'De-Mything'

the

Logos:

Anaximander's Apeiron and the

Possibility

of

Post-

Metaphysical Understanding of
the Incarnation
Author: Edward Moore
Quodlibet Journal: Volume 4
Number 1, Winter 2002
ISSN: 1526-6575
Introduction [1]
When Martin Heidegger introduced
his unique brand of Existentialism
to the world, with the publication in
1927

of

his

entitled Being

and

vast

tome

Time,

many

philosophers recognized what they

felt to be the need to move "beyond
metaphysics." Even in the realm of
theology, this demand was felt, and
met, for example, by Rudolph
Bultmann

and

his

"demythologization."

program of
[2]

What

Bultmann's program amounted to

was nothing less than the removal,
from the kerygma, of any remnant
of

divine

resultant

transcendence.
reinterpretation

of

His
the

Christian message in terms of

Existentialism served to place the
radical demand of Jesus Christ at
the

very

center

of

human

existence, and was therefore a

positive contribution to theology

and ethics. Bultmann's argument

that the truth of the Christian
kerygma lies in the doctrine of
God's immanence, and that the
transcendent or "cosmic" language
of the New Testament is but the
necessary

consequence

of

the

mode of expression of a "prescientific age," [3] also succeeded

in opening the way for a "postmetaphysical"

understanding

of

God.
The

succeeding

generation

of

"Death of God" theologians fixated

upon the post-structural critique of
language, and the abandonment of
what Jacques Derrida has termed
"logocentrism" [4]; for the concern
to go "beyond metaphysics" was
really a critical concern with the
way philosophy conceives of truth.
When Nietzsche stated that "we
are not rid of God because we still
have faith in grammar" [5] he was
referring to the prevalent belief that
language is capable of expressing
ultimate truth. This idea is based
upon a belief, going back to Plato,
[6] that spoken language proceeds
from the logos, or rational faculty of
the mind, and therefore owes its
referential power to an eternal
principle of veracity, if you will - a

guarantor of truth. If language all

too often fails to convey truth, this
is the fault of the one who wields
the tool of language, not of the tool
itself.

Nietzsche,

of

course,

believed none of this, and most

subsequent

philosophy

has

followed suit.
Many

radical

theologians

have

seen in the post-modern critique of

"logocentrism"

way

of

reinterpreting the "Death of God" in

the sense of an "emptying out,"
or kenosis, of the logos into and
within language, which, in the
absence

of

any

metaphysical

fundament, has become the sole

subject of philosophy. Language,
then,

and

the

philosophy

and

theology that is concerned with it,

has come

to

be

seen

as a

manipulation of the very logos upon

which language - understood as
the tool for the construction of
meaning - was formerly thought to
be dependent. In the realm of
theology, this can lead to a manner
of discourse that no longer has
anything positive to say concerning
the revelation of God. In an essay
entitled

"The

Deconstruction

God," Carl A. Raschke writes:

of

If theology, instead of examining

the nature and attributes of God, or
even exploring the meaning and
discursive function of the holy
name, becomes preoccupied in
contrast

with

pondering

the

purpose for which it is "done," then

it

must

come

to

understand

itself strictu sensu as a meditation

within discourse upon discourse.
The divine word, the sacra verba, is
truly made flesh; it reaches its
kenotic consummation, its radical
otherness, in a theology which is
nought

but

writing

about

theology. [7]
It is important to note here that the
problem that Raschke is isolating,
and which he feels signals the "end
of theology," [8] is only a problem
because he is remaining tied to the
metaphysical language or mode of
speaking that Bultmann earlier tried
to do away with. To speak of "the
nature and attributes of God," or
even

of

"the

meaning

and

discursive function of the holy

name" is, in my view, to carry over,
into post-modern discourse, a now
outmoded "mythological" sense of
the

divinity in order

to make

seemingly profound claims about

the kenosis of the logos in writing,
or

to

"demythologize"

the

Incarnation by making it into an

event of language. This selective
use of metaphysical terminology is
even

more

suspect

when

we

realize that the kenotic event that

Raschke speaks of would only
have meaning if the logos has lost
or relinquished a power it formerly
held. If this is actually the case,
then to speak of this passage of the
logos

from

position

as

"transcendental signified" to an
immanent dwelling amidst human
beings

in

language

as

"transformation of word as logos

('representation')

to

word

as rhema ('flow')"

[9]

subordinate

dispersed

this

is

to
or

disseminated logos to the human

act of utilizing or gathering the
various logoi

spermatikoi for

purpose

effecting

of

the

strictly

human meaning. In other words,

the logos has become secularized.
This is indeed the ultimate kenosis,
the final ptsis or "downfall" of the
formerly

divine

"transcendental

Post-modernism,

and

signified."

"deconstruction"
admits
general

to

in

working

structure

metaphysical

particular,
within
of

discourse,

the

Western
even

though the work being done is

often

highly subversive

of the

original intention of this structure.

