Nicomachean Ethics
The Nicomachean Ethics is Aristotle’s systematic inquiry into the nature of human happiness (eudaimonia) and the virtues of character and intellect that constitute a good life. Beginning from common beliefs about happiness and the human good, Aristotle argues that the highest human end is rational activity in accordance with virtue over a complete life within a political community. He develops detailed accounts of moral virtues as means between extremes, of practical wisdom (phronēsis), responsibility, pleasure, friendship, justice, and the relation between ethical and contemplative lives, culminating in the superiority of theoria (contemplation) while acknowledging the importance of ethical and civic virtue.
At a Glance
- Author
- Aristotle
- Composed
- c. 335–322 BCE
- Language
- Ancient Greek
- Status
- copies only
- •Eudaimonia (happiness or flourishing) as the highest human good: Aristotle argues that all actions aim at some good, and there must be a highest, final, and self-sufficient good for human beings. He identifies this with eudaimonia, understood not as a passing feeling but as a complete life of activity in accordance with virtue (Books I, X).
- •The function (ergon) argument: To determine the human good, Aristotle examines the distinctive function of human beings—an active life in accordance with reason. The good for a human is thus excellent rational activity, which grounds his account of virtue and happiness (Book I, chs. 7–8).
- •Doctrine of the mean in ethical virtue: Moral virtues (courage, temperance, generosity, etc.) are stable states of character that choose the mean relative to us, determined by reason and by the practically wise person. Virtue is thus opposed to both deficiency and excess in feeling and action (Book II).
- •The role of habituation and practical wisdom (phronēsis): Virtue of character arises from habituation and education, not innate disposition. Practical wisdom is the intellectual virtue that enables correct deliberation about what is good and advantageous for a human life and is necessary for full moral virtue (Books II–VI).
- •Justice, friendship, and the political nature of ethics: Aristotle treats justice as a complete virtue in relation to others and distinguishes various forms of distributive and corrective justice. He also argues that friendship is essential to human flourishing and explores its types (utility, pleasure, and virtue). Ethics is thereby inseparable from politics, since the polis provides the institutions and conditions for virtuous lives (Books V, VIII–IX, and I.2–3).
- •The primacy of the contemplative life: While defending the value of ethical and political activity, Aristotle concludes that the highest and most divine form of happiness is found in theoretical contemplation (theoria), the activity of the intellect in grasping truth for its own sake (Book X, chs. 6–8).
The Nicomachean Ethics is one of the foundational texts of Western moral and political philosophy. It shaped medieval Christian, Jewish, and Islamic ethical thought (notably in Aquinas, Maimonides, and Ibn Rushd), informed conceptions of natural law, and deeply influenced Renaissance and early modern debates about virtue, happiness, and the good life. In the 20th century, it became a central source for virtue ethics and continues to inform contemporary discussions in moral psychology, political theory, and practical philosophy. Its concepts of eudaimonia, virtue, practical wisdom, and friendship remain touchstones for both academic and applied ethics.
1. Introduction
Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics is a systematic investigation into how human beings should live and what it is for a human life to go well. It centers on eudaimonia—often translated as “happiness,” “flourishing,” or “living well”—and the virtues of character and intellect that, on Aristotle’s view, constitute such a life.
The work belongs to Aristotle’s broader project of practical philosophy and is closely connected with his Politics. It begins from familiar beliefs about the good life and gradually refines them into a more precise account. Rather than offering moral rules or a single decision procedure, it focuses on the formation of character and the cultivation of practical wisdom (phronēsis), presenting ethics as a craft of living that requires experience, habituation, and judgment.
Within the history of philosophy, the Nicomachean Ethics is often treated as the classic source of virtue ethics, in contrast to later deontological and consequentialist approaches. Its influence, however, is not limited to ethical theory; it has shaped ideas about political association, friendship, moral psychology, and the nature of happiness across diverse traditions.
Interpretively, the work is read both as a unified treatise and as a compilation of lecture materials, and scholars debate the exact relation between its parts and between it and Aristotle’s other ethical writings. Despite these textual and philosophical controversies, the Nicomachean Ethics remains a central reference point for discussions of moral character, responsibility, and the good human life.
2. Historical and Intellectual Context
2.1 Aristotle’s Place in Classical Greek Philosophy
Aristotle (384–322 BCE) wrote the Nicomachean Ethics after studying in Plato’s Academy and while teaching at the Lyceum in Athens. The work emerges from, and reacts to, a rich classical Greek conversation about virtue and happiness shaped by Plato, Socrates (as represented in Platonic dialogues), and various Sophists.
