Theaetetus’s Ethical Digression According to the Anonymous

The Theaetetus is often regarded as paving the way for an epistemology of the late dialogues and leaving aside the Two-World Theory. However, such a reading is challenged by the famous ethical Digression, which, prima facie, is an awkward fit in the dialogue and resembles the tenets of the middle dialogues. Thus, questions arise about the meaning of the Digression itself and its place in the dialogue. For a valuable perspective on these questions, this paper turns to Middle Platonic Anonymi Commentarius In Platonis Theaetetum. More specifically, the paper reconstructs the Anonymous’s position on the homoiōsis theōi ethical principle and its relation to Theaetetus’s epistemology. In the context of philosophical rivalry with the Stoics, the Theaetetus emerges as a dialogue whose ethics and epistemology are both based on the Two-World Theory. However, the Commentary presents the Stoic alternatives as incomplete rather than erroneous. Thus, it is shown to be less categorical and banal than it may seem.