In terms of how it was finally to be used in the concept of the analogy of being, the Aristotelian use of the term analogy must be understood as inchoate at best. As we saw in our last posting, in his Nicomachean Ethics Aristotle seems to have taken a notion of arithmetic or geometric origins and applied it to moral concepts (justice).
Aristotle also seems to be the first to tie the word analogy (or at least analogical thinking) to ontological questions, that is, to questions about being. Aristotle perceived different levels or different participations in being. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle astutely observes that "being can be said in many ways," τὸ δὲ ὂν λέγεται μὲν πολλαχῶς. Metaph. 4.1003a. Aristotle indeed extends this insight into the analogical feature of being in that, while he recognizes that being can be used in different senses, he also recognizes that the different senses of the word participate in "one central idea and one definite characteristic, and not as merely a common epithet," ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἓν καὶ μίαν τινὰ φύσιν καὶ οὐχ ὁμωνύμως. The word "being" is used of different things not like a mere homonym, a term with the same spelling and pronunciation but with a different meaning. The word "being" is used in a relational, analogical way, to describe a shared similarity or unity in unequal or even opposing opposing things. Indeed, "being" can be used analogically even to refer to "non-being"!
Metaph., 1003b.
This concept--of different-yet-somehow-similar things all are referable "to one" primary analogate from when all derive their core meaning--is analogical. In fact, it is a specific kind of analogy, one called (with reference to Aristotle) a πρὸς ἓν (pros hen) analogy ("pros hen" means "in relation to one"). More commonly, this sort of analogy is called (in the language of Cajetan) analogy of attribution (analogia attributionis). It is, as Aristotle put it, a concept between univocity and equivocity: analogy can be said to be a kind of mean between the extremes of univocity and equivocity, τὸ γὰρ ἀνάλογον μέσον. Nich. Ethic., 1131b.
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Source: Betz (2011), 46-47.
Aristotle also seems to be the first to tie the word analogy (or at least analogical thinking) to ontological questions, that is, to questions about being. Aristotle perceived different levels or different participations in being. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle astutely observes that "being can be said in many ways," τὸ δὲ ὂν λέγεται μὲν πολλαχῶς. Metaph. 4.1003a. Aristotle indeed extends this insight into the analogical feature of being in that, while he recognizes that being can be used in different senses, he also recognizes that the different senses of the word participate in "one central idea and one definite characteristic, and not as merely a common epithet," ἀλλὰ πρὸς ἓν καὶ μίαν τινὰ φύσιν καὶ οὐχ ὁμωνύμως. The word "being" is used of different things not like a mere homonym, a term with the same spelling and pronunciation but with a different meaning. The word "being" is used in a relational, analogical way, to describe a shared similarity or unity in unequal or even opposing opposing things. Indeed, "being" can be used analogically even to refer to "non-being"!
[S]o "being " is used in various senses, but always with reference to one principle. For some things are said to "be" because they are substances; others because they are modifications of substance; others because they are a process towards substance, or destructions or privations or qualities of substance, or productive or generative of substance or of terms relating to substance, or negations of certain of these terms or of substance. (Hence we even say that not-being is not-being.)
οὕτω δὲ καὶ τὸ ὂν λέγεται πολλαχῶς μὲν ἀλλ᾽ ἅπαν πρὸς μίαν ἀρχήν: τὰ μὲν γὰρ ὅτι οὐσίαι, ὄντα λέγεται, τὰ δ᾽ ὅτι πάθη οὐσίας, τὰ δ᾽ ὅτι ὁδὸς εἰς οὐσίαν ἢ φθοραὶ ἢ στερήσεις ἢ ποιότητες ἢ ποιητικὰ ἢ γεννητικὰ οὐσίας ἢ τῶν πρὸς τὴν οὐσίαν λεγομένων, ἢ τούτων τινὸς ἀποφάσεις ἢ οὐσίας: διὸ καὶ τὸ μὴ ὂν εἶναι μὴ ὄν φαμεν.
Metaph., 1003b.
This concept--of different-yet-somehow-similar things all are referable "to one" primary analogate from when all derive their core meaning--is analogical. In fact, it is a specific kind of analogy, one called (with reference to Aristotle) a πρὸς ἓν (pros hen) analogy ("pros hen" means "in relation to one"). More commonly, this sort of analogy is called (in the language of Cajetan) analogy of attribution (analogia attributionis). It is, as Aristotle put it, a concept between univocity and equivocity: analogy can be said to be a kind of mean between the extremes of univocity and equivocity, τὸ γὰρ ἀνάλογον μέσον. Nich. Ethic., 1131b.
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Source: Betz (2011), 46-47.
Thank you, Andrew Greenwell. This succinct little entry is very clear and helpful. Happy to have you go back to Aristotle. Sorry that Anaximander did not comment on the presumptions of his connections to the one but then again, philosophy had not been coined. Grateful for what we have. D.Tresan
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