James Wilberding and Julia Trompeter
Almost nothing is known about the life of Michael of Ephesus, and what we do know is in large part inferred from his writings. His name indicates that he was a Christian, and this is confirmed by a number of passages in his commentaries (e.g. in EN 462,19ff.; 549,21ff.; 620,17ff.). His routine references to medicine also give us good reason to believe that Michael was a physician.2 It is only thanks to an offhand remark he makes in his commentary on EN 10 at 570,21–2 (and cf. in GA 149,19) about the Presocratic Heraclitus of Ephesus being a ‘fellow citizen’, that we may be certain that Michael was himself a native of Ephesus.3 Even the dates of Michael’s life were a matter of controversy until the appearance of ground-breaking articles by Robert Browning and Sten Ebbesen.4 Previously it had been argued by Karl Praechter that Michael’s commentaries must have been written prior to 1040 AD because a certain anonymous summary of logic and the quadrivium, the oldest manuscript of which dates back to 1040 AD, already appears to incorporate material from Michael’s commentary on Aristotle’s Sophistical Refutations.5 Browning, however, directed our attention to a hitherto neglected funeral oration on Princess Anna Comnena (1083–1153), composed by a certain George Tornikes, which established later dates for the composition of his commentaries by demonstrating that Michael’s commentary work was part of larger project directed by Princess Comnena in Constantinople – this location is confirmed in Michael’s in EN 10, 610,11ff. – to fill in the gaps left in the Aristotelian commentary tradition. Here Michael is described as being a professional philosopher working at the imperial court.6 Browning reasonably concludes that the period of production began with Anna’s commencement of the project after her retirement in 1118 and was ‘probably completed’ by 1138, when she turned her attention to the composition of her Alexiad, though H.P.F. Mercken is surely right to point out that Michael might have begun his commentary activity on his own before the commencement of this project and might have continued on his own afterwards.7 Sten Ebbesen buttressed this conclusion by defusing Praechter’s argument for an earlier dating, showing that both Michael and the anonymous summary were in fact drawing on a common tradition of earlier scholia.8
Despite the fact that we know so little about his life, Michael of Ephesus has the distinction of being one of the most wide-ranging commentators on Aristotle ever to have lived. His surviving commentaries on Aristotle – there is no evidence that he composed commentaries on other authors – follow the standard Olympiodorian structure that first approaches a passage via a preface (dianoia) addressing its general import and then turns to discuss the details of the text (lexis), and the scope of his commentary work extends over the traditional divisions of philosophy to include logic, natural philosophy, metaphysics and ethics. Commentaries by Michael have been transmitted to us in some form on Aristotle’s Parva Naturalia, On the Parts of Animals, On the Movement of Animals, On the Progression of Animals, Nicomachean Ethics 5, Nicomachean Ethics 9–10, Sophistical Refutations, On the Generation of Animals, Metaphysics 7–149 and Politics10 as well as the pseudo-Aristotelian De coloribus.11
Moreover, Michael appears to refer to a number of other commentaries, and some scholars have maintained that these commentaries were written but have not survived: Physics,12 Rhetoric,13 Topics,14 Prior and Posterior Analytics,15 On the Heavens,16 On Interpretation,17 On the Soul,18 History of Animals19 and a certain Peri hormês.20 Yet two caveats must be added here. First, not all scholars include all of the last group of works in their overviews of Michael’s writings (though these overviews are not always claimed to be exhaustive), and second, at least some of these inferences might need to be revised in light of Concetta Luna’s contention that Michael routinely refers to the commentaries of Alexander of Aphrodisias as if they were his own.21
One of the recurring issues in the scholarship concerns Michael’s respective commitments to Platonism and Aristotelianism, on which scholars have historically advanced conflicting views. Almost the entire post-Plotinian commentary tradition is characterized by a commitment to the harmonization of Plato and Aristotle, although the level of commitment does vary from commentator to commentator.22 And so it should come as no surprise that a first wave of scholars placed Michael securely in this tradition, aligning him closely (and in some cases identifying him) with the Byzantine Platonist Michael Psellus.23 But this was followed by a second wave that held Michael to be an exception to this general rule, maintaining that his commentaries represent a return to a form of commentating more or less untainted by Platonic influence, such as can be found in the pre-Plotinian commentaries of Alexander of Aphrodisias.24 Michael’s penchant for looking to Alexander for insight certainly speaks for this view, as does the fact that he refers to Aristotle as ho daimonios (in EN 10, 529,4; 589,36–7; in PA 16,13; etc.) and even addresses him at one point as theiotate kai philosophôn koruphaiotate (in GA 158,26–7) but never attaches such epithets to Plato. Further, as Praechter has pointed out,25 Michael also appears to stick to the traditional Aristotelian doctrine of four causes, instead of adopting the Neoplatonic doctrine of six causes, as his predecessor Michael Psellus had. Moreover, it is easy enough to find passages in Michael’s corpus where he criticizes Plato, even without being explicitly prompted to do so by Aristotle’s text, e.g. in GA 25,16ff. and in PA 36,33ff. There are also historical and cultural reasons for this view. For in 1082 AD John Italus, a disciple of sorts of Michael Psellus, was condemned for ‘propagating the erroneous views of Iamblichus and Proclus’,26 which at the very least included the doctrine of Platonic Forms and the transmigration of souls, as Anna Comnena herself reports in the fifth book of her Alexiad, and this might reasonably lead one to expect Michael to distance himself from Neoplatonic thought. To these and other such considerations it may now be added that Michael’s embryology shows little to no Neoplatonic influence.27 The scholars included in this second wave do acknowledge that Michael does at times refer to Plato and adopt Neoplatonic language,28 but they maintain that the degree of this influence is limited enough that it does not amount to a significant departure from Aristotle’s theory.
