0021-1818_islam_98-1-2-i-259

Reviews 181
terials from the Aristotelian original as he sees fit – to the penultimate (n. 687, on
how Averroes tries to pave the way from a discussion of providence to that of the
principle of non-contradiction through evoking the relativist spectre of Protagoras).
Given the discursive nature of much of this material, the publisher has been
prudent to print the endnotes at full size. The presence of Arnzen’s notes is, I
suspect, in the final analysis just as much a draw to the scholar as the English
translation itself.
The endnotes also record meticulously – some might say obsessively – the
disagreements both great and small that Arnzen has with previous translators.
On the whole, Arnzen is less impressed with van den Bergh’s and Horten’s efforts
than with those of Mantino and Quirós: while a few mentions here and there
might be justified as a working record of gentlemen’s disagreements, to return to
this theme so often comes perilously close to harping. Likewise, while van den
Bergh was indubitably wrong in reading Averroes’ proof for the eternity of motion
in light of Kant’s first antinomy (n. 412), the mere mention of such a misstep must
appear a bit churlish. It is not, after all, as if people would be reading Arnzen’s
work for guidance in how to approach early-20th-century scholars, with their all
too predictable quirks, but Averroes and Aristotle.
For all the impressive effort that has gone into the annotations, not all leads
have been followed through. Some of these threads are potentially quite interesting:
for instance, when Averroes counsels those who fear in error that the cosmos
might one day come to an end (p. 108), the proximate source must indeed have
been Met. 1050b22–26 (n. 411). But to follow this up with a variation on the ‘why
not sooner’ argument indicates that he has in mind a broader range of theologically
motivated arguments for and against eternity, such as one finds already in
Philo of Alexandria (supposedly building on Aristotle’s De philosophia, incidentally).
The reading of all such arguments in light of the potentiality-actuality
distinction seems a peculiarly Averroist touch: nonetheless, one would want to
know whether there are precise and concise precedents in the Arabic literature to
which Averroes had access. One might also add to Arnzen’s observation (p. 100,
n. 362) about Averroes conflating the Megarians and the Ash^arites that this in fact
happens in multiple places, prominently including the Commentary on the Metaphysics.
And so on.
A much broader range of issues that Arnzen broaches only obliquely has to
do with the layers of revision that went into preparing the version, and indeed
versions, of the Epitome that we have today. Did the original version of the Epitome
already contain substantial criticisms of Avicenna? It appears that it did. But
then, what does this say about a thesis that has been in vogue for quite some time,
that it was Averroes’ engagement with al-Ghazal\’s criticisms that led him to assess
more critically the eclectic Aristotelianism with which he grew up, and to de-