Pythagoras: biography and teachings. Pythagoras - ancient Greek mathematician and philosopher, founder of the Pythagorean school Pythagoras life as the teaching of the Boreans

Born on o. Samos (c. 570 BC, 576), in his youth he went to study in Miletus, where he listened to Anaximander. He was also a student of Pherecydes of Syros. Made a trip to the East, incl. to Egypt and Babylon, becoming acquainted with ancient eastern mathematics and astronomy and studying non-Greek religious and cult traditions. OK. 532, under the pressure of the tyranny of Polycrates, he moved to Croton (Southern Italy), where he founded a religious and philosophical brotherhood with a ritualized charter and community of property, which took power in Crotona and spread political influence throughout Southern Italy. As a result of the anti-Pythagorean uprising, he fled to Metapontus, where he probably died c. 497/496 BC e. Secrecy, lack of written recording and the absolute authority of Pythagoras (cf. the proverb “He said it himself”), combined with the requirement to attribute all the students’ discoveries to the teacher.

Reliably attested: the doctrine of the immortality of the soul (psyche), of metempsychosis (transmigration of souls), combined with the “memory of ancestors” (he remembered his previous four previous incarnations, the son of Hermes); the requirement of “purification” (catharsis) as the highest ethical goal, achieved – for the body – through vegetarianism, for the soul – through knowledge of the musical-numerical structure of the cosmos, symbolically expressed in the “tetractyd” (“quaternary”), i.e. the sum of the first four numbers 1+2+3+4=10, containing the basic musical intervals: octave, fifth and fourth.

Pythagoreanism, a set of teachings that claimed origins from Pythagoras, is one of the most influential movements in ancient philosophy. They are distinguished: 1) early, or pre-Platonic: the last quarter of the 6th century. – sir. 4th century BC e.; 2) Platonizing the Ancient Academy 4th century BC. e.; 3) Hellenistic (middle), represented by pseudo-Pythagorean treatises, dating mainly from the end of the 4th century. – 1st century BC e.; 4) neo-Pythagoreanism - from the 1st century. BC e.

By Pythagorean in the narrow sense is meant early Pythagoras, coinciding with the history of the Pythagorean Union, founded by Pythagoras in Croton, a free religious community focused primarily on the problem of salvation; the legend of Pythagoras in this sense is comparable to the Gospel: cf. early evidence of Pythagoras' descent into Hades and his resurrection. But unlike similar Orphic communities, the Pythagorean Union was also a scientific and philosophical school (at least starting from the 5th century) and a political party that extended its influence to the Greek city-states of Southern Italy and (partially) Sicily. The Pythagorean slogan “Friends have everything in common” was combined with a rigid hierarchical tendency that hampered the democratic development of the polis.

After the anti-Pythagorean uprisings (the first occurred during the life of Pythagoras at the turn of the 6th-5th centuries) and the defeat of the union, the Italian center of Palestine moved to Tarentum: back in the middle of the 4th century. BC e. there was a strong community led by Archytas, a friend of Pythagoras. At the same time, the Pythagoreans, who fled from the massacre, first appear in Balkan Greece: in Thebes and Phlius. Members of the Phlionian community were “the last of the Pythagoreans.” However, there are indications that the tradition of P. did not completely die out in the Hellenistic era.

The internal organization of the Pythagorean Union is expressed primarily in the division into “acousmatics and mathematicians” (otherwise “exoterics and esoterics”). Initially, it may have corresponded to various levels of initiation, but over time, “acousmatics” and “mathematicians” turned into warring factions, with the first embodying the folklore-religious, and the second – the scientific and philosophical tradition in P. “Acousmatics” memorized “acousmas” (otherwise “symbols”) - unproven maxims of a cosmological, eschatological and ethical nature (“What is the wisest? - Number”, “What are the islands of the blessed? - Sun and Moon”, “Earthquake - a gathering of the dead”, “What is the most beautiful? - Harmony”, “What is the strongest? - Thought”, “What is the best? - Happiness”, “What is the truest? - That people are bad”, etc.), which also included many ritual prohibitions and taboos. “Mathematicians” studied the sciences (“mathematics”) - arithmetic, geometry, astronomy, harmonics and philosophical cosmology. Both of them claimed loyalty to the original teachings of Pythagoras, whose image is therefore divided in ancient sources into a religious teacher and the creator of mathematical science.

The reconstruction of pre-Platonic P. is based on two main sources: Philolaus and Aristotle’s testimony about the so-called. the Pythagoreans, in whose teaching most modern researchers see an integral system, basically coinciding with the system of Philolaus. It does not include the table of opposites - 10 pairs of ontological principles: limit - unlimited, odd - even, one - many, right - left, male - female, stationary - moving, straight - curved, light - dark, good - evil, square - rectangle. The last major representative of pre-Platonic P. is Archytas of Tarentum: in his person, the Pythagorean “sciences” finally separated from speculative philosophy and emerged as special disciplines.

What was new in Platonizing P. was a purely ontological understanding of number, while ancient Pythagorean arrhythmology was directly related to cosmogony; idealization and substantialization of numbers, which in Plato form an intermediate sphere of existence between ideas and sensory things (in early P. numbers are “inseparable from things”); replacing “the limit and the infinite” as the highest principles with one (monad) and an indefinite two (dyad); the generation of sensory bodies through the sequence “point – line – plane – body”, where a point is defined as a unit with an extended value; five regular polyhedra and their correlation with the five elements.

Hellenistic Pythagoreans are represented by treatises attributed to Pythagoras and the ancient Pythagoreans and which became the subjects of intensive study after their dating was revised (previously they were considered “neo-Pythagorean”). Treatises “Archite. About categories", "Okkel. On the Nature of the Universe", "Timaeus from Locr. On the nature of the soul and the cosmos" (considered in ancient times to be the original of Plato's Timaeus). Hellenistic philosophy is propaedeutic in nature (“philosophy textbooks”) and uses the conceptual apparatus of Plato and Aristotle.

Name: Pythagoras of Samos

Years of life: 569 BC - 495 BC

State: Ancient Greece

Scope of activity: Mathematician, Philosopher

Greatest Achievement: One of the greatest mathematicians who proved many theorems. Founder of the Pythagorean school.

He was born on the island of Samos (Greece), in 569 BC. According to various sources, the death of Pythagoras is recorded between 500 BC. and 475 BC in Metaponte (Italy).

Personal life of Pythagoras

His father, Mnesarchus, was a merchant of precious stones. His mother's name was Pyphaida. Pythagoras had two or three brothers.

Some historians say that Pythagoras was married to a woman named Theano and had a daughter, Miya, as well as a son named Thelaugus, who succeeded as a teacher of mathematics and may have taught Empedocles.

Others say that Theano was one of Pythagoras' students, not his wife, and it is possible that Pythagoras never married or had children.

Pythagoras was well educated, he played the lyre throughout his life, knew poetry and read Homer. He was interested in mathematics, philosophy, astronomy and music, and was greatly influenced by Pherecydes (philosophy), (mathematics and astronomy) and Anaximander (philosophy, geometry).

Pythagoras abandoned Samos around 535 BC. and went to Egypt to study with the priests in the temples. Many of the beliefs that Pythagoras later pursued in Italy were borrowed from the Egyptian priests, such as secret signs, the pursuit of purity, and not eating legumes or wearing animal skins as clothing.

Ten years later, when Persia invaded, Pythagoras was captured and sent to Babylon (now Iraq), where he met priests who taught him sacred rites. Iamblichus (250-330 AD), a Syrian philosopher, wrote about Pythagoras: “He also achieved perfection in arithmetic, music and other mathematical sciences, which were taught by the Babylonians...”.

