6474 NEOPLATONISM

and New York, 2002. The Norwegian theologian Salomon- identify with one’s higher, true self, there is opportunity for
sen focuses on the theology, feminist ideals, and ritual life of a mystical union. Plotinus had frequent mystical experiences
one important Neopagan organization. (IV.8.1). Neoplatonists separated their pagan philosophy
Starhawk. The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of from pagan worship, allowing intellectual Christians to be
the Great Goddess. San Francisco, 1979. A description of the philosophically educated and yet remain orthodox believers.
basic beliefs and practices of a feminist version of Witchcraft Nevertheless, one cannot assume that all borrowing between
by the Neopagan leader and social activist Starhawk. One of Christians and pagans came from the Christian side. Ploti-
the first Neopagan books to achieve widespread popularity nus’s teacher, Ammonius, was reputed to have once been a
and to function as a kind of sacred text for many women and
Christian. In the third century CE the goal of philosophy be-
men discovering Neopaganism for the first time.
came more explicitly religious, but according to human rea-
Zell, Morning Glory. “Pan.” Green Egg 27 (1994): 12–13. An son. The philosopher’s role was to guide his followers, with-
essay by one of the leaders of the Neopagan organization the out using religious myths and oracles as premises, to the
Church of All Worlds that explores the deep connection
experience of the divine. Christians thereby found in Neo-
Neopagans feel between divinity and nature.
platonism a purer notion of God than was available in Classi-
SARAH M. PIKE (2005) cal Greek religion.
The Enneads present an ordered structure of living reali-
ty eternally proceeding from the One and descending in con-
NEOPLATONISM is the Platonic philosophy inter- tinuous stages from the Divine Intellect, with its living
preted by Plotinus (205–270 CE), systematized in his Enne- forms, intelligences, through Soul, ruling through World
ads and further developed by others through the sixth centu- Soul to the forms of bodies, made from formless matter. No
ry. From the first century BCE, the “divine Plato” had been dualism here.
revived as the supreme religious and theological guide by DEVELOPMENT OF NEOPLATONIC THEORIES. Post-Plotinian
pagan Middle Platonists; simultaneously Neo-Pythagorean Neoplatonism developed in four stages, largely through
philosophers were active. Plotinus was receptive to both modifying the Plotinian structure.
these theistic and apophatic (negative) schools. He liked the 1. The first stage is the teaching of the disciples, Porphyry,
Middle Platonist teaching of the transcendence of a Supreme Amelius, and Eustochius. Most influential was Porphy-
Mind and Being called theos (God) possessing the Platonic ry (c. 234–c. 305), who taught a more monistic philoso-
Forms as divine Ideas. These Ideas became the basis for phy than that of Plotinus by conflating the hypostases
kataphatic (positive) theology and a doctrine of divine provi- into a unity of being, life, intelligence, thus departing
dence for a later period, not for Plotinus. from Plotinian subordinationism.
Realizing that unity must always precede plurality, how- 2. The fourth-century Syrian and Pergamene schools were
ever, Plotinus taught that the First Principle of reality, the influenced by the teaching of Iamblichus (d. 326) that
One, or Good, transcends being and thought and is ineffa- theurgy (ritual magic), invoking demons rather than
ble, indefinable, thereby contradicting Middle Platonism. philosophizing, was the way to God. Iamblichus and
This theory, original with Plotinus, was repeated by his followers rejected Plotinus’s doctrine of the undescend-
pagan successors, especially Iamblichus and Proclus, but not ed part of the soul and stressed a need for divine help
by Porphyry. to reach the Intelligible World. Julian the Apostate
Conflict between Christians and pagan philosophers (332–363) sought to downgrade Christianity when as
began in the second century with an anti-Christian treatise a two-year sole Roman emperor he declared Iam-
of the Platonist Celsus, to which the Christian theologian blichus’s version of Neoplatonism to be the State reli-
Origen responded in the third century; the opposition con- gion.
