The treatise known as book Lambda of Aristotle’s Metaphysics has become one of the most debated issues of recent scholarship. Aristotle adresses here fundamental questions of his theory of substance, his idea of causes and principles, and his concept of motions. Furthermore, the importance of the text is due to the fact that it contains an outline of what was traditionally understood as Aristotle’s theology.

A group of scholars of ancient philosophy here presents a systematic study of the twelfth book of Aristotle's Metaphysics. Book Lambda was chosen as the focus of the 14th Symposium Aristotelicum, from which this volume derives.

The Clarendon Aristotle Series is designed for both students and professionals. It provides accurate translations of selected Aristotelian texts, accompanied by incisive commentaries that focus on philosophical problems and issues. The volumes in the series have been widely welcomed and favourably reviewed. Important new titles are being added to the series, and a number of well-established volumes are being reissued with revisions and/or supplementary material. Lindsay Judson provides a rigorous translation of the twelfth book (Lambda) of Aristotle's Metaphysics and a detailed philosophical commentary. Lambda is an outline for a much more extended work in metaphysics - or more accurately, since Aristotle does not use the term 'metaphysics', in what he calls 'first philosophy', the inquiry into 'the principles and causes of all things'. Aristotle discusses the principles of natural and changeable substances, which include form, matter, privation and efficient cause; he argues that principles of this sort are, at least by analogy, the principles of non-substantial items as well. In the second half of the book he turns to unchanging, immaterial substances, first arguing that there must be at least one such substance, which he calls 'God', to act as the 'prime unmoved mover', the source of all change in the natural world. He then explores the nature of God and its activity of thinking (it is the fullest exposition there is of Aristotle's extraordinary and very difficult conception of his supreme god, its goodness, and its activity), and in the course of arguing for a plurality of immaterial unmoved movers he provides important evidence for the leading astronomical theory of his day (by Eudoxus) and for his own highly impressive cosmology. The commentary on each chapter or pair of chapters is preceded by a Prologue, which sets the scene for Aristotle's often very compressed discussion, and explores the general issues raised by that discussion. The Introduction discusses the place of Lambda in the Metaphysics, and offers a solution to the problem of the unity of Aristotle's project in the book.

A distinguished group of scholars of ancient philosophy here presents a systematic study of the twelfth book of Aristotle's Metaphysics. Lambda, which can be regarded as a self-standing treatise on substance, has been attracting particular attention in recent years, and was chosen as the focusof the fourteenth Symposium Aristotelicum, from which this volume derives. At the Symposium, each of Lambda's ten chapters was taken in turn as the subject of a session at which a specially written paper was read to and discussed by the assembled symposiasts. (The ninth chapter commanded twosessions by dint of its particular difficulty.) The papers have been revised in the light of discussion, and are now offered to a wider audience as a discursive commentary on points of particular philosophical interest covering all of Lambda. Michael Frede's extensive Introduction aims to give abroader view of Lambda as a whole and the problems it raises, and thus to provide the context for the discussion of each of the chapters. This volume will be a resource of great value and interest for anyone working on ancient metaphysics and theology.

Lambda, the twelfth book of Aristotle's Metaphysics, is an outline for a much more extended work in metaphysics or, more accurately, in what Aristotle calls 'first philosophy', the inquiry into 'the principles and causes of all things'. Lindsay Judson provides a rigorous translation of this important book and a detailed philosophical commentary.

Lambda, the twelfth book of Aristotle's 'Metaphysics', is an outline for a much more extended work in metaphysics or, more accurately, in what Aristotle calls 'first philosophy', the inquiry into 'the principles and causes of all things'. Lindsay Judson provides a rigorous translation of this important book and a detailed philosophical commentary.

In this annotated critical edition of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Lambda Stefan Alexandru explores and utilizes for the first time numerous previously neglected textual sources, written in Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew. The twelfth book of the Metaphysics, originally an independent treatise, is crucial for the understanding of Aristotle’s philosophy, primarily because the doctrine of the Unmoved Mover is nowhere else set forth in greater detail. Not only all the forty-two formerly known Greek codices have been collated, but also commentaries and translations. Moreover, a hitherto undiscovered, independent manuscript, representing a tenuous and particularly valuable branch of the direct tradition, is minutely investigated. The document in question, preserved in the Vatican, is an autograph of the Byzantine humanist and Ecumenical Patriarch Gennadios II Scholarios.