_Necessity for a Mediator between God and Man partly met by
Oracular Inspiration—General failure of Oracles in the age of
Plutarch—Plutarch’s “Delphian Essays”—The DE PYTHIÆ ORACULIS:
nature of Inspiration: oracles not verbally inspired—The DE
DEFECTU ORACULORUM—Various explanations of Inspiration—Plutarch
inclines to accept that which assumes an original Divine
afflatus placed under the superintendence of Dæmons, whose
activities are subject to the operation of natural causes._
An age which attempts to reinvigorate its own ethical life by draughts of
inspiration from springs hallowed by their duration from an immemorial
antiquity, will naturally regret that currents, which once ran full,
now flow no longer in their early strength, but have dwindled to
insignificant rills, or are dried up altogether in their courses. And
there is no source of religious inspiration so greatly held in honour
as that which comes from the communication of mankind with the Divine
Being.[271] Visions, dreams, incantations, inspired writings, omens, and
prophecies have been valued as means of bringing man into communication
with God, and as furnishing an unerring way of indicating the Divine will
to humanity. But it would be difficult to mention any institution or
practice having this ostensible aim which has had such absolute sway over
the minds of those who came within reach of its influence, as the group
of oracles which were celebrated in the ancient Hellenic world. It is no
wonder, therefore, that in the age of Plutarch the present silence of the
oracles was a common topic of speculation, of anxious alarm to the pious,
of ribald sarcasm to the profane. Juvenal[272] satirically describes the
meaner methods which the cessation of the Oracle at Delphi has imposed
upon those who yet wish to peer through the gloom that hides the future.
Lucan laments the loss which his degenerate time suffers from this cause:
“_non ullo secula dono Nostra carent majore Deum, quam Delphica sedes
Quod siluit_;”[273] and speculates as to the probable reason for the
failure of the ancient inspiration.[274] That Plutarch should have shown
solicitude on this aspect of the ancient faith is natural, and one cannot
but be grateful that the chances of time have preserved the exhaustive
tracts in which he and his friends are represented as discussing various
questions connected with the inspiration of the Delphic Oracle, and the
manner in which this inspiration was conveyed to humanity. No extant work
gives us so intelligible and natural an explanation of the significance
which oracular institutions possessed for the ancient world, nor so
close an insight into the workings of the minds of educated men at one
of the most important periods of human history, in face of one of the
most interesting and, perhaps, most appalling of human problems. We have
already made copious quotations from the two tracts in question; we now
propose to use them mainly for the light which they cast on the question
of oracular inspiration. We refer to the tracts known as the “De Pythiæ
Oraculis” and the “De Defectu Oraculorum.” These two tracts (together
with the one entitled the “De Ε apud Delphos”)[275] purport to be reports
of conversations held by philosophical friends and acquaintances of
Plutarch at the shrine of Apollo at Delphi.
The dialogue, briefly called “On the Pythian Responses,” deals, as
the Greek title indicates, with the fact that the Pythia at Delphi no
longer uses verse as the instrument of her inspired utterances. It takes
the form of a conversation in the Delphic temple, between Philinus,
Diogenianus, Theon, Serapion, and Boethus—the first of whom reports
the conversation to his friend Basilocles, who has grown quite weary
of waiting while the rest of the party conduct Diogenianus, a visitor,
on a tour of inspection among the sacred offerings in the Temple.[276]
Philinus[277] tells how “after the Ciceroni (οἱ περιηγηταὶ) had gone
through their wonted programme, disregarding our requests that they
would cut short their formal narratives and their explanations of most
of the inscriptions,” the conversation had turned by a series of natural
gradations from the interesting objects, that so strongly attracted
the attention of visitors, to the medium through which the oracles of
the God had been conveyed to humanity.[278] Diogenianus had noted that
“the majority of the oracular utterances were crowded with faults of
inelegance and incorrectness, both of composition and metre.” Serapion,
to whom previous reference has been made, and who is here described as
“the poet from Athens,” will not admit the correctness of this impious
indictment.[279] “You are of opinion, then,” said he, “that, believing
these verses to be the work of the god, we may assert that they are
inferior to those of Homer and Hesiod? Shall we not rather regard them as
being the best and most beautiful of all compositions, and reconstitute,
by the standard which they supply, our own taste and judgment, so long
corrupted by an evil tradition?” Boethus, “the geometrician,” who has
lately joined the Epicureans, uses a neat form of the _argumentum ad
hominem_ in refutation of Serapion, paying him a polished compliment
at the same time.[280] “Your own poems,” says he, “grave, indeed,
and philosophic in matter, are, in power and grace and finish, much
more after the model of Homer and Hesiod than of the Pythia;” and he
gives concise expression to the two opposing mental attitudes in which
