Download or read book Philosophic Silence and the One in Plotinus written by Nicholas Banner and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-03-29 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Plotinus, the greatest philosopher of Late Antiquity, discusses at length a first principle of reality - the One - which, he tells us, cannot be expressed in words or grasped in thought. How and why, then, does Plotinus write about it at all? This book explores this act of writing the unwritable. Seeking to explain what seems to be an insoluble paradox in the very practice of late Platonist writing, it examines not only the philosophical concerns involved, but the cultural and rhetorical aspects of the question. The discussion outlines an ancient practice of ‛philosophical silence' which determined the themes and tropes of public secrecy appropriate to Late Platonist philosophy. Through philosophic silence, public secrecy and silence flow into one another, and the unsaid space of the text becomes an initiatory secret. Understanding this mode of discourse allows us to resolve many apparent contradictions in Plotinus' thought.

Download or read book Philosophic Silence and the One in Plotinus written by Nicholas Banner and published by . This book was released on 2018 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores a central paradox in Plotinus' work: Plotinus writes about the One, which he tells us is ineffable.

Download or read book The Enneads written by Plotinus and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2005-06-30 with total page 688 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Regarded as the founder of Neo-Platonism, Plotinus (AD 204-70) was the last great philosopher of antiquity, producing 0works that proved in many ways a precursor to Renaissance thought. Plotinus was convinced of the existence of a state of supreme perfection and argued powerfully that it was necessary to guide the human soul towards this state. Here he outlines his compelling belief in three increasingly perfect levels of existence - the Soul, the Intellect, and the One - and explains his conviction that humanity must strive to draw the soul towards spiritual transcendence. A fusion of Platonism, mystic passion and Aristotelian thought, The Enneads offers a highly original synthesis of early philosophical and religious beliefs, which powerfully influenced later Christian and Islamic theology.

Download or read book The Essential Plotinus written by Plotinus and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 1964-01-01 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'The Essential Plotinus is a lifesaver. For many years my students in Greek and Roman Religion have depended on it to understand the transition from antiquity to the Middle Ages. The translation is crisp and clear, and the excerpts are just right for an introduction to Plotionus's many-layered view of the world and humankind's place in it' - F. E. Romer, University of Arizona

Download or read book Plotinus written by Lloyd P. Gerson and published by Psychology Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This major study brings Plotinus into the contemporary philosophical discussion. Lloyd P. Gerson gives a detailed account of Plotinus' arguments in the major philosophical areas of metaphysics, epistemology, psychology, and ethics. He examines the work of Plotinus both in its historical context and in its sustained systematic rigour.

Download or read book Plotinus written by Eyjólfur K. Emilsson and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2017-02-24 with total page 421 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Plotinus (AD 205-270) was the founder of Neoplatonism, whose thought has had a profound influence on medieval philosophy, and on Western philosophy more broadly. In this engaging book, Eyjólfur K. Emilsson introduces and explains the full spectrum of Plotinus' philosophy for those coming to his work for the first time.Beginning with a chapter-length overview of Plotinus' life and works which also assesses the Platonic, Aristotelian and Stoic traditions that influenced him. Emilsson goes on to address key topics including: Plotinus' originalitythe status of souls; Plotinus' languagethe notion of the One or the Good; Intellect, including Plotinus' holism; the physical world; the soul and the body, including emotions and the self; Plotinus' ethics; Plotinus' influence and legacy.Including a chronology, glossary of terms and suggestions for further reading, Plotinus is an ideal introduction to this major figure in Western philosophy, and is essential reading for students of ancient philosophy and classics.

Download or read book Plotinus Self and the World written by Raoul Mortley and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2013-12-19 with total page 163 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the idea of the invention of the individual subjective self by Plotinus and its impact on the Christian tradition, asking about the self in its relationships - the self in love, in ignorance, in forgetfulness, in possession - and about the self and its own physical image.

Download or read book PLOTINUS Ennead VI 4 VI 5 written by Eyjolfur Strange Emilsson, Steven and published by Parmenides Publishing. This book was released on 2015-01-14 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ennead VI.4-5, originally written as a single treatise, contains Plotinus' most general and sustained exposition of the relationship between the intelligible and the sensible realms, addressing and coalescing two central issues in Platonism: the nature of the soul-body relationship and the nature of participation. Its main question is, How can soul animate bodies without sharing their extension? The treatise seems to have had considerable impact: it is much reflected in Porphyry's important work, Sententiae, and the doctrine of reception according to the capacity of the recipient, for which this treatise is the main source, resonated in medieval thinkers.

