On the Nature of Man (review)

This translation with notes makes an important work accessible to a wider audience of scholars. As an update of the former translation and commentary by W. Telfer ( Cyril of Jerusalem and Nemesius of Emesa[London, 1955]), from which material has been incorporated, it provides a wealth of information, successfully balanced, in the introduction, notes, and bibliography. (The translation is a substantially revised version of work done by J. O. Urmson, but never published.) The work is based on Morani's 1987 Teubner edition. (The electronic Thesaurus Linguae Graecaedatabase also lists as typescript an edition by B. Einarson, as forthcoming in the Corpus Medicorum Graecorum.) This high-quality presentation will empower research by others. The text itself, dating from the late-fourth century AD, is important for the range of issues it covers, for the information it provides on how sources were used and philosophical views summarized and transmitted in late antiquity, and for enhancing our understanding of the interaction between pagan and Christian culture (the work has at times been mistakenly attributed to St. Gregory of Nyssa).

The opening section starts with an overview of the order of the universe: sections 2–4 cover the general relation of the human soul with the body, sections 4–28 then focus on more specific topics of physiology, psychology, and the emotions, and sections 29–43 return to the cosmic dimension, but this time from the angle of the question of fate and providence as God's government of the universe.

P. J. van der Eijk greatly adds to the value of the work by bringing in his expertise on the medical tradition, and R. W. Sharples contributes state-of-the-art reflections (many of which result from his own previously published research) on connections with the Peripatetic tradition and with Alexander of Aphrodisias in particular. But perhaps the time has also come to re-evaluate, in subsequent research, Porphyry's role in the doxographical transmission chain (and particularly of works of his that are no longer extant), just as Posidonius's influence has been reduced to more realistic proportions in recent scholarship.

Throughout his work Nemesius, as a bishop at Emesa in Syria, does not leave his readers guessing at his Christian identity, and when mentioning the Christian tradition always ranks it explicitly higher in truth-value than the other accounts he mentions (as in section 1.4.end ff. and in 2.38). He is also a witness to the debate about Origen's thoughts, accepting some views, and rejecting others (pp. 6–7, introduction 3.b; for criticism cf. 3.44.end, 30.95.18).

The translation in general reads very well. One minor concern one could raise, however, is the varying translations of the Greek term δημιουργóς. When Nemesius is following closely the exposition of Plato's Timaeus, the term is merely transcribed, as "Demiurge" (for example, 2.34.10–15, yet not consistently; cf. 5.48), but elsewhere the word is rendered as the explicitly Christian "Creator" (for example, 1.3, 1.14.15), or, literally, as "Craftsman" (2.36.15).The translation "Creator" in the parts of Nemesius's exposition that are clearly Christian makes sense, because the context indicates that the Christian notion is meant here (yet "Creator" is also used in contexts that are not specifically Christian, as in section 8). But this translation comes at the price of losing the connection between Christian and so-called pagan terminology: the fact that the same word is used in both contexts establishes a common ground for someone who is addressing both audiences simultaneously (2.38.7–9; 42.120.21–23).