Recently, a third wave of scholarship has been developing, which has the Neoplatonic influence on Michael’s thought running much deeper. This wave begins by taking more seriously the instances of Neoplatonic influence already known to the second wave and then adds to these some previously unidentified instances, while also accounting for the absence of Neoplatonism where it does not appear. Outside of Michael’s commentaries on the Nicomachean Ethics, this includes his heavy dependence on Syrianus in his commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics 7–14.29 Dominic O’Meara has now shown30 that while Michael’s scholia on the Politics contain hardly any explicit references to Neoplatonism, there are even here certain important points of contact, e.g. regarding Michael’s admission of the Neoplatonic hierarchy of virtues (in Pol. 305,19–20) and the Platonic theory of Forms (in Pol. 310,12–15). Moreover, Sten Ebbesen has shown31 that while there are no ‘high flown Neo-Platonist speculations’ in his commentary on Aristotle’s Sophistical Refutations, this is simply because the older scholia that he was working with did not themselves include such speculations, so that the absence of Neoplatonism in his Sophistical Refutations commentary cannot be taken as evidence that Michael was refraining from engaging with this school of thought.
Michael’s commentaries on Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics provide us with further evidence of a rather ambivalent attitude towards Neoplatonism.32 On the one hand, we find some clear cases where Michael is borrowing from Neoplatonic philosophers. He explicitly points to Plotinus as one who has commendably established the ineffability of contemplative pleasure,33 and as Carlos Steel has shown, Michael draws implicitly but demonstrably from Proclus’ commentary on Plato’s Alcibiades 1 in order to elucidate Aristotle’s claim that the one who contemplates is supremely god-loved.34 Other nods to the Neoplatonic tradition are less obvious but not to be ignored. Aristotle’s god becomes for Michael a creator god (dêmiourgos) who bestows gifts upon humanity and guides the course of the universe.35 (In his commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics 12 he even adds that this god is a ‘substance that transcends substance’ – huperousios ousia).36 Likewise, when Michael describes the human intellect’s contemplative activity, he often invokes very Platonic terminology, including: ascent,37 separation,38 reversion,39 self-reflection,40 immediate contact,41 union,42 illumination43 and participation.44 And although the moral psychology that we find in Michael’s comments on the Nicomachean Ethics does not appear to represent a major departure from Aristotle, his introduction of the so-called ‘attentive part’ of the soul in his comments on Book 9 is a clear case of Michael being influenced by the subsequent Neoplatonic commentary tradition.45
On the other hand, Michael’s rejects with the Neoplatonic ladder of virtues. To be sure, at one point he does acknowledge that he has had some exposure to the Neoplatonic scala, at least as far as the lower virtues are concerned, namely in in EN 10, 578,13–18, where he reports to us that ‘the Platonists’ – unlike the Aristotelians – distinguish between political virtues and virtues of character. But not only does Michael refuse to follow the Neoplatonists here,46 but he does not even engage with the higher levels of virtue in the Neoplatonic scala. For Aristotle’s contention that individual virtues such as justice and courage cannot be ascribed to the gods (EN 1178b7–24) offers Michael the perfect opportunity to engage with this scala. After all, the Neoplatonic scala was designed to explain precisely this – the special sense in which justice, courage, moderation and wisdom can be attributed to the gods. But Michael is instead content simply to repeat Aristotle’s reasons for rejecting any such ascription. Thus, it would seem that Michael was either not adequately acquainted with the higher levels of the scala – this is possible seeing that Michael never explicitly refers to purifying or paradigmatic or theurgic virtues – or else he simply had little interest in engaging with the Neoplatonists on this issue. At the same time, he seems all too keen to engage with the Neoplatonists when he comes to Aristotle’s comment that ‘a complete span of life’ is a prerequisite for happiness (EN 1177b24–5). For here Michael seizes on this as an opportunity to reject the thesis that happiness does not increase with time,47 and even if Michael does not reveal the identity of his opponent(s), there is some reason to think that his hypothetical objector is meant to represent Plotinus.48
