Simplicius of Cilicia

Simplicius (Greek Σιμπλίκιος Simplicius, latin Simplicius; * 490, † 560 ), a late ancient Greek philosopher was ( Neoplatonist ) in the Eastern Roman Empire. He emerged mainly as a commentator of Aristotle's writings, which he pointed Neoplatonic; according to a ruling in late antique Neoplatonism view he held Aristotle for a Platonist. In the Middle Ages his commentary on Aristotle achieved a significant aftereffect. His writings are valuable sources for earlier periods of Greek history of philosophy, especially for the time of the pre-Socratics.

• 4.1 Middle Ages
• 4.2 Modern Times

• 6.1 Authentic works
• 6.2 Comment on De anima (authenticity disputed )

Life

The Greek Simplicius was from Cilicia, a region on the southern coast of Asia Minor. He received his philosophical training, first in Alexandria, where the influential Neo-Platonist Ammonius Hermeiou was his teacher. How Ammonius was Simplicius among the adherents of the ancient Greek religion were the Christian state religion of the empire in opposition. Among the disciples of Ammonius were zealous representatives of pagan belief, but also Christians, because in Alexandria, efforts were made to teach a Neo-Platonism, which was also acceptable for this.

Later, Simplicius went to Athens, where the pagan Neoplatonist tradition sharply demarcated from their Christian environment. His teacher there was Damascius, who had also studied in Alexandria Ammonius and no later than 515 of the last conductor ( Scholarch ) of the Neo-Platonic school of philosophy in Athens was. This school, which was founded in Plutarch of Athens, claimed the tradition of the Platonic Academy continued. She stayed until the last refuge of a pagan religion, which was connected to the local philosophers inseparable from the Platonism. After the activities of the Neoplatonists in Athens had long been tolerated by the Christian emperors, came to a head under Emperor Justinian, the religious opposition to. In the year 529 ( or 531 ) under the Emperor said the pagan teaching, which led to the closure of the school. Simplicius, Damascius and five other philosophers decided to emigrate; probably in the spring of 532 they emigrated to the Persian Sassanid Empire. There they offered the throne in 531 Great King Chosroes I. refuge at his court; the monarch had the reputation, to be interested in Greek philosophy.

However, the philosophers were apparently soon disappointed by the conditions at the Persian court. As a peace between the Sassanids and the Oströmern was closed in the autumn of 532, was the Great King in one of the clauses of the peace treaty that philosophers return unmolested to the Eastern Roman Empire and there were allowed to hold on to their religious beliefs. In the same year left the Neoplatonists the kingdom Chosraus, which had remained alien to them.

Perhaps Simplicius now allowed in Carrhae down, one in the border area with the Persian Empire town, and founded a new Platonic school; this influential, first put forward by Michel Tardieu hypothesis is controversial. It is based on circumstantial evidence such as the fact that at the time of Simplicius, a very large part of the population still held in Carrhae at the pagan religion that the environment was so cheap. In favor of the hypothesis is also argued that there existed a Greek school of philosophy in the year 943, as is clear from a report by the scholar al - Mas'udi.

Simplicius wrote most of his works after returning from Persia, and thereby repeatedly inveighed against the Christian philosopher John Philoponus, who had studied with Ammonius as Simplicius Hermeiou; Simplicius said he could not remember to have seen his opponent ever in the classroom. When Simplicius died, is unknown; Allusions in his works, however, indicate that he may have been alive after 550.

Works

The very extensive, consisting exclusively of comments overall work of Simplicius has remained only partly preserved. The works received concern primarily to post writings of Aristotle ( Categories, Physics and On the Heavens ). These three comments are incurred only after returning from the Persian Empire and evidence of the erudition and intellectual brilliance of its author. The physics comment contains two digressions, which are referred to in modern research as a corollary de tempore ( " digression about the time " ) and corollary de loco ( " digression about the place "). Furthermore, Simplicius commented as Encheiridion (hand book ) spread version of the doctrinal discussions of the Stoic Epictetus. The Encheiridion treated principles of ethics, which belonged in the Neoplatonic teaching for propaedeutic.

These comments are among the most valuable sources for the history of ancient philosophy. In contrast to many other Neoplatonic comment works there are not transcripts of students from courses, but entirely formulated by the author texts. They contain a wealth of quotations from a lost older literature, with Simplicius grapples, and representations of philosophical doctrines, is passed down through the otherwise little or nothing: In the 7th and 8th century, when Ostrom in the wake of the Islamic expansion existential in a crisis was, most of the works of ancient Greek philosophy should be lost; Simplicius, however, these texts were still ahead. In particular, a significant portion of the fragments of the Presocratics he is to thank; for Parmenides, he is the main source. Great is his importance as a mediator of ideas stoic and Peripatetic philosophers.

About the views of members of the Platonic Academy and Central and Neo-Platonists and Pythagoreans Simplicius also provides a number of important information. Some of his reports allow a reconstruction of the doctrines that were set forth in the lost writings of these authors.

Simplicius turns out to be conscientious commentator. It also takes account philological aspects by comparing manuscripts and text-critical efforts undertakes. As characteristics of a good commentator on Aristotle he calls impartiality and familiarity not only with the annotated script, but with the complete works of Aristotle and of expression; Obedience to authority he declares to be inappropriate. He critically examines the arguments of Aristotle apart, he takes part, partly rejects. He also reported on the views of previous commentators such as Alexander of Aphrodisias and Iamblichus of Chalcis and examined them on their merits. He called Eudemus of Rhodes as the best commentator on Aristotle.

A commentary of Simplicius to the first book of Euclid's Elements was in the Middle Ages, in an Arabic translation, have been preserved from the excerpts; the original Greek text is lost. Do not get are his comments on the Meteorologica of Aristotle and a font of Iamblichus on the Pythagoreans. Furthermore, there is evidence that Simplicius wrote comments on Plato's dialogue Phaedo and the Techne of the rhetorician Hermogenes of Tarsus.

In a Scholion two verses of Simplicius have survived.

Traditionally, Simplicius is also attributed to a commentary on Aristotle's " On the Soul " ( De anima ). In more recent research, however, dominates the view that this work does not come from him. Controversial proposal, the unknown author (pseudo Simplicius ) with Priskianos Lydos is identified. Pseudo- Simplicius mentions two works that he has written: a commentary on the Metaphysics of Aristotle, and an excerpt from the physics of Theophrastus. These two writings were therefore counted earlier to the lost works of Simplicius.

Teaching

Simplicius is considered an important thinker. As in the late antique Neoplatonism usual, he tried to harmonize Platonic and Aristotelian philosophy. He thinks the objections of Aristotle against Plato's doctrines do not concern the substantive core, but only certain formulations. Even otherwise, it is based on a fundamental consensus of the various philosophical trends.

Natural philosophy

Aristotle 's view, the universe is not located in one place, for the sky was surrounded and limited, since there is no reality outside of heaven from nothing. Here he contradicts Simplicius with the argument that the circular motion of the heavenly bodies being local movements; the celestial sphere could move only when the sky is located in one place. Aristotle regarded the place as an outer shell at the boundary between the Comprehensive and included, which comes into contact with the surface of the object encompassed by it. For Simplicius, however, the place is a material, spread reality that includes all parts of a thing. As part of the category system, therefore the place is not attributable to an expansion and thus the category of quantity, but he should be identified as an extended ousia ( substance). At the same time the place for Simplicius the degree to which each body is allocating its proper position and also its parts arranged, and the principle of an ordered structure in the cosmos.

