Damasiphrōn Khrusos: Act, Implement and Tekhnē in Pindar

Abstract

— And so, I said, the art of medicine does not look to the advantage of medicine but rather to that of the body.— Yes, he answered.— Neither does horsemanship look to benefit itself but rather horses.Nor does any other art look to its own advantage, for it has no need to, but instead that of its object.(Plato, Republic 342c.1-6)Few things emerge more clearly from Pindar, despite the praise of successful human action to which the odes are devoted and from which their occasion is drawn, than the utter contingency of that success. Ultimately this results from a flaw that is inscribed aboriginally in the nature of human being. However common in source the race of gods and that of men may be, they are split along a primordial rift in dunamis (‘power’, ‘capacity’) that grounds all other inequalities between them (Nem. 6.1-4). It is in the practical realm of desire, aim, will and action that the consequences of this rift become especially evident. On one side, divine action or praxis encompasses the fulfilment of every aim — ‘the goal of every act is in your power’ (Nem. 10.29f.; cf. Ol. 13.104f.) — since the god's powers are sufficient to achieve whatever his elpis (‘hope’) aspires to (Pyth. 2.49). This is because for the god there is a virtual equivalence of dunamis to desire: no distance intervenes between the inner movements that are his desire and will and their perfect accomplishment in and as reality. Divine causality is such that through its workings desire enjoys swift translation into act — ‘swift is the praxis of gods once moved to act, short the pathways’ (Pyth. 9.67f.) — and act into desire's flawless actualization. The full range of the god's dunamis in fact surpasses even credibility (cf. Pyth. 10.48-50), imagination and hope, making fulfilment of desire a ‘light achievement’ (Ol. 13.83).