Georgios Steiris

National and Kapodistrian University of Athens | uoa · Department of Philosophy

Εισαγωγή στην πολιτική φιλοσοφία του Ακινάτη

In the 21st century, it is obvious that new technological and scientific challenges are being posed and scientific data, which foreshadow radical reorientations of both man and humanity. Especially biotechnology, robotics and artificial intelligence promote both a superhuman and a metahuman ideals. In this paper we attempt to scrutinize the challen...

Cardinal Bessarion (1408–1472), in the second chapter of the first book of his influential work In calumniatorem Platonis, attempted to reply to Georgios Trapezuntios’ (1396–1474) criticism against Plato in the Comparatio Philosophorum Platonis et Aristotelis. Bessarion investigates why the Athenian philosopher maintained, in several dialogues, tha...

In ancient Greek texts we can trace implicit discussions about the possible artificial expansion of human nature and the creation of intelligent automata. In the 21th century the same discussion is brought forth by the evolution of technology. Biotechne, the interrelation of biology and technology and its implications, is a heated topic among schol...

Confucius associates the good and the beautiful. Li (translated variously as “ritual propriety,” “ritual,” “etiquette,” or “propriety”) embodies the entire spectrum of interaction with humans, nature, and even material objects. I argue that Confucius attempts to introduce an ethical ontology, not of “what,” but of “the way.” The “way” of reality be...

Georgios Trapezuntios (1395-c.1472), otherwise known as George of Trebizond, was an eminent scholar of the 15th century, who contributed vastly to the dissemination of ancient Greek philosophy and rhetoric in Renaissance Italy. According to a letter of consolation he sent in the 1420s to Georgius Vatacius Cretensis on the occasion of the latter’s w...

Review of: Valery Rees, Anna Corrias, Francesca M. Crasta, Laura Follesa, Guido Giglioni (eds.), Platonism, Ficino to Foucault, Leiden–Boston, Brill 2021 (Brill’s Studies in Intellectual History, 320), 357 pp., ISBN: 9789004358935.

This Handbook contains forty essays by an international team of experts on the antecedents, the content, and the reception of the Dionysian corpus, a body of writings falsely ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite, a convert of St Paul, but actually written about 500 AD. The first section contains discussions of the genesis of the corpus, its Christi...

The first public appearance of the Dionysian Corpus is linked to the intellectual circle of Severus of Antioch, who prized the corpus since they saw in its assertion of the composition with humanity of the ‘simple Jesus’ and in his ‘god-manly activity’ a vindication of their own Christology. This chapter passes under review the earliest textual cit...

According to Georgios Gemistos ‘Pletho’, politics should be established on true philosophy and mirror the cosmic order. Pletho interprets politically his ontotheology, by presenting a popularized metaphysical order in close connection to Pseudo Dionysius, in order to enhance the sociopolitical value of his programme. His works prove that he was a p...

16ος-17ος αιώνας) συνιστούν στην πραγματικότητα εκκοσμικευμένες θεολογικές έννοιες, στο πλαίσιο μιας πολιτικής θεολογίας που κατέτεινε, εν μέσω θρησκευτικών διαμαχών και ερίδων, σε μια ουσιωδώς θεολογική πολιτική υπό νεωτερικό μανδύα. Δεν έχει όμως διασαφηθεί ότι στην ευτοπική γραμματεία της ίδιας περιόδου εμφανίζεται κυρίαρχα μια πολιτική θεοσοφία...

The canon in the history of philosophy, as has been crystallized, needs revision with an emphasis on intercultural studies. Especially the view of self-contained cultures and communities, since antiquity up to the fifteenth century, forms an ahistorical construct, which is already being attacked and is in no position to offer anything fruitful to r...

Some Christian thinkers of the first centuries discuss human nature and sexual differentiation in a rather modern way. In this article, we attempt to bring forth Gregory’s of Nyssa (335-394 A.D.) views in the “De hominis opificio”, which consequently influenced Maximus’ the Confessor and Johannes Scotus’ Eriugena arguments on gender and sex. Namely...

During the European Renaissance, scholars and members of the bourgeoisie showed a stronginterest in practical philosophy, namely ethics and politics. This shift was expressed in works that described ideal societies, also known as utopias. Meanwhile, the Renaissance philosophy of nature, influenced by Late Ancient philosophy and mysticism, imposed a...

Recently, seminal publications highlighted the Romanitas of the Byzantines. However, it is not without importance that from the 12th century onwards the ethnonym Hellene (Ἓλλην) became progressively more popular. A number of influential intellectuals and political actors preferred the term Hellene to identify themselves, instead of the formal Roman...

