“Lastly, if anyone believes that any matter is otherwise than the fact is, he not only has not knowledge, but his opinion is false also, and that is very far from the truth of knowledge. Wherefore, if any future event is such that its fulfilment is not sure or necessary, how can it possibly be known beforehand that it will occur?
“For just as absolute knowledge has no taint of falsity, so also that which is conceived by knowledge cannot be otherwise than as it is conceived. That is the reason why knowledge cannot lie, because each matter must be just as knowledge knows that it is.
“What then? How can God know beforehand these uncertain future events? For if He thinks inevitable the fulfilment of such things as may possibly not result, He is wrong; and that we may not believe, nor even utter, rightly. But if He perceives that they will result as they are in such a manner that He only knows that they may or may not occur, equally, how is this foreknowledge, this which knows nothing for sure, nothing absolutely?
“How is such a foreknowledge different from the absurd prophecy which Horace puts in the mouth of Tiresias: ‘Whatever I shall say, will either come to pass, or it will not ‘? How, too, would God's Providence be better than man's opinion, if, as men do, He only sees to be uncertain such things as have an uncertain result? But if there can be no uncertainty with God, the most sure source of all things, then the fulfilment of all that He has surely foreknown, is certain.”
—from Book 5, Prose 3
Saying that we know something, as distinct from merely having an opinion, following a hunch, or hazarding a guess, carries with it a certain weight, and it is with good reason that we therefore take a claim of knowledge far more seriously.
If I claim to know it, I should be able to back it up, point to the evidence, and offer irrefutable proof. “Well, just because . . .” or “You’re going to have to trust me on this one!” isn’t going to cut it. As Plato said, knowledge differs from opinion in that it is tied down, and it stays in its place. Opinions come and go with our whims, but knowledge brings with it a hard necessity.
As a simple example, I was worried when I suspected that the lost love of my life was fooling around behind my back. I was absolutely devastated, however, when I actually saw her doing it. There was no getting around it anymore, and I could no longer make excuses for myself. Ironically enough, it was the event that made me start reading Boethius with a greater commitment. It’s the strangest things that will bring you closer to philosophy.
That certainty can also bring with it a burden. I may not want it that way, but I have to accept that it is that way. It gets even worse when it comes to prophecies, when I am assured that it will be that way, as much as the coming prospect fills me with dread.
If it is real soothsaying, the genuine article, then it will have to be as it will be. Yes, we frown on that sort of thing nowadays, but I should not be so quick to reject the possibility that some are given insights about the future straight from the source of the Divine. Whether or not there can be human messengers of such truths, God must surely know how it must play itself out. If it is known with Divine perfection, it will seem to be inevitable by means of Divine authority.
In writing his satire, Horace was having a bit of fun at the expense of Tiresias, making him out to be a sort of used car salesman, a fellow who offers conditions to every promise, and qualifies in the fine print that the guarantee is not really a guarantee at all. “I assure you that it will happen, unless, of course, it doesn’t happen.” Certain New Age psychics, self-help gurus, and politicians do much the same to this day.
But they don’t really know, do they? They are playing the odds, hoping that if they are clever enough or vague enough that you will fall for the trick. They cryptically go through every letter of the alphabet, but when they arrive at ‘Z’ and notice you perk up about your Aunt Zoe, they’ve got you by the short and curlies.
Providence will have to be a bit different, of course, as it proceeds from truth that cannot be doubted. The Greeks understood this when they wrote all those terrifying tragedies, where mortals vainly tried to avoid their fates. That hubris will get you every time.
Laius hears from the Oracle that he will be killed by his own son, and so he immediately disposes of the boy. The young Oedipus, however, ends up being raised by Polybus and Merope.
Oedipus himself also later hears from the Oracle, that he will murder his father and marry his mother. Horrified by the prospect, he leaves home and makes his way to Thebes. What happens next is seemingly unavoidable, and the more those involved try to change events, the more they assure that they will happen.
Laius falls at the crossroads, Oedipus outwits the Sphinx, and he then weds Jocasta. It ends in grief, death, and blindness, as the Oracle always knew it would.
Where is the freedom in that fate?
Written in 1/2016
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