According to Michael’s exegesis of Aristotle, it is the key enterprise of EN 10 to show that the true and happy man lives a life according to intellect. In this context (cf. 529,5–10), he emphasizes that ‘the happy man is two-fold’ (529,7), on the one hand the political man, who needs good luck for actualizing his activity unimpededly, and on the other hand the contemplating man, who grasps ‘the real Beings’ (529,9). Michael mentions that the reason why Aristotle devotes book 10 exclusively to the life according to intellect is that Aristotle ‘has already said a great deal about the happy political man (529,10)’, and also later on he refers Aristotle’s elaboration of political happiness to book 1 (cf. 572,25–30). But this still does not say much about any different rating or value of the two kinds of happiness.
In other passages this hierarchy is assessed with respect to pleasure. Michael rates the pleasure of contemplating as more valuable than that of virtuous practical action (cf. 529,19–20). But even though he clearly states this, Michael still puts much weight and emphasis on the relevance of practical action as such, being the basis and touchstone for a person’s credibility and virtue. One might even say that at some points Michael’s focus on practical action is stronger than Aristotle’s. For example, Aristotle only demands that words should be ‘in agreement with what is seen to happen’ (EN 1172b5–6), i.e. with the things one does, but Michael makes this remark more concrete by saying that deeds make assertions credible – and not the other way around.49 Deeds and practical actions generally play an important role in Michael’s interpretation of happiness. In his explanation of Aristotle’s statement that happiness should be ‘given a complete length of life’ (EN 1177b25), Michael adds that this is because during a whole life ‘we can engage in more noble practical actions’ than during a short period of time.50 What does that mean? This quantification of practical virtuous acts is not to be confused with the thesis that contemplative happiness is ‘more continuous’ and ‘longer-lasting’ than political happiness, because we can contemplate for a greater measure of time.51 Thus, the continuity of contemplative happiness depends on the continuity of contemplation. By contrast, the claim that we, in a greater measure of time, can engage in more practical actions does not mean that these actions are themselves continuous and long-lasting like contemplation. During a longer life, we can engage in more practical actions. According to Michael, the continuity and duration of activities depends on the measure of time we can spend on one and the same activity, and this, again, has to do with the attainability of the object sought after.
It is worth asking what that means for contemplation. After all, our everyday experience shows that, when it comes to engaging in an activity for a long time and continuously, i.e. without a break, this tends to be easier for us with other activities, e.g. playing video-games or watching television, than with engaging in contemplation. While Aristotle does not give an explanation for the fact that contemplating is called most continuous, and more continuous than practical action (cf. EN 1177a21–2), Michael explains this thought with an interesting reference to Metaph. 1072a32–b14 – a passage he also comments on in his commentary on Aristotle’s Metaphysics: it is because the object of contemplation is structured in a special way that we can engage in the act of contemplation for a longer period than we can engage in other activities for. To put the matter succinctly, the object of desire and the good we seek in contemplation is defined as ‘the first cause of all things’ (581,26), and it is desirable by its own nature, lovelier and more longed for than other objects, because – since it is infinite in goodness and unattainable – the contemplating person necessarily remains insatiable with respect to it.52 We can add that virtuous practical action, by contrast, is limited because its attainable end and object lies in the action itself. In courage, for instance, the courageous action itself already is the end, and such an action is usually limited to a certain act, like fighting in a battle. That we can engage more or less continuously in playing video-games is due to the fact that these games, too, do not have an attainable end insofar the attaining of this end (i.e. approaching an endless row of new levels) might be an endless enterprise, but there is a crucial difference in the goodness of the two ends. We cannot really compare the approaching of a new gaming-level to a metaphysical first cause that is desirable by its own beauty and nature.
