De Anima by Any Other Name

In A Rose by Any Other Name philosopher Umberto Eco said that the translator is always
a traitor.1 This line is culled from an Italian phrase "traduttore, traditore," which means translator,
traitor. Henry J. Blumenthals essay Neoplatonic Elements in the De Anima Commentaries seems
to reflect this problematic in interpreting the classic ancient Aristotelian text about the meaning of
the soul.
In this essay, Blumenthal analyzed De Anima 3.5 which deals about the notion of the soul. He
wrote that many Neoplatonist commentators have knowingly and unknowingly inserted their own
Platonic perspective on the Aristotelian context.2 This blunder on their part argues Blumenthal
could have only been the result of their training as Neoplatonists which looks at Aristotles teachings
as manifestation of Neoplatonic truth.3 His argument further hinges on the historical fact that unlike
the other commentators such Simplicius, Proclus, Plotinus, Philoponus who are all noted
Neoplatonists, he considers Alexander as one immune from the incompetence of the[se]
commentators,4 having written before the Neoplatonic period.
Blumentals critical analysis of ancient commentators of Aristotles De Anima showed us how
ones point of view can influence their interpretation of a text.5 This is exemplified in one of the
general principle of hermeneutics which states that one cannot be virtually neutral in interpreting a
particular text without leaning to a particular perspective.6 The essay brings to view the
hermeneutical aspect of language, language as expressive of human condition particularly of
knowledge. We may recall Paul Ricoeurs narrative emplotment as method or framework with
which one could interpret a given phenomenon or text. Being greatly influenced by Aristotle himself,
Ricoeur said that there are no absolute interpretation of something given that the object studied or
known and the subject knowing exists in a tensive state. There is an epistemic distance that pervades
this gap. That is why his method came to be known as the hermeneutic of suspicion.7
Any interpretation therefore merits some suspicion.

CJFF
Manila/2014

Umberto Eco, A Rose by Any Other Name, trans. William Weaver, Guardian Weekly, January 16, 1994,
retrieved December 10, 2013 from http://www.themodernword.com/eco/eco_guardian94.html.
2

Cf. Henry J. Blumenthal, Neoplatonic Elements in the De Anima Commentaries, in Aristotle

Transformed, ed. Richard Sorabji (New York: Cornell University Press, 1990), 310.
3

Ibid., 316.

Ibid., 305.

Ibid., 323.

Principles of Textual Interpretation, God on the Net, retrieved December 10, 2013 from
http://www.godonthe. net/evidence/intrpret.htm.
7
Kim Atkins, Paul Ricoeur, Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy (August 4, 2003). Retrieved December 10,
2013 from http://www.iep.utm.edu/ricoeur/.