历史的另一度:沃格林论“没有柏拉图的希腊人”

The Other Dimension of History:Voegelin’s Views on “the Greeks without Plato”

沃格林的研究掀开了古代希腊的另一维度:史诗显示出希腊世界从神界到人间都已身缠重疾;修昔底德则警示世人,不受约束的强力只会带来“动荡”以及“民族自杀”般的灾难,雅典就是例证。而早期思想已经意识到,人没有智慧,不要妄想拥有真理,占有存在。人永远没有这个能力。任何妄称拥有真理的人,如果不是天真的幻想,那就是无知的轻浮与傲慢,必将遭到毁灭的报应。强盛雅典帝国毁灭之际的绝望哀嚎,是这一论断的鲜活象征。

Voegelin’s research exposes another dimension of ancient Greece. The epic shows that the Greek world has been fatally ill from the divine world to the human world. Thucydides warns that the unconstrained power would inevitably lead to the tragedies of“upheaval”and“national suicide”, as is exemplified by Athens.In the early history, it is held that human, with no wisdom, should have no delusion of possessing truth and being. And human will never this capacity. Anyone, who falsely claims to have truth, is either naively fantastic or ignorantly frivolous and arrogant, and will be punished. The cry of despair at the time of the destruction of the powerful Athenian Empire is a vivid symbol of this assertion.