questions of this kind are universally approached. “Some will maintain
that the oracles are fine poems because they are the god’s, others that
they cannot be the god’s because they are not fine poems.” Serapion
emphatically re-asserts the former of these two views, maintaining that
“our eyes and our ears are diseased. We have become accustomed, by long
indulgence in luxury and effeminacy, to regard sweetness as identical
with beauty.”[281] Theon[282] is the exponent of a compromise not unknown
in modern discussions on the “Inspiration of the Scriptures”—“Since
these verses are inferior to those of Homer, it cannot be maintained
that the god is their author. He supplies the primary inspiration to
the prophetess, who gives expression thereto in accordance with her
natural aptitude and capacity. He only suggests the images, and makes
the light of the future shine in her soul.” The conversation then turns
upon certain events which had accompanied, or been preceded by, portents
and wonders happening to statues and other gifts consecrated in the
Temple. On this subject Philinus asserts his firm belief that “all the
sacred offerings at Delphi are specially moved by divine forethought to
the indication of futurity, and that no fragment of them is dead and
irresponsive, but all are filled with divine power.” Boethus, as a newly
converted Epicurean, makes a mock of this view, this “identification of
Apollo with brass and stone, as if chance were not quite competent to
account for such coincidences,” and he subsequently enlarges his view
as follows:—“What possible condition of temporal affairs, my friend,
cannot be assigned to natural causes? What strange and unexpected event,
occurring by sea or by land, to cities or to individual men, could one
predict without some chance of hitting the mark?[283] Yet you would
hardly call this prediction; it would be merely assertion, or, rather,
the dissemination at random, into the abyss of infinity, of bare words
without any guiding principle leading them to a particular end, words
which, as they wander about, are sometimes met by chance events which
correspond with them.” And Boethus continues to insist that, though some
predictions may have by accident come true, the original assertions
were not the less false on that account. Serapion admits that this
may be true about vague predictions, but maintains that such detailed
prophecies as those he proceeds to quote from history do not owe their
accomplishment to chance.[284]
The attention of the disputants—if these calm and dignified colloquies
can be called disputes—is here again attracted to the objects of artistic
and historical interest surrounding them, among which the guide takes
occasion to point out the place where formerly had reposed the iron
spits dedicated by the courtezan Rhodopis under the circumstances
detailed by Herodotus.[285] Diogenianus warmly protests against such
offerings having ever been admitted into the Temple, but Serapion draws
his attention to the golden statue of the more notorious Phryne, “that
trophy of Greek incontinence,”—as Crates had called it—and condemns the
inconsistency of these objections in people who see, without a protest,
the temple crowded with offerings made by the Greek cities for victories
in their internecine warfare. “It were fitting,” exclaims he, “that
kings and magistrates should consecrate to the god offerings of justice,
temperance, and magnanimity, and not tributes of a golden and luxurious
wealth, which the most evil livers often abound in.”[286]
The concluding portion of this somewhat discursive tract is devoted to
a speech by Theon on the question with which the title only has so far
dealt, the cessation of the oracle to use verse. Theon, as we have seen,
believes that the god inspires the thought, and not the expression,
of the Pythia, and his explanation of the change of medium is purely
natural, being based upon the general tendency towards prose which
early became evident in Greek Literature and Philosophy. Besides, the
matters on which the oracle is now consulted are not such as to require
the mystery and magnificence of verse.[287] “In these cases it would be
absurd to employ the diction, metre, and imagery of poetry, when what is
required is a simple and concise reply. It would be like a vain Sophist
to turn an oracle finely for the sake of show. The Pythian priestess,
moreover, is noble and virtuous in her own character, and when she mounts
the tripod and approaches the god, she is more intent on truth than
appearance, more regardful of the god’s message than of the praise or
blame of men.”[288] “In old days,” continues Theon, “were not wanting
those who accused the oracles of uncertainty and ambiguity, and there are
now those who accuse them of excessive simplicity. But the ways of such
persons are childish and silly: for just as children take more delight in
looking at rainbows and aureoles and comets than at the sun and moon, so
do these desire enigmas and allegories and metaphors to fill the heart
of man with wonder and mystery. In their ignorance of the true reason of
the change (in the oracle’s mode of expression), they depart, blaming
the god instead of charging the defect to the weakness of our human
intellect, which cannot comprehend the purposes of the Deity.”[289]
In this defence of the Deity Theon has apparently committed himself to
a view of the manner in which the process of inspiration takes place.
