Simplicius: On Aristotle Physics 1–8 Volume General Introduction to the 12 Volumes of Translations: General Introduction to the 12 Volumes of Translations

Speusippus of Athens, 4th century bce , nephew, student, and successor of Plato Xenocrates of Chalcedon, 4th century bce , successor of Speusippus as head of the Academy Aristotle of Stagira, 4th century bce , student of Plato, founder of Peripatetic School in Athens Th eophrastus of Eresus, 4th-3rd century bce , Peripatetic, student and successor of Aristotle Eudemus of Rhodes, 4th-3rd century bce , Peripatetic, student of Aristotle Mathematicians Hippocrates of Chios, late-5th century bce Euclid, early-3rd century bce Archimedes of Syracuse, 3rd century bce Nicomedes, 3rd century bce Apollonius of Perga, late-3rd century bce Nicomachus of Gerasa, 1st-2nd century ce , mathematician and neo-Pythagorean philosopher Eutocius, 6th century ce , commentator on mathematical texts, active in Alexandria Later Greek philosophers and commentators Andronicus of Rhodes, 1st century bce , Peripatetic Nicolaus of Damascus, 1st century bce , Peripatetic Plutarch of Chaironeia, 1st-2nd century ce , Platonist Atticus, 2nd century ce , Platonist Adrastus of Aphrodisias, 1st-2nd century ce , Peripatetic Aspasius, 2nd century ce , Peripatetic Alexander of Aphrodisias, 2nd-3rd century ce , Peripatetic, chairholder in Athens Ammonius Saccas, early-3rd century ce , Platonist, teacher of Plotinus in Alexandria Plotinus of Lycopolis, mid-3rd century ce , Platonist, taught in Rome xii Principal Philosophers and Mathematicians Discussed Longinus, mid-3rd century ce , Platonist, taught in Athens, adviser to Zenobia of Palmyra Porphyry of Tyre, late-3rd century ce , Platonist, student of Longinus and then of Plotinus Iamblichus of Chalcis, 3rd-4th century ce , Platonist, rebellious student of Porphyry Th emistius, 4th century ce , Peripatetic, active in Constantinople Th e Athenian and Alexandrian Platonist schools of the 5th-6th centuries ce Syrianus, 4th-5th century ce , Platonist, chairholder in Athens Proclus of Lycia, 5th century ce , Platonist, student of Syrianus, chairholder in Athens Hermias, 5th century ce , Platonist, student of Syrianus, taught in Alexandria Ammonius, 5th-6th century ce , Platonist, son of Hermias, student of Proclus, chairholder in Alexandria Olympiodorus, 6th century ce , Platonist, student and second successor of Ammonius Damascius, 6th century ce , Platonist, last chairholder in Athens Simplicius of Cilicia, 6th century ce , Platonist, student of Ammonius and Damascius Priscian of Lydia, 6th century ce , Platonist, active in Athens John Philoponus, 6th century ce , Christian, active in Alexandria defends Aristotle's arguments, and he also argues that Philoponus is wrong to claim Plato's Timaeus as supporting his own side of these issues. Simplicius also engages in questions of textual scholarship on Aristotle, and he is also led to preserve, by quoting or closely paraphrasing, sometimes lengthy texts of earlier philosophers and mathematicians that would otherwise be lost. Most famously, he cites many texts of the pre-Socratic philosophers; but also, for instance, of the fi ft h-century bce mathematician Hippocrates of Chios (through an intermediate source); of the early Peripatetics, especially Aristotle's immediate students Th eophrastus and Eudemus; the commentaries of the second-third-century ce Peripatetic (neo-Aristotelian) Alexander of Aphrodisias on the Physics and On the Heaven , the commentary of the late-third-century ce neo-Platonist Porphyry on the Physics , and many earlier commentaries on the Categories (some cited directly and others at second hand); and the series of (mostly neo-Platonic) writers on place and time, culminating in Simplicius' own teacher Damascius, that he cites in the Corollaries on Place and Time embedded in his commentary on Physics 4. Even when Simplicius is not our only source for some text, he is an important witness to its early history, oft en giving a slightly diff erent version of the text than other sources: since Diels' classic article, Simplicius has been used as a witness to the history of the text of Aristotle, earlier than any of our extant manuscripts. 