Good Works Translation from Ancient Greek
This page translates Kern fragment 224 from the Orphic Sacred Discourses in Twenty-Four Rhapsodies. The witnesses are Proclus and Olympiodorus on Plato's Republic and Phaedo: after the Titanic myth, souls exchange lives through cycles, pass from human bodies into human bodies, and also pass into the bodies of other living beings.
Translation
Kern Fr. 224 — Souls Changing Through the Cycles
Proclus says that Orphic theology teaches these things too. Orpheus clearly hands them down when, after the mythical punishment of the Titans and the birth from them of these mortal living beings, he says first that souls exchange lives according to certain cycles and often enter, one after another, into human bodies:
The same ones become fathers and sons in the houses,
orderly wives and mothers and daughters,
coming to birth through one another as generations are exchanged.
In these lines, Proclus says, Orpheus hands down the migration of souls from human bodies into human bodies.
Then Orpheus teaches explicitly that human souls also pass into other living beings when he defines the matter this way:
Because the soul, changing according to cycles of time,
passes from human beings into living beings, from one place to another:
at one time it becomes a horse, then [the verse is broken],
at another time a sheep, then a bird dreadful to behold,
at another again the body of a dog and a heavy voice,
and the race of cold serpents creeps on sacred earth.
Olympiodorus says similarly that Plato's words establish, from the testimony of the ancient poets, that the living and the dead come from one another. He means Orpheus, who says:
The same ones are fathers and sons in the houses,
and also solemn wives and good daughters.
Olympiodorus adds that Plato everywhere echoes Orpheus.
Colophon
This Good Works translation was made from Otto Kern's Orphicorum fragmenta (Berlin: Weidmann, 1922), fr. 224, in the section headed "Hieroi logoi en rhapsodiais ka'." Kern's numbering is retained.
The source witnesses translated here are Proclus, Commentary on Plato's Republic, and Olympiodorus, Commentary on Plato's Phaedo, as printed by Kern.
Source Text
Kern Fr. 224 — Proclus and Olympiodorus
Proclus, Commentary on Plato's Republic:
ταῦτα καὶ τῆς Ὀρφικῆς ἡμᾶς ἐκδιδασκούσης θεολογίας. ἢ οὐχὶ καὶ Ὀρφεὺς τὰ τοιαῦτα σαφῶς παραδίδωσιν, ὅταν μετὰ τὴν τῶν Τιτάνων μυθικὴν δίκην καὶ τὴν ἐξ ἐκείνων γένεσιν τῶν θνητῶν τούτων ζώιων λέγηι πρῶτον μέν, ὅτι τοὺς βίους ἀμείβουσιν αἱ ψυχαὶ κατὰ δή τινας περιόδους καὶ εἰσδύονται ἄλλαι εἰς ἄλλα σώματα πολλάκις ἀνθρώπων·
οἱ δ' αὐτοὶ πατέρες τε καὶ υἱέες ἐν μεγάροισιν
εὔκοσμοί τ' ἄλοχοι καὶ μητέρες ἠδὲ θύγατρες
γίνοντ' ἀλλήλων μεταμειβομένηισι γενέθλαις.
ἐν γὰρ τούτοις τὴν ἀπ' ἀνθρωπίνων σωμάτων εἰς ἀνθρώπινα μετοίκισιν αὐτῶν παραδίδωσιν. ἔπειθ' ὅτι καὶ εἰς τὰ ἄλλα ζῶια μετάβασίς ἐστι τῶν ψυχῶν τῶν ἀνθρωπίνων, καὶ τοῦτο διαρρήδην Ὀρφεὺς ἀναδιδάσκει, ὁπηνίκα ἂν διορίζηται·
οὕνεκ' ἀμειβομένη ψυχὴ κατὰ κύκλα χρόνοιο
ἀνθρώπων ζώιοισι μετέρχεται ἄλλοθεν ἄλλοις·
ἄλλοτε μέν θ' ἵππος, τότε γίνεται — — — — — — —
ἄλλοτε δὲ πρόβατον, τότε δ' ὄρνεον αἰνὸν ἰδέσθαι,
ἄλλοτε δ' αὖ κύνεον τε δέμας φωνή τε βαρεῖα,
καὶ ψυχρῶν ὀφίων ἕρπει γένος ἐν χθονὶ δίηι.
Olympiodorus, Commentary on Plato's Phaedo:
καὶ ὅτι τὸ ζῶν καὶ τὸ τεθνεὸς ἐξ ἀλλήλων, κατασκευάζει ἡ λέξις ἐκ τῆς μαρτυρίας τῶν παλαιῶν ποιητῶν, ἀπὸ Ὀρφέως, φημί, λέγοντος·
οἱ δ' αὐτοὶ πατέρες τε καὶ υἱέες ἐν μεγάροισιν
ἠδ' ἄλοχοι σεμναὶ κεδναί τε θύγατερες.
πανταχοῦ γὰρ ὁ Πλάτων παρωιδεῖ τὰ Ὀρφέως.