Andreas Schwab | Universität Heidelberg (original) (raw)

Books by Andreas Schwab

Comment traiter et organiser le savoir ? Comment intégrer les découvertes nouvelles aux connaissa... more Comment traiter et organiser le savoir ? Comment intégrer les découvertes nouvelles aux connaissances déjà acquises ? Comment articuler la théorie à la pratique ? Ce volume réunit neuf études en français, en allemand, en anglais et en italien qui exposent les réponses apportées à ces questions par quelques textes anciens. À travers toute l’Antiquité gréco-romaine et jusqu’à l’époque byzantine, ces études relèvent de nombreuses intersections entre sciences et philosophie. Ainsi, elles éclairent le problème toujours actuel qu’on peut désigner du nom de Wissensbewältigung – le « travail du savoir ». Les thématiques suivantes figurent au premier plan : mathématiques, médecine et astrologie ; cosmologie, géographie et biologie ; réception et critique de la science.

Wie gebrauchen und organisieren wir unser Wissen? Wie werden neue wissenschaftliche Erkenntnisse in bereits bestehende Wissensbestände integriert? Wie verhält sich theoretisches zu praktischem Wissen? Die Untersuchungen dieses Bandes in französischer, italienischer, deutscher und englischer Sprache antworten auf diese Fragen, indem sie von einigen antiken Texten ihren Ausgang nehmen. Für den Zeitraum von der griechisch-römischen Antike bis in die byzantinische Zeit weisen sie auf zahlreiche Überschneidungen von Wissenschaft und Philosophie hin. Auf diese Weise werfen sie neues Licht auf das gerade heute noch aktuelle Problem der ‚Wissensbewältigung‘ (‚travail du savoir‘). Die folgenden Themen stehen im Vordergrund der Beiträge: Mathematik, Medizin und Astrologie; Kosmologie, Geographie und Biologie; die Rezeption und Kritik von Wissenschaft.

Thales of Miletus is regarded as one of the most important figures within the fields of philosoph... more Thales of Miletus is regarded as one of the most important figures within the fields of philosophy and science in ancient Greece. Despite this fact few anecdotes of his life are known and nothing of his work has been transmitted to us directly. This is one important reason for my investigation.
For the first time this book takes on the task of investigating and making accessible more than one hundred written testimonies of 25 Christian authors – Greek as well as Latin – who lived from the 2nd to the 7th Century BC, on the subject of Thales’ life and work. This interdisciplinary approach, crossing the areas of Classical Philology, Philosophy, History of Science, and Theology, is based on the new trilingual edition of Thales (Traditio Praesocratica, Bd. 1, Die Milesier. Thales, 2009), a project in which I have been actively involved.
This study breaks new ground in two respects: Firstly by using the so far univestigated new text corpus as its basis, secondly with regard to the methodological approach, which places a special focus on the respective context and argumentative correlations of the passages in which the name of Thales as the founder of the European philosophical tradition appears. By doing so this work seeks to make an important contribution to the research not only of early Greek philosophy, but also to the field of early Christian theology and its relation to Greek philosophy.

Content and Motivation
The first, methodological part takes the previous history of research as a background to explain on the one hand, why it is relevant to undertake such an investigation and on the other hand why the chosen method is adequate for the task. It is shown how the research of the last century on Thales is dependant and based on the outdated edition (1903) of Hermann Diels who only offers a small selection of the existing written testimonies. It is also shown, that the previous research primarily showed interest into the reconstruction of the historical Thales, while it neglected and even ignored the varying contexts and multilayered motivations of the authors referring to Thales. Recognizing these shortcomings, this work tries to offer a more sophisticated understanding: Firstly it discusses Greek and Latin testimonies which were hitherto uninvestigated. Secondly it approaches the subject with a new perspective and method. It does not attempt to reconstruct the life and work of Thales himself, but instead examines the image of Thales held by a certain author at a certain time. For the first time, this focuses necessary attention on the context within the discussion of these testimonies. The methodological preliminaries and reflections are followed in the main part by a number of case studies including 73 Greek and 37 Latin testimonies of 25 Christian authors: At its core there is a detailed analysis and commentary of the Latin testimonies from Irenaeus of Lyon to Isidore of Seville and the Greek testimonies from Athenagoras to Iohannes Malalas.