Where Plato’s dialogues often frame ethics in terms of knowledge of the Forms and the unity of virtues, Aristotle develops a more empirical and psychological account, analyzing emotions, habits, and social practices. He retains a broadly teleological outlook but embeds it in biological and political observations about human beings as living, social animals.
2.2 Athenian Social and Political Background
The Nicomachean Ethics assumes the framework of the classical polis, in which free male citizens participate in shared decision-making and warfare, while women, slaves, and resident foreigners are largely excluded from political life. Aristotle’s ethical ideals presuppose access to leisure, property, and education, conditions more available to elites.
Some interpreters argue that this context explains the emphasis on honor, political engagement, and friendship among equals. Others emphasize that, even within these constraints, Aristotle articulates general claims about human nature and rationality that can be abstracted from their original social setting.
2.3 Intellectual Currents and Rival Traditions
Aristotle’s ethical theory also responds to contemporaneous and subsequent schools:
| Tradition | Contrast with Aristotle in Ethics |
|---|---|
| Platonism | Greater emphasis on separate, eternal Forms of the Good; less on habituated character and empirical psychology. |
| Sophistic thought | Often skeptical or relativist about justice; Aristotle insists on a natural basis for virtue and political association. |
| Cynicism | Advocates radical simplicity and rejection of conventional goods; Aristotle grants importance to external goods and political life. |
| Proto-Stoic tendencies | Later Stoics will radicalize ideas about virtue’s sufficiency; Aristotle gives virtue primacy but not strict sufficiency for happiness. |
While Stoic and Epicurean ethics postdate the Nicomachean Ethics, ancient authors present them as developing and contesting themes already articulated by Aristotle, such as the role of pleasure, the sufficiency of virtue, and the relation of individual good to the community.
3. Author, Composition, and Transmission
3.1 Authorship and the Title “Nicomachean”
The Nicomachean Ethics is almost universally attributed to Aristotle. Ancient testimonies and the work’s style and doctrine support this attribution. The title’s reference to “Nicomachean” is traditionally connected either to Aristotle’s father or to his son, both named Nicomachus. Ancient and modern scholars have proposed that:
- the work was dedicated to Nicomachus,
- Nicomachus served as editor or recipient,
- or the title reflects family or school traditions.
No consensus has emerged, and the title’s exact origin remains uncertain.
3.2 Composition and Relation to Other Ethical Works
The work likely originated as lecture notes or teaching materials at the Lyceum rather than as a polished literary treatise. Many scholars think it was redacted after Aristotle’s death, possibly by Theophrastus or later Peripatetics.
Its relation to Aristotle’s other ethical writings is a major textual issue. The Eudemian Ethics (EE) overlaps substantially with Books V–VII of the Nicomachean Ethics; these three books are sometimes called the “common books”. Competing hypotheses include:
| View | Claim about Composition |
|---|---|
| Nicomachean priority | The NE is Aristotle’s later, more mature ethical work, incorporating or revising material also used in the EE. |
| Eudemian priority | The EE represents an earlier or more authentic version; the NE reuses or reorders parts of it. |
| Unified treatise view | The “common books” belong originally to one work, later attached to both corpora by editors. |
Evidence is drawn from stylistic features, doctrinal details, and ancient catalogues of Aristotle’s writings.
3.3 Manuscript Transmission and Editions
The Nicomachean Ethics survived antiquity as part of the Peripatetic corpus. After an early period of Peripatetic circulation, the text was:
- commented upon by Hellenistic and late antique philosophers,
- transmitted through Byzantine manuscripts,
- translated into Syriac and Arabic in the Islamic world,
- and rendered into Latin from the 12th century onward.
The standard modern Greek text is that of Immanuel Bekker (1831), whose pagination remains the reference system in scholarship. Critical editions since Bekker have refined readings based on additional manuscripts, but no radically different underlying text has emerged. Editorial debates concern, among other issues, the ordering of chapters, the boundaries of the “common books,” and occasional suspected interpolations.
4. Structure and Organization of the Nicomachean Ethics
4.1 Book-by-Book Overview
The Nicomachean Ethics is divided into ten books, traditionally grouped into thematic clusters:
| Books | Main Focus |
|---|---|
| I | The human good, eudaimonia, and the function argument |
| II–IV | Moral virtue, habituation, and particular virtues of character |
| V | Justice and its forms |
| VI | Intellectual virtues and practical wisdom |
| VII | Continence, incontinence, and pleasure (first treatment) |
| VIII–IX | Friendship (philia) and self-love |
| X | Pleasure (revisited) and the contemplative life |
This organization reflects a progression from general ethical theory to specific virtues, and from individual character to social relationships and the highest form of happiness.