In 520 BC. Pythagoras, now a free man, left Babylon and returned to Samos, and after some time opened a school called "Semicircle". However, his teachings were not popular with the rulers of the island of Samos, and their desire for Pythagoras' involvement in politics failed, so Pythagoras left and settled in Crotona, a Greek colony in southern Italy, around 518 BC.

There he founded a philosophical and religious school, where his many followers lived and worked.

School of Pythagoras

The Pythagoreans lived by special rules of behavior, including the rules that stated when to say what to wear and what to eat. Pythagoras was the head of the society, and his followers, both men and women who also lived there, were known as mathematicians. They had no personal belongings and were vegetarians.

Another group of followers, who lived separately from the school, had the right to own personal property and not be vegetarians. They all worked together. Pythagoras believed:
All things are numbers. Mathematics is the basis of everything, and geometry is the highest form of mathematical study. The physical world can be understood through mathematics.
The soul resides in the brain and is immortal. It passes from one being to another, sometimes from human to animal, through a series of reincarnations called transmigrations, until the soul becomes pure. Pythagoras believed that mathematics and music could purify.
Numbers have personality, characteristics, strengths and weaknesses.
The world depends on the interaction of opposites, such as man and woman, light and dark, heat and cold, dryness and moisture, lightness and heaviness, speed and slowness.
Certain symbols have mystical meanings.

Pythagorean theorems

All members of society were expected to observe strict loyalty and secrecy. Due to the strict secrecy among members of the Pythagorean society and the fact that they shared ideas and intellectual discoveries within the group and were closed to society, it is difficult to be sure whether all theorems attributed to Pythagoras originally belonged to him or were the property of the entire Pythagorean community .

Some of Pythagoras' students eventually wrote their theories, teachings and discoveries, but the Pythagoreans always gave honor to Pythagoras as their Teacher:

The sum of the angles of a triangle is equal to two right angles.
Pythagorean Theorem - For a right triangle, the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the other two sides. The Babylonians realized this 1000 years before the discovery, but Pythagoras proved it.
Constructing figures geometric algebra. For example, they solved various equations using geometric means.
The discovery of irrational numbers is attributed to the Pythagoreans, but it is unlikely that this was Pythagoras' idea because it does not agree with his philosophy that all things are numbers, since number for him meant the ratio of two integers.
Five regular solids (tetrahedron, cube, octahedron, icosahedron, dodecahedron). It is believed that Pythagoras only knew how to build the first three, but not the last two.
Pythagoras taught that the Earth was a sphere at the center of the Cosmos (Universe); that the planets, stars and universe were spherical because the sphere was the most perfect figure. He also taught that the paths of the planets were circular. Pythagoras discovered that the morning star was the same as the evening star Venus.

Pythagoras studied odd and even numbers, triangular numbers and perfect numbers. The Pythagoreans contributed to the understanding of angles, triangles, areas, proportions, polygons, and polyhedrons.
Pythagoras also related music to mathematics. He played the seven-string lyre for a long time and discovered how harmonious the vibrating strings are when the lengths of the strings are proportional to whole numbers such as 2:1, 3:2, 4:3.

The Pythagoreans also realized that this knowledge could be applied to other musical instruments.

Death of Pythagoras

He is said to have been killed by an angry mob, the Syracusans, during . It is also said that Pythagoras' school in Croton was burned, as a result of which he went to Metapontus, where he died of starvation.

At least both stories include a scene in which Pythagoras refuses to trample the legume crop in the field in order to escape and save himself, because of which he, along with other Pythagoreans, was caught, and during an unequal battle, the students and Pythagoras himself died.

The Pythagorean Theorem is a cornerstone of mathematics and remains so interesting to mathematicians that there are over 400 different proofs of its solution, including the original proof of the 20th American President Garfield.

LIFE IS LIKE TEACHING

The giant stars will shine,

The seas will not flood the Pamirs,

As long as the Atlanteans exist

And hold the world with your palms!

The human history of the Earth sometimes looks like a colored patchwork quilt, where among the gray shabby burlap of human savagery, materialism and godlessness, bright “patches” of expensive velvet or silk suddenly shine - unknown as divinely wise civilizations are blossoming. The fascinating pattern of this earthly “blanket” is patiently embroidered by our cosmic “nannies” - the Kumaras of Venus, the Spirits of the Higher Planets and the Teachers of Shambhala.

So, thanks to the immortal king of Atlantis, Arlich Vomalites, a unique state arose on the plateaus of green Africa - Ancient Egypt. This great country for many thousands of years became a world school for neophytes and initiates, a citadel of Knowledge and the headquarters of the White Brotherhood in the Mediterranean. The great Arlich Vomalites, known in Egypt under the name Thoth, nurtured this glorious civilization and helped thousands of ascetics take wings and fly away from our mortal planet forever. But when the time came for Egypt to die, it was Thoth who became the founder of the next greatest culture, whose name is Ancient Greece.

The sages call Thoth the father of Egypt, and European history books call Pythagoras the father of Greece and claim that on the basis of the Pythagorean school in Croton and thanks to the titanic efforts of the Teacher, Ancient Hellas arose from Samos, and from it came all of our modern science, culture and, in fact, Western civilization. However, Pythagoras himself repeatedly noted in his writings that it was He who “took him by the hand and went down with him under the Great Pyramid.” The great king of Atlantis, Arlich Vomalites, revealed to him under the Pyramid, in the secret underground city under the Sphinx, the knowledge of geometry and music, numbers and forms, knowledge of the nature of Reality and the sequence of Creation. When Ancient Greece arose thanks to Pythagoras and his teachings, the immortal king of Atlantis entered this culture in the same body and with the same knowledge as in Atlantis as in Ancient Egypt. It is appropriate to note here that in those hoary times Greece was the name given to the cities and territories of many countries in the Mediterranean and Asia Minor, which later became part of the Roman Empire. So, when He came to enlighten the peoples of Europe, he called himself Hermes. After Hermes left Hellas, Pythagoras became the same Shepherd for the laity as He was for the priests of Egypt. And today the School of Pythagoras continues the religious thought of its Teacher, applying it to new times and new incarnated souls. Thus the circle of times closes.

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Pythagoras of Samos (lat. Pythagoras; 570-490 BC) - ancient Greek philosopher and mathematician, creator of the religious and philosophical school of the Pythagoreans.
The life story of Pythagoras is difficult to separate from the legends that present him as a perfect sage and a great initiate into all the mysteries of the Greeks and barbarians. Herodotus also called him “the greatest Hellenic sage.”
The main sources on the life and teachings of Pythagoras are the works of the Neoplatonist philosopher Iamblichus (242-306) “On the Pythagorean Life”; Porphyry (234-305) “Life of Pythagoras”; Diogenes Laertius (200-250) book. 8, "Pythagoras". These authors relied on the writings of earlier authors, of which it should be noted that Aristotle's student Aristoxenus (370-300 BC) was from Tarentum, where the Pythagoreans had a strong position. Thus, the earliest known sources wrote about Pythagoras 200 years after his death. Pythagoras himself did not leave any writings, and all information about him and his teachings is based on the works of his followers, who are not always impartial. The teachings of Pythagoras should be divided into two components: the scientific approach to understanding the world and the religious-occult way of life preached by Pythagoras. The merits of Pythagoras in the first part are not known for certain, since everything created by followers within the school of Pythagoreanism was later attributed to him. The second part prevails in the teachings of Pythagoras, and it is this part that remained in the minds of most ancient authors. A crater on the Moon is named after Pythagoras. (http://www.zitata.eu/pythagoras.shtml).

