Plato and Aristotle in Agreement?: Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry (Oxford Philosophical Monographs) PDF
Preview Plato and Aristotle in Agreement?: Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry (Oxford Philosophical Monographs)
PLATO AND ARISTOTLE IN AGREEMENT? OXFORDPHILOSOPHICALMONOGRAPHS EditorialCommittee AnitaAvramides,R.S.Crisp, MichaelRoser,ChristopherShields,RalphC.S.Walker OTHERTITLESINTHESERIESINCLUDE Kant’sEmpiricalRealism PaulAbela AgainstEqualityofOpportunity MattCavanagh Causality,Interpretation,andtheMind WilliamChild MetaphorandMoralExperience A.E.Denham SemanticPowers MeaningandtheMeansofKnowinginClassicalIndianPhilosophy JonardonGaneri Kant’sTheoryofImagination BridgingGapsinJudgementandExperience SarahL.Gibbons OfLibertyandNecessity JamesA.Harris TheGroundsofEthicalJudgement NewTranscendentalArgumentsinMoralPhilosophy ChristianIllies ProjectiveProbability JamesLogue UnderstandingPictures DominicLopes Wittgenstein,Finitism,andtheFoundationsofMathematics MathieuMarion TruthandtheEndofInquiry APeirceanAccountofTruth C.J.Misak TheGoodandtheTrue MichaelMorris Hegel’sIdeaofFreedom AlanPatten NictzschcandMetaphysics PeterPoellner TheOntologyofMind Events,Processes,andStates HelenSteward ThingsthatHappenBecauseTheyShould ATeleologicalApproachtoAction RowlandStout Plato and Aristotle in Agreement? Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry GEORGE E. KARAMANOLIS CLARENDON PRESS (cid:1) OXFORD 3 GreatClarendonStreet,Oxfordox26dp OxfordUniversityPressisadepartmentoftheUniversityofOxford. ItfurtherstheUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellenceinresearch,scholarship, andeducationbypublishingworldwidein Oxford NewYork Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto WithoYcesin Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress intheUKandincertainothercountries PublishedintheUnitedStates byOxfordUniversityPressInc.,NewYork (cid:1)GeorgeKaramanolis2006 Themoralrightsoftheauthorhavebeenasserted DatabaserightOxfordUniversityPress(maker) Firstpublished2006 Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced, storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans, withoutthepriorpermissioninwritingofOxfordUniversityPress, orasexpresslypermittedbylaw,orundertermsagreedwiththeappropriate reprographicsrightsorganization.Enquiriesconcerningreproduction outsidethescopeoftheaboveshouldbesenttotheRightsDepartment, OxfordUniversityPress,attheaddressabove Youmustnotcirculatethisbookinanyotherbindingorcover andyoumustimposethesameconditiononanyacquirer BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable LibraryofCongressCataloguinginPublicationData Dataavailable TypesetbySPIPublisherServices,Pondicherry,India PrintedinGreatBritain onacid-freepaperby BiddlesLtd.,King’sLynn,Norfolk ISBN0–19–926456–2 978–0–19–926456–8 1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2 Contents Abbreviations x Introduction 1 1. AntiochusofAscalon 44 2. Plutarch 85 3. Numenius 127 4. Atticus 150 5. AmmoniusSaccas 191 6. Plotinus 216 7. Porphyry 243 AppendixI:ThePlatonismofAristotleandofthe EarlyPeripatetics 331 AppendixII:ListofWorksofPlatonistson Aristotle’sPhilosophy 337 Bibliography 340 GeneralIndex 363 IndexofPassages 379 Abbreviations InthefollowingIlisttheabbreviationsofnames,works,andeditionswhichare mostoftenreferredto.Therestofmyabbreviationsforthemostpartfollowthe conventions of H. Liddell, R. Scott, and H. Jones, A Greek–English Lexicon (Oxford,1940;9thedn). AGP Archivfu¨rdieGeschichtederPhilosophie AJP AmericanJournalofPhilology ANRW AufstiegundNiedergangderro¨mischenWelt CAG CommentariainAristotelemGraeca CQ ClassicalQuarterly DG H.Diels,DoxographiGraeci(Berlin,1879). DK H.DielsandW.Kranz,DieFragmentederVorsokratiker(Ber- lin,1934–7;5thedn) DL DiogenesLaertius E-K I.EdelsteinandI.G.Kidd(eds.),Posidonius,i–iii(Cambridge, 1972–99). fr.,frs. fragment,fragments GRBS Greek,Roman,andByzantineStudies HSCPh HarvardStudiesinClassicalPhilology JHS JournalofHellenicStudies IndexAcad. Philodemus, Index Academicorum, ed. T. Dorandi, Filodemo: Storia dei WlosoW. Platone e l’ Academia (PHerc.1021 e 164). (Naples,1991). LSJ H. Liddell, R. Scott, and H. Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford,1940;9thedn). OCT OxfordClassicalTexts OLD P.G.W.Glare,OxfordLatinDictionary(Oxford,1982). OSAP OxfordStudiesinAncientPhilosophy PE Eusebius,PraeparatioEvangelica PHP Galen,DeplacitisHippocratisetPlatonis RE Pauly-Wissowa, Real-Enzyclopa¨die der klassischen Altertums- wissenschaft(StuttgartandMunich,1894–1980). SVF H. von Arnim, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, i–iii (Leipzig, 1903–5;vol.iv,index,compiledbyM.Adler,1924). V.Plot. Porphyry,VitaPlotini Sent. Porphyry,Sententiae W F. Wehrli, Die Schule des Aristoteles, i–x (Basel and Stuttgart, 1944–62). Introduction 1. THE STUDY OF ARISTOTLE’S PHILOSOPHY BY PLATONISTS IN LATE ANTIQUITY AnyonewhobeginstostudythephilosophyoflateantiquitymustWnd strikingthefactthattheknowncommentariesonAristotle’sworksafter ad 300 are written exclusively by Platonists.1 Two important features makethisfactparticularlyconspicuous.TheWrstisthatthepracticeof writing extensive commentaries on Aristotle’s works had started, as we would expect, with the Peripatetics, and for a long time had remained their undisputed domain. The Peripatetics had been commenting on several Aristotelian works, especially the Categories, since the days of Andronicus, Boethus, and Aristo of Alexandria in the Wrst century bc, but their exegetical activity culminated in the second century ad with Adrastus, Herminus, Aspasius, and especially with Alexander of Aph- rodisias(c.ad200).ThethreecenturiesfollowingAlexander,however, were utterly bereft of Peripatetic commentators of any signiWcance,2 whilemanyimportantPlatonistsdevotedmuchoftheirtimetowriting commentariesonAristotle. Secondly, a telling indication of the Platonist preoccupation with commenting on Aristotle is the fact that the written work of several Platonists of this era (third–sixth centuries ad), such as Ammonius Hermeiou (435/45–517/26) and Simplicius (6th century),3 consists largely of commentaries on Aristotle. What is remarkable here is not that these Platonists were engaged in writing commentaries. For 1 For some basic information aboutthe Greekcommentators see Praechter (1909, 1910), whose views have been modiWed by I. Hadot (1978, 1991); see also Sorabji (1990:1–30). 2 With the possible exception of Themistius (c. 317–88); on him see Blumenthal (1990). 3 OnthecommentariesofAmmoniusandSimpliciusandtheirattitudetoAristotle seeWesterink(1990),I.Hadot(1978:20–32)andHoVmann(1987). 2 Introduction philosophersoflateantiquity,commentingonancientauthoritiesboth orally and in writing was the main way of doing philosophy. What is remarkable rather is that Platonists, who had been commenting on Platosince atleastthetimeofCrantor(latefourth–earlythirdcentury bc),4 began around ad 300 to write commentaries on Aristotle quite systematically. And for some of them this became their main literary activity. HowandwhydidAristotlebecomesoimportanttothePlatonistsas to be considered an authority deserving extensive commentary? One may be tempted to think that Aristotle became a useful guide to Platonists in areas which Plato had insuYciently explored, such as biology,or,moregenerally,science andespeciallylogic.Thisistrue,at leastsofaraslogicisconcerned.AlargenumberofPlatonistcommen- taries are on the Categories, the De interpretatione, and the Analytics. Suchastronginterestinlogicisunderstandableinviewofthefactthat inlateantiquitylogicacquirededucationalvalueandbecamepartofthe syllabus.5However,thestoryhereismorecomplex.Aristotle’slogic,as expounded in one of his most popular works in late antiquity, the Categories, involves, as we know, metaphysical views quite diVerent from