Simplicius strives depth to an understanding of the phenomenon of time. It summarizes the time as an image of Aion ( Eternity ). He also distinguishes between the physical time and a " first time", which he regarded as a condition of physical time. The physical time he determined as a measure of being the moved, the first time than that instance, which assigns the physical time and measured. The first time is flowing above the physical time, but is distinguishable from Aion. It is for Simplicius from its relation to the soul to understand because it is associated with the hypostasis soul as the principle of the unity and order. Therefore, it does not really belong to physics, but to metaphysics. Through the first time getting into becoming and MOVING its relative unit; the flowing time is not to convey by themselves capable of this unit and to organize the development of the wanderers themselves. The first time allows the flow of physical time and the regulated nature of the processes in it.

Simplicius attempts to resolve the time of Aristotle discussed the paradoxes ( paradoxes ). He thinks this is neither Aristotle nor any of the later thinkers succeeded. He justified the need for a resolution so that if they do not succeed, no one let convince them that the time exists. One of the paradoxes states that time does not exist, because their constituents do not exist. The past does not exist no more, the future, and the present has no extension. Had the presence of a stretch, so this would be partly passed, partly in the future. Thus, the presence would overlap with the past and the future and would therefore not different from them. Another paradox is that every moment must cease to exist, but it can in principle be no time at which this happens. Neither can the moment cease to exist, while it still exists, yet he can in the next moment cease to exist; a " next " moment there can not be, because without extension moments as well as geometric points are not adjacent to each other on a line.

A number of approaches can be considered to dispute about the reality of the time or the existence extensionless moments or, as it tries Damascius to work with the assumption of a " sudden " transition from one time to the next. Simplicius maintains its postulated by Aristotle existence of a continuous, non- quantized but arbitrarily divisible time. In his view, makes the orderly succession of arising and passing away of things from the time; a division of time into moments is just a mental construct. The exact cause of the paradox does Simplicius in the nature of the soul, their specific mode of being first enables you not have access to change and thus the time. Only by inspecting their own static nature can the soul understand the difference between their way of being and that of the rise and fall subject to things and thus understand the becoming and as such the time.

The possibility of instantaneous change includes Simplicius from the material world; qualitative changes he deems continuously. For a change of the substance by the appearance of a new form in a material substrate, although he takes instantaneous character, but he sees only the completion of a previously running continuous physical process.

Simplicius defended the Aristotelian doctrine of the indestructibility of the cosmos beginninglessness and against the position of Philoponus, which occurs as a Christian for a creation as starting time and for a future apocalypse. It also shares Aristotle's belief that the spatial extent of the universe is finite, and justifies this with both a geometric and a physical argument. Methodologically, there is a deeper contrast between Simplicius and Philoponus that Simplicius restricting the validity of mathematical principles in the physical world, which he finds in the cosmology of Philoponus rejects. It calls for an unobstructed transition from physics to their mathematical principles and, conversely, a full application of mathematical principles to the physics. This means that a target on the physics mathematical argument can not be invalidated by referring to properties of the physical reality.

Metaphysics and ethics

Simplicius turns against a dualistic thinking that the bad ( kakon ) allocates its own original principle. He argues against Manichaeism, a doctrine that represents the dualism especially distinct. He bases himself in terms of the Manichaean cosmology on information that he owes to verbal statements of a Manichaean. The evil has no ontological reality for him, there is no nature of evil. Among other things, he accuses the Manichaeans, that they do not like the Neoplatonists interpreted myths symbolically but literally interpret. In his opinion, all striving toward an actual or supposed good; Errors and wickedness of people are therefore the result of a lack of insight and not a perversion of the will. He argues the Manichaeans had not to consider God as the cause of evil, where evil into an independent principle. They would have claimed that the good have voluntarily mixed with the bad, exposed to its influence and even parts of abandoned definitely the adversary power. If this were the case, would the good as unwise, unfair, and thus prove to be bad.

