1. Plato, Timaeus, None (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 195; Wiebe (2021), Fallen Angels in the Theology of St Augustine, 206
| 28c δʼ αἰσθητά, δόξῃ περιληπτὰ μετʼ αἰσθήσεως, γιγνόμενα καὶ γεννητὰ ἐφάνη. τῷ δʼ αὖ γενομένῳ φαμὲν ὑπʼ αἰτίου τινὸς ἀνάγκην εἶναι γενέσθαι. ΤΙ. τὸν μὲν οὖν ποιητὴν καὶ πατέρα τοῦδε τοῦ παντὸς εὑρεῖν τε ἔργον καὶ εὑρόντα εἰς πάντας ἀδύνατον λέγειν· τόδε δʼ οὖν πάλιν ἐπισκεπτέον περὶ αὐτοῦ, πρὸς πότερον τῶν παραδειγμάτων ὁ τεκταινόμενος αὐτὸν'' None | 28c and things sensible, being apprehensible by opinion with the aid of sensation, come into existence, as we saw, and are generated. And that which has come into existence must necessarily, as we say, have come into existence by reason of some Cause. Tim. Now to discover the Maker and Father of this Universe were a task indeed; and having discovered Him, to declare Him unto all men were a thing impossible. However, let us return and inquire further concerning the Cosmos,—after which of the Models did its Architect construct it?'' None |
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2. None, None, nan (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 217; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 95
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3. None, None, nan (5th cent. BCE - 4th cent. BCE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, as a source for the Precepts • Iamblichus, treatment of sources
Found in books: Huffman (2019), A History of Pythagoreanism, 18; Lloyd (1989), The Revolutions of Wisdom: Studies in the Claims and Practice of Ancient Greek Science, 334
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4. Cicero, On The Ends of Good And Evil, 5.87 (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 123; Wardy and Warren (2018), Authors and Authorities in Ancient Philosophy, 164
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5.87 quare hoc hoc atque hoc Non. videndum est, possitne nobis hoc ratio philosophorum dare. pollicetur certe. nisi enim id faceret, cur Plato Aegyptum peragravit, ut a sacerdotibus barbaris numeros et caelestia acciperet? cur post Tarentum ad Archytam? cur ad reliquos Pythagoreos, Echecratem, Timaeum, Arionem, Locros, ut, cum Socratem expressisset, adiungeret Pythagoreorum disciplinam eaque, quae Socrates repudiabat, addisceret? cur ipse Pythagoras et Aegyptum lustravit et Persarum magos adiit? cur tantas regiones barbarorum pedibus obiit, tot maria transmisit? cur haec eadem Democritus? qui —vere falsone, quaerere mittimus quaerere mittimus Se. quereremus BER queremus V quae- rere nolumus C.F.W. Mue. —dicitur oculis se se oculis BE privasse; privavisse R certe, ut quam minime animus a cogitationibus abduceretur, patrimonium neglexit, agros deseruit incultos, quid quaerens aliud nisi vitam beatam? beatam vitam R quam si etiam in rerum cognitione ponebat, tamen ex illa investigatione naturae consequi volebat, bono ut esset animo. id enim ille id enim ille R ideo enim ille BE id ille V id est enim illi summum bonum; eu)qumi/an cet. coni. Mdv. summum bonum eu)qumi/an et saepe a)qambi/an appellat, id est animum terrore liberum.'' None | sup>
5.87 \xa0On this your cousin and\xa0I are agreed. Hence what we have to consider is this, can the systems of the philosophers give us happiness? They certainly profess to do so. Whether it not so, why did Plato travel through Egypt to learn arithmetic and astronomy from barbarian priests? Why did he later visit Archytas at Tarentum, or the other Pythagoreans, Echecrates, Timaeus and Arion, at Locri, intending to append to his picture of Socrates an account of the Pythagorean system and to extend his studies into those branches which Socrates repudiated? Why did Pythagoras himself scour Egypt and visit the Persian magi? why did he travel on foot through those vast barbarian lands and sail across those many seas? Why did Democritus do the same? It is related of Democritus (whether truly or falsely we are not concerned to inquire) that he deprived himself of eyesight; and it is certain that in order that his mind should be distracted as little as possible from reflection, he neglected his paternal estate and left his land uncultivated, engrossed in the search for what else but happiness? Even if he supposed happiness to consist in knowledge, still he designed that his study of natural philosophy should bring him cheerfulness of mind; since that is his conception of the Chief Good, which he entitles euthumia, or often athambia, that is freedom from alarm. <'' None |
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5. None, None, nan (2nd cent. BCE - 1st cent. BCE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 123; Wardy and Warren (2018), Authors and Authorities in Ancient Philosophy, 164
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6. None, None, nan (1st cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 96; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 196
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7. None, None, nan (2nd cent. CE - 2nd cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 350; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 241
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8. Diogenes Laertius, Lives of The Philosophers, 8.19, 8.24-8.35 (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, Pseudo-Iamblichus • Iamblichus, as source for Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus, influence of the Precepts on • Iamblichus, use of singulars and plurals in the VP
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 79, 82, 96, 245; Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 383; Huffman (2019), A History of Pythagoreanism, 52, 565; Pevarello (2013), The Sentences of Sextus and the Origins of Christian Ascetiscism. 155; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 118; Wardy and Warren (2018), Authors and Authorities in Ancient Philosophy, 164; Wolfsdorf (2020), Early Greek Ethics, 700
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8.19 Above all, he forbade as food red mullet and blacktail, and he enjoined abstinence from the hearts of animals and from beans, and sometimes, according to Aristotle, even from paunch and gurnard. Some say that he contented himself with just some honey or a honeycomb or bread, never touching wine in the daytime, and with greens boiled or raw for dainties, and fish but rarely. His robe was white and spotless, his quilts of white wool, for linen had not yet reached those parts.
8.24 to respect all divination, to sing to the lyre and by hymns to show due gratitude to gods and to good men. To abstain from beans because they are flatulent and partake most of the breath of life; and besides, it is better for the stomach if they are not taken, and this again will make our dreams in sleep smooth and untroubled.Alexander in his Successions of Philosophers says that he found in the Pythagorean memoirs the following tenets as well. 8.25 The principle of all things is the monad or unit; arising from this monad the undefined dyad or two serves as material substratum to the monad, which is cause; from the monad and the undefined dyad spring numbers; from numbers, points; from points, lines; from lines, plane figures; from plane figures, solid figures; from solid figures, sensible bodies, the elements of which are four, fire, water, earth and air; these elements interchange and turn into one another completely, and combine to produce a universe animate, intelligent, spherical, with the earth at its centre, the earth itself too being spherical and inhabited round about. There are also antipodes, and our down is their up. 8.26 Light and darkness have equal part in the universe, so have hot and cold, and dry and moist; and of these, if hot preponderates, we have summer; if cold, winter; if dry, spring; if moist, late autumn. If all are in equilibrium, we have the best periods of the year, of which the freshness of spring constitutes the healthy season, and the decay of late autumn the unhealthy. So too, in the day, freshness belongs to the morning, and decay to the evening, which is therefore more unhealthy. The air about the earth is stagt and unwholesome, and all within it is mortal; but the uppermost air is ever-moved and pure and healthy, and all within it is immortal and consequently divine.' "8.27 The sun, the moon, and the other stars are gods; for, in them, there is a preponderance of heat, and heat is the cause of life. The moon is illumined by the sun. Gods and men are akin, inasmuch as man partakes of heat; therefore God takes thought for man. Fate is the cause of things being thus ordered both as a whole and separately. The sun's ray penetrates through the aether, whether cold or dense – the air they call cold aether, and the sea and moisture dense aether – and this ray descends even to the depths and for this reason quickens all things." '8.28 All things live which partake of heat – this is why plants are living things – but all have not soul, which is a detached part of aether, partly the hot and partly the cold, for it partakes of cold aether too. Soul is distinct from life; it is immortal, since that from which it is detached is immortal. Living creatures are reproduced from one another by germination; there is no such thing as spontaneous generation from earth. The germ is a clot of brain containing hot vapour within it; and this, when brought to the womb, throws out, from the brain, ichor, fluid and blood, whence are formed flesh, sinews, bones, hairs, and the whole of the body, while soul and sense come from the vapour within. 8.29 First congealing in about forty days, it receives form and, according to the ratios of harmony, in seven, nine, or at the most ten, months, the mature child is brought forth. It has in it all the relations constituting life, and these, forming a continuous series, keep it together according to the ratios of harmony, each appearing at regulated intervals. Sense generally, and sight in particular, is a certain unusually hot vapour. This is why it is said to see through air and water, because the hot aether is resisted by the cold; for, if the vapour in the eyes had been cold, it would have been dissipated on meeting the air, its like. As it is, in certain lines he calls the eyes the portals of the sun. His conclusion is the same with regard to hearing and the other senses. 8.30 The soul of man, he says, is divided into three parts, intelligence, reason, and passion. Intelligence and passion are possessed by other animals as well, but reason by man alone. The seat of the soul extends from the heart to the brain; the part of it which is in the heart is passion, while the parts located in the brain are reason and intelligence. The senses are distillations from these. Reason is immortal, all else mortal. The soul draws nourishment from the blood; the faculties of the soul are winds, for they as well as the soul are invisible, just as the aether is invisible. 8.31 The veins, arteries, and sinews are the bonds of the soul. But when it is strong and settled down into itself, reasonings and deeds become its bonds. When cast out upon the earth, it wanders in the air like the body. Hermes is the steward of souls, and for that reason is called Hermes the Escorter, Hermes the Keeper of the Gate, and Hermes of the Underworld, since it is he who brings in the souls from their bodies both by land and sea; and the pure are taken into the uppermost region, but the impure are not permitted to approach the pure or each other, but are bound by the Furies in bonds unbreakable. 8.32 The whole air is full of souls which are called genii or heroes; these are they who send men dreams and signs of future disease and health, and not to men alone, but to sheep also and cattle as well; and it is to them that purifications and lustrations, all divination, omens and the like, have reference. The most momentous thing in human life is the art of winning the soul to good or to evil. Blest are the men who acquire a good soul; they can never be at rest, nor ever keep the same course two days together. 