The Early Greek Concept of the Soul

by Jan N. Bremmer

Jan Bremmer presents a provocative picture of the historical development of beliefs regarding the soul in ancient Greece. He argues that before Homer the Greeks distinguished between two types of soul, both identified with the the free soul, which possessed no psychological attributes and was active only outside the body, as in dreams, swoons, and the afterlife; and the body soul, which endowed a person with life and consciousness. Gradually this concept of two kinds of souls was replaced by the idea of a single soul. In exploring Greek ideas of human souls as well as those of plants and animals, Bremmer illuminates an important stage in the genesis of the Greek mind.

Genres: Philosophy, Religion, History, Classics, Nonfiction, Mythology

166 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

Prof. em. Dr. Jan Nicolaas Bremmer (Ph.D., Free University Amsterdam, 1979) is Professor emeritus for Religious Studies in the Faculty for Religious Studies and Theology at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands, where he twice held the post of Dean of the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies.

Reviews

[Dustin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fans of Mircea Eliade or Carlo Ginzburg who are curious about what we can gather of early Greek ideas regarding animating forces and consciousness outside the body (during life or after death) will not be disappointed. The author confines himself to existing evidence well, with little or no supposition. I was disappointed to see little comparative reference to other early Mediterranean cultures (Minoan, Egyptian, Phoenician), but there are some nice segues into comparative Indo-European research, so very satisfying on the whole.

[Chuck · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's a struggle for me to get my head around the concept of pre-unitary / multi-part souls. I find the idea of a network of body (ego) souls (the thymos, noos, menos) and the breath or free soul (psyche) a bit overly complicated, even for the Greeks -- especially so, when we consider the more "primitive" setting of the late Bronze Age/Homeric era. It seems a bit too reminiscent of some of the later classical Greek theories and it's too easy to mistake what in all probability were poetic devices in Homer and Hesiod for actual religious thought, but the author is keen on this point as well. But a dualistic soul structure seems somewhat reasonable at least.

This book is a wealth of comparisons to similar cultures and tons of food for thought on not only this deep issue but a few other related topics. Especially interesting is the section concerning the souls of the dead, which the Greeks seemed to always have had a fascinating disregard for (interesting to compare to the early Romans, who worshiped ancestors as personal family-gods: thelares). Good stuff.

[dill · Rating 3 out of 5]

This felt a little inaccessible even by standards for an academic textbook, to be honest. There was a lot of very interesting evidence and arguments, but they weren't particularly well communicated. My background is mostly classics rather than philosophy, and it felt like it was more about the latter than the former. I'm not sure how I feel about attempting to insert classical sources into models made based on contemporary anthropological evidence- as an approach it feels too teleological. I think the book would have been a more enjoyable read if it took the classical sources as a starting point, rather than the models Bremmer tries to argue in favour for. There was a still a lot of valuable arguments made and interesting points discussed, but it really could have done with a different approach.

[ronushka · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Σῶμα σῆμα, Ψυχὴ πᾶσα ἀθάνατος ἐστί” (soma sema, psyche pasa athanatos esti)

[David Olmsted · Rating 4 out of 5]

The official description of this book having the author postulating 2 souls is wrong. Here is a quote from the conclusions at the end of the book: "Instead Greek soul belief might best be characterized as multiple. The Greeks separated where other traditions do not and a unitary soul can only be found in the period after the Archaic Age."

At the time of Homer the Greek "psyche" was in transition from meaning "life force" based upon its root meaning "breath" to a unitary soul. Other "souls" at that time were "thymos" meaning spirit, "phrenes" meaning the willful heart, "Noos" meaning mind, and "menos" meaning passion.

[AC · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reliable.