Porphyry, universal soul and the Arabic Plotinus

Arabic Sciences and Philosophy

Volumn 9, Issue 1, 1999, Pages

  Costa, Cristina D'Ancona ^a  

^a NONE

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EID: 67650911668     PISSN: 09574239     EISSN: 14740524     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0957423900002605     Document Type: Article

References (94)

1. R. Walzer, "Porphyry and the Arabic tradition," in Porphyre, Entretiens Hardt XII (Vandœuvres - Genève, 1965), pp. 275-97; discussion, pp. 298-9
2. (no 6 in R. Beutler, Porphyrios, in Paulys Realencyklopädie, 22, 1 [1953]
3. and on Aristotle's Physics (no 14 Beutler, no 6 Smith)
4. De interpretatione (no 13 Beutler, no 4 Smith)
5. Nicomachean Ethics (no 16 Beutler, no 9 Smith)
6. Walzer, "Porphyry and the Arabic tradition," p. 283, maintained that "The Arabic writer" (i.e., according to Walzer's view, the translator of the Theology from Greek or Syriac into Arabic) "refers to the original as a commentary written by Porphyry, and I cannot see at all why Porphyry should not have written a commentary on eight or more essays of Plotinus - which an unknown late Greek or Syriac writer came to attribute to Aristotle." This information comes from the incipit of the Preface opening the Theology of Aristotle, repeatedly examined in the past and recent scholarship
7. See for instance (chronologically arranged) J. Bidez, Vie de Porphyre, le philosophe néo-platonicien, avec les fragments des traités περὶ αcombining comma aboveγαλ μάτων et De regressu animae (Ghent, 1913; repr. Hildesheim, 1964), pp. 130-6
8. W. Theiler, "Porphyrios und Augustin," Schriften der Königsberger Gelehrten Gesellschaft, Geistesw. Kl. 10 (1933): 1-74
9. P. Henry, Plotin et l'Occident. Firmicus Maternus, Marius Victorinus, Saint Augustin et Macrobe, Spicilegium Sacrum Lovaniense (Louvain, 1934), passim
10. E. L. Fortin, Christianisme et culture philosophique au cinquième siècle. La querelle de l'âme humaine en Occident (Paris, 1959), pp. 119-54
11. and chiefly, P. Hadot, Porphyre et Victorinus (Paris, 1968), the most impressive fresco of Porphyry's own options and their influence
12. See also A. Smith, Porphyry's Place in the Neoplatonic tradition. A Study in Post-Plotinian Neoplatonism (The Hague, 1974)
13. S. Ebbesen, Porphyry's Legacy to Logic: a Reconstruction, chapter 7 in the same volume, pp. 141-72
14. The evidence offered by Eunapius of Sardis in his Vitae Sophistarum should now be considered along with its exegesis by H.-D. Saffrey in his masterly essay Pourquoi Porphyre a-t-il édité Plotin? Réponse provisoire, in Porphyre. La Vie de Plotin, II, par L. Brisson, J.-L. Charlonneix, M.-O. Goulet-Cazé, R. Goulet, M. D. Grmeck, J.-M. Flamand, S. Matton, D. O' Brien, J. Pépin, H.-D. Saffrey, A.-Ph. Segonds, M. Tardieu et P. Thillet, Histoire des doctrines de l'Antiquité classique 16 (Paris, 1992), pp. 31-64
15. F. Altheim - R. Stiehl, "New fragments of Greek philosophers, 2. Porphyry in Arabic and Syriac translation," East and West, 13 (1962): 3-15
16. Walzer, Porphyry and the Arabic Tradition, pp. 285-94. It is worth mentioning Walzer's perceptive remark that a similar topic in saint Augustine, namely, the idea of the ultimate consistency of the main philosophical tenets in Plato and Aristotle, in all likelihood traces back to a sort of common source in Porphyry
17. Ebbesen, Porphyry's legacy to logic, joined with Hadot's analysis
18. See S. K. Strange, "Plotinus, Porphyry and the Neoplatonic interpretation of the Categories," in Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt. Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung hrsg. von W. Haase, II, 36.2 (Berlin, 1987), pp. 955-74
19. C. Evangeliou, Aristotle's Categories and Porphyry, Philosophia Antiqua 48 (Leiden, New York, København, Köln, 1988)
20. Saffrey's essay, Pourquoi Porphyre a-t-il édité Plotin? helps understanding the reasons of such an attitude. Saffrey presents us with the debate opened, in post-Plotinian times, between Iamblichus and his former teacher Porphyry about the primacy of theurgy or rational philosophy, and convincingly argues that Porphyry's final decision to accomplish Plotinus' wish to have a complete edition of his own treatises was intended to face Iamblichus' position