4.2 Internal Transitions and Cross-References
Aristotle frequently signals transitions between books and topics, for example:
- from Book I’s general account of eudaimonia to Book II’s analysis of moral virtue,
- from moral virtue (Books II–IV) to justice (Book V) and intellectual virtues (Book VI),
- from character and intellect to conditions of failure (Book VII),
- and finally to external relations (friendship) and the ranking of lives (Book X).
These transitions are often explicit, though some scholars view certain joins—especially at the start of Books VI and X—as abrupt, suggesting editorial stitching.
4.3 Structural Unity and the “Common Books”
A central structural question concerns Books V–VII, shared in large part with the Eudemian Ethics:
- One view maintains that the Nicomachean Ethics is a deliberately unified work whose structure is guided by the aim of specifying the activities and virtues constitutive of eudaimonia.
- Another proposes that the presence of “common books” indicates subsequent compilation from separate courses or treatises, so that the existing structure partly reflects editorial decisions.
Despite these debates, most readers treat the present ten-book division as a coherent framework, using it to trace Aristotle’s movement from the definition of the human good, through the analysis of virtues, to the culminating account of happiness and its political preconditions.
5. The Human Good and the Function Argument
5.1 The Highest Good and Eudaimonia
Book I begins by observing that every action and choice aims at some good. Aristotle argues that there must be a highest, final end that is desired for its own sake and renders other ends choiceworthy. This he identifies with eudaimonia.
He characterizes eudaimonia as:
- final (chosen always for itself, never merely as a means),
- self-sufficient (making a life lacking in nothing important),
- and in accordance with virtue over a complete life.
This conception aims to refine common Greek views equating happiness with pleasure, honor, wealth, or a combination of external goods.
5.2 The Function (Ergon) Argument
To specify what eudaimonia consists in, Aristotle introduces the function argument (I.7). The structure is roughly:
- A thing’s good is determined by its characteristic function (ergon).
- Human beings possess a distinctive capacity: rational activity.
- Therefore, the human good is excellent rational activity in accordance with virtue.
He distinguishes mere life (shared with plants), perception (shared with animals), and a rational principle peculiar to humans. The human good, on this view, is an activity (energeia) of soul expressing reason well, not a passive state or feeling.
5.3 Interpretive Disputes about the Function Argument
Scholars disagree about the argument’s force and presuppositions:
| Interpretation | Main Claim |
|---|---|
| Teleological-naturalist | Human nature has an objective function grounded in biology and metaphysics; ethics derives from this natural teleology. |
| Practical/heuristic | The argument is a clarifying device linking familiar evaluative practices (talk of “good” knives or flutes) to human life, without heavy metaphysical commitments. |
| Critical views | Some contend the inference from “distinctive capacity” to “good” is question-begging or relies on unargued value assumptions. |
Debate also concerns whether eudaimonia, so defined, is primarily one activity (contemplation) or an inclusive set of virtuous activities; this issue becomes central in interpreting the relation between Book I and Book X.
6. Virtue, Habituation, and the Doctrine of the Mean
6.1 Virtue as a State (Hexis) Acquired by Habituation
In Book II, Aristotle develops a general theory of moral virtue (ēthikē aretē). He distinguishes:
- Natural capacities (e.g., to feel fear or pleasure),
- States (hexeis) such as virtues and vices, shaped by habituation (ethismos).
Virtues are not innate; they arise from repeated actions under guidance. Performing just or courageous acts, especially under sound upbringing and laws, gradually forms a stable disposition to act and feel in the right ways.
6.2 Definition of Moral Virtue
Aristotle famously defines virtue (II.6):
“Virtue, then, is a state concerned with choice, lying in a mean relative to us, this being determined by reason and in the way in which the practically wise person would determine it.”
— Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1106b36–1107a2
Key elements:
- virtue is concerned with choice (prohairesis), not mere behavior,
- it involves a mean between excess and deficiency,
- the mean is relative to the agent and set by practical reason.
6.3 The Doctrine of the Mean
The doctrine of the mean holds that for many emotions and actions, virtue occupies an intermediate point:
| Virtue | Deficiency | Mean | Excess |
|---|---|---|---|
| Courage | Cowardice | Courage | Rashness |
| Temperance | Insensibility | Temperance | Self-indulgence |
| Generosity | Stinginess | Generosity | Prodigality |
This is not a mathematical midpoint but what is appropriate in context, given the agent and circumstances. Some responses (e.g., adultery, murder) are described as having no virtuous mean.
Interpretive discussions focus on:
- whether the mean doctrine is primarily normative (a guide to feeling and acting) or descriptive (a way to classify virtues),
- how it applies to complex virtues (e.g., justice) and to emotions like shame,
- and whether it risks encouraging mediocrity; defenders emphasize that the mean often requires intense, not tepid, engagement (e.g., great courage).
