Simplicius Research Environment

Author

BY DATE
BY TITLE

Porphyry: The first Platonist commentator on Aristotle, 2004
By: Karamanolis, George, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Porphyry: The first Platonist commentator on Aristotle
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	97-120
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Karamanolis, George
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

In this paper I shall argue that Porphyry was the first Platonist philosopher to write commentaries on Aristotle’s works. Previous scholars have come close to maintaining such a view, but to my knowledge, this has never been expressly argued. They usually hold that Porphyry was the first of the Neoplatonists (ie. the Platonists after Plotinus) to write commentaries on Aristotle, but not the first of the entire Platonist tradition. One reason for this is that Porphyry’s estimation of Aristotle’s philosophy has not been sufficiently appreciated. In addition, I think, the particular nature of philosophical commentary, composed systematically in late antiquity by philosophers such as Alexander of Aphrodisias, Porphyry, or Iamblichus remains in need of clarification, as does its philosophical motivation. As a result, scholars have tended to credit several Platonists before Porphyry with the writing of commentaries on Aristotelian works, simply because they appear to have made various sorts of comments on one or more of his works. I will argue that these Platonists did not, however, produce commentaries of the sort that Porphyry did, which I consider to be ‘commentaries’ in the proper sense of the term. Their failure to do so, I will argue, owes to their particular shared philosophical background, one which, as I will argue, changes with Porphyry. In the first part of my paper (I) I will outline the difference between the various forms of commentary and the specific form of commentary written by Porphyry. I will claim that in the latter case the author sets out to write a commentary in order to facilitate and encourage its study and assist in its teaching. This presupposes acceptance of the views expressed by the source text and implies an assertion of its authority. The examination of the evidence concerning the Platonists before Porphyry shows that none of them can be credited with a commentary on Aristotle of the sort written by Porphyry (II). I will then try to explain why Porphyry wrote commentaries on Aristotle in the first place (III), which leads me to conjecture that he considered Aristotle’s views in the Categories (IV), the Physics (V), and on first principles (VI) compatible with those of Plato and also sufficiently philosophically valuable as to deserve serious study. I will conclude that Porphyry wrote commentaries on Aristotle because, given his interpretations of Aristotle’s views, he accepted him as an authority next to Plato, and this represented something new in the Platonic tradition (VII). [introduction, p. 97]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/N41MQStD4wulva1

Aristotelianism as a commentary tradition, 2004
By: Fazzo, Silvia, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Aristotelianism as a commentary tradition
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	1-19
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Fazzo, Silvia
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

[Conclusion, p. 14]: We have seen that it was only in the twentieth century, after the two World Wars, that the study of Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca began to come into its own as a field of research.44 Among the first to make profitable use of the CAG were those Orientalists, chiefly from Germany, who were interested in Greek-Arabic connections and translations. In the case of Alexander, the availability of critical editions of the texts made it possible to identify the Greek counterparts of many short pieces transmitted in Arabic under his name but with titles different from those familiar to us.

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/ARmAVVKwXAN0Dk6

Exegesis in the Derveni Papyrus, 2004
By: Betegh, Gábor, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Exegesis in the Derveni Papyrus
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	37-50
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Betegh, Gábor
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

The text of the Derveni papyrus has often been labeled ‘a commentary’, or a hypomnema and its unidentified author has habitually been called ‘the Derveni commentator.’ The roll, which was found among the remains of the funeral pyre of a Macedonian tomb, has been dated to the last third of the fourth century BC on the basis of the archeological evidence. Moreover, there is an overriding consensus among scholars that the text was composed sometime around the end of the Presocratic period.1 Given this early dating of the text, it appears to be most significant for our knowledge of the early, pre-Hellenistic phase of the commentary tradition. Indeed, if both the dating and the above characterization is correct, the Derveni text is probably the earliest surviving specimen of this genre, and certainly the earliest document providing first-hand evidence of sufficient length for direct textual analysis.Alas, things with the Derveni papyrus are never so clear-cut. Most importantly, it is not entirely evident whether it is legitimate to call the whole text a ‘commentary’ at all, and, if so, with what qualifications. This is the basic question that I shall try to examine in this paper. I shall tackle the issue by breaking it down into two, more or less independent, sets of problems. The first of the two is largely formal and relatively simple. It amounts to asking whether or not the Derveni text, or more precisely what has survived of it, conforms with certain formal and structural features that we normally expect from a commentary. The second set of problems is considerably more complex. To put it bluntly, I shall ask why the Derveni author set out in the first place to interpret the object of his exegesis. This question thus pertains to both the author’s cognitive and pragmatic attitude towards the object of his interpretative enterprise, and, closely related to these, to the specific cultural and sociological context in which the author pursues his exegesis. It is also in this second part that I shall try to present a sympathetic rendering of the so-called ‘allegorical’ method of the Derveni author. [Introduction, p. 37]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/GJjS0gyR2rIo9Cj

