Olympiodorus: Commentary on Plato's Gorgias

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matters as Aristotle’s categories and his syllogistic figures as already understood.Garbled syllogistic should be attributed rather to poor recording and greater flexibility in the rules than to the lecturer’s incompetence; see Tarrant (1997c). A general introduction to Plato may also have been read, though probably less full than the surviving Prolegomena—for this work contains an extensive life of Plato, whereas Olympiodorus’ treatment of the first work of the curriculum itself includes a life in the long second chapter, a pointless exercise if the student had already encountered similar material.

The initial words of Olympiodorus’ Alcibiades-Commentary lead nicely away from the study of Aristotle towards that of Plato. Aristotle’s remark that all men naturally desire knowledge is read as the claim that all naturally desire Plato’s philosophy—they want to receive the goodness and inspiration which proceeds from that philosophy. Inspiration (enthousiasmos) seems here to mean allowing some higher voice to operate through oneself, and four examples are given from Plato’s work.Tim. 41-42: Plato speaks as the demiurge himself; Rep. 546a ff.: he takes the part of the Muses; Phdr. 238-41: he takes the part of the nymphs; Tht. 173-7: he takes the part of the ideal philosopher. Plato is thus seen as somebody through whose works higher voices may speak. The vita (biography) reinforces this impression by emphasizing the link between Plato and Apollo. Because Platonists were interested in symbolic meaning rather than concrete physical significance, there is no attempt to claim that Apollo was Plato’s actual father, as there had been even in fourth-century Athens.Speusippus, frs. 1a and 1b (Tarán). The important message for the student is that Plato is a philosopher who is also a spokesman for the god.

Plato was not always held in such supreme regard in Neoplatonism, for the Platonism represented by philosophers such as Iamblichus saw itself as returning to the thought of Pythagoras rather than that of Plato.See D. O’Meara, Pythagoras Revived (Oxford, 1987). Their inclination for a religiously grounded philosophy, seen in the views of such groups as the priests of Egypt or the Magi as well as in Pythagoras’ true but elusive doctrine, led to an attempt to separate off the Socratic element in Plato as something inferior and dangerously inconclusive (aporetic),Compare Numenius, fr. 24.57ff. (des Places), who sees Plato’s Socratic caution as the thing that allowed Arcesilaus to claim Plato’s authority for his leaving behind whatever preserved the true