7. Responsibility, Choice, and Weakness of Will
7.1 Voluntary and Involuntary Action
Book III opens by analyzing when actions are voluntary and thus praiseworthy or blameworthy. Aristotle distinguishes:
- Involuntary actions: done under compulsion (external force) or through ignorance of particulars, accompanied by regret.
- Non-voluntary actions: done in ignorance but without later regret.
- Voluntary actions: originating in the agent, with knowledge of particulars.
These distinctions aim to ground moral responsibility without invoking a modern notion of free will.
7.2 Choice (Prohairesis) and Deliberation
Aristotle identifies choice (prohairesis) as the central expression of character:
- Choice is deliberate desire for things in our power.
- We deliberate about means to ends we take as given, not about ends themselves in the same way.
- Responsible agency involves correct deliberation guided by practical wisdom.
This framework underpins his claim that we are, in an important sense, “responsible for our character”, since habitual choices shape our dispositions over time.
7.3 Weakness of Will (Akrasia)
In Book VII, Aristotle investigates akrasia, the phenomenon of acting against one’s better judgment. He poses the puzzle: if the akratic person knows the right course, why does this knowledge not prevent wrongdoing?
Key distinctions include:
- Different senses of “knowing”: the akratic may have knowledge in a way that is not fully active (e.g., like a drunk or someone asleep).
- Types of akrasia: with respect to impetuosity (acting without deliberation) and weakness (failing to abide by a settled decision).
- Objects of akrasia: especially bodily pleasures such as food, drink, and sex, though he also considers anger-driven cases.
Interpretations diverge on whether Aristotle offers a psychological model of divided motivation (reason vs. appetite) or a primarily epistemic analysis where practical knowledge can be temporarily “silenced” or overpowered. Comparisons with Socratic intellectualism highlight that Aristotle allows that one may, in a qualified sense, know the good yet fail to do it.
8. Justice, Law, and Political Community
8.1 Justice as Complete Virtue in Relation to Others
In Book V, Aristotle treats justice (dikaiosynē) as both:
- a comprehensive virtue toward others, encompassing lawful and fair behavior generally,
- and a particular virtue concerned with distributions and transactions.
As a complete virtue, justice embodies the exercise of all virtues in the context of social relations, since it involves acting rightly for the common good and not merely for one’s own advantage.
8.2 Particular Justice: Distributive and Corrective
Aristotle distinguishes two principal forms of particular justice:
| Type | Domain | Principle |
|---|---|---|
| Distributive justice | Allocation of honors, wealth, and other goods by the polis | Geometrical proportion: shares according to merit or contribution |
| Corrective (rectificatory) justice | Voluntary exchanges and involuntary wrongs (theft, assault) | Arithmetic proportion: restoration of equality between parties |
He also analyzes justice in exchange, where proportionality in value (not merely equality in quantity) is needed to sustain mutual benefit.
8.3 Law, Equity, and Political Justice
Aristotle connects justice closely with law (nomos) and political constitutions. Law is a rational ordering of the polis aimed at the common advantage. Yet he introduces equity (epieikeia) as a virtue that corrects the generality of law:
“The equitable is just, but not what is legally just: it is a correction of legal justice.”
— Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1137b11–12
Equity allows for context-sensitive adjustments where strict application of a rule would produce unfair outcomes.
He further distinguishes:
- Natural justice: what holds “everywhere in the same way,”
- Legal (conventional) justice: what depends on particular enactments.
How robust natural justice is, and how it relates to later notions of natural law, is widely debated.
8.4 Ethics and the Polis
Throughout the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle presupposes that ethical life is realized within a political community. The virtues, including justice, are cultivated and sustained by laws, institutions, and education. Later sections of the work link personal virtue with the responsibilities and structures of citizenship, anticipating the more detailed treatment in the Politics.
9. Intellectual Virtues and Practical Wisdom
9.1 Types of Intellectual Virtue
Book VI classifies intellectual virtues (aretai dianoētikai), which perfect the rational part of the soul:
| Intellectual Virtue | Domain |
|---|---|
| Technē (craft) | Making or producing (e.g., building ships, medicine as techne) |
| Epistēmē (scientific knowledge) | Necessary, demonstrable truths |
| Phronēsis (practical wisdom) | Deliberation about what is good and beneficial for living well |
| Sophia (theoretical wisdom) | Highest understanding of unchanging, noble realities (combining nous and epistēmē) |
| Nous (intuitive intellect) | Direct grasp of first principles |
These virtues differ by object (necessary vs. contingent, practical vs. theoretical) and by their role in guiding action or contemplation.
