ABSTRACT
This chapter examines Philoponus’ stance in regard to positing Platonic forms. He rejects separately existing universals. But Philoponus never decisively rejects Platonic forms, as understood in as logoi in the mind of God, identified with the Platonic Demiurge. So understood, these forms are particulars that are such as can cause a multiplicity of particulars to exist. He attributes such causal principles to Aristotle, and to Plato as interpreted by Aristotle, without correction. He does however take issue with Forms subsisting prior to the demiurgic intellect, and accordingly follows his teacher Ammonius in rejecting the Proclean interpretation of Plato’s metaphysics. In earlier commentaries, he echoes Ammonius in his assertion that those who attribute to Plato the existence of pre-demiurgic principles err in the interpretation of Plato. In later works, he signals that they got Plato right.
