Commentary Tradition Research Articles

Aphra Behn’s “Emperor of the Moon” and Its French Source “Arlequin, Empereur dans la lune.” Ed. and trans. Judy A. Hayden and Daniel J. Worden.

<i>Aphra Behn’s “Emperor of the Moon” and Its French Source “Arlequin, Empereur dans la lune.”</i> Ed. and trans. Judy A. Hayden and Daniel J. Worden.

Calcidius on Plato’s Timaeus: Greek Philosophy, Latin Reception, and Christian Contexts by Gretchen Reydams-Schils

Reviewed by: Calcidius on Plato’s Timaeus: Greek Philosophy, Latin Reception, and Christian Contexts by Gretchen Reydams-Schils Sara Ahbel-Rappe REYDAMS-SCHILS, Gretchen. Calcidius on Plato’s Timaeus: Greek Philosophy, Latin Reception, and Christian Contexts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 2020. 232 pp. Cloth, $99.99; paper and eBook, $29.99 This carefully written study is the first to address in its entirety the fourth-century Latin commentary on Plato’s Timaeus by the otherwise unknown Calcidius. The commentary appears together with a partial translation of the dialogue (“The translation goes up to 53c and the commentary covers the section from 31 to 53c”). In framing this work as part of the Platonic commentary tradition, Reydams-Schils moves us beyond the misunderstanding that the work is a paraphrase of now lost sources (primarily Porphyry and/or Nemesius). She treats the commentary as an original composition by an independent thinker steeped in middle Platonic, stoic, and even Aristotelian philosophy. As such, the work, alongside that of Cicero, Boethius, Macrobius, and Martianus Capella, is one of the crucial conduits for the transmission of Platonism to the Latin West. Reydams-Schils offers an evenhanded assessment of the text’s central arguments. Her immense erudition and meticulous research, together with fine-grained readings of the text in the original Latin, are everywhere in evidence. The book also relies on two decades’ worth of her own writing about and exploration of the intellectual world of this dialogue in concert with other scholars. The book falls into three parts: part 1 gives us a roadmap of the commentary; part 2 assesses the importance of its philosophical themes; and part 3 places Calcidius’s work alongside his reading of stoic, Peripatetic, middle Platonic, and Christian sources. By the end of the volume, we come away with a rich knowledge of Calcidius’s project together with a deeper understanding of what has been called eclecticism in the context of middle Platonic philosophy. As Reydams-Schils shows, [End Page 396] this work should not be taken as sharing in the late antique Neoplatonic milieu that characterizes Proclus or even Boethius, for example. Instead, Calcidius’s commentary develops as an original interpretation of the meaning of Platonism and especially of Plato’s doctrines of creation. The heart of the commentary, as Reydams-Schils unfolds it, relates to the theme of universal providence, an emphasis that has Calcidius reading the Timaeus primarily as an ethical work. In his articulation of how providence works in the world, Calcidius transgresses in fundamental ways the root division that runs through the original dialogue, between the works of intelligence and the works of necessity, between the intelligent cause and the errant cause (Timaeus 47e). Reydams-Schils writes, “the notion [of providence] is so important for Calcidius that he in effect rewrites Plato’s account in crucial passages to make room for it.” She pays attention to how Calcidius (deliberately?) mistranslates Plato’s Greek and thus insinuates his own version of the creation story to accord with a doctrine that borrows a great deal from the Stoic understanding of divine providence. Thus, for example, Calcidius has prouidae mentis intellectus instituit for the Greek “τὰ δία νοῦ δεδημιουργημένα,” where the original Greek entirely lacks any mention of providence. The longest and most theoretically sophisticated section of the commentary forms a subtreatise on the topic of matter (a word that Calcidius admits does not occur in Plato’s text). Reydams-Schils neatly connects the philosophy of providence that Calcidius earlier weaves together through his understanding of the function of the world soul with his philosophy of matter. She shows how Calcidius leans heavily on the stoic delineation of matter as a passive substance in order to circumvent the resistance or even recalcitrance of Plato’s receptacle, by describing matter as “a providential form of obedience in necessity found upon reason.” Strange words for a Platonist, indeed. The third part of the book is a judicious review of previous scholarship on Calcidius’s sources, his dependence on (actually, to a great extent, Reydams-Schils demonstrates, independence from) them, together with a survey of issues surrounding the possible religious identity of Calcidius. (There is no reason to think he is Christian, according to Reydams...

