The importance of the timaeus and its commentary tradition

Proclus' Commentary on the Timaeus is arguably the most important text of ancient Neoplatonism. The Timaeus itself has proved to be the most important of all Plato's works from a historical perspective, for it remained a key text from the death of Plato, through Hellenistic philosophy, Philo of Alexandria, Middle Platonism, and the Christian fathers, down to the Neoplatonists, and well beyond. The fact that in the past century or so it has been effectively challenged by the Republic for the title of ‘Plato's greatest work’ means little in the 2500-year history of Platonism. The Timaeus was acknowledged as one of the two supreme texts of the Neoplatonist curriculum. The other was the Parmenides, which was of similar importance to many Neoplatonists, but less widely acknowledged as central to a Platonic education.

The commentary itself was usually the major vehicle of Neoplatonist teaching, even though much of what survives on Plato, unlike Aristotle, is not in this form. Interpretation of authoritative texts, including many of those of Plato, was a central part of a Neoplatonist's work. The commentary arose directly out of the reading of texts in the schools of philosophy, though some commentaries went on being used by subsequent generations, for which reason Proclus would have been conscious that he was not writing an ephemeral work, but one that could be used in other contexts.

It is not possible for only two things to be well combined in the absence of some third thing, for there must be some bond between the middle to effect the combination of both. The finest bond is the one which makes both itself and the things that are bound one. (31b9–c4)

The bond in general

In this passage, the bond (desmos) is understood as offering itself as an image of divine unification and the mutual sharing of powers in virtue of which the intellectual causes of wholes achieve their productions. On the other hand, what is fine is here understood as involving a unifying and binding essence and power. For the words well combined and the finest of bonds both appear to me to have this signification. Beginning, therefore, from the Dyad as something aligned with (suzugos) Generation, Procession and Difference, he introduces unification to the things that participate in the Dyad and also harmonious association through the bond – this gift being the second of the things given to the cosmos by the Demiurge.

I beg the misinterpreters of Plato not to raise any of the following objections against his discourse:

• (1) Those who say that semicircles require no kind of bond in the generation of the circle do not speak correctly. For the circle is not established from semicircles but rather the opposite is the case. For when the circle already exists – and not as something composed out of semicircles – then when the diameter is drawn then at that point semicircles are made. The name itself proves this, since ‘semicircle’ has its derivation from ‘circle’ and not vice versa.

• (2) Neither are those who take it that the monad and the dyad are somehow opposed and have no middle correct. For Plato does not say simply that in the case of things of whatever character, there is something between them, but says instead that in the case of such things as are intended to complete the subsistence (hupostasis) of a single composite, [there is something else between the things joined]. Hence, he said that ‘it is impossible to combine two things well alone separate from a third thing’, and the monad and the dyad are not opposites since the dyad is made of monads.

The Demiurge gave it a shape that was fitting and akin to it: for the living thing that was to encompass within itself all living things, the fitting shape would be the shape that includes all the shapes within itself. For this reason it is spherical in form, being entirely equal from the middle to the extremes: he made it rounded off into a circle229 – of all shapes the most complete or perfect and most similar to itself – since the Demiurge thought that similarity was by far more beautiful than dissimilarity. (33b1–8)

After the universal causes (ta aitia ta hola) of the cosmos and the universal composition (holê sustasis), of it and the establishment of an essence that 15 results from its being composed from wholes that are integral to it (ek plêrômatôn holôn), Plato speaks about the shape of the universe – that which surely has been assigned to the universe in accordance with its essence from its creation. This most similar of all the shapes is the fourth demiurgic gift to the universe (5.21 above).

Therefore, though there are also other demonstrations of the spherical shape of the cosmos which are both physical and mathematical and which we shall later examine, for now we shall first consider the Platonic demonstration (apodeixis). This really is a demonstration since the reason why it is (to dioti) is included along with the fact that it is (to hoti). The demonstration is itself triple: the first derives from the One; another from intelligible beauty, and a third from intellectual creation. Or rather, each one of these demonstrations is multiple and is at least triple.