9.2 Practical Wisdom (Phronēsis)
Phronēsis occupies a central place in Aristotle’s ethics. It is:
- concerned with particulars and contingent matters,
- involves correct deliberation about what promotes eudaimonia in concrete situations,
- and requires experience and perception of salience, not just general rules.
Aristotle compares the phronimos (practically wise person) to a good judge, able to discern the mean relative to us in complex circumstances.
9.3 Relation Between Moral Virtue and Practical Wisdom
Book VI insists on a reciprocal dependence:
- full moral virtue cannot exist without practical wisdom, since virtue requires right reason,
- but practical wisdom itself presupposes a virtuous character, because passions and desires must be properly trained to “see” ends correctly.
This mutuality leads to interpretive questions: whether Aristotle allows for natural virtue (right tendencies without full rational articulation), and how he conceives the process by which habituation prepares the way for phronēsis.
9.4 Practical vs. Theoretical Wisdom
Aristotle contrasts phronēsis with sophia:
“It would be strange, then, if one supposed that politics or practical wisdom is the best kind of knowledge, since the human being is not the best thing in the world.”
— Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1141a20–22
While sophia concerns the highest objects, phronēsis is indispensable for living well as a human being. Later books return to this distinction when ranking the ethical and contemplative lives, leading to debates about how Aristotle integrates practical and theoretical wisdom within his overall conception of eudaimonia.
10. Pleasure, Happiness, and the Contemplative Life
10.1 Early and Later Treatments of Pleasure
Aristotle treats pleasure (hēdonē) in both Book VII and Book X. He rejects two extreme positions:
- that pleasure is the highest good,
- and that pleasure is wholly bad.
Instead, he argues that pleasure is a completion or perfection of activity, supervening on activities when they function well.
In Book X, he refines this view:
- every activity has a characteristic pleasure that enhances it,
- the best pleasures are those associated with the best activities (notably virtuous actions and contemplation),
- improper pleasures can distort judgment and character.
10.2 Happiness and the Ranking of Lives
Aristotle evaluates candidate lives—of pleasure, honor, money-making, and contemplation. Eudaimonia, as defined in Book I, is activity in accordance with virtue over a complete life. In Book X, he argues that the contemplative life (bios theoretikos) most fully satisfies the criteria of the highest good.
10.3 The Contemplative Life
The activity of theoria is described as:
- most continuous and self-sustaining,
- most pleasant in a stable, refined sense,
- most self-sufficient, requiring fewer external conditions,
- most loved for its own sake and least for external results,
- and closest to the divine, aligning the human intellect with what is highest.
“Such a life would be superior to the human level; for one will live it not insofar as one is a human being, but insofar as there is something divine in one.”
— Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1177b26–28
10.4 The “Inclusive” vs. “Dominant” Good Debate
A central interpretive issue is whether Aristotle’s account of happiness is:
| View | Claim about Eudaimonia |
|---|---|
| Dominant end | Happiness is primarily a single highest activity: contemplation; ethical and political activities are secondary or “secondary happiness.” |
| Inclusive end | Happiness comprises a composite of virtuous activities, including contemplation, moral action, and friendship. |
Proponents of the inclusive reading emphasize Book I’s broader picture of a life of virtuous activity, while dominant-end interpreters stress Book X’s hierarchical language and divine model. Some hybrid views attempt to reconcile these strands by treating contemplation as supreme while acknowledging a subordinate, but genuine, ethical form of happiness.
11. Friendship and the Social Dimensions of the Good Life
11.1 Types of Friendship (Philia)
Books VIII–IX offer an extended analysis of friendship (philia), understood broadly to include many affiliative relationships. Aristotle distinguishes three main kinds, based on what is loved:
| Type of Friendship | Basis | Stability |
|---|---|---|
| Utility | Mutual benefit | Ends when advantage ends |
| Pleasure | Enjoyment of one another’s company | Ends when pleasure fades or changes |
| Virtue (character friendship) | Appreciation of the other’s character as good | Most stable and complete |
Genuine friendship requires reciprocal goodwill, recognition, and shared life.
11.2 Friendship and Moral Development
Aristotle argues that friendship:
- is necessary for life; no one would choose to live without friends,
- provides a context for moral education, as friends mirror and correct each other,
- and expresses the social dimension of virtue, since the virtuous person benefits from acting well with and for others.
The best friendships are between morally good equals, in which each loves the other “for his own sake” as a virtuous person.
