I appreciate your response, Fooloso4 - and that of others in this thread.
I will be taking time out for a bit. To follow up on this and other helpful comments.
Perhaps I'll circle back to Aristotle and his 'first mover'...

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The pros and cons of using secondary literature have been discussed elsewhere. In other group discussions. It almost always comes up with some suggestion, or 'suspicion' that it is 'cheating' your own reading of the original text. I argue that if one is using them effectively and with a critical eye, then the benefits can outweigh any potential swaying. Indeed, reading different perspectives might counteract one's own bias or pre-judging. — Amity

I never thought about relying upon secondary choices as "cheating" or encouraging poor judgment. The tradition of reading I was instructed within recognized that translations and explanations of terms are "secondary" help to being able to encounter the writing "as is" as much as possible. I need the help because I did not get to go to the party the Symposium describes.

The emphasis upon having as little as possible stand between you and a writer is for the sake of having a certain kind of experience. The writer writes to incite a response and the reader accepts those conditions for a little while. This experience inevitably leads to the sensation that different people are reading different texts.

That is where the dialectic starts.

Socrates said that he possessed human wisdom, knowing that he does not know. He contrasts this with divine wisdom, knowledge of the things Socrates desires to know.

Hegel's claim is that the pursuit has successfully come to its end. Philosophy as the pursuit of wisdom finds its realization in obtaining what it loves,desires, and pursues. It has become science.

Nietzsche's Dionysus is the god who philosophizes, that is, one who seeks but does not possess wisdom. It is not only human beings who are not wise, the gods are not wise either. Dionysus is a skeptic, knowing that he does not know.

Can Hegel be a lover of wisdom if he believes he possesses wisdom, or is he unwise like those Socrates criticizes for not knowing their own ignorance? But surely Hegel is not the first philosopher to claim to know. Perhaps it would be better to distinguish between philosophers who claim to know and those who know they do not know. I will leave open the question of whether anyone does have knowledge of the whole or if it is even possible.


Regarding the question of secondary sources: they have their uses and abuses. Commentary is a time honored tradition. I have learned far more from secondary sources than I ever could have learned if I only read primary sources. The problem arises when instead of using secondary sources as an aid to reading a philosopher they are relied upon to the exclusion of the primary material.