[396b]
Thus this god is correctly named, through whom (δι᾽ ὅν) all living beings have the gift of life (ζῆν). But, as I say, the name is divided, though it is one name, into the two parts, Dia and Zena. And it might seem, at first hearing, highly irreverent to call him the son of Cronus and reasonable to say that Zeus is the offspring of some great intellect; and so he is, for κόρος (for Κρόνος) signifies not child, but the purity (καθαρόν) and unblemished nature of his mind. And Cronus, according to tradition, is the son of Uranus; but the upward gaze is rightly called by the name urania (οὐρανία),
Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 12 translated by Harold N. Fowler. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1921.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com
This work is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License.
An XML version of this text is available for download, with the additional restriction that you offer Perseus any modifications you make. Perseus provides credit for all accepted changes, storing new additions in a versioning system.