However,

for

philosophical

mindset that still seeks positive

statements about existence, there
is very little satisfaction (to say the
least) to be found in a mode of
discourse that merely subverts the
quest for truth, or, even worse,
advocates a fluid relativism devoid
of positive assertions. While any
attempt to return to a former
metaphysical mode of thinking is
admittedly untenable, I do not
believe that one must abandon the
hope

of

ever

again

speaking

meaningfully of transcendence - or
of

speaking of

transcendental

meaning in

manner.

It

may

even be possible, if one is willing to

go the intellectual distance, to
again speak meaningfully of the
Incarnation.
I will now examine what has been
called

the

earliest

surviving

fragment of Western philosophical

thinking

few

lines

from

Anaximander - with the purpose of

re-establishing a more dynamic
conception of the Deity: one that is
not bound to static metaphysical
principles.

Utilizing

this

non-

metaphysical conception of the

Divinity, I will proceed to interpret

the doctrine of the Incarnation in a
manner that will, I hope, preserve
the transcendent power of this allimportant part of the kerygma,
while at the same time making it
tenable for the post-modern and,
more precisely, post-metaphysical
mind.
Anaximander's Apeiron
From out of that which things arise,
there also does their destruction [or
dissolution] occur, according to
necessity; for they render justice
and recompense to one another for
their injustice, according to the
orderly arrangement of time. [10]
"It

is

considered

the

oldest

fragment of Western thinking" thus

writes

Heidegger

in

his

famous essay on the even more

famous sentence of the ancient
Milesian philosopher Anaximander
(ca.

610-540

BCE).

[11]

The

"fragment" in question, of course, is

preserved

by

the

Neo-Platonic

scholar Simplicius, who flourished

in the early to mid-sixth century CE.
Without pausing to consider what
meaning, if any, we may find in the
phrase

"fragment

of

Western

thinking" - as if "thinking" could

produce or be held fast in a

fragmentary manner - or even to

ask

how

one

is

justified

in

assigning an age - "the oldest" - to

a passage that occurs, as a quote,
in the midst of a treatise produced
by a writer working at the very end
of a long and noble tradition, [12] I
will simply say that we fail to render
the proper tribute to this statement
of Anaximander if we only refer to it
as a preserved piece of thinking.
For thinking, as Heidegger himself
has taught us, is a tending toward
existence and all its questions; a
tending that causes questions to
grow, and calls ever more urgently
for bolder and more profound acts
of thought. [13]
A careful look at Anaximander's
statement will show us that his was
not a call for thinking, nor even a
step toward thinking; rather, it was
an interpretative attempt to answer
the boldest and most profound
question that has ever been asked:
'What is the nature and origin
of that which is?' The fact that, for
Anaximander, this abstract Being,
"that which is," was conceived,
even before questioning, as the
Divinity, the ex n, the from-out-ofwhich all things emerge, shows us
that

Being,

for

this

early

philosopher, was already thought in

terms of dependence upon an

origin. But this is not the end of the
story. If Anaximander had simply
thought Being as the primordial
ground upon which all existing
beings show themselves forth, or
even as the hidden, indeterminate
source

whence

all

determinate

entities flow, he would not be far

from Heidegger's own conceptworld.

[14]

The

fact

that

Anaximander is not uncovering or

disclosing an experience, but rather
interpreting an understanding of
reality that was based on a tradition
extending back into the prehistoric
mists of Greek memory, should
serve as evidence that he was
concerned not with the primordiality
of

theapeiron as

indeterminate

source, but rather as unlimited

possibility.

[15]

The

unlimited

possibility of/that is the apeiron,

then, is carried over by all existents
into the course of a life lived, and
utilized as the fecund basis of all
self-expression

or

personal

becoming. Therefore, Anaximander

was, as Cornford has explained,
struggling with the traditional ideas
of divinity and the nature informed
by it, in order to explain how "that
which is" (Being) arose from that
which is not - the arkh. [16]

The genius of Anaximander is

displayed in his 'explanation,' in
which he states that genesis, the
principle of 'emergence' or birth, is
constantly

usurping

of phthora -

the

power

dissolution,

destruction, passing-away, etc. and vice-versa. Anaximander never

states that these two productive
principles ever attempt to usurp
the apeiron itself. This is supremely
logical,

from

an

experiential

standpoint, for we know that no

existing thing can come to be
without the foundational support of
that which has gone before. When
we posit the apeiron, or the primal
possibility, as an actual, existing
source, whence all is derived, then
we are broaching a metaphysical
thought-mode, and foisting it upon
an expression that was made
before

metaphysics

was

even

possible. Anaximander did not do

this. What he did was describe
the apeiron, in dynamic language,
as that which lies at the base of all
existence, making expression and
individuality possible. "From out of
that which ..." (ex n de genesis)
- this is Anaximander's apeiron, his
'principle' of unlimited power or
fecundity which makes the dual
principles

of

Becoming

genesis and phthora -

possible.

