Of Anaximander, the second of the philosophers of Miletus, a single sentence remains. Not a book, not a treatise, a phrase, preserved by chance in a quote from another author, centuries later. And even this single phrase does not reach us in a stable form: each translation returns it with a slightly different weight.
The fragment
In a widely cited English rendering, translated by John Burnet, the text reads: "Into that from which things take their rise they pass away once more, as is ordained; for they make reparation and satisfaction to one another for their injustice according to the ordinance of time." The phrase was preserved by Simplicius, a commentator from the 6th century after Christ, in a commentary on Aristotle's Physics (24.13), and is cataloged by historians of philosophy under the code DK 12 B1 (Diels-Kranz, the standard numbering of pre-Socratic fragments).
Why does it sound like a court
The phrase uses legal vocabulary to describe a natural process: "penalty", "retribution", "injustice". Anaximander seems to describe the birth and death of things, the hot giving way to the cold, the dry giving way to the wet, as if each element committed an injustice by existing at the expense of its opposite, an injustice that time exacts back, with interest, like a judge. It is an image of rare poetic strength: the universe as a permanent court, where nothing takes on more existence than it has without having to give it back.
Why translations differ from each other
If you compare different editions of the fragment, you will notice that they never exactly match. This is not the fault of any specific translator: the original Greek uses terms like dikē (δίκη, justice, penalty) and tísis (τίσις, retribution) in an ambiguous way, which oscillates between the literal legal meaning and the metaphor applied to nature. Each translator decides, sentence by sentence, how much weight to give this metaphor of judgment, and the result is noticeably different versions of the same central idea. Reading more than one translation side by side, instead of choosing just one as definitive, is the most honest way to get closer to what Anaximander wanted to say: a two-thousand-six-hundred-year-old fragment does not surrender to a single translation, and this resistance is part of what he has to teach.
Readings from Nous
Read the classics in depth
Our list of more than 130 recommended books, commented and organized by theme, so you don't read in the dark.
See recommended readingsFrequently asked questions
What is the only fragment of Anaximander?
"Into that from which things take their rise they pass away once more, as is ordained; for they make reparation and satisfaction to one another for their injustice according to the ordinance of time." Preserved by Simplicius, in his commentary on Aristotle's Physics (24.13), it is cataloged as DK 12 B1.
Why is there only a fragment of Anaximander left?
Because, like almost all pre-Socratics, he did not come down to us in a complete work, only in quotations and paraphrases from later authors. Simplicius, a commentator from the sixth century after Christ, preserved this phrase when commenting on Aristotle's Physics.
Why do translations of Anaximander's fragment differ so much?
Because the original Greek uses legal terms, dikē (justice, penalty) and tisis (retribution), applied to a natural process, not a human court. Each translator decides how much weight to give the judgment metaphor, which produces noticeably different versions of the same sentence.
Continue: What is Anaximander's Apeiron? · Who were the pre-Socratics · Why the disciple must refute the master · Why is Macbeth "the Scottish play"?
Source class (NousCast Community): Quem foram os Pré-Socráticos? O momento em que o mundo deixou de ser explicado por deuses