Simplicius distinguishes three kinds of souls:

• Divine souls that never descend to earth and know no evil. They inhabit immortal bodies.
• Human souls that descend to the earth and then inhabit human bodies. This allows them to come into contact, they get one of their nature opposite disposition with the bad. If they do, however, "up" stop (beyond the sphere of the moon ), they are completely free of this evil. Simplicius dismisses the idea that some human souls definitely remain in the region of evil; rather, all must be able to return because their homes otherwise would be incomplete by a definitive loss of some of their components.
• Souls who stay always on the earth below. These are the souls of animals and plants. The plants experienced the evil souls as their bodies. In the souls of animals, there is a gradation according to the respective vicinity of the soul to the body, which is greater in lower animals. In some higher animal species, the experience of evil that human souls approaches, while the souls of the lower animals experience the evil physically similar to the plant souls.

Physical evil is not evil in the true sense of Simplicius. Mental - - ​​evil only at the level of the people and in a certain way even with some higher animals souls noticeable Therefore, real power. All evils are in principle limited to the region below the sphere of the moon, ie on the earth and the area between Earth and the Moon, where there is a rise and fall. Above them are heavenly regions of immortality, where everything bad is foreign.

The soul has Simplicius to an intermediate position between the world of pure being and that of pure becoming. She has fallen into the world of birth and death and is therefore subject to forgetting. Therefore, there it needs the seeing and hearing, because that she can remember the forgotten. For the purpose of knowledge, which is a reminder of forgotten ( anamnesis ), she has produced language after her fall and entering a body, so that instruction by a person who has already obtained a realization is possible. The policy aims to promote the efforts of the soul to recover their state before the Einkörperung; this effort is successful, the language is superfluous.

Reception

Middle Ages

A few decades after Simplicius came with the end of antiquity and the end of the Greek philosophy of the ancient world. Nevertheless, Simplicius was further rezipiert. In Arabic -speaking Simplicius was known as Sinbilīqiyūs. At least the comments on the categories and for the first book of Euclid's Elements were translated into Arabic; in the 10th century it led the scholar Ibn an - Nadim in his Kitāb al - Fihrist. He ranked among the Simplicius doing a mathematician and astronomer. The mathematician al - Nayrīzī ( 9th century ) quoted the Euclidean comment extensively in his own commentary on the elements. The work of al - Nayrīzīs in turn was translated in the 12th century by Gerard of Cremona into Latin; Gerhard gave the name of Simplicius as Sambelichius again. The writer ibn al - Qifṭī (1172-1248) described as Simplicius famous mathematician who had named after him successor, thus formed a school.

In the Latin -speaking scholarly world of the late Middle Ages only two writings of Simplicius were known: the comments on the categories and across the sky, which of Moerbeke in the 13th century Wilhelm translated from the Greek. Before Moerbeke already Robert Grosseteste had made a partial translation of the Commentary on On the Heavens. The comment to the categories used by scholars such as Thomas Aquinas, Henry of Ghent, Aegidius Romanus and John Duns Scotus, and so developed a significant effect. Duns Scotus thought it necessary, especially to point out that the judgment of reason, a higher rank fees as the authority of Simplicius; it is seen that the Aristotle commentary of Simplicius enjoyed an extraordinary reputation.

Modern Times

In the 15th century Cardinal Bessarion studied the comment to Across the sky; he had access to two manuscripts and tried to textual criticism. A native of Crete scholar Zacharias Kallierges edited in 1499 in Venice the categories commentary. Also in Venice a Latin translation of this work was published in 1540, which had made Guillelmus Dorotheus ( Guglielmo Doroteo ). The editio princeps of the Physics commentary appeared in 1526 as Aldine, Venice. In the same year arrived in Venice the first Greek edition of the Commentary on Across the sky out, which is, however, concerned a retranslation of the Latin version Moerbeke. It was not until 1865, the first edition of the Greek original text was published.

