DOCSLIB.ORG

Ancient Philosophy

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Ancient Philosophy Lecture Outline I. Raphael’s “The School of Athens” II. What has Athens to do with Jerusalem? III. The Nature & Outline History of Greek Philosophy IV. This Course Ancient Philosophy 1. Introduction Renaissance Rome • On 18 August 1503, Pope Alexander VI, the Borgia pope, died after leading a life characterized by greed, lust, & murder. • Despite his manifest vices, Pope Alexander was a generous patron of the arts. Among other projects, he had commissioned Pinturicchio’s paintings for the Borgia Apartments in the Vatican Palace. I. Raphael’s “The School of Athens” • Shortly after Pope Alexander’s death Giuliano della Rovere, long a rival of Alexander, was elected Pope as Julius II. • Julius refused to allow the Borgia Apartments to become the Papal residence. Instead, he decided to decorate several rooms in the floor above. • Thus it was that Cardinal Tommasso Inghirami, his librarian, programmed & Raffaello Sanzio executed the frescoes for Julius’ library, a room that has come to be known as the Stanza della Segnatura. Pope Julius’ Library (The Stanza della Segnatura) Principles of Interpretation • There are at least three approaches one could take to discussing these paintings: 1. The aesthetic—How did Raphael fit those figures so neatly into the space available? What use did he make of color? 2. The historical—Why does that historical figure have Leonardo’s face? Why did Raphael add in a figure that looks like Michelangelo late in the work? 3. The hermeneutic—What ideas does the painting express? • This lecture will offer an hermeneutic interpretation of the painting. Philosophy - There is much difference of opinion among experts on the details. Here, I rely on Poetry!! Jurisprudence • Giovanni Reale, La Scuola di Atene di Raffaello • Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier, Raphael’s Stanza della Segnatura Theology - The painting offers a Platonic interpretation of the history of Greek philosophy. • With this also, there is room for disagreement. “The School of Athens” Organization of the Room • This room was intended as a library. – The four paintings reflect a Renaissance librarian’s way of classifying books. • But it was not a haphazard classification. We can use it to reflect on the relation among the subjects represented. Revealed Rational Beauty Goodness Truth Truth The Sophists Plato Aristotle Strabo & The Socratics Ptolemy Theology Philosophy Poetry Law “The Adoration of the “The Knowledge of Sacrament” Causes” The “Parnassus” “Jurisprudence” [Popularly [“Popularly ‘The “Disputation”] School of Athens’] Orphic Mysteries Heraclitus Empedocles Pythagoras Euclid The Overall Organization of The Orphic Roots of Philosophy “The School of Athens” • Philosophy itself with Plato & Aristotle at the center. • Platonic Texts – The point here is harmonization, not contrast. “I conceive that the founders of the mysteries had a real – Plato focuses on divine matters meaning and were not mere triflers when they intimated in a figure long ago that he who passes unsanctified and • though the book he carries, the Timaeus, is, more than most of his others, uninitiated into the world below will live in a slough, but concerned with explaining the natural world. that he who arrives there after initiation and purification will – Aristotle explains natural matters dwell with the gods. For ‘many,’ as they say in the mysteries, • though the book he carries, the Ethics, ends by commending the contemplative life ‘are the thyrsus bearers, but few are the mystics.’”—Phaedo (as the one centered on the most godlike of human activities). 69c • He does not carry, say, The Gaits of Animals. “And they produce a host of books written by Musaeus and • Philosophy & Mathematics Orpheus … according to which they perform their ritual.”— – Plato is said to have placed above the entry of his Academy a motto, “Let no one Republic 364e ignorant of geometry enter here.” • The effect of Orphism on philosophy – In the painting, the mathematical arts are at the foundation of the steps leading to – Orphism offered a new anthropology (in contrast to the Homeric one), in which man philosophy: is identified, not with his body, but with his soul. • On the left, arithmetic (represented by Pythagoras) & its application, music – It emphasized the importance of a kind of purification which will make possible, not (harmonics). reincarnation, but an afterlife with the gods. • On the right, geometry (represented by Euclid) & its application, astronomy (& geography). • Modern collections of texts (Diels, Kirk & Raven) often begin with a section on Orphic religion. The Importance of Pythagoras The Exclusion of the Sophists (on this Interpretation of the History of Philosophy) • Pythagoras forms a bridge between Orphism & Plato. The Sophists make no contribution to the purification of the soul. (Note the way they are depicted with books.) – Stage #1 (Orphism): “Can it be, Hippocrates, that the Sophist is really a • Purification of the human soul (person) by magical ritual. sort of merchant or dealer in provisions on which a soul is nourished? For such is the view I take of him. – Stage #2 (Pythagoreanism): “With what, Socrates, is a soul nourished? • Pythagoreanism is a kind of (community) life including ritual “With doctrines, presumably, I replied. And we must prescriptions & proscriptions. take care, my good friend, that the Sophist, in commending his wares, does not deceive us, as both • But purification comes more through arithmetico-geometric knowledge than merchant and dealer do in the case of our bodily food. through magical rituals (& through music, whose harmonies have arithmetic For among the provisions, you know, in which these men deal, not only are they themselves ignorant roots). what is good or bad for the body, since in selling they commend them all, but the people who buy from them are so too, unless one happens to be a trainer or a doctor. And in the same way, those who – Stage #3 (Socrates) take their doctrines the round of our cities, hawking them about to any odd purchaser who desires • Plato’s early dialogs show Socrates’ life as a search for wisdom. them, commend everything that they sell, and there may well be some of these too, my good sir, who – Stage #4 (Plato) are ignorant which of their wares is good or bad for the soul; and in just the same case are the people who buy from them, unless one happens to have a doctor’s knowledge here also, but of the soul. So • Plato’s later dialogs (Phaedo, Republic) show a concern with purification through then, if you are well informed as to what is good or bad among these wares, it will be safe for you to knowledge (of the Forms), &c. buy doctrines from Protagoras or from anyone else you please: but if not, take care, my dear fellow, that you do not risk your greatest treasure on a toss of the dice.”—Plato, Protagoras 313 cd Portrayed here, probably Gorgias (center) & Protagoras (left). Apollodorus, one of the friends of Socrates, tells them that they do not belong in the painting. The Socratics The Euclideans • Socrates • Alcibiades • Euclid (fl. late C3 or early C2 BC) “a flamboyant aristocrat, … – His Elements [of geometry & number theory] was a competent military leader & a taught in schools until C19. master of intrigue, [whose] per- • Ptolemy (C2 AD) & Strabo (C1) [or Zoroaster?] sonal ambition & the excesses of [whose] private life aroused the – Ptolemy’s Almagest summarized & contributed to distrust of the Athenians” geocentric astronomy. It was superseded only in —Oxford Classical Dictionary C16–17. [Note his role in Plato’s Symposium.] – Both made important contributions to astronomy & • Xenophon geography. Ptolemy was the first to project a sphere –“They say that Socrates met him in a narrow lane, and put his stick across it and onto a plane. prevented him from passing by, asking him where all kinds of necessary things were sold. And when he had answered him, he asked him again where men where made good and virtuous. And as he did not know, he said, ‘Follow me, then, and learn.’ And from this time forth, Xenophon became a follower of Socrates.”—Diogenes Laërtius, Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers –He later wrote dialogues about Socrates, which are still extant. • Crito –“a wealthy & devoted friend of Socrates” [OCD]. –He plays a major role in the trial & death dialogues. Wisdom in Story: The Point of Studying This Painting W. Somerset Maugham’s “Appointment in Samarra” • Cultural literacy Death speaks: • A contrast with philosophy: The painting requires reading & analysis, as does “There was a merchant in Baghdad who sent his servant to market to a philosophical text, but … buy provisions and in a little while the servant came back, white and – In the hermeneutic analysis of the painting, there is a prevalence of trembling, and said, ‘Master, just now when I was in the market-place I association over argument. was jostled by a woman in the crowd and when I turned I saw it was Death that jostled me. She looked at me and made a threatening • A kind of wisdom comes from association—suggestive juxtaposition. gesture; now, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city – In philosophy, the key is arguments. and avoid my fate. I will go to Samarra and there death will not find • Wisdom might also be presented in story, poem, or aphorism me.’ The merchant lent him his horse, and the servant mounted it, and (see next two slides). he dug his spurs in its flanks and as fast as the horse could gallop he • But in philosophy, the questions are: went. – to what extent do the authors rely on argument? “Then the merchant went down to the marketplace and he saw me – To what extent do they supplement or replace it with aphorism or standing in the crowd and he came to me and said, ‘Why did you make story? a threatening gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning?’ ‘That was not a threatening gesture,’ I said, ‘it was only a start of • This is not just a combination of individual portraits, but a painting unified by surprise.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Janson. History of Art. Chapter 16: The
    16_CH16_P556-589.qxp 12/10/09 09:16 Page 556 16_CH16_P556-589.qxp 12/10/09 09:16 Page 557 CHAPTER 16 CHAPTER The High Renaissance in Italy, 1495 1520 OOKINGBACKATTHEARTISTSOFTHEFIFTEENTHCENTURY , THE artist and art historian Giorgio Vasari wrote in 1550, Truly great was the advancement conferred on the arts of architecture, painting, and L sculpture by those excellent masters. From Vasari s perspective, the earlier generation had provided the groundwork that enabled sixteenth-century artists to surpass the age of the ancients. Later artists and critics agreed Leonardo, Bramante, Michelangelo, Raphael, Giorgione, and with Vasari s judgment that the artists who worked in the decades Titian were all sought after in early sixteenth-century Italy, and just before and after 1500 attained a perfection in their art worthy the two who lived beyond 1520, Michelangelo and Titian, were of admiration and emulation. internationally celebrated during their lifetimes. This fame was For Vasari, the artists of this generation were paragons of their part of a wholesale change in the status of artists that had been profession. Following Vasari, artists and art teachers of subse- occurring gradually during the course of the fifteenth century and quent centuries have used the works of this 25-year period which gained strength with these artists. Despite the qualities of between 1495 and 1520, known as the High Renaissance, as a their births, or the differences in their styles and personalities, benchmark against which to measure their own. Yet the idea of a these artists were given the respect due to intellectuals and High Renaissance presupposes that it follows something humanists.
    [Show full text]
  • Phenomenological Philosophy and Orthodox Christian Scientific Ecological Theology
    Indo-Pacific Journal of Phenomenology, Volume 8, Edition 2 September 2008 Page 1 of 9 Phenomenological Philosophy and Orthodox Christian Scientific Ecological Theology by Allan M Savage Abstract Contemporary philosophy, to be useful to Orthodox Christian theology, must capture the “essence” of the divine and human activity in the world in the scientific sense of Edmund Husserl. Scholastic philosophy is no longer an academically privileged supporter of theology in the interpretation of the universe. In its place, this paper suggests that phenomenological philosophy becomes the unique and transcendent partner, as it were, in the interpretive dialogue. The methodological thinking of Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger offers a way of philosophical understanding that is more satisfactory than the traditional scholastic metaphysics in giving meaning to contemporary human experience. A phenomenological eco-theological approach captures the essences of a subject’s immediate and holistic perception of the environment. A Phenomenological Eco-Theological Approach: As William James (1902/1958) pointed out, there are Capturing “Essences” a variety of religious experiences. To understand these various forms, we must capture the “essence” of This paper arose out of my studious attempt to both the divine and human activity in the world in the develop a comprehensive theological understanding scientific sense of Edmund Husserl. Currently, in of ecology within the Western theological tradition. addressing the essence of divine and human activity The Western tradition is rooted in scholastic in the contemporary world, Ünal (2005) identifies philosophy, which has proved unsatisfactory, and I theological phenomenology as one component in his thus undertook a phenomenological approach to my understanding of a practical and comprehensive studies.