8.33 Right has the force of an oath, and that is why Zeus is called the God of Oaths. Virtue is harmony, and so are health and all good and God himself; this is why they say that all things are constructed according to the laws of harmony. The love of friends is just concord and equality. We should not pay equal worship to gods and heroes, but to the gods always, with reverent silence, in white robes, and after purification, to the heroes only from midday onwards. Purification is by cleansing, baptism and lustration, and by keeping clean from all deaths and births and all pollution, and abstaining from meat and flesh of animals that have died, mullets, gurnards, eggs and egg-sprung animals, beans, and the other abstinences prescribed by those who perform rites in the sanctuaries.' "8.34 According to Aristotle in his work On the Pythagoreans, Pythagoras counselled abstinence from beans either because they are like the genitals, or because they are like the gates of Hades . . . as being alone unjointed, or because they are injurious, or because they are like the form of the universe, or because they belong to oligarchy, since they are used in election by lot. He bade his disciples not to pick up fallen crumbs, either in order to accustom them not to eat immoderately, or because connected with a person's death; nay, even, according to Aristophanes, crumbs belong to the heroes, for in his Heroes he says:Nor taste ye of what falls beneath the board !Another of his precepts was not to eat white cocks, as being sacred to the Month and wearing suppliant garb – now supplication ranked with things good – sacred to the Month because they announce the time of day; and again white represents the nature of the good, black the nature of evil. Not to touch such fish as were sacred; for it is not right that gods and men should be allotted the same things, any more than free men and slaves." '8.35 Not to break bread; for once friends used to meet over one loaf, as the barbarians do even to this day; and you should not divide bread which brings them together; some give as the explanation of this that it has reference to the judgement of the dead in Hades, others that bread makes cowards in war, others again that it is from it that the whole world begins.He held that the most beautiful figure is the sphere among solids, and the circle among plane figures. Old age may be compared to everything that is decreasing, while youth is one with increase. Health means retention of the form, disease its destruction. of salt he said it should be brought to table to remind us of what is right; for salt preserves whatever it finds, and it arises from the purest sources, sun and sea.'' None |
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9. Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras, 15.65 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Apollonius (source for Iamblichus) • Iamblichus • Iamblichus as Pythagorean/on Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus on appetite, see appetite • Iamblichus on myth • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Stresses Pythagoras' catharsis by music • Iamblichus, as a source for the Precepts • Iamblichus, expands and rearranges his original • Iamblichus, influence of the Precepts on • Iamblichus, methods of composition in the VP • Iamblichus, political theory of • Iamblichus, structures VP according to virtues • Iamblichus, use of singulars and plurals in the VP
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 3, 10, 57, 79, 80, 82, 85, 143, 158, 161, 245, 246, 381, 407; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 359; Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 6, 122, 123, 125, 126, 204; Gagne (2021), Cosmography and the Idea of Hyperborea in Ancient Greece, 290; Huffman (2019), A History of Pythagoreanism, 9, 15, 16, 26, 27, 52, 62, 133, 282, 283, 324, 343, 463, 465, 469, 515, 520, 525, 602; Niccolai (2023), Christianity, Philosophy, and Roman Power: Constantine, Julian, and the Bishops on Exegesis and Empire. 64; Pevarello (2013), The Sentences of Sextus and the Origins of Christian Ascetiscism. 93, 155, 159; Sorabji (2000), Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation, 297; Wardy and Warren (2018), Authors and Authorities in Ancient Philosophy, 164; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 211, 212
| sup>1 Since it is usual with all men of sound understandings, to call on divinity, when entering on any philosophic discussion, it is certainly much more appropriate to do this in the consideration of that philosophy which justly receives its denomination from the divine Pythagoras. For as it derives its origin from the Gods, it cannot be apprehended without their inspiring aid. To which we may also add, that the beauty and magnitude of it so greatly surpasses human power, that it is impossible to survey it by a sudden view; but then alone can any one gradually collect some portion of this philosophy, when, the Gods being his leaders, he quietly approaches to it. On all these accounts, therefore, having invoked the Gods as our leaders, and converting both ourselves and our discussion to them, we shall acquiesce in whatever they may command us to do. We shall not, however, make any apology for this sect having been neglected for a long time, nor for its being concealed by foreign disciplines, and certain arcane symbols, nor for 2having been obscured by false and spurious writings, nor for many other such-like difficulties by which it has been impeded. For the will of the Gods is sufficient for us, in conjunction with which it is possible to sustain things still more arduous than these. But after the Gods, we shall unite ourselves as to a leader, to the prince and father of this divine philosophy; of whose origin and country we must rise a little higher in our investigation.'
15.65 Conceiving, however, that the first attention which should be paid to men, is that which takes place through the senses; as when some one perceives beautiful figures and forms, or hears beautiful rythms and melodies, he established that to be the first erudition which subsists through music, and also through certain melodies and rythms, from which the remedies of human manners and passions are obtained, together with those harmonies of the powers of the soul which it possessed from the first. He likewise devised medicines calculated to repress and expel the diseases both of bodies and souls. And by Jupiter that which deserves to be mentioned above all these particulars is this, that he arranged and adapted for his disciples what are called apparatus and contrectations, divinely contriving mixtures of certain diatonic, chromatic, and euharmonic melodies, through which he easily transferred and circularly led the passions of the soul into a contrary direction, when they had recently and in an irrational and clandestine manner been formed; such as sorrow, rage, and pity, absurd emulation and fear, all-various desires, angers, and appetites, pride, supineness, and vehemence. For he corrected each of these by the rule of virtue, attempering them through appropriate melodies, as 44through certain salutary medicines. In the evening, likewise, when his disciples were retiring to sleep, he liberated them by these means from diurnal perturbations and tumults, and purified their intellective power from the influxive and effluxive waves of a corporeal nature; rendered their sleep quiet, and their dreams pleasing and prophetic. But when they again rose from their bed, he freed them from nocturnal heaviness, relaxation and torpor, through certain peculiar songs and modulations, produced either by simply striking the lyre, or employing the voice. Pythagoras, however, did not procure for himself a thing of this kind through instruments or the voice, but employing a certain ineffable divinity, and which it is difficult to apprehend, he extended his ears, and fixed his intellect in the sublime symphonies of the world, he alone hearing and understanding, as it appears, the universal harmony and consoce of the spheres, and the stars that are moved through them, and which produce a fuller and more intense melody than any thing effected by mortal sounds.17 This melody also was the result of 45dissimilar and variously differing sounds, celerities, magnitudes, and intervals, arranged with reference 46to each other in a certain most musical ratio, and thus producing a most gentle, and at the same time variously beautiful motion and convolution. Being therefore irrigated as it were with this melody, having the reason of his intellect well arranged through it, and as I may say, exercised, he determined to exhibit certain images of these things to his disciples as much as possible, especially producing an imitation of them through instruments, and through the mere voice alone. For he conceived that by him alone, of all the inhabitants of the earth, the mundane sounds were understood and heard, and this from a natural fountain itself and root. He therefore thought himself worthy to be 47taught, and to learn something about the celestial orbs, and to be assimilated to them by desire and imitation, as being the only one on the earth adapted to this by the conformation of his body, through the dæmoniacal power that inspired him. But he apprehended that other men ought to be satisfied in looking to him, and the gifts he possessed, and in being benefited and corrected through images and examples, in consequence of their inability to comprehend truly the first and genuine archetypes of things. Just, indeed, as to those who are incapable of looking intently at the sun, through the transcendent splendor of his rays, we contrive to exhibit the eclipses of that luminary, either in the profundity of still water, or through melted pitch, or through some darkly-splendid mirror; sparing the imbecility of their eyes, and devising a method of representing a certain repercussive light, though less intense than its archetype, to those who are delighted with a thing of this kind. Empedocles also appears to have obscurely signified this about Pythagoras, and the illustrious and divinely-gifted conformation of his body above that of other men, when he says:“There was a man among them i. e. among the Pythagoreans who was transcendent in knowledge, who possessed the most ample stores of intellectual wealth, and who was in the most eminent degree the adjutor of the works of the wise. For when he extended all the powers of his intellect, he easily 48beheld every thing, as far as to ten or twenty ages of the human race.”For the words transcendent, and he beheld every thing, and the wealth of intellect, and the like, especially exhibit the illustrious nature of the conformation of his mind and body, and its superior accuracy in seeing, and hearing, and in intellectual perception. ' None |
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10. Porphyry, Letter To Marcella, 13, 35 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Catharsis, Iamblichus, alternative to aversion therapy • Iamblichus
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 230; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 35; Pevarello (2013), The Sentences of Sextus and the Origins of Christian Ascetiscism. 93; Sorabji (2000), Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation, 284
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13 Thus can God best be reflected, who cannot be seen by the body, nor yet by an impure soul darkened with vice. For purity is God's beauty, and His light is the life-giving flame of truth. Every vice is deceived by ignorance, and turned astray by wickedness. Wherefore desire and ask of |38 God what is in accordance with His own will and nature, well assured that, inasmuch as a man longs after the body and the things of the body, in so far does he fail to know God, and is blind to the sight of God, even though all men should hold him as a god. Now the wise man, if known by only few, or, if thou wilt, unknown to all, yet is known by God. Let then thy mind follow after God and by likening itself unto Him reflect His image; let the soul follow the mind, and the body be subservient to the soul as far as may be, the pure body serving the pure soul. For if it be defiled by the emotions of the soul, the defilement reacts upon the soul itself." " None |
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11. Porphyry, On Abstinence, 2.36.5, 2.37-2.43, 2.40.1, 2.49, 2.51-2.52 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Catharsis, Iamblichus, alternative to aversion therapy • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, • offerings, bloodless, in Iamblichus • psyche as seat of purity/impurity, in Iamblichus
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 98, 101, 215, 218; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 373; Petrovic and Petrovic (2016), Inner Purity and Pollution in Greek Religion, 75; Piovanelli, Burke, Pettipiece (2015), Rediscovering the Apocryphal Continent : New Perspectives on Early Christian and Late Antique Apocryphal Textsand Traditions. De Gruyter: 2015 398; Russell and Nesselrath (2014), On Prophecy, Dreams and Human Imagination: Synesius, De insomniis, 153; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 171; Sorabji (2000), Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation, 284; Zanker (1996), The Mask of Socrates: The Image of the Intellectual in Antiquity, 308