If the thought that contemplation can per se not achieve satisfaction, on the one hand, is taken to be serious, and if we take into account that, on the other hand, contemplation as well as happiness, which are so often identified,53 are said to be (most) self-sufficient,54 and that, furthermore, the intellectual life is ‘lacking in nothing’ (582,17) and ‘wanting nothing’ (583,20), this causes a serious problem: how can contemplation per se escape satisfaction, when at the same time it is said to be most self-sufficient, lacking in nothing, and even wanting nothing? One possible explanation is that the lack of satisfaction has nothing to do with frustration and that Michael rather sees it as a great advantage.55 For it is precisely because the desire for contemplation cannot be satisfied that we go on with this most pleasant activity without becoming tired of it: ‘There is satiety with respect to the other goods and the objects of desire and the apparent goods, and we pursue them up to the point where we attain them and achieve satiety with respect to them, but once we attain them and are filled by them, we desist and no longer want to be active with respect to them’.56 Here Michael would seem to be open to the criticism that this permanent activity of the contemplating person sounds rather exhausting, assuming it is even possible. Yet he reassures us that, although the contemplating person is permanently active, this activity is by itself full of leisure, and has nothing to do with being in a state of stress like the man of political happiness who ‘insofar he is keeping a careful eye on the day-to-day matters of the city and is anxious to maintain as firm and enduring what is noble and advantageous both to the general public and separately to each individual, […] is lacking leisure and in a state of turmoil’.57 Michael states that the ultimate end, which is identified with contemplative happiness, is found in leisure. It is thus necessary that the object of contemplation, i.e. ‘the first cause of all things’, may not be this ‘ultimate end’ because even if contemplative happiness is an ultimate end, the object of contemplation may not be such, since when it had been grasped as an ultimate end, the activity would stop – just as other activities do.58
Further, there are passages in Michael’s commentary suggesting that in the end he was more an advocate of an inclusive than of an exclusive understanding of happiness. Sometimes he says that it is the combination of moderate possessions, noble practical actions and being wholly committed to contemplation that makes our lives happy. Further, he does not see any contradiction in saying that the happy person can engage in the best practical actions and at the same time be wholly committed to contemplation. At one point, when he is aiming to show the importance of coherence between one’s statements and actions, he says: ‘For if someone says that the one who has moderate possessions and pursues the best [practical actions] is happy and, while saying [this], possesses no more than is necessary and performs the most noble and best practical actions and is wholly committed to contemplation, we should be persuaded by this man and say that both he and his claims are most true’.59 Here Michael offers a distinction that corresponds to the tripartite division of the soul: the attitude of moderation or modesty, which in Platonic terms could be seen as the virtue of the appetitive part of the soul, the virtue that consists in other practical actions, being probably attributed to the spirited part of the soul and its virtues and contemplation. The following remark lends credence to the assumption that Plato is clearly in the background here:
The spirited part needs courage in order that it might confidently and fearlessly set upon the things it should and flee what it must; and the appetitive part needs temperance in order to enjoy the things it should and be pained when it should. If, then, the affections are lacking moderation and indeterminate and sources of agitation and disturbance, how could the man who is being dragged around by his irrational affections and being pulled from one thing to another and led around in circles engage in intellectual activity? Therefore, those who said that practical virtue and its end, happiness, are certain suitable conditions for the reception of contemplative happiness were correct.60
Moderation, confidence and fearlessness are subsumed under practical virtue and happiness which, again, are called suitable conditions for contemplative happiness. For in a soul, in which the irrational affections are not in control, these immoderate affections are irritations to the rational soul. Here we can see that Michael combines Platonic and Aristotelian ethical theory by interpreting practical happiness as having a certain control over the appetites which ensures the rational part’s freedom from that disturbance and agitation; at the same time, this freedom builds the first step and precondition for contemplative happiness. The end and goal of this freedom, as Michael says in his interpretation of EN 1177b27, is that that the person can live out his life insofar as something divine exists in him, and insofar as he has separated himself from his bodily life. That is to say, insofar as he is not ‘the human being composed of reason and the many-headed beast of appetite and the lion-like spirit together with the body’.61 The divine life is the intellectual (noeros) life and involves fleeing from the excitement connected to matter upwards to the intelligible summit. In other words, the real man can live an intellectual life, which is the activity in accordance with intellect and therefore, all by itself, more divine than the human life and its political happiness.62
