Extemporaneous musings, occasionally poetic, about life in its richly varied dimensions, especially as relates to history, theology, law, literature, science, by one who is an attorney, ordained minister, historian, writer, and African American.
Thursday, January 26, 2017
PHARAONIC PERIOD --OBENGA
"So the topic of the anteriority of black civilization, championed by Cheikh Anta Diop (pharaonic Egypt, Africa as the cradle of humanity etc.) , had long before been raised and discussed, in ancient times, by the Phoenicians and the Greeks, specifically by Plato in 'Phaedrus,' 'Timaeus,' 'Critias,' 'The Laws,' etc., and by Aristotle in 'Metaphysics,' 'On The Heavens,' 'On Meteorology,' etc. These ancient sources consistently and unanimously emphasized Egypt 's civilizing role in the Mediterranean. Western scholarship, however, no longer mentions these eyewitness accounts from the Phoenicians and the Greeks. The reasons are obvious....
"The new sciences taught to Greek students (Orpheus, Homer, Solon , Plato, Thales of Miletus , Pythagoras, Oenodipus, Eudoxus and others) included geometry, astronomy, theology, philosophy, and an initiation into the pure 'esoteric tradition ' of pharaonic Egypt, the discipline of sacerdotal practice....
"From that perspective , then , as a result of historical shuttling between Europe and Africa, African students who today read Plato and Aristotle as part of their training in philosophy have, in various ways, to contemplate the fact that these Greek philosophers themselves learned from ancient Egypt, intrinsically a black African society."
P.266-267, AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY : THE PHARAONIC PERIOD, 2780-330 BC by Theophile Obenga (2004)