Download or read book The Enneads of Plotinus Volume 1 written by Paul Kalligas and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2014-10-12 with total page 729 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The first volume in a landmark commentary on an important and influential work of ancient philosophy This is the first volume of a groundbreaking commentary on one of the most important works of ancient philosophy, the Enneads of Plotinus—a text that formed the basis of Neoplatonism and had a deep influence on early Christian thought and medieval and Renaissance philosophy. This volume covers the first three of the six Enneads, as well as Porphyry's Life of Plotinus, a document in which Plotinus’s student—the collector and arranger of the Enneads—introduces the philosopher and his work. A landmark contribution to modern Plotinus scholarship, Paul Kalligas’s commentary is the most detailed and extensive ever written for the whole of the Enneads. For each of the treatises in the first three Enneads, Kalligas provides a brief introduction that presents the philosophical background against which Plotinus’s contribution can be assessed; a synopsis giving the main lines and the articulation of the argument; and a running commentary placing Plotinus’s thought in its intellectual context and making evident the systematic association of its various parts with each other.

Download or read book Plotinus written by Stephen R. L. Clark and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2018-02-09 with total page 367 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Plotinus, the Roman philosopher (c. 204-270 CE) who is widely regarded as the founder of Neoplatonism, was also the creator of numerous myths, images, and metaphors, which have frequently been dismissed by modern scholars as merely ornamental. In this book, distinguished philosopher Stephen R. L. Clark shows that they form a vital set of spiritual exercises by which individuals can achieve one of Plotinus's most important goals: self-transformation through contemplation. Clark examines a variety of Plotinus's myths and metaphors within the cultural and philosophical context of his time, asking probing questions about their contemplative effects. Through rich images and structures, Clark casts Plotinus as a philosopher deeply concerned with philosophy as a way of life." -- Résumé de l'éditeur.

Download or read book Plotinus on Consciousness written by D. M. Hutchinson and published by . This book was released on 2018-04-26 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Examines the first theory of consciousness in Western philosophy, dispelling the dogma that consciousness studies begins with Descartes.

Download or read book Plotinus on Intellect written by Eyjólfur Kjalar Emilsson and published by Oxford University Press on Demand. This book was released on 2007-02-15 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Plotinus (205-269 AD) is considered the founder of Neoplatonism, the dominant philosophical movement of late antiquity, and a rich seam of current scholarly interest. Whilst Plotinus' influence on the subsequent philosophical tradition was enormous, his ideas can also be seen as the culmination of some implicit trends in the Greek tradition from Parmenides, Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics.Emilsson's in-depth study focuses on Plotinus' notion of Intellect, which comes second in his hierarchical model of reality, after the One, unknowable first cause of everything. As opposed to ordinary human discursive thinking, Intellect's thought is all-at-once, timeless, truthful and a direct intuition into 'things themselves'; it is presumably not even propositional. Emilsson discusses and explains this strong notion of non-discursive thought and explores Plotinus' insistence that this mustbe the primary form of thought.Plotinus' doctrine of Intellect raises a host of questions that Emilsson addresses. First, Intellect's thought is described as an attempt to grasp the One and at the same time as self-thought. How are these two claims related? How are they compatible? What lies in Plotinus' insistence that Intellect's thought is a thought of itself? Second, Plotinus gives two minimum requirements of thought: that it must involve a distinction between thinker and object of thought, and that the object itselfmust be varied. How are these two pluralist claims related? Third, what is the relation between Intellect as a thinker and Intellect as an object of thought? Plotinus' position here seems to amount to a form of idealism, and this is explored.

Download or read book Plotinus Enneads IV written by Plotinus and published by . This book was released on 1984 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: PLOTINUS (A.D. 204/5-270), possibly of Roman descent, but certainly a Greek in education and environment, was the first and greatest of Neoplatonic philosophers. Practically nothing is known of his early life, but at the age of 28 he came to Alexandria, and studied philosophy with Ammonius 'Saccas' for 11 years. Wishing to learn the philosophy of the Persians and Indians he joined the expedition of Gordian III against the Persians in 243, not without subsequent danger. Aged 40 he came to Rome and taught philosophy there till shortly before his death. In 253 he began to write and continued to do so till the last year of his life. His writings were edited by his disciple Porphyry, who published them many years after his master's death in six sets of nine treatises each (the Enneads). He regarded Plato as his master, and his own philosophy is a profoundly original development of the Platonism of the first two centuries of the Christian era and the closely related thought of the Neophthagoreans, with some influences from Aristotle and his followers and the Stoics, whose writings he knew well but used critically. There is no real trace of Oriental influence on his thought, and he was passionately opposed to Gnosticism. He is a unique combination of mystic and Hellenic rationalist. He was deeply respected by many members of the Roman aristocracy and a personal friend of the Emperor Gallienus and his wife. He devoted much of his time to the care of orphan children to whom he had been appointed guardian. But before his death his circle of friends had broken up, and he died alone except for his faithful friend and doctor Eustochius. His thought dominated later Greek philosophy and influenced both Christians and Moslems, and is still alive today because of its union of rationality and intense religious experience.

