The article is a source-critical study of the doctrine of demonstration in the so-called eighth book of Stromata by Clement of Alexandria. After an overview of the doctrine, as presented in Str. VIII 3,1-15,1, it examines parallels in philosophical literature, especially in the writings of Galen. This examination brings to light correspondences (not all of which have been previously noted) whose number and proximity opens the question of the relation between Galen and the source of Stromata VIII. After considering three explanations to account for these similarities, the article proposes that Galen’s lost writing on demonstration could be Clement’s source.
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von Arnim, De octavo, 10. Chapter division of the Stromata, proposed by William Lowth, was first introduced in John Potter’s edition in 1715.
Cf. Iwan von Müller, “Über Galens Werk vom wissenschaftlichen Beweis,” in Abhandlungen der königlich-bayerischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, phil.-philol. Kl. 20 (1897) 405-478; Barnes, “Galen on Logic and Therapy,” in F. Kudlien—R.J. Durling (edd), Galen’s Method of Healing(Leiden etc.: Brill, 1991) 50-102; Riccardo Chiaradonna, “Le traité de Galien Sur la démonstration et sa postérité tardo-antique,” in R. Chiaradonna, F. Trabattoni (eds.), Physics and Philosophy of Nature in Greek Neoplatonism (Leiden/Boston: Brill, 2009) 43-77.
Solmsen, “Early Christian Interest,” 285. Apart from the correspondences detected by Ernst, Solmsen refers to “verbatim agreement” between MM (Kühn X 39,9f.) and Clem. Str. VIII 4,2.
Cf. Teun Tieleman, Galen and Chrysipus on the Soul (Leiden etc.: Brill, 1996) 127. The parallels are mentioned on pp. 20, 24f., 30, 104.
Cf. Tieleman, Galen and Chrysippus, 30. However, as Mansfeld, “Doxography,” 3092-3108 et passim, shows, the question is a commonplace philosophical theme associated with the doxographic tradition.
Solmsen, “Early Christian Interest,” 286. As a possible source of the trend represented by both Galen and Stromata VIII Solmsen suggests Gaius (290, note 36).
Mansfeld, “Doxography,” 3184f. Cf. also Mansfeld, Heresiography in Context (Leiden etc.: Brill, 1992) 62f.
“Doxography,” 3184.
Cf. Barnes, “Galen on Logic and Therapy,” 68; 72-76; Chiaradonna, “Le traité de Galien,” 45. For Galen’s interest in division and definition cf. also Tieleman, in Cambridge Companion to Galen, 59f.; Hankinson, ibid., 167f. Cf. also Mansfeld, Heresiography, 330, who quotes Galen, PHP IX 9,43-46 (CMG V 4,1,2: 608), as another parallel to Alcinous, Did. 5. The passage recalls Clement’s distinction of three kinds of division in Str. VIII 19,3-8. However, in this instance Galen is closer to Alcinous than to Clement, as he introduces not three, but five kinds of division. Cf. Mansfeld, Heresiography, 81.
Cf. Jean-Joël Duhot, La conception stoicienne de la causalité (Paris: Vrin, 1989) 211-235, who argues that the character of some passages in this amalgam of Stoic and Aristotelian elements is “indisputably” medical. Cf. Str. VIII 28,7; 30,1; 31,4-5; 32,7; 33,1-9; Duhot, La conception stoicienne, 221, 224, 226, 232-4, 235. We may add two observations: (1) In Str. VIII 25,2, having explained that procatarctic causes provide the occasion for something to happen, Clement adduces the following example: beauty, when seen by an incontinent person, creates in him the “erotic condition” (τὴν ἐρωτικὴν διάθεσιν) but does not necessitate its fulfilment. This is often explained as a Stoic description. However, the word διάθεσις is not used in the sense attested for the Stoics, namely as “an enduring state which additionally does not admit of degrees” (Anthony Long, David Sedley, The Hellenistic Philosophers, vol. I [Cambridge: CUP, 1987] 376), but rather describes a transient inner condition. This usage might be labelled as Aristotelian, but the description of the procatarctic cause as an external factor that provides for some διάθεσις has closer parallels in medical literature, particularly Galen; cf. MM X 242-9; Caus. Puls. IX 2-3; Hankinson, “Galen’s Theory of Causation,” ANRW II 37.2 (1994), 1766f. (2) In Str. VIII 32,4, Clement makes a distinction between pre-evident and non-evident causes and adds that while the former are grasped ἐπιλογισμῷ, the latter are grasped ἀναλογισμῷ. Again, the distinction between ἐπιλογισμός and ἀναλογισμός, and the way it is applied here, closely corresponds to the medical usage attested by Galen; cf. esp. SI 11 (Kühn I 77,14-78,6); for the context cf. Frede’s introduction to Galen, Three Treatises on the Nature of Science (Indianapolis 1985) ix-xxxiv. For the history of the concept of epilogismos cf. Malcolm Schofield, “Epilogismos: An Appraisal,” in M. Frede, G. Striker (edd.), Rationality in Greek Thought (Oxford: OUP, 1996) 221-237.
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The article is a source-critical study of the doctrine of demonstration in the so-called eighth book of Stromata by Clement of Alexandria. After an overview of the doctrine, as presented in Str. VIII 3,1-15,1, it examines parallels in philosophical literature, especially in the writings of Galen. This examination brings to light correspondences (not all of which have been previously noted) whose number and proximity opens the question of the relation between Galen and the source of Stromata VIII. After considering three explanations to account for these similarities, the article proposes that Galen’s lost writing on demonstration could be Clement’s source.
All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
---|---|---|---|
Abstract Views | 232 | 58 | 6 |
Full Text Views | 132 | 1 | 0 |
PDF Views & Downloads | 42 | 2 | 0 |