When Mnesarchus, the father of Pythagoras, was in Delphi on his trading business, he and his wife Parthenis decided to ask the Delphic Oracle whether Fate would favor them on their return journey to Syria. Pythia (the soothsayer of Apollo) did not answer their question, but told Mnesarchus that his wife was carrying a child within her and that they would have a son who would surpass all people in beauty and wisdom and who would work hard in life for the good of humanity. Mnesarchus was so impressed by the prophecy that he changed the name of his own wife to Pyphasis in honor of the Pythian priestess. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

Versions of the date of birth of Pythagoras:
- This most famous philosopher was born somewhere between 600 and 590. BC and lived about a hundred years.
- Pythogoras was born on the island of Samos around 570 BC. (Newspaper materials).
- Pythagoras was born in Sidon, Phenicia, around 570 BC. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

When the child was born in the city of Sidon, Phenicia, it turned out to be a boy, as the oracle had said. Mnesarchus and Pyphasis named him Pythagoras (in honor of Pythia) and dedicated him to the light of Apollo. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

Many strange legends have survived to this day about the birth of Pythagoras. Some of them claim that he was not an ordinary person, but was one of the gods who took on human form in order to enter the world and teach the human race. Pythagoras was one of the many sages and saviors of antiquity who had a reputation for being “impeccable in everything.”
In his Apocalypse, Godfrey Higgins writes:
“The first strange thing about the story of Pythagoras, when compared with the life of Jesus, was that they were natives of the same place: Pythagoras was born in Sidon, and Jesus in Bethlehem, both cities in Syria.
The father of Pythagoras, like the father of Jesus, was prophetically informed that he would have a son who would be a benefactor of mankind.
Both were born at a time when their parents were away from home. Joseph and his wife were on their way to Bethlehem to pay taxes, and Pythagoras' father and mother were traveling from Samos, their residence, to Sidon on business.
Pyphasis, the mother of Pythagoras, had intercourse with the spirit of the god Apollo or the Sun God (of course, it was probably the holy spirit, and in the case of Jesus it was the Holy Spirit), who subsequently appeared to her husband and told him that he should not lie down with his wife throughout her pregnancy - the story is the same, in fact, what happened to Joseph and Mary. Because of these circumstances, Pythagoras was known by the same name as Jesus, namely, as the son of God, and people believed that He was Divinely inspired."
Pythagoras' father, Mnesarchus, was a rich enough man to give his son a good upbringing. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

From an early age, Pythagoras strives to learn as much as possible. He studies in several temples in Greece. It is generally accepted that he was the first teacher of Pherekydes of Syros and Elder Hermodamant. The first instills in the boy a love of science, the second - to the poetry of Homer. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

A number of sources indicate that Pythagoras became the champion of one of the first Olympics in fist fighting. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

In his youth, Pythagoras went to study in Miletus, where he listened to Anaximander and was a student of Pherecydes of Syros, whose mystical-allegorical cosmology was congenial to Pythagoras.

At a young age, Pythagoras went to Egypt to gain wisdom and secret knowledge from the Egyptian priests. Diogenes and Porphyry write that the Samian tyrant Polycrates provided Pythagoras with a letter of recommendation to Pharaoh Amasis, thanks to which he was allowed to study and initiated into the sacraments forbidden to other foreigners. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

Iamblichus writes that Pythagoras at the age of 18 left his native island and, having traveled around the sages in different parts of the world, reached Egypt, where he stayed for 22 years (he became familiar with mathematics and created the center of his philosophical system from it), until he was taken to Babylon Among the captives was the Persian king Cambyses, who conquered Egypt in 525 BC. e. Pythagoras stayed in Babylon for another 12 years, communicating with magicians, until he was finally able to return to Samos at the age of 56, where his compatriots recognized him as a wise man. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

In his youth, Pythagoras traveled to the East, including Egypt and Babylon, becoming acquainted with ancient Eastern mathematics and astronomy and studying non-Greek religious and cult traditions.
The teachings of Pythagoras indicate that he was perfectly familiar with the content of the Eastern and Western esoteric schools. He lived among the Jews and learned much from the rabbis about the secret traditions of Moses, the lawgiver of Israel. Subsequently, the Essene school was devoted largely to the interpretation of Pythagorean symbols. Pythagoras was initiated into the Egyptian, Babylonian, and Chaldean Mysteries. Although many believed him to be a student of Zoroaster, it is doubtful that his teacher was the god-man whom the Persians revered. Accounts of his travels differ, but historians agree that he visited many countries and studied with many teachers.
After becoming acquainted with all that he could gain from the Greek philosophers, having been initiated into the Eleusinian Mysteries, he went to Egypt, where he succeeded in initiation into the Mystery of Isis, performed by the priestesses of Thebes.
Pythagoras then directed his steps to Phenicia and Syria, where he was initiated into the Mysteries of Adonis, and, having managed to cross the valley of the Euphrates, he stayed long enough with the Chaldeans to learn their secret wisdom. Finally, he undertook his greatest and most important historical journey through Media and Persia to Hindustan, where he was a student for some years, and then became initiated into the Brahmins of Elephanta and Ellora” (see “Ancient Freemasonry” by Frank Higgins, 32).
The same author adds that the name of Pythagoras is still preserved in the annals of the Brahmins, where he appears as Yavancharya, that is, the Ionian Teacher.
Pythagoras was the first person to call himself a philosopher - the world owes this term to him. Before him, smart people called themselves wise men, which meant a person who knows. Pythagoras was much more modest. He coined the term philosopher, which he defined as one who tries to find, find out.
Around 532 BC, under the pressure of the tyranny of Polycrates, Pythogoras moved to Croton (Southern Italy), where he founded a religious and philosophical brotherhood with a ritualized charter and community of property, which took power in Croton and spread influence throughout Southern Italy.
Pythagoras founded a school or, as it is often called, a university.
In Crotona (Southern Italy) Pythagoras founded a school - the Pythagorean Union. Pythagoras calls only those who have gone through many stages of knowledge his closest students and allows them into the courtyard of his house, where he talks with them. This is where the concept of “esoteric” comes from, that is, located inside. Pythagoreans study geometry, mathematics, harmony, and astronomy. Pythagoras was one of the first to declare that the Earth has the shape of a ball, and the Sun, Moon and other planets have their own trajectory of movement. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

At first they looked askance at him in Crotone, but after a while those in power in this city were already looking for his advice in matters of great importance. He gathered around him a small group of devoted disciples, whom he initiated into the deep wisdom revealed to him, as well as into the principles of occult mathematics, music, astronomy, which he considered as the triangular foundation for all arts and sciences.
The Crotonians called Pythagoras the “Hyperborean Apollo.”
When he was about 60 years old, Pythagoras married one of his students and they had seven children. His wife was a remarkably capable woman who inspired him for the rest of his life.
At the age of approximately 60, Pythagoras married Theano, one of his students. They have 3 children (two sons and a daughter), and they all become followers of their father. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

Pythagoras takes a large part in the political life of Croton. On his initiative, an aristocratic ruling body is created - the “Council of Three Hundred”. Pythagoras himself heads it for about 25 years. Gradually, the “Council of Three Hundred” spreads its influence to neighboring cities. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

Around 500 BC, a rebellion breaks out in Sybaris against the rule of the aristocratic party. They say that the reason was Pythagoras’s refusal to accept a certain rich but unworthy citizen into his school, and he provoked a riot out of revenge. After the uprising, persecution of the Pythagoreans began. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