    [Show full text]
  • Pope Benedict XVI on Faith and Reason
    Digital Commons @ Assumption University Philosophy Department Faculty Works Philosophy Department 2009 Pope Benedict XVI on Faith and Reason Daniel P. Maher Assumption College, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.assumption.edu/philosophy-faculty Part of the Philosophy Commons, and the Religion Commons Recommended Citation Maher, Daniel P. "Pope Benedict XVI on Faith and Reason." Nova et Vetera vol. 7 no. 3 (Summer 2009): 625-652. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Philosophy Department at Digital Commons @ Assumption University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Philosophy Department Faculty Works by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Assumption University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. t\'oi-<1 et Vt>tera, English Edition, Vol. 7, No. 3 (2009): 625-52 625 Pope Benedict XVI on Faith and R eason DANIEL P. MAHER Assu111p1io11 Colle)!e Wi>rcesrer, Massacltuselts T HE MOST widely noted aspect of Pope Benedict's speech at the University of Regensburg in September of 2006 has been his quotation of a brief passage from an otherwise obscure text chat, with "startling brusqueness," speaks ill of Islam. I The Holy Father stated that he found chis brusqueness "unacceptable," but, evidently, not so unacceptable as to preclude his quoting it. H is willingness to use the text has been judged still more unacceptable by large numbers of Muslims and non-Muslims alike. And this reaction in its various forms has diverted attention from and nearly ovenvhelmed the central message of the speech. That message focuses on the adequacy of human reason for coming co know God.
    [Show full text]
  • Hellenistic Philosophies and the Preaching of the Resurrection (Acts 17:18, 32)
    HELLENISTIC PHILOSOPHIES AND THE PREACHING OF THE RESURRECTION (ACTS 17:18, 32) by N. CLAYTON CROY Decatur, GA The Acts of the Apostles traces, somewhat sporadically, the advance of Christian missions from Jerusalem through Judea and Samaria, to Syria, Asia Minor, Greece, and ultimately to Rome, the political cen­ ter of the Mediterranean world. But long before the narrator reaches the great capital city, he describes the Gospel's encounter with certain pagan schools of thought in a Greek polis which in some respects could claim to be the cultural center of the Mediterranean world, Athens. This city's fame as the showpiece of Greek democracy had dimmed by the NT era, but Athens could still claim to be an important center of archi­ tecture, art, and philosophy. The dimension of philosophy is the chief concern of this paper. In Acts 17:16-34 Luke offers his account of Paul's brief missionary experience in Athens. The centerpiece of this passage is Paul's sermon before the Areopagus (vss. 22-31). This sermon's skilful composition starts with an acknowledgement of pagan piety, moves deftly through natural revelation, faint allusions to Jewish ideas and a quotation of Hellenistic poetry, and culminates with a message of eschatological judg­ ment highlighting the role of Christ and the significance of his resur­ rection.1 Such a combination of topoi and technique, along with the perception that Luke is here presenting a paradigm of Paul's mission­ ary preaching to Gentiles, has rightfully elevated this passage to one of celebrated status. With fame comes the attention of many expositors.
    [Show full text]
  • Hermeneutics of Creeds and Confessions: the Question of Continuity and Change
    start page: 99 Stellenbosch Theological Journal 2015, Vol 1, No 1, 99–123 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17570/stj.2015.v1n1.a5 Online ISSN 2226-2385 | Print ISSN 0028-2006 2015 © Pieter de Waal Neethling Trust Hermeneutics of creeds and confessions: The question of continuity and change Echeverria, EJ University of the Free State [email protected] Abstract Modern culture has not really rendered creeds and confessions untrue; far less has it rendered them unbiblical. But it has rendered them implausible and distasteful. They are implausible because they are built on old-fashioned notions of truth and language. They make the claim that a linguistic formulation of a state of affairs can have a binding authority beyond the mere text on the page that creeds actually refer to something and that that something has significance for all of humanity.1 Keywords History, Truth, Fallibilism Truth and its formulations, Propositional revelation. 1. The creedal and confessional imperative The Apostle Paul calls us to believe with one’s heart and to confess what one believes (Rom 10:9). This is a twofold Christian imperative – the creedal and confessional imperative – that is at the root of creeds and confessions of faith.2 Faith involves both the fides qua creditor – the faith with which one believes – and the fides quae creditur – the faith which one believes.3 Maximally, a biblical account of faith involves knowledge (notitia), assent (assensus), and trust (fiducia); indeed, these are three elements of a single 1 Trueman, Carl R, The Creedal Imperative (Wheaton, Illinois: Crossway, 2012), 48.
    [Show full text]
  • Taking Shape Before Our Eyes - WSJ
    6/16/2019 Taking Shape Before Our Eyes - WSJ BREAKING NEWS Gary Woodland wins the U.S. Open, capturing his irst major title after holding o a charge by two-time defending champion Brooks Koep This copy is for your personal, non­commercial use only. To order presentation­ready copies for distribution to your colleagues, clients or customers visit https://www.djreprints.com. https://www.wsj.com/articles/taking­shape­before­our­eyes­11560528609 MASTERPIECE Taking Shape Before Our Eyes With its energetic lines, full figures and thrilling sense of tactility, Raphael’s cartoon for his fresco ‘School of Athens’ is a breathtaking artwork in its own right. ‘School of Athens’ (1510), by Raphael PHOTO: VENERANDA BIBLIOTECA AMBROSIANA, MONDADORI PORTFOLIO By Cammy Brothers June 14, 2019 1210 p.m. ET The fame of Raphael’s “School of Athens,” painted between 1508 and 1510 for the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican, makes it almost impossible to actually see. One must endure the lines, the crush of humanity in the room itself and rushing by to get to the Sistine Chapel. Beyond this, like any work of art known through countless reproductions, it is difficult to approach with fresh eyes. What an extraordinary satisfaction, then, in the galleries of the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan, to see it in peace, albeit in another form. Since March, Raphael’s preliminary drawing, or cartoon, measuring over 25 feet across, has been on display in a newly designed room after a four-year restoration. Unlike the other large-scale surviving cartoons by Raphael at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, it can be seen up close, at eye level and behind nonreflective glass.
    [Show full text]
  • 5-3 Dean.Pdf
    Word & World 5/3 (1985) Copyright © 1985 by Word & World, Luther Seminary, St. Paul, MN. All rights reserved. page 269 The Dehellenization of the Religious Imagination WILLIAM DEAN Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, Minnesota I. THE UNSETTLING OF A SETTLED QUESTION Just after the death of William James, in an article entitled “Empiricism and Platonism in the Philosophy of Religion,” Ernst Troeltsch drew a sharp contrast between James’s empiricism and the Platonic “type of philosophy of religion which is traditional on the Continent of. Europe.”1 Troeltsch pronounced James’s empiricism an important and non-European interpretation of religion—one which offered several correctives for the European discussion of religion, correctives ignored, Troeltsch thought, only at the peril of European philosophy of religion. But Troeltsch decided that on the whole he could not follow James’s pluralism and empiricism; he had to stay with Platonistic rationalism and monism, and, of course, in this he typified the Europeans. He also set the course for American students of religion, who—except for an episode of “empirical theology” and then one form of process theology—not only ignored the Jamesian precedent, but continued to ape the Europeans, especially the Germans. Now, many decades after Troeltsch’s 1912 article, new social and intellectual developments may press American students of religion to reexamine the choice between empiricism and Platonism, and to ask whether to take again the turn Troeltsch took or to find new reasons for following James’s still-thorny route. The developments prompting a reconsideration of James’s American option are those social developments which have moved us all closer to pluralism.