those Plato had presented in his dialogues. Yet, judging by the activity of Platonist commentators, if there was one work which every Platonist in late antiquity had to study, it was the Categories. How, we wonder, did the Categories become such a basic text for Platonists to study,givenitsnon-Platonicmetaphysics? PlatonistsalsostudiedAristotle’smajorworksonthesoulandonthe universe, such as the De anima and the De Caelo, and wrote long commentaries on them.6 In these works, however, Aristotle rejects several views which were subsequently regarded as the core of Plato’s philosophy, most famously the view that the soul is immortal, and the idea that the universe had been created by a divine craftsman. How, 4 CrantorcommentedontheTimaeus(Proclus,InTim.1.76.1–2),yetitisunclear inwhatformhedidso,andweshouldnotassumethathewroteacommentarylikethe lateantiqueones.SeeCh.7,pp.324–5. 5 See Clarke (1971: 2–7, 126) and Sandy (1997: 29–34). The Christian Origen included dialectic in his course of studies (Eusebius Hist. Eccl. 6. 18. 3), while both GelliusandApuleiusseemtohavelearntlogic(Gellius,NA.15.26,16.8,Apuleius, Florida20). 6 Onemustbearinmindthatseveralcommentarieshavebeenlost.LikeSimplicius, SyrianusalsowrotecommentariesontheDecaeloandtheDeanima,yettheydonot survive;seePraechter(1926);Cardullo(1986). Introduction 3 then, did Platonists committed to Plato’s philosophy come to Wnd Aristotle’sviewsworthyofstudy? Thequestionbecomesmorepressinggiventhat,forPlatonistsofall ages, and especially for those of late antiquity, nothing which was considered to be systematically contradictory to, or critical of, Plato couldbeacceptable,letalonephilosophicallyimportantandbeneWcial, preciselybecausePlatoenjoyedanenormousauthorityandhisphiloso- phywastakenfortruth.Anyphilosophicalactivityaimingtorefuteor tocriticizePlatowasassumedaprioritobemistakenornotevenworthy of the name of philosophy. Apparently the Platonists who did study Aristotle regarded him as being neither systematically nor radically in conXictwithPlato. In fact, it turns out that the majority of Platonists in this era shared theviewthatAristotle’sphilosophy,whenunderstoodintherightspirit, is essentially compatible with Plato’s doctrine, as they interpreted it. Platonists actually maintained that the core of Aristotle’s philosophy both supports and complements Plato’s philosophy, and this, they argued, was not accidental. If it were, it could neither be helpful in the study of philosophy nor of particular importance, and thus hardly worthy of systematic study. When confronted with contradictions be- tween Aristotle and Plato, Platonists argued that such contradictions wereonlyapparent,theresultsofuncriticalfocusontheletterandnot the real spirit of the texts.7 And they explicitly stated that Aristotle’s workswerebothusefulandphilosophically importantforaPlatonist.8 For this reason, such a study, they believed, had to be done in a systematicandproperway. Thismeans at least two things.First, Aristotle’swork wasassigned a deWnite place in the Platonist philosophical curriculum. Platonists wrote introductions (Prolegomena) in which they gave an overview of Aristotle’sphilosophicalworkandexplainedhowhisphilosophyistobe studied.ThusAristotle’streatiseswereintegratedinthecontextofsuch a curriculum.9 What is more, the study of Aristotle was a requirement whichhadtobefulWlledearly,becauseitwasconsideredpreparatoryfor 7 See Simplicius, In Cat. 6. 7–18, 7. 23–32, In De caelo 454. 23–4, 640. 27–8, Philoponus,Indeanima10.8–12.12,Olympiodorus,Proleg.4.3–15,InMet.7.21–30. SeeBlumenthal(1986:92–7). 8 SeeAmmonius,InCat.6.9–16,Simplicius,InCat.6.6–15,13.27–8.Olympio- dorus,Proleg.9.14–30,22.3–12Elias,InCat.132.5–21. 9 See e.g. Ammonius, In Cat. 7. 15–13. 11, Simplicius, In Cat. 3. 18–6. 18. See Westerink (1990: 341–7) and esp. Plezia (1949: 70–81), who lists all the relevant references.
Description:The list of books you might like