As often happens with geniuses, with his sincerity Pythagoras aroused both political and personal hostility from the citizens of Croton. Among those who wanted to accept initiation, there was one whom Pythagoras refused, and then he decided to destroy both the man and his teaching. Through false rumors, this man aroused dissatisfaction with the philosopher among ordinary people. Without any warning, a gang of killers broke into a small group of buildings where the great teacher and his students lived, set fire to the buildings and killed Pythagoras.
According to other sources, as a result of the anti-Pythagorean uprising led by Cylon, Pythogoras fled to Metapontus, where he probably died around 497/498 BC.
There is no general agreement as to how Pythagoras died. Some say he was killed by his own disciples; others say that he fled from Croton with a small group of followers and, being ambushed, was burned to death in a house set on fire. Another version says that in a burning house, the students formed a bridge of bodies, entering the fire alive, so that their teacher would walk across it and be saved, and only later Pythagoras died of a broken heart, grieving over the seeming futility of his efforts for education and service to humanity.
Little is known about the death of Pythagoras; there are at least three versions of the death of the great scientist. One thing is certain - this happened due to the persecution of the Pythagoreans. According to surviving data, Pythagoras lived for about 100 years. Memories of Pythagoras have reached us thanks to those few of his students who managed to escape from southern Italy to Greece. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

His surviving disciples tried to continue his teaching, but they were persecuted each time, and to this day there is little evidence left of the greatness of this philosopher.
It is said that his disciples never spoke his name, but used the words “Master” or “That Man.” According to legend, the name of Pythagoras consisted of specially ordered letters and had great sacred meaning.
Pythagoras initiated his candidate disciples through a certain formula hidden in the letters of his name. This may explain why the name Pythagoras was held in such high esteem. (Word magazine, article by T. Prater).
After the death of Pythagoras, his school gradually disintegrated. Time passed, and Pythagoras began to be considered no longer a man, but a god, and his disciples scattered throughout the world were united by a common admiration for the increasingly superior genius of their teacher.
F. Higgins gives an excellent summary of Pythagorean doctrines:
“The teaching of Pythagoras is of great importance to the Freemasons because it was the result of his contacts with the leading philosophers of the entire civilized world of that time and represented what they all agreed on, uprooting all the weeds of disagreement.
—The arguments of Pythagoras in defense of pure monotheism are sufficient evidence that the unity of God was the supreme secret of all ancient initiations.
- The philosophical school of Pythagoras was to a certain extent a series of initiations, for he forced his disciples to pass through various stages and never entered into personal contact with them until they had reached a certain stage of perfection.
According to his biographers, there were three degrees:
- Firstly, it concerned “Mathematics” - his students were required to know mathematics and geometry, which was then and could be now, the foundation on which all knowledge was built.
- Secondly, it concerned “Theory”, which dealt with skillful applications of the exact sciences.
- Thirdly, we were talking about the degree of “Chosenness”, which was assigned to the candidate when he comprehended the light of complete enlightenment that could be achieved.
The students of the Pythagorean school were divided into “exotericists,” or students of external degrees, and “esotericists,” those who passed the third degree of initiation and were admitted to secret wisdom. Silence, secrecy and unconditional obedience were the cardinal principles of this great order."
BASICS OF PYTHAGORISM
The study of geometry, music and astronomy was considered essential to the understanding of God, man or Nature, and no one could consider himself a student of Pythagoras until he had sufficiently mastered these sciences. Each applicant was tested on these three subjects, and if his ignorance was discovered, he was quickly expelled.
Pythagoras did not go to extremes. He taught moderation in all things rather than excess in anything, since he believed that an excess of virtue is already a vice. One of his favorite expressions was: “We must strive with all our might to destroy excesses in all things and, with fire and sword, drive out disease from the body, ignorance from the soul, gluttony from the stomach, calls for rebellion from cities, discord from the family.” . Pythagoras believed that there is no greater crime than anarchy.
All people know what they want, but few people know what they need. Pythagoras warned his disciples that they should not pray for themselves; that when they ask the gods for something, they should not ask for themselves, because man does not know what is good for him, and therefore it is unreasonable to ask for something that, when received, can cause harm.
Pythagoras's god was the Monad, or the One, which is All. He described God as the Supreme Mind, dispersed throughout all parts of the Universe, as the Cause of all things. He further said that God's movement is circular, God's body is composed of light substance, and God's nature must be composed of truth substance
Pythagoras said that eating meat darkens the mental faculties, although he did not prohibit others from eating it and he himself did not completely abstain from meat.
Pythagoras said that a judge should refrain from eating meat before court in order to make the most honest and insightful decision to those appearing before him.
When Pythagoras decided (and this was done often) to retire to the temple of God for a long time for meditation and prayer, he took with him a prepared supply of food and drink. The food consisted of equal parts poppy and sesame seeds, sea onion skins from which the juice was squeezed out, narcissus flowers, mallow leaves, barley and peas. Wild honey was also added here. To prepare the drink, he used cucumber seeds, seedless raisins, coriander flowers, mallow and purslane seeds, grated cheese, milk and butter, mixed together and sweetened with wild honey. Pythagoras said that this was the diet of Hercules when he wandered through the Libyan desert, and the recipe was given to him by the goddess Ceres herself.
The Pythagoreans' favorite treatment method was poultices. These people also knew the magical properties of a huge number of plants.
Pythagoras highly valued the medicinal properties of sea onions, and they say he wrote an entire book on this subject. This work, however, is unknown to us.
Pythagoras discovered that music could have therapeutic value and composed various special harmonies for various diseases.
Pythagoras experimented with color and achieved great success.
One of Pythagoras' unique treatments involved reciting verses from Homer's Iliad and Odyssey; they had to be read to a sick person.
Pythagoras opposed surgery in all its forms.
He did not allow changes to the human body, since this was, from his point of view, a sacrilege against the gods, since, in this case, their habitat was violated.
Pythagoras taught that friendship is the truest and almost perfect of all human relationships. He said that in Nature everything is friends with everything; gods with people, soul with body, rationalism with irrationalism, philosophy with theory, man with other people. He also said that friendship exists between strangers, between a man and his wife, his children and servants. All ties without friendship are mere fetters, and there is no virtue in maintaining them.
Pythagoras believed that human relationships were more mental in nature than physical, and that a stranger who liked him from an intellectual point of view was closer to him than a blood relative who did not share his point of view.
Pythagoras defined knowledge as the fruits of mental accumulation. He believed that it could be obtained in many ways, but he considered observation to be the main thing. Wisdom is the understanding of the source or cause of all things and can only be achieved by raising the intellect to the point where it is intuitively aware of the invisible manifestations directed through the visible, thus becoming capable of communicating with the spirits of things rather than with their forms. The ultimate source to be comprehended by wisdom was the Monad, the mysterious eternal atom of the Pythagoreans.
Pythagoras taught that man and the universe are made in the image of God. And since this image is one, then knowledge about one is knowledge about the other. He, further, taught that there is a constant interaction between the Big Man (the Universe) and man (the small universe).
Pythagoras believed that all sidereal bodies are living and that the forms of the planets and stars are simply the bodies of souls, minds and spirits, just as the visible human form is the vehicle of the invisible spiritual organism, which is in reality the conscious individual.
Pythagoras considered the planets to be magical deities worthy of human worship and respect. All these deities, however, from his point of view, are subordinate to the First Cause, within which they exist temporarily, just as mortality exists in the midst of immortality.
The famous Pythagorean Y stood for the power of choice and was used in the Mysteries as an emblem of the Fork in the Path. The main road was divided into two - right and left. The right branch was called Divine Wisdom, and the left - Earthly Wisdom. Youth, personified in the candidate, walks along the Road of Life, symbolized by the central trunk of the sign Y, and reaches the point where the Path divides. The neophyte must choose whether he will follow the left path and, following the dictates of his lower nature, take the path of error and thoughtlessness, which will inevitably lead him to disappearance, or whether he will choose the right path and through integrity, work and sincerity will finally achieve union with the immortals in higher spheres.
It is likely that Pythagoras borrowed his concept of Y from the Egyptians, who included in some of their initiation rituals a scene where the candidate appeared before two female figures. One of them, wrapped in the white robes of the temple, called the neophyte into the hall of learning, and the other, adorned with precious stones symbolizing earthly treasures, held a tray filled with fruit (an emblem of the false light) and lured him into the halls of debauchery.
According to Pythagoras, the soul is immortal and is the subject of successive reincarnations.
Pythagoras owns: the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, metempsychosis in combination with the memory of ancestors (Pythagoras remembered his 4 previous incarnations) and the kinship of all living beings; the requirement of purification (catharsis) as the highest ethical goal, achieved - for the body - through vegetarianism, for the soul - through knowledge of the musical-numerical structure of the cosmos, symbolically expressed in the tetractyd, that is, the sum of the first four integers 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 = 10 , containing the basic musical intervals: octave (2:1), fifth (3:2) and fourth (4:3).
There are different points of view regarding the Pythagorean theory of transmigration of souls:
- According to one view, he taught that mortals who during life resembled some animal would, upon returning to earth, take the form of that animal. This allegory should be understood as follows: human beings become beasts when they allow themselves to be dominated by their own base desires and destructive tendencies. It is likely that the term "transmigration" is to be understood in the sense of reincarnation, a doctrine which Pythagoras may have learned directly or indirectly from India and Egypt.
The fact that Pythagoras accepted the theory of successive incarnations of the spiritual nature in human form is found in Levi's History of Magic:
“He was a prominent proponent of what is called the doctrine of metempsychosis, understood as the transmigration of the soul into subsequent bodies.
He himself was:
a) Etalides, son of Mercury;
b) Euphorbus, son of Panthos, who fell at the hands of Menelaus in the Trojan War;
c) Hermotimaeus, a prophet in Clazomenae, a city in Ionia;
d) a humble fisherman;
e) a philosopher from Samos."
Pythagoras taught that every species of being has what he called a seal given to the creature by God, and that the physical form of each of them is an impression of this seal on the wax of the physical substance. Thus, each body is marked with dignity coming from the divine image.
Pythagoras believed that eventually man would reach a state in which he would be able to reflect his greater nature in an etheric body superimposed on the physical body, and would then dwell in the eighth sphere, or Antichthon. From here he can ascend to the realm of the immortals, to which he belongs by divine right of birth.
Pythagoras taught that everything in nature is divided into three parts and that no one can become truly wise until he represents every problem in the form of a triangular diagram. He said: “See the triangle, and the problem is two-thirds solved... All things are made of three.”
Pythagoras divided the Universe into three parts, which he called: the Supreme World, the Superior World and the Inferior World. The chief of these, the Supreme World, is the subtle, permeable spiritual essence pervading all things, and therefore the true plane of the Supreme Deity itself, and the Deity is omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient. Both subordinate worlds exist in the nature of this highest sphere.
The Higher World is the abode of the immortals. It is also the place of archetypes, or seals; their nature is in no way similar to earthly materiality, but they, casting their shadow into the depths (the Lower World), are realized only through their shadows.
The third, Lower World, is the abode of those creatures that consist of material substance or are busy working on material substance. Thus, this is the abode of mortal gods, Demiurges, angels who deal with people, and demons who have an earthly nature. This also includes humanity and the lower kingdoms, temporary residents on earth, but capable of ascending to higher spheres through reason and philosophy.
1 and 2 were not considered numbers by the Pythagoreans because they represent two supra-mundane spheres. Pythagorean numbers begin with "3", a triangle, and "4", a square. Added together and plus 1 and 2, they give the number 10, the great number of all things, the archetype of the Universe.
The three worlds were called containers:
- The first is the repository of principles;
- the second – the mind;
- third - lowest - container of quantities.

