Eudemian ethics
The Eudemian Ethics belongs to the Nicomachean Ethics and the Great Ethics (Magna Moralia) of the three essays on his ethics handed down under the name of Aristotle . Its authenticity was controversial in the 19th century, but since Werner Jaeger (1923) the view has prevailed that it was the work of Aristotle and that it came before the Nicomachean Ethics .
The work has eight books. The so-called “controversial books” IV-VI correspond to books V-VII of the Nicomachean Ethics . Based on the handwritten tradition, it is now assumed that they originally belonged to the Nicomachean Ethics .
According to the view prevailing today in classical scholarship, Eudemian ethics is dedicated to the young deceased friend and student of Aristotle Eudemos of Rhodes . Because of the title - which did not come from the author - the Eudemian Ethics was often regarded as a work by Eudemos of Rhodes even in antiquity and until the late 19th century. Occasionally, another friend of Aristotle, Eudemos of Cyprus , is also considered as an addressee in research.
content
Book I treats bliss ( eudaimonia ) as the goal of human activity. Aristotle asks about the prerequisites for a happy life and the forms of life that correspond to them. Books II through VI discuss the subject of virtue ( Arete ). A distinction is made between character ( aretai êthikai ) and intellectual virtues ( aretai dianoêtikai ), which also belong to different parts of the soul . Book VII analyzes the phenomenon of friendship . Book VIII contains remarks on prudence ( phronesis ), being beautiful and good ( kalokagathia ) and the relationship between success ( eutychia ) and happiness ( eudaimonia ).
expenditure
- Richard R. Walzer / Jean Mingay (eds.): Aristotelis ethica Eudemia . Oxford University Press, Oxford 1991, ISBN 0-19-814575-6
Translations
- Aristotle: Eudemian ethics . Translated by Franz Dirlmeier . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1962 (Aristotle: Works in German translation. Edited by Ernst Grumach, Vol. 7).
- Aristotle's Eudemian Ethics: Books I, II, and VIII. Transl. with a comm. by Michael John Woods . Clarendon Press 1982, 2nd edition 1992.
literature
- Egon Braun : Ethika Eudemeia. In: Franco Volpi (Hrsg.): Großes Werklexikon der Philosophie. 2 vols. Anniversary edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2004, ISBN 3-520-83901-6
- Paul Moraux and Dieter Harlfinger (eds.): Investigations on the “Ethica Eudemica” , files of the 5th Aristotelicum Symposium , Berlin 1971
- Anthony Kenny : The Aristotelian Ethics , Oxford 1978
- Markus H. Wörner: The ethical in the rhetoric of Aristotle , Freiburg i. B./München 1990, ISBN 3-495-47679-2
Web links
- Richard Kraut: Aristotle's Ethics. In: Edward N. Zalta (Ed.): Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy .
Remarks
- ↑ Werner Jaeger: Aristotle. Foundation of a history of its development , Berlin 1923.
- ^ Franz Dirlmeier (Ed.): Aristoteles: Magna Moralia , Berlin 1958, p. 97; Vianney Décarie (Ed.): Aristote: Éthique à Eudème , Paris 1978, pp. 29–31; Vianney Décarie: Eudème: de Rhodes ou de Chypre . In: Proceedings of the World Congress on Aristotle, Thessaloniki August 7-14, 1978 , Athens 1981, pp. 277-280.