Lavius Egyptus: Lectures in the Pythagorean Senate, in the Temple of the Oracle of Dodona

About this book

Dodona's oracle and the name of Pythagoras provide the setting for lectures that no ancient listener ever attended. Thomas Sawyer Spivey imagines a council of instruction in which Egypt and Greece speak for hidden wisdom.

Lavius Egyptus belongs to the occult habit of placing modern philosophical arguments in an invented ancient classroom. The staging matters: the authority of temples, oracles and priestly learning colours every claim. Spivey's work is best approached as an imaginative esoteric construction, without mistaking its dramatic frame for a classical source. The scene lets him present speculation in the voice of initiation.