The Aristotelian Commentators: A Bibliographical Guide, 2004
By: Sellars, J. T., Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	The Aristotelian Commentators: A Bibliographical Guide
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	239-268
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Sellars, J. T.
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

In what follows I offer a bibliographical guide to the ancient commentators on Aristotle, outlining where one may find texts, translations, studies, and more detailed bibliographies containing further references.* It is designed to supplement the existing bibliography in: [l] R. Sorabji, ed., Aristotle Transformed: The Ancient Commentators and Their Influence (London: Duckworth, 1990), 485-524. The focus here is on the ancient commentators, but reference will also be made to Byzantine commentators. For a list of around 300 commentators on Aristotle - ancient, Byzantine, Islamic, medieval, and renaissance - see the final pages of [ 2 ] Operum Aristotelis Stagiritae Philosophorum Omnium, ed. I Casaubon (Lugduni, apud Guillelmum Laemarium, 1590). This list is followed by a detailed inventory of individual commentaries arranged by the Aristotelian text upon which they comment. This very useful second list is reprinted in: [3] Aristotelis Opera Omnia quae extant Uno Volumine Comprehensa, ed. C. H. Weise (Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1843), 1013-18. Note also the more recent list of ancient commentaries by R. Goulet in D P h A 1,437-41 (1993), now supplemented by M. Chase in DPhA Suppl., 113-21 (2003). [Introduction, p. 239]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/sYbkNe4lpIE1WVb

The κοινη αισθεσις in Proclus and Ps.-Simplicius, 2004
By: Lautner, Peter, Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Adamson, Peter (Ed.)

Title	The κοινη αισθεσις in Proclus and Ps.-Simplicius
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	163-174
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Lautner, Peter
Editor(s)	Stone, Martin W. F. , Baltussen, Han , Adamson, Peter
Translator(s)

Although the metaphysical systems of the Neoplatonists at Athens were much the same, their views on the human soul, particularly on its activities, showed great divergence. This is all the more striking because they were all heavily influenced by Iamblichus. But the mode and extent of that influence varied a great deal, and their theories of the human soul varied accordingly. As a case study, I shall examine the position of Proclus and Pseudo-Simplicius on the koinê aisthêsis. Both authors took Aristotle's views as the point of departure; that is obvious in Pseudo-Simplicius' commentary on the De anima and easily detectable in Proclus' commentary on the Timaeus. Moreover, both of them paid special attention to the problem of whether this sense is separate from the five particular senses or just a joint activity of the senses. My aim is to show that the different conceptions are signs of a deeper divergence. Despite the similarity of their metaphysical outlook, their views on the structure of the human soul were considerably different, and this left its mark on their accounts of the koinê aisthêsis. [Introduction, p. 163]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/mmogdVPzGKbtNc8

Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1, 2004
By: Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Type	Edited Book
Language	English
Date	2004
Publication Place	London
Publisher	Institute of Classical Studies
Series	Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies (BICS)
Volume	Supplement 83.1
Categories	no categories
Author(s)
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

This two volume Supplement to the Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies represents the proceedings of a conference held at the Institute on 27-29 June, 2002 in honour of Richard Sorabji. These volumes, which are intended to build on the massive achievement of Professor Sorabji’s Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series, focus on the commentary as a vehicle of philosophical and scientific thought. Volume One deals with the Greek tradition, including one paper on Byzantine philosophy and one on the Latin author Calcidius, who is very close to the late Greek tradition in outlook. The volume begins with an overview of the tradition of commenting on Aristotle and of the study of this tradition in the modern era. It concludes with an up-to-date bibliography of scholarship devoted to the commentators.

