Plotinus
204/5-270 CE · Greek · Metaphysics, Late Antique Platonism, Mysticism, Philosophical Anthropology
Our concern is not merely to be sinless but to be God.
Born in Roman Egypt around 205 CE, Plotinus spent eleven years under Ammonius Saccas in Alexandria, then joined a military expedition to Persia hoping to encounter Eastern wisdom — the campaign collapsed when the emperor was murdered. He settled in Rome, taught in a salon attracting senators and imperial courtiers, and published nothing until his fifties, when Porphyry arranged his lectures into six groups of nine — the Enneads.
Topics Plotinus addresses
- the One
- the three hypostases
- Intellect (Nous)
- Soul (Psyche)
- procession (proodos)
- reversion (epistrophê)
- undiminished giving
- the Good beyond being
- emanation
- mystical union (henôsis)
- the flight of the alone to the Alone
- contemplation (theoria)
- two activities of substance
- ineffability
- negative theology
- the undescended soul
- matter as evil
- matter as non-being
- intelligible matter
- intellect as identity of being and thinking
- World Soul
- eternity and time
- Forms of individuals
- intelligible beauty
Questions to put to Plotinus
The One and the Good Beyond Being
- What do you mean when you say the One is beyond being?
- Why can't we speak directly about the One?
- How can we approach something that's beyond intellect and language?
- What's the difference between the One and Intellect?
- Have you yourself experienced union with the One?
Procession and the Three Hypostases
- How does everything flow from the One without depleting it?
- What is Intellect, and how does it arise from the One?
- What's the difference between Intellect and Soul?
- How does contemplation generate the next level of reality?
- Why are there exactly three hypostases and not more or fewer?
The Soul's Descent and the Undescended Part
- What do you mean when you say part of my soul never descended?
- If part of my soul is still in Intellect, why am I not aware of it?
- Why did the soul descend into a body in the first place?
- Is the descent into body voluntary or necessary?
- Which part of me is the real me — the embodied self or the higher soul?
Matter, Evil, and the Visible World
- How can you call matter evil itself and still say the cosmos is good?
- What do you mean when you call the body a corpse adorned?
- If matter is evil, why did the One allow it to exist?
- How do you respond to the Gnostics who say the world is a prison?
- Is there beauty in the sensible world or is it all illusion?
The Ascent to God and Mystical Union
- What does it mean that our concern is not to be free of sin but to be god?
- How do the cathartic virtues prepare the soul for ascent?
- Should I detach from family affection and pity in the process of purification?
- What happens in the flight of the alone to the Alone?
- What's the difference between contemplating Intellect and union with the One?
Converse with Plotinus on Simposeum. Replies are grounded in Plotinus's own writing, cited to the page.