gr. πρόνοια, prónoia: providência. Latim: Providentia. Primeiro sentido: previdência, previsão. Depois, essa palavra ganha o sentido de Providência divina, que prevê nossas ações e lhes dá socorro. [Gobry]
Em Plotino, se estende a todo o universo, salvo os “mínimos detalhes” (smikrotata), resíduo de contingências de limites mal definidos. [Gandillac]
prónoia: premeditação, providência. Nas duas obras mais longas do mestre inconteste de Plotino, onde um lugar central é dado à organização da cidade terrestre, assim como enfatizando o mito como pedagogia, Platão esperava, para a boa administração de nossas cidades, menos da prudência humana que da providência divina. [Maurice de Gandillac]
III. 2. 9 (Armstrong Selection and Translation from the Enneads)
[Our own part in the universal order; we remain free and responsible, and the wicked cannot expect gods or good men to help them escape the consequences of their actions.]Providence cannot exist in such a way as to make us nothing. If everything was Providence and nothing but Providence, then Providence would not exist; for what would It have to provide for? There would be nothing but the Divine. The Divine exists as things are, and comes forth to something other than Itself, not to destroy that other, but to preside over it. With man, for instance, It sees to it that he is man, that is, that he lives by the law of Providence, which means doing everything that that law says. And it says that those who become good shall have a good life, now, and laid up in store for them hereafter as well, and the wicked the opposite. It is not lawful for those who have become wicked to demand others to be their saviours and to sacrifice themselves in answer to their prayers; or to require gods to direct their affairs in detail, laying aside their own life, or good men, who live another life better than human rule, to become their rulers.
Plato Laws 10, 903B-905B maintains that God’s concern is for the whole rather than for the part. As for the Stoics, although their God knows all things, his providence too is more concerned with the whole than with the part, and moreover (Cicero ND 2.167; Plutarch St. Rep. 1051C) can neglect small details.
Alexander, as an Aristotelian, restricts providence still further. Like some modern environmentalists, his providence is concerned with the species, not with the individual.
Providence and stellar motion preserve not individuals as such in our part of the world, but only enough individuals to preserve the species. The heavens are eternal and need no providence. [SorabjiPC2:79]
PRÓNOIA (préméditation, providence) [grec]
subs. fém.
Terme formé à partir de prô- (avant) et noein (penser). Traduction usuelle : préméditation, providence. La pronoia, qui signifie littéralement la préméditation et qui aura des usages techniques dans le vocabulaire juridique, est associée très anciennement au thème de la Providence. Le terme en vient à signifier la prévision, la direction et le souci du monde et renvoie dès l’origine à l’existence d’un Etre suprême intelligent (nous, Platon, Lois, X, 899 d). Chez Aristote, la pronoia est rapprochée du telos à l’œuvre dans toute la nature et ultimement rapportée à la causalité du Premier Moteur immobile. Chez les stoïciens, le Logos immanent au monde gouverne toutes choses par l’intellect de la providence (SVF, I, 176). Déjà Chrysippe avait écrit un traité sur la pronoia. Cette providence n’est pas personnelle et elle est couramment identifiée au Destin, à l’heimarmene (Zénon, SVF, I, 44 et II, 264). Epictète en fera un thème important de ses Entretiens (I, 16).
La philosophie grecque s’est toujours préoccupée des modes d’exercice de la providence. Chez Plotin (Επη., IV, 8,2 et IV, 3,13), mais aussi chez Philon (De Fuga, 101) et dans le traité pseudo-aristotélicien De Mundo (6,13), c’est par l’activité de puissances intermédiaires que la Providence effectue son œuvre, au fur et à mesure que l’Etre suprême gagne en transcendance. Plus encore que le Premier Moteur immobile d’Aristote, l’Un de Plotin (Enn., VI, 8,17) est au-delà du souci (epimeleia) et de la providence. La théologie platonicienne s’opposait fortement à l’immanentisme stoïcien (Plotin, Enn., II, 2 et 3 ; Proclus, Tria Opuscula). Proclus notamment a beaucoup discuté cette question (Elém. théol., p. 100-122) et il maintenait que la providence est compatible avec la transcendance divine. (G. Leroux) [NP]