Ο Μακιαβέλι ασχολήθηκε συστηματικά με τη συγγραφή θεατρικών έργων προς το τέλος πια της ζωής του, όταν είχε αρχίσει να χάνει τις ελπίδες επανάκαμψης του στην ενεργό πολιτική, στην οποία είχε αφιερώσει το γονιμότερο μέρος της ζωής του. Ίσως, η ενασχόληση με το θέατρο ήταν η μόνη δραστηριότητα που θα μπορούσε να του προσφέρει ευχαρίστηση όταν ένιωθε...

Abu Nasr Muhammad b. Muhammad, better known as al-Farabi (c.870 -c.950), was the most au-thentic of the Arabic philosophers. The principal sources of his philosophy are to be sought in the Greek tradition, in the original writings of Plato and Aristotle, in Neoplatonism and Aristotelianism of Alex-andria. Most significant is his turn towards the mu...

Әл-Фараби (c.870-c.950) деген атпен танылған Әбу Насыр Мұхаммед ибн Мұхаммед Араб философтарының ішіндегі бірегейі болып саналады. Оның философиясының негізгі көздері Грек дәстүрінен, Платон мен Аристотельдің түпнұсқа жазбаларынан, неоплатонизмнен және Александрия Аристотеланизмінен бастау алады. Ең маңыздысы, ол тиісті бағасын алмаған орташа плато...

Marsilio Ficino is well known for his efforts to expand the philosophical canon of his time. He exhibited great interest in Platonism and Neoplatonism, but also endeavoured to recover understudied philosophical traditions of the ancient world. In his Theologia platonica de immortalitate animorum, he commented on the Presocratics. Ficino thought of...

Renaissance political thought

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494) decided to study all the ancient and medieval schools of philosophy, including the Pre-Socratics, in order to broaden his scope. Pico showed interest in ancient monists. He commented that only Xenophanes’ One is the One simply, while Parmenides’ One is not the absolute One, but the oneness of Being. Melissu...

The Contribution of Byzantine Scholars to Renaissance Aristotelianism It is widely known that the Byzantine scholars who fled to Italy during the fifteenth century contributed to Renaissance philosophy. They brought with them manuscripts and produced editions and translations of Greek philosophical texts. Despite the common view that their works we...

This volume constitutes an attempt at bringing together philosophies of time—or more precisely, philosophies on time and, in a concomitant way, history—emerging from Christianity’s and Islam’s intellectual histories. Starting from the Neoplatonic heritage and the voice of classical philosophy, the volume enters the Byzantine and Arabic intellectual...

Pico’s view on emanationism is ambiguous. Moreover, his position viz. emanation seems to change at times. He made his emanationism more elaborate and complex by incorporating in it Neoplatonic ideas and the Kabbalistic hierarchy. He attempted a reconciliation of emanatio and creatio ex nihilo, as certain Christian Neoplatonists like Augustine did b...

Στη διάρκεια του 14ου αιώνα, αρχικά στην Ιταλία και κατόπιν και στη υπόλοιπη Ευρώπη, αναπτύσσεται ένας νέος πολιτισμός που θέτει ως πρώτη του προτεραιότητα την ολόπλευρη εξέλιξη του ανθρώπου, ώστε αυτός να ανταποκριθεί στις απαιτήσεις του πρακτικού βίου, τόσο στην ιδιωτική όσο και στη δημόσια σφαίρα. Στην Αναγέννηση η ευδαιμονία του ανθρώπου μετατί...

It has been repeatedly stated that Maximus the Confessor’s (c. 580–662) thought is of eminently philosophical interest, and his work has been approached from a philosophical point of view in a number of monographs. However, no dedicated collective scholarly engagement on Maximus the Confessor as a philosopher has been produced. Although Maximus’ tr...

The question of Modern Greek identity is certainly timely. The political events of the previous years have once more brought up such questions as: What does it actually mean to be a Greek today? What is Modern Greece, apart from and beyond the bulk of information that one would find in an encyclopaedia and the established stereotypes? This volume d...

Those who work with topics related to Modern Greek identity usually start discussing these issues by quoting the famous Georgios Gemistos Pletho (c.1360-1454): we, over whom you rule and hold sway, are Hellenes by genos (γένος), as is witnessed by our language and ancestral education. Although Woodhouse thought of Pletho as the last of the Hellenes...

We are most thankful to Forum Philosophicum, and its Editor-in-Chief Marcin Podbielski, for the invitation to act as guest editors in a special issue dedicated to looking at Maximus the Confessor from a philosophical perspective—by which we mean both the philosophical efflorescence of Maximus’ thought per se, approached within its historical contex...

