Given the sophistication that Proclean studies have achieved in the past 20 years, it is somewhat surprising that so many questions remain unanswered about his philosophy of nature. Yet such is the case. Much of this neglect may be traced to a strong Neoplatonic emphasis on metaphysics as the end of philosophical speculation (since Iamblichus, the Timaeus had been treated as preliminary to study of the Parmenides, the capstone of the Neoplatonic curriculum) and to consequent prejudices among modern scholars against a distinct field of Proclean physics.
It was not until the Baltzly, Tarrant, Runia, and Share translations of Proclus's Commentary on the Timaeus began to appear in 2007 that scholars directed concerted and sustained attention to Proclus's physiologia. In addition to generating new interest in Proclus's theory of nature, scholars have begun not only to dispel long-held misunderstandings about the apparent opposition between Being and Becoming, Intelligible and Sensible in Proclus's cosmology, but also to sort out the complex relations of ontological structure and operation that blend the Intelligible with the Sensible in seamless continuity. Marije Martijn's Proclus on Nature makes a number of important contributions to this project.
