Gainful and without gain · Lexicon

From the book

Hipparchus

Plato · Diotimos Editions · 2026

Orientation

At a Glance

The wordΚερδαλέος means gainful or profitable, describing what brings or constitutes gain.
In HipparchusAt 230d both proposed kinds are called equally “gains and gainful.”
In this editionThe edition deliberately keeps the gain family visible with “gainful” and “without gain.”
A place to readκέρδη μὲν ὁμοίως ἐστὶν ἀμφότερα καὶ κερδαλέα — Both noun and adjective are applied to the two supposed kinds.

Meaning

Κερδαλέος means gainful or profitable, describing what brings or constitutes gain. Ἀκερδής means without gain, unprofitable; its privative beginning denies gainfulness. The source forms κερδαλέα, κερδαλέον and ἀκερδές are inflections of these adjectives. They differ grammatically from κέρδος, the noun gain, and κερδαίνειν, the verb to gain.

“Without gain” need not on its own mean a positive loss. Something might simply produce no gain. Although the argument connects worthlessness and absence of gain, the privative adjective is not a lexical synonym of ζημία, loss. Preserving that distinction avoids making the negative counterpart stronger than its wording.

Use in the book

At 230d both proposed kinds are called equally “gains and gainful.” The addition of the adjective links the classification of the things with their result for the possessor. It follows the disputed claim that someone with decent gain gains no more than someone with base gain. The adjective therefore participates in the passage’s pressure between being a gain and producing a gain, rather than providing independent proof of equality.

At 231e the adjective returns after the metal exchange. Socrates states that what is of worth is gainful, whether small or great, while what is of no worth is without gain. Size has ceased to determine the verdict. The relevant assessment concerns worth, and the next questions specify worth as worth possessing and then as benefit.

The final result at 232a is phrased adjectivally: what is gainful has once again been agreed good. Socrates counts this as the third or fourth arrival at the same conclusion. The wording ties together several earlier formulations, but the reader should still notice their differences. “Gain is good,” “gaining is being benefited,” and “what is gainful is good” are connected claims with different grammatical subjects; repeating their family does not make every transition self-evident.

The adjective also concentrates the main interpretive choice. If gainful means truly beneficial, calling it good is plausible and perhaps nearly built into the term as now explained. If it means profitable in an ordinary financial sense, the examples have not independently proved that every profitable thing is decent or beneficial overall. The companion’s original reproach may concern just that possibility. The lexicon consequently should not gloss κερδαλέος everywhere as “morally good,” even though Socrates eventually obtains agreement to its goodness.

The paired term ἀκερδής occurs in the compact summary at 231e rather than receiving a separate developed theory. It marks the failure to gain without forcing all neutral cases into a detailed taxonomy of loss.

Places to read

230dκέρδη μὲν ὁμοίως ἐστὶν ἀμφότερα καὶ κερδαλέα — Both noun and adjective are applied to the two supposed kinds.
231eΤὸ μὲν ἄξιον ἄρα κερδαλέον ἐστίν — Worth supplies the criterion for gainfulness.
231eτὸ δὲ ἀνάξιον ἀκερδές — The negative adjective describes what is of no worth.
232aτὸ κερδαλέον — The final return to goodness uses the substantivized adjective.

Translation in this edition

The edition deliberately keeps the gain family visible with “gainful” and “without gain.” Rendering the latter “harmful” would add a claim, while rendering the former “beneficial” would erase the intervening question that connects gainfulness with benefit. Its glossary treats these as distinct members of one family, not interchangeable definitions.