Demonstration from the One

You might say that the Demiurge is one immediately from the One, and you might say that the paradigm is also one, and you might say that the Good is one. From all this you might assume likewise, in the case of the figures, that the figure which is unified to the highest degree is more divine and perfect than that which is not one. For that which the One is among the divine things, and that which the One Living Being Itself is among the intelligible living things, and that which the one Creator and Father is among the demiurges – this role is played in the same way by the sphere among the solid shapes.

There was no air around it that it might be required to breathe; nor did it need to have any sort of organ by which it could take nourishment into itself or again any organ with which to expel what it had previously digested. For since there was nothing else, there would be nothing to come to it or leave it from anywhere. Nourishment was present to it from its own waste, and it came about from its design that all things that it experienced or did were experienced in it and done by it. For its builder thought it better for it to be self-sufficient rather than in need of something else besides itself. (33c3–d3)

Theoria

Through these words he takes away two other kinds of sensation from the universe: smell and taste. It doesn't have the former because the universe would not have respiration, for that which breathes requires a sense of smell. (This is so in this case, even though it is not true that everything that has a sense of smell is such as to breathe. Nonetheless the animals with a sense of smell that do breathe are more perfect than those who do not (cf. II. 87.13)). Therefore this sense is taken away from the universe. As for the latter case, he takes the sense of taste away because the universe does not need to eat; for [only] animals which are nourished are in need of a sense of taste.

Well, then we may again ask, ‘How can this be?’ Isn't it like this: the particular senses do not pertain to the universe, but there is a single, simple sense which is cognizant (gnôristikos) of all the things in it: the colours, sounds, tastes, odours, qualities, being themselves the essences of sensible things as they are in an underlying subject. For if the single sense in us makes use of all the particular senses and knows all [the particular sensibles] by virtue of the same thing (kata tauton), how much more then must the cosmos know at one time all the various sensibles by virtue of one logos and a single sense! Therefore, because it is one thing by virtue of its essence and in just the same way it has been allotted a shape that is uniform, so too it has a single sense that encompasses all the sense objects.

The composition of the world took up the entirety of each [lit. ‘one whole each’] of the four elements. The builder built it from all the [kinds of] fire, water, air and earth there are, and left no part or power of any of them external to it. (32c5–8)

Theoria

These words relate to what we said earlier (50.16) – that Plato knew that there are many different [grades of] fire and water and the other elements, out of all of which the cosmos has been composed. This is the third demiurgic gift to the cosmos. So we ought not to be surprised if he leaves the highest grades of the four elements in the heavens, the middle grades in the region below the moon and the final dregs in the region below the earth (49.12), distributing the elements in a manner analogous to the three demiurges, referring these to Zeus, Poseidon and Pluto respectively. For in each case, the whole of them is received and the universe is [composed] out of all of each one. [This is so] whether you speak about the first and celestial fire, or the middle [gradation of fire] or the final and discordant kind which is merely tinged with certain fiery qualities. For whatever we suppose discord and disorder to be, each of the elements below the earth surely manifests this sort of nature. This is because when creation proceeds, after a short while it tails off into that which is unordered (to akosmêton) and that which participates in order to the least degree. These things, then, are all cleared up.

We say that when Plato writes that the builder left no part or power of any of them external to it there are two different things at issue. A part of one of the elements is of the same sort of substance as the whole element of which it is a portion, but a power completes each of the elements. So, a part of [the totality of] fire is fire, but a single power is one of the many defining features of fire – the power of movement or the power of sharpness or the power of tenuousness. From these powers there results one single fire, and all the [kinds of] fire and all the powers of fire and of the other elements are included in the cosmos.

For he assigned it a motion appropriate for its body – of the seven [kinds of motion] the one that is particularly relevant to intellect and wisdom. (34a1–3).

Theoria

Among the ancient philosophers, some supposed that the cosmos reverted upon the intellect and credited its motion to the love of this primary object of desire, and said that nothing goes down into the cosmos from the intellect. In this manner they deprived intellect of its capacity to be productive and gave it a status equivalent to things that fill us with desire to see them. But such things have no capacity to engender anything in virtue of their own natures [as visually appealing objects]. Now others among the ancients agreed that intellect or soul or whatever it was above the world did something to it, but they did not grant motion to the cosmos as something innate and appropriate, and instead said that it was led to revolve in a circle only extrinsically. This latter view is one Aristotle knocked on the head as a theory that destroys the everlasting character of the universe: for that which happens by force is not everlasting.