Further, since the 'twin' principles

of "birth" and "dissolution" are
equally

dependent

the apeiron,

and

upon

also

equally

necessary for the productive flow of

existence,

how

understand

are

the

Anaximander's

we

to

meaning

of

statement

that

these principles do each other

"injustice," for which they must
make "recompense"? The answer
lies, I believe, in an understanding
of the apeiron not as a primordial,
metaphysical principle or source,
but as a power that is present
within and amongst all beings.
In his masterful study of the PreSocratics, Cornford went to great
lengths to explain the extent to
which the ideas of Anaximander
were based upon a very ancient,
pre-Olympian,

cosmogony.

[17]

This early cosmogony utilized a

non-anthropomorphic notion of a
primal ordering, moira, upon which
all

existence

is

dependent.

However, this moira was believed

to be, itself, the result of an even
more primordial activity or process
of 'nature,' phusis. Nature itself was
understood
principle

as the ever-flowing
of

life,

of

eternal

becoming,

while moira,

the

structure into which nature divided

itself, or came to be divided, was
understood

as

fixed,

static,

immutable. This inviolable moira,

then, was that against which one
would commit injustice, if one
sought to step beyond the bounds
set by it - that is, if one sought, in
the manner of a tragic hero, to defy
the destiny set by the gods. Indeed,
with the rise of the Olympian
pantheon, the primal moira came to
be expressed or understood by
way of the decrees and laws of the
gods. As we know from Homer,
even the Olympians were subject
to the higher power of moira, but
that idea gradually came to be
supplanted by the belief that the
Olympian gods were themselves
the stewards and dispensers of an
eternal Justice which they were
believed to embody. By this time,
relatively late in the Classical era,
the origin of Justice, Goodness,
existence,
identified

etc.,
with

an

immutable arkh,
principle

of

"allotment"

came

to

eternal
an

and

inviolable

distribution
(moira).

be

or
This

development coincided with the

critique

of

the

traditional

understanding of the gods carried

out by Xenophanes and, later, by

Plato himself, and provided the
impetus for Stoic allegory. This new
idea

was

responsible

for,

or

perhaps grew out of, the belief that

the cosmos is eternal, and that
each human being is a part of the
divine whole, and required to play
his or her part appropriately. In
other words, this development - of
the belief in moiraas the fixed and
immutable arkh, over against a
notion that the arkh itself is in
motion,

flowing,

constantly

producing - was the very birth of

metaphysical thinking.
The birth of metaphysical thinking,
then, was also the loss of that
dynamic notion of nature (phusis)
as the living and ever-flowing origin
of all existence. This dynamic
conception of nature was the very
conception that Anaximander had
in mind when he made his famous
statement about the apeiron, the
unlimited origin of all things. It was
also the idea behind Thales' belief
that "everything is full of gods." [18]
When we recall that the earlier or
Homeric

use

of

the

term the indicated a "running" or

flowing, the meaning of this latter
statement

appears

to

be

that

everything contains a productive

force or power capable of being
expressed in a variety of ways, i.e.,
as theos. [19] If this is the case,
then how are we to make sense of
Anaximander's

statement

about

injustice and recompense? In other

words,

if

the

very

the apeiron is

nature

to

of

produce

multiplicity through its ceaseless

flowing, why is guilt incurred by the
existents that are part of the
process? This question can only be
answered by thinking the apeiron in
a non-metaphysical manner.
When the twin principles of birth
and decay come to commit their
injustices, they are not said, by
Anaximander,
accountable
whatever

to
by

be

held

their source for

crimes

they

have

committed. There is no need for

these principles to answer to or
give an account of themselves
before the "dread judgment seat" of
the Unlimited, if you will. Instead,
they

pay

"recompense

to one

anotherfor their injustice." If we

think carefully about the problem
presented to us by this "fragment,"
it will, I believe, become clear that
the

"injustice"

spoken

of

by

Anaximander has nothing to do

with the transgression of a fixed,

primordial law, but rather with the
manner in which the immanent
power of the apeiron is utilized by
all those existents that have come
to

be through it.

And

since

the apeironis precisely that which is

ever flowing and boundless, only
that which strives for fixity, or
reposeful,
possibly

static
find

Being,

offense

in

can
the

utilization of a given possibility for

the purpose, not of ek-sistence or
persistence in externality, but of
eternal

and

autonomous establishment.

This

point is made explicit by the very

first

line

of

Anaximander's

statement, where he tells us that

both the birth and destruction of all
things occur in and through the
apeiron, the "from out of which ...".
Since all things flow back into
the apeiron, and out of it again, for
all eternity, the injustice spoken of
must

itself

be

something

that

passes away, and is therefore not

an injustice against a metaphysical
or cosmological order. The injustice
is rather an injustice committed
against existing beings by existing
beings, and is made possible by
the fact that all beings carry with
them, as their ownmost possibility,

the unlimited potential of/that is

the apeiron. The injustice is the
very attempt, by these beings, to
utilize

this

principle

eternally

for

the

productive

purpose

of

establishing their own existence for

all

eternity,

and

over-against

the apeiron, as Being, the Limited

(peras): the same metaphysically
static

'entity'

that

later

onto-

theology came to equate with God.

