Spiritual training in the Way of Hermes was supposed to culminate in an experience of radical transformation known as rebirth (palingenesis). This process involved a state of mania (divine madness) and an exorcism of daimonic entities, and is analyzed in detail with reference to Corpus Hermeticum XIII.

This book explores Xenophon's Anabasis as a work in its own right and as one that forms an integral part of the author's oeuvre. Drawing primarily on historiographical and literary perspectives, it examines the dynamics of Anabasis in relation to its treatment of leadership and apologia. A central argument is that these key Xenophontic elements are driven in an important way by the influence of Socrates. The extent of this influence gives rise to the book's subtitle, ‘A Socratic History’, which I explain as a narrative rooted in a historical event or period and in which the author embeds a reflection of the philosopher and his values.

The study is part of a burgeoning scholarly interest in Xenophon that has its origins in the 1960s with the contributions of Hartmut Erbse, ‘Xenophon's Anabasis’ (1966), William Henry, Greek Historical Writing (1966) and Hans Breitenbach (in Real-Encyclopädie, 1967). The seminal work of William Higgins, Xenophon the Athenian (1977), a decade later was a further important stimulus. Reflecting on the dramatic decline in Xenophon's reputation in modern times, Erbse identified the eminent nineteenth-century historian, Barthold Niebuhr, as instrumental in setting aside the high reputation he had enjoyed for most of the preceding two millennia. Already before the emergence of new, unfavourable comparable historical evidence (Hellenika Oxyrhynchos), Niebuhr took aim at Hellenika, descending into a rant about the degenerate character of its author. Paul Cartledge points as well to George Grote, a disciple of Niebuhr. In his multi-volume History of Greece Grote wrote:

The decline of the nineteenth century continued well into the twentieth. The discovery in the 1900s at Oxyrhynchos in Egypt of papyri covering the same field as Hellenika seriously undermined Xenophon's standing as a historian. Comparison revealed bias, omissions and inaccuracies. Meanwhile in the philosophy arena his capacity for thinking came under growing scrutiny.

The constituent elements of the book: Hermetic spirituality, the historical imagination, alterations of consciousness, the relation between language and experiential knowledge, and radical agnosticism in the study of religion. Narrative historiography and historical-comparative methods.

Having attained rebirth, the pupil’s mind was opened permanently to the universal cosmic consciousness of Gods own imagination. As described in a unique Coptic treatise, s/he could then make a further ascent beyond the cosmos to experience the Ogdoad of universal Life, the Ennead of universal Light, and even glimpse the pēgē, the divine Source of manifestation.

In this chapter I consider historiographical and literary aspects of Xenophon's Anabasis. Long regarded as his most popular work, in more recent times it has come to be seen as one of his richest as well, a fact that has brought into relief questions of intent and classification. This issue of the book's nature is looked at in the second part of the chapter, which, having described it as a ‘Socratic history’, concludes with a consideration of the term in the context of Xenophon's historiographical (broadly defined) writings. In the third part I look at literary features of the text, focusing on how exemplars shape the narrative, and in the fourth, following a preview of Xenophon's apologetic Tendenz, I highlight and explore the presence of what might be termed ‘literary apologia’. I begin the chapter by looking for the work's audience.

Listeners and Readers

I suppose that, like every writer, Xenophon imagined his potential audience as large. Considering his links to important historical figures, his adventures out in the world and the range of themes which he addresses in his works, in his case that expectation was not unrealistic. The subjects dealt with in Anabasis indicate that Xenophon may have had a few distinct audiences in mind. The question I seek to answer here is, in addition to his everyman listener, to whom did he wish to speak? Was there a particular polis, social class, intellectual or professional group? By identifying one or more of these, by the degree of inflection we may gain insight into the writing motivations behind the text.

Discussion of what happened to the Hermetic literature during the process of scribal transmission in Byzantine culture, and the importance of Gadamerian hermeneutics for mediating between patterns of familiarity and strangeness.

The Hermetic literature should be seen not in terms of philosophical speculation but as a path of experiential practice that aimed at radical spiritual liberation. To understand it properly, we must pay attention to the problematics of translation and be aware of philhellenist frames.

Historical writing described a form of imaginal enchantment, as illustrated by Hans Jonas’ concept of “gnosticism,” André-Jean Festugière’s “religion of the world,” and Frances A. Yates’ “Hermetic Tradition.” The importance of overcoming philhellenist ideologies, and the centrality of nonduality and embodiment to Hermetic spirituality.

Hermetic spirituality was focused on healing the embodied soul from its corruption by the passions. Analysis of the Poimandres as a visionary revelation in which Hermes Trismegistus receives enlightenment about the nature of reality and the human predicament.

Since the Ogdoad, the Ennead, and the Source are described as beyond verbal description, how can written language convey anything at all about this ultimate experience of gnōsis? Discussion of oral transmission by means of logos, dissemination of written treatises, and the paradoxes of hermeneutics as understood in terms of Deconstruction (Derrida) and Hermeneutics (Gadamer).

Political philosophy, the problem of how to rule, pervades Xenophon's writing. Time and again, whether by way of households, armies, kingdoms or oneself, it surfaces in his works. We need only look to his experience of war and civil war at Athens on the one hand and to his early association with Socrates on the other to appreciate how such a deep-seated concern developed. In the comparative scheme presented by the author in Anabasis, ‘Xenophon’ serves as a paradigm for an ideal leader, and in this chapter I seek to show how this ideal derives from Socratic and Athenian elements. The representation serves at the same time to obliquely defend the author, as the historical figure behind the model, and Socrates, Xenophon's mentor and teacher, against accusations made against them respectively. The cases for Anabasis as personal and Socratic apologia are examined in the following chapters.

As Anabasis is the story of an army on campaign written by one of its commanders, it should not be surprising that it encompasses the subject of military leadership. The fact that the author is a Socratic furthermore sets up an expectation that guidance on the subject may be provided. Yet it is not immediately obvious from the narrative that the treatment has a function beyond the storytelling itself; it does not, of course, follow from the presence of leadership content in the narrative that it must be didactic. Carried along by the trials of the Greeks, a reader who had not been drawn to the text by an interest in leadership could be excused for not registering the force of that underlying theme. This is a mark of Xenophon's talent as a writer, and we can see his artful approach as a way of transcending the often tedious style of military treatises of the day.