FM>    I think that I would respond that truth CAN be and HAS been 
 FM> presented in 
 FM> allegory but that it is wrong on principle to return to Homer and 
 FM> others of 
 FM> the past to impose an allegorical interpretation upon them in a kind 
 FM> of 
 FM> transpostion of their pre-philosophic, poetic representation of truth 
 FM> as it was available to them in that environment. 
Leaving aside Philo and the allegorical appeal of the Gospel to a 
common man, and separating out the conventional lack of wisdom in 
ancient Greek, as well as more modern minds Frank, I recall some 
sense of awareness the early writers had in the difficulty to put 
concepts forward without allegory that the uneducated mind would 
be able to understand. 
 
The dialogs often remind me of a joke, with three repetitions of 
a situation, in which the last was the one with the point. 
 
 FM> I'm not 
 FM> certain that I understood completely the philosophical question you 
 FM> raised which was, "is all truth allegorical?" 
To some considerable extent I don't understand my question either 
Frank; I spoze I posed it more as a rhetorical to see, as you've 
shown me, what someone else might make of it. 
 
 FM> ...I shall, in the normal course of things, 
 FM> probably precede you into the realm beyond this life and if (smile) I 
 FM> learn 
 FM> the final answer and am able to communicate it back to you I shall 
 FM> certainly 
 FM> not withhold it.  Don't count on that solution, though!!!   
Well for one, I dunno that the 'normal course' of things still is 
a reasonable expectation what with the pace of developments going 
faster all the time.  But, like you, I have reached the age where 
if I woke up dead, nobody'd be all that surprised, not even me. 
 
And, I do wonder if there are not, in all the clues revealed by 
all the sciences, all the time, some point at which, despite the 
fact that there has never been sufficient data before now to get 
to a reasonable conclusion, that such data sets do not, or will 
not exist. 
 
If I may be allowed an allegory, we seem to be capable of seeing 
up to five elements in a set without counting; and that grasp is 
needed for certain kinds of knowlege.  If, thru allegory, one is 
able to conceptualize several elements of fundamental reality in 
mind concurrently one may reach cognition of a system in reality 
that is not conceivable by more direct means. 
 
As an aside, when I read an ancient I try to imagine who *he* was 
trying to communicate with. I doubt that any of them ever thought 
that their words would still be read 2 millennia hence, and given 
the exhorbitant expense of hand written books, can see how they'd 
never expect anyone to have read more than a few dozen books in a 
lifetime.  Before the concept of the copywrite, they'd habitually 
quote each other without attribution and pass ideas around freely 
without names attached to them. 
 
By our standards, they were trying to communicate to illiterates, 
and allegory was expedient or even necessary.  Then too, there is 
that bit in the Bagavad Gita where the Brahmin says he sees how a 
simple mind prays to a stone carving and cannot differentiate how 
it is not the mystical force behind the symbol.  Both Bramin and 
lovers of wisdom see the limitations of simple minds and struggle 
with crafting myth to teach them while at the same time, struggle 
with presenting deeper truths to deeper minds... perhaps best put 
in the contrast between Mahayana and Hinayana- should the monk do 
only that which furthers his own enlightenment, or is he obliged 
to help others reach it? -if such efforts are futile? 
 
The solution I see is to find enlightenment from the struggle to 
explain it to others... whether they understand or not is not my 
problem, *I* gain understanding.  When you weigh in on an issue, 
I get to see how a Brahmin would see it as well. thanx. 
___ 
 * OFFLINE 1.58 * Sounds as good as a Reggai band from Tulsa. 
--- Maximus 3.01
---------------