Simplicius: On Aristotle's Categories 1-4

metaphysical speculation are quotations or paraphrases — acknowledged or otherwise — from Iamblichus or Damascius.

Given what we have learned about the determination of Neoplatonic commentaries by the text to be commented, we would expect a commentary on Aristotle's Categories — the first work studied in the division (logic) of the first author (Aristotle) to be read by prospective philosophers — to be relatively elementary. Simplicius' Commentary fits this description, but the operative term here is 'relatively'. While it does not show fundamental doctrinal differences with the other Late Neoplatonic commentaries on the Categories — those of Ammonius, Philoponus, Olympiodorus, David, and the Latin commentary of Boethius — Simplicius' work does indulge in occasional flights of Iamblicho-Damascian metaphysics. One thinks, for example, of his discussion of the three-fold nature of the common, or the passages mentioning 'essential participation' (ousiôdês methexis). Such passages are perhaps to be explained by the fact that Simplicius' Commentary was actually composed and written down as a literary work, while the other Commentaries on the Categories — like the vast majority of the Neoplatonic Aristotelian commentaries — have come down to us in the form of students' notes.

Overall, however, one gets the impression of thoughtful, scholarly care, as Simplicius attempts to integrate and assimilate some 800 years of philosophical commentary on the Categories. He compares manuscripts, makes textual emendations, and occasionally even goes so far as to correct his beloved Iamblichus. All the reasons for reading Simplicius' commentary which we enumerated above thus still hold true: he provides us with information on the views of otherwise little-known ancient philosophers; helps us to comprehend the worldview (Weltanschauung) of the Late Antique creators of the Scholastic tradition; and he can give us an improved understanding of Aristotle's text itself. Indeed, when one surveys contemporary philosophical debate about the Categories, one finds discussions about the following kinds of questions: What is the actual subject-matter of the Categories: words, things or concepts? Why does the treatise begin without a proper introduction, but plunge directly into a seemingly irrelevant discussion of synonyms, homonyms, and paronyms? What is the ontological status of the differentia? Whence did Aristotle derive his list of ten categories? It is interesting to learn from Simplicius that most of such issues had already, by the sixth century AD, been discussed for hundreds of years. Much contemporary 're-inventing of the wheel' could thus be avoided if modern philosophers were more familiar with the ancient exegetical tradition.

When listing the characteristics required of a good Aristotelian exegete, Simplicius writes: