Eudemian Ethics

The Eudemian Ethics (sometimes abbreviated EE in scholarly works) is a work of philosophy by Aristotle. Its primary focus is on Ethics, making it one of the primary sources available for study of Aristotelian Ethics. It is named for Eudemus of Rhodes, a pupil of Aristotle who may also have had a hand in editing the final work. It is commonly believed to have been written before the Nicomachean Ethics, though this is not without controversy.

The Eudemian Ethics usually receives less attention than Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, and when scholars refer simply to The Ethics of Aristotle, they usually mean the latter. The Eudemian Ethics is shorter than the Nicomachean Ethics, eight books as opposed to ten, and some of its most interesting passages are mirrored in the latter. Books IV, V, and VI of the Eudemian Ethics, for example, are identical to Books V, VI, and VII of the Nicomachean Ethics, and as a result some critical editions of the former include only Books I-III and VII-VIII (the omitted books being included in the publisher's critical edition of the latter).

The translator for the Loeb edition, Rackham, states in the Introduction to that edition that "in some places The Eudemian Ethics is fuller in expression or more discursive than The Nicomachean Ethics." Compared to the Nicomachean Ethics, Rackham mentions, for example:-

• It "inserts the virtue of Mildness between Temperance and Liberality".
• It "adds to the minor Graces of Character Nemesis (righteous indignation at another's undeserved good or bad fortune), Friendliness and Dignity, while it omits Gentleness and Agreeableness". (The Nicomachean Ethics actually states that Nemesis will be discussed within that work, but never does so.)

In Book VIII there is a section concerning kalokagathia, the beautiful and good nobility of a gentleman, a virtue which implies all the moral virtues as well as good fortune. This has no parallel in the Nicomachean Ethics.