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2 results

  • Chapter 3 - ‘Revelation’ for Christians and Pagans and Its Philosophical Allegoresis

  • from Part I - Philosophical Perspectives on Divination, Revelation, and Prophecy
  • Edited by Elsa Giovanna Simonetti, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, Belgium, Claire Hall, University of Durham
  • Book:
    Divination and Revelation in Later Antiquity
    Published online:
    19 October 2023
    Print publication:
    02 November 2023, pp 49-72

  • Summary

    This chapter first investigates the meaning of ‘revelation’ in ancient Christianity and ancient non-Jewish and non-Christian religions, especially in ‘pagan’ Platonism of the early imperial period. ‘Revelation’ was characterised by the stress on authoritative sources of revealed knowledge (e.g., the Bible, the Chaldaean Oracles). The objective is to argue that ‘pagan’ Platonists faithful to Plato (and commenting just on Plato) cannot be simplistically opposed to Jewish or Christian Platonists faithful to the Bible (and commenting exclusively on the Bible). The chapter examines how philosophical allegoresis was applied by Stoics and Platonists – ‘pagan’, Jewish, and Christian Platonists – to their authoritative texts and revelations. This study provides an accurate examination of the conceptual and methodological intersections between the works of ‘pagan’ and Christian Platonists, and points to cases that break the binary between ‘pagan’ commentaries on ‘pagan’ authoritative texts and Christian commentaries on Scripture. It will also suggest that Amelius commented on the Prologue of John in light of his previous knowledge of Origen’s Commentary.

  • 17 - Plotinus

  • from III - Plotinus and the new Platonism
  • Edited by Lloyd P. Gerson, University of Toronto
  • Book:
    The Cambridge History of Philosophy in Late Antiquity
    Published online:
    28 May 2011
    Print publication:
    01 January 2000, pp 301-324

  • Summary

    Plotinus was assisted by Amelius and Porphyry in dealing with the criticisms of him coming from Greece and with the more subversive threat to some members of the school represented by Gnosticism. The author suggests the movement of thought whereby Plotinus came upon and explored some of the ideas characteristic of his philosophy. The brief sketch of Plotinus' theory of first principles raises many questions, some of which are discussed. One of these questions concerns the sense and way in which Intellect is constituted from the One, Soul from Intellect, and the world from Soul. In later Platonism, however, the formalism of scholastic structures and the recourse to other means of ascent, such as theurgy, considerably reshaped Plotinus' approach. The way for the soul to reach the Good in Christian theology would follow other paths than those afforded by the study of Plato and the practices of pagan religion.