The high value of contemplation is also mirrored in the value of pleasure. Pleasure is not only ‘perhaps’ but necessarily connected to human virtue: being not only a mere symptom or shadow supervening on it, but ‘properly connected to our kind’, pleasure necessarily belongs to virtue both by definition and substantially.63 Michael contrasts the view that pleasure is identical with the Good, as Eudoxus said, with the opinion that it is most base.64 According to Michael, those who maintain that pleasure is most base do this not because they are convinced by plausible arguments, but by mere observation: ‘Rather, it is because they have seen the masses sinking into pleasure and neglecting the most noble [activities] and because they wish to lead the masses away from the unchecked charge and advance into pleasure that they make pleasure appear to be one of the most base things, even if it is not most base’.65 Even if it is not right to despise pleasure as a whole, there are didactical reasons to condemn it, since a condemnation can be part of a helpful method of bringing some people’s enjoyment to the right mean and harmonious measure. In order to achieve this measure, these people first need ‘complete abstention from pleasure’.66 The masses have to be kept away from pleasure since they lack the experience and ability of discrimination (cf. 533,8–10). This is due to the fact that they were not brought up soundly. This lack of early education further leads to the bad consequence that they are immune to arguments or discourses and must be harshly reigned in. When he cites the famous thesis ‘contraries are cures for contraries’, Michael appears to be mixing together Aristotelian and Hippocratic ideas. The idea seems to be that we can moderate the enjoyment of pleasure best by inflicting very particular pains on the person who is indulgent. For Michael these pains to be inflicted are not random but consist in keeping the person away from his special objects of desire, e.g. keeping the wine-lover from wine.67 Only ‘those who have been educated and habituated to keep away from what is bad, immediately run towards good things as soon as they hear discourses advising them to do so, whereas “discourses are unable to exhort the masses towards noble excellence” ’ (EN 1179b10).68 In the end, education and experience form the ability to distinguish between the varieties of pleasures properly. In order to achieve virtue, it is helpful to ‘know which of the pleasant and painful things turn out to contribute to virtue and which are impediments to it, and we must not irrationally hasten to everything pleasant and flee everything painful, […] and thereby act without any discrimination’.69 When Michael says that contemplation is a valuable and divine activity, and therefore must be pleasant, this is because ‘it is simply not permitted to think that the life in accordance with intellect is unpleasant’, nor to assume that it is ‘full of agitation and disturbance and filled with unpleasantness’.70 As we saw above, Michael invokes Plotinus’ name to emphasize the ineffability of this kind of pleasure, remarking that only ‘those who have been engaged in this kind of activity know what sort of pleasure this is’ (529,21–2). The pleasure of contemplation must be experienced to be understood.
We are very grateful to the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) for its generous support of this project (WI 3873/2–1) over 30 months. During this time, large parts of Michael’s comments on EN 10 were taken up as the focus text of an Ancient Greek reading group at the Ruhr Universität Bochum, and we would like to express our gratitude to the participants in this group for their commitment to the project, and especially for their valuable comments and questions, from which this translation has certainly benefitted: Wolfram Adam, Daniel Recker, Jana Schultz and Giulia Weißmann.
1The sections ‘The Life and Works of Michael of Ephesus’ and ‘Neoplatonic Influence on the Thought of Michael of Ephesus’ are by James Wilberding, and the section ‘Michael of Ephesus on the Happy Life’ is by Julia Trompeter.
2See K. Praechter, ‘Review of Michael Ephesii In libros De partibus animalium commentaria’, Göttingische gelehrte Anzeigen 168 (1906), pp. 861–907 at pp. 863–4 and K. Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations On Michael Of Ephesus’ Comments On Nicomachean Ethics X’, in C. Barber and D. Jenkins (eds) Medieval Greek Commentaries on the Nicomachean Ethics, Leiden: Brill 2009, pp. 185–202 at pp. 187–94.
3See Praechter, ‘Review’, 902.
4R. Browning, ‘An Unpublished Funeral Oration on Anna Comnena’, Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 8 (1962), pp. 1–12, reprinted with revisions in R. Sorabji (ed.) Aristotle Transformed. The Ancient Commentators and Their Influence, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press 1990, pp. 393–406 and S. Ebbesen, Commentators and Commentaries on Aristotle’s Sophistici Elenchi, Leiden: Brill 1981.
5K. Praechter, ‘Michael von Ephesos und Psellos’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 31 (1931), pp. 1–12.
6M. Trizio, ‘Byzantine Philosophy as a Contemporary Historiographical Project’, Recherches de théologie et philosophie médiévales 74 (2007), pp. 247–94 at pp. 291–2.