| 2.36 36.The Pythagoreans, therefore, diligently applying themselves to the study of numbers and lines, sacrificed for the most part from these to the Gods, denominating, indeed, a certain number Minerva, but another Diana, and another Apollo: and again, they called one number justice, but another temperance 15. In diagrams also they adopted a similar mode. And thus, by offerings of this kind, they rendered the Gods propitious to them, so as to obtain of them the object of their wishes, by the things which they dedicated to, and the names by which they invoked them. They likewise frequently employed their aid in divination, and if they were in want of a certain thing for the purpose of some investigation. In order, therefore to affect this, they made use of the Gods within the heavens, both the erratic and non-erratic, of all of whom it is requisite to consider the sun as the leader; but to rank the moon in the second place; and we should conjoin with these fire, in the third place, from its |66 alliance to them, as the theologist 16 says. He also says that no animal is to be sacrificed; but that first-fruits are to be offered from meal and honey, and the vegetable productions of the earth. He adds, that fire is not to be enkindled on a hearth defiled with gore; and asserts other things of the like kind. For what occasion is there to transcribe all he says? For he who is studious of piety knows, indeed, that to the Gods no animal is to be sacrificed, but that a sacrifice of this kind pertains to daemons, and other powers, whether they are beneficent, or depraved1. He likewise knows who those are that ought to sacrifice to these, and to what extent they ought to proceed in the sacrifices which they make. Other things, however, will be passed over by me in silence. But what some Platonists have divulged, I shall lay before the reader, in order that the things proposed to be discussed, may become manifest to the intelligent. What they have unfolded, therefore, is as follows:
2.37 37.The first God being incorporeal, immoveable, and impartible, and neither subsisting in any thing, nor restrained in his energies, is not, as has been before observed, in want of any thing external to himself, as neither is the soul of the world; but this latter, containing in itself the principle of that which is triply divisible, and being naturally self-motive, is adapted to be moved in a beautiful and orderly manner, and also to move the body of the world, according to the most excellent reasons i.e. productive principles or powers. It is, however, connected with and comprehends body, though it is itself incorporeal, and liberated from the participation of any passion. To the remaining Gods, therefore, to the world, to the inerratic and erratic stars, who are visible Gods, consisting of soul and body, thanks are to be returned after the above-mentioned manner, through sacrifices from iimate natures. The multitude, therefore, of those invisible beings remains for us, whom Plato indiscriminately calls daemons 17; but of these, some being denominated by men, obtain from them honours, and other religious observances, similar to those which are paid to the Gods; but others, who for the most part are not explicitly denominated, receive an occult religious reverence and appellation from certain persons in villages and certain cities; and the remaining multitude is called in common by the |67 name of daemons. The general persuasion, however, respecting all these invisible beings, is this, that if they become angry through being neglected, and deprived of the religious reverence which is due to them, they are noxious to those by whom they are thus neglected, and that they again become beneficent, if they are appeased by prayers, supplications, and sacrifices, and other similar rites. 2.38 38.But the confused notion which is formed of these beings, and which has proceeded to great crimination, necessarily requires that the nature of them should be distinguished according to reason. For perhaps it will be said, that it is requisite to show whence the error concerning them originated among men. The distinction, therefore, must be made after the following manner. Such souls as are the progeny of the whole soul of the universe, and who govern the great parts of the region under the moon, these, being incumbent on a pneumatic substance or spirit, and ruling over it conformably to reason, are to be considered as good daemons, who are diligently employed in causing every thing to be beneficial to the subjects of their government, whether they preside over certain animals, or fruits, which are arranged under their inspective care, or over things which subsist for the sake of these, such as showers of rain, moderate winds, serene weather, and other things which co-operate with these, such as the good temperament of the seasons of the year. They are also our leaders in the attainment of music, and the whole of erudition, and likewise of medicine and gymnastic, and of every thing else similar to these. For it is impossible that these daemons should impart utility, and yet become, in the very same things, the causes of what is detrimental. Among these two, those transporters, as Plato calls them, in his Banquet are to be enumerated, who announce the affairs of men to the Gods, and the will of the Gods to men; carrying our prayers, indeed, to the Gods as judges, but oracularly unfolding to us the exhortations and admonitions of the Gods. But such souls as do not rule over the pneumatic substance with which they are connected, but for the most part are vanquished by it; these are vehemently agitated and borne along in a disorderly manner, when the irascible motions and the desires of the pneumatic substance, received an impetus. These souls, therefore, are indeed daemons, but are deservedly called malefic daemons. 2.39 39.All these being, likewise, and those who possess a contrary power, are invisible, and perfectly imperceptible by human senses; for they are not surrounded with a solid body, nor are all of them of one form, but they are fashioned in numerous figures. The forms, however, which |68 characterize their pneumatic substance, at one time become apparent, but at another are invisible. Sometimes also those that are malefic, change their forms; but the pneumatic substance, so far as it is corporeal, is passive and corruptible: and though, because it is thus bound by the souls that are incumbent on it, the form of it remains for a long time, yet it is not eternal. For it is probable that something continually flows from it, and also that it is nourished. The pneumatic substance, therefore, of good daemons, possesses symmetry, in the same manner as the bodies of the visible Gods; but the spirit of malefic dsemons is deprived of symmetry, and in consequence of its abounding in passivity, they are distributed about the terrestrial region. Hence, there is no evil which they do not attempt to effect; for, in short, being violent and fraudulent in their manners, and being also deprived of the guardian care of more excellent dsemons, they make, for the most part, vehement and sudden attacks; sometimes endeavouring to conceal their incursions, but at other times assaulting openly. Hence the molestations which are produced by them are rapid; but the remedies and corrections which proceed from more excellent dsemons, appear to be more slowly effected: for every thing which is good being tractable and equable, proceeds in an orderly manner, and does not pass beyond what is fit. By forming this opinion, therefore, you will never fall into that most absurd notion, that evil may be expected from the good, or good from the evil. For this notion is not truly attended with absurdity, but the multitude, receiving through it the most erroneous conceptions of the Gods, disseminate them among the rest of mankind. 2.40 40.It must be admitted, therefore, that one of the greatest injuries occasioned by malefic dsemons is this, that though they are the causes of the calamities which take place upon the earth, such as pestilence, sterility, earthquakes, excessive dryness, and the like, yet they endeavour to persuade us, that they are the causes of things the most contrary to these, viz. of fertility, salubrity, and elementary peace. Hence, they exonerate themselves from blame, and, in the first place, endeavour to avoid being detected as the sources of injury; and, in the next place, they convert us to supplications and sacrifices to the beneficent Gods, as if they were angry. But they effect these, and things of a similar nature, in consequence of wishing to turn us from right conceptions of the Gods, and convert us to themselves; for they are delighted with all such as act thus incongruously and discordantly, and, as it were, assuming the persons of other Gods, they enjoy the effects of our imprudence and folly; conciliating to themselves the good opinion of the vulgar, by inflaming the minds of men with the love of riches, power, and pleasure, |69 and fulling them with the desire of vain glory, from which sedition, and war, and other things allied to these, are produced. But that which is the most dire of all things, they proceed still farther, and persuade men that similar things are effected by the greatest Gods, and do not stop till they even subject the most excellent of the divinities to these calumnies, through whom they say every thing is in perfect confusion. And not only the vulgar are affected in this manner, but not a few also of those who are conversant with philosophy. The cause of this, however, extends equally to philosophers, and the vulgar; for of philosophers, those who do not depart from the prevailing notions, fall into the same error with the multitude; and again, the multitude, on hearing assertions from celebrated men conformable to their own opinions, are in a greater degree corroborated in conceiving things of this kind of the Gods. 2.41 41.For poetry also inflames the opinions of men, by employing a diction adapted to produce astonishment and enchantment, and not only allures the ears, but is also capable of procuring belief in things that are most impossible. At the same time, however, it is requisite to be firmly persuaded, that what is good can never injure, or what is evil can never be beneficial; for, as Plato says, it is not the province of heat to refrigerate, but of that which is contrary to heat; and, in like manner, neither is it the province of that which is just to injure. But divinity is naturally the most just of all things; since otherwise he would not be divinity. Hence this power and portion of good is not to be abscinded from beneficent daemons; for the power which is naturally adapted, and wishes to injure, is contrary to the power which is beneficent: but contraries can never subsist about the same thing. As malefic daemons, therefore, injure the mortal race in many respects, and sometimes in things of the greatest consequence, good daemons not only never cease to act conformably to their office, but also, as much as possible, presignify to us the dangers which are impendent from malefic daemons, unfolding these through dreams, through a divinely inspired soul, and through many other things; so that he who is capable of explaining what is signified, may know and avoid all the perils with which he is threatened. For they indicate future events to all men, but every one cannot understand what they indicate nor is every one able to read what is written by them; but he alone is able to do this, who has learnt their letters. All enchantment, however, or witchcraft, is effected through daemons of a contrary nature; for those who perpetrate evil through enchantments, especially venerate these malefic beings, and the power that presides over them. |70 2.42 42.For they are full of every kind of imagination, and are sufficiently qualified to deceive, through effects of a prodigious nature; and through these, unhappy men procure philtres, and amatory allurements. For all intemperance, and hope of possessing wealth and renown, and especially deception, exist through these, since falsehood is allied to these malevolent beings; for they wish to he considered as Gods, and the power which presides over them is ambitious to appear to be the greatest God. These are they that rejoice in libations, and the savour of sacrifices, through which their pneumatic vehicle is fattened; for this vehicle lives through vapours and exhalations, and the life of it is various through various exhalations. It is likewise corroborated by the savour of blood and flesh. 