But Plato, on the other hand, has been saved from both of these kinds of mistake. He gives motion to the cosmos as something innate and appropriate and also provides evidence of its demiurgic cause. This motion is the sixth demiurgic gift to the cosmos (cf. II. 5.24 ff.) – a motion that imitates intellect and which we say it has both in virtue of itself and also from the father. For the word assigned sends us back up to the paternal cause (for that from which the universe gets its being (ousia) is also the source of its natural motion). But a motion appropriate for its body refers to the distinctive nature of the cosmos through which it motivates itself to move in this fashion by its own agency. For it has a certain self-motion in virtue of its life, and in virtue of its shape (which is spherical) it has something appropriate to circular motion.

Why Plato mentions only being visible and tangible

The whole account will unfold these things as it proceeds. Right now let us just say that since the cosmos is extended and grasped by sense perception, it is known through both sight and touch, being visible in as much as it is through and through suffused with light, while being tangible in as much as it is solid. For it is sufficient for Plato to embrace all the objects of sense (aisthêta) just by mentioning these two senses. For when viewed in relation to the four elements that always exist in the cosmos, these things – the visible and the tangible – are opposites. This is because they are furthest apart and under the same genus. Both of them are kinds of things that are sensed and this is their common genus, but they are also very far apart, presuming that the one is a sense object that involves no medium while the other does.

But if we were to investigate the contraries among the elements in as much as they are subject to change, we would not say that the contraries are fire and earth, but we would rather say fire and water are contraries. For water in particular quenches fire. And each of these accounts is true. For it is common to both accounts to establish the contrariety in the extremes and in this respect the choices [about contraries] are in agreement: qua sensibles, earth is contrary to fire, but qua things that undergo change, water is contrary to fire. That is why Plato has set out the visible as something contrary to the tangible, taking the elements qua sensibles and not yet considering them qua things that undergo change, for in this way water is more opposed to fire than earth. And so the account is not incomplete as Theophrastus thinks. He raises the following puzzle: ‘why ever did Plato say that visibility was the defining feature (idion) of fire and tangibility [the defining feature] of earth, yet say nothing of the remaining elements?’ In response to him we say that we actually see the cosmos and touch it, but we don't in any way taste it or hear it or smell it. In addition, the actual cosmos itself is visible and tangible to itself.

THE STRUCTURE OF BOOK 3 OF PROCLUS’ COMMENTARY

The portion of Proclus’ commentary translated in this volume takes in Timaeus 31b–34b in which Plato describes the body of the universe. However, Book 3 of Proclus’ commentary – equivalent to volume II of the Teubner text of the in Timaeum – spans Timaeus 31a to 37c and thus includes Timaeus’ discourse on the construction the World Soul and its union with the body of the universe. Because of the wealth of detail involved in Book 3 as a whole, the translators have taken the decision to dedicate a volume each to the body and soul of the universe (volumes III and IV respectively). The final volume of our series (volume V) will condense into one the translation of Books 4 and 5 of Proclus’ commentary – equivalent to the third volume in the Teubner series of Proclus’ text.

The question of the skopos or target of the Timaeus in general is taken up in the introduction to volume I. Notionally, the skopos of the dialogue is supposed to be physiologia or the study of the realm of nature (I. 1.17– 20). ‘Nature’ here should be given its Aristotelian sense: what is at issue is the realm of things that change. This will include the body of the world as well as its soul, the individual heavenly gods such as stars and planets, as well as the kinds and individuals that inhabit the sublunary realm. However, we must remember Proclus’ views on (what he takes to be) the characteristically Platonic manner of explaining things in the realm of nature by reference to productive, paradigmatic and final causes (I. 2.1– 9). By his lights, Plato's exploration of the subject matter of physiologia traces the explanation of these things back up to the Demiurge, the paradigm of the All-Perfect Living Being, and the Good. Moreover, the universe that is described as if it came to be in the Timaeus is itself a ‘visible god’ (34ab). Thus from Proclus’ point of view, the Timaeus is actually a profoundly theological work.