“I am an exile from the gods and a wanderer, for I trusted in raging Strife.”
— EmpedoclesDiels-Kranz 31 B115, preserved in Plutarch; approximate English rendering
Commentary
This fragment, reported by Plutarch, describes the speaker as a fallen divinity who has been exiled for trusting Strife, and it links the cosmic doctrine of the forces to a story of guilt and exile. The poem's myth of the daimon who is driven out of the gods' company and wanders through the cycles of life gives the physics a moral and religious setting. Kirk, Raven, and Schofield discuss the fragment in relation to the Purifications, the second of Empedocles' poems, which deals with the soul's transmigration. Daniel Graham argues that the figure of the exile should be read as part of Empedocles' effort to make his cosmology carry religious weight. Richard Wright emphasises the first-person voice of the poem and its claim to divine authority. Jean Bollack treats the myth as an expression of the poet's religious self-understanding. The English is an approximation, and the attribution of the lines to the poem's speaker should be read with the Greek before quotation.
Commentary
This fragment, reported by Plutarch, describes the speaker as a fallen divinity who has been exiled for trusting Strife, and it links the cosmic doctrine of the forces to a story of guilt and exile. The poem's myth of the daimon who is driven out of the gods' company and wanders through the cycles of life gives the physics a moral and religious setting. Kirk, Raven, and Schofield discuss the fragment in relation to the Purifications, the second of Empedocles' poems, which deals with the soul's transmigration. Daniel Graham argues that the figure of the exile should be read as part of Empedocles' effort to make his cosmology carry religious weight. Richard Wright emphasises the first-person voice of the poem and its claim to divine authority. Jean Bollack treats the myth as an expression of the poet's religious self-understanding. The English is an approximation, and the attribution of the lines to the poem's speaker should be read with the Greek before quotation.