Pythagoras, master of inquiry — and of fraud
Read the full text in our reader
Πυθαγόρης Μνησάρχου ἱστορίην ἤσκησεν ἀνθρώπων μάλιστα πάντων καὶ ἐκλεξάμενος ταύτας τὰς συγγραφὰς ἐποιήσατο ἑωυτοῦ σοφίην, πολυμαθίην, κακοτεχνίην
Pythagoras son of Mnesarchus pursued inquiry further than any man alive, and, culling these writings, made himself a wisdom of his own — much learning, a swindler's craft.
Preserved by Diogenes Laertius (Lives 8.6), who quotes it as evidence that Pythagoras left writings. One of three fragments in which Heraclitus names Pythagoras (with B40 and B81), and the most damning: research turned into a patchwork passed off as one's own wisdom.
The fragment builds a trap in its own grammar. It opens as praise: Pythagoras "practiced <em>historiē</em>" — inquiry, research, the gathering of knowledge by looking into things — "more than any man alive." Then it turns. What he did with all that inquiry was <em>eklexamenos</em>, "pick and choose," other men's <em>syngraphai</em>, "writings," and out of them manufacture a wisdom he called his own. The final three nouns land the verdict: <em>sophiē</em> (wisdom), yes — but really <em>polymathiē</em> (much-learning) and <em>kakotechniē</em>, an "evil art," a swindle.
The charge is the one Heraclitus levels everywhere: that <em>polymathiē</em>, the piling-up of information, "does not teach insight" (B40, where Pythagoras is named again). Here it sharpens into fraud — <em>kakotechniē</em>, literally "bad craftsmanship," the ordinary word for a forgery or a con. Pythagoras is accused not of ignorance but of plagiarism dressed as revelation: excerpting the books of others and selling the compilation as his own vision. Against him stands Heraclitus's own method, which claims to listen not to itself but to the <em>logos</em> (B50) — to find the one thing rather than to hoard the many.
Read the full commentary — and tap any word for its dictionary entry — in the interlinear reader.
Open Heraclitus B129 in the full reader
Always open passages in the reader
You are reading a page of the Heraclitus — the whole book is free in our interlinear reader.
The Great Library Project presses the classics in their original languages, glossed word by word — free to read, always. Browse the whole library.
Also on our shelves:
Heraclitus B129 — The Great Library Project interlinear edition · greatlibraryproject.com/book/heraclitus/B129/