On Rembrandt and Aristotle

by Robert Dominic

To understand the painting of Rembrandt entitled "Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer, I decided to establish instead what I understood about Poetry, Philosophy, and their relationship independent of, and in connection to, each other.

Poetry's main ingredients are words. The essence of it is the idea of trying to express the author's understanding of the things around him, and so in effect Poetry becomes a form of answering. And to answer is to define, and to define puts things within certain parameters. Poetry is a form of encapsulation; using words, we are given the power to name and define things and henceforth establish what they are. And so we go back to water: Water is a liquid, it is the main thing that makes up our body, and depending on one's situation, it can kill you or make you healthy.

But then what is Philosophy? I understand Philosophy as the venture into the uncertain. It decides to even take the definite, and find out what made it uncertain before it was even defined in the first place. Philosophy being a matter of asking questions, may not necessarily provide an avenue for answers, but rather greater scopes of question, inquiry, and thought. Water might be a common substance. But what makes it uniquely water? What makes water, water? Going back to the lecture of Dr. Garcia, we know that we can think. But do we know that we think? And if so, there must certainly be the human capacity to think that we think that we think, right? Is this measure of humanity extendable to any being that is non-human? Is this human aspect extendable to a greater form of thinking, and should we deviate from such, does that degrade or devalue us being human?

This then connect and puts together for me the harmony of Poetry, and Philosophy best depicted in Rembrandt's painting. Poetry, much as it expresses and defines the feeling, the thought, or the thing it seeks to depict, kills the question. Being defined, it becomes a display rather than a matter of query. It is the bust of Homer; Homer the poet, is a question that is killed, for he is depicted and defined by his works, and his thoughts put onto paper are what speak for who and what Homer is.

But then there is the connection to Aristotle, alive and not in stone, his hand resting on the bust of Homer. Aristotle, La Philosophe, is that depiction of the life of Philosophy. He is alive, he seeks to contemplate what is established, and take it to the uncertain. Yes, Homer wrote this, lived that, but do his works really define Homer? What if these were merely extensions of the thoughts and observations of Homer, what were his thoughts and what was his own philosophy? Aristotle not only represents Philosophy in the painting, but stands for the life of questioning and actively contemplating the uncertain as well for looking at what is defined and sincerely thinking of what made it come to be defined in the first place; what initiated or stimulated Homer to write, to expressly declare or creatively depict.


As I reflected upon this, I come to the conclusion that Philosophy and Poetry bear their own missions independent of each other, but when they come together, they challenge the human person with the opportunity to exercise his capability to dare to question what is established, or in turn, establish an answer for the questions unanswered for Man.