tinued with Porphyry’s fourth-century treatise Against the 3. During the predominance of the fifth and sixth century
Christians. Yet Origen considered philosophy and Plato as Athenian school, Neoplatonism became the official
natural defenders of some Christian doctrines. By openness teaching of Plato’s Academy, the chief member being
to Greek culture but not to Classical Greek religion, the Proclus (410?–485), who continued pagan worship
Cappadocian fathers who succeeded Origen fruitfully related against imperial policy. For Proclus, theurgy, rather
Hellenism to Christianity, with increased ability to discuss than philosophy, brought salvation to souls. The last
Christianity with educated pagans. head of the Academy when Justinian closed it in 529
The Neoplatonic One, or Good, was the object of reli- was Damascius.
gious aspiration. It was described as transcendent, infinite, 4. The Neoplatonism of the Athenian school was influen-
overflowing goodness and spiritual freedom, and reachable tial over the Alexandrian school (fifth and sixth centu-
through mystical experience. The One pours love (eros) into ries) of commentators on Plato’s and Aristotle’s psychol-
all souls, a love leading each soul, aided by intellectual and ogy and logic. Both schools depended on Iamblichus.
moral effort, to mystical union with their Source. The One The Alexandrians, however, preferred philosophical
is present everywhere, and whenever one turns within to scholarship to theurgy.

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION

EARLY CHRISTIAN THOUGHT. Plotinus and the Christian (Plotinus/Porphyry) into Latin, Augustine became aware of
Origen, who studied under Ammonius (Saccas), influenced the spirituality of human souls and of God, thus freeing him
the Cappadocian fathers—Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of from Manichaean materialism. Some Porphyrian positions
Nazianzus, Gregory of Nyssa—who saw Christianity and its on the divine triad and on the body-soul union impressed
mission as the fulfillment of Classical Greek education Augustine. In the City of God Augustine seems to take Por-
(paideia). Reading the Bible rather than classical Greek litera- phyry’s version of Neoplatonism as the empire’s main pagan
ture, they believed, would mold humankind into the form philosophy. Boethius was familiar with texts of both Vic-
of Christ. Like Neoplatonists, the Eastern Church valued the torinus and of Proclus.
material world as a theophany, or manifestation of the di-
Until Plato’s dialogues Meno and Phaedo were translated
vine.
into Latin in the twelth century, the western medieval world
Proclus influenced the fifth-century thinker known had a Middle Platonic view of Platonism, their awareness of
under the name of the apostle Paul’s first Athenian convert, Platonism coming only from Chalcidius’s fourth-century
Dionysius the Areopagite, as well as Michael Psellus (1018– commentary on the Timaeus, greatly influenced by Numeni-
1078?), who stimulated the eleventh-century Byzantine re- us. An indirect influence of Neoplatonism upon medieval
naissance. At the Council of Florence (1438), called to unite thought came through Augustine, Dionysius the Areopagite,
Eastern and Western churches, George Plethon (1360– and Boethius.
1450), from the Platonic school at Mistra, inspired Cosimo In medieval Jewish thought, Neoplatonism is evident in
de’ Medici to open a Platonic academy in Florence. Its head, the Qabbalah and in the teachings of Shelomoh ibn Gebirol
Marsilio Ficino (1433–1499), translated Platonic dialogues (Avicebron) (1021–1058), who developed Plotinus’s views
and the Enneads into Latin and wrote commentaries to har- on intelligible matter. Maimonides (1135/8–1204) accepted
monize Platonic and Chaldean traditions with Christianity. Neoplatonic negative theology while remaining predomi-
Some scholars consider the Renaissance to have been more nantly Aristotelian.
Neoplatonic than Platonic, with Aristotle also influential.
After the fall of Constantinople (1453), the literary tradition Only in the twelth century also did the West recover the
of the Byzantine East was brought to Italy by Greek scholars. complete Aristotle through translations of the Arabic texts
The Christian humanism of Erasmus is rooted in the theolo- into Latin. But among these texts was the Theology of Aristotle
gy of the Greek fathers. (Enneads) and Liber de causis (Proclus’s), attributed by the
Arabs to Aristotle. In translating Aristotle’s texts, these trans-
ISLAMIC NEOPLATONISM. The Alexandrian School, moving lators would assume a harmony between them and these two
to Antioch in 720 CE and to Baghdad in 900, was active with pseudo-texts. Therefore, in the thirteenth century William
commentaries on Plato and Aristotle. The Arabic interpreta- of Moerbeke translated from the original Greek Aristotle’s
tion of these two thinkers was affected by two works, pur- works. But he also translated Proclus’s Elements of Theology
ported to be by Aristotle but actually based on the writings and his commentaries on the Parmenides and Timaeus. These
of Plotinus and Proclus. The so-called Theology of Aristotle translations enabled Thomas Aquinas to identify the Liber
was mainly composed of extracts of Enneads IV–VI; the Liber de causis as non-Aristotelian. This freed Aristotle from the
de causis, attributed to Aristotle, reproduced parts of Pro- Neoplatonic additions and interpretations of the Muslims.
