Aristotle is regarded as one of the greatest philosophers in history, in which his influence could be felt to this day. Aristotle wrote on various subjects, such as chemistry, physics, biology, logic, and ethics. And in Aristotle’s most popular work, Nichomachean Ethics, he delves in achieving pathway to achieve virtue and moral character. Following this, Aristotle concentrates of friendship and its importance in one’s life as a very essential virtue.
In this book, Aristotle describes friendship as reciprocated goodwill, mainly a relationship between two people in which love and goodwill is shared. But the question of perfect friendship here resides in the source for that goodwill, in which Aristotle describes three general types of friendship, that of utility, that of pleasure, and that of good or virtue.
Aristotle further explains that each one of these friendships to be an actual friendship, should have the following attributes: “To be friends therefore, men must feel goodwill for each other, that is, wish each other’s good, and be aware of each other’s goodwill, and the cause of their goodwill must be one of the lovable qualities mentioned above.”
It must be noted here that Aristotle uses the term philia to describe this relationship, and some of its meaning is lost when we translated as friendship since the Greeks also used this word to describe the relationship between family members, and not just voluntary relationships.
Aristotle finds that the perfect friendship is the one of virtue and good, in which friends love each other for their own sake, and they wish good things for each other. This kind of friendship, is only possible between “good people similar in virtue”, since only virtuous people are capable of loving another person for that person’s own sake.
This leaves us with the two remaining types of friendships, the ones revolve around utility and pleasure. These are imperfect friendships, where two friends like each other because they find each other pleasant or useful, or both. If two people are friends because they happen to be in the same class, and help each other study and prepare for exams, this would be a friendship of utility. Other friends might like each other because they like hanging out with each other, or because they make each other laugh, this would be a friendship of pleasure.
Aristotle describes the friendship of utility as shallow, easily dissolved, and for the old. The reason he described it as such is because it’s easily broken, since it’s based on something fragile, and that can change at any given moment. He states, “thus friends whose affection is based on utility do not love each other in themselves, but in so far as some benefit accrues to them from each other.” So, in a friendship of utility, “men love their friend for their own good… and not as being the person loved, but as useful or agreeable.” Aristotle then further explains that, “friendships of Utility seem to occur most frequently between the old, as in old age men do not pursue pleasure but profit; and between those persons in the prime of life and young people whose object in life is gain. Friends of this kind do not indeed frequent each other’s company much, for in some cases they are not even pleasing to each other, and therefore have no use for friendly intercourse unless they are mutually profitable; since their pleasure in each other goes no further than their expectations of advantage.”
On the other hand, Aristotle describes the friendship of pleasure as a friendship for the young, in which he states that, “With the young on the other hand the motive of friendship appears to be pleasure, since the young guide their lives by emotion, and for the most part pursue what is pleasant to themselves, and the object of the moment. And the things that please them change as their age alters; hence they both form friendships and drop them quickly, since their affections alter with what gives them pleasure, and the tastes of youth change quickly. Also the young are prone to fall in love, as love is chiefly guided by emotion, and grounded on pleasure; hence they form attachments quickly and give them up quickly, often changing before the day is out. The young do desire to pass their time in their friend’s company, for that is how they get the enjoyment of their friendship.”
Now to focus on the highest form of friendship, that of good and virtue. Aristotle explains here that, “The perfect form of friendship is that between the good, and those who resemble each other in virtue. For these friends wish each alike the other’s good in respect of their goodness, and they are good in themselves; but it is those who wish the good of their friends for their friends’ sake who are friends in the fullest sense, since they love each other for themselves and not accidentally. Hence the friendship of these lasts as long as they continue to be good; and virtue is a permanent quality. And each is good relatively to his friend as well as absolutely, since the good are both good absolutely and profitable to each other. And each is pleasant in both ways also, since good men are pleasant both absolutely and to each other; for everyone is pleased by his own actions, and therefore by actions that resemble his own, and the actions of all good men are the same or similar.”
True friendships are harder to find and take a lot more time to build than the other two, but it’s a lot more powerful and enduring, and one of the highest forms of virtue. Aristotle observes here that, “Such friendships are of course rare, because such men are few. Moreover they require time and intimacy… people who enter into friendly relations quickly have the wish to be friends, but cannot really be friends without being worthy of friendship, and also knowing each other to be so; the wish to be friends is a quick growth, but friendship is not.”
All of this does not mean the other types of friendships are bad, especially that in order to love someone for who he is, one needs to know it first, discover it, and this usually happens after a useful or pleasant friendship, in which after a long period of time, friends eventually love each other for who they are. And this also means a true and perfect friendship can have have a mutual relationship of utility and pleasure, but these attributes would not be the reasons for that friendship.
Aristotle surely held a very high view of friendship, he valued it so much that he believed it even supersedes justice and honor in importance. He found friendship to be a beautiful thing, an essential and beautiful thing; a glue that holds cities and societies together.
In this fast-paced age, in which many things have lost its value, people are in need of true friendships, someone beautiful and deep in hard times.
I leave you with an expert from Massimo Pigliucci’s ‘Answers for Aristotle’:
"Aristotle’s opinion was that friends hold a mirror up to each other; through that mirror they can see each other in ways that would not otherwise be accessible to them, and it is this (reciprocal) mirroring that helps them improve themselves as persons. Friends, then, share a similar concept of eudaimonia [Greek for “having a good demon,” often translated as “happiness”] and help each other achieve it. So it is not just that friends are instrumentally good because they enrich our lives, but that they are an integral part of what it means to live the good life, according to Aristotle and other ancient Greek philosophers (like Epicurus). Of course, another reason to value the idea of friendship is its social dimension. In the words of philosopher Elizabeth Telfer, friendship provides “a degree and kind of consideration for others’ welfare which cannot exist outside."
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