the essence of forgetting in one single word can hardly be imagined.
The way Greek speech in general uses λανθάνειν (being concealed) as a "ruling" word, as well as the interpretation of the essence of forgetting precisely through this event of concealing, already show clearly enough that in the "existence" of the Greeks, i.e., in their dwelling in the midst of beings as such, the essence of concealment holds sway essentially. From this we can already surmise more readily why they experience and think truth in the sense of "unconcealedness." But in view of this dominating event of concealment, should not the essence of the most common opposite to truth, i.e., the essence of falsity, i.e., τὸ ψεῦδος, also be determined on the basis of concealing, even though in the sound of the word ψεῦδος the stem λαθ- cannot be heard?
We become assured in this surmise when we consider that the false and untrue, e.g., an incorrect judgment, is a kind of not knowing, in which the "true" state of affairs is withheld from us, not in exactly the same way as "forgetting," which the Greeks do experience on the basis of concealment, though indeed in a corresponding way. Now whether Greek thinking also conceives the essence of ψεῦδος on the basis of concealment can only be shown by paying heed to the immediate self-expression of the Greek experience and, at the start, not at all by entering into what the Greek thinkers themselves explicitly say about ψεῦδος.
Recapitulation
Τὸ ψεῦδος as the opposite of ἀληθές. The relationship between the stems of the words ἀλήθεια and λανθάνω. Reference to Homer, Odyssey, VIII, 93. The withdrawal of forgetting.
We are trying to become attentive to the dictum of Parmenides of Elea, a thinker who conceived and uttered that dictum around the time the temple of Poseidon was constructed in Poseidonia, later Paestum, not far from Elea. The dictum of this thinker expresses the word of the goddess Ἀλήθεια, a name we usually translate as "truth." The essence of the goddess "truth" is present throughout the entire edifice of the dictum, in each of its verses, but above all and purely in the guiding statement, which is precisely silent on the name Ἀλήθεια. Therefore, prior to the elucidation of the individual fragments, and on behalf of them, we must learn something of the essence of this goddess; on the other hand, only by thinking through the entire "didactic poem" will there appear for us the essence of this ἀλήθεια in its primordial form and character.