Throughout the speech, but especially in the previous section 133, Isocrates surveys the problem of the Hellenes’ disunity before the power of the Persian king.
Translation: And, in this regard [καὶ τῷ] on the one hand nothing is more important than [for the Persian king] to spy out the causes of which we never stop fighting among ourselves. . . .
I am reading τῷ as having an implied noun denoting the information Isocrates has just given in the preceding section.
I am reading ἐξ ὧν as “the causes of which”. It might be better Englished as “the reasons why”.
Hi Hugh,
I think τῷ μὲν has to be read as masculine, with reference to the King, just as with εκεινου and αυτω in the next sentence. The contrast is between τῷ μὲν and ημεις δε.
mwh wrote:
I think τῷ μὲν has to be read as masculine, with reference to the King, just as with εκεινου and αυτω in the next sentence. The contrast is between τῷ μὲν and ημεις δε.
Very helpful session! I needed restudy of this use of the article as a kind of demonstrative. It had slipped my mind, which is why in desperation I wrote as I did in my OP. Almost every day I discover that I’ve forgotten something that I must surely have studied when I went through Mastronarde.
Dunno about τω μεν being masculine, I feel it’s neuter = “from this fact”. If it referred to a person wouldn’t it require a preposition rather than just a dative? But then I’ve never read any Isocrates. Understand ταυτα in front of ἐξ ὡν = “investigate those things as a result of which…”
No, τω μεν (“for him [on the one hand]”) is contrasted with ημεις δε “while we [on the other] ….” and it doesn’t need a preposition. And neuter wouldn’t make sense here.