Numbers and shapes.
Pythagoras taught that the point symbolizes the number 1, the line the number 2, the plane the number 3, and the polyhedra the number 4
Symmetrical geometric bodies were of the greatest importance to the Pythagoreans and subsequent Greek thinkers. To be perfectly symmetrical, a geometric solid must have an equal number of faces meeting at the corners, and these faces must be regular polygons, that is, figures with equal sides and angles. Pythagoras was probably the first to make the greatest discovery that there are only five such bodies...
The Greeks believed that the world consisted of four elements: earth, air, fire and water, and the shapes of the particles or elements were regular geometric bodies.
The particles of the earth were cubes, and the cube, being a regular geometric body, had the greatest stability.
The fire particles were tetrahedrons; The tetrahedron was the simplest of the regular bodies and therefore the lightest.
The water particles were icosahedrons due to the same principle.
The air particles, being intermediate between the last two, were octahedra. For ancient mathematicians, the dodecahedron was the most mysterious of all geometric bodies. It was the most difficult to construct, one of the reasons for which was the need to carefully draw a pentagon, a pentagon, using the great theorem of Pythagoras. Hence Plato’s conclusion that “the Deity used this (the regular dodecahedron) to plan the Universe” (H. Redgrove “Departed Faiths”).
SYMMETRICAL GEOMETRIC BODIES.
To the five symmetrical regular bodies of the ancients was added the sphere (1), the most perfect of all created forms.
The five Pythagorean solids are:
- tetrahedron (2) with four faces, which are equilateral triangles;
- cube (3) with six square faces;
- octahedron (4) with eight faces - equilateral triangles;
- icosahedron (5) with twenty faces - regular pentagons.
Redgrove did not mention the fifth element of the ancient Mysteries. The fifth element, ether, was called akasa by the Hindus. It is in close connection with the hypothetical ether of modern science. Ether is a permeable substance that permeates all other elements and acts as their common solvent and common denominator. In a regular geometric body with twelve sides one should see a subtle analogy with the Twelve Immortals covering the Universe, and in the twelve convolutions of the human brain - the presence of these Immortals in human nature.
According to Pythagoras, the position of each body in the universe is determined by its merits. The prevailing concept in his day was that the Earth occupied a central position in the solar system, that the planets, including the Sun and Moon, moved around the Earth, and that the Earth was flat and square. In contrast to this, regardless of criticism, Pythagoras said that fire is the most important of all elements, that the center is the most important part of every body and that just as the fire of Vesta is in the middle of the house, so the middle of the Universe represents the flaming sphere heavenly radiance. This central globe he called the Castle of Jupiter, or the Ball of Unity, the Great Monad, or the Altar of Vesta. Since the number 10, being sacred, symbolizes the sum of all parts and the completeness of all things, it was quite natural for Pythagoras to divide the Universe into ten spheres, symbolized by ten concentric circles. The center of these circles was in the center of the ball of Divine Fire; then came the seven planets, the Earth, another mysterious planet called Antichthon, which is never visible.
There are different points of view on the nature of Antichthon. Clement of Alexandria believed that he represented the mass of the heavens, while others believed that he was the Moon. It is more likely that it was the mysterious eighth sphere of the ancients, which moved in the same orbit as the Earth, but which was always hidden from the Earth by the Sun, being at all times exactly opposite to the Earth in orbit. Is this not the same Lilith that astrologers have been arguing about for so long?
Isaac Mayer states the following: “The Pythagoreans believed that each star was a world with an atmosphere of ether surrounding it” (see “Kabalah”).
The planet Venus was highly revered by the disciples of Pythagoras because it was the only planet bright enough to cast a shadow. As a morning star, Venus was visible even before sunrise, and as an evening star, she shone immediately after sunset. Because of these properties, it was given many names by the ancients. Being visible in the sky at sunset, it was called Vesper, and because it rose before the sun, it was called the false light, the morning star, or Lucifer, which means bearer of light. Because of this relationship with the sun, the planet was also called Venus, Astarte, Aphrodite, Isis and the Mother of the Gods. At some times of the year at some latitudes, the crescent of Venus can be seen without a telescope. The frequently encountered image of the ancient goddess with a sickle can be associated with this fact, and one must keep in mind that the phases of Venus did not coincide with the phases of the Moon.
The exact knowledge of astronomy that Pythagoras possessed was undoubtedly borrowed from the Egyptian temples, because their priests perfectly understood the true relationship of the celestial bodies thousands of years before this knowledge was revealed to the uninitiated world. It is the fact that the knowledge he acquired enabled him to make statements that required two thousand years to be verified is the reason why Plato and Aristotle so highly valued the depth of the ancient Mysteries.
An interesting application of the Pythagorean doctrine of geometric solids was its expansion by Plato in his Canon.
“Almost all the old philosophers,” says an anonymous writer, “invented harmonious theories of the Universe, and this practice continued until this mode of philosophizing died out.”
Kepler (1596), in order to demonstrate Plato's doctrine that the Universe consists of five regular bodies, proposed the following rule: “The earth is a circle, the measurer of everything. A dodecahedron is described around it. The circle surrounding it will be Mars. A tetrahedron is described around Mars, and the sphere describing it will be Jupiter. A cube is described around Jupiter, and the sphere around it will be Saturn. Now let's inscribe an icosahedron into the Earth, and the circle inside it will be Venus. Let us inscribe an octahedron into Venus, and the circle inside it will be Mercury” (Misterium Cosmographikum.” 1596).
This rule cannot be taken seriously as a statement about the actual proportions of the Universe, since it in no way coincided with the relations derived by Copernicus at the beginning of the 16th century. Yet Kepler was very proud of his formula and said that he valued it more than the Electorate of Saxony. It was also highly regarded by two prominent authorities, Tycho Brahe and Galileo, who apparently understood it. Kepler himself never gave the slightest hint as to how to interpret his precious rule. Platonic astronomy did not deal with the material components of the celestial bodies, but viewed the stars and planets primarily as focal points of the Divine mind.
Pythagoras practiced fortune telling (arithmomania). He was said to have a wonderful wheel of fortune, with which he could predict the future and very distant events, and he also learned hydromania from the Egyptians. He believed that copper had prophetic properties, because even when everything around was calm, a rumble could be heard in the copper bowl. He once prayed to the spirit of the river, and a voice was heard from the water: “Pythagoras, I greet you.” They say that he could force demons to enter the water and stir it up, and through such an action, looking at the ripples, he could predict certain things.
One day, after drinking from a spring, one of the Pythagorean Masters declared that the spirit of water predicted a terrible earthquake the next day - the prophecy was fulfilled.
Pythagoras had hypnotic power not only over people, but also over animals. He forced birds to change their flight direction, a bear to stop raiding homes, and a bull to change food, and all this through purely mental effort. He also had the gift of second sight, being able to see things at great distances and accurately describe events that had not yet occurred.

