Heraclitus

Agora

Heraclitus

c. 535–475 BCE

A first way ina deliberate simplification – the portrait says more

Everything is constantly changing, like a flowing river, yet a hidden order holds the world together through the tension of opposites.

Placement

Ancient Greek · West Asia & North Africa · Metaphysics

Everything flows: the world is eternal becoming, governed by the Logos and the strife of opposites.

Key ideas

Panta rhei (later summary of the river fragment)
Logos
Unity of opposites

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Influence

Influenced 6

Plato

influenced ✓
According to Aristotle, Plato accepted from Heraclitus, through Cratylus, that sensible things are always in flux and cannot be known, and so posited unchanging Forms (Metaphysics I.6). Aristotle, Metaphysics I.6, 987a32–b7; Plato, Cratylus 402a; SEP “Heraclitus”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Plato › 428–348 BCE
Zeno of Citium

influenced
Zeno took up Heraclitus’ cosmic fire and logos for Stoic physics: a designing fire runs through the world and periodically consumes it; Cleanthes wrote on Heraclitus. Diogenes Laertius VII.134–142, VII.174; A. A. Long, ‘Heraclitus and Stoicism’, Philosophia 5–6 (1975–76); SEP “Heraclitus”
Evidence: also in InPhO · InPhO
Zeno of Citium › c. 334–262 BCE
Marcus Aurelius

influenced
Marcus Aurelius cited Heraclitus on the cycle of the elements and on sleepers as co-workers in the world, and pictured time as a river (Meditations IV.43, IV.46, VI.42). Marcus Aurelius, Meditations IV.43, IV.46, VI.42; SEP “Heraclitus”
Evidence: AI draft
Marcus Aurelius › 121–180
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel

influenced ✓
Hegel said there is no proposition of Heraclitus he had not taken into his Logic, where becoming unites being and nothing (Lectures on the History of Philosophy, 1833). G. W. F. Hegel, Vorlesungen über die Geschichte der Philosophie, ed. K. L. Michelet (1833); Wissenschaft der Logik (1812)
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel › 1770–1831
Friedrich Nietzsche

influenced ✓
Nietzsche praised Heraclitus’ eternal becoming in Philosophy in the Tragic Age of the Greeks (written 1873) and felt closest to him (Ecce Homo, 1888). F. Nietzsche, Die Philosophie im tragischen Zeitalter der Griechen (1873, unpublished); Ecce homo (1888), on The Birth of Tragedy; SEP “Friedrich Nietzsche”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Friedrich Nietzsche › 1844–1900
Martin Heidegger

influenced ✓
Heidegger read Heraclitus’ logos as the gathering that lets beings appear (‘Logos’, 1951) and discussed his fragments in lectures (1943–44) and a seminar with Eugen Fink (1966–67). M. Heidegger, “Logos (Heraklit, Fragment 50)” (1951), in Vorträge und Aufsätze (1954); Heraklit (lectures 1943–44; publ. 1979); M. Heidegger and E. Fink, Heraklit (seminar 1966–67; publ. 1970); SEP “Martin Heidegger”
Evidence: also in Wikidata · Wikidata · InPhO
Martin Heidegger › 1889–1976

Criticism

Criticized by 3

Parmenides

criticised by disputed
Parmenides’ attack on ‘two-headed mortals’, for whom being and not-being are the same and not the same, is often read as aimed at Heraclitus; this is disputed. Parmenides, DK 28 B6.4–9; SEP “Parmenides”
Evidence: AI draft
Parmenides › c. 515–450 BCE
Aristotle

criticised by
Aristotle objected to the claim, ascribed by some to Heraclitus, that the same thing is and is not: the principle of non-contradiction makes it unbelievable (Metaphysics IV). Aristotle, Metaphysics IV.3, 1005b23–26; IV.7, 1012a24–26; SEP “Heraclitus”
Evidence: AI draft
Aristotle › 384–322 BCE
Lucretius

criticised by
Lucretius rejected Heraclitus’ view that all things are made of fire, calling him famous among the foolish for his obscure language (De rerum natura I.635–704). Lucretius, De rerum natura I.635–704
Evidence: AI draft
Lucretius › c. 99–55 BCE

Criticizes 2

Pythagoras

criticised
Heraclitus held that Pythagoras’ ‘much learning’ does not teach understanding, and called his wisdom ‘artful knavery’ (DK 22 B40, B129). Heraclitus, DK 22 B40, B129; SEP “Heraclitus”
Evidence: AI draft
Pythagoras › traditionally c. 570–495 BCE
Xenophanes

criticised
Heraclitus named Xenophanes, with Hesiod, Pythagoras and Hecataeus, among those whose much learning had not taught them understanding (DK 22 B40). Heraclitus, DK 22 B40 (Diogenes Laertius 9.1)
Evidence: AI draft
Xenophanes › c. 570–478 BCE

Works

c. 500 BCEFragments
Aphorisms on the Logos, fire and the flux of all things.

Position

Heraclitus saw the world as a process of constant change governed by a hidden order he called the logos. You cannot step twice into the same river, yet the river remains: stability arises from ongoing flux. Opposites – day and night, war and peace, life and death – belong together and turn into one another; strife is not a defect but the very engine of the world, and ever-living fire is its fitting image. Most people, he complained, live as if asleep, without grasping this common logos. His thought of unity in tension inspired Plato and the Stoics and, much later, Hegel and Nietzsche.

Life & context

Heraclitus came from an aristocratic family in Ephesus on the coast of Asia Minor and was active around 500 BCE. Ancient reports portray him as proud and solitary, scornful both of the masses and of famous predecessors. His book survives only in some 130 terse, often enigmatic fragments, which earned him the nickname “the Obscure”.