Summistae. The Commentary Tradition on Thomas Aquinas’ ‘Summa Theologiae’ from the 15th to the 17th centuries, edited by Lidia Lanza &amp; Marco Toste. Leuven University Press: Leuven (Ancient and Medieval Philosophy – Series 1‑ LVIII), 2021, 447 pp.

Summistae. The Commentary Tradition on Thomas Aquinas’ ‘Summa Theologiae’ from the 15th to the 17th centuries, edited by Lidia Lanza &amp; Marco Toste. Leuven University Press: Leuven (Ancient and Medieval Philosophy – Series 1‑ LVIII), 2021, 447 pp.

Religious ‘Slogans’ in 1 Corinthians: Wit, Wisdom, and the Quest for Status in a Roman Colony

Abstract First Corinthians contains a number of well-known maxims, commonly called ‘slogans’ in the commentary tradition, but which Paul’s contemporaries would have called sententiae (Gk. γνῶμαι). A handful of these appear to have been coined by rival teachers at Corinth. Others have obviously been composed by Paul himself, often in direct response to his competitors. Commentators have long studied these ‘slogans’, especially those attributable to Paul’s rivals, for information about the Corinthian assembly. But why sententiae in the first place? And why at Corinth and not, say, at Paul’s earlier foundation at Thessalonica? The answer to these neglected questions lies in the essential role sententiae came to play in the elite rhetoric of Paul’s day, rhetoric Paul first confronted at Corinth. Paul would always lack the education to match the easy eloquence of his cultural betters. But he could with effort imitate their genus dicendi or way of speaking in his written correspondence, which he first attempts in 1 Corinthians. The mixed result is neatly summarized in 2 Corinthians 10:10: ‘His letters, they say, are weighty and strong; nevertheless, his physical presentation is weak and his speech contemptible’. Readers of Paul’s Corinthian letters do well to consider his cultural precarity.

Matters of Empire in American Humor: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Matters of Empire in American Humor: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Matters of Empire in American Humor: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Matters of Empire in American Humor: An Introduction to the Special Issue

Gendered Comic Traditions: How Fanny Fern's Satire Subverts Nineteenth-Century Colonial Continuity and Enables Twenty-First Century Neocolonial Hybridity

Abstract This article offers examples from the antebellum period that bear out Judith Lee's matters of empire framework; it exposes the ways in which American humor both continues and breaks away from its English antecedents, showing in particular how Sara Willis Parton as Fanny Fern does and does not fit into aesthetic and philosophical parameters about satire and satirists that can be traced back to English periodicals. After outlining a colonial continuity through a discussion of Parton and two contemporaries, Lewis Gaylord Clark and William Makepeace Thackeray, I go on to suggest that Parton's Fanny Fern persona also functions as a symbolic origin for a genealogy of women satirists who evoke Hélène Cixous's image of a laughing Medusa, a genealogy I describe as a neocolonial hybrid because it details American women writing satire to mock and resist the domestic imperium of US patriarchy.

From Blackface to Black Twitter: Reflections on Black Humor, Race, Politics, and Gender

From Blackface to Black Twitter: Reflections on Black Humor, Race, Politics, and Gender

From Blackface to Black Twitter: Reflections on Black Humor, Race, Politics, and Gender

From Blackface to Black Twitter: Reflections on Black Humor, Race, Politics, and Gender

Gendered Comic Traditions: How Fanny Fern's Satire Subverts Nineteenth-Century Colonial Continuity and Enables Twenty-First Century Neocolonial Hybridity

Abstract This article offers examples from the antebellum period that bear out Judith Lee's matters of empire framework; it exposes the ways in which American humor both continues and breaks away from its English antecedents, showing in particular how Sara Willis Parton as Fanny Fern does and does not fit into aesthetic and philosophical parameters about satire and satirists that can be traced back to English periodicals. After outlining a colonial continuity through a discussion of Parton and two contemporaries, Lewis Gaylord Clark and William Makepeace Thackeray, I go on to suggest that Parton's Fanny Fern persona also functions as a symbolic origin for a genealogy of women satirists who evoke Hélène Cixous's image of a laughing Medusa, a genealogy I describe as a neocolonial hybrid because it details American women writing satire to mock and resist the domestic imperium of US patriarchy.

