Vladimir Bibikhin - The Woods

I shall read out, to reprise and consolidate what has already been said, a long quotation from the Physics (190b), the point of which is that it introduces nothing new. ‘Thus, clearly, from what has been said, whatever comes to be is always complex. There is, on the one hand, (a) something which comes into existence, and again (b) something which becomes that – the latter (b) in two senses, either the subject or the opposite. By the “opposite” I mean the “unmusical”, by the “subject” “man”’ (190b, 10). 8

To repeat: the ‘matter’ for becoming musical was, make no mistake, not the chaos of ‘unmusical’ but human; the chaos of unmusical is the contrary of musical and, paradoxically, it is lodged not in the person but in the musical: until the aim of becoming musical was formulated there was no unmusical; ‘the absence of shape or form or order are the “opposite”, and the bronze or stone or gold the subject”’ (190b, 15). We tend to think that the matter itself was chaos and that it is overcome by eidos. Not a bit of it. Before eidos, matter is not chaos. As soon as eidos comes on the scene, the absence of shape or form or order also appears.

Now, just as the seed wants to develop, does every substratum contain this movement within it? Exactly so, we read in the Physics, Book 1; and in Book 2 we find matter and movement placed side by side (200a, 31). Matter and its movements, the forest and its history. If the forest is like the seed, it, too, will have its history of development.

1 1. Encyclopaedia Britannica, s.v. ‘Christianity: Relics and Saints’ ( https://www.britannica.com/topic/Christianity/Relics-and-saints). [Tr.]

2 2. See ‘Yggdrasil (Ygg’s Steed)’, in John Lindow, Norse Mythology: A Guide to Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002), pp. 319–22. [AM]

3 3. Ossip Zadkine (1890–1967) was a Russian-born avant-garde French sculptor and artist. [AM]

4 4. Pavel Florenskii, Filosofiia Kul’ta (Moscow: Mysl’, 2004). The ontology of the Cross is the central topic of this 1922 lecture course. [AM]

5 5. The Metaphysics of Aristotle, tr. John H. M’Mahon (London: George Bell, 1884). [Tr.]

6 6. Aristotle, On Coming-to-Be and Passing-Away, tr. Harold H. Joachim (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1922), book 2, part 1 (329a). [Tr.]

7 7. Aristotle, Physics, tr. Robin Waterfield (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008), book 1, 190b 20–5. [AM]

8 8. Aristotle, Physica, tr. R.P. Hardie and R.K. Gaye, in The Works of Aristotle, ed. W.D. Ross (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1930), vol. 2, book 1, ch. 7.

Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».

Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию на ЛитРес.

Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.