2 Simplicius' aim in quoting is oft en not just to preserve an earlier thinker or to cite him as a witness, but to rehabilitate him against criticism, or to correct what he sees as a common misinterpretation of a past thinker. It is usually an interest in these accomplishments of Simplicius -preserving earlier texts, harmonizing Aristotle or other thinkers with Plato, arguing against other philosophers and scholars including Philoponus -that leads modern readers to Simplicius. But while it is easy to fi nd interesting passages in Simplicius on all these things, without the larger context we cannot judge when he is quoting verbatim or paraphrasing, when he knows a text at fi rst hand and when only through later sources, or what biases might infl uence his selection and interpretation of the particular passages he cites. We cannot evaluate his testimony on particular points without understanding the larger programme that leads him to write vast commentaries on Aristotle, to discuss the views of earlier thinkers, and sometimes to cite their writings. Th e three Aristotle commentaries, and especially the commentaries on the Physics and On the Heaven , are parts of a single programme, and can be dated relative to each other and placed within the larger frame of Simplicius' career. In the Physics commentary 1117,15-1118,11 and in several later passages, 3 Supporting the twelve volumes of translation of Simplicius' great commentary on Aristotle's Physics , all published by Bloomsbury in the Ancient Commentators on Aristotle series, between 1992 and 2021, this volume presents a general introduction to the commentary. It covers the philosophical aims of Simplicius' commentaries on the Physics and the related text On the Heaven ; Simplicius' methods and his use of earlier sources; and key themes and comparison with Philoponus' commentary on the same text. Simplicius treats the Physics as a universal study of the principles of all natural things underlying the account of the cosmos in On the Heaven . In both treatises, he responds at every stage to the now lost Peripatetic commentaries of Alexander of Aphrodisias, which set Aristotle in opposition to Plato and to earlier thinkers such as Parmenides, Empedocles and Anaxagoras. On each passage, Simplicius after going through Alexander's commentary raises difficulties for the text of Aristotle as interpreted by Alexander. Then, after making observations about details of the text, and often going back to a direct reading of the older philosophers (for whom he is now often our main source, as he is for Alexander's commentary), he proposes his own solution to the difficulties, introduced with a modest 'perhaps', which reads Aristotle as in harmony with Plato and earlier thinkers. "Supporting the twelve volumes of translation of Simplicius' great commentary on Aristotle's Physics, published between 1992 and 2021, this volume presents a general introduction to the commentary. It covers the philosophical aims of Simplicius' commentaries on the Physics and the related text On the Heaven ; Simplicius' methods and his use of earlier sources; key themes and comparison with Philoponus' commentary on the same text. In the first chapters of his work, Aristotle raises the question of the number and character of the first principles of nature and feels the need to oppose the challenge of the paradoxical Eleatic philosophers who had denied that there could be more than one unchanging thing. By 1.7, Aristotle reaches the conclusion that we must distinguish one substratum and two contrary states that it may possess: a form and a privation of that form. But this only foreshadows what is to follow. In book 2, Aristotle introduces four kinds of explanatory factor: besides the material substratum of a thing and its form, there is its function or purpose, and the efficient cause of its taking on new forms. He goes on in Books 3 to 8 to discuss causation, chance and necessity, motion, infinity, vacuum, spatial relations and the continuum and he postulates the need for a divine first mover as the source of purposive motion in celestial bodies."-- Provided by publisher Cover Halftitle page Ancient Commentators on Aristotle Title page Copyright page Acknowledgements Contents Editors’ Preface Abbreviations Acknowledgements Principal Philosophers and Mathematicians Discussed General Introduction 1. Simplicius and his Physics commentary 2. Simplicius’ philosophical aims in his commentaries on Aristotle’s On the Heaven and Physics 3. Simplicius’ commentary-methods and his use of earlier commentators; from Alexander to other sources 4. Themes of Simplicius’ commentary on Physics 1.1–2 5. The text of Simplicius and our translation Appendix: Hippocrates’ constructions Notes Bibliography Index of Names Index of Subjects