target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href="#ulink_d651c663-4947-5a79-93cc-be98bd6eeda3">93. Ibid., 498. Brunt (ibid., 497) also explains that Aristotle connected the use of topoi to enthymemes, which are syllogistic in nature. However, while a syllogism is a complete argument, in an enthymeme one premise of the argument is missing. The topoi represent the source of the enthymemes.
94. Wuellner, “Toposforschung und Torahinterpretation,” 463–83.
95. Thom, “Defining the topos,” 555–73. He cautions that his work should not be considered the final word on the topic; rather, his essay represents “an exploratory survey,” and that “[A]t most [he] will attempt to indicate some of the lines of investigation that need to be developed further” (ibid., 557).
96. Ibid., 561.
97. Ibid. By “formal,” Thom is referring to topoi that are used as “strategies of argumentation,” while “substantive” topoi are those that represent topics for arguments.
98. Ibid., 566.
99. Ibid. He offers the example of an argument from the lesser to the greater, found in Matt 6:30.
100. Ibid., 566–67. An example, according to Thom, is the “younger-son motif in the Parable of the Prodigal Son.” This definition is also emphasized by J. McDonald, Kerygma and Didache, 70–72. Two examples noted by McDonald include:
Seneca, Ep. 34.19: “I remember one day you were handling the well-known commonplace [Memini te illum locum aliquando tractasse],—that we do not suddenly fall on death, but advance towards it by slight degrees; we die every day.”
Seneca the Elder, Suasoriae 1.7.9: “He then spoke the commonplace [Dixit deinde locum] on the variability of Fortune. He described how nothing is stable, everything fluid, now raised, now depressed in unpredictable change.”
101. Thom, “Defining the topos,” 567.
102. Ibid. Thom lists Plutarch as an example of the Hellenistic moral writers (he specifically mentions the Moralia).
103. In examining the later development of the topos, Thom devotes a paragraph of his study to Theon’s treatment of topos in the Progymnasmata. Thom confines his comments to the formal elementary exercise of topos.
104. This same distinction as seen in Cicero and Quintilian, as will be demonstrated below.
105. Kennedy (Classical Rhetoric, 61) notes that the idea had already surfaced in the writings of Isocrates; he states in particular that Isocrates mentioned the topos of possibility/impossibility and arguments which cite authoritative sources (Hel. enc. 4, 38). In his encomium to Helen, Isocrates writes concerning those who would, through the use of rhetoric, attempt to prove those things which are agreed upon to be false: “Nevertheless, although these men [Georgias, Zeno, Melissus] have shown that it is easy to contrive false statements on any subject that may be proposed, they still waste time on this commonplace [περὶ τὸν τόπον τοῦτον]” (Hel. enc. 4). In the same treatise, Isocrates continues, commenting on the appropriateness of praising Helen: “But lest I seem through poverty of ideas to be dwelling unduly upon the same theme [περὶ τὸν αὐτὸν τόπον] and by misusing the glory of one man to be praising Helen, I wish now to review the subsequent events also” (Hel. enc. 38). For a somewhat tentative discussion (admittedly; cf. the title of the work) of the origins of the concept of the topos, see D’Angelo, “The Evolution of the Analytic Topoi,” 50–68, esp. 54–61.
106. Aristotle specifically lists five inartificial proofs: laws, witnesses, contracts, that which is revealed by someone being tortured, and oaths.
107. Ryan’s comment is helpful; concerning enthymemes and topoi, he states: “To say, then, that an enthymeme is derived from a topos does not mean that the enthymeme is constructed from the topos as from a premise . . . Instead, the enthymeme follows the structure of the topos . . . The topos is not part of the argument, but it is the argument’s pattern” (Ryan, Aristotle’s Theory, 48–49).
108. J. Martin, Antike Rhetorik, 107.
109. Inartificial proofs, according to Aristotle, are those which are particularly appropriate for forensic speeches (1.15.1–2).
110. For a similar, albeit much later view of quoting and/or imitating ancient sources, see Longinus, [Subl.] 13.2–4. In this passage, the author, concerning the μίμησις of ancient sources, argues that referring to others’ works is another path to the “sublime.” The author uses the analogy of the steam which came from the earth at Delphi and intoxicated the pythia; the pythia is “impregnated with the divine power and is at once inspired to utter oracles.” In this same way, by the imitation of historians and poets the reader is “carried away” by this use of others’ work. By analogy, readers are captivated by the wisdom of the ancients (“old writers [ἀρχαίων]”). The author goes on to say that quoting or imitation is not plagiarism; rather, it is like “taking an impression from fine characters as one does from molded figures or other works of art.”
111. See Kennedy, Rhetorical Criticism, 20–22, who briefly summarizes Aristotle’s concept of topos; cf. a similar discussion in Kennedy, The Art of Persuasion, 100–103.
112. This is certainly not to say that the concept of topos disappears between Aristotle and Cicero; on the contrary, many ancient rhetoricians address this subject matter. The evidence is such, however, that Reinhardt can correctly note: “In light of the scanty evidence for the post-Aristotelian development of dialectical τόποι, we may assume that Cicero’s loci reflect a post-Aristotelian tradition of rhetorical τόποι which have been rearranged and supplemented with the help of Top. and other sources” (Reinhardt, Topica, 28–29; emphasis original). See Reinhardt, Cicero’s Topica, 18–35, for a brief overview of the various understandings of topos from Aristotle to Boethius. See also Kemper, “Topik,” 17–32, for a summary of the topoi from Aristotle to Cicero.
113. See Kennedy’s discussion of the situation surrounding Cicero’s writing of Inv. in The Art of Rhetoric, 106–11. Kennedy argues that Cicero and his contemporaries followed the ancient convention of not mentioning a living person to whom they were indebted; only those authorities who were deceased were cited. In Inv. 2.50.111, Cicero does mention Crassus, but makes no reference to Antonius anywhere in the work. According to Kennedy, both of these men would have been well respected by Cicero. Thus Kennedy argues that Inv. was completed after
