Brill's Companion to the Reception of Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
Published on 25. November 2021
Book
Hardback
512 pages
978-90-04-37362-4 (ISBN)
Description
A wide range of specialists provide a comprehensive overview of the reception of Pythagorean ideas in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, shedding new light especially on the understudied 'Medieval Pythagoras' of the Latin West. They also explore the survival of Pythagoreanism in the Arabic, Jewish, and Persian cultures, thus adopting a multicultural perspective. Their common concern is to detect the sources of this reception, and to follow their circulation in diverse linguistic areas. The reader can thus have a panoramic view of the major themes belonging to the Pythagorean heritage - number philosophy and the sciences of the quadrivium; ethics and way of life; theology, metaphysics and the soul - until the Early Modern times.
Reviews / Votes
"This is a very erudite, coherent, and carefully edited volume. I noticed no typographical mistakes. Moreover, what I found particularly successful was the organization of the content in thematic divisions corresponding to the focal aspects of Pythagorean philosophy. These divisions enabled the contributions focusing on different traditions (Christian Latin, Hebrew, and Arabic) to supplement each other, and thus to demonstrate as fully as possible the historical and philosophical interactions between East and West, which were also vital for the reception of Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism during the Middle Ages. It is only unfortunate that, given the volume's title, the Byzantine component has been left out (a decision the editors explain in the introduction, p. 3). That said, the companion under review, with its broad scope and wealth of detail, definitely constitutes a welcome contribution to the field and an indispensable reference source for all students of the transmission of ancient Pythagoreanism (and to some extent also of Platonism), as well as of Presocratic philosophy."Theofanis Tsiampokalos in BMCR 2022.09.14
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Leiden
Netherlands
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
sewn/stitched
Cloth over boards
Dimensions
Height: 160 mm
Width: 238 mm
Thickness: 38 mm
Weight
1020 gr
ISBN-13
978-90-04-37362-4 (9789004373624)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Irene Caiazzo, Ph.D. (1999), Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Paris), is Senior Research Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). She specializes in the history of medieval philosophy and science, and is editor-in-chief of the annual journal Archives d'histoire doctrinale et litteraire du Moyen Age. Her major publications include Lectures medievales de Macrobe: Les Glosae Colonienses super Macrobium (Paris, 2002) and Thierry of Chartres: The Commentary on the De arithmetica of Boethius (Toronto, 2015).
Constantinos Macris, Ph.D. (2004), Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Paris), is Research Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) specialising in ancient Greek philosophy and religion, with a focus on Pythagoreanism and its Neoplatonic reception. He is the author of a book-length entry on Pythagoras, the Pythagoreans, and their Nachleben (Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques, vol. VII, Paris 2018), and editor of Pythagoras redivivus. Studies on the Texts Attributed to Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans (Baden Baden, 2021).
Aurelien Robert, Ph.D. (2005), is Senior Research Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). His works focus on the reception of Ancient Greek philosophy in the Middle Ages, and more particularly atomism, philosophical medicine and Aristotelian metaphysics, physics and ethics. He is the author of Epicure aux enfers. Heresie, atheisme et hedonisme au Moyen Age (Paris, 2021) and Atomism in Late Medieval Philosophy and Theology (Leiden-Boston, 2009).
Contributors are: Constantinos Macris, Cecilia Panti, Andrew Hicks, Sonja Brentjes, Gad Freudenthal, Tzvi Langermann, Anna Izdebska, Aurelien Robert, Daniel De Smet, Carmela Baffioni, Irene Caiazzo, Marta Borgo, Iacopo Costa, David Albertson, Denis Robichaud, Jean-Pierre Brach.
Constantinos Macris, Ph.D. (2004), Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (Paris), is Research Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) specialising in ancient Greek philosophy and religion, with a focus on Pythagoreanism and its Neoplatonic reception. He is the author of a book-length entry on Pythagoras, the Pythagoreans, and their Nachleben (Dictionnaire des philosophes antiques, vol. VII, Paris 2018), and editor of Pythagoras redivivus. Studies on the Texts Attributed to Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans (Baden Baden, 2021).
Aurelien Robert, Ph.D. (2005), is Senior Research Fellow at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). His works focus on the reception of Ancient Greek philosophy in the Middle Ages, and more particularly atomism, philosophical medicine and Aristotelian metaphysics, physics and ethics. He is the author of Epicure aux enfers. Heresie, atheisme et hedonisme au Moyen Age (Paris, 2021) and Atomism in Late Medieval Philosophy and Theology (Leiden-Boston, 2009).