11.3 Friendships of Unequals and Political Analogies
Aristotle also analyzes friendships involving inequality (e.g., parent–child, ruler–subject, husband–wife, benefactor–beneficiary). Such relationships are structured by proportional equality: the superior is loved “more” in honor, the inferior in service or affection.
He draws analogies between forms of constitution and types of friendship:
| Constitution | Corresponding Friendship |
|---|---|
| Kingship | Father–child (benevolent inequality) |
| Aristocracy | Husband–wife or older–younger friend (merit-based inequality) |
| Timocracy/Polity | Friendship among equals (citizen–citizen) |
These comparisons highlight how Aristotle’s account of friendship illuminates the ethical underpinnings of political life.
11.4 Self-Love and Friendship
In Book IX, Aristotle defends a nuanced notion of self-love (philautia). He distinguishes:
- Vicious self-love: grasping for wealth, honor, or bodily pleasures,
- Proper self-love: seeking what is truly noble (kalon) for oneself.
The good person, by loving what is truly good in himself, becomes a standard for loving others; such self-love is presented as the model for virtuous friendship. This raises interpretive questions about altruism, the interplay of self- and other-regarding motives, and whether Aristotle’s ideal friendship is fundamentally egoistic or relational.
12. Philosophical Method and Use of Endoxa
12.1 Starting from Endoxa
Aristotle describes his ethical method as beginning from endoxa—reputable opinions held by:
- the many,
- the wise,
- or some combination of both.
He aims to save the phenomena of moral experience by:
- collecting endoxa about a topic (e.g., happiness, virtue, friendship),
- identifying tensions or contradictions among them,
- and resolving these through distinctions and arguments.
This approach is evident, for example, in Book I’s review of common views about happiness and the good life.
12.2 Dialectical and Scientific Elements
Scholars differ on how to classify Aristotle’s ethical method:
| View | Characterization |
|---|---|
| Dialectical reading | Ethics is primarily dialectical, refining common beliefs rather than providing apodictic demonstrations. |
| Quasi-scientific reading | Ethics aspires to a kind of scientia, though adjusted to the inexactness of practical matters. |
| Hybrid reading | Ethics is dialectical in starting points but aims at more stable, explanatory accounts akin to scientific understanding. |
Aristotle himself notes that precision should be suited to the subject matter; ethics deals with variable, particular cases and thus cannot achieve the exactness of mathematics.
12.3 Role of Perception and Experience
In addition to endoxa, Aristotle emphasizes experience (empeiria) and a kind of practical perception:
“For the end appears in different ways to different people, and to the good person as what it truly is.”
— Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics 1114a32–33
The virtuous person is said to “see” the right thing to do, suggesting that ethical understanding involves trained sensitivity to salient features of situations, not merely rule application.
12.4 Methodological Implications
These methodological commitments affect:
- the status of ethical claims (as general but not exceptionless),
- the interplay between universal principles and particular judgments,
- and the extent to which Aristotle’s ethics is compatible with modern expectations about justification and objectivity.
Interpretive debates focus on whether Aristotle’s reliance on endoxa anchors ethics in shared human experience or leaves it vulnerable to the limitations and biases of his cultural milieu.
13. Textual History, Translations, and Commentarial Traditions
13.1 Ancient Transmission and Early Commentaries
The Nicomachean Ethics circulated within the Peripatetic school in antiquity. It became part of the Aristotelian corpus consolidated in the Hellenistic era. Late antique commentators, especially Aspasius (2nd c. CE), Alexander of Aphrodisias, and later Neoplatonists, produced detailed expositions.
These commentaries often interpret Aristotle through a Platonic or Neoplatonic lens, emphasizing the hierarchy of lives and the relation between ethics and metaphysics.
13.2 Medieval Islamic and Jewish Reception
In the medieval Islamic world, the Ethics was translated into Arabic, sometimes indirectly through paraphrases or summary versions. Key figures include:
| Author | Work | Contribution |
|---|---|---|
| Al-Fārābī | Works on virtues and the virtuous city | Integrates Aristotelian ethics into an Islamic philosophical framework. |
| Ibn Rushd (Averroes) | Middle Commentary on the Nicomachean Ethics | Provides a systematic exposition that influenced Latin scholastics. |
Jewish philosophers such as Maimonides engaged Aristotelian ethical ideas, often mediated by Arabic sources, and adapted them within halakhic and theological contexts.
13.3 Latin Translations and Scholastic Commentaries
From the 12th century, Latin translations (notably by Robert Grosseteste and others) brought the Nicomachean Ethics into the emerging university curriculum. It became a core text in Arts and Theology faculties.
Thomas Aquinas’s Sententia Libri Ethicorum (c. 1271–72) is among the most influential medieval commentaries, aligning Aristotle’s account of virtue and happiness with Christian doctrines of beatitude and grace.
