Heraclitus B35 · B35

This is one of the first appearances in Greek of the word <em>philosophos</em>, 'lover of wisdom,' and it is worth pausing on how plainly Heraclitus uses it: the philosophic man 'must be an inquirer into very many things.' The key noun is <em>histor</em> — the one who knows because he has investigated, the root of <em>historia</em>, 'inquiry,' and so of 'history' itself. To love wisdom, he says, is to inquire widely, into 'very many things.'

The surprise is that this seems to praise exactly what Heraclitus elsewhere mocks. In B40 he scorns <em>polymathie</em>, 'much-learning,' which 'does not teach understanding' — and there names Pythagoras and Hesiod as men who knew a great deal and understood little. The tension is real but resolvable, and it defines his idea of philosophy. Wide inquiry is necessary — the <em>philosophos</em> must range over many things — but it is not sufficient; the many things must be gathered into the one insight, the <em>logos</em> that is 'common to all' (B2). Learning that piles up facts without grasping the one thing that steers all things (B41) is mere <em>polymathie</em>; learning that inquires into the many in order to see the one is philosophy. B35 gives the necessary condition; B40 and B50 give what it is for.

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