From the book
Empedocles’ The Testimonia, Volume II
Empedocles of Acragas · Diotimos Editions · 2026
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At a Glance
- The wordThe forms are the accusative plural “gods” in Aëtius and the nominative plural in Aristotle.
- In this workAëtius says explicitly that Empedocles calls the elements gods.
- In this editionA32 is heavily compressed and supplemented; A40 is an argumentative aside.
- A place to readExplicitly reports that the elements are gods alongside the mixture, cosmos and Sphairos.
Meaning
The forms are the accusative plural “gods” in Aëtius and the nominative plural in Aristotle. They make a stronger assertion than the use of divine names as convenient labels: the constituents themselves are represented as divine. The prose forms are those of the witnesses, even when their reports may preserve an Empedoclean commitment.
Use in the book
Aëtius says explicitly that Empedocles calls the elements gods. Aristotle’s compressed objection in A40 similarly adds that the elements “too are gods” after arguing that they are prior by nature to “the god,” understood in the edition as the Sphairos. The resulting plurality matters. The unified divine state does not straightforwardly replace a previously non-divine stock of materials; the report makes what composes it divine as well.
This offers a useful control on readings of Plato’s anonymous naturalists in A48. Their primary bodies are described as entirely soulless and their cosmogenesis as proceeding without god. That polemical construction cannot simply be laid over the divine constituents reported by Aëtius and Aristotle. Conversely, calling roots gods is not sufficient evidence for a modern personalist or pantheist theology. The testimonia establish a vocabulary of divinity, but they do not supply a systematic account of agency, personhood, or worship for every root.
Places to read
- A 32 (testimony)Aëtius I 7,28 (D. 303). Explicitly reports that the elements are gods alongside the mixture, cosmos and Sphairos.
- A 40 (polemical)Aristotle, De generatione et corruptione B 6, 333b20. Acknowledges the divinity of the elements while arguing for their natural priority to the god.
Translation in this edition
A32 is heavily compressed and supplemented; A40 is an argumentative aside. Their convergence supports taking the divine predication seriously, but does not settle the disputed individual name-to-root mappings at A332.