Philoponus : on Aristotle physics 1.1-3

161 Pages·2006·2.13 MB·English

by  Catherine Osborne

PHILOPONUS
On Aristotle
Physics 1.1-3
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PHILOPONUS
On Aristotle
Physics 1.1-3
Translated by
Catherine Osborne
Duckworth
Ancient Commentators on Aristotle
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Catherine Osborne htarsa ansssemrtietdt ehde,r irnig hatns yu nfodremr t hoer Cboyp yarnigyh tm, Deeasnigsn, se alencdt Proanteinct,s Act, 1988, to be
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Acknowledgements
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The present translations have been made possible by generous and
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imaginative funding from the following sources: the National En-
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dowment for the Humanities, Division of Research Programs, an
indepenLdiebnrat rfye doef rCaol naggreenssc yC aoft atlhoeg iUngS-Ain;- Pthueb lLiceavteiornh uDlamtae Trust; the
BrAit ciastha lAogc aredceomrd yfo; rt hthei sJ boowoke tist aCvoapilyabrlieg hfrto mT rtuhes tLeiebsra; rtyh oef RCoonygarle sSso.ciety
(UK); Centro Internazionale A. Beltrame di Storia dello Spazio e del
Tempo (Padua); Mario MAcikgnnouwcclei;d Lgeivmeernptosol University; the Leventis
FouTnhdea ptiroense;n tth ter aAnrsltast iaonnds hHavuem baeenni tmieasd eR peossesaibrlceh b yB goeanredro oufs t ahned British
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for the Humanities, Division of Research Programs, an
Trust; Mr and Mrs N. Egon; the Netherlands Organisation for
independent federal agency of the USA; the Leverhulme Trust; the
Scientific Research (NWO/GW), Dr Victoria Solomonides, the Cul-
British Academy; the Jowett Copyright Trustees; the Royal Society
tural Attaché of the Greek Embassy in London. The editor wishes
(UK); Centro Internazionale A. Beltrame di Storia dello Spazio e del
to tTheamnpko P(Peatdeura )L; aMuatrnioe Mr,i gInaunc cMi; Luievlelrepro,o lE Udnwivaerrdsi tHy; uthses eLye,v eanntids Moss-
manF oRunoduaetciohné; tfhoer A trhtse airn dc oHmummaennittises, RJeoshenar cShe Blloaarrsd ofof rth pe rBerpitaisrhing the
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Attaché of the Greek Embassy in London. The editor wishes
Typeset by Ray Davies
to thank Peter Lautner, Ian Mueller, Edward Hussey, and Mossman
Roueché Pforri nthteeidr caonmdm benotusn, Jdo hinn SGerlleaarts fBorr iptraeipna rbinyg the
volume for presBs,i danddle Ds eLbotrda,h K Bilnagk’es a Lt yDnunck, wNoortrhf,o wlkho has been
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Printed and bound in Great Britain
Contents
Abbreviations vii
Introduction 1
Textual Emendations 20
Translation 23
Notes 107
Bibliography 131
English-Greek Glossary 133
Greek-English Index 138
Subject Index 147
Index of Passages 150
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Abbreviations
CAG = Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, ed. H. Diels, 23 vols (Berlin:
Reimer, 1882-1909)
Charlton = William Charlton, Aristotle’s Physics Books I and II, Claren-
don Aristotle Series (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970)
DK = Hermann Diels and Walther Kranz, Die Fragmente der Vorsokra-
tiker, 3 vols (Berlin: Weidmann, 1951)
FHSG = W.W. Fortenbaugh, P.M. Huby, R.W. Sharples, and D. Gutas,
Theophrastus of Eresus: Sources for his Life, Writings, Thought, and
Influence, 2 vols (Leiden: Brill, 1992)
Guthrie = W.K.C. Guthrie, A History of Greek Philosophy, 6 vols (Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1962-81)
KRS = G.S. Kirk, J.E. Raven and M. Schofield, The Presocratic Philo-
sophers, 2nd edn (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983)
L&S = A.A. Long and D.N. Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers, 2 vols
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987)
Ross = W.D. Ross, Aristotle’s Physics: A Revised Text with Introduction
and Commentary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1936)
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Introduction
Aristotle’sPhysics
The work known to us, and to the ancient commentators, as Aristotle’s
Physics is a treatise in eight books on a range of topics to do with the
structure of the physical world, and the explanation of motion. The
topics are not confined to what we would call physics, if by that we mean
the scientific analysis of forces and the explanation of why a body moves.
Rather, much of what Aristotle has to say falls under what we would
describe as metaphysics: questions about place, about time and the
structure of matter, and discussion of how change is possible.
Nevertheless, Aristotle draws a distinction between enquiries that
belong to natural philosophy (or physics) and those that belong to a
meta-level of investigation, which John Philoponus calls ‘first philo-
sophy’1 and we might be inclined to call ‘metaphysics’. ‘First philosophy’
is how I have translated the expression in this volume, with ‘metaphy-
sician’ for the ‘first philosopher’, the expert in this branch of study.2 The
fit with our own terminology is not at all exact, however. As we have
observed, the philosophical analysis of the structure of time, place,
space, and change – as opposed to the empirical investigation of their
application – might well belong in metaphysics for us, but Aristotle
includes them in natural philosophy, because they are about charac-
teristics of natural things (‘adjuncts that belong to all natural things in
common’ as Philoponus puts it).3 By contrast, the topics that Aristotle
brackets off, to be assigned to first philosophy, are questions about the
first principles of a particular discipline such as natural philosophy (or
geometry, mathematics, or whatever): that is, the axioms that the
subject must take for granted in its investigations. Natural philosophy
must begin from some starting points, and those starting points cannot
themselves be investigated from within the subject, but must be re-
ferred to a different discipline, a meta-discipline that investigates
whether the starting points were correct. This meta-discipline, Phi-
loponus tells us, is ‘first philosophy’.
This description of an architectonic metaphysics, charged with ques-
tioning the axioms of the physicist, does not exactly correspond with
Philoponus’ initial analysis of the three-fold divisions of theoretical
philosophy – into natural philosophy, theological philosophy, and
mathematical philosophy.4 Implicitly, one might suppose, that division