Ammonius Hermiae

Ammonius Hermiae (/əˈmoʊniəs/; Greek: Ἀμμώνιος ὁ Ἑρμείου; c. 440 – c. 520 AD) was a Greek philosopher, and the son of the Neoplatonist philosophers Hermias and Aedesia. He was a pupil of Proclus in Athens, and taught at Alexandria for most of his life, writing commentaries on Plato, Aristotle, and other philosophers.

Life

Ammonius' father, Hermias, died when he was a child, and his mother, Aedesia, raised him and his brother, Heliodorus, in Alexandria. When they reached adulthood, Aedesia accompanied her sons to Athens where they studied under Proclus. Eventually, they returned to Alexandria, where Ammonius, as head of the Neoplatonist school in Alexandria, lectured on Plato and Aristotle for the rest of his life. According to Damascius, during the persecution of the pagans at Alexandria in the late 480's, Ammonius made concessions to the Christian authorities so that he could continue his lectures.^[1] Damascius, who scolds Ammonius for the agreement that he made, does not say what the concessions were, but it may have involved limitations on the doctrines he could teach or promote. He was still teaching in 515; Olympiodorus heard him lecture on Plato's Gorgias in that year.^[2] He also taught Asclepius of Tralles, John Philoponus, Damascius and Simplicius. He was also an accomplished astronomer; he lectured on Ptolemy and is known to have written a treatise on the astrolabe.

Writings

First page of the first edition of the Isagoge commentary, Venice 1500

Of his reputedly numerous writings, only his commentary on Aristotle's De Interpretatione survives intact. A commentary on Porphyry's Isagoge may also be his, but it is somewhat corrupt and contains later interpolations.

In De Interpretatione, Ammonius contends that divine foreknowledge makes void the contingent. Like Boëthius in his second Commentary and The Consolation of Philosophy, this argument maintains the effectiveness of prayer. Ammonius cites Iamblichus who said "knowledge is intermediate between the knower and the known, since it is the activity of the knower concerning the known."^[3]

In addition, there are some notes of Ammonius' lectures written by various students which also survive:

• On Aristotle's Categories (anonymous writer)
• On Aristotle's Prior Analytics I (anonymous writer)
• On Aristotle's Metaphysics 1–7 (written by Asclepius)
• On Nicomachus' Introduction to Arithmetic (written by Asclepius)
• On Aristotle's Prior Analytics (written by John Philoponus)
• On Aristotle's Posterior Analytics (written by John Philoponus)
• On Aristotle's On Generation and Corruption (written by John Philoponus)
• On Aristotle's On the Soul (written by John Philoponus)

There is Greek-language work called Life of Aristotle, which is usually ascribed to Ammonius, but "is more probable that it is the work of Joannes Philoponus, the pupil of Ammonius, to whom it is ascribed in some MSS."^[4]

English translations

• Ammonius: On Aristotle Categories, translated by S. M. Cohen and G. B. Matthews. London and Ithaca 1992.
• Ammonius: On Aristotle's On Interpretation 1–8, translated by D. Blank. London and Ithaca 1996.
• Ammonius: On Aristotle's On Interpretation 9, with Boethius: On Aristotle's On Interpretation 9, translated by D. Blank (Ammonius) and N. Kretzmann (Boethius). London and Ithaca 1998
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On Coming-to-be and Perishing 1.1–5, translated by C. J. F. Williams. London and Ithaca 1999
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On Coming-to-be and Perishing 1.6–2.4, translated by C. J. F. Williams. London and Ithaca 1999.
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On the Soul 2.1–6, translated by W. Charlton. London and Ithaca 2005
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On the Soul 2.7–12, translated by W. Charlton. London and Ithaca 2005
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On the Soul 3.1–8, translated by W. Charlton. London and Ithaca 2000
• John Philoponus: On Aristotle On the Intellect (de Anima 3.4–8), translated by W. Charlton. London and Ithaca 1991.

Notes

1. Damascius, Philosophos Historia, 118B, Athanassiadi
2. Olympiodorus, in Gorgias, 199, 8–10
3. Medieval Philosophy and the Classical Tradition, Curzon Press, John Inglis, 2002, pg. 128.
4. Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, The biographical dictionary of the Society for the diffusion of useful knowledge, Volume 2, Part 2, Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, 1843, p. 487.

References

• Andron, Cosmin. "Ammonios of Alexandria",The Routledge Encyclopedia of Ancient Natural Scientists, eds. Georgia Irby-Massie and Paul Keyser, New York: Routledge, 2008.
• Jones, A., Martindale, J., Morris, J. The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992, pages 71–72.
• Karamanolis, George E. Plato and Aristotle in agreement? : Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry, New York : Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Merlan, Phillip (1970). "Ammonius, Son of Hermias". Dictionary of Scientific Biography. 1. New York: CharlesScribner's Sons. p. 137. ISBN 0-684-10114-9.
• Seel, Gerhard (ed.), Ammonius and the Seabattle. Texts, Commentary, and Essays, in collaboration with Jean-Pierre Schneider and Daniel Schulthess ; Ammonius on Aristotle: De interpretatione 9 (and 7, 1-17) Greek text established by A. Busse, philosophical commentary by Gerhard Seel; essays by Mario Mignucci and Gerhard Seel, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2001.
• Sorabji, Richard. The Philosophy of the Commentators, 200–600 AD. A Sourcebook, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005.
• Verrycken, Koenraad. The Metaphysics of Ammonius son of Hermias, in Richard Sorabji (ed.), Aristotle Transformed. The Ancient Commentators and their Influence, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1990, p. 199-231.
•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "^{article name needed}". Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.

External links

• Blank, David. "Ammonius". Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• Commentaria in Aristotelem Graeca, Vol. 4 parts 2–6, Akademie der Wissenschaften, Berlin, Edita consilio et auctoritate Academiae litterarum regiae borussicae (1882).