ON ARISTOTLE'S PERI HERMENEIAS 16A1–18: THE CASE OF AN ANONYMOUS ARMENIAN COMMENTARY

AbstractThe anonymous Armenian commentary was transmitted together with the Armenian translation of Aristotle's Peri Hermeneias (sixth century or earlier). It was composed in the Hellenizing style and commonly associated with the figure of David the Invincible, a philosopher of the Neoplatonic School of Alexandria. This article presents a general structural analysis of the commentary followed by a comparative study and translation of its first chapter. It argues that the commentary was indeed written in the tradition of late antique Greek commentaries but was probably not associated with late Neoplatonism. The Armenian commentary shares many common features with Ammonius’ commentary, but also departs from it on many crucial aspects. From a philosophical standpoint, it has much more in common with Boethius’ and Alexander of Aphrodisias’ commentaries than with those of the Neoplatonic School of Alexandria, thus suggesting an early writing date.

Logic and Exegesis: The Logical Reconstruction of Arguments in the Greek Commentary Tradition

Logic and Exegesis: The Logical Reconstruction of Arguments in the Greek Commentary Tradition

MOLECULAR INCOHERENCE, CONTINUITY, AND THE PERFECTION OF THE LAOZI

AbstractThe Laozi is a well-loved and oft-translated ancient text, whose popularity with interpreters and translators seems to have hardly ebbed in over two thousand years. This is attested in part by the number of bamboo and silk manuscript versions of the text unearthed in recent years from the Warring States (475–221 b.c.e.) and Western Han (221–206 b.c.e.), such that few transmitted Chinese texts have so many corresponding manuscript versions. The Laozi's popularity and relative abundance have also made the text instrumental in shaping theoretical approaches to book formation in early Chinese manuscript culture. In particular, the Laozi has been central to the study of how books were assembled out of pre-existent, stable, coherent molecules of text, or zhang 章 (chapters). Emerging from a case study of Laozi chapter 13, in which interpretive problems of the written commentarial tradition are shown to be continuous with those in manuscript culture, this article re-examines the theory of molecular coherence in the Laozi's formation, showing ultimately that the textual and rhetorical patterns by which zhang cohere internally are created by the same forces that deposit zhang in proximity to one another. Moving from the molecular to organismic level, the article also examines the use of conjoining phrases in Peking University's Laozi manuscript to demonstrate how editors, compilers, and interpreters may sacrifice coherence at one level of organization to achieve perfection at another.

Aristotle and His Commentators: Studies in Memory of Paraskevi Kotzia edit­ed by Pantelis Golitsis and Katerina Ierodiakonou

This commemorative volume, dedicated to the late scholar of Greek antiquity and onetime scientific coordinator of the Center of Aristotelian Studies at the University of Thessaloniki, Paraskevi Kotzia, draws together 12 important essays on various aspects of Aristotle’s thought and the late ancient and Byzantine tradition of commentary, nine of which were presented at an international and interdisciplinary conference held in her memory in September 2014. Reviewed by: Nicholas Allan Aubin, Published Online (2021-08-31)Copyright © 2021 by Nicholas Allan AubinThis open access publication is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (CC BY-NC-ND) Article PDF Link: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/aestimatio/article/view/37712/28722 Corresponding Author: Nicholas Allan Aubin, Humboldt University, BerlinE-Mail: nicholasallanaubin@gmail.com

The Colorless History of Pseudo-Aristotle’s De coloribus

Abstract This article examines the medieval reception history of De coloribus. This pseudo-Aristotelian treatise on colors was translated from Greek into Latin in the thirteenth century, but the question of its success and use by contemporary scholars has not yet received any attention. After an examination of its medieval commentary tradition, the marginal glosses, and the first attestations, I conclude that De coloribus was scarcely used in the medieval Latin West, although the translation survived in a significant number of manuscripts. In the second part of the article, I look into some possible explanations for this limited reception history. One of the main factors is the availability of several alternative discussions on color in the Aristotelian corpus as well as in the non-Aristotelian scientific literature.