SYMBOLIC APHORISMS OF PYTHAGORE.
Iamblichus collected thirty-nine symbolic sayings of Pythagoras and gave them an interpretation. They were translated from the Greek by Thomas Taylor. Aphoristic statements were one of Pythagoras' favorite methods and were widely used at the Pythagorean University at Crotona.
Below are ten of the most important aphorisms with brief explanations of the hidden meaning:
1. STAY AWAY FROM THE ROADS WALKED IN, USE THE ROADS LESS WALKED.
This must be understood to mean that he who seeks wisdom must seek it in solitude
2. BE THE MASTER OF YOUR LANGUAGE BEFORE ALL OTHER THINGS, WHILE FOLLOWING THE GODS.
This aphorism warns a person that his words, instead of giving a true picture of him, can mislead others, and when there is any doubt about what should be said, it is always better to remain silent.
3. THE WIND IS BLOWING, WORSHIP THE NOISE.
Pythagoras here reminds his disciples that God commands to listen to the voice of the elements and that all things in Nature appear through harmony, rhythm, order or action attributed to God.
4. HELP THE PERSON IN LIFTING WEIGHTS, BUT DO NOT HELP IN ADDING THEM.
One should learn to help the diligent, but never help those who seek to avoid responsibility - it is a sin to help the lazy.
5. DO NOT TALK ABOUT THE AFFAIRS OF THE PYTHAGOREAN TEACHING WITHOUT LIGHT.
Here the world is warned not to interpret God's mysteries and the secrets of science without spiritual and intellectual enlightenment
6. WHEN YOU LEAVE YOUR HOUSE, DON’T COME BACK, OTHERWISE THE FURY WILL LIVE IN IT.
Pythagoras here warns those who, having begun the search for truth and having studied some of the sacraments, will try to return to their path of vice and ignorance. It is better to know nothing about the Divine than to study little and stop halfway.
7. FEED THE ROCK, BUT DO NOT SACRIFICE HIM, SINCE IT IS DEDICATED TO THE SUN AND MOON.
There are two great lessons hidden in this aphorism. The first is that living beings should not be sacrificed to the gods because life is sacred and it should not be destroyed even when offered to God. The second is to warn man that the human body, here symbolized by the rooster, is sacred to the sun (God) and the moon (Nature) and should be preserved as the most precious means of human embodiment. Pythagoras warned his students against suicide.
8. DO NOT LET SWALLOWS IN YOUR HOUSE.
This is a warning to the seeker of truth so that he does not allow wandering thoughts to enter his mind or people who are incapable of spiritual change to enter into his life. He must surround himself with rational people and conscientious workers.
9. DO NOT WILLINGLY EXTEND YOUR RIGHT HAND TO ANYONE.
This is a warning to the student to have his own mind and not to share wisdom and knowledge (the right hand) with those who are not able to appreciate it. The hand here represents truth, which lifts up those who have fallen due to ignorance; but since many of these fallen have no need of wisdom at all, they would rather cut off the hand extended to them. Only time can help in redeeming the ignorance of people.
10. WHEN RISING OUT OF BED, SMOOTH THE BODY PRINTS.
Pythagoras believed that disciples who awakened from the slumber of ignorance and came to a waking state of mind should eliminate all memories of their former spiritual darkness. A wise man does not leave behind himself a form that the less wise may mistake for a form for making an idol.

Pythagoras of Samos. Quotes and Aphorisms. (http://www.zitata.eu/pythagoras.shtml).

Save the tears of your children so that they can shed them at your grave.
Prudent wife! If you want your husband to spend his free time next to you, then try so that he does not find so much pleasantness, pleasure, modesty and tenderness in any other place.
Blessed be the divine number that gave birth to gods and men.
Be a friend of truth to the point of martyrdom, but do not be its defender to the point of intolerance.