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/Py3juEhsYVa8BVG

{"_index":"sire","_type":"_doc","_id":"233","_score":null,"_source":{"id":233,"authors_free":[{"id":297,"entry_id":233,"agent_type":null,"is_normalised":null,"person_id":98,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"},"free_name":"Adamson, Peter","free_first_name":"Peter","free_last_name":"Adamson","norm_person":{"id":98,"first_name":"Peter","last_name":"Adamson","full_name":"Adamson, Peter","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":null,"dnb_url":"http:\/\/d-nb.info\/gnd\/139896104","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":null}},{"id":298,"entry_id":233,"agent_type":null,"is_normalised":null,"person_id":39,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"},"free_name":"Baltussen, Han","free_first_name":"Han","free_last_name":"Baltussen","norm_person":{"id":39,"first_name":"Han","last_name":"Baltussen","full_name":"Baltussen, Han","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":null,"dnb_url":"http:\/\/d-nb.info\/gnd\/136236456","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":null}},{"id":299,"entry_id":233,"agent_type":null,"is_normalised":null,"person_id":111,"institution_id":null,"role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"},"free_name":"Stone, Martin W. F.","free_first_name":"Martin W. F.","free_last_name":"Stone","norm_person":{"id":111,"first_name":"Martin W. F.","last_name":"Stone","full_name":"Stone, Martin W. F.","short_ident":"","is_classical_name":null,"dnb_url":"http:\/\/d-nb.info\/gnd\/132001543","viaf_url":"","db_url":"","from_claudius":null}}],"entry_title":"Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1","main_title":{"title":"Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1"},"abstract":"This two volume Supplement to the Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies represents the proceedings of a conference held at the Institute on 27-29 June, 2002 in honour of Richard Sorabji. These volumes, which are intended to build on the massive achievement of Professor Sorabji\u2019s Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series, focus on the commentary as a vehicle of philosophical and scientific thought. Volume One deals with the Greek tradition, including one paper on Byzantine philosophy and one on the Latin author Calcidius, who is very close to the late Greek tradition in outlook. The volume begins with an overview of the tradition of commenting on Aristotle and of the study of this tradition in the modern era. It concludes with an up-to-date bibliography of scholarship devoted to the commentators.","btype":4,"date":"2004","language":"English","online_url":"","online_resources":"https:\/\/uni-koeln.sciebo.de\/s\/Py3juEhsYVa8BVG","doi_url":null,"categories":[],"authors":[{"id":98,"full_name":"Adamson, Peter","role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"}},{"id":39,"full_name":"Baltussen, Han","role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"}},{"id":111,"full_name":"Stone, Martin W. F.","role":{"id":2,"role_name":"editor"}}],"book":{"id":233,"pubplace":"London","publisher":"Institute of Classical Studies","series":"Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies (BICS)","volume":"Supplement 83.1","edition_no":"","valid_from":null,"valid_until":null},"booksection":null,"article":null},"sort":[2004]}

PAGE 1 OF 1

Aristotelianism as a commentary tradition, 2004
By: Fazzo, Silvia, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Aristotelianism as a commentary tradition
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	1-19
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Fazzo, Silvia
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

[Conclusion, p. 14]: We have seen that it was only in the twentieth century, after the two  World Wars,  that  the 
study of Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca began to  come  into  its  own  as  a  field  of 
research.44 Among  the first  to  make  profitable  use  of  the  CAG  were  those  Orientalists, 
chiefly from Germany,  who  were interested  in  Greek-Arabic connections  and  translations. 
In the case of Alexander, the availability of critical editions of the texts made it possible to 
identify the Greek counterparts of many short pieces  transmitted  in  Arabic  under his  name 
but with titles different from those familiar to us.