Scribal and Commentary Traditions at the Dawn of Print: The Manuscripts of the Near Eastern School of Theology as an Archive of the Early Nahḍa

Abstract This article focuses on the Arabic manuscript collection of the Near Eastern School of Theology (NEST). The NEST library contains several manuscripts that were donated, copied, or read by important Christian-born intellectuals of the nahḍa. Given these men’s role in the emergence of modern publishing in the Middle East, I examine the intersections between their scribal and printing activities. I also discuss works of grammar, logic, and rhetoric in the NEST’s collection. Most of these are by late medieval and early modern authors and contain extensive commentaries and glosses. This commentary culture was a key site of learning throughout the early modern Ottoman Empire and endured among Christian as well as Muslim intellectuals of the nahḍa movement. The persistence of these scribal and intellectual traditions reveals a longue durée of Islamicate scholarly traditions that is only beginning to be understood by historians of Arab modernity.

Co(s)mic Vision

The Bhagavata Purana (BhP) is a popular sacred Sanskrit text characterized by its devotion for Krsna and the many narratives concerning him and his incarnations. These narratives have an edifying quality. A great number of them bring their point across through the use of humour. Though the comic tradition of India has been covered by scholars, such studies primarily discuss the performing arts. I argue that there is a strong presence of humour in the BhP, and that this humour communicates a playful attitude which has a prominent place in the overall religiosity of the BhP, thus communicating a worldview I term the co(s)mic vision. This study contributes to the discussion on the ludic dimensions of religious traditions and indicates how religious discourse is established through the entertaining and edifying effects of humour. Narrative is used as an entertaining alternative to religious instruction as exhortation, theological assertion, or propositional excursuses.

‘Antropological paradigm’ and paradigmatic method: particular and common nature in the treatise of Leontius of Byzantium and the Neoplatonic commentary tradition (III)

‘Antropological paradigm’ and paradigmatic method: particular and common nature in the treatise of Leontius of Byzantium and the Neoplatonic commentary tradition (III)

Non-humans in the Zhuangzi: Animalism and anti-anthropocentrism

ABSTRACT Some argue that animals and non-human figures in the Zhuangzi help displace the significance of humans. According to others the Zhuangzi suggests a certain time of ‘animalism,’ asking us to be more like various types of fauna and flora that do not share our self-centeredness. In this paper the use of non-human characters in the Zhuangzi will be examined through a survey of traditional Chinese commentary, comparisons with the Lunyu, and placing the use of non-human characters within the larger context of the Zhuangzi. Thus we find that while anti-anthropocentric and animalistic perspectives can be philosophized with the Zhuangzi, the text itself is not overly concerned with these subjects. Animals and non-human characters are mainly allegorical or metaphorical, allowing the Zhuangzito 1) make broadly applicable arguments; 2) playfully discuss ideas that may be unappealing at first glance, and; 3) create a distance that allows the text to resist ossification.

Classes and texts in the curriculum of Drepung Loseling Monastic University

This article examines the system of education in the philosophical college of Drepung Loseling Monastic University (India), introduces into the scientific discourse a full list of subjects and titles of the texts with their identification by the collected works of Indian and Tibetan authors posted on the digital platform TBRC (Tibetan Buddhist Resource Center). The primary sources and commentarial literature are determined. The learning process begins with the preliminary study of logic and epistemology, proceeding with the five great treatises that are core of the curriculum. The article combines classical textual approach and contextual analysis, with consideration of the Buddhist commentarial tradition; as well as methods of analytical comparison, structural and content classification. The novelty of this research lies in introduction into the scientific discourse of the previously unexplored system of education and its study guides. It is established that the monastery relies on the study guides compiled by Panchen Sonam Drakpa, as well as other prominent Tibetan authors &amp;ndash; Je Tsongkhapa, Gendun Drub and Sherab Sangpo. The main method for digesting the material is the debates. Although with immigration of the Tibetans to India and reestablishment of Loseling College the curriculum structure was preserved, there are also innovations due to adding several grades and classes on the grammar and history of the Gelug School.