Anaximander's

understanding

of

the primal source, which I feel we

are correct to refer to as the
Divinity, theios, "the ever-flowing,"
is such that he is able to leave
room, in the cosmos, for the
manifest reality of injustice and
strife, while never abandoning a
belief in the eternal power and
fecundity of the Deity. As Werner
Jaeger

has

doctrine

pointed

of

something

out,

this

Anaximander

"is

more

than

mere

explanation of nature: it is the first

philosophical theodicy." [20] It was
only later, with the advent of the
Platonic conception of God as the
eternal

and

immutable

orarkh situated

"beyond

source
being"

(epekeina ts ousias), [21] that the

problem of how to account for the
presence of evil in the world

became

radically

difficult

question. This was all the more

marked

precisely

because

the

Platonic conception of God did not

allow any negative predicates indeed, it was limited. The Platonic
God could only be the Good, the
Eternal,

the

Just,

etc.

Anaximander's dynamic conception

of the Deity was completely left
behind. The issue becomes even
more complex when we realize that
the metaphysical conception of
God

developed

philosophy

was

in

Platonic

the

concrete

representation of the very injustice

mentioned by Anaximander - that
is, the principle of staticity, of
Being, was given absolute primacy
over

the

productive

force

of

Becoming, to the extent that the

visible, sensible - i.e., changeable
and "flowing" - world was degraded
to the status of a mere illusion.
This metaphysical conception of
the Deity, and the philosophy that
came to be based upon it, held
sway throughout the centuries, and
exercised its influence upon the
Hellenistic mind to a profound
degree.

By

emergence

the
of

time
the

of

the

Christian

kerygma, this Platonic philosophy

was already firmly entrenched, and

provided

the

language

and

concepts with which theologically

minded individuals conceived of the
Deity. It is therefore no accident
that the New Testament came to
be written, as Jaroslav Pelikan has
remarked,

"in

the

Greek

of

Socrates and Plato, or at any rate

in a reasonably accurate facsimile
thereof." [22] However, we must
ask whether the mere use of
philosophical

or

metaphysical

language, in the New Testament, is

evidence that the conception of the
Deity

expressed

language

is

through

that

also,

itself,

of

the

metaphysical.
The

'Myth'

Incarnate Logos
Rudolph

Bultmann,

in

his

Existentialist analysis of the Cross

and the Resurrection, has shown
us that the deeper meaning of
these events, as expressed in the
New

Testament,

although

in

mythical language, is not itself

mythical, and can indeed survive
the process of "demythologization."
[23] It must be kept in mind,
however,

that

the

doctrines

that

Bultmann

demythologizing

are

events

or
was

not strictu

sensu "metaphysical" events; they

are

events

character,

an

historical

albeit

mythically.
mythical

of

By

expressed

removing

language

from

the
the

explanation, or expression of the

meaning,

of

these

events,

Bultmann was able, all the more

easily,

to

fall

back

upon

the

Existentialist interpretation that he

was already prepared to employ.
But what of the Incarnation? The
task

of

"demythologizing"

that

supremely metaphysical or 'cosmic'

doctrine is rendered all the more
difficult

precisely

because

Existentialism does not possess

the language to describe it. That is
to say, this event is not of an
existential nature; it is not historical,
precisely

because

it

exceeds

history, belonging, as it does, to a

process originating and culminating
in the godhead. It is perhaps for
this very reason that Bultmann did
not attempt to demythologize the
Incarnation,
mythical

but

rather

meaning

left

intact,

its
by

describing it as an article of faith.

He

of

course

recognized

the

mythical character of the doctrine

of the Incarnation, as expressed in
the New Testament, but he also
recognized, tacitly, that it need not

be understood mythically. When he

wrote, toward the end ofJesus
Christ and Mythology, that "[w]hen
we speak of God as acting, we do
not speak mythologically in the
objectifying sense," [24] Bultmann
was referring to a manner of
perceiving God's activity in our lives
that is not metaphysical, in the
sense of a transcendent being
acting uponus, but rather personal,
in the sense of a divine power
acting

or

manifesting

itself within us, in the course of a

life lived, and dependent upon our
own decision to either tend to or
ignore the promise of this divine
presence.
The problem with this interpretation
is that it places the power of the
divine logos at the mercy of the
human being, and, as I said of Carl
Raschke's notion of the "kenotic
consummation of thelogos," leads
to the secularization of the Deity.
For

when

we

demythologize

the logos, by refusing to speak of

the act of God apart from the
human reception or recognition of
that act, we are not only removing
the

myth

from

the logos from

the logos,

the

myth!

