to its own fully determined possibility of being-there—φύσις—or according to the impetus that is lying within the beings in question as such. Thus one says, fever has the person [sickness has the person; it has attacked him “whom it has” or “whom it has seized”]; the tyrants have the towns [they rule over them]. Further, the ones who are dressed have clothes (on). Ἔχειν in the sense of ἄγειν.
2. ἐν ᾧ ἄν τι ὑπάρχῃ ὡς δεκτικῷ, ο ἷον ὁ χαλκὸς ἔχει τὸ εἶδος τοῦ ἀνδριάντος καὶ τὴν νόσον τὸ σῶμα.184 “The metal has the look of a statue [has the look, is a statue]. The body has the illness [it is sick].” The more precise determination of this having is to be a being in the sense that “in itself something is present, for which being-present the being in question itself has the readiness (δεκτικόν).” The metal is determined as metal on account of the δεκτικόν. The metal is determined in its being such that it can become a statue. The metal is determined as ὕλη. In this context, ὕλη does not mean an indeterminate “material,” but rather a positive character of a mode of being-there. Being in preparedness for . . . is a positive determination of a being. Having means nothing other than being the wherein of a being-present of something out of preparedness.
3. ὡς τὸ περιέχον τὰ περιεχόμενα· ἐν ᾧ γάρ ἐστι περιεχόμενόν τι, ἔχεσθαι ὑπὸ τούτου λέγεται, οἷ τὸ ἀγγεῖον ἔχειν τὸ ὑγρόν φαμεν καὶ τὴν πόλιν ἀνθρώπους καὶ τὴν ναῦν ναύτας· οὕτω δὲ καὶ τὸ ὅλον ἔχειν τὰ μέρη.185 “The enclosing has that which is enclosed [in the sense of containing, of being all around it]; wherein something is as contained therein, of which we say that something is had from the start, as the basin has, or contains, water, the town has people, the ship has sailors. In this way too the whole has parts.” Being-part is always being-part-of-something, part of a whole, belonging to something. The whole is the wherein of the determinate belongingness of a part.
4. ἔτι τὸ κωλῦον κατὰ τὴν αὑτοῦ ὁρμήν τι κινεῖσθαι ἢ πράττειν ἔχειν λέγεται τοῦτο αὐτό, οἷον καὶ οἱ κίονες τὰ ἐπικείμενα βάρη, καὶ ὡς οἱ ποιηταὶ τὸν Ἄτλαντα ποιοῦσι τὸν οὐρανὸν ἔχειν ὡς συμπεσόντ’ ἂν ἐπὶ τὴν γῆν, ὥσπερ καὶ τῶν φυσιολόγων τινές φασιν.186 “Pillars hold, have the weight lying upon them, and, as the poets say, Atlas holds the vault of heaven”: having in the sense of holding, and indeed as κωλύειν, “holding off” another being, hindering it from being as it would like to be according to its own being, “according to its genuine ὁρμή.” This is holding in the sense of not allowing another being to be as it would like to be. The ὁρμή of the weight is to fall downward; the vault of heaven “has the tendency to fall down upon the earth.” Having in this sense of holding as the holding off of another from its determinate beingpossibility, which lies in its ὁρμή, is the συνέχον, “holding-together.” τοῦτον δὲ τὸν τρόπον καὶ τὸ συνέχον λέγεται ἃ συνέχει ἔχειν, ὡς διαχωρισθέντα ἂν
184. Met. Δ 23, 1023 a 11 sqq.
185. Met. Δ 23, 1023 a 13 sqq.
186. Met. Δ 23, 1023 a 17 sqq.