“The body employs many organs, while the soul employs the body and its
parts. The soul, in like manner, is God’s instrument. Now the virtue of
an instrument consists in imitating, subject to its natural limitations,
the power that makes use of it, and in exhibiting the thought of that
power in operation. This it cannot do to the extent of reproducing the
purity and perfection of the Divine Creator, but its work is mixed with
alien matter. The Moon reproduces the splendour of the Sun, but in a dim
and weak form. These images are representations of the way in which the
Pythia reproduces for the service of mankind the thoughts of God.”[290]
We may be tempted, while reading this explanation, to assert that
Plutarch wishes to maintain that the inspiration of the Pythia by the
Deity is direct. But these illustrations are intended only to explain why
the Pythian verses are not divinely perfect. They come through a human
soul, which has the weakness of an instrument, and is prevented by its
limitations from expressing the purity and beauty of the divine thought.
The manner of this inspiration is more fully discussed in the following
dialogue, the “De Defectu Oraculorum.”
This tract is in the form of a letter addressed to Terentius Priscus,
and although the person speaking as “I” in the dialogue is alluded
to as “Lamprias”[291] by the other speakers, it is clearly Plutarch
himself who is modestly represented under this guise. After a warning,
characteristic of Plutarch both as regards its purport and the manner
in which it is conveyed (by means of a historical reminiscence), that
these questions are not to be tested “like a painting by the touch,” the
writer brings a party of philosophers together at Delphi “shortly before
the Pythian games held under Callistratus.” Two of these philosophers
are already known to us. Like the eagles or swans of the ancient legend
they had met at Delphi coming from opposite quarters of the globe;[292]
Demetrius, of Tarsus, returning home from Britain, and Cleombrotus, of
Lacedæmon, from prolonged journeyings by land and sea, in Egypt and the
East. Cleombrotus, being possessed of a competence, employed his means
and his leisure in travel, for the purpose of accumulating evidence to
form the basis of that branch of philosophy whose end and aim, as he
expressed it, was Theology.[293] A preliminary discussion takes place
respecting the “everlasting lamp” which Cleombrotus had been shown
in the Temple of Ammon, a discussion involving abstract consideration
of Mathematics and Astronomy. In this conversation, Plutarch’s three
favourite characters, doubtlessly representing three common types of
the day, are again depicted in the pious belief of Cleombrotus, the
scepticism of Demetrius, and the judicial pose of the Academic Ammonius.
