Ridiculous Beliefs Of The World’s Most Acclaimed Thinkers

Published May 25, 2014
Updated October 14, 2019
Ridiculous Beliefs Pythagoras Writing

Source: Zen Shaman

Ridiculous Beliefs: Pythagoras

Pythagoras is a world-renowned mathematician credited with coming up with the Pythagorean Theorem. This theorem forms the crux of trigonometry and, as any half decent geometry student should know, posits that the square of a right triangle’s hypotenuse is equal to the sum of the square of the other two sides. As one might glean, Pythagoras was heavily invested in explaining natural phenomena mathematically, and is credited for discoveries in music, astronomy and medicine.

Not content to confine his thoughts to the material world, Pythagoras often dabbled in the divine. Reasonably enough, Pythagoras believed in the reincarnation of souls and advocated vegetarianism and pacifism, but beneath that lurked some rather odd beliefs. For example, Pythagoras believed that beans were made from the same material as humans and should not be consumed.

He also sanctioned that you must smooth out all bodily indents on your bed/pillow; you cannot step over a crossbar, allow swallows to nest under the roof or walk on highways. Pythagoras’ religion, Pythagoreanism, had an established following – a secret brotherhood – that pursued the practices of their master, and he appears in religious or priestly guises across Greece.

author
Mamta Bhatt
author
editor
John Kuroski
editor
John Kuroski is the editorial director of All That's Interesting. He graduated from New York University with a degree in history, earning a place in the Phi Alpha Theta honor society for history students. An editor at All That's Interesting since 2015, his areas of interest include modern history and true crime.