Basic Concepts of Ancient Philosophy [180-181]
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character of οὐσία is ἐντελέχεια, which is "prior," πρότερον,157 than every other mode of Being; i.e., there must be something present-at-hand in the first place, in order for modifications to be possible.
Insofar as δύναμις and ἐνέργεια determine οὐσία as such, which is the primary category and to which the others are related analogously, then δύναμις and ἐνέργεια also extend, as modifications, to all the remaining categories. In this way, everything is led back to οὐσία as the basic phenomenon, specifically such that ἐνέργεια is the highest kind of presence-at-hand.
The being that genuinely is in this highest sense of Being is the πρῶτον κινοῦν ἀκίνητον the ον θειότατον ["most divine being"] The science of this most proper being, of the being that is everything a being can be, is Beohoyia. The science of beings, of what they are as beings, the science of Being, is πρώτη φιλοσοφία.159 καθόλου πασῶν κοινή ["universally common to all"] (1026a27), [this science is about] that which determines every being as a being, and at the same time [it is] about Being. This fundamental science deals with that which properly is, with that which is the most proper being, with the highest being and with Being, with what properly belongs to a being.
Problem: 1. fundamental ontology: one particular being is by necessity exemplary and thus becomes the theme, though with a view to understanding Being in the sense of a concept of Being. 2. Being of the categories: ον ["a being"], ἕν ["one"], ἀγαθόν ["good"], ἔτερον ["other"], ἐναντίον ["opposite"], μὴ ον ["nonbeing"]. Formal ontology.
The double concept of the fundamental science is not a confusion or a conjunction of two different approaches that have nothing to do with each other; on the contrary, it always proceeds from a necessity lying in the content of the problem. Aristotle did not master this problem, nor did he even formulate it as such, which is why it later fell into complete oblivion.
1. Motion as movedness. Ontological meaning of motion.
2. This character of Being, which imposes itself on the moved and on its mode of Being, is grasped universally. δυνάμει is, taken positively, a mode of presence; δύναμις καὶ ἐνέργεια [?] are modes of presence; ἐνέργεια a mode of presence. ἐντελέχεια: motion and yet not only that, but also what is contained in it.
3. ἐνέργεια is πρότερον,160 ontically-ontologically. Guideline. Highest presence, autonomous, constant. In and of itself: i. present (moveable); ii. constant; iii. but not in motion.
4. What properly is ἐνέργεια ον with respect to the whole of Being?
157. Met. Θ 8, 1050b3f.
158. Cf. Met. Λ 9, 1074b26.
159. Met. Ε 1, 1026a22; cf. above, p. 150.
160. See above, n. 157