but
The

question we must ask is whether

the Incarnation of the Logos, as

expressed in the New Testament,
can be 'de-mythed,' while leaving
the logos intact. To answer this
question, we must first discover the
relation between mythical thought
and metaphysical philosophy.
The development within ancient
Greek philosophy, which led from
Anaximander's dynamic conception
of

the

deity

to

the

purely

metaphysical conception that we

find in Plato, is as varied and
complex

as

the

thinkers

who

contributed to it; however, one

thing is clear: that Plato, more than
any other thinker, is responsible for
the birth of metaphysical thinking,
and the theology that came to
depend

upon

it

for

so

many

centuries. When we reflect upon

the

scientific

thought

with

approached

rigor

and

which
the

critical
Aristotle

doctrines

contained in his own Metaphysics,

it may seem striking that Plato
relied heavily on myth in order to
express

his

own

metaphysical

doctrines. Yet this is only striking if

we fail to recall, or to appreciate the
fact, that Plato was not, himself,
returning to an earlier mode of
mythical thinking that had now

become outmoded or obsolete in

the face of the 'scientific' approach
of the Pre-Socratic thinkers, but
was rather positing a brand new
way of thinking about the Deity.
That

Plato

permitted

himself

recourse to myths and mythical

conceptions

in

those

parts

of

his Dialogues that deal with these

'theological' issues, serves to show,
I believe, that he was utilizing the
language of the earlier mythic
mode of thinking in order to better
explain or elucidate his own entirely
new conception of the Deity.
We have already seen how for
Anaximander

the

divinity

was

conceived in dynamic, productive

terms, and described as being
thoroughly immanent in the realm
of

existence.

Plato

entirely

abandoned this way of thinking,

and presented us with a view of the
Deity (still prevalent today) in which
God is described as changeless,
eternal, static, at rest with Himself and hence Limited. The reasons for
Plato's conceiving of God in this
way are complex, and I shall not
discuss them here; however, it will
suffice to say that with Platonism
two important changes occurred in
humankind's thinking about God.

These changes are: (1.) the spatial

positing of God or the Divine Realm
as outside the cosmos (as opposed
to

the

immanence

of

Anaximandrean apeiron)

the
and

therefore "beyond being"; and (2.)

the idea that the thoughts in the
mind of God, the Forms, are
essences that precede substance,
and that all reality is comprised of
the images produced or rendered
possible

by

these

eternal,

intellectual 'seeds'. [25]

The result of these conceptions are
two distinct realms, that of the
senses or matter, where human
existence plays itself out, and the
realm of the Deity, which the
human mind can only grasp or
understand after it has ceased to
be human - that is, when it has
become like that upon which it
gazes. [26] No longer is the Deity
experienced in/as immediacy; in
order to know God, according to
Plato, one must abandon the realm
of the immediate, that is, of the
senses.

Whereas

the

Pre-

Socratics, for the most part, saw in

the immediate manifestations of
productive

power

direct

theophany (which is why Thales

could say that all things are full of

gods, i.e., water, his productive

principle), for Plato, the direct
display of productive or natural
power was of a lower order, since it
involved change - albeit change
following a fixed law, but change
nonetheless, and hence un-divine.
It is important to note that Plato's
ideal

was

salvation

through

knowledge, and all of his myths, in

the Dialogues, are concerned with
the various aspects of this journey
of the soul, or else with the
structure and nature of the cosmos
containing this soul. Therefore, the
mythologizing of Plato is done from
an existential standpoint, and not
from

a strictu

sensu theological

one. It is safe to say that, for Plato,

there

is

no

point

in

directly

discussing God, since He or It is

changeless, and so there is nothing
to talk about! However, with the
rise of Christianity, all the talk was
not only about God, but about the
way He acted in history, and
became wholly human, for the
salvation of all humans. When this
divine event, the Incarnation, is
understood

within

the

limited

confines of the Platonic conception

of the Deity, then it is truly a
'mystery' or, depending upon one's

attitude, "foolishness," a "stumbling

block." However, when we think the
Incarnation

along

Anaximander's

the

lines

conception

the apeiron as

of
of

productive

possibility, we find, in the notion of

the "Logos made flesh" the very
possibility of a return to a manner
of thinking about God as the
immanent possibility of existence,
while preserving the necessity of
the Platonic notion of supreme - if
not absolute - transcendence that
is so necessary for the Christian
kerygma.
When St. Paul wrote, in his Epistle
to

the

Philippians,

that

Christ

"emptied himself" (eauton ekense;

Phil. 2:7), and in 2 Corinthians 2:9
that He "became poor" or lowly
(eptkheuse), we are being told
that Christ, the Logos, relinquished
His

divinity

when

He

became

human. When these passages are

read with the Platonic conception of
the Deity in mind, we cannot help
thinking, even if only fancifully, that
God emptied Himself of His divine
substance, and that this substance
somehow

became

scattered

throughout the material realm in the

form of logoi spermatikoi, and that
our

salvation

consists

in

our

rendering back to God these lost

seeds of divinity. This idea is only
farfetched to us, because we have
had the benefit of two thousand
years

of

largely

Platonic-

Aristotelian exegesis of the New

Testament, much of which has
served to soften the bold mythical
attitude of this early utterance of
Christian faith, without ever coming
to question the notion of God that
lurks behind the language. The
early Gnostics, of course, thought
about salvation precisely in this
crude - to us - mythical manner.
Early in the Christian era this
doctrine

of

the

redeemer"

was

especially

within

"redeemed

quite
the

popular,
highly

mythological Manichaean religion.