2.43 43.On this account, a wise and temperate man will be religiously afraid to use sacrifices of this kind, through which he will attract to himself such-like daemons; but he will endeavour in all possible ways to purify his soul. For these malefic beings do not attack a pure soul, because it is dissimilar to them; but if it is necessary to cities to render them propitious, this is nothing to us. For by these riches, and things external and corporeal, are thought to be good, and their contraries evil; but the smallest attention is paid by them to the good of the soul. We however, to the utmost of our ability, endeavour not to be in want of those things which they impart; but all our endeavour is to become similar to God, and to the divine powers with which he is surrounded both from what pertains to the soul, and from externals; and this is effected through an entire liberation from the dominion of the passions, an evolved perception of truly existing beings, and a vital tendency towards them. On the other hand, we strive to become dissimilar to depraved men and evil daemons, and, in short, to every being that rejoices in a mortal and material nature. So that, conformably to what is said by Theophrastus, we also shall sacrifice from those things which theologists permit us to use for this purpose; as well knowing, that by how much the more we neglect to exempt ourselves from the passions of the soul, by so much the more we connect ourselves with a depraved power, and render it necessary that he should become propitious to us. For, as theologists say, it is necessary for those who are bound 18 to things |71 external, and have not yet vanquished their passions, should avert the anger of this malefic power; since, if they do not, there will be no end to their labours. 2.52 52.Nevertheless, we permit those whose life is rolled about externals, having once acted impiously towards themselves, to be borne along to that which they tend; but we rightly say, that the man who we designate as a philosopher, and who is separated from externals, will not |75 be disturbed by daemons, nor be in want of diviners, nor of the viscera of animals. For he earnestly endeavours to be separated from those things for the sake of which divinations are effected. For he does not betake himself to nuptials, in order that he may molest the diviner about wedlock, or merchandise, or inquiries about a servant, or an increase of property, or any other object of vulgar pursuit. For the subjects of his investigation are not clearly indicated by any diviner or viscera of animals. But he, as we have said, approaching through himself to the supreme God, who is established in the true inward parts of himself, receives from thence the precepts of eternal life, tending thither by a conflux of the whole of himself, and instead of a diviner praying that he may become a confabulator of the mighty Jupiter. |
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12. Porphyry, Life of Plotinus, 10, 20, 23-24 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 468; DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 68; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 19, 119; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 339, 352; Janowitz (2002b), Icons of Power: Ritual Practices in Late Antiquity, 17; Motta and Petrucci (2022), Isagogical Crossroads from the Early Imperial Age to the End of Antiquity, 106; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 33, 37
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10 Among those making profession of Philosophy at Rome was one Olympius, an Alexandrian, who had been for a little while a pupil of Ammonius. This man's jealous envy showed itself in continual insolence, and finally he grew so bitter that he even ventured sorcery, seeking to crush Plotinus by star-spells. But he found his experiments recoiling upon himself, and he confessed to his associates that Plotinus possessed 'a mighty soul, so powerful, as to be able to hurl every assault back upon those that sought his ruin'. Plotinus had felt the operation and declared that at that moment Olympius limbs were convulsed and his body shrivelling like a money-bag pulled tight'. Olympius, perceiving on several attempts that he was endangering himself rather than Plotinus, desisted. In fact Plotinus possessed by birth something more than is accorded to other men. An Egyptian priest who had arrived in Rome and, through some friend, had been presented to the philosopher, became desirous of displaying his powers to him, and he offered to evoke a visible manifestation of Plotinus' presiding spirit. Plotinus readily consented and the evocation was made in the Temple of Isis, the only place, they say, which the Egyptian could find pure in Rome. At the summons a Divinity appeared, not a being of the spirit-ranks, and the Egyptian exclaimed: 'You are singularly graced; the guiding-spirit within you is not of the lower degree but a God.' It was not possible, however, to interrogate or even to contemplate this God any further, for the priest's assistant, who had been holding the birds to prevent them flying away, strangled them, whether through jealousy or in terror. Thus Plotinus had for indwelling spirit a Being of the more divine degree, and he kept his own divine spirit unceasingly intent upon that inner presence. It was this preoccupation that led him to write his treatise upon Our Tutelary Spirit, an essay in the explanation of the differences among spirit-guides. Amelius was scrupulous in observing the day of the New-Moon and other holy-days, and once asked Plotinus to join in some such celebration: Plotinus refused: 'It is for those Beings to come to me, not for me to go to them.' What was in his mind in so lofty an utterance we could not explain to ourselves and we dared not ask him. "
20 This extended quotation from the most acute of the critics of our day--a writer who has passed judgement on nearly all his contemporaries--serves to show the estimate he came to set upon Plotinus of whom, at first, misled by ignorant talk, he had held a poor opinion. His notion, by the way, that the transcripts he acquired from Amelius were faulty sprang from his misunderstanding of Plotinus' style and phraseology; if there were ever any accurate copies, these were they, faithful reproductions from the author's own manuscript. Another passage from the work of Longinus, dealing with Amelius, Plotinus, and other metaphysicians of the day, must be inserted here to give a complete view of the opinion formed upon these philosophers by the most authoritative and most searching of critics. The work was entitled On the End: in Answer to Plotinus and Gentilianus Amelius. It opens with the following preface: 'In our time, Marcellus, there have been many philosophers--especially in our youth--for there is a strange scarcity at present. When I was a boy, my parents' long journeys gave me the opportunity of seeing all the better-known teachers; and in later life those that still lived became known to me as my visits to this and that city and people brought me where they happened to live. 'Some of these undertook the labour of developing their theories in formal works and so have bequeathed to the future the means of profiting by their services. Others thought they had done enough when they had convinced their own immediate hearers of the truth of their theories.. 'First of those that have written. 'Among the Platonists there are Euclides, Democritus, Proclinus the philosopher of the Troad, and the two who still profess philosophy at Rome, Plotinus and his friend Gentilianus Amelius. Among the Stoics there are Themistocles and Phoibion and the two who flourished only a little while ago, Annius and Medius. And there is the Peripatetic, Heliodorus of Alexandria. 'For those that have not written, there are among the Platonists Ammonius and Origen, two teachers whose lectures I myself attended during a long period, men greatly surpassing their contemporaries in mental power; and there are the Platonic Successors at Athens, Theodotus and Eubulus. 'No doubt some writing of a metaphysical order stands to the credit of this group: Origen wrote On Spirit-Beings, Eubulus On the Philebus and Gorgias, and the objections urged by Aristotle to Plato's Republic; but this is not enough to class either of them with systematic authors. This was side-play; authorship was not in the main plan of their careers. 'Among Stoic teachers that refrained from writing we have Herminus and Lysimachus, and the two living at Athens, Musonius and Athenaeus; among Peripatetics, Ammonius and Ptolemaeus. 'The two last were the most accomplished scholars of their time, Ammonius especially being unapproached in breadth of learning; but neither produced any systematic work; we have from them merely verses and duty-speeches; and these I cannot think to have been preserved with their consent; they did not concern themselves about formal statement of their doctrine, and it is not likely they would wish to be known in after times by compositions of so trivial a nature. 'To return to the writers; some of them, like Euclides, Democritus, and Proclinus, confined themselves to the mere compilation and transcription of passages from earlier authorities. Others diligently worked over various minor points in the investigations of the ancients, and put together books dealing with the same subjects. Such were Annius, Medius, and Phoibion, the last especially choosing to be distinguished for style rather than for systematic thinking. In the same class must be ranked Heliodorus; his writings contribute nothing to the organization of the thought which he found to his hand in the teaching of earlier workers. 'Plotinus and Gentilianus Amelius alone display the true spirit of authorship; they treat of a great number of questions and they bring a method of their own to the treatment. 'Plotinus, it would seem, set the principles of Pythagoras and of Plato in a clearer light than anyone before him; on the same subjects, Numenius, Cronius, Moderatus, and Thrasyllus fall far short of him in precision and fullness. Amelius set himself to walk in Plotinus' steps and adopted most of Plotinus' opinions; his method, however, was diffuse an, unlike his friend, he indulges in an extravagance of explanation. 'Only these two seem to me worth study. What profit can anyone expect from troubling the works of any of the others to the neglect of the originals on which they drew? They bring us nothing of their own, not even a novel augment, much less a leading idea, and are too unconcerned even to set side by side the most generally adopted theories or to choose the better among them. 'My own method has been different; as for example when I replied to Gentilianus upon Plato's treatment of Justice and in a review I undertook of Plotinus' work On the Ideas. This latter was in the form of a reply to Basileus of Tyre, my friend as theirs. He had preferred Plotinus' system to mine and had written several works in the manner of his master, amongst them a treatise supporting Plotinus' theory of the Idea against that which I taught. I endeavoured, not, I think, unsuccessfully, to show that his change of mind was mistaken. 'In these two essays I have ranged widely over the doctrines of this school, as also in my Letter to Amelius which, despite the simple title with which I contented myself, has the dimensions of a book, being a reply to a treatise he addressed to me from Rome under the title On Plotinus' Philosophic Method.' " "