The interest in Epictetus comment awoke in the Renaissance, first within the Cardinal Bessarion, whose pupil Niccolò Perotti translated the introduction of Simplicius in Latin, and his translation of the "manual booklet " prefaced, which he dedicated to Pope Nicholas V in 1451. Angelo Poliziano recycled in 1479 the comment for his defense of the " little book hand " against the criticism of Bartolomeo Scala. Also for his Latin translation of " hand booklet " pulled Poliziano the comment zoom. Despite the early interest in this work of Simplicius in humanist circles, the first edition came out only in 1528 in Venice. 1546 published the scholar Angelo Canini ( Angelus Caninius ) in Venice the first complete Latin translation of this commentary; another, made ​​by Hieronymus Wolf, was printed for the first time in 1563 in Basel. A new edition of the Greek text, worried by Daniel Heinsius, appeared in 1639, 1640 and 1646 in Leiden.

Agostino Steuco frequently invoked in his 1540 published his De perenni philosophia ( "On the perennial philosophy " ) on the Epictetus comment.

In the 17th century the Epictetus Commentary found at the Cambridge Platonists attention: John Smith took this as a confirmation of his beliefs and Ralph Cudworth grappled with thoughts of Simplicius.

In modern times, the comments of Simplicius were initially estimated primarily as sources for the history of philosophy of earlier periods and for the ancient reception of Aristotle. Only in the last decades of the 20th century intensified the exploration of his own philosophy.

Spending (partly with translation )

• Johan Heiberg L. (ed.): Simplicii in Aristotelis de Caelo Commentaria. Georg Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1894 ( Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca vol 7; critical edition )
• Charles Veal ( Eds.): Simplicii in Aristotelis categorias Commentarium. Georg Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1907 ( Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca vol 8; critical edition )
• Hermann Diels (ed.): Simplicii in Aristotelis libros physicorum quattuor -priority Commentaria. Georg Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1882 ( Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca vol 9; critical edition )
• Hermann Diels (ed.): Simplicii in Aristotelis libros physicorum quattuor posterior Commentaria. Georg Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1895 ( Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca vol 10; critical edition )
• Ilsetraut Hadot (ed.): Simplicius: Commentaire sur le Manuel d' Epictète. Brill, Leiden 1996, ISBN 90-04-09772-4 ( critical edition with extensive introduction)
• Ilsetraut Hadot (ed.): Simplicius: Commentaire sur le Manuel d' Epictète. Les Belles Lettres, Paris 2001ff. ( critical edition with French translation ) Volume 1: Chapitres I- XXIX, 2001, ISBN 2-251-00493-9

• Michael Hayduck (ed.): Simplicii in libros Aristotelis de anima Commentaria. Georg Reimer Verlag, Berlin 1882 ( Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca vol 11; critical edition )

Translations

Authentic works

German

• Erwin Sonderegger: Simplicius: About time. A Commentary on the corollary de tempore. Cambridge University Press, Göttingen 1982, ISBN 3-525-25166-1, pp. 140-174 ( translation of corollary de tempore; digitized )