clus’s Elements of Theology. Accepting the two pseudo works Neoplatonism reached Thomas Aquinas chiefly through Au-
of Aristotle as authentic led the Arabic philosophers to inter- gustine, Dionysius, Boethius, and Proclus. Meister Eckhart
pret Neoplatonically the actual texts of Aristotle. They inter- (c.1260–1327) embraced Neoplatonism, as indicated by his
preted Aristotle’s First Principle as an efficient as well as final distinction between God and the unknowable godhead as
cause of the world. This helped Muslims to harmonize phi- well as by his doctrine of the uncreated element in the soul.
losophy with the QurDān. Later, under the influence of Ibn Also influenced by Neoplatonism and Dionysius were the
Rushd (Averroës), some Muslim philosophers separated phi- other Rhineland mystics, Tauler (c. l300–1361) and Suso
losophy from religion, holding that one could contradict the (1295–1366), as were Nicholas of Cusa and Giordano
other. This is the so-called double-truth theory. Bruno.
NEOPLATONISM IN THE MIDDLE AGES. Marius Victorinus NEOPLATONISM IN MODERN THOUGHT. Neoplatonism
(fourth century) in his work on the Trinity against the Arian may be lurking in the background of Descartes’s philosophy
heresy conflated the Porphyrian triad of Being, Life, Intelli- of consciousness, although Plotinus made room for a sub-
gence into Absolute Being at rest and in motion, expressed conscious and superconscious activity as more significant
infinitively as to einai (Esse) (To Be), a triad discoverable in than ordinary consciousness. Neoplatonism is present in the
the Sentences of Porphyry and in the anonymous Commen- Cambridge Platonists, Henry More (1614–1687) and Ralph
tary on the Parmenides, considered by Pierre Hadot (Porphyre Cudworth (1617–1688), as well as in Berkeley’s Siris. It is
et Victorinus, 1968) to be authored by Porphyry. Both the detectable in Spenser, Coleridge, Blake, and Yeats. It is evi-
Sentences and the Parmenides Commentary were influenced dent in Spinoza’s monism and in Leibniz’s monadism. In the
by the Chaldaean Oracles as well as by Middle Platonism. nineteenth century Schelling learned from Plotinus, and
Through Victorinus’s translation of some Neoplatonic works Hegel from Proclus. In the twentieth century Bergson at-

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION

tempted the reconciliation of Plotinus’s philosophy of soul Harris, R. Baine, ed. The Significance of Neoplatonism. Albany,
with modern science. N.Y., 1976.
Only in the nineteenth century was Plato recognized for Harris, R. Baine, ed. Neoplatonism and Indian Thought. Albany,
N.Y., 1982.
his authentic thought and clearly distinguished from Ploti-
nus and his followers who were henceforth called Neoplato- Lloyd, A. C. The Anatomy of Neoplatonism. Oxford, 1990.
nists. Neoplatonism was the first philosophical theology O’Meara, Dominic J., ed. Neoplatonism and Christian Thought.
based on religious experience. Although it gave mixed mes- Norfolk, Va., 1981.
sages regarding the value of the body and the material world, Smith, A. Porphyry’s Place in the Neoplatonic Tradition. The
its cosmic religion—the veneration of star-gods—entailed Hague, 1974.
respect for the sensible world. Neoplatonism benefited reli- Victorinus, Marius. Theological Treatises on the Trinity. Translated
gion by adocating interiority, negative theology, and both by M. T. Clark. Washington, D.C., 1984.