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/ARmAVVKwXAN0Dk6

Exegesis in the Derveni Papyrus, 2004
By: Betegh, Gábor, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Exegesis in the Derveni Papyrus
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	37-50
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Betegh, Gábor
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

The text of the Derveni papyrus has often been labeled ‘a commentary’, or a hypomnema
and its unidentified author has habitually been called ‘the Derveni commentator.’ The roll,
which was found among the remains of the funeral pyre of a Macedonian tomb, has been
dated to the last third of the fourth century BC on the basis of the archeological evidence.
Moreover, there is an overriding consensus among scholars that the text was composed
sometime around the end of the Presocratic period.1 Given this early dating of the text, it
appears to be most significant for our knowledge of the early, pre-Hellenistic phase of the
commentary tradition. Indeed, if both the dating and the above characterization is correct,
the Derveni text is probably the earliest surviving specimen of this genre, and certainly the
earliest document providing first-hand evidence of sufficient length for direct textual
analysis.Alas, things with the Derveni papyrus are never so clear-cut. Most importantly, it is not
entirely evident whether it is legitimate to call the whole text a ‘commentary’ at all, and, if
so, with what qualifications. This is the basic question that I shall try to examine in this
paper. I shall tackle the issue by breaking it down into two, more or less independent, sets
of problems. The first of the two is largely formal and relatively simple. It amounts to
asking whether or not the Derveni text, or more precisely what has survived of it,
conforms with certain formal and structural features that we normally expect from a
commentary. The second set of problems is considerably more complex. To put it bluntly,
I shall ask why the Derveni author set out in the first place to interpret the object of his
exegesis. This question thus pertains to both the author’s cognitive and pragmatic attitude
towards the object of his interpretative enterprise, and, closely related to these, to the
specific cultural and sociological context in which the author pursues his exegesis. It is
also in this second part that I shall try to present a sympathetic rendering of the so-called
‘allegorical’ method of the Derveni author. [Introduction, p. 37]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/GJjS0gyR2rIo9Cj

Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1, 2004
By: Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Type	Edited Book
Language	English
Date	2004
Publication Place	London
Publisher	Institute of Classical Studies
Series	Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies (BICS)
Volume	Supplement 83.1
Categories	no categories
Author(s)
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

This two volume Supplement to the Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies represents the proceedings of a conference held at the Institute on 27-29 June, 2002 in honour of Richard Sorabji. These volumes, which are intended to build on the massive achievement of Professor Sorabji’s Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series, focus on the commentary as a vehicle of philosophical and scientific thought. Volume One deals with the Greek tradition, including one paper on Byzantine philosophy and one on the Latin author Calcidius, who is very close to the late Greek tradition in outlook. The volume begins with an overview of the tradition of commenting on Aristotle and of the study of this tradition in the modern era. It concludes with an up-to-date bibliography of scholarship devoted to the commentators.

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/Py3juEhsYVa8BVG

Porphyry: The first Platonist commentator on Aristotle, 2004
By: Karamanolis, George, Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	Porphyry: The first Platonist commentator on Aristotle
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	97-120
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Karamanolis, George
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

In this paper I shall argue that Porphyry was the first Platonist philosopher to write commentaries on Aristotle’s works. Previous scholars have come close to maintaining
such a view, but to my knowledge, this has never been expressly argued. They usually hold that Porphyry was the first of the Neoplatonists (ie. the Platonists after Plotinus) to write commentaries on Aristotle, but not the first of the entire Platonist tradition. One reason for this is that Porphyry’s estimation of Aristotle’s philosophy has not been sufficiently appreciated. In addition, I think, the particular nature of philosophical commentary, composed systematically in late antiquity by philosophers such as Alexander of Aphrodisias, Porphyry, or Iamblichus remains in need of clarification, as does its philosophical motivation. As a result, scholars have tended to credit several Platonists
before Porphyry with the writing of commentaries on Aristotelian works, simply because they appear to have made various sorts of comments on one or more of his works. I will argue that these Platonists did not, however, produce commentaries of the sort that Porphyry did, which I consider to be ‘commentaries’ in the proper sense of the term. Their failure to do so, I will argue, owes to their particular shared philosophical background, one which, as I will argue, changes with Porphyry. In the first part of my paper (I) I will outline the difference between the various forms of commentary and the specific form of commentary written by Porphyry. I will claim that in the latter case the author sets out to write a commentary in order to facilitate and
encourage its study and assist in its teaching. This presupposes acceptance of the views
expressed by the source text and implies an assertion of its authority. The examination of
the evidence concerning the Platonists before Porphyry shows that none of them can be
credited with a commentary on Aristotle of the sort written by Porphyry (II). I will then
try to explain why Porphyry wrote commentaries on Aristotle in the first place (III), which leads me to conjecture that he considered Aristotle’s views in the Categories (IV), the Physics (V), and on first principles (VI) compatible with those of Plato and also sufficiently philosophically valuable as to deserve serious study. I will conclude that Porphyry wrote commentaries on Aristotle because, given his interpretations of Aristotle’s views, he accepted him as an authority next to Plato, and this represented something new in the Platonic tradition (VII). [introduction, p. 97]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/N41MQStD4wulva1