21. See also A. de Libera, La querelle des universaux. De Platon à la fin du Moyen Age (Paris, 1996), pp. 34-47; 68-120
22. See I. Hadot, Le problème du néoplatonisme alexandrin. Hiéroclès et Simplicius (Paris, 1978)
23. "Aristote dans l'enseignement philosophique néoplatonicien. Les préfaces des commentaires sur les Catégories," Revue de théologie et de philosophie, 124 (1992): 407-25
24. C. Hein, Definition und Einteilung der Philosophie. Von der spätantiken Einleitungsliteratur zur arabischen Enzyklopädie, Europäische Hochschulschriften, Reihe XX, Philosophie, Bd. 177 (Frankfurt am Main - Bern - New York, 1985). Hein's work explores the influence in Islamic times of Alexandrian definitions of philosophy and its subdivision, paying special attention to the reading order of the parts of Aristotle's corpus
25. See also H. Hugonnard-Roche, Introductions syriaques à l'étude de la logique: À propos de quelques "Divisions de Porphyre," in Comprendre et maîtriser la nature au moyen âge. Mélanges d'histoire des sciences offerts à Guy Beaujouan (Genève-Paris, 1994), pp. 385-408
26. "Les traductions syriaques de l'Isagoge de Porphyre et la constitution du corpus syriaque de logique," Revue d'histoire des textes, 24 (1994): 293-312
27. "Les Catégories d'Aristote comme introduction à la philosophie, dans un commentaire syriaque de Sergius de Reš'ainā († 536)," Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale, 8 (1997): 339-63
28. For the understanding of the general context of this transmission, it is necessary to report to H. Daiber, "Doxographie und Geschichtsschreibung über griechische Philosophen in islamischer Zeit," Medioevo. Rivista di storia della filosofia medievale, 17 (1990): 1-21
29. Hein, Definition, pp. 47-56, goes through the Arabic translations of the Isagoge (al-Raqqī, before 820, and al-Dimašqī, before 920), and the Arabic commentaries upon it or utilizations of it (al-Kindī, al-Rāzī, al-Fārābī, Yahcombining dot belowyā ibn 'Adī, his pupil Ibn Suwār, and Ibn al-Tcombining dot belowayyib)
30. D. B. Haneberg, "Über das neuplatonische Werk Theologie des Aristoteles," Sitzungsberichte der köningl. bayer. Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1 (1862): 1-12, especially p. 11
31. See Aouad, "La Théologie d'Aristote," pp. 546-8, 576-7 (quoted at note 2)
32. Deutsche Literaturzeitung für Kritik der internationalen Wissenschaft, 4 (1883): 843-6
33. 'A. Badawī, Aflūtcombining dot belowīn 'inda al-'Arab. Plotinus apud Arabes. Theologia Aristotelis et fragmenta quae supersunt, Islamica 20 (Cairo, 1966), p. 3.4-5 (hereafter: Badawī)
34. published in the Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft, 37 (1883): 135-8
35. A. Baumstark, "Zur Vorgeschichte der arabischen Theologie des Aristoteles," Oriens Christianus, 2 (1902): 187-91. The "pattern" includes (i) the idea that the work is "eine bewusste Fälschung" (p. 187); (ii) the hypothesis of a lost Syriac antecedent of the Arabic text we actually possess, an antecedent responsible (a) for the completely different disposition of the text with respect to the Greek original, (b) for the doctrinal shift the Arabic presents under many respects in comparison with Plotinus' texts, and (c) for the pseudepigraphic attribution to Aristotle (p. 189)
36. See the review by H. Daiber, Der Islam, 65 (1988): 130-4, whose main doubt about Zimmermann's thesis is that the idea to harmonize Plotinus with Aristotle would hardly have arisen in the Islamic context itself, without a pre-existent late ancient pattern. P. Thillet, "Note sur la Théologie d'Aristote," presents some passages in the Theology which receive, in his view, a better explanation on the assumption of a Syriac model for the Arabic translation
37. Finally, see R. Brague, "La philosophie dans la Théologie d'Aristote. Pour un inventaire," Documenti e studi sulla tradizione filosofica medievale, 8 (1997): 365-87
38. Baumstark, "Zur Vorgeschichte," pp. 187-8
