[Buddha-l] Re: Natural lucidity for Socrates

[jkirk]

Thanks, intriguing. Of course, some scholars tend to take these ancient 
reporters with somewhat of a grain of salt. But what else is there?
Joanna
=============================

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "James Ward" <jamesward at earthlink.net>

Hi Joanna,

Here is an interesting entry for "kalanos" from the Suda On Line:

http://www.stoa.org/sol-bin/search.pl?
db=REAL&search_method=QUERY&login=guest&enlogin=guest&user_list=LIST&pag
e_num=1&searchstr=kalanos&field=any&num_per_page=100

(It looks like the address is going to be broken up in the post...)

It refers to Arrian, Plutarch, Diodorus, and Strabo as the principal
sources for this person.

Megasthenes' _Indika_:

http://www.mssu.edu/projectsouthasia/history/primarydocs/Foreign_Views/
GreekRoman/Megasthenes-Indika.htm

 From Diogenes Laertius on Pyrrho (IX 61):

"Pyrrho of Elis was the son of Pleistarchus, as Diocles relates.
According to Apollodorus in his _Chronology_, he was first a painter;
then he studied under Stilpo's son Bryson:  thus Alexander in his
_Successions of Philosophers_.  Afterwards he joined Anaxarchus, whom
he accompanied on his travels everywhere so that he even forgathered
with the Indian Gymnosophists and with the Magi.  This led him to adopt
a most noble philosophy, to quote Ascanius of Abdera, taking the form
of agnosticism and suspension of judgement.  He denied that anything
was honourable or dishonourable, just or unjust.  And so, universally,
he held that there is nothing really existent, but custom and
convention govern human action; for no single thing is in itself any
more this than that."

(Diogenes Laertius, translated by R. D. Hicks, Loeb Classical Library,
vol. II, p. 475)

All the best,

James Ward


On Sep 5, 2006, at 7:03 PM, jkirk wrote:

> Hi Eric,
> Any references for any of these? Who wrote that Alex. the Gr. took a 
> sadhu with him? Who wrote about Pyrrhon and Jains?
> Thanks
> Joanna
> =====================
>
> I remember some more. A certain Megasthenes was ambassador for the  king 
> of Syria. He lived in Pataliputra (Patna) for some time. This man  wrote a 
> book about his discoveries. Indian logic and astrology is of  Greek 
> origin. Another French scolar, Georges Dumézil wrote about the  common 
> heritage of Aryans and Greeks, like the gods, the three layers  of society 
> etc. Alexander took with him a yogi who lived in Athens  under the name of 
> Kalanos (translation of sadhu). Pyrrhon based his  scepticism presumably 
> on dicussions with Indian sadhus, perhaps Jains.
>
> Erik

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