Articles

Wisdom’s Open Secret: Boethius’s Consolation as Image of Philosophy

William C. Hackett

Abstract

In this William C. Hackett essay showcases the deep agreement between Platonic philosophy in Plato’s Laws and Christian eschatology in Boethius’s Consolation of Philosophy. It highlights the ways in which religion and philosophy variously intersect to convert and educate the soul in divine wisdom.

Citations

Consolation 3.10.

William Wrede, Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1965).

Phaedrus, 278d–79c, CW, 555-56

Joachim Gruber, Kommentar zu Boethius, De Consolatione Philosophiae, 2nd ed. (Walter de Gruyter, 2006), 396–412.

Plato: Complete Works, ed. John M. Cooper (Hackett, 1998), 1326

Plotinus, Enneads 5.1.7.1–5.

Plotinus, Enneads 5.8.5.20–25.

John Marenbon’s commentary on parts 3–6 of book 5 in Boethius (Oxford University Press, 2003), 125–45.

Axel Tisserand, Pars theologica: Logique et théologique chez Boèce (Vrin, 2008).

Ammonius, On Aristotle’s “On Interpretation 9, 18–19, 135.

Joel Relihan, The Prisoner’s Philosophy (University of Notre Dame Press, 2007), 15–33

Consolation 1.4 (LCL 74:146).

Blaise Pascal, Pensées 308 (Lafuma)/793 (Brunschvicg).

Boethius, Consolation of Philosophy 5.4, in Boethius: Consolation of Philosophy, rev. ed., ed. Victor Watts (Penguin, 1999), 124

Boethius: Theological Tractates, The Consolation of Philosophy, Loeb Classical Library 74 (Harvard University Press, 1973)

Stanislas Breton, Du Principe: Essai sur l’organisation contemporaine du pensable (Aubier-Montaigne, 1971), 150.

Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 1.15.1, in Clement of Alexandria: Stromateis, books 1–3, trans. Adam Ferguson (The Catholic University of America Press, 1991), 35.

David Bradshaw, “The Opuscula Sacra: Boethius and Theology,” in The Cambridge Companion to Boethius, ed. John Marenbon (Cambridge University Press, 2009), 105–27.

Augustine, City of God 19.4, in Augustine: The City of God Against the Pagans, ed. R. W. Dyson (Cambridge University Press, 1998), 924.

Ammonius, Commentary on Aristotle’s On Interpretation 9.

Boethius, On Aristotle’s “On Interpretation 9, trans. David Blank and Norman Kretzmann (Bloomsbury Academic, 2014), 12–35, 135.

Plotinus, Enneads 4.3.18.4–5.

Pseudo-Dionysius, Letter 7, 1077C, 1081B.

John Magee, “Boethius’ Philosophiae Consolatio: The Intersection of Literary Form and Philosophical Content,” chap. 1 in Boethius’ ‘Consolation of Philosophy’: A Critical Guide, ed. Michael Wittala (Cambridge University Press, 2024), 12–31.

H. G. Wells, The Invisible Man (1897).