Steven Carr

We have all heard of the famous liar paradox , first expressed by Epemindes (spelling), when he said that 'All Cretans are liars'.

Now there are many things to be said about the liar paradox.

One of the least useful things to say is that it is a statement of fact about the moral nature of the inhabitants of Crete.

Yet this is what we find in Titus 1

11 They must be silenced, because they are ruining whole households by teaching things they ought not to teach–and that for the sake of dishonest gain.

12Even one of their own prophets has said, “Cretans are always liars, evil brutes, lazy gluttons.�

13This testimony is true. Therefore, rebuke them sharply, so that they will be sound in the faith and will pay no attention to Jewish myths or to the commands of those who reject the truth.

Was the author just an idiot, to take the liar paradox so woodenly literally as he did?

spin

I wonder what Martin van Buren (Old Kinderhoek, where he was born) would think about people these days having lost the context of his "initials", "OK", being used without one being aware of the origin and "real" siginificance of the term?

Maybe even that's incorrect...


spin

Duncan Abercrombie

Yes.

Benni72

If Epimenides (or whomever the biblical author cites) meant just to formulate a paradox, why did he add "evil brutes" and "lazy gluttons"? Maybe originally it was, in fact, a moral comment, and only later somebody noted its paradoxical nature?

Steven Carr

You could be right.

Actually, the lie that Epiminides was referring to was the claim that Zeus was mortal. Perhaps the Bible is right and this was a lie.

'They fashioned a tomb for thee, O holy and high one—
The Cretans, always liars, evil beasts, idle bellies!
But thou art not dead: thou livest and abidest forever,
For in thee we live and move and have our being.'

Rather curiously , the 4th line of this address to Zeus is quoted in Acts 17:28.
There is no doubt that the author of Acts was a learned man, who happily took Greek literature and Christianised it.

The Cretan is also in Callimachus 'Hymn to Zeus'

How should we sing of him, as Dictaean or Lycaean? My mind is full of doubt, since his birth is disputed. Zeus, some say you were born in the Idaian hills , but others say, Zeus, you were born in Arcadia. Which ones, O Father, are the liars? "The Cretans always lie." For the Cretans built you a tomb, Lord. Yet you did not die; you are eternal.