7See H.P.F. Mercken, ‘The Greek Commentators on Aristotle’s Ethics’, in R. Sorabji (ed.) Aristotle Transformed, pp. 407–44 at p. 437. Michael’s lament in his scholia on Aristotle’s Politics, which O’Meara has suggested was written after the Ethics commentaries (D. O’Meara, ‘Spätantike und Byzanz: Neuplatonische Rezeption – Michael von Ephesos’, in C. Horn and A. Neschke-Hentschke (eds) Politischer Aristotelismus. Die Rezeption der aristotelischen Politik von der Antike bis zum 19. Jahrhundert, Stuttgart: Verlag J.B. Metzler 2008, pp. 42–52 at p. 48), about being ‘a beggar’ (in Pol. 322,16–17, translated in E. Barker, Social and Political Thought in Byzantium from Justinian to the Last Palaeologus. Passages from Byzantine Writers and Documents, Oxford: Oxford University Press 1957, p. 141) might indeed be an indication that his work is no longer being sponsored by Anna.
8See Ebbesen, Commentators and Commentaries on Aristotle’s Sophistici Elenchi.
9Book 6 has often been attributed to Michael as well, but see P. Golitsis, ‘Who Were the Real Authors of the Metaphysics Commentary Ascribed to Alexander and Ps.-Alexander?’, in R. Sorabji (ed.) Aristotle Re-Interpreteted. New Findings on Seven Hundred Years of the Ancient Commentators, London: Bloomsbury 2016, pp. 565–89.
10Editions of all the previously listed commentaries are available in CAG. The scholia on the Politics have been collected in the edition of O. Immisch, Aristotelis Politica, Leipzig: Teubner 1929, pp. 293–327, though O’Meara, ‘Spätantike und Byzanz’, p. 47 suggests that this collection might still be augmented. A selection of these has been translated in Barker, Social and Political Thought in Byzantium from Justinian to the Last Palaeologus, pp. 136–41.
11See G. Wöhrle, Aristoteles. De Coloribus, Berlin: De Gruyter 1999, pp. 105–29.
12Michael refers to his commentary on the Physics in his in SE 163,14 and 178,7–8. This commentary is widely acknowledged by scholars.
13Michael refers to his commentary on the Rhetoric in his in SE 98,11–12. T. Conley, ‘Aristotle’s “Rhetoric” in Byzantium’, Rhetorica 8 (1990), pp. 29–44 at 38 has suggested that this is not lost and is in fact the anonymous commentary contained in H. Rabe (ed.) Anonymi et Stephani In Artem Rhetoricam Commentaria, CAG 21,2, Berlin: Reimer 1896, pp. 1–261. This commentary is widely acknowledged by scholars.
14Michael refers to his commentary on the Topics in his in SE 109,16–17 (cf. 177,8–9). This commentary is acknowledged by e.g. Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 881; Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations’, p. 186; Barber and Jenkins (eds), Medieval Greek Commentaries, p. xi, but not mentioned by L. Benakis, ‘Commentaries and Commentators on the Works of Aristotle (except the Logical Ones) in Byzantium’, in B. Mojsisch and O. Pluta (eds) Historia Philosophiae Medii Aevi. Studien zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters I, 2 vols, Amsterdam: B.R. Grüner 1992, pp. 45–54 at pp. 47–8 and L. Benakis, ‘Aristotelian Ethics in Byzantium’, in C. Barber and D. Jenkins (eds) Medieval Greek Commentaries, pp. 63–70 at p. 65.
15Michael refers to his commentaries on the Prior and Posterior Analytics in his in SE 1,3–5; 10,9; 58,24–7; 140,2–4; 194,10–11; and in EN 5, 9,30–2. This commentary is acknowledged by e.g. Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 881; Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations’, p. 186; Barber and Jenkins, Medieval Greek Commentaries, xi, but not mentioned by Benakis, ‘Commentaries and Commentators’, pp. 47–8 and idem, ‘Aristotelian Ethics in Byzantium’, p. 65.
16Benakis, ‘Commentaries and Commentators’, p. 47 and idem, ‘Aristotelian Ethics in Byzantium’, p. 65 and Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations’, p. 186 describe this as a ‘lost’ commentary, presumably on the basis of the number of Michael’s references to it (e.g. in EN 9–10, 541,31–2; 552,32–3; in PN 90,11; 137,20; etc.), but there is no pressing reason in my view to go beyond Praechter’s view, ‘Michael von Ephesos und Psellos’, p. 7n1 that Michael lectured on the De caelo but the lecture was never written down. Not mentioned by Mercken, ‘The Greek Commentators on Aristotle’s Ethics’, p. 433.