[27] In fact, it is quite easy to
'blame' Christianity for the gradual
lapse of the Platonic philosophy
into a highly mythical attitude,
replete

with

ritual

magic

or

"theurgy," which became the rule

by the time of Iamblichus in the
fourth century. The reason for all of
this is to be found in the supreme
paradox that the language used by
the New Testament writers (almost
without exception) to describe God
is

derived

from

Platonic

metaphysics, [28] and yet the

underlying message is

thoroughly

un-Platonic and indeed 'mythical,'

insofar as it involves a doctrine of a
purely divine force or entity, the
Logos, becoming entangled, as it
were, in history - in that everflowing realm known as Becoming
which, to the Platonists, had always
held the character of, if not an
outright illusion, at least - and
especially among Gnostics - of
something inferior to and ever
separated from the Divine.
The

affront

the skandalon,

to
of

reason,

the

Christian

kerygma, was its key doctrine that

one is not required to ascend to
union with God, but rather to
accept God as He has descended
to humanity - in the form, not only
of

man,

but

of

servant

(morphn doulou; Philippians 2:7).

The mistake, made by the Gnostics
and others, was to think that the
purpose of this divine descent was
to raise human beings up to the
Deity; it was impossible for these
early exegetes, so steeped in the
Platonic philosophy, to understand
that God Himself chose to incline
towards humanity, giving Himself
as

gift

that

would

restore

humanity to its primeval status as

the image (eikona; Gen. 1:26 LXX)

of God. This meant, not that human
beings would be transformed into
gods, as the Gnostics believed, but
rather that they would come to be
"sharers

in

the

divine

nature"

(theias koinnoi phuses; 2 Peter

1:4). The

method

of salvation

described in the New Testament,

then, does not involve a once-forall cosmic act of God, but a
receptivity and decision on the part
of humanity - to dwell with/in God.
As St. Paul wrote: "in Him all the
fullness [plrma] was pleased to
dwell" (Colossians 1:19).
What is being broached here is a
union of humanity with God in
which the human is not only
preserved,

but

perfected,

and

rendered capable of persisting not

as a self-willed and finite human
being, destined for death, but as a
human being who is an image of
God, and hence destined for an
eternally

fecund

persistence

in

Becoming. The fact that humanity

as a whole is implicated in this
schema, as evidenced by the use
of the term "fullness" (which was a
common

Gnostic term for

the

totality of spiritual beings, with

which the redeemed human being

was believed to join), shows that

there is no notion, in this schema,
of a cosmic - i.e., spatio-temporal division between the material or
human realm, and the realm of the
divine,

as

Platonic

philosophy

taught, but only of an existential or

'psychological'

division

between

human and Deity.

According

to

the

Christian

kerygma, this breach both occurred

and was healed within history, as
part of a divine process, with the
result that God, the Logos, is now
immanent within His creation as the
possibility of all existence, just as
Anaximander's apeiron was
immanent as the possibility of
generation and decay, and the
possibility of Becoming as the
eternal Good, over-against Being,
which is, in itself, the merely static.
The fact that this movement or
return from a static conception of
God as Being, to a dynamic
conception of God as the eternal,
and immanent,

possibility

of

all

Becoming, was made possible by

and through the doctrine of the
Incarnation of the Logos, shows
that, far from being the supremely
mythical idea that it has often been
taken to be, the Incarnation was,

itself,

an

attempt

to

"demythologize" the Platonicallyderived idea of salvation, which

held that the human being must
rise to God, and, by so doing,
relinquish his or her humanity or
personality in the process. This
latter,

Platonic

conception

of

salvation presents a 'myth' of a

wholly different order - that of the
heroic quest for the homeland.
Indeed, this myth goes back to
Homer's Odysseus. However, by
the

Late

Hellenistic

era,

the

"homeland" was no longer Ithaca,

an idyllic island within the world,
but an hypostatized Pleroma held
to exist "beyond being," to which all
souls would rise only after leaving
behind

the

body

and

all

its

accretions.
The Platonic or metaphysical view
of salvation, then, is not really a
salvation of the human being, but
rather,

and

paradoxically,

salvation of the

human

being from Humanity! The Christian

idea of salvation, which can only be
comprehended

and

experienced

through the Incarnation, is truly a

salvation of Humanity, for it brings
all human beings together, as the
"fullness," within God as the image

of

God

but

also

as

thoroughly human Humanity.

Conclusion
My purpose here has been twofold:
to show that it is still possible to
speak

meaningfully

of

transcendence in general, as well

as, more specifically, to speak
meaningfully of the Incarnation. I
felt obliged to accomplish the latter
task by showing in what way the
doctrine

of

the

Incarnation

understood as the response, on the

part of an early community of
believers to an historical, revelatory
event

served

the

perhaps

unintended purpose of 'de-mything'

the earlier Platonic notion of a
human ascent to God by turning
the attention of individuals to the
immanent

manner

God inclines toward

in

which

us.