God’s transcendence and immanence as ground for mystical
Wallis, Richard T. Neoplatonism. London, 1972. Discusses the in-
experience. Christians and Jews freely borrowed Neoplatonic terrelationships of all the Neoplatonic schools of thought.
principles to express revealed truths, those accessible to rea-
Wallis, Richard T., and J. Bregman, eds. Neoplatonism and Gnosti-
son. This made possible dialogue with educated nonbeliev-
cism. Albany, N.Y., 1992.
ers. The presence of an intellectual Greek culture in the em-
pire gave to Christian teaching, expressed in contemporary Whittaker, Thomas. The Neo-Platonists: A Study in the History of
Hellenism, 4th ed. Hildesheim, 1928, 1968. Before Wallis’s
philosophical concepts, some universality. Christians saw
book, this was the only survey of Neoplatonism.
human wisdom as God’s own natural revelation before di-
vine Revelation through the Law and the prophets and the MARY T. CLARK (1987 AND 2005)
teachings of Christ.
Christianity was not Hellenized, but with divine Revela-
tion guiding the choice of Greek concepts, Christianity, at NERGAL was a Mesopotamian god of the underworld.
first a Jewish sect, became a world religion. Christians re- Nergal (properly, Nerigal) is a phonetic rendering of the Su-
spected the Greek classical tradition, as did the Romans. merian Enirigal(a) (“lord of the big city [i.e., the under-
Through the Christian classicists of the fourth century, such world]”). Nergal was also called Meslamtaea (“one who
as Augustine in the West and the Cappadocians in the East, comes out of the Meslam [temple]”). His consort was Eresh-
classical culture and literature survived and was made avail- kigal (“queen of the big place [i.e., the underworld]”). How
able to the future. Philosophy was enriched by Neoplatonic he came to be king of the underworld is described in the Ak-
reasoning, but philosophy as a human activity was without kadian myth Nergal and Ereshkigal. His cultic center was
saving power. Neither does it even claim to give positive Cuthah, in central Babylonia, where his consort was Laz
knowledge of an ineffable God. But since “faith seeks under- (Akk., la asu, “no exit [i.e., the underworld]”), also called
standing,” philosophy, and especially Neoplatonic philoso- Mamma, Mammi, and Mammitum. Because of the com-
phy, contributes greatly to that understanding. plete identity of Nergal with Cuthah, that city’s name be-
came synonymous with the underworld.
SEE ALSO Plotinus.
The myth of Nergal and Ereshkigal is preserved in three
versions, the first coming from Tell El-Amarna, with two
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Armstrong, A. Hilary, ed. The Cambridge History of Later Greek later versions from Sultantepe and Uruk. The story of how
and Early Medieval Philosophy. Cambridge, U.K., 1957, Nergal became the husband of Ereshkigal begins with the de-
1970. cision of the heavenly gods to hold a banquet and to send
Armstrong, A. Hilary, and Robert A. Markus. Christian Faith and their messenger Kaka to the underworld, so that Ereshkigal
Greek Philosophy. London, 1960. The tension and interplay (for whom it is impossible to go up to heaven, just as it is
of revealed doctrine and philosophical ideas, a dialogue that impossible for the heavenly gods to descend to the under-
continues. world) can receive her due portion of the banquet foods.
Blumenthal, Henry J., and Robert A. Markus, eds. Neoplatonism Kaka makes the journey, presents himself to the gatekeeper,
and Early Christian Thought: Essays in Honor of A. H. Arm- and asks him to open the gate. The latter welcomes him, lets
strong. London, 1981. Emphasis on Plotinus’s dialogue with him pass through the seven gates of the underworld, and
his contemporaries, the Neoplatonic background of Augus- takes him to see Ereshkigal. Kaka bows before the queen of
tine, and the encounter between later Neoplatonism and the the underworld and passes on the message he has been given.
Christian tradition.
Ereshkigal is given greetings from the heavenly gods,
Dodds, E. R. Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety. Cam- and Kaka tells her that the gods of the heavenly pantheon
bridge, U.K., 1965. are well. After these conventional greetings the queen of the
Gersh, S. Middle Platonism and Neoplatonism: The Latin Tradi- underworld appoints Namtar to go to heaven to retrieve her
tion. 2 vols. Notre Dame, Ind., 1986. portion of the food. After a lacuna in the text, the god Ea
Hadot, Pierre. Porphyre et Victorinus. Paris, 1970. severely chastises Nergal for being disrespectful to the mes-

ENCYCLOPEDIA OF RELIGION, SECOND EDITION