39. In 1909, in his review of Mommert's edition of the Porphyrian Sententiae ad intelligibilia ducentes, J. Bidez, Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 18 (1909): 186-90, suggested that the pseudo-Theology might well have been a remainder of Porphyry's cursive Greek chiεφάλαι α (p. 188)
40. Zimmermann, "The origins of the so-called Theology of Aristotle," p. 125
41. P. Henry, "Vers la reconstitution de l'enseignement oral de Plotin," Bulletin de l'Académie Royale de Belgique, Classe des Lettres 23 (1937): 310-42
42. (on Amelius' stay in Apamea) and 805-10 (on Amelius' record of Plotinus' teaching, which Brisson interprets as being the same as the pre-Porphyrian edition of Plotinus' writings attributed to Eustochius by P. Henry, Recherches sur la Préparation évangélique d'Eusèbe et l'édition perdue des œuvres de Plotin publiée par Eustochius, Bibliothèque de l'École des Hautes Études. Sciences Religieuses 50 [Paris, 1935])
43. Porphyry, Life of Plotinus, 26.32-35
44. Henry's contention that the differences between the Arabic pseudo-Theology and Plotinus' text could trace back to his oral teaching transmitted to the Arab world via Amelius has been criticized also by W. Theiler in his review of Henry's Les États du texte de Plotin, published in Byzantinische Zeitschrift, 41 (1941): 169-76, especially p. 170
45. Zimmermann, "The origins of the so-called Theology of Aristotle," pp. 165-77, discusses at length this hypothesis. On the grounds of the fact that there are cases in which a "Heading" reproduces a peculiar shift of the Arabic vs the Greek, he construes the "Headings of the Questions" as a "catalogue" made by the translator himself
46. H. R. Schwyzer, "Die pseudoaristotelische Theologie und die Plotin-Ausgabe des Porphyrios," Museum Helveticum, 90 (1941): 216-36
47. In turn, Henry qualified Schwyzer's reasoning as a "decisive argument" against his previous view: "The oral teaching of Plotinus," Dionysius, 6 (1982): 3-12, p. 5 n. 9
48. Such is the picture in the authoritative Introduction by P. Henry and H. R. Schwyzer in Plotini Opera II (see note 30)
49. See also H. Dörrie, review of the quoted Plotini Opera, Gnomon, 36 (1964): 461-69, who understands the "enneadische Vorlage" of the Arabic pseudo-Theology as "eine von Porphyrios kommentierte Plotin-Ausgabe" (p. 464)
50. P. Kraus, "Plotin chez les Arabes. Remarques sur un nouveau fragment de la paraphrase arabe des Ennéades," Bulletin de l'Institut d'Égypte, 23 (1941): 263-95
51. See also B. Mariën, "De zogenaamde Theologie van Aristoteles en de Araabse Plotinos-traditie," Tjidschrift voor Filosofie, 10 (1948): 125-46
52. an article which aims at completing some data in the study by Kraus, and whose main results are summarised in B. Märien, "Études plotiniennes," Revue philosophique de Louvain, 47 (1949): 386-410, p. 399, n. 40
53. F. Rosenthal, "Aš-Šayhcombining breve below al-Yūnānī and the Arabic Plotinus source," Orientalia, 21 (1952): 461-92
54. 22 (1953): 370-400
55. 24 (1955): 42-65
56. In the same course of time, the mentioned doxography (preserved in Šahrastānī's Milal wa al-nihcombining dot belowal; see above, note 19), was translated into Italian by F. Gabrieli, "Plotino e Porfirio in un eresiografo musulmano," La Parola del Passato, 1 (1946): 338-46
57. Rosenthal, "Aš-Šayhcombining breve below al-Yūnānī and the Arabic Plotinus source," p. 467
58. W. Kutsch, "Ein arabisches Bruchstück aus Porphyrios (?) περὶ ψυχη̃ς und die Frage des Verfassers der Theologie des Aristoteles," Mélanges de l'Université saint-Joseph, 31 (1954): 265-86
59. See G. Endress, "Al-Kindī über die Wiedererinnerung der Seele. Arabischer Platonismus und die Legitimation der Wissenschaften im Islam," Oriens, 34 (1994): 174-221, especially p. 200
60. Ch. Généquand, "La mémoire de l'âme: Porphyre et la Théologie d'Aristote," Bulletin d'études orientales, 48 (1996): 102-13
61. Van Ess, "Jüngere orientalistische Literatur," pp. 338-9
62. Le Néoplatonisme. Colloques internationaux du CNRS, Royaumont 9-13 juin 1969 (Paris, 1971)
63. P. Thillet, "Indices porphyriens dans la Théologie d'Aristote," in Le Néoplatonisme, 293-302, p. 294