Download or read book Plotinus Or the Simplicity of Vision written by Pierre Hadot and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1998-04-28 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Since its original publication in France in 1963, Pierre Hadot's lively philosophical portrait of Plotinus remains the preeminent introduction to the man and his thought. Michael Chase's lucid translation—complete with a useful chronology and analytical bibliography—at last makes this book available to the English-speaking world. Hadot carefully examines Plotinus's views on the self, existence, love, virtue, gentleness, and solitude. He shows that Plotinus, like other philosophers of his day, believed that Plato and Aristotle had already articulated the essential truths; for him, the purpose of practicing philosophy was not to profess new truths but to engage in spiritual exercises so as to live philosophically. Seen in this light, Plotinus's counsel against fixation on the body and all earthly matters stemmed not from disgust or fear, but rather from his awareness of the negative effect that bodily preoccupation and material concern could have on spiritual exercises.

Download or read book Plotinus on the Appearance of Time and the World of Sense written by Deepa Majumdar and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-22 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Plotinus (c.205-70) was a Neoplatonist philosopher, his work posthumously published by Porphyry and divided into six books, nine tractates each, called the Enneads. In this book Majumdar makes a valuable addition to the literature on his work, especially Ennead III.7(45)11-13 - in particular explaining Plotinus' cosmology using the genus-species model of soul, coordinating the literature on the appearance of time and the cosmos with that on the larger issue of Plotinian "emanation" and examining the role of tolma and the restless nature of soul in this conjoint appearance. This book investigates Plotinian "emanation," its laws of poiesis (contemplative making ) and the roles of nature, matter, logos, (rational formative principle) and contemplation and highlights the subtler details of Plotinus' cosmology by disentangling conceptual issues about the nature of soul and self ("we") and their impact on the process of generation of time and the cosmos.

Download or read book The Plotinus Reader written by Plotinus and published by . This book was released on 2020-07-17 with total page 312 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Plotinus Reader provides a generous selection of translations from the fifty-four treatises that together make up the Enneads of Plotinus, a central work in the history of philosophy. They were prepared by a team of specialists in ancient philosophy and edited by Lloyd P. Gerson. Based on the definitive critical edition of the Greek along with decades of additional textual criticism by many scholars, these translations aim to provide a readable, accurate rendering of Plotinus's often very difficult language. Included are extensive references to Plotinus's sources, scores of cross-references, and an extensive glossary of technical terms.

Download or read book Plotinus on the Good Or the One Enneads VI 9 written by P. A. Meijer and published by Amsterdam Classical Monographs. This book was released on 1992 with total page 412 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Amazing as it may be, to this day few commentaries on the treatises of Plotinus' Enneads are written. The classic ninth treatise (VI,9 in Porphyrius' order), for example, has hardly been studied. This treatise, however, is of vital importance, because it is in this work that for the first time in the Enneads, the One in its superform emerges and Plotinus dwells on the remarkable phenomenon of a 'mystical union' of the soul with the One. A thorough analysis of the argument and its development next to philosophical and philo-logical support will be welcome to any reader of this in-triguing but difficult treatise. These aims are pursued in the main part of Meijer's work, the commentary. The first part of the book, preceding the commentary, examines the philosophical history of the concept of the One and its status in the first eight treatises. This new approach to the problem of the One leads to striking conclusions. It appears that while Plotinus was writing these first eight treatises, the concept of the One developed from that of a Supreme Entity of a Mesoplatonian character, viz. the upper part of the mind, to One of a Superone above mind. This casts an entirely new light on the position of the One in Plotinus and that of the ninth treatise itself. The third part not only examines the mystical union as pictured in the ninth treatise, but also provides a full scale discussion of Plotinus' descriptions of this union in his en-tire work. The degree of unification, viz. the question whether a part of the mystic self remains intact during the unification, is a matter of vigorous scholarly debate. Meijer shows that, in spite of some inconsistencies in his doctrine about the union, one must accept that Plotinus basically considered the union as a complete absorption of the soul into the Supreme Entity.