Aiming at reconstructing the prologue to On Nature, the first part of this chapter focuses on the collocation of the demonological fragments which, by expanding on Empedocles’ exile introduced in B 115, depict his katabasis into the realm of the dead. The narrative of this extraordinary journey serves Empedocles as authorial legitimation on matters beyond ordinary human knowledge. The second part of Chapter 2 reconstructs the rest of the proem by interweaving traditionally introductory themes, such as the dedication to Pausanias and the invocation to the Muse, with novel topics concerning the rejection of ritual sacrifice based on Empedocles’ concept of rebirth. The proem thus reconstructed presents a coherent programmatic structure and makes sense of several Empedoclean fragments that are essential for a comprehensive and impartial understanding of his thought. Moreover, by showing that religious concerns inform the entire introductory section, the new proem indicates that the concept of rebirth is central to Empedocles’ physical system and thus offers a new basis to rethink the interplay of myth, religion, and physics in his natural philosophy.

Chapter 3 focuses on δαίμων and its significance in Empedocles’ concept of rebirth. I show that the demonological fragments and the term δαίμων, in particular, emphasize Empedocles’ divine nature in contrast to the rest of humankind and cannot represent, as is generally believed, the place where his personal vicissitude becomes exemplary of every soul’s destiny, thus grounding his doctrine of rebirth. To define what Empedocles intended when he called himself a reincarnated δαίμων, I analyze Plato’s myths of the soul’s otherworldly journeys and some fragments attesting to Pythagoras’ demonology. While Plato, in his concept of rebirth, conceptualized the δαίμονες as deities who guide souls during and beyond this life, Pythagoras articulated the idea that a god could exceptionally undergo rebirths, but these are usually reserved for ordinary souls. Following Pythagoras and anticipating Plato, Empedocles constructs his demonology which is linked, but does not overlap, with his doctrine of rebirth. Finally, addressing the issue of the ‘physical’ δαίμων in B 59 I argue that δαίμων is a predicative notion which, in all Empedoclean occurrences, is still intimately connected to the traditional sense of ‘god’.