Abstract
AbstractThe political outlook of the so-called ‘Anonymus Iamblichi’ (DK 89) has been a subject of controversy in the scholarly literature, with some commentators judging him to be a committed democrat, while others see in him a partisan of aristocracy or even oligarchy. This disagreement is not surprising, for the text contains passages that seem to pull in opposite directions. The article suggests that we move beyond the one-dimensional oligarch-or-democrat model traditionally employed and instead approach the issue from a fresh angle, applying the more nuanced typology for understanding ancient social criticism (‘rejectionist’ vs ‘immanent’) developed by Josiah Ober.The article begins by situating the author within the social landscape of classical Athens. The resulting characterization presents the author as a representative of a distinctive social type: the Athenian ‘rich quietist’, who prefers private economic endeavours to engagement in public affairs, and who is ideologically committed to democratic government but also highly critical of how democratic society treats its wealthy citizens. This characterization helps make better sense of the seemingly contradictory political indications in the text. In particular, fragments 6 and 7 should be read as a single line of argument, which takes the form of an ‘immanent critique’ of contemporary Athenian democracy. According to ‘Anonymus Iamblichi’, democratic society rightly praises the rule of law as a distinctive democratic value, but it falls disappointingly short of that ideal in its treatment of its own wealthy elite citizens.
Highlights
The article begins by situating the author within the social landscape of classical Athens
The political outlook of the so-called ‘Anonymus Iamblichi’ (DK 89) has been a subject of controversy in the scholarly literature, with some commentators judging him to be a committed democrat, while others see in him a partisan of aristocracy or even oligarchy
The resulting characterization presents the author as a representative of a distinctive social type: the Athenian ‘rich quietist’, who prefers private economic endeavours to engagement in public affairs, and who is ideologically committed to democratic government and highly critical of how democratic society treats its wealthy citizens
Summary
Few writers from antiquity have had such a wide array of political viewpoints and party affiliations ascribed to them as the anonymous Greek author traditionally referred to as the ‘Anonymus Iamblichi’ (89 DK)—literally ‘Iamblichus’ unnamed author’, because his work has been preserved for us in the form of seven extended but unmarked citations by the late third- and early fourth-century C.E. philosopher Iamblichus in his Protreptikos.[1]. As the above cases show, the traditional approach to the question of the political orientation of the author has taken the form of an attempt to place him somewhere on a linear political spectrum ranging from ‘full-blown oligarch’ to ‘die-hard supporter of democracy’. The problem with this one-dimensional approach is not just that the labels commonly used in order to specify the author’s exact position on the spectrum (‘democrat’, ‘moderate’, ‘conservative’, ‘oligarch’) are seldom clearly defined and not informative.
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