The mention of the Temple of Ammon naturally leads Plutarch to raise the
question of the present silence of that famous oracle.[294] Demetrius
diverts this particular topic into a general inquiry respecting the
comparative failure of oracles all the world over.[295] Bœotia, for
example, once so renowned in this respect, suffers from an almost total
drought of oracular inspiration. While Demetrius is speaking, the
party—Demetrius, Cleombrotus, Ammonius, and Plutarch—had walked from
the shrine towards the “doors of the Hall of the Cnidians,[296] and,”
proceeds Plutarch, “entering therein we came upon our friends sitting
down and waiting for us.” Demetrius playfully suggests that their
listless attitude and idle expression do not indicate attention to any
important subject of discussion; but Heracleon of Megara retorts sharply
upon the grammarian that people who try to solve trifling questions of
grammar and philology naturally contract their brows and contort their
features;[297] but there are subjects of importance which people discuss
with their eyebrows composed in their natural way. “Such,” amiably
replies Cleombrotus, “such is the subject we now propose to discuss;”
and, the two groups having joined company, he proceeds to explain the
topic to his hearers. His observations excite the cynic Didymus, surnamed
Planetiades, in a remarkable manner.[298] Striking his cynic’s staff
upon the ground, he inveighs against the wickedness of the times, and
wonders that the Divine Providence has not gathered up its oracles on
every side and taken its departure long ago, like the Aidos and Nemesis
of Hesiod. “I would suggest for your discussion the question why some god
has not repeated the feat of Hercules and shattered the tripod, filled to
overflowing, as it has been, with disgraceful and atheistical requests.
Some of us have questioned the god as if he were a sophist, anxious to
show off his rhetorical skill. Some of us have appealed to him about
riches and treasures; some about legacies; some about unlawful marriages.
Surely Pythagoras was utterly wrong when he said that men were at their
best when approaching the gods. Do we not expose, naked and unashamed,
to the eyes of the god such vices and diseases of the soul as we should
shun mentioning even in the presence of an old and experienced man?”[299]
He was going to add more, when Heracleon twitched his cloak, “but I,”
writes Plutarch, “being on more familiar terms with him than were the
others, said to him, ‘My dear Planetiades, cease your efforts to provoke
a god who is really amiable and gentle, and who has been, as Pindar says,
“Adjudged exceeding mild to mortal men.”
And whether he is the sun, or lord and father of the sun and of the whole
perceptible world, it is not right to believe that he would deprive the
men of to-day of the help of his utterances, for he is the author and
supporter of our life, and the master of our intelligence. Nor is it
reasonable to suppose that Providence, which, like a kind and tender
mother, has given us all that we possess, should wish to punish us in
one single point alone—by taking away from us that prophetic aid which
was once given to us. Just as if the wicked were not as numerous when
the oracles were firmly established in many parts of the earth! Sit down
again, and, in honour of the Pythian games, make a truce for once with
vice, which you are always eager to chastise, and help us to find out
the cause of the failure of the oracles.’ The only result of my remarks
was that Planetiades went out-of-doors in silence.[300] After a brief
silence, Ammonius turned to me and said, ‘Come, Lamprias, we must be
careful not to deprive the god of all agency in this matter. For if we
maintain that the cessation of the oracles is due to any other cause
than the will of God, we can hardly escape the conclusion that their
foundation also was not His work. If the prophetic power of the oracles
is, indeed, the work of God, we can imagine no greater or stronger power
than that required to destroy it. Planetiades’ remarks were displeasing
to me, particularly on account of the inconstancy which he attributes
to God in His attitude towards men’s wickedness, now punishing and now
protecting it, as if God were some king or tyrant excluding vicious men
at one door while welcoming and rewarding them at another. We ought
to start with the principle that God’s action is always marked by an
adaptation of means to ends, that He does not furnish an excess of what
is not required, and should then observe that Greece has shared in a
particular degree that general depopulation which wars and revolutions
have effected in all parts of the world, to such an extent, indeed, that
the whole of Greece could now barely furnish the 3000 hoplites which
were Megara’s contingent to Platæa.[301] If we were to do this we should
accurately display our own judgment; for how could the god leave his
oracles with us for the mere purpose of marking the desolation of our
land? For who would be the better if its ancient oracle were still left
to Tegyra, or at Ptoum, where after searching whole days you can hardly
find a single herdsman tending his cattle? Even this most ancient and
famous oracle at Delphi is related to have been for a long period reduced
to a state of desolation and inaccessibility by a terrible monster in the
shape of a serpent. But this desolation is not rightly explained. The
solitude brought the serpent, not the serpent the solitude. But when,
in the great purpose of God, Greece again grew strong in its cities,
and the land was replenished with mankind, the temple was served by two
