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Doxa (δόξα) is a Greek word meaning common belief or popular opinion, from which are derived the modern terms of orthodoxy¹ and heterodoxy.² Used by the Greek rhetoricians as a tool for the formation of argument by using common opinions, the doxa was often manipulated by sophists to persuade the people, leading to Plato's condemnation of Athenian democracy.

The word doxa picked up a new meaning between the 3rd and 1st centuries BC when the "Seventy" (evdomikonta) Hebrew scholars in Alexandria translated the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek. In this translation of the Scriptures, called the Septuagint, the scholars rendered the Hebrew word for "glory" (kabot) as doxa. This translation of the Hebrew Scriptures was used by the early church and is quoted frequently by the New Testament authors. The effects of this new meaning of doxa as "glory" is evidenced by the ubiquitous use of the word throughout the New Testament and in the worship services of the Greek Orthodox Church.

Doxa, a philosopheme

Henceforth, Plato opposed knowledge to doxa, which would lead to the classical opposition of error to truth, which has since become a major concern in Western philosophy. Thus, error is considered in Occident as pure negativity, which can take various forms, among whom the form of illusion (which can't be dissipated, as Kant showed). As such, doxa may ironically be defined as the "philosopher's sin". In classical rhetoric, it is contrasted with episteme. However, Aristotle used the term endoxa (commonly held beliefs accepted by the wise and by elder rhetors) to acknowledge the beliefs of the city. Endoxa is a more stable belief than doxa, because it has been "tested" in argumentative struggles in the Polis by prior interlocutors. The use of endoxa in the Stagirite's Organon can be found in Aristotle's Topics and Rhetoric.

Vox populi, synonym or reverse of doxa?

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The Latin expression Vox populi may be compared to doxa, as it means popular opinion. However, in the common sentence Vox populi vox Dei, instead of being a synonym of error, it is reversed into a synonym of truth.^{citation needed} Indeed, it may approximatively be translated into: "God speaks through the clamor of the masses."^{citation needed} It may be argued that republicanism or even democracy must be confident in the power of the people to escape doxa through education in order to have a sense; however, the concept of civic virtue complicates things, as being knowledgeable doesn't necessarily means being good - an argument often overlooked by advocates of technocracy or other such enlightened despotism.^who? Of course, Plato would completely reject this argumentation,^{citation needed} as he identifies learning to the treading of an ethical path, as did Foucault,^{citation needed} among many others, show: in ancient Greece, knowledge implies a conversion of the being, whereas "pure knowledge", disjoined from "Good", is the product of latter inventions.

Examples of elements of the doxa of our society include:

• The sun rises in the East and sets in the West every day.
• The universities are organized around academic disciplines and there are rational reasons for the academic division of labor, i.e. it is not based on arbitrary framing and power relations.

The use of "doxa" in sociology and anthropology

Pierre Bourdieu, in his pathbreaking Outline of a Theory of Practice ³, Bourdieu used the term doxa to denote what is taken for granted in any particular society. The doxa, in his view, is the experience by which “the natural and social world appears as self-evident” ⁴. It encompasses what falls within the limits of the thinkable and the sayable (“the universe of possible discourse”), that which “goes without saying because it comes without saying” ⁵. The humanist instances of Bourdieu's application of notion of doxa are to be traced in Distinction where doxa sets limits on social mobility within the social space through limits imposed on the characteristic consumption of each social individual: certain cultural artefacts are recognised by doxa as being inappropriate to actual social position, hence doxa helps to petrify social limits, the "sense of one's place", and one's sense of belonging, which is closely connected with the idea that "this is not for us" (ce n´est pas pour nous). Thus individuals become voluntary subjects of those incorporated mental structures that deprive them of more deliberate consumption ⁶.

Doxa and opinion denote, respectively, a society's taken-for-granted, unquestioned truths, and the sphere of that which may be openly contested and discussed.⁷

References

1. ^ Harper, Douglas (November 2001). ""Othrodox" Etymology". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved on 2008-07-01.
2. ^ Harper, Douglas (November 2001). ""Heterodox" Etymology". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved on 2008-07-01.
3. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977 [1972]. Outline of a Theory of Practice. R. Nice, transl. Volume 16. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
4. ^ ibid. 164
5. ^ ibid. 167, 169
6. ^ Bourdieu, Pierre. 1979. La Distinction. Critique Sociale du Jugement. Paris: Les éditions de minuit. Page 549
7. ^ Pierre Bourdieu - AnthroBase - Dictionary of Anthropology: A searchable database of anthropological texts