The great science of living happily is to live only in the present.
During anger one should neither speak nor act.
Explore everything, give your mind first place.
Two things make a person godlike: living for the good of society and being truthful.
Do great things without promising great things.
To learn the customs of any people, try to first learn their language.
If you can be an eagle, do not strive to be the first among the jackdaws.
Live with people so that your friends do not become enemies, and your enemies become friends.
Life is like games: some come to compete, others to trade, and the happiest ones come to watch.
And suffering will begin, and torment will return, for the soul is again imprisoned in the body and is no longer free.
Choose a friend for yourself; You cannot be happy alone: happiness is a matter of two.
No matter how short the words “yes” and “no” are, they still require the most serious consideration.
Just as old wine is unsuitable for drinking a lot, so rude treatment is unsuitable for an interview.
The cup of life would be sweet to the point of cloying if bitter tears did not fall into it.
Flattery is like a weapon in a painting. It brings pleasure, but no benefit.
Be silent or say something better than silence.
Don't chase happiness: it is always within you.
Do not do anything shameful, either in front of others or in secret. Your first law should be self-respect.
Don’t close your eyes when you want to sleep without having sorted out all your actions over the past day.
Those who are foolish when drinking wine reach the point of intoxication, and in the event of misfortunes - to complete loss of mind.
No one should exceed the limit in food or drink.
It is one and the same thing to take away the bitterness from wormwood and to cut off the insolence from a word.
The whole life should be entrusted to reason alone, as a wise guardian.
Wash the insult received not in blood, but in Lethe, the river of oblivion.
Try not to cover up your mistakes with words, but to heal them with accusations.
It is more useful to throw a stone at random than an empty word.
First of all, don't lose your self-respect!
When you wake up in the morning, ask yourself: “What should I do?” In the evening, before falling asleep: “What have I done?”
Drunkenness is an exercise in madness.
Ask a drunkard how he could stop drinking? I will answer for him: let him remember more often the things he does while drunk.
A statue is painted by his appearance, but a man by his deeds.
Only an ignoble person is capable of praising to his face and slander behind his back.
Friends have everything in common, and friendship is equality.
In boasters, as in gilded weapons, the inside does not match the outside.
When you leave, don't look back.
A man dies drunk from wine; he rages in the intoxication of love.
Whatever they think of you, do what you think is fair. Be equally indifferent to both blame and praise.
Joke, like salt, should be consumed in moderation.
(http://www.zitata.eu/pythagoras.shtml).

The most famous of all Pythagoras's fragments is the Golden Verses, attributed to himself, although there is some doubt as to the authorship. The Golden Verses contain a brief version of the whole system of philosophy which underlay the educational doctrines of the Italian school at Crotona. These verses open by advising the reader to love God, honor great heroes, and respect the spirits of nature. Man is then called upon to meditate carefully throughout his daily life, and to prefer the treasures of the mind and soul to earthly accumulations. The verses also promise man that if he raises his lower material nature and cultivates self-control, he will be noticed by the gods and unite with them, sharing immortality with them. (It is important to note that Plato highly valued this Pythagorean manuscript, which survived the destruction at Croton).
In the III-IV centuries. BC e. a compilation of Pythagoras’ sayings appeared, known as the “Sacred Word,” from which the so-called “Golden Verses” later emerged.
The final excerpt from “Golden Verses” translated by I. Peter:
“Be firm: the divine race is present in mortals,
To them, proclaiming, sacred nature reveals everything.
If this is not alien to you, you will carry out orders,
You will heal your soul and deliver you from many disasters.
Dishes, I said, leave those that I indicated in the cleansings
And to deliver the soul, approach everything with thoughtfulness.
And be guided by true knowledge - the best charioteer.
If you, having left your body, ascend into the free ether,
You will become an incorruptible and eternal god who does not know death.”
(http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).
Alcmaeon, Parmenides, Plato, Euclid, Empedocles, and Kepler considered themselves followers of Pythagoras and his teachings. (http://www.new-numerology.ru/pifagor.htm).

When writing this article, materials from newspapers and the Internet were used.

Pythagoras of Samos (580-500 BC) - ancient Greek thinker, mathematician and mystic. He created the religious and philosophical school of the Pythagoreans.

The life story of Pythagoras is difficult to separate from the legends that present him as a perfect sage and a great initiate into all the mysteries of the Greeks and barbarians. Herodotus also called him “the greatest Hellenic sage.” The main sources on the life and teachings of Pythagoras are the works of the Neoplatonist philosopher Iamblichus, “On the Pythagorean Life”; Porphyry "Life of Pythagoras"; Diogenes Laertius, Pythagoras. These authors relied on the writings of earlier authors, of which it should be noted that Aristotle's student Aristoxenus was from Tarentum, where the Pythagoreans had a strong position.

Brief biography of Pythagoras:

The earliest known sources about the teachings of this thinker appeared only 200 years after his death. However, it is on them that the biography of Pythagoras is based. He himself did not leave any works to his descendants, therefore all information about his teaching and personality is based only on the works of his followers, who were not always impartial.

Pythagoras was born in Sidon Phoenician around 580 (according to other sources around 570) BC. e. Pythagoras' parents are Parthenides and Mnesarchus from the island of Samos. Pythagoras' father was, according to one version, a stone cutter, according to another, a rich merchant who received Samos citizenship for distributing bread during a famine. The first version is preferable, since Pausanias, who testified to this, gives the genealogy of this thinker. Parthenis, his mother, was later renamed Pyphaida by her husband. She came from the family of Ankeus, a noble man who founded a Greek colony on Samos.

The great biography of Pythagoras was supposedly predetermined even before his birth, which seemed to have been predicted at Delphi by the Pythia, which is why he was called that way. Pythagoras means "he who was announced by the Pythia." This fortuneteller allegedly told Mnesarch that the future great man would bring as much good and benefit to people as anyone else would later. To celebrate this, the child’s father even gave a new name to his wife, Pyphaida, and called his son Pythagoras “the one who was announced by Pythia.”

There is another version of the appearance of this name. Moreover, they say that this is a nickname, and he received it for his ability to speak the truth. On behalf of the priestess-soothsayer from the temple of Apollo Pythia. And its meaning is “persuasive by speech.”

The name of his first teacher is known. It was Hermodamas. This man, who instilled in the student a love of painting and music, introduced him to the Iliad and Odyssey.

When he was eighteen years old, Pythagoras left his native island. After several years spent traveling and meeting with sages from different lands, he arrived in Egypt. His plans include studying with priests and comprehending ancient wisdom. In this he is helped by a letter of recommendation from the tyrant of Samos Polycrates to Pharaoh Amasis. Now he has access to something that many foreigners cannot even dream of: not only mathematics and medicine, but also the sacraments. Pythagoras spent 22 years here. And he left the country as a prisoner of the king of Persia, Cambyses, who conquered Egypt in 525 BC. The next 12 years were spent in Babylon.

He was able to return to his native Samos only at 56, and was recognized by his compatriots as the wisest of people. He also had followers here. Many are attracted by mystical philosophy, healthy asceticism and strict morality. Pythagoras preached the moral ennoblement of the people. It could be achieved where power is in the hands of knowledgeable and wise people, to whom the people obey unconditionally in one thing and consciously in another, as a moral authority. It is Pythagoras who is traditionally credited with introducing such words as “philosopher” and “philosophy”.