priestesses, who took alternate duties on the tripod, and a third was
appointed to be available in case of emergency. But now there is but
one Pythia; and her we find enough for all our needs. For the prophetic
inspiration that yet remains is sufficient to send all comers away with
their requirements satisfied. Agamemnon employed nine heralds; and
even so he was hard put to it to control the assembly of the Greeks,
so numerous it was. But within a few days you will have an opportunity
of observing that one voice will easily reach the ears of everybody
in the Theatre here. In a similar manner the prophetic influence of
the god issued by a greater number of voices when the population was
greater. But as things at present are, the real cause for astonishment
would be that the god should allow the prophetic agency to waste like
water, or his voice to sound in vain like the cries of shepherds and
sheep re-echoing among the rocky solitudes.’[302] Ammonius ceased, and
I remained silent. But Cleombrotus, turning to me, said: ‘Was it not
you who, just now, maintained that it is the god himself who not only
gives, but also takes away the oracles?’ ‘No, indeed,’ replied I, ‘on
the contrary, I assert that the god has taken away neither oracle nor
sacred shrine. But just as the god bestows upon us many other things
which are subject to decay and destruction by natural processes—or,
rather, the original substance, containing a principle of change and
movement in its own nature, often dissolves itself and reshapes itself
without the intervention of the original creator—so in like manner, I
think, the oracles undergo darkenings and declines, being included in
the truth of the statement that the god bestows many fair gifts on men,
but not one of them to last for ever; or, as Sophocles has it, “the
gods immortal are, but not their works”’”—“The foundation of oracles
is rightly assigned to God,” continues Plutarch, “but the law of their
existence and its operation we must seek for in nature and in matter.
For it is nothing but the most childish folly to look upon God as a sort
of ventriloquist: like the fellows once called Eurycleis and nowadays
Pythons, inserting Himself into the bodies of the prophets, using their
mouths and vocal chords as instruments of His messages. For he who puts
God into this personal contact with human weaknesses and necessities,
sins against His glory, and deprives Him of the excellence and grandeur
of His Virtue.” This strong insistence upon the splendour of the Divine
Nature is, as we know, one of the most characteristic elements of
Plutarch’s philosophy, and, so long as he can preserve this intact,
he is not careful of consistency in his arguments on less important
points of doctrine. We have seen him shrinking in conversation from
too close an identification with Rationalism; and we are also prepared
to find him giving importance to a view which introduces a supernatural
element even into the operation of secondary causes. Hence Cleombrotus
is represented as saying how difficult it is to draw the line exactly
at the direct interposition of Providence in human affairs; since those
who exclude God from second causes, and those who see Him everywhere,
are equally in error. Hence the pious student of Theology is permitted
to give a full exposition of the doctrines of Dæmonology as applied to
the question of Oracles and Inspiration. “Plato delivered Philosophy
from many difficulties when he discovered Matter as the substratum of
phenomenal qualities; but those who invented the science of Dæmonology
have solved greater difficulties still.” We are already familiar with
the nature and activities of the Dæmons; it remains to see how their
existence is applied to the question under discussion. “Let us not
listen,” says Cleombrotus, “to those who say that oracles are not
divinely inspired, or that religious rites and ceremonies are disregarded
by the gods: nor, on the other hand, let us approve of the view that God
is actively, personally, and directly concerned in these matters; but let
us believe that the Dæmons are superintendents of, and participators in,
the sacred sacrifices and mysteries, justly assigning these functions to
Lieutenants of the gods, as it were to Servants and Secretaries, while
others go about and punish great and notorious acts of injustice.”[303]
This belief, in the opinion of Cleombrotus, furnishes an explanation
of the silent periods of the oracles. “I am not afraid to say, as many
others have said before me, that when the Dæmons who have been appointed
to administer prophetic shrines and oracles leave them finally, then
the shrines and oracles finally decline. If these guardians flee and go
elsewhither, and then return after a long interval, the oracles, silent
during their absence, become again, as of old, the means of conveying
responses to those who come to consult them.” “But,” says Demetrius,
“it is impossible to assert that the oracles are silent owing to their
desertion by the Dæmons, unless we are first reassured respecting the
method by which the Dæmons, when in actual superintendence of the
oracles, make them actively inspired.”[304] Plutarch here introduces a
rationalistic argument imputing prophetic inspiration to subterrestrial
exhalations, and draws down upon himself the reproof from Ammonius that
he has followed up the abstraction of Divination from the gods by now
depriving the Dæmons of that power and referring it to “exhalations,
winds, and vapours.” Plutarch, however, though adhering to Rationalism to
the extent of insisting on the operation of secondary causes, saves his
piety by explicitly placing them under the superintendence of the Dæmons.
