Authority and Authoritative Texts
in the Platonist Tradition
Michael Erler, Jan Erik Hebler & Federico M. Petrucci, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2021, 284 p.
Description
All disciplines can count on a noble founder, and the representation of this founder as an authority is key in order to construe a discipline’s identity. This book sheds light on how Plato and other authorities were represented in one of the most long-lasting traditions of all time. It leads the reader through exegesis and polemics, recovery of the past and construction of a philosophical identity. From Xenocrates to Proclus, from the sceptical shift to the re-establishment of dogmatism, from the Mosaic of the Philosophers to the Neoplatonist Commentaries, the construction of authority emerges as a way of access to the core of the Platonist tradition.
(Text from the publisher)
Table of contents
Introduction
By Michael Erler, Jan Erik Heßler, Federico M. Petrucci
Chapter 1 – Xenocrates’ Invention of Platonism
By David Sedley
Chapter 2 – An Iconography of Xenocrates’ Platonism
By David Sedley
Chapter 3 – Arcesilaus’ Appeal to Heraclitus as a Philosophical Authority for His Sceptical Stance
By Anna Maria Ioppolo
Chapter 4 – Authority beyond Doctrines in the First Century bc
Antiochus Model For Plato S Authority
By Federico M. Petrucci
Chapter 5 – Authority and Doctrine in the Pseudo-Pythagorean Writings
By Bruno Centrone
Chapter 6 – Constructing Authority
A Re Examination Of Some Controversial Issues In The Theology Of Numenius
By Alexandra Michalewski
Chapter 7 – Plutarch’s E at Delphi
The Hypothesis of Platonic Authority
By George Boys-Stones
Chapter 8 – Aristotle’s Physics as an Authoritative Work in Early Neoplatonism
Plotinus And Porphyry
By Riccardo Chiaradonna
Chapter 9 – Conflicting Authorities? Hermias and Simplicius on the Self-Moving Soul
By Saskia Aerts
Chapter 10 – Kathēgemōn: The Importance of the Personal Teacher in Proclus and Later Neoplatonism
By Christian Tornau
Chapter 11 – ‘In Plato we can see the bad characters being changed by the good and instructed and purified.’
Attitudes To Platonic Dialogue In Later Neoplatonism
By Anne Sheppard
Index Locorum
General Index