Pythagoreans: The Hearth of the Universe

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Pythagoreans: The Hearth of the Universe

The Pythagoreans first proposed a non-geocentric system, perhaps partly on the basis of moral and religious grounds: to them, humanity and earth were imperfect, and only by sacrifice and a strict regimen of personal conduct could one strive to reach the divine. Accordingly, they placed the divine, poetically called the "Hearth of the Universe" or "Throne of Zeus", at the center of a finite, spherical universe (Aristot. de. caelo B13, 293a-b30). The sun is a glass sphere (Aetius 20.12) which catches and reflects this hearth-light. A counter-earth, the "antichthon", had to be invented, supposedly to make the number of planetary spheres ten. These include the five visible planets out through Saturn, earth, the moon, the sun, and the heavenly sphere on which were the stars.(Aetius 2.7.7,Aristot. Met. A5,986a1). Heath, in outlining this system, suggests that the counter-earth was invented to account for the frequency of lunar eclipses . The counter-earth also solves a major problem in this view, serving to eclipse the Hearth-Fire so that we never look God in the face, so to speak. The concepts of number, harmony, and music all influenced the Pythagoreans to invent this fully-realized version of the concentric celestial orbits, which resonate with "the music of the spheres" .

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