What is classical philosophy? Approaches to the understanding of the classics and their relevance

Abstract

The article presents the clarification of the meaning of the term «classical philosophy» which is usually used unproblematically in modern philosophical academic literature and study books. The author argues that the meaning in which this term is used is unacceptable for effective historico-philosophical research, as it is developed in the approaches to the explication of classics based on the conceptualization of the material of art. Particularly, classical philosophy can be neither a role model nor what appertains entirely to the past, nor an individual type of philosophy. The main idea of the article lies in the fact that we can consider the term «classical philosophy» in both socio-cultural and methodological aspects. Classical philosophy is a meaningful and topical foundation of present-day philosophizing and at the same time it is the way to arrange of huge empirical materials from certain research perspective. This article proves that if we will use such methodological tool as an ideal type «classical philosophy» we can avoid substantial problem situations in the studies of history of philosophy. The article attempts to substantiate the thesis that significant differences between art and philosophy make it difficult to apply value-normative, historical-descriptive and theoretical-typological approaches in historico-philosophical studies.