La rehabilitation de Platon chez Gadamer

Abstract

<p>Gadamer, while primarily known as the author of Truth and Method, is also a life-long interpreter of Plato. This study aims at a general exposition of his rehabilitating interpretation of the Greek philosopher. It attempts to clarify the philosophical and scholarly polemics which his dialectical rendition of Plato's dialogues implicitly involves.</p> <p>The most significant polemic is by far the one with Heidegger. Gadamer adopts Heidegger's phenomenological method, but rejects his Aristotelian, stigmatic interpretation of Platonism as dogmatic and dualist. This textual disagreement reveals the extent of Gadamer's philosophical originality vis-a.-vis his famous teacher.</p> <p>Plato's non-propositional conception of truth, as exposed in the Seventh Letter, explains, according to Gadamer, his choice of the dialogue form: the dialogue is an imitation of dialectic and seeks to elicit existential participation on the part of the reader. The "ideas" are to be understood as the condition of possibility of language and common understanding. Gadamer, moreover, links the problem of the one and the many with the "unwritten doctrines" of the one and the indeterminate dyad, and understands them as the early foundation of the theory of ideas: the ideas, similar to numbers, imply plurality, interdependence and, therefore also, indetermination.</p> <p>Beyond Aristotle's criticism lies, maintains Gadamer, communality. Platonic dialectic and Aristotelian phronesis are fundamentally similar: both are unteachable dispositions, distinct from technical and scientific knowledge.</p> <p>A brief critical reflection on Gadamer's project of rehabilitation points to some theoretical and exegitical difficulties: his attempt at defending a "truer" Plato against misleading traditions of dogmatic Platonism appears incompatible with his own theory of Interpretation. Furthermore, his unusual employment of Aristotle's testimonies for the "unwritten doctrines" is based on a neglect of some important texts.</p>