The disciples of this thinker formed a religious order, a kind of brotherhood of initiates, which consisted of a caste of like-minded people who deified the teacher. This order actually came to power in Crotone. All members of the order became vegetarians, who were forbidden to eat meat or bring sacrificial animals to the gods. Eating food of animal origin is the same as engaging in cannibalism. History has even preserved funny practices in this almost religious order. For example, they did not allow swallows to build nests under the roofs of their houses, or could not touch the white rooster, or eat beans. There is another version according to which the restriction applied only to certain types of meat.

At the end of the 6th century BC. e. Due to anti-Pythagorean sentiments, the philosopher had to go to Metapontum, another Greek colony, where he died. Here, 450 years later, during the reign of Cicero (1st century BC), the crypt of this thinker was shown as a local landmark. Like the date of his birth, the exact date of death of Pythagoras is unknown, only it is assumed that he lived to be 80 years old.

Pythagoras, according to Iamblichus, led the secret society for 39 years. Based on this, the date of his death is 491 BC. e., when the period of the Greco-Persian wars began. Referring to Heraclides, Diogenes said that this philosopher died at the age of 80, or even 90, according to other unnamed sources. That is, the date of death from here is 490 BC. e. (or, less likely, 480). In his chronology, Eusebius of Caesarea indicated 497 BC as the year of death of this thinker. e. Thus, the biography of this thinker is largely questionable.

Scientific achievements and works of Pythagoras:

The earliest known sources about the teachings of Pythagoras did not appear until 200 years after his death. Pythagoras himself did not leave any writings, and all information about him and his teachings is based on the works of his followers, who are not always impartial.

1) In the field of mathematics:

Pythagoras is today considered the great cosmologist and mathematician of antiquity, but early evidence does not mention such merits. Iamblichus writes about the Pythagoreans that they had a custom of attributing all achievements to their teacher. This thinker is considered by ancient authors to be the creator of the famous theorem that in a right triangle the square of the hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of its legs (Pythagorean theorem). Both the biography of this philosopher and his achievements are largely dubious. The opinion about the theorem, in particular, is based on the testimony of Apollodorus the calculator, whose identity has not been established, as well as on poetic lines, the authorship of which also remains a mystery. Modern historians suggest that this thinker did not prove the theorem, but could convey this knowledge to the Greeks, which was known 1000 years ago in Babylon before the time when the biography of the mathematician Pythagoras dates back to. Although there is doubt that this particular thinker was able to make this discovery, no compelling arguments can be found to challenge this point of view. In addition to proving the above theorem, this mathematician is also credited with the study of integers, their properties and proportions.

2) Aristotle’s discoveries in the field of cosmology:

Aristotle in his work “Metaphysics” touches on the development of cosmology, but the contribution of Pythagoras is not voiced in any way in it. The thinker we are interested in is also credited with the discovery that the Earth is round. However, Theophrastus, the most authoritative author on this issue, gives it to Parmenides. Despite controversial issues, the merits of the Pythagorean school in cosmology and mathematics are indisputable. According to Aristotle, the real ones were the acousmatists, who followed the doctrine of the transmigration of souls. They viewed mathematics as a science that came not so much from their teacher as from one of the Pythagoreans, Hippasus.

3) Works created by Pythagoras:

This thinker did not write any treatises. It was impossible to compile a work from oral instructions addressed to the common people. And the secret occult teaching, intended for the elite, could not be entrusted to the book either. Diogenes lists some of the titles of books that allegedly belonged to Pythagoras: “On Nature,” “On the State,” “On Education.” But for the first 200 years after his death, not a single author, including Aristotle, Plato, and their successors at the Lyceum and Academy, quotes from the works of Pythagoras or even indicates their existence. The written works of Pythagoras were unknown to ancient writers from the beginning of the new era. This is reported by Josephus, Plutarch, and Galen. A compilation of the sayings of this thinker appeared in the 3rd century BC. e. It's called "The Sacred Word". Later, the “Golden Poems” arose from it (which are sometimes attributed, without good reason, to the 4th century BC, when the biography of Pythagoras is considered by various authors).

4) Pythagoras mug:

Quite a clever invention. It is not possible to fill it to the brim, because the entire contents of the mug will immediately leak out. There should be liquid in it only up to a certain level. It looks like an ordinary mug, but what distinguishes it from others is the column in the center. It was called the “greed circle.” Even today in Greece it is in deserved demand. And for those who do not know how to limit their alcohol consumption, it is even recommended.

5) Oratorical talent:

No one questions it in Pythagoras. He was a great speaker. It is known for certain that after his very first public lecture, he had two thousand students. Entire families, imbued with the ideas of their teacher, were ready to start a new life. Their Pythagorean community became a kind of state within a state. All the rules and laws developed by the Teacher were in force in their Magna Graecia. Property here was collective, even scientific discoveries, which, by the way, were attributed exclusively to Pythagoras, were attributed to his personal merits even when the teacher was no longer alive.

Pythagoras - quotes, aphorisms, sayings:

*Two things make a person godlike: living for the good of society and being truthful.

*Just as old wine is unsuitable for drinking a lot, so rude treatment is unsuitable for an interview.

*Take care of your children’s tears so that they can shed them at your grave.

*It is equally dangerous to give a sword to a madman and to a dishonest person to give power.

*Do not consider yourself a great person based on the size of your shadow at sunset.

*Of two people of equal strength, the one who is right is stronger.

*No matter how short the words “yes” and “no” are, they still require the most serious consideration.

*To learn the customs of any people, try to first learn their language.

*It is more useful to throw a stone at random than an empty word.

*Live with people so that your friends do not become enemies, and your enemies become friends.

*No one should exceed the limit in food or drink.

*Blessed be the divine number that gave birth to gods and men.

*Joke, like salt, should be consumed in moderation.

*In order to live long, buy yourself old wine and an old friend.

*Choose the best, and habit will make it pleasant and easy.

*During anger one should neither speak nor act.

*A statue is painted by its appearance, but a man by his deeds.

*Flattery is like a weapon in a painting. It brings pleasure, but no benefit.

*Don’t chase happiness: it is always within you.

30 interesting facts about Pythagoras:

1. The name of Pythagoras is famous for his theorem. And this is this man's greatest achievement.

2. The name of the “father” of democracy has long been known. This is Plato. But he based his teaching on the ideas of Pythagoras, one might say, his grandfather.

3.According to Pythagoras, everything in the world is reflected in numbers. His favorite number was 10.

4. None of the evidence from early times contains any mention of the merits of Pythagoras as the greatest cosmologist and mathematician of antiquity. And he is considered as such today.

5.Already during his lifetime he was considered a demigod, a miracle worker and an absolute sage, a kind of Einstein of the 4th century BC. There is no more mysterious great man in history.

6. One day Pythagoras got angry with one of his students, who committed suicide out of grief. From then on, the philosopher decided never to take out his irritation on people again.

7. Legends also attributed to Pythagoras the ability to heal people, using, among other things, excellent knowledge of various medicinal plants. The influence of this personality on those around him is difficult to overestimate.

8. In fact, Pythagoras is not a name, but a nickname of the great philosopher.

9. Pythagoras was distinguished by an excellent memory and developed curiosity.

10. Pythagoras was a famous cosmologist.

11. The name of Pythagoras was always surrounded by many legends even during his lifetime. For example, it was believed that he was able to control spirits, knew the language of animals, knew how to prophesy, and birds could change the direction of their flight under the influence of his speeches.

12. Pythagoras was the first to say that the soul of a person is reborn again after his death.

13.From a young age, Pythagoras was drawn to travel.

14. Pythagoras had his own school, which included 3 directions: political, religious and philosophical.

15. Pythagoras conducted experiments with color on the human psyche.