Isagoge et in Aristotelis Categorias commentarium (grec original)
- Language:
- Greek
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Extent:
- ~130,000 words · 599 passages
Cite this work
- APAPorphyry. (n.d.). Isagoge et in Aristotelis Categorias commentarium (grec original). SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/porphyry/isagoge-et-in-aristotelis-categorias-commentarium-grec-original
- MLAPorphyry. "Isagoge et in Aristotelis Categorias commentarium (grec original)." SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/porphyry/isagoge-et-in-aristotelis-categorias-commentarium-grec-original.
- ChicagoPorphyry. Isagoge et in Aristotelis Categorias commentarium (grec original). SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/porphyry/isagoge-et-in-aristotelis-categorias-commentarium-grec-original.
What it is about
Porphyry's 'Isagoge' in the Greek original, with his commentary on Aristotle's 'Categories': the logic textbook of the whole West for a thousand years.
Context and history
The 'Isagoge' — 'introduction' — is a very short piece written in the third century to prepare the reader of the 'Categories', and it ended up more influential than many major works. It explains the five predicables: genus, species, difference, property and accident. Its real importance comes from one sentence: Porphyry raises the question whether genera and species really exist or exist only in thought, and immediately says he will not discuss it there. Boethius translated it into Latin with that question left open, and out of it came the dispute over universals, which occupied the whole of scholasticism for centuries. Seldom has a declined question given so much work.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
Ex Porphyrianis in Organon commentariis Isagoge ') et Commentarius per interrogationem et responsionem ad nostram aetatem pervenerunt, de ceteris consulatur Zelleri liber De Philosophie der. Griechen 4n dhrer gesch. Entw. ΠῚ, 2 p. 640 not. 3 (Leipzig 1881). atque Isa-£oge quamvis sperni soleat a nostratibus philosophis?), tanta auctoritate per saecula amplius deeem apud viros doetos floruit et in oriente quidem etiam nune floret?), ut inter seripta omnium notissima atque vulgatissima referenda esse videatur. referenda esse videatur. 7 'Pres tituli traduntur, quorum quem nos inseripsiimus unum genuinum esse et codieum fere omnium consensu et commentariorum testimoniis eomprobatur. nam qui vulgo in usu est at πέντε φωναί vel περὶ πέντε φωνῶν recentiorum codicum quorundam memoria nititur (ef. cod. Paris. 2051). Suidas autem (II p. 212 ed. Bernhardy) inter libros Porphyrianos appellat Περὶ Γένους καὶ EXOouc καὶ Διαφορᾶς καὶ ᾿Ἰδίου καὶ Συμβεβη-χότος. Doxopater inter Rhetores Graecos (IIl, 126 ed. Walz 1855) non similiter, ut Bernhardy ad Suidam adnotat, sed reete Isagogen exhibet, cum dieit χαὶ λέγομεν, ὅτι ὥσπερ πέντε φωνὰς τοῦ [Πορφυρίου ἐν