Abstract

This chapter reassesses the role of Aristotle in Gadamer’s work. Gadamer is sometimes read as preferential to Plato over Aristotle. Such a reading, however, displaces the centrality of Aristotle to Gadamer’s thought. Gadamer saw Aristotle, and not Plato, as the first phenomenologist. Gadamer consequently expressed a great debt to Aristotle, not only for modeling a phenomenological approach to philosophy, but also for the illuminating phenomenological descriptions that Aristotle gave. Both his philosophical approach and the insights it yielded serve as compelling evidence for Aristotle’s continued relevance for us today.