Contributors are: Constantinos Macris, Cecilia Panti, Andrew Hicks, Sonja Brentjes, Gad Freudenthal, Tzvi Langermann, Anna Izdebska, Aurelien Robert, Daniel De Smet, Carmela Baffioni, Irene Caiazzo, Marta Borgo, Iacopo Costa, David Albertson, Denis Robichaud, Jean-Pierre Brach.
Content
Acknowledgements
List of Figures
Notes on the Contributors
Introduction: Pythagoras, from Late Antiquity to Early Modernity
?A Multicultural Approach
?Irene Caiazzo, Constantinos Macris and Aurelien Robert
part 1: Pythagorean Number Theory and the Quadrivium
1 Pythagoras and the Quadrivium from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages
?Cecilia Panti
2 Music and the Pythagorean Tradition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages
?Andrew Hicks
3 Nicomachean Number Theory in Arabic and Persian Scholarly Literature
?Sonja Brentjes
4 The Tribulations of the Introduction to Arithmetic from Greek to Hebrew Via Syriac and Arabic
?Nicomachus of Gerasa, ?abib Ibn Bahriz, al-Kindi, and Qalonymos ben Qalonymos
?Gad Freudenthal
5 Medieval Jewish Pythagoreanism
?Remarks on Maimonides and on Sefer Melakhim
?Tzvi Langermann
part 2: Pythagorean Way(s) of Life, East and West
6 Popular Pythagoreanism in the Arabic Tradition
?Between Biography and Gnomology
?Anna Izdebska
7 Pythagoras' Ethics and the Pythagorean Way of Life in the Middle Ages
?Aurelien Robert
Part 3: Theology, Metaphysics and the Soul
8 Pythagoras' Philosophy of Unity as a Precursor of Islamic Monotheism
?Pseudo-Ammonius and Related Sources
?Daniel De Smet
9 The "Brethren of Purity" and the Pythagorean Tradition
?Carmela Baffioni
10 "Pythagoras' Mistake"
?The Transmigration of Souls in the Latin Middle Ages and Beyond
?Irene Caiazzo
11 Pythagoras Latinus
?Aquinas' Interpretation of Pythagoreanism in His Aristotelian Commentaries
?Marta Borgo and Iacopo Costa
12 Latin Christian Neopythagorean Theology
?A Speculative Summa
?David Albertson
Part 4: New Trends in Early Modern Pythagoreanism
13 Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism in the Renaissance
?Philosophical and Religious Itineraries from Pico to Brucker
?Denis J.-J. Robichaud
14 Pythagorean Number Mysticism in the Renaissance
?An Overview
?Jean-Pierre Brach
Index
List of Figures
Notes on the Contributors
Introduction: Pythagoras, from Late Antiquity to Early Modernity
?A Multicultural Approach
?Irene Caiazzo, Constantinos Macris and Aurelien Robert
part 1: Pythagorean Number Theory and the Quadrivium
1 Pythagoras and the Quadrivium from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages
?Cecilia Panti
2 Music and the Pythagorean Tradition from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages
?Andrew Hicks
3 Nicomachean Number Theory in Arabic and Persian Scholarly Literature
?Sonja Brentjes
4 The Tribulations of the Introduction to Arithmetic from Greek to Hebrew Via Syriac and Arabic
?Nicomachus of Gerasa, ?abib Ibn Bahriz, al-Kindi, and Qalonymos ben Qalonymos
?Gad Freudenthal
5 Medieval Jewish Pythagoreanism
?Remarks on Maimonides and on Sefer Melakhim
?Tzvi Langermann
part 2: Pythagorean Way(s) of Life, East and West
6 Popular Pythagoreanism in the Arabic Tradition
?Between Biography and Gnomology
?Anna Izdebska
7 Pythagoras' Ethics and the Pythagorean Way of Life in the Middle Ages
?Aurelien Robert
Part 3: Theology, Metaphysics and the Soul
8 Pythagoras' Philosophy of Unity as a Precursor of Islamic Monotheism
?Pseudo-Ammonius and Related Sources
?Daniel De Smet
9 The "Brethren of Purity" and the Pythagorean Tradition
?Carmela Baffioni
10 "Pythagoras' Mistake"
?The Transmigration of Souls in the Latin Middle Ages and Beyond
?Irene Caiazzo
11 Pythagoras Latinus
?Aquinas' Interpretation of Pythagoreanism in His Aristotelian Commentaries
?Marta Borgo and Iacopo Costa
12 Latin Christian Neopythagorean Theology
?A Speculative Summa
?David Albertson
Part 4: New Trends in Early Modern Pythagoreanism
13 Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism in the Renaissance
?Philosophical and Religious Itineraries from Pico to Brucker
?Denis J.-J. Robichaud
14 Pythagorean Number Mysticism in the Renaissance
?An Overview
?Jean-Pierre Brach
Index