Work · Renaissance & Humanism
On the Differences between Aristotle and Plato (De differentiis)
Treatise written in Florence during the Church council for Latin readers: Aristotle falls short of Plato because he makes God a mover rather than a creator, rejects the Forms and puts individual things before universals; it started a Plato–Aristotle controversy among Greek and Latin scholars.
Introduction
Plethon wrote the short treatise “On the Differences between Aristotle and Plato” in Florence in 1439, during the Council of Ferrara–Florence, for Latin scholars for whom Aristotle was the authority in philosophy while Plato was hardly known. Point by point he argued that Aristotle falls short of Plato: he does not make God the creator of the universe but only its mover, rejects the Forms and so loses the source of order in the world, places individual things before universals, and leaves the immortality of the soul unclear. Gennadios Scholarios answered with a defence of Aristotle, to which Plethon replied; George of Trebizond attacked Plato, and Bessarion defended him in “Against the Slanderer of Plato” (1469). The controversy contributed to the reception of Plato in fifteenth-century Italy.
Connections
Criticizes
- Metaphysicsc. 340 BCE · Aristotle
More works by George Gemistos Plethon
- c. 1450Book of Laws (Nomoi)
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