    [Show full text]
  • Being of God: a Trinitarian Critique of Postmodern A/Theology
    RICE UNIVERSITY (DE)CONSTRUCTING THE (NON)BEING OF GHD: A TRINITARIAN CRITIQUE OF POSTMODERN A/THEOLOGY by B. KEITH PUTT A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY APPROVED, THESIS COMMITTEE Niels C. Nielsen, Jr.,Director Professor Emeritus of Philoso¬ phy and Religious Thought Werner H. Kelber Isla Carroll Turner and Percy E. Turner Professor of Reli¬ gious Studies Stjeven G. Crowell Associate Professor of Philoso¬ phy Houston, Texas May, 1995 Copyright B. Keith Putt 1995 ABSTRACT (DE) CONSTRUCTING THE (NON) BEING OF G8D: A TRINITARIAN CRITIQUE OF POSTMODERN A/THEOLOGY by B. KEITH PUTT Langdon Gilkey maintained in 1969 that theological language was in "ferment" over whether "God" could be ex¬ pressed in language. He argued that "radical theology," specifically the kenotic christology in Altizer's "death of God" theology, best represented that ferment. Some twenty- five years later, in the postmodern context of the 1990's, whether one can speak of God and, if so, how remain promi¬ nent issues for philosophers of religion and theologians. One of the most provocative contemporary approaches to these questions continues to focus on the "death of God." Mark Taylor's a/theology attempts to "do" theology after the divine demise by thinking the end of theology without ending theological thinking. Taylor's primary thesis, predicated upon his reading of Jacques Derrida's deconstruetive philos¬ ophy, is that God gives way to the sacred and the sacred may be encountered only within the "divine milieu" of writing. God is dead, the self is dead, history has no structure, and language cannot be totalized in books; consequently, theo¬ logy must be errant and textually disseminative.
    [Show full text]
  • Raphael's School of Athens: a Theorem in a Painting?
    Journal of Humanistic Mathematics Volume 2 | Issue 2 July 2012 Raphael's School of Athens: A Theorem in a Painting? Robert Haas Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm Part of the Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque Art and Architecture Commons, and the Geometry and Topology Commons Recommended Citation Haas, R. "Raphael's School of Athens: A Theorem in a Painting?," Journal of Humanistic Mathematics, Volume 2 Issue 2 (July 2012), pages 2-26. DOI: 10.5642/jhummath.201202.03 . Available at: https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/vol2/iss2/3 ©2012 by the authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License. JHM is an open access bi-annual journal sponsored by the Claremont Center for the Mathematical Sciences and published by the Claremont Colleges Library | ISSN 2159-8118 | http://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/ The editorial staff of JHM works hard to make sure the scholarship disseminated in JHM is accurate and upholds professional ethical guidelines. However the views and opinions expressed in each published manuscript belong exclusively to the individual contributor(s). The publisher and the editors do not endorse or accept responsibility for them. See https://scholarship.claremont.edu/jhm/policies.html for more information. Raphael's School of Athens: A Theorem in a Painting? Cover Page Footnote Acknowledgments: I thank Robert J. Kolesar, Professor of Mathematics at John Carroll University, and Jon L. Seydl, the Paul J. and Edith Ingalls Vignos, Jr., Curator of European Painting and Sculpture, 1500-1800, at the Cleveland Museum of Art, for their comments and encouragement on the manuscript.
