FM> More and more, David, as I read your response to various problems when
 FM> offered in philosophical language (broadly speaking) I perceive that you
 FM> generally take the approach of Goethe - i.e., the approach of the
 FM> artist.  I have no quarrel with that.  In fact, I understand it to be in
 FM> general the approach of Aristotle as well since Aristotle considered
 FM> myth to be attacking exactly the same problems as philosophy and a
 FM> generosity regarding meanings is certainly in order.
 DB> You have hit on the nub of a thread between David and I Frank. In noting
 DB> the *use* which Aristotle put on myth makes me aware that I too, am
 DB> employing myth, or allegory, or parable, to communicate a set of ideas
 DB> which weave togather a coherent of re-ALL-ity, as he put it.
 DB> Each of the threads can be disputed as to whether it supports the weight
 DB> I have given it, although I don't see any thread clearly as broken by
 DB> the strain.  but woven togather, they form a fabric
 DB> to lay it all out on.
 DB> I find it ironic that the extreem noetic discipline of quantum physics
 DB> now has their formulae not proved by rational analysis anymore, but like
 DB> Goethe, judged on the basis of aesthetics. It looks to me like a parable
 DB> here too. Is all truth allegorical?
   Tardiness in responding to your post, Day, dictated that I indulge in what
appears to be an overgenerous quotation of your post in order to attempt
anything resembling an adequate response. 
   I think that I would respond that truth CAN be and HAS been presented in
allegory but that it is wrong on principle to return to Homer and others of
the past to impose an allegorical interpretation upon them in a kind of
transpostion of their pre-philosophic, poetic representation of truth as it
was available to them in that environment.  Philo and the "fathers" of the
Christian religion indulged in allegoreses as a method of attempting to
understand the stage of the myth reached in Judaism by subjecting the myth
even in is transition from the "old" cosmic polytheism to a more
differentiated cosmogony in Genesis to an allegorizing explanation mistakenly
thought to be a bit more "scientific" by usage of a language of rationalism.
The endeavor had to fail in the end because subjecting even an old myth with
some of the substance of the truth it still contains to a rationalistic
allegorical interpretation destroys even the kernel of the truth of reality 
t
sets forth in pristine form.  However one might try, as Philo did, to make
Moses into a philosopher who asks philosophical questions about why this bush
is burning and yet not consumed injures both myth AND science. 
   Having somewhat torturedly ventured all of that, I must admit that I'm not
certain that I understood completely the philosophical question you raised
which was, "is all truth allegorical?"  You well know (grin) that I'm not
going to overstep my bounds by presuming to frame an answer to what "all
truth" is.  You outdistanced me long ago in the realm of science and
mathematics I'm quite certain and except in some minor instances I find a
kinship with you in your approach of a disciplined openness toward the 
urther
exploration of the truth of reality.  I shall, in the normal course of 
hings,
probably precede you into the realm beyond this life and if (smile) I learn
the final answer and am able to communicate it back to you I shall certainly
not withhold it.  Don't count on that solution, though!!!  
   Allegory is a legitimate method of elaborating a myth which still has
living meaning.  John Bunyan's _Pilgrim's Progress_ is a prime example.  It
does not attempt to allegorize the roots but rather the conflicts within the
life of the experience of transformation which still has to be lived in the
world that is quite as real to the affected one as is the experience which
draws from the beyond.  
Sincerely, 
                                     Frank
                                                                              
                                                       
   
--- PPoint 2.05
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