While I agree with their notion that not only the
ideas but the language of the epic poets is being rejected, along with the majority of more
recent scholars, I do not think this phenomenon can be explained entirely in terms of an oral/
literate divide,
4. Hesiod's Works and Days 27-41 shows that judicial oratory was common even in the
eighth century and may imply that skill in legal argument could make, as it were, the worse
case seem the better, though this effect may have been caused entirely by the crookedness of
the (bribed) judges. Traditionally, the rise of rhetoric is placed in fifth century Sicily (Kennedy
1963 remains the best detailed overview to rhetoric of the period) The Dissoi Logoi and
Antiphon's Tetralogies (both translated in Sprague 1972 from Greeks texts in Diels-Kranz)
are (substantially later) evidence for ancient views of arguing both sides of a question equally
well, as are the remains of Protagoras and the portrait of Protagoras/Socrates in Aristophanes'
Clouds. In any trial, though, both sides of a case will be argued. See Jeffrey Walker (2000)
for a cogent discussion of the relationship of archaic poetry and rhetoric and for a strong
argument that rhetorical theory pre-dates the Sicilian "origin" myth.
5. Parmenides' poem has many similarities, both linguistic and structural to traditional
epic, as has been noted by numerous authors, including Havelock (1958), Mourelatos (1970),
and Pellikaan-Engel (1974). Floyd acknowledges close epic parallels in Parmenides and
suggests use of verse form (and modification of epic tradition) is "essential to Parmenides'
integration of contraries" (1992, 263). Heraclitus seems closer formally to a gnomic tradi
tion, as is discussed by H?lscher (1974). In a short paper, Gallop (1989) draws interesting
parallels between Heraclitus and both classical and modern riddles. Havelock (1983) and
Owen (1974) argue that Parmenides was trying to invent the "timeless present" of an ana
lytic copula. Mason (1988) argues that Parmenides sees human language as misleading and
the goddess' language as non-descriptive. Havelock (1983) argues for the new language of
the pre-Socratics as marking an oral-literate transition. Cherniss (1977) is a general survey
of the literary forms of pre-Socratic discourse.
6. Heraclitus criticizes earlier thinkers in numerous fragments, e.g., DK22b40, 56, 57,
81, and 129. Xenophanes objects to earlier poets' theologies in DK21M1,12, and 21. Whether
18 CAROL POSTER
Parmenides' DK28b6 is or is not directed specifically against Heraclitus, it does object to

