![Book Cover of Nicomachean Ethics](/image/book/nicomachean-ethics.webp)
Nicomachean Ethics
by Aristotle
'Nicomachean Ethics' Summary
The theme of the work is a Socratic question previously explored in the works of Plato, Aristotle's friend and teacher, of how men should best live. In his Metaphysics, Aristotle described how Socrates, the friend and teacher of Plato, had turned philosophy to human questions, whereas pre-Socratic philosophy had only been theoretical. Ethics, as now separated out for discussion by Aristotle, is practical rather than theoretical, in the original Aristotelian senses of these terms. In other words, it is not only a contemplation about good living, because it also aims to create good living. It is therefore connected to Aristotle's other practical work, the Politics, which similarly aims at people becoming good. Ethics is about how individuals should best live, while the study of politics is from the perspective of a law-giver, looking at the good of a whole community.
The Nicomachean Ethics is widely considered one of the most important historical philosophical works and had an important influence on the European Middle Ages, becoming one of the core works of medieval philosophy. It therefore indirectly became critical in the development of all modern philosophy as well as European law and theology. Many parts of the Nicomachean Ethics are well known in their own right, within different fields. In the Middle Ages, a synthesis between Aristotelian ethics and Christian theology became widespread, in Europe as introduced by Albertus Magnus. While various philosophers had influenced Christendom since its earliest times, in Western Europe Aristotle became "the Philosopher". The most important version of this synthesis was that of Thomas Aquinas. Other more "Averroist" Aristotelians such as Marsilius of Padua were controversial but also influential. (Marsilius is for example sometimes said to have influenced the controversial English political reformer Thomas Cromwell.)
A critical period in the history of this work's influence is at the end of the Middle Ages, and beginning of modernity, when several authors such as Francis Bacon and Thomas Hobbes, argued forcefully and largely successfully that the medieval Aristotelian tradition in practical thinking had become a great impediment to philosophy in their time. However, in more recent generations, Aristotle's original works (if not those of his medieval followers) have once again become an important source. More recent authors influenced by this work include Alasdair MacIntyre, G. E. M. Anscombe, Hans-Georg Gadamer, and Martha Nussbaum.
Book Details
Language
EnglishOriginal Language
GreekPublished In
Author
![Aristotle image](/thumbs/image/author/aristotle.webp)
Aristotle
Greece
Aristotle (384–322 BC) was a Greek philosopher and polymath during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. Taught by Plato, he was the founder of the Lyceum, the Peripatetic school of philosophy...
More on AristotleDownload eBooks
Listen/Download Audiobook
- Select Speed
Related books
![The Morals (Moralia), Book 1 Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-morals-moralia-book-1.webp)
The Morals (Moralia), Book 1 by Plutarch
The Moralia is a group of manuscripts dating from the 10th-13th centuries, traditionally ascribed to the 1st-century Greek scholar Plutarch of Chaeron...
![The Freedom of Life Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-freedom-of-life.webp)
The Freedom of Life by Annie Payson Call
"The Freedom of Life" is a book written by Annie Payson Call, an American author and teacher of the Alexander Technique, a method for improving postur...
![The Nicomachean Ethics Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-nicomachean-ethics.webp)
The Nicomachean Ethics by Aristotle
The Nicomachean Ethics is Aristotle's best-known work on ethics, the science of the good for human life, which is the goal or end at which all our act...
![The Genealogy of Morals Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-genealogy-of-morals.webp)
The Genealogy of Morals by Friedrich Nietzsche
On the Genealogy of Morality: A Polemic is an 1887 book by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche. It consists of a preface and three interrelated tre...
![Laws Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/laws.webp)
Laws by Plato (Πλάτων)
Laws is Plato's last and longest dialogue. It is generally agreed that Plato wrote this dialogue as an older man, having failed in his effort in Syrac...
![The Boys' and Girls' Pliny Vol. 2 Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-boys-and-girls-pliny-vol-2.webp)
The Boys' and Girls' Pliny Vol. 2 by Pliny the Elder
White continue their remarkable journey through the realms of natural history, unearthing extraordinary secrets from the past and shedding light on th...
![Euthyphro Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/euthyphro.webp)
Euthyphro by Plato (Πλάτων)
Euthyphro by Plato, is a Socratic dialogue whose events occur in the weeks before the trial of Socrates (399 BC), between Socrates and Euthyphro. The...
![Perfumes and their Preparation Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/perfumes-and-their-preparation.webp)
Perfumes and their Preparation by George William Askinson
The art of perfumery is a centuries-old tradition, and George William Askinson's Perfumes and their Preparation is a classic guide to the craft. Perf...
![The Golden Sayings of Epictetus Cover image](/thumbs/image/book/the-golden-sayings-of-epictetus.webp)
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus by Epictetus
Aphorisms from the Stoic Greek.
Reviews for Nicomachean Ethics
No reviews posted or approved, yet...