Aristotle on divine movement and human nature 245
own explanation in 1248 a 25 ff. Aristotle speaks of ‘God’ ( !) as ‘princi-
ple of movement in the soul’ ("%
) C :C) who ‘sees
both the future and the present’ (+C 3 3 \, 38 ) and who
‘moves more powerfully’ (
-
+ )( 40 – 1 ). For the rest, this ‘God’
is in the main passive: he is the object of ‘having’ (
, 32 ) and of ‘using’
(
, 38 ),^26 and it is worth noting that verbs like ‘give’ (
!
)or
‘be concerned’ (
,cf.
inOn Divination in Sleepand
"
inMagna moralia) are absent here.^27 The idea of a divine move-
ment which Aristotle here expounds does not, as has often been claimed,
amount to an incidental and momentaneous inspiration or possession by
a god comparable, for instance, with Plato’s description of divine frenzy in
theIonand thePhaedrus(as the word
!might suggest).^28 It
(^26) X
is mostly translated here as ‘use’, probably because it is supposed that the god ( !)of
whom Aristotle here speaks is an immanent principle, some sort of psychic faculty. Apart from the
question of whether this is correct (see below),
in the context of divination has the meaning
‘consult’; it is thus often connected with C(‘god’, Herodotus 1. 47 ; Aeschines 3. 124 ), with
(‘sooth-sayers’, Aristophanes,Birds 724 ; Plato,Laws 686 a) and with C(‘divination’, Plato,
Timaeus 71 d). This use of
is, according to Redard ( 1953 ) 44 , derived from the principal
meaning ‘seek the use of something’, which is an ‘essentially human’ activity (‘rechercher l’utilisation
de quelque chose. C’est un verbe essentiellement humain. Le proces exprim ́e est restreintalasphere du sujet qui fait un recours occasionela l’objet’), in which the object remains passive (‘Le rapport
sujet–objet se d ́efinit comme un rapport d’appropriation occasionelle’).
(^27) The question of divine activity in this chapter is connected, of course, with the question of how this
‘god’ ( !) should be conceived. The analogy in 1248 a 26 , ‘as it is a god (or, God) that moves the
universe, so it is in the soul’ (? C )C 3 " )C) seems to exclude the possibility
that it is an immanent principle. In any case this ‘god’ is not identical with ‘the divine element in
us’ (3 8 , line 27 ), for this is the ‘intellect’ ($), whereas ‘God’ is ‘superior to intellect’
( $ $). This is why I prefer the MSS reading Cover Spengel’s conjecture )Cin
line 38. If the Unmoved Mover is referred to, then the wording ‘principle of movement’ ("%
)), which is usually set aside for efficient causality, is awkward, since the Unmoved Mover
moves as a final cause (but see P ̈otscher ( 1970 ) 57 ). But it is questionable whether the theology of
Metaphysicsshould serve as a guiding principle here: passages such asPol. 1362 a 32 ,On Coming
to Be and Passing Away(Gen. corr.) 336 b 27 ,On the Heavens(Cael.) 271 a 33 andMetaph. 1074 b 3
show a greater resemblance to the theology ofEth. Eud. 8. 2. The same applies to 1248 a 38 : ‘he sees
well both the future and the present’ ($ G +C 3 3 \), which seems
inconsistent with God’s activity of ‘thinking of thinking’ ( ) !#
)inMetaph. 1074 b 34 – 5
and also withEth. Eud. 1245 b 17 (‘he is too good to think of anything other than himself ’,<
B ? '
5(3 H!), but which might be connected withMetaph. 983 a 5 – 10 ,
where it is stated that God knows the ‘principles and causes’ ("andA
) of all things (see
Owens ( 1979 ) 227 ). On these matters see Huby ( 1979 ) 57.
(^28) The idea expressed by ‘using God’ (
C, see n. 26 above) is in contrast with the concept of
enthusiastic divination in Plato’sIon: ‘this is why God takes out the mind of these people and uses
them as his servants, as well as the sooth-sayers and godly diviners’ (
1 $ . 3 D
-
-) 3 $ -
H#
# )
,
534 c 7 –d 1 ), where ‘God’ ( !) is the subject of ‘use’ (
) and man the object. This
contrast supports the view that Aristotle here does not, as Effe ( 1970 ) argues (cf. my note 29 ), have
in mind Plato’s notion of divine madness ( ). The presence of the word
!(‘divine
inspiration’) here in Aristotle’s text does not alter this view, for this is used by Aristotle elsewhere to
denote an affection (a ) of the human soul (cf.Pol. 1342 a 6 ;Eth. Eud. 1225 a 25 ) and here seems
to be used in a somewhat metaphorical way. See also Croissant ( 1932 ) 30 n. 2 : ‘Le mot
!