Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Plato in Antiquity
Harold Tarrant, Danielle A. Layne, Dirk Baltzly and François Renaud (eds), Leiden: Brill, 2017
Description
Brill’s Companion to the Reception of Plato in Antiquity offers a comprehensive account of the ways in which ancient readers responded to Plato, as philosopher, as author, and more generally as a central figure in the intellectual heritage of Classical Greece, from his death in the fourth century BCE until the Platonist and Aristotelian commentators in the sixth century CE. The volume is divided into three sections: ‘Early Developments in Reception’ (four chapters); ‘Early Imperial Reception’ (nine chapters); and ‘Early Christianity and Late Antique Platonism’ (eighteen chapters). Sectional introductions cover matters of importance that could not easily be covered in dedicated chapters. The book demonstrates the great variety of approaches to and interpretations of Plato among even his most dedicated ancient readers, offering some salutary lessons for his modern readers too.
(Text from the publisher)
Table of contents
Abbreviations
Notes on Contributors
Introduction
Introduction: The Old Academy to Cicero
1 Speusippus and Xenocrates on the Pursuit and Ends of Philosophy – Phillip Sidney Horky
2 The Influence of the Platonic Dialogues on Stoic Ethics from Zeno to Panaetius of Rhodes – Francesca Alesse
3 Plato and the Freedom of the New Academy – Charles E. Snyder
4 Return to Plato and Transition to Middle Platonism in Cicero – François Renaud
Introduction: Early Imperial Reception of Plato
5 From Fringe Reading to Core Curriculum: Commentary, Introduction and Doctrinal Summary – Harold Tarrant
6 Philo of Alexandria – Sami Yli-Karjanmaa
7 Plutarch of Chaeronea and the Anonymous Commentator on the Theaetetus – Mauro Bonazzi
8 Theon of Smyrna: Re-thinking Platonic Mathematics in Middle Platonism – Federico M. Petrucci
9 Cupid’s Swan from the Academy (De Plat. 1.1, 183): Apuleius’ Reception of Plato – Geert Roskam
10 Alcinous’ Reception of Plato – Carl S. O’Brien
11 Numenius: Portrait of a Platonicus – Polymnia Athanassiadi
12 Galen and Middle Platonism: The Case of the Demiurge – Julius Rocca
13 Variations of Receptions of Plato during the Second Sophistic – Ryan C. Fowler
Introduction: Early Christianity and Late Antique Platonism
14 Origen to Evagrius – Ilaria Ramelli
15 Sethian Gnostic Appropriations of Plato – John D. Turner
16 Plotinus and Platonism – Lloyd P. Gerson
17 Porphyry – Michael Chase
18 The Anonymous Commentary on the Parmenides – Dennis Clark
19 Iamblichus, the Commentary Tradition, and the Soul – John Finamore
20 Amelius and Theodore of Asine – Dirk Baltzly
21 Plato’s Political Dialogues in the Writings of Julian the Emperor – Dominic J. O’Meara
22 Plato’s Women Readers – Crystal Addey
23 Calcidius – Christina Hoenig
24 Augustine’s Plato – Gerd Van Riel
25 Orthodoxy and Allegory: Syrianus’ Metaphysical Hermeneutics – Sarah Klitenic Wear
26 Hermias: On Plato’s Phaedrus – Harold Tarrant and Dirk Baltzly
27 Proclus and the Authority of Plato – Jan Opsomer
28 Damascius the Platonic Successor: Socratic Activity and Philosophy in the 6th Century CE – Sara Ahbel-Rappe
29 The Anonymous Prolegomena to Platonic Philosophy – Danielle A. Layne
30 Olympiodorus of Alexandria – Michael Griffin
31 Simplicius of Cilicia: Plato’s Last Interpreter – Gary Gabor
Bibliography
General Index
Index Locorum