To

experience this inclination of God

toward

humanity

is

to

actuallyexperience transcendence,
to

understand

or

grasp

the

transcendent not as an abstraction,

but

as

an

ontologically

existentially

or

valid event.

Anaximander's idea of the infinite

yet always immanent possibility for
existence opened up by and with/in
the apeiron serves

as

philosophical or ahistorical basis

upon

which

to

speak

of

the

incarnationality of the apeiron itself,

which is brought before human
understanding

in

the

historical

'event' of Jesus Christ. My success

in accomplishing the former task, of
course, is completely dependent
upon my success is carrying out
the latter task.
One unintended consequence of
this

endeavor

has

been

the

opening up to thought of the

possibility

that,

due

to

the

immanence of the apeiron and its

incarnationality,

there

may

be

multiple incarnations, or at least

more than one. [29] This is a very
important

matter

for

further

thinking, since it threatens not only

to take us beyond the confines of a
strictly

Christian

philosophical

theology, but to actually undermine

my purpose in this undertaking. In
conclusion, therefore, I will merely
add a few words that will, I hope,
lead us, not to an immediate
answer, but to a larger arena for
thought.
It is my belief that, philosophically,
Anaximander's apeiron represents
an originary moment in thinking - a
moment

more

pluralistic

than

Heidegger's altheia, and not as

delimiting - a moment that, once
thought,

is

not

but remembered,

held

thought

the

as

repeated,
close

in

uncanny

immanence of the eternal flow of

Becoming.

Was

this apeiron forgotten, then, or lost

in

later

conceptualization,

like altheia,

according

to

Heidegger, was lost behind the

idea of truth as correctness in
representation? We may only say
that the apeiron was forgotten if its
nature is such that it should be
remembered - i.e., if we think of
remembering as conceptualizing. If
that is the case, then surely any
attempt

at

conceptualizing

the apeiron would lead to its loss

within

Being,

course,

be

which
an

would,

injustice,

of
on

Anaximander's terms. However, the

loss

of

the apeironwithin

Being

would also open up the possibility

for another incarnation, for what is
lost

and

forgotten

is

always

capable of (re)appearing for the

first time. Let us say, rather, that
the apeiron requires constantly to
be brought to our attention, so that
we may utilize and "partake" of this
immanent and infinitely powerful
source of existence. In that sense,

there can only be one presentation

or incarnation of the apeiron, which
must, of necessity, take on an
historical

character.

Historical

events or persons are never really

forgotten

or

lost;

they

simply

require to be brought to attention,

or re-presented, in ever new ways
and contexts. There is only ever a
single presentation, which then
makes possible all subsequent representations. The Incarnation of
Christ was the unique presentation
of God within history, with the result
that any further re-presentations or
re-incarnations

of

the

unique

Godhead must be understood or

interpreted in light of the initial
presentation - the Incarnation.
End Notes
[1] An earlier version of this essay
was presented at the 53rd Annual
Northwest

Conference

on

Philosophy, held at Washington

State University, October 12-13,
2001.

would

like

to

thank

Professor Michael W. Myers, of the

Department

of

Philosophy

at

Washington State University, for

his

challenging

and

insightful

commentary on that earlier version,

which has aided me greatly in my
subsequent revision, and has led

me to new paths of thinking on this

subject.
[2]

Bultmann's

program

of

"demythologization" was introduced

in his 1941 essay entitled "New
Testament

and

Mythology"

(published in Bartsch, ed. Kerygma

and Myth, New York: Harper and
Row 1961).
[3] Kerygma and Myth, p. 3.
[4]

Jacques

Grammatology,
(Baltimore:

Derrida, Of
tr.

Spivak

Johns

Hopkins

University Press 1974). Cf. esp.

Part 2, "Nature, Culture, Writing."
[5] Friedrich Nietzsche, Twilight of
the Idols, tr. Kaufmann, in The
Portable

Nietzsche (New

York:

Viking Penguin 1968), p. 483.

[6] Cf. Plato, Phaedrus 275d-276a
ff.
[7]

Carl

A.

Deconstruction

Raschke,

"The

of

God,"

in Deconstruction
Theology (New

and
York:

Crossroad

Publishing Company 1982), p. 14.

[8] Deconstruction and Theology, p.
14.
[9] Deconstruction and Theology, p.
31.

[10] ex n de genesis esti tois

ousi kai tn phthoran eis tauta
ginesthai kata to khren. didonai
gar auta dikn kai tisin alllois ts
adikias kata tn tou khronou taxin.
Anaximander, fragment B 1 (Diels),
my translation. The fragment is
preserved

in

Simplicius' Commentary

on

the

Physics 24.13-25.
[11]

Martin

Heidegger,

"The

Anaximander Fragment," in Early

Greek Thinking (New York: Harper
and Row 1984), p. 13.
[12] Simplicius lived to witness the
closing of the Platonic Academy in
Athens, by the Emperor Justinian,
in 529 CE.
[13] Cf. Heidegger, "What Calls for
Thinking?" in Basic Writings, ed.
Krell

(New

York:

HarperCollins

1993).
[14] Although Heidegger is not
often referred to as a philosopher
of the 'concept,' I believe that his
notions

of

'being-toward-death,'

'Care' (Sorge), and most of all, his

understanding of Being as that
which conceals as it reveals (based
on his analysis of the Greek
term altheia) together produce a
'concept-world' that may or not be

ultimately metaphysical. For an

articulate

and

sympathetic

challenge to some of Heidegger's

ideas, from a Christian and 'postmetaphysical'

viewpoint,

see

Bultmann, "The Historicity of Man

and

Faith,"

in Existence

and

Faith (New York: Meridian Books

1960), p. 92 ff.
[15]

Cf.

