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Ammonius on Aristotle's Categories • Ammonius On Aristotle's Categories • Translated by S. Marc Cohen and Gareth B. Matthews I ~ Cornell University Press Ithaca, New York ~ Introduction © 1991 by Richard Sorabji Translation © 1991 by S. Marc Cohen and Gareth B. Matthews All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. Contents For information address Cornell University Press, 124 Roberts Place, Ithaca, New York 14850. • First published 1991 Cornell University Press. Introduction Richard Sorabji 1 7 Library ofCongress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Translation Ammonius, Hermiae. Prolegomena 9 [In Aristotelis De interpretatione commentarius. Latin & Greek Commentary 22 On Aristotle's categories / Ammonius : translated S. Marc Cohen 45 and Gareth B. Matthews. On Substance p. cm. - (Ancient Commentators on Aristotle) On Quantity 65 Translation of: In Aristotelis De interpretatione commentarius. On Relatives 76 Includes bibliographical references and indexes. 97 ISBN 0-8014-2688-X On Qualified and Quality 1. Aristotle. Categoriae. 2. Categories (Philosophy}-Early On Doing and Being Affected 112 works to 1800. I. Cohen, S. Marc. II. Matthews, Gareth B. On Opposites 113 III. Title. On Contraries 124 B438.A45 1991 126 16O--dc20 91-55258 On Priority On Simultaneity 127 On Change 128 Textual Emendations 130 73 if- 3'8 Appendix: the commentators 132 LJ.C::' English-Greek Glossary 142 , -' I '1 r Greek-English Index 145 SUbject Index 162 Printed in Great Britain Introduction .. Richard Sorabji Ammonius (AD 435/45-517/26) brought the ideas ofhis teacher Proclus from Athens to the chair of philosophy in Alexandria. He succeeded his father Hermeias in the chair, but he gave new life to it. His pupils included all the most important remaining Neoplatoni.st philosophers ofthe sixth century AD: Philoponus, Simplicius, Damascius, Asclepius and Olympiodorus. His father-in-law was Syrianus and his brother Heliodorus. The Categories commentary, translated here, is described as being written up by pupils from the voice of, that is from the seminars of, Ammonius. Only one of the commentaries surviv­ ing in his name, that on the de lnterpretatione, is not so described. He is the first author to hand down to us the set of ten introductory questions about the study of Aristotle which thereafter are standardly prefixed to Neoplatonist commen­ taries on Aristotle's Categories, We know from elsewhere that the set of ten was already laid down by Proclus in his Sun­ anagnosis (readingofa text with a master),1 There follows a set of particular questions about the treatise to be commented on, in this case the Categories. Some of these questions are repeated when Ammonius comes to comment on the categories ofrelative and quality.2 Perhaps the most important question is the point of studying Aristotelian Philosophy. The aim is to ascend to the supreme 1 Elias in Cat. 107,24-6. For this and other information, see Richard Sorabji (ed.l Aristotle Transformed: The Ancient Commentators and Their Influence. London and Ithaca N.Y. 1990. 266,5; 80,15. 1 2 Introduction Introduction 3 Neoplatonist God, the One.3 This will be made possible by a substance that has matter as well as form.l0 But as to reading of Aristotle and Plato, culminating in Plato's two Porphyry's idea that Aristotle is talking about words which supposedly theological works, the Timaeus (on the second signify things through the medium of concepts, Ammonius God, the divine Intellect) and the Parmenides (on the One). claims that Aristotle is talking about all three: words, things Ammonius' belief in the One is clearly expessed in this and concepts.11 Hence Ammonius sometimes describes him as passage and again In 36,25, where he gives the standard talking about things,12 sometimes as talking about words.13 Neoplatonist view that one can speak only negatively of it, Where Aristotle uses two different expressions, 'said of' and 'is SaYIng what it is not. This commitment to the One is present in', Ammonius suggests that he employs the first important, because Ammonius was accused of making some expression ('said of ') to show that he is talking about words disgraceful compromise with the Christian authorities in which are said, while he employs 'is' to show that he is talking Alexandria.4 And one of the reasons why the pagan about things.14 Universals are merely said of individuals, Neoplatonist school lasted so much longer in Alexandria than because they do not depend on individuals for their being.15 in Athens has been thought to be that the Alexandrians were Aristotle also describes himself at 2a12 as talking about what closer to Christian monotheism, having abandoned the is said to be the most primary