P. Hadot and the hermeneutic challenge of acient texts: how to read so as to understand?

Abstract

The article is not a case of conceptual analysis or critical interpretation. Rather, its general aim is reconstructive, i. e. to give a brief account of hermeneutical principles formulated by the French scholar Pierre Hadot. Despite many advantages, such as precision, factual base, efficiency, contextuality and the fact that Hadot’s methodology is relevant not only to ancient texts but also to contemporary literature, many philosophers preferred pure philosophico-anthropological hermeneutics (initiated by M. Heidegger, H. G. Gadamer, P. Ricoeur and others). Therefore, it is necessary to stress that the principles of Hadot’s hermeneutics deserve more attention and can improve usually very arbitrary relations between a scholar and the text under investigation, while bearing in mind, that “text” today is saturated with socio-cultural, existential and even ontological
connotations. The basic points of Hadot’s hermeneutics are illustrated referring to famous passages from the texts of early and late Antiquity.