Theology

Werner
of

the

Jaeger, The
Early

Philosophers (London:

Greek
Oxford

University Press 1967), p. 24.

[16] F.M. Cornford, From Religion
to Philosophy: A Study in the
Origins

of

Western

Speculation(New York: Harper and

Row 1957), p. 145.
[17] Cornford, From Religion to
Philosophy, esp. ch. 2, "The Origin
of Moira," p. 40 ff.
[18] This belief is attributed to
Thales

by

Aristotle,

in De

Anima 411a7-8.
[19]

Cf.

G.M.A.

Grube, Plato's

Thought (Indianapolis:

Hackett

Publishing Company 1980), p. 150.

In this important study, Grube
reminds

us,

referring

to

Wilamowitz, that for the ancient

Greekstheos "is

primarily

predicative notion." He goes on to

explain that 'the divine' (theios), as
an adjective, referred to anything
that was felt to exceed the human
being.
"Any power, any force we see at
work in the world, which is not born
with us and will continue after we
are gone could thus be called a
god, and most of them were.
It was not only the adjective divine
(theios) that could be applied to
anything greater and more lasting
than

man,

but

even

the

noun theos was constantly used in

such a vague way that it cannot be
translated

god

nonsense.
philosophers,

without

making

The

Milesian

for

example,

called theosthe substratum of the

physical

world

for

which

they

sought, so that when Thales said

the world was full of gods he may
only have meant that it was full of
water!" (Grube, pp. 150-151).
But even if that were all Thales
meant, he would still have been
referring not to the simple element
of water, but rather to the power or
force inherent in water. For water,
according to Thales (as his thought
has

come

down

to

us)

was

a generative principle, not a mere

substratum or foundation - i.e., this
'primal

substance'

was

not

considered to be static.
[20] Jaeger, The Theology of the
Early Greek Philosophers, p. 36.
[21] Plato, Republic 509b.
[22] Jaroslav Pelikan, Christianity
and

Classical

Culture:

Metamorphosis

The

of

Natural
Christian

Theology

in

the

Encounter

with

Hellenism (New

Haven:

Yale

University

Press

1993), p. 3.
[23] Bultmann, Kerygma and Myth,
esp. pp. 34-44.
[24] Bultmann, Jesus Christ and
Mythology (New

York:

Charles

Scribner's Sons 1958), p. 62.

[25] While Plato, in the Dialogues,
never systematically explains or
posits this conception of the Deity,
we

know

that

successor

in

Speusippus,

his

immediate

the

Academy,

taught

that

Plato

posited a One that is beyond being

and wholly changeless. In fact,
Speusippus went so far as to deny
this One the status of a 'first
principle'

(arkh);

rather,

he

bestowed this distinction upon the

Dyad, or the Unlimited Principle,

which is ordered or governed by
the One, the principle of Limit. The
belief that the Forms are "thoughts
in

the

Mind

of

God"

is first

attributed to Antiochus of Ascalon

(fl. 110 BCE). It is, however,
possible that this notion was so
commonly accepted, that it did not
require any explicit formulation by
the teachers of the Old Academy such is my conjecture. For more
information, see John Dillon, The
Middle Platonists (Ithaca: Cornell
University Press 1977).
[26] Cf. Plato, Republic 508c-d, and
518a-d. The idea that the self is
lost in this vision of the Good is
problematical. For an alternative
interpretation,

see

my

essay,

"Salvation and the Human Ideal:

Plato,

Plotinus,

Origen,"

in

the Proceedings of the First Annual

Conference
Philosophy

of

the

Society,

Ancient
Villanova

University 2001.
[27] Cf. my article on "Gnosticism,"
in The Internet Encyclopedia of
Philosophy, esp. the section "Mani
and

Manichaeism."

http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/g/
gnostic.htm

[28] This does not necessarily

mean

that

conscious

there

was

usage

of

self-

Platonic

language on the part of the New

Testament
most

writers.

striking

Indeed,

the

examples

of

Platonism in the New Testament e.g. the Gospel of John and the
Epistle to the Hebrews, as well as
numerous sections of the Pauline
Epistles where the spirit-soul-body
distinction is broached - are filtered
through Gnosticism. This serves to
show, however, how prevalent the
Platonic conception of the Deity, in
its various historical forms, had
become by the time of early
Christianity.
[29] This possibility was brought to
my attention by Professor Michael
W. Myers, in his commentary on an
earlier draft of this essay (see note
1).