23 Good and kindly, singularly gentle and engaging: thus the oracle presents him, and so in fact we found him. Sleeplessly alert--Apollo tells--pure of soul, ever striving towards the divine which he loved with all his being, he laboured strenuously to free himself and rise above the bitter waves of this blood-drenched life: and this is why to Plotinus--God-like and lifting himself often, by the ways of meditation and by the methods Plato teaches in the Banquet, to the first and all-transcendent God--that God appeared, the God who has neither shape nor form but sits enthroned above the Intellectual-Principle and all the Intellectual-Sphere. 'There was shown to Plotinus the Term ever near': for the Term, the one end, of his life was to become Uniate, to approach to the God over all: and four times, during the period I passed with him, he achieved this Term, by no mere latent fitness but by the ineffable Act. To this God, I also declare, I Porphyry, that in my sixty-eighth year I too was once admitted and I entered into Union. We are told that often when he was leaving the way, the Gods set him on the true path again, pouring down before him a dense shaft of light; here we are to understand that in his writing he was overlooked and guided by the divine powers. 'In this sleepless vision within and without,' the oracle says, 'your eyes have beheld sights many and fair not vouchsafed to all that take the philosophic path': contemplation in man may sometimes be more than human, but compare it with the True-Knowing of the Gods and, wonderful though it be, it can never plunge into the depths their divine vision fathoms. Thus far the Oracle recounts what Plotinus accomplished and to what heights he attained while still in the body: emancipated from the body, we are told how he entered the celestial circle where all is friendship, tender delight, happiness, and loving union with God, where Minos and Rhadamanthus and Aeacus, the sons of God, are enthroned as judges of souls--not, however, to hold him to judgement but as welcoming him to their consort to which are bidden spirits pleasing to the Gods--Plato, Pythagoras, and all the people of the Choir of Immortal Love, there where the blessed spirits have their birth-home and live in days filled full of 'joyous festival' and made happy by the Gods. " "" None |
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13. Porphyry, Life of Pythagoras, 1, 6, 20, 37, 41-42, 45 (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, Life of Pythagoras • Iamblichus, as source for Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus, influence of the Precepts on • Iamblichus, political theory of
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 12, 20, 80, 82, 96, 166; DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 282; Huffman (2019), A History of Pythagoreanism, 52; Niccolai (2023), Christianity, Philosophy, and Roman Power: Constantine, Julian, and the Bishops on Exegesis and Empire. 64; Wardy and Warren (2018), Authors and Authorities in Ancient Philosophy, 164; Wolfsdorf (2020), Early Greek Ethics, 570
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1 Many think that Pythagoras was the son of Mnesarchus, but they differ as to the latter's race; some thinking him a Samian, while Neanthes, in the fifth book of his Fables states he was a Syrian, from the city of Tyre. As a famine had arisen in Samos, Mnesarchus went thither to trade, and was naturalized there. There also was born his son Pythagoras, who early manifested studiousness, but was later taken to Tyre, and there entrusted to the Chaldeans, whose doctrines he imbibed. Thence he returned to Ionia, where he first studied under the Syrian Pherecydes, then also under Hermodamas the Creophylian who at that time was an old man residing in Samos.
6 As to his knowledge, it is said that he learned the mathematical sciences from the Egyptians, Chaldeans and Phoenicians; for of' old the Egyptians excelled, in geometry, the Phoenicians in numbers and proportions, and the Chaldeans of astronomical theorems, divine rites, and worship of the Gods; other secrets concerning the course of life he received and learned from the Magi.
20 His speech was so persuasive that, according to Nicomachus, in one address made on first landing in Italy he made more than two thousand adherents. Out of desire to live with him, ........., to which both women and built a large auditorium, to which both women and boys were admitted. (Foreign visitors were so many that) they built whole cities, settling that whole region of Italy now known as Magna Grecia. His ordices and laws were by them received as divine precepts, and without them would do nothing. Indeed they ranked him among the divinities. They held all property in common. They ranked him among the divinities, and whenever they communicated to each other some choice bit of his philosophy, from which physical truths could always be deduced, they would swear by the Tetractys, adjuring Pythagoras as a divine witness, in the words. "I call to witness him who to our souls expressed The Tetractys, eternal Nature\'s fountain-spring."
37 His utterances were of two kinds, plain or symbolical. His teaching was twofold: of his disciples some were called Students, and others Hearers. The Students learned the fuller and more exactly elaborate reasons of science, while the Hearers heard only the chief heads of learning, without more detailed explanations. 4
1 Such things taught he, though advising above all things to speak the truth, for this alone deifies men. For as he had learned from the Magi, who call God Oremasdes, God's body is light, and his soul is truth. He taught much else, which he claimed to have learned from Aristoclea at Delphi. Certain things he declared mystically, symbolically, most of which were collected by Aristotle, as when he called the sea a tear of Saturn; the two bear (constellations) the hand of Rhea; the Pleiades, the lyre of the Muses; the Planets, the dogs of Persephone; and he called be sound caused by striking on brass the voice of a genius enclosed in the brass. 42 He had also another kind of symbol, such as, pass not over a balance; that is, Shun avarice. Poke not the fire with a sword, that is, we ought not to excite a man full of fire and anger with sharp language. Pluck not a crown, meant not to violate the laws, which are the crowns of cities. Eat not the heart, signified not to afflict ourselves with sorrows. Do not sit upon a pack-measure, meant, do not live ignobly. On starting a journey, do not turn back, meant, that this life should not be regretted, when near the bourne of death. Do not walk in the public way, meant, to avoid the opinions of the multitude, adopting those of the learned and the few. Receive not swallows into your house, meant, not to admit under the same roof garrulous and intemperate men. Help a man to take up a burden, but not to lay it down, meant, to encourage no one to be indolent, but to apply oneself to labor and virtue. Do not carry the images of the Gods in rings, signified that one should not at once to the vulgar reveal one's opinions about the Gods, or discourse about them. offer libations to the Gods, just to the ears of the cup, meant, that we ought to worship and celebrate the Gods with music, for that penetrates through the ears. Do not eat those things that are unlawful, sexual or increase, beginning nor end, nor the first basis of all things. 45 He also wished men to abstain from other things, such as a swine\'s paunch, a mullet, and a sea-fish called a "nettle," and from nearly all other marine animals. He referred his origin to those of past ages, affirming that he was first Euphorbus, then Aethalides, then Hermotimus, then Pyrrhus, and last, Pythagoras. He showed to his disciples that the soul is immortal, and to those who were rightly purified he brought back the memory of the acts of their former lives. |
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14. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, Porphyrys view of
Found in books: Pevarello (2013), The Sentences of Sextus and the Origins of Christian Ascetiscism. 161; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 28
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15. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, as source for Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus, composition of Protrepticus
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 278; Wolfsdorf (2020), Early Greek Ethics, 266
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16. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Catharsis, Iamblichus, alternative to aversion therapy • Catharsis, Porphyry and Iamblichus, Does inspiration depend on physical apokatharsis? • Iamblichus • Iamblichus as Pythagorean/on Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus on music • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, Julian the Apostate and • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Alternative defences of phallic festivals, Metriopatheia by catharsis or aversion therapy • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Attacks Porphyry, his probable teacher • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Favourable to marriage • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Inspiration not due to physical purgation (apokatharsis), but to the gods • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Sexual enchantment not due to gods • Iamblichus, as a source for the Precepts • Iamblichus, defense of ritual of • Iamblichus, on demons • Iamblichus, on divination and prophecy • Metriopatheia, Moderate, moderation of, emotion; Iamblichus, phallic festivals may produce metriopatheia by catharsis • demons, Iamblichus on • divination and prophecy, Iamblichus on • foundational myth of Iamblichus • psyche as seat of purity/impurity, in Iamblichus • sacrifice, animal, in Iamblichus • theurgy in Iamblichus
Found in books: Ayres Champion and Crawford (2023), The Intellectual World of Late Antique Christianity: Reshaping Classical Traditions. 145, 146, 148, 149, 150; DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 91, 92, 96, 97, 121, 122, 131, 135, 136, 2607; Dieleman (2005), Priests, Tongues, and Rites: The London-Leiden Magical Manuscripts and Translation in Egyptian Ritual (100–300 CE), 5, 277; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 15, 16, 17, 21, 40, 65, 115, 116, 119, 152, 158, 165, 171, 174, 175, 176, 181; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 86, 196, 326, 333, 374, 398; Fowler (2014), Plato in the Third Sophistic, 52, 53; Harkins and Maier (2022), Experiencing the Shepherd of Hermas, 42; Huffman (2019), A History of Pythagoreanism, 515; Janowitz (2002b), Icons of Power: Ritual Practices in Late Antiquity, 5, 10, 59, 128; Kahlos (2019), Religious Dissent in Late Antiquity, 350-450, 100; Luck (2006), Arcana mundi: magic and the occult in the Greek and Roman worlds: a collection of ancient texts, 484; Petrovic and Petrovic (2016), Inner Purity and Pollution in Greek Religion, 70, 71; Piovanelli, Burke, Pettipiece (2015), Rediscovering the Apocryphal Continent : New Perspectives on Early Christian and Late Antique Apocryphal Textsand Traditions. De Gruyter: 2015 398; Renberg (2017), Where Dreams May Come: Incubation Sanctuaries in the Greco-Roman World, 25; Russell and Nesselrath (2014), On Prophecy, Dreams and Human Imagination: Synesius, De insomniis, 118, 142, 143, 153; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 118, 171; Sorabji (2000), Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation, 285, 286, 295; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 312, 321; Xenophontos and Marmodoro (2021), The Reception of Greek Ethics in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 77, 78, 79, 80, 82; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 213, 237, 289
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17. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, Pseudo-Iamblichus
Found in books: Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 193; Vazques and Ross (2022), Time and Cosmology in Plato and the Platonic Tradition, 161
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18. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 154; Dieleman (2005), Priests, Tongues, and Rites: The London-Leiden Magical Manuscripts and Translation in Egyptian Ritual (100–300 CE), 266, 277; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 341, 368
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19. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 3rd cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, on divination and prophecy • divination and prophecy, Iamblichus on • theurgy in Iamblichus
Found in books: Ayres Champion and Crawford (2023), The Intellectual World of Late Antique Christianity: Reshaping Classical Traditions. 146; Brouwer and Vimercati (2020), Fate, Providence and Free Will: Philosophy and Religion in Dialogue in the Early Imperial Age, 19; Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 429, 445, 456, 468; DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 132, 170, 252, 261; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 175; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 339; Fowler (2014), Plato in the Third Sophistic, 265; Janowitz (2002b), Icons of Power: Ritual Practices in Late Antiquity, 17; Joosse (2021), Olympiodorus of Alexandria: Exegete, Teacher, Platonic Philosopher, 56; Marmodoro and Prince (2015), Causation and Creation in Late Antiquity, 208; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 161; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 243; Trettel (2019), Desires in Paradise: An Interpretative Study of Augustine's City of God 14, 7; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 121, 135