Results
Apart from commenting on the 110 testimonies, the investigation leads to the following three results, which might impact on further research of early Greek philosophy:

(1) Important factors which influence the respective description and representation of Thales and his ideas in later times were determined and differentiated by examining the Greek and Latin testimonies within their context. These factors range from some authors’ argumentation goals which although clearly present in the text had to be concluded indirectly, up to other authors’ explicitly named strategies and intentions. Some for example instrumentalize the figure of Thales and his attributes for their argumentation, while others have an encyclopedic interest or even employ a rhetorical mise en scène of their own, non-Christian education. Based on these inductively gained findings the following thesis seems plausible: The most important factor for understanding each respective description and representation of Thales and his ideas lies within the propositional content of each context in which the reference takes place.

(2) The investigation was also able to differentiate a number of areas of discourse into which Christian authors of different centuries could be placed. It appeared to be reasonable to distinguish between varying areas of discourse such as apologetic-protreptic, chronological, epistolographical, encyclopaedical and theological-philosophical areas of discourse. Furthermore within the “inner-Christian” discourse this research managed to make a distinction between heresiological, exegetical, homiletical and epistolographical contexts. By basing this research both upon synchronic and diachronic comparison, a description and representation pattern inherent to a specific area of discourse concerning specific modes of argumentation and recurring text passages emerged. The repercussions of these results are far-reaching for further research on and understanding of early Greek philosophy as a whole and in particular on the transmission of the texts, which so often is only fragmentary.

(3) Thirdly this investigation shows that it is no longer possible to speak about a uniform image of Thales which is common to all Christian authors. The view of a homogeneous reception or a uniform image of Thales and his ideas appears to be not only imprecise, but even to be inadequate with the detailed analysis of the testimonies as a basis. However, the following thesis could rightly be held, that within a certain context and area of discourse a similar description and representation of Thales and his ideas can be found.

These results are of general impact on every further critical work on Early Greek philosophy. Be it, that it emphasizes the importance attached to the context of the tradition and transmission of the text, or, that in dealing with an early Greek thinker a thorough distinction of different transmission branches, recipients and areas of discourse is required.
In précis this work makes a critical and innovative contribution to the research of early Greek philosophy and science. It can be viewed as an impulse and a prompt for further promising research on early Greek thinking and both its reception and transformation in later times.

Papers by Andreas Schwab

Conferences by Andreas Schwab

Publication workshop organized by the Centre of Excellence in Ancient Near Eastern Empires of the... more Publication workshop organized by the Centre of Excellence in Ancient Near Eastern Empires of the University of Helsinki (Dr Melanie Wasmuth) and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (Dr Alexander Schütze, Egyptology, and Professor Dr Andreas Schwab, Greek Philology).

6th c. BCE Egypt spawned a key figure of ancient cross-regional diplomacy. The Egyptian politician and physician Udjahorresnet held high inner political functions in the former Egyptian kingship realm and became an important figure in transforming Egypt into a regional centre within the first ‘global’ and exceedingly culturally diverse empire of the Achaemenians. Though the ‘autobiographic’ inscription on his statue in the Musei Vaticani has been discussed in various aspects from an Egyptological perspective, the potential of a cross-regional close reading has not been taken up until now. Similarly, a discussion of the person and function of Udjahorresnet as a diplomat based on the cross-regional contemporary evidence throughout the Achaemenid empire is still missing. The workshop aims at a detailed cross-disciplinary commentary on one of the key sources on early Achaemenid expansion politics. This close reading of a specific primary source for ancient diplomacy in a phase of highly increasing globalization will be embedded into a set of contributions concerning Udjahorresnet’s personal life and his professional functions as well as on Udjahorrenet as diplomatic figure and as historical mediator.

Results
Apart from commenting on the 110 testimonies, the investigation leads to the following three results, which might impact on further research of early Greek philosophy: