Cambridge Ancient Hi.. - Index of

philosophy in alexandria 845
First, the differences in Athenian and Alexandrian interests as commentators.
The first Alexandrian commentators, Hierocles and Hermias, studied
in Athens under Plutarch and Syrianus respectively, and their scanty surviving
work suggests no significant difference between their interests and those
of their Athenian teachers. Hierocles’ concern with Pythagoras’ Golden Verses
is typical of the period; Hermias’ commentary on the Phaedrus is, as I have
said, largely a report of the lectures of Syrianus. With Ammonius, however,
divergence does appear, although Ammonius too studied in Athens, under
Proclus. Koenraad Verrycken has examined Ammonius’ metaphysics, asking
specifically whether, as Praechter thought, Ammonius considered the
Demiurge the highest principle. 23 Verrycken argues convincingly that such a
view is no more to be found in Ammonius than it is in Hierocles. He considers
particularly Asclepius’ commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics, which is
a faithful report of Ammonius’ lectures, and concludes that Ammonius
regarded the One as the supreme principle followed, as in Syrianus and
Proclus, by the monad and the dyad. However, in those lectures Ammonius
has simplified Proclus’ metaphysical system in other ways: to quote
Verrycken, ‘the henads disappear; the Demiurge seems to be simply
identified with the divine intellect; there is not much left of Proclus’ construction
of innumerable triads; the articulation of the intelligible world at
levels between the divine Intellect and the sensible world has been blurred.
Moreover Ammonius is inclined to remodel the hierarchy of ontological
levels into a dichotomy between the creative and the created.’ 24 It could be
argued that this simplification of metaphysics, like the simplifications found
in Hierocles and in Simplicius’ Encheiridion commentary, is due to the nature
of the work being commented on. Aristotle’s Metaphysics is hardly an elementary
work, but in the standard Neoplatonic curriculum Aristotle was covered
first, before the student went on to the deeper thought of Plato. Verrycken
is well aware of this possibility but argues against it. He points out that the
only works of Plato on which Ammonius certainly commented were the
Gorgias and the Theaetetus, both regarded as elementary by the Neoplatonists.
There is no record of Ammonius commenting on the Timaeus or the
Parmenides. Ammonius regards Aristotle’s Metaphysics as the final stage in the
study of Aristotelian philosophy and he tries to make Aristotle’s theology converge
with Plato’s. Ammonius appears less interested than Proclus in the
details of the intelligible world, more concerned with the cosmos. Verrycken
finds a similar approach in certain commentaries of Philoponus which
derive from Ammonius’ lectures. (Philoponus, born around 490, studied
under Ammonius and edited some of his lectures. He produced a number
of philosophical works but gradually moved away from the teachings of his
23 Verrycken (1990). 24 Verrycken (1990) 226.
Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008