similar doctrines; see Taran (1965, 69-74) for discussion of evidence for and against this
fragment referring to Heraclitus.
7. Particularly useful works on the problems of fragmentary texts include Burkert (1998),
Mansfeld (1993, 1997), and Most (1997, 1998). Osborne (1987) provides a detailed analysis
of the problems of the fragments of Heraclitus reported in the context of Christian
heresiography.
8. Among the strongest expressions of the oralist view of pre-Socratic modes of thought
and literary expression are Havelock (1982, 1983), Hershbell (1983), and Robb (1983, 1994).
Kirk (1962) sees Heraclitus' work as having consisted originally of discontinuous oral say
ings. Kahn (1979) takes the opposite view, considering the extant fragments as originally
belonging to a continuous book or treatise.
9. Seen Guthrie (1967) for summary of ancient sources concerning the obscurity of
Heraclitus.
10. Aristotle cites DK22M as the opening of Heraclitus' work (Rhetoric 1407b 14) and
many contemporary scholars (e.g., Dilcher and Kahn) use it as a starting point for discussing
Heraclitus' thought.
11. See Marcovich (1967, 190-192) for sources for the fragment. The first particle (sec
ond place in sentence), when present, appears sometimes as oun (or goun) and sometimes
de. Whether the particle was added as a contrast between Heraclitus' words and the preced
ing words of the author quoting him or whether the particle was in a Heraclitean original
would be useful information for determining whether Heraclitus' work consisted of discon
nected gnomic saying or continuous discourse. The presence of either particle toward the
beginning of the fragment, for example, would suggest a contrast or continuation with an
earlier sentence, and thus support the notion of its having been part of a larger continuous
argument. Since there are, however, cases where both these particles are found at the begin
nings of works or speeches (Denniston 1996, xlvi-xlvii), and, moreover, we cannot be sure
whether the particle in the second place in the fragment is genuinely Heraclitean, it is im
possible to use the presence of a particle toward the beginning of DK22b48 as evidence for
Heraclitean discourse being continuous. It would be equally imprudent to see the absence of
such particles as evidence for gnomic form of Heraclitean utterance, for, as Demetrius points
out, the gnomic prose of Heraclitus typically lacks connectives at the beginnings of clauses
(On Style 192). See Barnes (1983, 102-4) for general discussion of particle use in Heraclitus
and Kirk (1962, 116) concerning the impossibility of deciding whether the particle in
DK22b48 is genuinely Heraclitean.
12. Kahn, a strong proponent of the thesis that Heraclitus wrote a book consisting of con
tinuous prose, sees the pun as purely literate (1979, 201), as does Most (1999, 58). Marcovich
(1967, 190-92) lists other oral contexts in which similar and identical puns occur.
13. I would like to thank Malcolm Heath for suggesting the reference to Wasps and pro
viding the misleading park bench inscription.
14. For discussion of the sources for DK22b48 see Kirk (1962, 116-17) and Marcovich
(1967, 190-91).
15. Hesiod considers stored wealth and food what sustains life and considers risking it or
not attending to it a dangerous, perhaps even deadly, business (e.g., Erga 31 and 680-94). If
one puts all one's wealth on a ship and it sinks or one spends time in the courtroom without
having the means for a year's livelihood, starvation or miserable poverty, like that of Hesiod's
father (Erga 630-640) is not an improbable outcome.
16. Since I will only be discussing the second half of the fragment, I will not discuss the
textual problems of in the first part of the fragment. None would be incompatible with my
discussion. They are discussed at length in Kirk (1962).
17. It is best to avoid the cognate "harmony" in English translation as this gives the im
pression of the technical musical usage as primary, which was not the case in archaic Greek,
as pointed out by Robinson (1987) and Hussey (1999, 110nl5).
18. As Kirk points out, "there is nothing to chose between the two variants on ancient
testimony" (1962, 211). Choices based on interpretation (which best reflects Heraclitean
doctrine or exhibits the most typical vocabulary) are often circular; one is tempted to argue
for the reading that most supports one's interpretation. Modern scholarship is divided; Kirk
(1962, 210 ff.) and Marcovich (1967, 125); support palintonos, Robinson (1987, 116) and
Kahn (1979, 195) palintropos. Since it is more likely that copyists would err by replacing
palintropos with the familiar Homeric epithet for the bow, palintonos, than the other way
around, I think it best to follow Wilamowitz et al. in preferring palintropos by lectio difficilior.
Although the evidence is inconclusive by itself, it does seem probable, given its consistency
with other less problematic texts.
19. Heraclitus criticizes Homer for misconceiving strife in DK22b56 and Hesiod for mis
understanding opposition in DK22b57.
20. Plato, Aristotle and Diogenes Laertius all categorize Cratylus as Heraclitean. Although
Kirk (1951) argued against the scholarly consensus and most ancient testimonia on this point,
he was ably refuted by Allan (1954). See Barney (2001) for a detailed commentary on this
issue.
21. Kahn (1979, 96-97) argues that DK22bl served as the opening of Heraclitus' book,
citing comments of Sextus Empiricus and Aristotle. That it may have been placed first in
whatever Heraclitean book was available to Aristotle and later writers does not, however,
necessarily imply that Heraclitus wrote a book of which this was the opening. On the other
hand, Kahn's parallels with traditional openings of Hecataeus and other authors do serve as
fairly strong evidence that either DK22M was the opening of some sort of Heraclitean work,
whether intended and written as such by Heraclitus, or likely to be so placed by later editors.
22. Even Aristotle points out the syntactic ambiguity of this opening (Rhetoric 1407M4).
The fragment begins: "tou ?e Xoyov to\>8 iovrog aiei at^vvcxoi." It is impossible to deter
mine whether aiei (forever) goes with eontos (holding, literally "being") or axunetos (un
comprehending), i.e., whether the account holds forever, people remain forever uncompre
hending, or both. Neither case would materially affect this part of my argument.
23. There are two additional fragments that make similar claims, DK22M7 ("Many people
do not understand the sorts of things they encounter . . .") and DK22M9 ("Certain people do
not know how to think or speak").
24. Gallop (1989) argues that Heraclitus is deliberately writing riddles, using a traditional
folk riddle form, like the one we find the Sphinx posing to Oedipus.
25. Allegorical readings of Homer began as early as the sixth century in the work of
Theagenes. If Heraclitus is advocating allegorical reading, then the Stoic tradition of alle
gorical reading may well have some continuity with or be influenced by Heraclitus (but
Stoicism is far outside the chronological scope of this study). See Lamberton (1986) and
Lamberton and Keaney (1992) for discussions of later Homeric interpretation.
26. I owe thanks to an anonymous reader for Philosophy and Rhetoric for useful suggestions.
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Task of The Bow: Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language

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Task of The Bow: Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language

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The Task of the Bow: Heraclitus' Rhetorical Critique of Epic Language

Author(s): Carol Poster

Before the leaves can mount again

They must be pierced by flowers and put

Philosophy and Rhetoric, Vol. 39, No. 1, 2006.

rhetorical and hermeneutic consequences of an ontology of flux within a

Interpreting Heraclitus: Problems and Methods

absolute truth and articulated in a homeostatic body of epic tradition. Re

syntax is agreed upon almost unanimously by both ancient and modern

1. Very well attested as to authenticity and accuracy;

The most common starting point for Heraclitean interpretation,

Heraclitean and Epic "BIOS"

Several versions of DK22b48 have been preserved, primarily in ancient

6r\G(0 yap fieya ro^ov 'O?vcjcjrjog Oeioia

It can be argued that Heraclitus' pun on "BIOS" is evidence that his

?neotepriKccg r?v ?iov x? t6%' kXcov.

You take away my life (bws), by seizing my bow (toxon).

In this speech, Philoctetes specifically identifies his bow with his

overwhelmingly in epic or in poetic works borrowing epic diction. Thus

ov t^vviaaiv ?Kcog Siacpepojievov ecovtco bfxoXyeevnaXivzponoq an\iovir\

They do not understand how, while differing from, it is in agreement with

The central problem for interpreting this fragment is textual. The

on the constant consumption (or death) of other things. Carnivores eat

Heraclitus rebukes the poet [Homer, Iliad 18.107] who wrote?

Aristotle's account appears to be a relatively accurate paraphrase or

If Homer's understanding of strife was insufficient, one might think

Using Cratylean evidence to supply unapparent connections among

The Rhetoric of Heraclitean Hermeneutics

Heraclitus, in fact, has as much to say about how language is understood

Simply hearing words, in a physical sense, is not the same as listening or

Heraclitus' objections to epic language are part of both a wider disagree

1. Heraclitus focuses on the problem of correctness of names substan

tion that is articulated in its most extreme form by the Heraclitean

losophy" or "pre-Socratic" versus "Older Sophist") oversimplify our ac

Parmenides' DK28b6 is or is not directed specifically against Heraclitus, it does object to

Burkert, Walter, ed. 1998. Fragmentsammlungen philosophischer Texte der Antike.

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