Timaeus and His Cosmos
In Plato’s Timaeus, ideas are set forth to explain the basic building blocks of the cosmos as experienced through the patterns of time, generation, and flux. Actually, as Timeaus explains these ideas, there is a strong feeling present in the text that all that can be known is just an imitation or reflection of a deeper harmony that lies beyond the boundaries or constraints of the physical manifestations that appear before us. Even though suggestions are made in regards to the origin of the cosmos, the nature of time and the elements, all of the explanations given are susceptible to being like the nature of all phenomena; that is, an admittedly unproven tale that nevertheless is the most probable one, at best an imitation of the totality referred to.
A dichotomy is set up early in the dialogue, serving as the backbone of Timaeus’ claims. It involves a theory that juxtaposes a permanent but invisible realm of pure reason both with and against the asserted impermanence and flux of its manifestation (27d). Imperfections that are perceived are thus warps or distortions that take place in the actualization of a pattern that is initially the framework of a harmonious intellect. This importance placed on the intellect is to run the course of the dialogue, and is the foundation used by Timaeus to claim that anything really exists in the first place. True existence takes place in a perfect, invisible pattern that sensory reality merely imitates. Existence exists, and at the same time it does not exist, for “that which is conceived…with the help of sensation and without reason is always in a process of becoming and perishing and never really is” (27d).
Not only does Timaeus allow for this interesting contradiction to explain and simultaneously deny existence, but also to imply that there must be a mind containing this eternal reason and intellect that created all that we perceive as existing. Admittedly, this “original mind” cannot be called by name or even found (28c). Following this initial presumption is just another presumption that it is indeed there, and the rather chauvinistic assertion that it is also male. Translation of this text into English apparently implies translation into Judeo-Christianity as well, as the concept of God with all its cultural baggage and preconceptions is immediately used in referring to a male creator of the cosmos. If he cannot be found, then this places him well beyond the religious paradigm in which the translator of this dialogue seems to dwell.
This cosmos, now understood to be a deliberate act done by an outside party, is described as a process of focus and clarity upon what is understood to have been a state of total chaos (30a). But for it to be infused with form and order, it must first be infused with intellect. So Timaeus’ original mind actually created a separate, new mind to allow for the existence of perceived matter to begin with. This mind/soul is at the center of all that exists, and expands into a “sphere of the self-moved” that encompasses all (37b). So the original mind that created this soul withdraws from the action that this soul now rules over, the male creator apparently done with his work: the interestingly female energy of generation.
Timaeus at this point is still faced with two mysteries of existence, each of which he aspires to explore, that of time and the eternity. Time is represented as a necessary application of measurement that eternity moves to, an endless dance of the stars (37d). As opposed to a linear notion of time through past, present, and future contexts of existence, time is explained as a circular imitation of the invisible dancing of the universe’s soul, “herself turning in herself” (36e). At this point, however, the reader is faced with a reality that is a rendition of perfection. How is it that the rendition in itself is wrought with imperfection? If time itself is merely a mathematical rhythm of eternity, does this claim assert that time really doesn’t exist? The original dichotomy of the dialogue answers these questions with the concept of an eternal motion of generation and degeneration. Thus what we understand to be time is indeed an eternity bound by its own eternal impermanence. None of this is mind alone, but “the combined work of necessity and mind” (47e). Hence, this mysterious “necessity” becomes a useful rationalization of why things are not as perfect as the mind that is presumed to inhabit them.
A final and significant shift in this reasoning on Timaeus’ part later on in the dialogue brings a third party into his original dichotomy, allowing for an investigation into the nature of the elements. The eternal, harmonious pattern that serves as the intelligent and invisible soul of the universe is only the first step. The “generated and visible,” being a rendition or manifestation of the original harmony, follows (48e). But what is this eternal rendition rendered on? We have so far in our tale an intellect that can be described as a painter, and the actualization and materialization of his art as the painting that is never complete. But what of the canvas?
This third notion is introduced hesitantly, an apologetic announcement that what is attempted at description is “another kind, which is difficult of explanation and dimly seen” (49a). Thus, the generation of all forms takes place in that which has no form (51a). The canvas, in order to enable the whole process, must by definition be separate not only from the painter but also the art.
To describe this “receptacle” involves letting go of any qualities that would define it as what it holds, or the original pattern that what it holds is a resemblance of. This is done partially by reexamining the notion that created, temporal things actually exist. If they, in a sense, do not exist, then not only are they closer to their origin as an invisible pattern, but also this allows for a receptacle that does not exist to hold them in. The very inconsistence of manifested reality can therefore be attributed to the nature of the receptacle of known reality, which is described as “an invisible being which receives all things and in some mysterious way partakes of the intelligible, and is most incomprehensible” (51a).
The justification is made for claiming the shaky nature of reality by examining its basic components, that which is assumed to be separate elements. Timaeus takes an important step from the ancient Greek notion of elements as the building blocks of the cosmos. He ties them together in a system of dispersion and compression that inexorably links them all (49c). If the “circles of the diverse and the same” are in perpetual motion, this implies that no state of diversity or likeness is free from impermanence and change (37b). Each and every element moves within these circles constantly, so that there is no point at which a final identity is reached. Fire is always on its way to becoming something else; so are air, water, and earth. These move within each other according to the circumstances of the changes taking place, each one being either a dispersion or compression of the other. Thus, the impression that they are constant, or that they exist as elements to begin with, is called into question (49d).
Within this cosmological theory of Timaeus, the ironic conclusion is reached that the only thing which can safely be said to exist as a separate or absolute entity is invisible. And yet it is this very assertion that upholds his other notions involving impermanence, played out timelessly upon a formless, nurturing mystery that “receives all things, but never departs from her own nature” (50b). Thus the forms that constitute the patterns and inspirations for all that we perceive finally have a home that is wondrous, baffling, and female in nature.
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