64. Thillet, "Indices porphyriens dans la Théologie d'Aristote," pp. 294-5
65. et son commentaire dans la pseudo-Théologie d'Aristote," Revue des études grecques, 81 (1968): X-XII
66. S. Pinès, "Les textes arabes dits plotiniens et le courant 'porphyrien' dans le néoplatonisme grec," in Le Né oplatonisme, pp. 303-17, especially p. 309
67. Pinès, "Les textes arabes dits plotiniens," p. 309
68. I have argued for the pseudo-Dionysian influence concerning this doctrine on the Arabic reworking of Plotinus' writings in "Esse quod est supra aeternitatem. La Cause première, l'être et l'éternité dans le Liber de Causis et dans ses sources," Archives d'histoire doctrinale et littéraire du Moyen Age, 59 (1992): 41-62
69. and in "La doctrine néoplatonicienne de l'être entre l'Antiquité tardive et le Moyen Age. Le Liber de Causis par rapport à ses sources," Recherches de théologie ancienne et médiévale, 59 (1992): 41-85
70. both collected in Recherches sur le Liber de Causis, Études de philosophie médiévale 72 (Paris, 1995), pp. 53-72; 121-53
71. Zimmermann's contention is based upon what he calls (p. 121, 173) the "amateur" character of the Arabic paraphrase with respect to the Greek original, or its "pervading dilettantism" (p. 133). I do agree with this evaluation (see my "Per un profilo filosofico dell'autore della Teologia di Aristotele," Medioevo. Rivista di storia della filosofia medievale, 17 [1992]: 83-134)
72. Against this thesis reacted convincingly J. Rist, Plotinus. The Road to Reality (Cambridge, 1967), pp. 91-3
73. Vita Plotini 4.41-42
74. I have quoted in the text the translation made by Lewis, p. 199
75. see Lewis, p. 185: "We say that this world does not proceed by luck and chance but proceeds by an intellectual soul-word with the utmost deliberation and control. If this is so, we say that it is the intellectual soul which is the ruler over this world." I have reproduced Lewis' use of italics and standard typescript (see above, note 62)
76. IV 7[2], 10.1-2
77. IV 7[2], 13.1-2; transl. Armstrong
78. Badawī, pp. 18.13-19.7
79. IV 7[2], 12.16; 19-20
80. The extant fragments are edited by A. R. Sodano, Porphyrii in Platonis Timaeum commentariorum fragmenta (Naples, 1964)
81. Smith, Porphyrii philosophi fragmenta (see note 1), p. 198, adds a fragment to the collection edited by Sodano
82. M. Baltes, Die Weltentstehung des platonischen Timaios nach den antiken Interpreten, Philosophia Antiqua 30 (Leiden, 1976), pp. 145-51
83. Schwyzer, Plotinos, in Paulys Realencyklopädie, p. 563
84. Blumenthal, "Nous and soul in Plotinus," p. 206
85. I have dealt with this problem in my "Primo principio e mondo intelligibile nella metafisica di Proclo: problemi e soluzioni," Elenchos. Rivista di studi sul pensiero antico, 12 (1991): 271-302
86. I am borrowing the English translation of this passage from C. Steel, The Changing Self. A Study on the Soul in later Neoplatonism: Iamblichus, Damascius and Priscianus, Verhandelingen van de koninklijke Academie voor Wetenschappen, Letteren en Schone Kunsten van België, Klasse der Letteren, 85 (Brussel, 1978), p. 24
87. See also Deuse, Untersuchungen zur mittelplatonischen und neuplatonischen Seelenlehre, pp. 167-218
88. Steel, The Changing Self, p. 25: "However, it is not a question here of whether the soul is 'uniform' in itself, hut rather whether the incorporeal reality of which the soul constitutes a part is entirely homogeneous or ontologically differentiated."
89. Hadot, Porphyre et Victorinus, I, p. 339, as Steel observes, interprets Iamblichus' passage in the same way
90. Steel, The Changing Self, pp. 30-31
91. Steel, The Changing Self, p. 30: "Particularly in those texts where he considers the soul in its pure essence, free from the bond with the sensible imposed on it by cosmic Necessity, the difference between the soul and the ideal forms is blurred."
92. Evangeliou, Aristotle's Categories and Porphyry, p. 2
93. see also my "La doctrine de la création mediante intelligentia dans le Liber de Causis et dans ses sources," Revue des sciences philosophiques et théologiques, 76 (1992): 209-33
94. (also in Recherches sur le Liber de Causis, quoted above, note 51)