“There are two causes of generation: the Zeus of the ancient poets and
theologians, and the physical causes of the natural philosophers. The
study of either of these sets of causes, to the exclusion of the other,
leads to defective philosophy. But he who first made use of both these
principles, combining creative Reason with created Matter, freed us
from fear of criticism either on the ground of impiety or unreason. For
we deprive prophetic inspiration neither of God nor of Reason when we
allow as its material the human soul, and assign as its instrument the
inspiring exhalation.[305] The Earth, indeed, breeds these exhalations,
but he that implants in the earth its tempering and transforming power—I
mean the Sun—is regarded as a god in our ancestral religion. Then, if we
leave the Dæmons as presidents and attendants and guardians, to secure
the due harmonizing of the various elements of the inspiring exhalation,
now slackening and now tightening it, now restraining its excessive power
of phrensy and confusion, and gently tempering its stimulating force so
that it becomes harmless and painless to those under its influence—if
we adopt these views, we shall be in perfect harmony with reason and
possibility.”[306]
The one thing that is conspicuously evident throughout these discussions
on important questions of Religion is the earnest sincerity with which
they are universally approached. We notice everywhere that combination
of piety with philosophy, which is characteristic of Plutarch’s own
genius, and which appears to be no less characteristic of the society
in which he constantly moves. Even the Epicurean Boethus, an excellent
man with his witty stories and courtly compliments, finds it somehow
in his power to defend the dignity of the prophetic God against those
who would “mix Him up with every piece of stone or brass,” while those
who are most solicitously inclined to a pious reverence of the ancient
faith—Serapion for a prominent example—never for long forget that spirit
of critical detachment proper to the inquiring philosopher.[307] “There
is no one here present,” says Heracleon,“who is profane and uninitiated,
and holds views of the gods inconsistent with our own; but we must take
care that we ourselves do not unconsciously admit absurd and far-reaching
hypotheses in support of our arguments.”[308] But it is Plutarch himself
who, shunning the “falsehood of extremes,” most conspicuously represents
this spirit of compromise. It is Theon-Plutarch who finds a middle way
between the views of Boethus and those of Serapion on the subject of
prophecy, and it is Lamprias-Plutarch who, knowing that these things
involve many contentions and are open to numerous contradictions,
combines the belief in an original divine inspiration, with a recognition
of the scientific importance of subsidiary causes, moving unchecked in
the sphere of Nature. “The power of the exhalation which inspires the
Pythia is in truth divine and dæmonic, but it is not exempt from the
operation of causes that bring silence, age, decay and destruction on
all that lives between the earth and moon.”[309] Plutarch here strikes
with clear emphasis a note not out of harmony with the spirit of modern
Theology; and had he pushed this view to its logical conclusion, as the
Epicurean Boethus[310] did, the Dæmons would have disappeared, and their
places would have been wholly occupied by natural causes operating under
the Divine impetus inspired by the great First Cause. But the necessity
for a _personality_, human on one aspect, Divine on the other, to stand
between God and man, was too strongly felt by Plutarch to enable him
to accept without qualification the conclusions of pure rationalism.
The blank between the Creator and His creatures is occupied, therefore,
partly by natural causes, partly by the Dæmons, whose existence and mode
of operation are now involved in the working of natural causes regarded
as under their superintendence, and now appear as supernatural agencies
vaguely dependent upon the will of the Supreme Power.