The Quest to Save Greece’s Endangered Dialects
Categories:
In the mountain folds of Lebanon, Syria, and northern Israel lives a small but fiercely private religious community known as the Druze, deeply influenced by Greek philosophy. At first glance, this enigmatic group appears to be yet another branch of Islam, and it did emerge from the Islamic milieu of the 11th century.
But scratch the surface, and one uncovers a layered and esoteric faith—a faith that draws as much from Greek philosophers as it does from Quranic revelation. In particular, Pythagorean and Platonic thought ripples through Druze theology, especially in their conception of the soul, cosmology, and the eternal return of life through reincarnation.
The Druze religion, or Tawhid, meaning “unity” or “oneness,” evolved during the reign of the Fatimid Caliph al-Hakim bi-Amr Allah in Cairo. Though rooted in Isma’ili Shi’a Islam, the Druze faith quickly veered into a radically different spiritual trajectory. Like the Alawites and other esoteric sects of Islam, it fused Neoplatonic metaphysics, Islamic mysticism, Persian gnosticism, and even elements of Hellenistic philosophy. This was not unusual in the intellectually adventurous atmosphere of the medieval Islamic world. During that time, philosophers and mystics eagerly studied Greek texts, which were both rediscovered and translated.
But the Druze took this synthesis further. While other schools may have engaged intellectually with Plato and Aristotle, the Druze built aspects of their cosmology and eschatology around these ideas.
Perhaps the most striking philosophical feature of the Druze faith is its unshakeable belief in reincarnation—not as a metaphor, but as a literal truth. As the “Letters of Wisdom” of Druze wise men show, Druze theology asserts that all human souls were created simultaneously and that no new souls can come into being. When a person dies, their soul is reborn in another human body. There is no purgatory, no eternal heaven or hell. Instead, judgment unfolds within the world, across multiple lifetimes.
This mirrors Plato’s doctrine almost perfectly. The ancient Greek philosopher Plato, and later his followers, taught in his work “Phaedo” that the soul is immortal and migrates from one body to another in a purification cycle. To the Pythagoreans, the physical world was a place of exile and trial, and only through right living, especially through philosophy and asceticism, could the soul be freed from this cycle.
Similarly to the Greek Platonic philosophy, Druze teachings emphasize ethical conduct and spiritual self-discipline as the means to elevate the soul in its successive incarnations. Sins and ignorance lead to rebirth in lesser conditions, while wisdom and righteousness bring the soul closer to divine truth. In both systems, the cosmos is a moral structure, and reincarnation is the soul’s teacher.
The influence of Plato and later Neoplatonism runs deep in Druze doctrine. At the heart of their theology lies the concept of Tawhid, the absolute and indivisible unity of an impersonal God. This doctrine resembles the Platonic One, the source of all being and knowledge. Just as Plato envisioned a world of eternal forms superior to the material world, the Druze believe in a hidden spiritual reality that only the wise can glimpse.
They speak of a divine hierarchy composed of five cosmic principles, or ḥudūd, emanations from the One, each representing an abstract facet of divine truth, similar to the emanations in Neoplatonism described by Plotinus. Among these principles are the Universal Intellect and the Universal Soul, unmistakable echoes of Platonic cosmology.
Indeed, for the Druze, the highest goal is not blind faith but gnosis—a deep, intuitive knowledge of divine truths accessible only to the initiated. Their texts are closed to outsiders, and even within the community, only a minority known as uqqal (“the wise”) are allowed access to sacred knowledge. This guarded approach recalls the secretive teachings of Pythagorean sects, which passed on wisdom through veiled symbols and rigorous ethical preparation.
While the Druze reject religious conversion and prohibit marriage outside their faith, they also reject religious formalism. They do not follow the Five Pillars of Islam, do not pray in mosques, and do not fast during Ramadan. Their spirituality is inner and allegorical, concerned more with truth and transformation than with ritual performance.
This inward turn, combined with their belief in the soul’s journey across time, makes the Druze worldview more akin to philosophical mysticism than conventional religion. Time is cyclical, not linear. Salvation is not granted or denied by an external deity, but earned by the soul’s growth in wisdom.
Today, the Druze remain a small but resilient community. They are often misunderstood or targeted by extremists, such as the radical anti-Hellenic Wahhabi jihadists of Sunni Islam. In times of conflict, they are pragmatic survivors, while in times of peace, they are quiet custodians of an ancient flame. This worldview bridges the deserts of the Levant with the classrooms of ancient Greece.
In their silence and secrecy, the Druze remind us that religion, at its most profound, is not only about divine command or cultural identity. It can also be a living philosophy, an inheritance of the ancients woven into the rhythm of life itself—just as Pythagoras and Plato might have understood.
