In the three chapters of On the Heavens dealt with in this volume, Aristotle argues that the universe is ungenerated and indestructible. In Simplicius' commentary, translated here, we see a battle royal between the Neoplatonist Simplicius and the Aristotelian Alexander, whose lost commentary on Aristotle's On the Heavens Simplicius partly preserves. Simplicius' rival, the Christian Philoponus, had conducted a parallel battle in his Against Proclus but had taken the side of Alexander against Proclus and other Platonists, arguing that Plato's Timaeus gives a beginning to the universe. Simplicius takes the Platonist side, denying that Plato intended a beginning. The origin to which Plato refers is, according to Simplicius, not a temporal origin, but the divine cause that produces the world without beginning.
| ISBN: | 9781472557438 |
| Publication date: | 10th April 2014 |
| Author: | Simplicius |
| Publisher: | Bloomsbury Academic an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing PLC |
| Format: | Paperback |
| Pagination: | 192 pages |
| Series: | Ancient Commentators on Aristotle |
| Genres: |
Ancient Greek and Roman philosophy Cosmology and the universe |