13.4 Early Modern to Contemporary Editions and Translations
The first printed Greek edition appeared in 1497 (Aldine Press, Venice). The Bekker edition (1831) later established standard pagination. Since then, numerous critical editions and translations have appeared in modern languages.
Some widely cited English translations include:
| Translator | Features |
|---|---|
| W. D. Ross (rev. Urmson & Barnes) | Traditional, close to Greek, influential in 20th-century scholarship. |
| Terence Irwin | Philosophically interpretive with extensive notes. |
| Roger Crisp | Clear and student-friendly, with concise commentary. |
| C. D. C. Reeve | Emphasizes readability and philosophical continuity. |
Differences in rendering key terms (e.g., eudaimonia, phronēsis, arete) contribute to divergent interpretations; some translators opt for Greek transliteration to avoid misleading equivalences.
13.5 Modern Scholarship and Companion Literature
Recent decades have seen a proliferation of monographs, edited volumes, and companions devoted to the Ethics. Works by scholars such as Sarah Broadie, Richard Kraut, Rachana Kamtekar, and others provide sustained philosophical and historical analysis, often engaging directly with textual and translation issues. The ancient commentaries, now increasingly available in translation, have also become important resources for understanding the work’s reception and interpretive possibilities.
14. Major Interpretive Debates and Criticisms
14.1 Unity of the Work and Relation to the Eudemian Ethics
One set of debates concerns the unity of the Nicomachean Ethics:
- Some scholars argue it is a coherent, unified treatise, despite minor seams.
- Others view it as a composite, stitched from separate lecture series, especially given the “common books” shared with the Eudemian Ethics.
These views affect interpretations of apparent tensions, such as shifts in emphasis between Books I, VI, and X.
14.2 The Nature of Eudaimonia
As noted earlier, there is a long-standing dispute between:
| Position | Characterization |
|---|---|
| Dominant-end | Eudaimonia is primarily contemplative activity; ethical and political virtues are secondary. |
| Inclusive | Eudaimonia includes a range of virtuous activities; contemplation is one, albeit especially important, component. |
Some hybrid approaches attempt to reconcile these by suggesting layered or plural notions of happiness (e.g., “primary” and “secondary” forms).
14.3 Teleology and Naturalism
Aristotle’s ethics relies on a teleological conception of nature and human function. Critics, especially in modern contexts, question:
- whether such teleology is scientifically defensible,
- and whether the move from “human nature” to “human good” is valid.
Defenders argue that a modest, functional teleology can survive modern criticisms or that Aristotle’s framework can be reconstructed in more naturalistic terms.
14.4 Elitism, Exclusion, and Gender
Aristotle’s account presupposes a male, free, property-owning citizen as the paradigm subject of virtue. Feminist and critical theorists contend that:
- this limits the purported universality of his ethics,
- rationalizes social hierarchies (gender, slavery, class),
- and shapes his conception of virtues like magnificence or megalopsychia.
Others respond that, while the historical context is exclusionary, certain structural features of the theory (e.g., focus on rational agency and character) can be abstracted and applied more inclusively.
14.5 Normativity, Conflict, and Pluralism
Some critics maintain that the Nicomachean Ethics:
- offers limited guidance in hard moral dilemmas, emphasizing character over decision procedures,
- presupposes a relatively homogeneous conception of the good life, making it less suited to modern moral pluralism.
Advocates of Aristotelian approaches reply that its attention to practical wisdom and context-sensitive judgment equips it to handle complexity in ways rule-based theories may not.
14.6 Internal Tensions and Coherence
Scholars also debate:
- the relation between virtue’s sufficiency for happiness and the acknowledged need for external goods,
- tensions between self-love and other-regard,
- and possible inconsistencies between books (e.g., accounts of pleasure, virtue and continence).
Some interpret these as evidence of development or multiple layers of composition; others see them as manageable nuances within a broadly coherent framework.
15. Legacy and Historical Significance
15.1 Influence in Antiquity and the Middle Ages
The Nicomachean Ethics quickly became a canonical text in late antique philosophical education. Stoics and Epicureans engaged with its themes, sometimes in opposition, especially on pleasure, sufficiency of virtue, and passions.
In the Islamic, Jewish, and Christian Middle Ages, it served as a foundational source for discussions of virtue, law, and beatitude. Thinkers such as Averroes, Maimonides, and Aquinas integrated Aristotelian ethics with religious doctrines, shaping natural law theory and scholastic moral theology.
15.2 Early Modern to 19th-Century Reception
Early modern philosophers responded in diverse ways:
- Some, like Hobbes and Kant, distanced themselves from teleological and virtue-centered ethics.