Review of Ioannis D. Evrigenis, Αντίπαλον δέος: Έξωθεν φόβος και συλλογική δράση [Fear of Enemies and Collective Action], Iraklio: Crete University Press, 2014. 448 pp.

Theodore Gaza was a fifteenth-century Byzantine scholar and translator. He was highly respected as an expert on Aristotle. His work influenced Renaissance and early modern scholars interested in Aristotle’s biological works. Gaza introduced a new method of translating and editing ancient texts which influenced translators and editors. He was associ...

Mark Eugenikos was a leading Byzantine scholar and theologian. He participated in the Council of Ferrara-Florence (1438–1439). He declined to sign the conciliatory agreement between the Greek Orthodox and the Roman Catholic Church. Because of his refusal he became a key figure in the anti-unionist movement and enjoyed high popularity among the Orth...

Joseph Philagrios was a Byzantine scholar of the fourteenth century from Crete who wrote against the rapprochement between the Greek Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church. He was also a copyist of manuscripts.

Maximus the Greek was a monk, theologian, scholar, and translator active in Greece and Russia. He is considered a pioneer of Greek letters after the fall of Constantinople. He dedicated his life to the promotion of theology and education in the Slavic territories. He was associated with some of the most famous and influential Italian humanists of h...

Maximus Margunios was a sixteenth-century Greek scholar. He devoted his life to Church and got engaged in the intense debate between the supporters and the opponents of the unification of the Greek Orthodox and the Catholic Church with the result of being prosecuted by the Venetian authorities. He also worked as an editor and teacher in Italy and G...

John Argyropoulos was a famous Greek scholar of the fifteenth century, whose contribution in classical letters and philosophy was praised by his fellow humanists. He shared his time between Constantinople, Crete, mainland Greece, Italy, and other European countries. Argyropoulos’ career in Constantinople and Italy was remarkable, as his teaching an...

Pachomios Roussanos was a seminal sixteenth-century Greek scholar. In addition to his work as a copyist and editor of manuscripts, he wrote numerous treatises on religion, ethics, and grammar. He was a leading theologian of his century and throughout his short life he defended the Orthodox dogma from the influences of Western European theology.

John Zygomalas and his son Theodosius were sixteenth-century Greek scholars. They resided in Constantinople and were active in the contacts between Protestants and Greek Orthodox Church. Their contribution to the preservation and further development of ancient Greek and Byzantine thought was crucial, since they held key positions in the Greek Ortho...

Nikolaus Laonikus Tomaeus was a Greek Renaissance scholar who taught Aristotelian philosophy at Padua for almost 10 years. His lectures on Aristotle were extremely influential since he lectured on the Greek text instead of its Latin translation. He was highly accomplished in several fields, including art. His reputation among his fellow scholars, i...

This special volume of Forum Philosophicum, entitled “Sharing in the Logos: Philosophical Readings of Maximus the Confessor,” makes available five papers selected from those presented at the conference “Maximus the Confessor as a European Philosopher,” held at the Freie Universität, Berlin, from the 26th to the 28th of September, 2014. We are happy...

Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463–1494) focuses on Anaxagoras (ca. 500–428 BC) because he considers him as a precursor of the the later Neoplatonic concept all things exist in all things in their own mode, which became the core of Pico’s metaphysics. Anaxagoras’s philosophy permits Pico to establish his doctrine that all things share a portion of...

Die ethische und politische Philosophie al-Fārābīs beruht auf einer philosophischen Anthropologie, die die Menschen als von Natur aus als ungleich betrachtet und der Natur eine fundamentale Bedeutung zuschreibt. Die Natur stattet nur wenige Menschen mit besonderen Fähigkeiten aus, sodass die Verwirklichung der höheren theoretischen, geistigen, mora...

This paper seeks to explore the way Giovanni Pico della Mirandola treated the Orphics and the Pythagoreans in his Conclusiones nongentae, his early and most ambitious work, so that he formulates his own philosophy. I do not intend to present and analyze the sum of Pico’s references to Orphics and Pythagoreans, since such an attempt is beyond the sc...

Renaissance Studies in Greece

Since the 19 th century, Renaissance studies have gradually gained autonomy from Medieval and the Early Modern studies. In countries like Greece, where the traditional view was that no Renaissance occurred in the Balkan Peninsula during the 14 th -16 th centuries as a result of the Turkish occupation, Renaissance studies had to struggle to gain aut...

This chapter examines why Niccol Machiavelli held the heritage of ancient Greece in such low esteem and why he thought the Renaissance was a period of decline. Machiavellis underestimation of Greek Antiquity could also be attributed to the fact that he entertained a relatively low interest in philosophy and the arts. It is obvious that Machiavelli...