From Ta Metá Ta Physika to Metaphysics
After Aristotle’s death only his immediate successor Theophrastus raised questions that would later be called metaphysical.1 In the extant fragments of Theophrastus’ work we do not find talk of being as being, and the metaphysical problematic is primarily the theological problematic, because it is concerned with knowing the first principles, and these principles are divine.2 When in turn Theophrastus died, the great scientific legacy of Aristotle (called the esoteric writings) vanished, and with them the books devoted to first philosophy perished. In the Lyceum they were no longer concerned with being as being or with the first principles.