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20. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 92, 97, 105, 204; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 94, 96
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21. None, None, nan (3rd cent. CE - 4th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Catharsis, Iamblichus, alternative to aversion therapy • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Attacks Porphyry, his probable teacher • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Favourable to marriage • Iamblichus, Neoplatonist, Sexual enchantment not due to gods
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 23, 51, 68; Joosse (2021), Olympiodorus of Alexandria: Exegete, Teacher, Platonic Philosopher, 56; Sorabji (2000), Emotion and Peace of Mind: From Stoic Agitation to Christian Temptation, 285; Xenophontos and Marmodoro (2021), The Reception of Greek Ethics in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 6, 44, 69
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22. Augustine, The City of God, 10.11, 10.24, 10.29, 10.32, 19.23 (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, Porphyrys view of
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 12; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 340; Russell and Nesselrath (2014), On Prophecy, Dreams and Human Imagination: Synesius, De insomniis, 117; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 28; Trettel (2019), Desires in Paradise: An Interpretative Study of Augustine's City of God 14, 8; Wiebe (2021), Fallen Angels in the Theology of St Augustine, 205, 206, 210
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10.11 It was a better tone which Porphyry adopted in his letter to Anebo the Egyptian, in which, assuming the character of an inquirer consulting him, he unmasks and explodes these sacrilegious arts. In that letter, indeed, he repudiates all demons, whom he maintains to be so foolish as to be attracted by the sacrificial vapors, and therefore residing not in the ether, but in the air beneath the moon, and indeed in the moon itself. Yet he has not the boldness to attribute to all the demons all the deceptions and malicious and foolish practices which justly move his indignation. For, though he acknowledges that as a race demons are foolish, he so far accommodates himself to popular ideas as to call some of them benigt demons. He expresses surprise that sacrifices not only incline the gods, but also compel and force them to do what men wish; and he is at a loss to understand how the sun and moon, and other visible celestial bodies - for bodies he does not doubt that they are - are considered gods, if the gods are distinguished from the demons by their incorporeality; also, if they are gods, how some are called beneficent and others hurtful, and how they, being corporeal, are numbered with the gods, who are incorporeal. He inquires further, and still as one in doubt, whether diviners and wonderworkers are men of unusually powerful souls, or whether the power to do these things is communicated by spirits from without. He inclines to the latter opinion, on the ground that it is by the use of stones and herbs that they lay spells on people, and open closed doors, and do similar wonders. And on this account, he says, some suppose that there is a race of beings whose property it is to listen to men - a race deceitful, full of contrivances, capable of assuming all forms, simulating gods, demons, and dead men, - and that it is this race which bring about all these things which have the appearance of good or evil, but that what is really good they never help us in, and are indeed unacquainted with, for they make wickedness easy, but throw obstacles in the path of those who eagerly follow virtue; and that they are filled with pride and rashness, delight in sacrificial odors, are taken with flattery. These and the other characteristics of this race of deceitful and malicious spirits, who come into the souls of men and delude their senses, both in sleep and waking, he describes not as things of which he is himself convinced, but only with so much suspicion and doubt as to cause him to speak of them as commonly received opinions. We should sympathize with this great philosopher in the difficulty he experienced in acquainting himself with and confidently assailing the whole fraternity of devils, which any Christian old woman would unhesitatingly describe and most unreservedly detest. Perhaps, however, he shrank from offending Anebo, to whom he was writing, himself the most eminent patron of these mysteries, or the others who marvelled at these magical feats as divine works, and closely allied to the worship of the gods. However, he pursues this subject, and, still in the character of an inquirer, mentions some things which no sober judgment could attribute to any but malicious and deceitful powers. He asks why, after the better class of spirits have been invoked, the worse should be commanded to perform the wicked desires of men; why they do not hear a man who has just left a woman's embrace, while they themselves make no scruple of tempting men to incest and adultery; why their priests are commanded to abstain from animal food for fear of being polluted by the corporeal exhalations, while they themselves are attracted by the fumes of sacrifices and other exhalations; why the initiated are forbidden to touch a dead body, while their mysteries are celebrated almost entirely by means of dead bodies; why it is that a man addicted to any vice should utter threats, not to a demon or to the soul of a dead man, but to the sun and moon, or some of the heavenly bodies, which he intimidates by imaginary terrors, that he may wring from them a real boon - for he threatens that he will demolish the sky, and such like impossibilities - that those gods, being alarmed, like silly children, with imaginary and absurd threats, may do what they are ordered. Porphyry further relates that a man, Ch remon, profoundly versed in these sacred or rather sacrilegious mysteries, had written that the famous Egyptian mysteries of Isis and her husband Osiris had very great influence with the gods to compel them to do what they were ordered, when he who used the spells threatened to divulge or do away with these mysteries, and cried with a threatening voice that he would scatter the members of Osiris if they neglected his orders. Not without reason is Porphyry surprised that a man should utter such wild and empty threats against the gods - not against gods of no account, but against the heavenly gods, and those that shine with sidereal light - and that these threats should be effectual to constrain them with resistless power, and alarm them so that they fulfill his wishes. Not without reason does he, in the character of an inquirer into the reasons of these surprising things, give it to be understood that they are done by that race of spirits which he previously described as if quoting other people's opinions - spirits who deceive not, as he said, by nature, but by their own corruption, and who simulate gods and dead men, but not, as he said, demons, for demons they really are. As to his idea that by means of herbs, and stones, and animals, and certain incantations and noises, and drawings, sometimes fanciful, and sometimes copied from the motions of the heavenly bodies, men create upon earth powers capable of bringing about various results, all that is only the mystification which these demons practise on those who are subject to them, for the sake of furnishing themselves with merriment at the expense of their dupes. Either, then, Porphyry was sincere in his doubts and inquiries, and mentioned these things to demonstrate and put beyond question that they were the work, not of powers which aid us in obtaining life, but of deceitful demons; or, to take a more favorable view of the philosopher, he adopted this method with the Egyptian who was wedded to these errors, and was proud of them, that he might not offend him by assuming the attitude of a teacher, nor discompose his mind by the altercation of a professed assailant, but, by assuming the character of an inquirer, and the humble attitude of one who was anxious to learn, might turn his attention to these matters, and show how worthy they are to be despised and relinquished. Towards the conclusion of his letter, he requests Anebo to inform him what the Egyptian wisdom indicates as the way to blessedness. But as to those who hold intercourse with the gods, and pester them only for the sake of finding a runaway slave, or acquiring property, or making a bargain of a marriage, or such things, he declares that their pretensions to wisdom are vain. He adds that these same gods, even granting that on other points their utterances were true, were yet so ill-advised and unsatisfactory in their disclosures about blessedness, that they cannot be either gods or good demons, but are either that spirit who is called the deceiver, or mere fictions of the imagination. " "
10.24 Accordingly, when we speak of God, we do not affirm two or three principles, no more than we are at liberty to affirm two or three gods; although, speaking of each, of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Ghost, we confess that each is God: and yet we do not say, as the Sabellian heretics say, that the Father is the same as the Son, and the Holy Spirit the same as the Father and the Son; but we say that the Father is the Father of the Son, and the Son the Son of the Father, and that the Holy Spirit of the Father and the Son is neither the Father nor the Son. It was therefore truly said that man is cleansed only by a Principle, although the Platonists erred in speaking in the plural of principles. But Porphyry, being under the dominion of these envious powers, whose influence he was at once ashamed of and afraid to throw off, refused to recognize that Christ is the Principle by whose incarnation we are purified. Indeed he despised Him, because of the flesh itself which He assumed, that He might offer a sacrifice for our purification - a great mystery, unintelligible to Porphyry's pride, which that true and benigt Redeemer brought low by His humility, manifesting Himself to mortals by the mortality which He assumed, and which the maligt and deceitful mediators are proud of wanting, promising, as the boon of immortals, a deceptive assistance to wretched men. Thus the good and true Mediator showed that it is sin which is evil, and not the substance or nature of flesh; for this, together with the human soul, could without sin be both assumed and retained, and laid down in death, and changed to something better by resurrection. He showed also that death itself, although the punishment of sin, was submitted to by Him for our sakes without sin, and must not be evaded by sin on our part, but rather, if opportunity serves, be borne for righteousness' sake. For he was able to expiate sins by dying, because He both died, and not for sin of His own. But He has not been recognized by Porphyry as the Principle, otherwise he would have recognized Him as the Purifier. The Principle is neither the flesh nor the human soul in Christ but the Word by which all things were made. The flesh, therefore, does not by its own virtue purify, but by virtue of the Word by which it was assumed, when the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. John 1:14 For speaking mystically of eating His flesh, when those who did not understand Him were offended and went away, saying, This is an hard saying, who can hear it? He answered to the rest who remained, It is the Spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing. John 6:60-64 The Principle, therefore, having assumed a human soul and flesh, cleanses the soul and flesh of believers. Therefore, when the Jews asked Him who He was, He answered that He was the Principle. And this we carnal and feeble men, liable to sin, and involved in the darkness of ignorance, could not possibly understand, unless we were cleansed and healed by Him, both by means of what we were, and of what we were not. For we were men, but we were not righteous; whereas in His incarnation there was a human nature, but it was righteous, and not sinful. This is the mediation whereby a hand is stretched to the lapsed and fallen; this is the seed ordained by angels, by whose ministry the law also was given enjoining the worship of one God, and promising that this Mediator should come. " "
