Concept

Fire (classical element)

Overview

Fire is one of the four classical elements along with earth, water and air in ancient Greek philosophy and science. Fire is considered to be both hot and dry and, according to Plato, is associated with the tetrahedron.

Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).

In the original texts

Passages from public-domain books where Fire (classical element) is discussed.

26). The element fire is called ḥoshek because it is not luminous, it is only transparent; for if it were luminous we should see at night the whole atmosphere in flames. The order of the four elements, according to the natural position is here described; namely, first earth, above it water, air close to water, and fire above air; for by placing air over water, ḥoshek (fire), which is “upon the face of the deep,” is…
Moses Maimonides, The guide for the perplexed
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In the next place, we may observe that there are different kinds of fire—(1) flame, (2) light that burns not, (3) the red heat of the embers of fire. And there are varieties of air, as for example, the pure aether, the opaque mist, and other nameless forms. Water, again, is of two kinds, liquid and fusile.
Plato, Timaeus
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Again, when fire escapes from this body, it does not retire into a vacuum, but the surrounding air repelled [by the fire] drives the easily-moveable mass of moisture into the place before occupied by the fire, with which at the same time it becomes mingled;—but when the mass by close compression once more becomes equable and smooth, it then resumes its smoothness and consistency, because fire, the artificer of…
Plato, The works of Plato
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Plato, that the visible world was framed after the exemplar of the intellectual world; the soul of the visible world was first produced, then the corporeal figure, first that which proceeded from fire and earth, then that which came from air and water. Pythagoras, that the world was formed of five solid figures which are called mathematical; the earth was produced by the cube, the fire by the pyramid, the air by the…
Plutarch, Complete Works of Plutarch — Volume 3
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This is however a digression. I am now concerned with the origin of the scientific doctrine of matter in Greek thought. In the _Timaeus_ Plato asserts that nature is made of fire and earth with air and water as intermediate between them, so that 'as fire is to air so is air to water, and as air is to water so is water to earth.' He also suggests a molecular hypothesis for these four elements. In this hypothesis…
Alfred North Whitehead, The Concept of Nature The Tarner Lectures Delivered in Trinity College, November 1919
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Philosophers who discussed Fire (classical element)

Related ideas

Opposing perspectives

Incorporeality

Place in the tradition

Part of Anaximander.

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