17The alleged fragments are to be found in A. Busse (ed.) In Aristotelis De Interpretatione (Fragments), CAG 4,5, Berlin: Reimer 1897, pp. xlv–xlvii. This commentary is acknowledged by K. Praechter, ‘Die griechischen Aristoteleskommentare’, Byzantinische Zeitschrift 18 (1909), pp. 516–38, reprinted in R. Sorabji (ed.) Aristotle Transformed, pp. 31–54 at p. 51 and with the qualification ‘perhaps’ in Mercken, ‘The Greek Commentators on Aristotle’s Ethics’, p. 433n82, not mentioned by Benakis, ‘Commentaries and Commentators’, pp. 47–8 and idem, ‘Aristotelian Ethics in Byzantium’, p. 65; Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations’, p. 186; Barber and Jenkins, Medieval Greek Commentaries, p. xi.
18Cf. in GA 88,6–8 and 85,28–9. Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 880 takes this to be an independent treatise, distinct from the Peri hormês, but in idem, ‘Die griechischen Aristoteleskommentare’, p. 52 he says this ‘was probably also a commentary’. This is not included in any recent catalogues of Michael’s works.
19References to the HA can be found frequently (e.g. in PA 88,23; in PN 134,29–30). There is also minimal evidence outside of Michael’s corpus of its existence. See Praechter, ‘Die griechischen Aristoteleskommentare’, p. 52 and idem, ‘Review’, p. 864, who concludes: ‘verloren, falls er überhaupt existiert hat’. This is not included in any recent catalogues of Michael’s works.
20Michael refers to the Peri hormês several times in his commentary on De motu animalium (114,27–116,11; 117,16–17). Earlier scholars had taken this to be an original treatise by Michael (M. Hayduck (ed.) Michaelis Ephesii In Libros De Partibus Animalium, De Animalium Motione, De Animalium Incessu Commentaria, Berlin: Reimer 1904, ad 114,24; Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 882), but P. Donini, ‘Il De Anima de Alessandro di Afrodisia e Michele Efesio’, Rivista di Filologia e di Istruzione Classica 96 (1968), pp. 316–23 has shown that this ‘treatise’ either refers to the chapter in Alexander of Aphrodisias’ De anima dealing with impulse and appetite (CAG Suppl. 2.1, pp. 78,6ff.) or if it does refer to a treatise by Michael, it is taken over largely or even verbatim from Alexander. Not mentioned in: Benakis, ‘Commentaries and Commentators’, pp. 47–8 and idem, ‘Aristotelian Ethics in Byzantium’, p. 65; Ierodiakonou, ‘Some Observations’, p. 186; Barber and Jenkins, Medieval Greek Commentaries, p. xi.
21See C. Luna, Trois études sur la tradition des commentaries anciens à la Métaphysique d’Aristote, Leiden: Brill 2001, pp. 66–71.
22See G. Karamanolis, Plato and Aristotle in Agreement? Platonists on Aristotle from Antiochus to Porphyry, Oxford: Oxford University Press 2006 and J. Wilberding, ‘The Ancient Commentators on Aristotle’, in F. Sheffield and J. Warren (eds) The Routledge Companion to Ancient Philosophy, New York and Oxford: Routledge 2014, pp. 643–58.
23See Praechter, ‘Review’, pp. 902ff.
24Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 896; A. Preus, Aristotle and Michael of Ephesus on the Movement and Progression of Animals, Hildesheim and New York: Georg Olms Verlag 1981; R. Sorabji, ‘The Ancient Commentators on Aristotle’, in idem (ed.) Aristotle Transformed, pp. 1–30 at p. 3; and Mercken, ‘The Greek Commentators on Aristotle’s Ethics’, pp. 407–44 have all advanced a view along these lines.
25Praechter, ‘Review’, p. 906.
26C. Steel, ‘Neoplatonic Sources in the Commentaries on the Nicomachean Ethics by Eustratius and Michael of Ephesus’, Bulletin de philosophie médiévale 44 (2002), pp. 51–7 at p. 51.
27See J. Wilberding, Forms, Souls and Embryos. Neoplatonists on Human Reproduction, New York and Oxford: Routledge 2016, pp. 111–18.
28E.g. Mercken, ‘The Greek Commentators on Aristotle’s Ethics’, pp. 434–6 and Praechter, ‘Review’, pp. 904–6.
29Already demonstrated by Praechter, ‘Review’, pp. 892ff. and now more thoroughly by Luna, Trois études, pp. 191–2. See now also Golitsis, ‘Who Were the Real Authors’, pp. 565–89 who demonstrates Michael’s dependance on Asclepius.