10.29 You proclaim the Father and His Son, whom you call the Father's intellect or mind, and between these a third, by whom we suppose you mean the Holy Spirit, and in your own fashion you call these three Gods. In this, though your expressions are inaccurate, you do in some sort, and as through a veil, see what we should strive towards; but the incarnation of the unchangeable Son of God, whereby we are saved, and are enabled to reach the things we believe, or in part understand, this is what you refuse to recognize. You see in a fashion, although at a distance, although with filmy eye, the country in which we should abide; but the way to it you know not. Yet you believe in grace, for you say it is granted to few to reach God by virtue of intelligence. For you do not say, Few have thought fit or have wished, but, It has been granted to few,- distinctly acknowledging God's grace, not man's sufficiency. You also use this word more expressly, when, in accordance with the opinion of Plato, you make no doubt that in this life a man cannot by any means attain to perfect wisdom, but that whatever is lacking is in the future life made up to those who live intellectually, by God's providence and grace. Oh, had you but recognized the grace of God in Jesus Christ our Lord, and that very incarnation of His, wherein He assumed a human soul and body, you might have seemed the brightest example of grace! But what am I doing? I know it is useless to speak to a dead man - useless, at least, so far as regards you, but perhaps not in vain for those who esteem you highly, and love you on account of their love of wisdom or curiosity about those arts which you ought not to have learned; and these persons I address in your name. The grace of God could not have been more graciously commended to us than thus, that the only Son of God, remaining unchangeable in Himself, should assume humanity, and should give us the hope of His love, by means of the mediation of a human nature, through which we, from the condition of men, might come to Him who was so far off - the immortal from the mortal; the unchangeable from the changeable; the just from the unjust; the blessed from the wretched. And, as He had given us a natural instinct to desire blessedness and immortality, He Himself continuing to be blessed; but assuming mortality, by enduring what we fear, taught us to despise it, that what we long for He might bestow upon us. But in order to your acquiescence in this truth, it is lowliness that is requisite, and to this it is extremely difficult to bend you. For what is there incredible, especially to men like you, accustomed to speculation, which might have predisposed you to believe in this - what is there incredible, I say, in the assertion that God assumed a human soul and body? You yourselves ascribe such excellence to the intellectual soul, which is, after all, the human soul, that you maintain that it can become consubstantial with that intelligence of the Father whom you believe in as the Son of God. What incredible thing is it, then, if some one soul be assumed by Him in an ineffable and unique manner for the salvation of many? Moreover, our nature itself testifies that a man is incomplete unless a body be united with the soul. This certainly would be more incredible, were it not of all things the most common; for we should more easily believe in a union between spirit and spirit, or, to use your own terminology, between the incorporeal and the incorporeal, even though the one were human, the other divine, the one changeable and the other unchangeable, than in a union between the corporeal and the incorporeal. But perhaps it is the unprecedented birth of a body from a virgin that staggers you? But, so far from this being a difficulty, it ought rather to assist you to receive our religion, that a miraculous person was born miraculously. Or, do you find a difficulty in the fact that, after His body had been given up to death, and had been changed into a higher kind of body by resurrection, and was now no longer mortal but incorruptible, He carried it up into heavenly places? Perhaps you refuse to believe this, because you remember that Porphyry, in these very books from which I have cited so much, and which treat of the return of the soul, so frequently teaches that a body of every kind is to be escaped from, in order that the soul may dwell in blessedness with God. But here, in place of following Porphyry, you ought rather to have corrected him, especially since you agree with him in believing such incredible things about the soul of this visible world and huge material frame. For, as scholars of Plato, you hold that the world is an animal, and a very happy animal, which you wish to be also everlasting. How, then, is it never to be loosed from a body, and yet never lose its happiness, if, in order to the happiness of the soul, the body must be left behind? The sun, too, and the other stars, you not only acknowledge to be bodies, in which you have the cordial assent of all seeing men, but also, in obedience to what you reckon a profounder insight, you declare that they are very blessed animals, and eternal, together with their bodies. Why is it, then, that when the Christian faith is pressed upon you, you forget, or pretend to ignore, what you habitually discuss or teach? Why is it that you refuse to be Christians, on the ground that you hold opinions which, in fact, you yourselves demolish? Is it not because Christ came in lowliness, and you are proud? The precise nature of the resurrection bodies of the saints may sometimes occasion discussion among those who are best read in the Christian Scriptures; yet there is not among us the smallest doubt that they shall be everlasting, and of a nature exemplified in the instance of Christ's risen body. But whatever be their nature, since we maintain that they shall be absolutely incorruptible and immortal, and shall offer no hindrance to the soul's contemplation, by which it is fixed in God, and as you say that among the celestials the bodies of the eternally blessed are eternal, why do you maintain that, in order to blessedness, every body must be escaped from? Why do you thus seek such a plausible reason for escaping from the Christian faith, if not because, as I again say, Christ is humble and you proud? Are you ashamed to be corrected? This is the vice of the proud. It is, forsooth, a degradation for learned men to pass from the school of Plato to the discipleship of Christ, who by His Spirit taught a fisherman to think and to say, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him; and without Him was not anything made that was made. In Him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shines in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. John 1:1-5 The old saint Simplicianus, afterwards bishop of Milan, used to tell me that a certain Platonist was in the habit of saying that this opening passage of the holy gospel, entitled, According to John, should be written in letters of gold, and hung up in all churches in the most conspicuous place. But the proud scorn to take God for their Master, because the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. John 1:14 So that, with these miserable creatures, it is not enough that they are sick, but they boast of their sickness, and are ashamed of the medicine which could heal them. And, doing so, they secure not elevation, but a more disastrous fall. " "
10.32 This is the religion which possesses the universal way for delivering the soul; for except by this way, none can be delivered. This is a kind of royal way, which alone leads to a kingdom which does not totter like all temporal dignities, but stands firm on eternal foundations. And when Porphyry says, towards the end of the first book De Regressu Animœ, that no system of doctrine which furnishes the universal way for delivering the soul has as yet been received, either from the truest philosophy, or from the ideas and practices of the Indians, or from the reasoning of the Chald ans, or from any source whatever, and that no historical reading had made him acquainted with that way, he manifestly acknowledges that there is such a way, but that as yet he was not acquainted with it. Nothing of all that he had so laboriously learned concerning the deliverance of the soul, nothing of all that he seemed to others, if not to himself, to know and believe, satisfied him. For he perceived that there was still wanting a commanding authority which it might be right to follow in a matter of such importance. And when he says that he had not learned from any truest philosophy a system which possessed the universal way of the soul's deliverance, he shows plainly enough, as it seems to me, either that the philosophy of which he was a disciple was not the truest, or that it did not comprehend such a way. And how can that be the truest philosophy which does not possess this way? For what else is the universal way of the soul's deliverance than that by which all souls universally are delivered, and without which, therefore, no soul is delivered? And when he says, in addition, or from the ideas and practices of the Indians, or from the reasoning of the Chald ans, or from any source whatever, he declares in the most unequivocal language that this universal way of the soul's deliverance was not embraced in what he had learned either from the Indians or the Chald ans; and yet he could not forbear stating that it was from the Chald ans he had derived these divine oracles of which he makes such frequent mention. What, therefore, does he mean by this universal way of the soul's deliverance, which had not yet been made known by any truest philosophy, or by the doctrinal systems of those nations which were considered to have great insight in things divine, because they indulged more freely in a curious and fanciful science and worship of angels? What is this universal way of which he acknowledges his ignorance, if not a way which does not belong to one nation as its special property, but is common to all, and divinely bestowed? Porphyry, a man of no mediocre abilities, does not question that such a way exists; for he believes that Divine Providence could not have left men destitute of this universal way of delivering the soul. For he does not say that this way does not exist, but that this great boon and assistance has not yet been discovered, and has not come to his knowledge. And no wonder; for Porphyry lived in an age when this universal way of the soul's deliverance - in other words, the Christian religion - was exposed to the persecutions of idolaters and demon-worshippers, and earthly rulers, that the number of martyrs or witnesses for the truth might be completed and consecrated, and that by them proof might be given that we must endure all bodily sufferings in the cause of the holy faith, and for the commendation of the truth. Porphyry, being a witness of these persecutions, concluded that this way was destined to a speedy extinction, and that it, therefore, was not the universal way of the soul's deliverance, and did not see that the very thing that thus moved him, and deterred him from becoming a Christian, contributed to the confirmation and more effectual commendation of our religion. This, then, is the universal way of the soul's deliverance, the way that is granted by the divine compassion to the nations universally. And no nation to which the knowledge of it has already come, or may hereafter come, ought to demand, Why so soon? Or, Why so late?