English

• Simplicius: Corollaries on Place and Time, translated by James O. Urmson, Duckworth, London 1992, ISBN 0-7156-2252-8
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Categories 1-4, translated by Michael Chase, Duckworth, London 2003, ISBN 0-7156-3197-7
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Categories 5-6, translated by Frans AJ de Haas and Barrie Fleet, Duckworth, London 2001, ISBN 0-7156-3037-7
• Simplicius: On Aristotle's "Categories 7-8 ", translated by Barrie Fleet, Cornell University Press, Ithaca ( NY) 2002, ISBN 0-8014-3839- X
• Simplicius: On Aristotle's "Categories 9-15 ", translated by Richard Gaskin, Cornell University Press, Ithaca (NY ), 2000, ISBN 0-8014-3691-5
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, On the Heavens 1.1-4, translated by Robert J. Hankinson, Duckworth, London 2002, ISBN 0-7156-3070-9
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, On the Heavens 1.5-9, translated by Robert J. Hankinson, Duckworth, London 2004, ISBN 0-7156-3231-0
• Simplicius: On Aristotle's "On the Heavens 1.10-12 ", translated by Robert J. Hankinson, Cornell University Press, Ithaca ( NY) 2006, ISBN 0-8014-4216-8
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, On the Heavens 2.1-9, translated by Ian Mueller, Duckworth, London 2004, ISBN 0-7156-3200-0
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, On the Heavens 2.10-14, translated by Ian Mueller, Duckworth, London 2005, ISBN 0-7156-3342-2
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Physics 2, translated by Barrie Fleet, Duckworth, London 1997, ISBN 0-7156-2732-5
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Physics 3, translated by James O. Urmson, Duckworth, London 2002, ISBN 0-7156-3067-9
• Simplicius: On Aristotle Physics 4.1-5, 10-14, translated by James O. Urmson, Duckworth, London 1992, ISBN 0-7156-2434-2
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Physics 5, translated by James O. Urmson, Duckworth, London 1997, ISBN 0-7156-2765-1
• Simplicius on Aristotle's Physics 6, translated by David Konstan, Cornell University Press, Ithaca ( NY), 1989, ISBN 0-8014-2238-8
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Physics 7, translated by Charles Hagen, Duckworth, London 1994, ISBN 0-7156-2485-7
• Simplicius: On Aristotle, Physics 8.6-10, translated by Richard McKirahan, Duckworth, London 2001, ISBN 0-7156-3039-3
• Simplicius: On Epictetus, Handbook 1-26, translated by Charles Brittain and Tad Brennan, Duckworth, London 2002, ISBN 0-7156-3068-7
• Simplicius: On Epictetus, Handbook 27-53, translated by Tad Brennan and Charles Brittain, Duckworth, London 2002, ISBN 0-7156-3069-5
• Simplicius: On Aristotle 's On the soul 3.1-5, translated by Henry J. Blumenthal. Duckworth, London 2000, ISBN 0-7156-2896-8

• Simplicius: Commentaire sur les Catégories. Traduction commentée, ed. Ilsetraut Hadot, Brill, Leiden 1990ff. Fascicule 1: Introduction, première partie, 1990, ISBN 90-04-09015-0
• Fascicule 3: Préambule aux Catégories. Commentaire au premier chapitre of Catégories, 1990, ISBN 90-04-09016-9

Latin ( medieval )

• Simplicius: Commentaire sur les Catégories d' Aristote. Traduction de Guillaume de Moerbeke, ed. Adriaan Pattin, 1971-1975 ( Critical Issue ) Vol 1 Publications Universitaires, Louvain 1971
• Vol 2 Brill, Leiden 1975, ISBN 90-04-04250-4

• Volume 1, ed. Fernand Bossier, 2004, ISBN 90-5867-404-5

Latin ( humanistic )

• Rainer Thiel, Charles Lohr ( Eds.): Simplicius: Commentarium in decem Categorias Aristotelis. Translated by Guillelmus Dorotheus. Reprint of the edition of Venice 1540. Frommann - Holzboog, Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt 1999, ISBN 3-7728-1220-1 ( with introduction)

Comment on De anima (authenticity disputed )

• Simplicius: On Aristotle 's On the Soul 1.1-2.4, translated by James O. Urmson, Cornell University Press, Ithaca ( NY) 1995, ISBN 0-8014-3160-3
• Priscian: On Theophrastus on Sense - Perception, with " Simplicius ": On Aristotle, On the Soul 2.5-12, translated by Pamela Huby, Carlos Steel, among others, Duckworth, London 1997, ISBN 0-7156-2752- X
• " Simplicius ": On Aristotle, On the Soul 3.1-5, translated by Henry J. Blumenthal, Duckworth, London 2000, ISBN 0-7156-2896-8