substance, because according to supreme One, in favour of the Creator-Intellect.5 It is clear, Ammonius, Aristotle's own view coincides with Plato'S, that it however, that Ammonius accepted the One in addition to the is universals, not these perceptible individuals, that are really Intellect and was free to express his belief. the primary substances.16 Ammonius reveals his own view on the reinterpretations of Ammonius does not at all endorse Iamblichus' interpreta­ Aristotle's Categories which Porphyry and Iamblichus had tion, according to which Aristotle's account of substance does devised, in order to protect the work from Plotinus' criticisms. after all apply to higher realities such as the Platonic Forms Plotinus' major complaint was that Aristotle's scheme of and the divine Mind in which they are lodged. Nor yet does categories took no account of Platonic Forms. Porphyry's reply Aristotle's account apply to Universal SOUL17 The entities to was that the work was designed for beginners, and therefore which Ammonius here refers, the Universal Soul and Forms was not intended to be about real things, but only about words inhering in a divine Mind, are all derived, of course, from the insofar as they signify things. Iamblichus went further: Platonist, not the Aristotelian, tradition. Aristotle's accounts of the various categories do apply, and Ammonius evidently sides with the view, which became apply first and f01'emost, to the Platonic Forms and to things standard from Porphyry onwards, that there is fairly at that higher level.6 substantial harmony between Plato and Aristotle. He does In Ammonius, we find agreement with Porphyry that the not, however, in his section on the qualities required of a Categories is designed for beginners.7It is therefore concerned commentator,18 go as far as his pupil Simplicius, who in a not with Platonic Forms, but with things perceptible to the corresponding passage makes it one of the commentator's senses8and familiar to the masses,9inter alia with the kind of duties to display the harmony of Plato and Aristotle in most things. What Ammonius does say in this section is that the 36,9. commentator must be dispassionate about Aristotle and not 4 Damascius, Life ofIsidore 250,2; 251,12-14. 5 Karl Praechter, 'Richtungen und Schulen im Neuplatonismus', Genethliakon fUr act as ifhe was paid to prove him right at every point.19 Carl Robert, Berlin 1910, 105-55, with reply by Koenraad Verrycken, ch. 10 in Ammonius has a splendid explanation for Aristotle's Aristotle Transformed. 6 For the evidence, see P. Hadot, 'The harmony of Plotinus and Aristotle according obscurity of style. The obscurity is deliberately designed so to Porphyry', translated in Aristotle Transformed ch.6, from the French of Platina e il Neoplatonismo in Oriente e in Occidente, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Rome 10 34,5; 45,22. 11 9,17ff. 12 18,16. 13 26,23; 93,9. 14 26,23. 1974,31-47. 15 40,19-21; cf. 26,12-14. 16 36,13-14. 17 37,1-22. 736,11; 53,6; 55,12. 833,25; 41,10. 933,25. 18 8,11-19; cf. Simplicius in Cat. 7,23-32. 19 8,15-18. .~ 4 Introduction Introduction 5 that 'good people for that reason may stretch their minds even in something (in Socrates), not as a part (of Socrates), and more, whereas empty minds that are lost through careless­ that it cannot exist separately from what it is in.28 But in that ness will be put to flight by the obscurity when they encounter case, why will not form be an accident of matter? And sentences like these'.2o Ammonius also has to discuss the conversely, will not Socrates' fragrance fail to be an accident number and state of the manuscripts and the authenticity of of him, since it exists separately from him when it floats off 21 the work. He does not, like many modern scholars, suspect into the surrounding air?29 the authenticity of chapters 10-15, but he does think their There are other problems too. If there is a category of positioning requires discussion. He also has occasion to passion to match that of action, why not one of being had to explain how Greek grammar sometimes followed different match that of having?30 Where do points and privations fit in rules nine hundred years earlier in the time of Plato and the scheme?31 Are the differentiae which differentiate kinds 22 Aristotle. of substance themselves substances?32 Since place and time Ammonius imports not only Platonist, but also Pytha­ fall under the category of quantity, how do the separate gorean, ideas into his commentary on Aristotle. He thinks, for categories of where and when relate to them?33 In fact, it example, that the numbers 4 and 10 have a special turns out that the first four categories are the basic ones, in 23 significance.
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