30D. O’Meara, ‘Spätantike und Byzanz’, pp. 46–50.
31Ebbesen, Commentators and Commentaries on Aristotle’s Sophistici Elenchi, p. 284.
32For a fuller discussion of what follows, see Wilberding (in progress).
33See in EN 10, 529,20–4. As discussed in the note ad loc., Michael’s source in this passage has been repeatedly misidentified and misunderstood.
34See in EN 10, 603,8–604,10 with notes ad loc. and Steel, ‘Neoplatonic Sources’.
35See in EN 10, 557,16–17 and 579,28, with notes ad loc.
36in Metaph. 600,25–7.
37in EN 10, 529,14–15; 561,36; 579,14; 591,4.5.9; 580,14; 603,17.18.29.
38in EN 10, 576,30–1; 580,17–18; 591,2.20.21; 594,21.22.
39in EN 10, 561,27–8; 556,17–18 (cf. Vat. 269 [330r]); 591,9; 603,17. Cf. also in EN 9, 481,32 together with Proclus in Alc. 1 190,11–13.
40See the references in the previous note and 561,35; 603,16.17.20.
41Neoplatonists commonly use the term epaphê to describe the superior cognition of the intellect, see e.g. Plotinus Enn. 1.2.6.12–13; Iamblichus De communi math. scientia VIII 33,19–20 Festa. Sometimes it serves as the preferred term for accessing what is even above the Intellect, e.g. Plotinus Enn. 5.3.10.42–3 and 6.7.36.3–4. Cf. also e.g. Hermias in Phaedr. 64,17 Couvreur (68,24 Lucarini and Moreschini) and 191,14 Couvreur (200,4 Lucarini and Moreschini). Michael employs the term three times in the in EN 10 commentary: in EN 10, 586,10; 589,19–20; 596,11. Cf. in Metaph. 714,21.
42in EN 10, 579,4; 580,14; 591,3.
43in EN 10, 580,20.21; 586,17; 591,3.4.26.27; 603,30–1. Cf. 585,11–12 and in GA 84,27–30.
44in EN 10, 580,20.21, and cf. in Metaph. 721,32.33.
45in EN 9, 517,14–18. I discuss this at great length in Wilberding (in progress).
46That said, he does at one point appear to concede the terminological distinction is in fact Aristotelian. See in EN 10, 605,30–3.
47See in EN 10, 589,31–590,29.
48See notes ad loc., especially 395 and 396.
49See in EN 10, 532,27–34.
50See in EN 10, 590,21–4.
51Cf. in EN 10, 581,12–20.
52See in EN 10, 581,27, and cf. 581,11–30 and in Metaph. 695,36–9.
53E.g. in EN 10, 539,39–40 and 578,12–13. Cf. EN 1099a29–31; 1100b9–10; 1101a14–15; 1102a5; 1102a17–18; 1144a6; 1153b10–11; 1169b29; 1177a9–13; 1177a16–17; 1177a22–5; 1177b23–5; 1178b7–8.
54E.g. in EN 10, 573,16 and 582,5.
55It is worth comparing this idea of an ‘unsatisfied self-sufficiency’ with Gregory of Nyssa’s distinction between satiety and satisfaction in De beatitudinibus. He compares the pointless effort spent on the pleasures to a leaky jar and contrasts this with the attainment of virtue as an eternal good. God ‘promises satisfaction to those who hunger for these things [i.e. the virtues], a satisfaction which sharpens the appetite by fullness, and does not blunt it’. Comparable to Michael’s characterization of contemplation, Gregory of Nyssa describes the striving for virtue as a never-ending process, since ‘being filled […] does not lead to aversion, but to intensification of the appetite’. Cf. Beat. IV, GNO VII,2, 119–22 Jaeger.
56in EN 10, 581,27–30.
57in EN 10, 586,27–30.
58See in EN 10, 581,26–587,2.
59in EN 10, 602,32–6.
60in EN 10, 578,29–579,1.
61See in EN 10, 590,35–591,1, and cf. Rep. 588C7–8; 589B1–2; 590A10; 588D2; and 588E7.
62See in EN 10, 590,35–591,10.
63See in EN 10, 530,1–30.
64See in EN 10, 531,19–30.
65in EN 10, 531,30–4.
66See in EN 10, 532,1–3.
67See in EN 10, 608,4–10.
68in EN 10, 606,6–9.
69in EN 10, 531,8–11.
70in EN 10, 529,15–16.