- Others, such as Leibniz and certain British moralists, drew selectively on Aristotelian ideas about virtue and happiness.
In the 19th century, historians of philosophy and neo-Aristotelian thinkers renewed systematic study of the Ethics, aided by improved editions and philological methods.
15.3 Role in Contemporary Virtue Ethics
In the late 20th century, the Nicomachean Ethics became a central reference for virtue ethics, notably through the work of G. E. M. Anscombe, Philippa Foot, Alasdair MacIntyre, and others. They turned to Aristotle to critique rule-centered ethics and to highlight:
- the importance of character, habituation, and moral psychology,
- the role of practices and communities in sustaining virtues,
- and the idea of a narrative unity of a life aimed at eudaimonia.
These appropriations vary in how closely they adhere to Aristotle’s original doctrines.
15.4 Impact Beyond Moral Philosophy
The Nicomachean Ethics has influenced:
- Political theory: through its conception of the polis, citizenship, and justice;
- Educational theory: in discussions of character education and habituation;
- Psychology: in explorations of emotion, motivation, and practical reasoning;
- Applied ethics: including professional, medical, and business ethics, where notions of virtue and practical wisdom inform debates.
15.5 Ongoing Relevance
Contemporary scholarship continues to mine the Ethics for insights into:
- the relationship between reason and emotion,
- the nature of moral responsibility without libertarian free will,
- and models of human flourishing compatible with pluralistic societies.
While critics highlight its historical limitations and metaphysical assumptions, the Nicomachean Ethics remains a touchstone for rethinking ethics as a question not only of right action but of what it is to live a good human life.
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@online{philopedia_nicomachean_ethics,
title = {nicomachean-ethics},
author = {Philopedia},
year = {2025},
url = {https://philopedia.com/works/nicomachean-ethics/},
urldate = {December 10, 2025}
}Study Guide
intermediateThe Nicomachean Ethics is conceptually rich but not technically forbidding. It demands comfort with abstract argument, unfamiliar terminology (often in Greek), and engagement with interpretive debates, but it is accessible to motivated readers who have some prior exposure to philosophy.
Eudaimonia (εὐδαιμονία)
A complete life of rational activity in accordance with virtue and with sufficient external goods; not a feeling but an overall state of living well and doing well.
Ergon (ἔργον, function) and the Function Argument
The characteristic activity or function of a being; Aristotle argues that the human good is determined by our distinctive function, rational activity, done excellently.
Arete (ἀρετή, virtue or excellence) and Hexis (ἕξις)
Arete is an excellence that enables a thing to perform its function well; as a hexis it is a stable disposition of character or intellect to feel and act in certain good ways.
Doctrine of the Mean
The view that each moral virtue is a mean between vices of excess and deficiency, identified relative to us by right reason and exemplified by the practically wise person.
Phronēsis (φρόνησις, practical wisdom)
The intellectual virtue that enables sound deliberation about what is good and beneficial for living well overall, guiding choice in particular circumstances.
Prohairesis (προαίρεσις, choice) and Voluntary Action
Deliberate desire for things within our power; together with Aristotle’s distinctions between voluntary, involuntary, and non-voluntary actions, it reveals character and grounds responsibility.
Justice (δικαιοσύνη) and Equity (ἐπιείκεια)
Justice is both complete virtue in relation to others and a particular virtue dealing with fairness in distributions and transactions; equity is a corrective that applies the spirit rather than the letter of the law.
Philia (φιλία, friendship) and Self-Love
Reciprocal relationships of goodwill and shared life, ranging from friendships of utility and pleasure to complete friendships based on virtue; proper self-love is love of what is truly noble in oneself.
How does Aristotle’s function (ergon) argument in Book I support his claim that the human good consists in rational activity in accordance with virtue? Is the move from ‘human function’ to ‘human good’ convincing?
In what sense is moral virtue a ‘mean’ between extremes of excess and deficiency, and why does Aristotle insist that the mean is ‘relative to us’?
Can someone with excellent character but little theoretical wisdom be happy in Aristotle’s sense, or does Book X make contemplation so central that ethical and political activity become secondary?
How does Aristotle’s analysis of voluntary and involuntary action shape his view of moral responsibility, especially in cases of ignorance or compulsion?
What is the relationship between practical wisdom (phronēsis) and moral virtue? Can one exist fully without the other?
Why does Aristotle devote two books to friendship (philia), and how does his account of friendship illuminate his broader conception of the good life?
In what ways is Aristotle’s ethics dependent on his teleological view of nature, and can his account of virtue and eudaimonia be preserved without that metaphysical background?