Description
Book SynopsisNemesius’ treatise On the Nature of Man is an important text for historians of ancient thought, not only as a much-quarried source of evidence for earlier works now lost, but also as an indication of intellectual life in the late fourth century AD. The author was a Christian bishop; the subject is the nature of human beings and their place in the scheme of created things. The medical works of Galen and the philosophical writings of Plato, Aristotle and the Neoplatonist Porphyry are all major influences on Nemesius; so too the controversial Christian Origen. On the Nature of Man provides the first kown compendium of theological anthropology with a Christian orientation and considerably influenced later Byzantine and medieval Latin philosophical theology.
Trade ReviewSharples and van der Eijk are to be thanked and congratulated for their production of this book which, by bringing together much of what is known about this important text, quite distinctly indicates also what still needs to be done for a full understanding of it. * Journal of Theological Studies, vol 61, no 1, April 2010 *
Sharples and van der Eijk have made a significant contribution to students of patristics and the late antique world. I hope that this excellent translation will fuel greater study of Nemesius, not only as a witness of lost antique philosophical and medical sources, but as an apologist and theologian in his own right. * Sobornost (incorporating Eastern Churches Review), 31:1 *
...its clear presentation of the work in its late antique context will mightily assist any exploration of this influence. This is a very welcome addition to the already immensely distinguished series, Translated Texts for Historians. * Early Medieval Europe Vol. 18 (4) *
Table of Contents
- Preface Abbreviations
- Introduction
- 1. The importance of Nemesius
- 2. Nemesius and the scope of his treatise
- 3. Nemesius' Christianity
- 4. Nemesius' views
- 5. Nemesius' sources
- Nemesius, On the Nature of Man
- 1. On the nature of man
- 2. On the soul
- 3. On the union of soul and body
- 4. On the body
- 5. On the elements
- 6. On imagination
- 7. On sight
- 8. On touch
- 9. On taste
- 10. On hearing
- 11. On smell
- 12. On thought
- 13. On memory
- 14. On immanent and expressed reason
- 15. Another division of the soul
- 16. On the non-rational part or kind of the soul, which is also called the affective and appetitive
- 17. On the desirous part
- 18. On pleasures
- 19. On distress
- 20. On anger
- 21. On fear
- 22. On the non-rational element that is not capable of obeying reason
- 23. On the nutritive faculty
- 24. On pulsation
- 25. On the generative or seminal faculty
- 26. Another division of the powers controlling living beings
- 27. On movement according to impulse or choice, which belongs to the appetitive part
- 28. On respiration
- 29. On the intentional and unintentional
- 30. On the unintentional
- 31. On the unintentional through ignorance
- 32. On the intentional
- 33. On choice
- 34. About what things do we deliberate?
- 35. On fate
- 36. On what is fated through the stars
- 37. On those who say that choice of actions is up to us
- 38. On Plato's account of fate
- 39. On what is up to us, or on autonomy
- 40. Concerning what things are up to us
- 41. For what reason were we born autonomous?
- 42. On providence
- 43. About what matters there is providence
- Bibliography
- Index of passages cited
- General index
