Abstract

CORNELLI, Gabriele. O belo antro e a grande oliveira: recepções da alegoria da caverna na tradição neoplatônica. Educação e Filosofia [online]. 2012, vol.26, n.51, pp.93-112. ISSN 1982-596X.

Since the Magna Graecia of Pythagoras, Parmenides, Empedocles and passing by the “dangerous” relations between the nascent wisdom and orphic-dionisiacs traditions, in clear continuity with the archaic mythology and teogonical narratives, dialoguing with asclepians medical practice, ancient philosophy frequents caves. The cave of the Republic, one of the most powerful and fruitful allegories of Western thought, is simultaneously heiress and vanishing point of the long career of this metaphor. It is not intended here, however, understand the Platonic image as the consummation of an old philosophical tradition that “thinks in caves”; seeks rather to illuminate this allegory with the interpretation offered by later academic philosophy. In the Cave of Nymphs, Porphyry starts from 11 verses of Homer (Od. XIII, 102-112) to cleverly draw a platonic theory inspired exegesis of the soul. The lectio porfiriana allows to suggest that the image of cave reveals something more than a simple literary allegory. It gives evidence of the existence of relationships, dialogical and circular, between platonic philosophy and popular religious imagery of the ancient world.

Keywords : Plato; Porphyry; De Antro Nynfarum; Cave; Neoplatonism.

        · abstract in Portuguese     · text in Portuguese     · Portuguese ( pdf )