The Aristotelian Commentators: A Bibliographical Guide, 2004
By: Sellars, J. T., Adamson, Peter (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.)

Title	The Aristotelian Commentators: A Bibliographical Guide
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	239-268
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Sellars, J. T.
Editor(s)	Adamson, Peter , Baltussen, Han , Stone, Martin W. F.
Translator(s)

In  what follows I offer a bibliographical guide to the ancient commentators on Aristotle, 
outlining where one may find texts, translations, studies, and more detailed bibliographies 
containing further references.* It  is designed to supplement the  existing bibliography in: 
[l] R.  Sorabji, ed., Aristotle  Transformed: The Ancient Commentators and Their Influence 
(London: Duckworth, 1990), 485-524. 
The  focus  here  is  on  the  ancient  commentators, but  reference  will  also  be  made  to 
Byzantine commentators. For  a  list of  around 300 commentators on Aristotle - ancient, 
Byzantine,  Islamic,  medieval,  and  renaissance  - see  the  final  pages  of  [ 2 ]   Operum 
Aristotelis Stagiritae Philosophorum Omnium,  ed.  I Casaubon  (Lugduni,  apud 
Guillelmum Laemarium, 1590). This list is followed by  a detailed inventory of  individual 
commentaries  arranged  by  the  Aristotelian  text  upon  which  they  comment.  This  very 
useful  second list is reprinted in:  [3] Aristotelis  Opera Omnia quae  extant  Uno Volumine 
Comprehensa, ed. C. H.  Weise (Leipzig: Tauchnitz, 1843), 1013-18. Note also the more 
recent  list  of ancient  commentaries  by R.  Goulet  in  D P h A   1,437-41  (1993),  now 
supplemented by  M. Chase in DPhA Suppl., 113-21 (2003). [Introduction, p. 239]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/sYbkNe4lpIE1WVb

The κοινη αισθεσις in Proclus and Ps.-Simplicius, 2004
By: Lautner, Peter, Stone, Martin W. F. (Ed.), Baltussen, Han (Ed.), Adamson, Peter (Ed.)

Title	The κοινη αισθεσις in Proclus and Ps.-Simplicius
Type	Book Section
Language	English
Date	2004
Published in	Philosophy, Science and Exegesis in Greek, Arabic and Latin commentaries, Volume 1
Pages	163-174
Categories	no categories
Author(s)	Lautner, Peter
Editor(s)	Stone, Martin W. F. , Baltussen, Han , Adamson, Peter
Translator(s)

Although the metaphysical systems of the Neoplatonists at Athens were much the same, their views on the human soul, particularly on its activities, showed great divergence. This is all the more striking because they were all heavily influenced by Iamblichus. But the mode and extent of that influence varied a great deal, and their theories of the human soul varied accordingly. As a case study, I shall examine the position of Proclus and Pseudo-Simplicius on the koinê aisthêsis. Both authors took Aristotle's views as the point of departure; that is obvious in Pseudo-Simplicius' commentary on the De anima and easily detectable in Proclus' commentary on the Timaeus. Moreover, both of them paid special attention to the problem of whether this sense is separate from the five particular senses or just a joint activity of the senses. My aim is to show that the different conceptions are signs of a deeper divergence. Despite the similarity of their metaphysical outlook, their views on the structure of the human soul were considerably different, and this left its mark on their accounts of the koinê aisthêsis. [Introduction, p. 163]

Online Resources

https://uni-koeln.sciebo.de/s/mmogdVPzGKbtNc8

PAGE 1 OF 1