Philoponus

Abstract

John of Alexandria or John the Grammarian, known as John Philoponus (c. 490s–570s), was a philosopher and theologian in 6th-century Alexandria. He first wrote on language, for example on words the meaning of which changes by accent alone, and studied philosophy with Ammonius, son of Hermias and a student of Proclus (411–485). The nickname “lover of toil” might refer to Philoponus’ industriousness, but the epithet was also used of the members of a Christian guild or brotherhood. While Philoponus’ early studies on language are considered as philosophically unimportant, his commentaries and critical treatises show independence and critical acumen, and some of his central contributions have even been taken to anticipate Galileo’s and Descartes’s views. Philoponus started his philosophical career as a commentator on Aristotle, often writing on the basis of the lectures of his teacher Ammonius. However, he grew increasingly independent and took distance from Aristotle and from the Neoplatonism of Ammonius and Proclus. Philoponus’ most famous innovations in philosophy include the arguments for the creation of the universe ex nihilo, the new analysis of prime matter as three-dimensional extension, the explanation of projectile motion by impressed force (later to be called impetus), and the rejection of the fifth element as the matter of celestial bodies that allowed him to use a unified model for explaining both celestial and sublunary motion. As a Christian theologian, Philoponus understood the central notions of the Trinitarian controversy in agreement with the philosophical tradition. He combined this analysis with what has been called his “particularist ontology” according to which universal natures are abstractions and exist only in thought and the Monophysite interpretation of Christ having one nature that is a composite of humanity and divinity. Although Philoponus managed to produce a consistent solution to the problem of the Trinity, his view was interpreted as tritheistic, i.e., as introducing three Godheads to the Trinity, and condemned as heretic in Constantinople (680–681). While the anathema probably decreased Philoponus’ impact in the Christian West in the centuries after his death, his arguments about creation and eternity were influential in the Islamic world, and many Renaissance thinkers recognized his effect on them. In general, it is perhaps somewhat ironic that Philoponus is celebrated as a forerunner of modern natural science while his central innovations are in agreement with Christian doctrine.