- for the design of Him who sends it is impenetrable by human capacity. This was felt by Porphyry when he confined himself to saying that this gift of God was not yet received, and had not yet come to his knowledge. For though this was so, he did not on that account pronounce that the way it self had no existence. This, I say, is the universal way for the deliverance of believers, concerning which the faithful Abraham received the divine assurance, In your seed shall all nations be blessed. Genesis 22:18 He, indeed, was by birth a Chald an; but, that he might receive these great promises, and that there might be propagated from him a seed disposed by angels in the hand of a Mediator, Galatians 3:19 in whom this universal way, thrown open to all nations for the deliverance of the soul, might be found, he was ordered to leave his country, and kindred, and father's house. Then was he himself, first of all, delivered from the Chald an superstitions, and by his obedience worshipped the one true God, whose promises he faithfully trusted. This is the universal way, of which it is said in holy prophecy, God be merciful unto us, and bless us, and cause His face to shine upon us; that Your way may be known upon earth, Your saving health among all nations. And hence, when our Saviour, so long after, had taken flesh of the seed of Abraham, He says of Himself, I am the way, the truth, and the life. John 14:6 This is the universal way, of which so long before it had been predicted, And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow unto it. And many people shall go and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for out of Sion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. Isaiah 2:2-3 This way, therefore, is not the property of one, but of all nations. The law and the word of the Lord did not remain in Zion and Jerusalem, but issued thence to be universally diffused. And therefore the Mediator Himself, after His resurrection, says to His alarmed disciples, These are the words which I spoke unto you while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning me. Then opened He their understandings that they might understand the Scriptures, and said to them, Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead the third day: and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. Luke 24:44-47 This is the universal way of the soul's deliverance, which the holy angels and the holy prophets formerly disclosed where they could among the few men who found the grace of God, and especially in the Hebrew nation, whose commonwealth was, as it were, consecrated to prefigure and fore-announce the city of God which was to be gathered from all nations, by their tabernacle, and temple, and priesthood, and sacrifices. In some explicit statements, and in many obscure foreshadowings, this way was declared; but latterly came the Mediator Himself in the flesh, and His blessed apostles, revealing how the grace of the New Testament more openly explained what had been obscurely hinted to preceding generations, in conformity with the relation of the ages of the human race, and as it pleased God in His wisdom to appoint, who also bore them witness with signs and miracles some of which I have cited above. For not only were there visions of angels, and words heard from those heavenly ministrants, but also men of God, armed with the word of simple piety, cast out unclean spirits from the bodies and senses of men, and healed deformities and sicknesses; the wild beasts of earth and sea, the birds of air, iimate things, the elements, the stars, obeyed their divine commands; the powers of hell gave way before them, the dead were restored to life. I say nothing of the miracles peculiar and proper to the Saviour's own person, especially the nativity and the resurrection; in the one of which He wrought only the mystery of a virgin maternity, while in the other He furnished an instance of the resurrection which all shall at last experience. This way purifies the whole man, and prepares the mortal in all his parts for immortality. For, to prevent us from seeking for one purgation for the part which Porphyry calls intellectual, and another for the part he calls spiritual, and another for the body itself, our most mighty and truthful Purifier and Saviour assumed the whole human nature. Except by this way, which has been present among men both during the period of the promises and of the proclamation of their fulfillment, no man has been delivered, no man is delivered, no man shall be delivered. As to Porphyry's statement that the universal way of the soul's deliverance had not yet come to his knowledge by any acquaintance he had with history, I would ask, what more remarkable history can be found than that which has taken possession of the whole world by its authoritative voice? Or what more trustworthy than that which narrates past events, and predicts the future with equal clearness, and in the unfulfilled predictions of which we are constrained to believe by those that are already fulfilled? For neither Porphyry nor any Platonists can despise divination and prediction, even of things that pertain to this life and earthly matters, though they justly despise ordinary soothsaying and the divination that is connected with magical arts. They deny that these are the predictions of great men, or are to be considered important, and they are right; for they are founded, either on the foresight of subsidiary causes, as to a professional eye much of the course of a disease is foreseen by certain pre-monitory symptoms, or the unclean demons predict what they have resolved to do, that they may thus work upon the thoughts and desires of the wicked with an appearance of authority, and incline human frailty to imitate their impure actions. It is not such things that the saints who walk in the universal way care to predict as important, although, for the purpose of commending the faith, they knew and often predicted even such things as could not be detected by human observation, nor be readily verified by experience. But there were other truly important and divine events which they predicted, in so far as it was given them to know the will of God. For the incarnation of Christ, and all those important marvels that were accomplished in Him, and done in His name; the repentance of men and the conversion of their wills to God; the remission of sins, the grace of righteousness, the faith of the pious, and the multitudes in all parts of the world who believe in the true divinity; the overthrow of idolatry and demon worship, and the testing of the faithful by trials; the purification of those who persevered, and their deliverance from all evil; the day of judgment, the resurrection of the dead, the eternal damnation of the community of the ungodly, and the eternal kingdom of the most glorious city of God, ever-blessed in the enjoyment of the vision of God - these things were predicted and promised in the Scriptures of this way; and of these we see so many fulfilled, that we justly and piously trust that the rest will also come to pass. As for those who do not believe, and consequently do not understand, that this is the way which leads straight to the vision of God and to eternal fellowship with Him, according to the true predictions and statements of the Holy Scriptures, they may storm at our position, but they cannot storm it. And therefore, in these ten books, though not meeting, I dare say, the expectation of some, yet I have, as the true God and Lord has vouchsafed to aid me, satisfied the desire of certain persons, by refuting the objections of the ungodly, who prefer their own gods to the Founder of the holy city, about which we undertook to speak. of these ten books, the first five were directed against those who think we should worship the gods for the sake of the blessings of this life, and the second five against those who think we should worship them for the sake of the life which is to be after death. And now, in fulfillment of the promise I made in the first book, I shall go on to say, as God shall aid me, what I think needs to be said regarding the origin, history, and deserved ends of the two cities, which, as already remarked, are in this world commingled and implicated with one another. <" "
19.23 For in his book called &" None |
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23. None, None, nan (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, Porphyrys view of
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 235; Simmons(1995), Arnobius of Sicca: Religious Conflict and Competition in the Age of Diocletian, 28
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24. None, None, nan (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: DeMarco, (2021), Augustine and Porphyry: A Commentary on De ciuitate Dei 10, 172; Wilson (2018), Augustine's Conversion from Traditional Free Choice to "Non-free Free Will": A Comprehensive Methodology, 254
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25. None, None, nan (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, according to Eunapius
Found in books: Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 356, 361, 368, 370; Niccolai (2023), Christianity, Philosophy, and Roman Power: Constantine, Julian, and the Bishops on Exegesis and Empire. 293, 295; Omeara (2005), Platonopolis: Platonic Political Philosophy in Late Antiquity 16; Zanker (1996), The Mask of Socrates: The Image of the Intellectual in Antiquity, 288, 308, 309
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26. None, None, nan (4th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus as Pythagorean/on Pythagoreanism • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus on contemplation (theôria, θεωρία) • Iamblichus on music • Iamblichus, • Iamblichus, as source for Pythagoreanism • foundational myth of Iamblichus • theurgy in Iamblichus
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 407; Fowler (2014), Plato in the Third Sophistic, 64; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 325; Wolfsdorf (2020), Early Greek Ethics, 570; Xenophontos and Marmodoro (2021), The Reception of Greek Ethics in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 47, 70, 77; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 170, 213, 234
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27. None, None, nan (5th cent. CE - 6th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus on virtues • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Joosse (2021), Olympiodorus of Alexandria: Exegete, Teacher, Platonic Philosopher, 56; Xenophontos and Marmodoro (2021), The Reception of Greek Ethics in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 70, 73; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 263
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28. None, None, nan (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus
Found in books: Joosse (2021), Olympiodorus of Alexandria: Exegete, Teacher, Platonic Philosopher, 211; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 302; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 32, 33
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29. None, None, nan (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus introduction of triads • Iamblichus on causality • Iamblichus on emanation • Iamblichus on vehicle (of the soul)(ochêma, ὄχημα)
Found in books: Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 149, 155; Tanaseanu-Döbler and von Alvensleben (2020), Athens II: Athens in Late Antiquity, 328; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 55, 68, 69, 134
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30. None, None, nan (5th cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 549; Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 192; Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 202, 217, 226, 232, 233, 235, 244
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31. None, None, nan (6th cent. CE - 6th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus on music • Iamblichus, as source for Pythagoreanism
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 407; Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 235; Fowler (2014), Plato in the Third Sophistic, 90; Wolfsdorf (2020), Early Greek Ethics, 570; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 289
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32. None, None, nan (missingth cent. CE - 5th cent. CE)
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 400; Erler et al. (2021), Authority and Authoritative Texts in the Platonist Tradition, 178
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33. None, None, nan
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Dillon and Timotin (2015), Platonic Theories of Prayer, 174; Edmonds (2019), Drawing Down the Moon: Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World, 359
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34. None, None, nan
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus • Iamblichus influence on Proclus • Iamblichus,
Found in books: Corrigan and Rasimus (2013), Gnosticism, Platonism and the Late Ancient World, 555; Motta and Petrucci (2022), Isagogical Crossroads from the Early Imperial Age to the End of Antiquity, 93, 107; Xenophontos and Marmodoro (2021), The Reception of Greek Ethics in Late Antiquity and Byzantium, 47, 49, 70; d'Hoine and Martijn (2017), All From One: A Guide to Proclus, 32, 112
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35. None, None, nan
Tagged with subjects: • Iamblichus
Found in books: Cornelli (2013), In Search of Pythagoreanism: Pythagoreanism as an Historiographical Category, 57; Pevarello (2013), The Sentences of Sextus and the Origins of Christian Ascetiscism. 154
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