    [Show full text]
  • A Case of Shifting Identities in Raphael's School of Athens
    Bridges 2011: Mathematics, Music, Art, Architecture, Culture Conjecture and Proof: A Case of Shifting Identities in Raphael’s School of Athens Katherine Smith Abbott and Stephen Abbott Department of the History of Art & Architecture and Department of Mathematics Middlebury College Middlebury, VT 05753 U.S.A. E-mail: [email protected] and [email protected] Abstract Perhaps the greatest challenge presented by Raphael‟s School of Athens is its potentially intentional ambiguity. Try as we might to secure identifications for the huddled philosophers massed in its soaring spaces, those identities have a way of shifting with the passage of time. A case in point is a relatively recent argument for Hypatia‟s inclusion in the painting. Inextricably linked to the complex program of the Stanza della Segnatura (the room in which it is located), and by extension, to the Neoplatonism of Julius II‟s papal court, Raphael‟s painting makes an awkward mirror for contemporary notions of mathematical achievement. By turns inspirational and controversial, Hypatia of Alexandria has captured the attention of historians and mathematicians since her “rediscovery” during the Enlightenment. In recent years, two fine biographies of Hypatia, one by Maria Dzielska (1995) the other by Michael Deakin (2007) have gone to great lengths to separate fact from fiction, and to assess her contributions to the field of mathematics. Alejandro Amenábar‟s 2010 film, Agora, likewise sought to introduce a modern audience to the historical figure of Hypatia. At the same time, an intriguing tradition has persisted, linking Hypatia to a figure at the lower left side of Raphael‟s painting of The School of Athens.
    [Show full text]
  • The Tübingen School
    chapter 14 The Tübingen School Vittorio Hösle Among so many interpretative approaches to Plato, as far as I can see, only one has been named after the town where it was developed: the Tübingen School.1 On the one hand, this is certainly due to the fact that the approach did not convince the whole community of Plato scholars; in fact, it has remained rela- tively isolated and was met, particularly in the Anglo-American world, mainly with skepticism if not outright hostility. On the other hand, the toponymic designation is an honor: unlike, say, the analytic approach to Plato, the new approach did not spread diffusely among many people but was the achieve- ment of a handful of scholars who worked as colleagues in the same small German university town, a town the importance of which for the development of early German Idealism and historical-critical theology is known across the world. The originality of the approach is thus comparatively much higher; and although originality is no warrant of truth, bold new conceptions deserve admiration even from those who do not accept them. At the end of his long critical review of the work of Krämer that inaugurated the school—a review to which I will return—Gregory Vlastos called attention to those entirely admirable qualities which make this book a remark- able performance: vigor of argument, boldness of conception, breadth 1 It is sometimes called the “Tübingen-Milan School”, since Giovanni Reale (1931–2014), who taught at the Università Cattolica in Milan, further developed the ideas of Krämer and Gaiser; his book Per una nuova interpretazione di Platone (Reale 1984) is the most exhaustive pre- sentation of Plato’s philosophy taking into account the unwritten doctrines.
    [Show full text]
  • Universi^ Micixsilms International
    INFORMATION TO USERS This reproduction was made from a copy of a document sent to us for microfilming. While the most advanced technology has been used to photograph and reproduce this document, the quality of the reproduction is heavily dependent upon the quality of the material submitted. The following explanation of techniques is provided to help clarify markings or notations which may appear on this reproduction. 1. The sign or “target” for pages apparently lacking from the document photographed is “Missing Page(s)” . If it was possible to obtain the missing page(s) or section, they are spliced into the film along with adjacent pages. This may have necessitated cutting through an image and duplicating adjacent pages to assure complete continuity. 2. When an image on the film is obliterated with a round black mark, it is an indication of either blurred copy because of movement during exposure, duplicate copy, or copyrighted materials that should not have been filmed. For blurred pages, a good image of the page can be found in the adjacent frame. If copyrighted materials were deleted, a target note will appear listing the pages in the adjacent frame. 3. When a map, drawing or chart, etc., is part of the material being photographed, a definite method of “sectioning” the material has been followed. It is customary to begin filming at the upper left hand comer of a large sheet and to continue from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. If necessary, sectioning is continued again-beginning below the first row and continuing on until complete.
    [Show full text]