From the book
Symposium
Plato · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordThe name identifies an interlocutor quoted inside another speaker’s exposition, not an independent text of Heraclitus reproduced in full.
- In the SymposiumEryximachus thinks music supports his medical model.
- In this editionThe note identifies the conventional fragment reference and observes that another ancient quotation gives fuller and different wording.
- A place to readThe preceding medical reconciliation of opposites.
Meaning
The name identifies an interlocutor quoted inside another speaker’s exposition, not an independent text of Heraclitus reproduced in full. The bow and lyre supply the image, while the contrast between differing and agreeing does the argumentative work.
Use in the book
Eryximachus thinks music supports his medical model. He says Heraclitus perhaps wants to say the same, but does not say it well. The quoted one is described as differing from itself yet agreeing with itself, like the harmony of a bow and lyre. Eryximachus rejects a harmony constituted by elements still at variance. He reconstructs the thought as a sequence: previously differing high and low pitches are subsequently made to agree by the musical craft.
Both the charitable “perhaps” and the temporal reconstruction matter. The doctor is proposing an interpretation that brings another thinker under his own theory. A lexicon should not label this corrected account simply “Heraclitus’ doctrine”. Nor should it treat the bow-image as a detailed musical mechanism already analyzed in the dialogue: the speech moves quickly to pitches and rhythm.
Places to read
Translation in this edition
The note identifies the conventional fragment reference and observes that another ancient quotation gives fuller and different wording. This entry relies on the wording in the supplied dialogue, not a fresh reconstruction of Heraclitus’ original book. “Harmony” and “agreement” must retain the speaker who defines their relation.
διαφέρω (diapherō)
diapherō — To differ or be at variance; Eryximachus treats continuing difference as incompatible with achieved harmony.
- 187a — διαφερόμενον αὐτὸ αὑτῷ συμφέρεσθαι. The reported claim: what differs from itself accords with itself.
Ἡράκλειτος (Hērakleitos)
Hērakleitos — Heraclitus, quoted and then corrected by Eryximachus, who distinguishes what he might mean from his actual wording.
- 187a — Ἡράκλειτος. The doctor attributes a statement about unity in difference to him.
τόξον (toxon)
toxon — A bow, paired with the lyre in the quoted analogy of harmony.
- 187a — τόξου τε καὶ λύρας. The joined objects in the Heraclitean comparison.