The Great Learning

18 January 2023

The Great Learning

“The knowledge or touching of the Good is the greatest thing, and Plato says it is the ‘greatest study’, not calling the looking at it a 'study', but learning about it beforehand.  We are taught about it by comparisons and negations and knowledge of the things which come from it and certain methods of ascent by degrees, but we are put on the way to it by purifications and virtues and adornings and by gaining footholds in the intelligible and settling ourselves firmly there and feasting on its contents.”

(Plotinus, Ennead VI.7.36, Plotinus Ennead VI.6.9, translated by A. H. Armstrong, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1988, page 199, ISBN: 9780674995154)

“’Certainly, he said [a worthy thought],; however, as to what is the most important study and what you mean by it, do you think anyone could let you off without asking what it is?’

“’Certainly not,” I said, ‘go ahead and ask me yourself.  At any rate you have heard it quite a few times, but now either you don’t understand, or more likely your intention is to cause me problems by your objections!  However, I rather think it’s the latter since in fact you have often heard that the Form of the Good is the most important thing to learn, in relation to which “just” and other such terms become useful and beneficial.  And now you know more or less that this is what I’m going to say, and that, in addition, we don’t know it adequately.  But if we don’t know it, you know that, even if we were to understand everything else as fully as possible, nothing is of any use to us without this notion, any more than we could acquire anything without the Good.  Or do you think there is any advantage in having gained every possession, apart from the Good?  Or to hold everything in high regard without the Good, but have no regard for anything beautiful and good?’

“’By Zeus, I certainly do not!’ he exclaimed.”

(Plato, The Republic, Book VI, 504e and 505a&b, Plato VI, Republic Books 6-10, translated by Chris Emlyn-Jones and William Preddy, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2013, pages 77-79, ISBN: 9780674996519, brackets inserted by translators)

 

1.  This is another example of the clarity of Plotinus’s writing.  (As an aside, I have read a lot of spiritual works in a variety of traditions, and my experience is that there is no writer of greater, or even equal, clarity to Plotinus.  I know some will disagree with this, and it isn’t a view I came to right away, or upon first reading Plotinus.  But over time that is the overall sense I have of The Enneads.)  Plotinus points out that we are taught about the Good through comparisons and negations and knowledge of the things which come from it and certain methods of ascent by degrees.

‘Comparisons’ means analogies, allegories, metaphors, and those types of communication.  (Some translations, such as MacKenna, use the word ‘analogies’ instead of comparisons.)  This touches on a point I have made previously and that has slowly grown as I become more familiar with, more at home with Platonic sources.  Namely, that allegory, analogy, metaphor, or ‘comparisons’ are a primary means whereby Platonism communicates its view and its understandings to others.  There is a tendency among moderns to pick out the passages that resemble modern analysis and think of these as primary to Platonism.  My view is that these passages are secondary, or even tertiary.  Logical analysis is done for the purpose of unpacking the meaning of an allegory or other comparison; analysis is in the service of the comparisons rather than the comparisons emerging from the analyses.  There is, I think, a reason for this: and that is that the Good, or the One, is beyond concepts, beyond name and form, is deathless and unborn, and because of this, comparisons, and devices such as allegory and metaphor, are the only means human intellect has for referring to, and talking about, the Good.

‘Negations’ refers to the via negativa, or negative way, found in Plato and Plotinus.  In Plato scholars say that this is most specifically laid out in the dialogue Parmenides.  The idea is that the mystical ascent to the Good and the One is accomplished by negating appearances and mental constructs.  This approach strongly influenced Christianity and Christian mysticism through the Mystical Theology of Dionysius the Areopagite which seems to rely on Plato’s Parmenides.  (The negative way is also found in Dharmic traditions.)

‘Knowledge of the things which come from it and certain methods of ascent by degrees’ refers to the three primary hypostases and how they relate to each other; in other words, the metaphysical structure of the emanated cosmos.

2.  I see these three topics (comparisons, negations, and knowledge of the hypostases and their relationships) as the kind of thing that one would talk about in a class, a kind of Platonism 101.  I think Plotinus is telling us that these are the topics to lecture on, particularly for new students.

After a student gets some clarity about these topics, then we move on to entering the way through a collection of spiritual practices.

3.  Plotinus moves from topics that give a student a sense of overall structure to actual spiritual practices, naming specifically purifications, virtues, adornings, gaining footholds in the intelligible (the nous, or the world of forms), settling, and feasting.

‘Purifications’ refers to the ascetic ideal and its three main practices: vegetarianism (and veganism), refraining from alcohol and, by extension, drugs that cloud the mind, and sexual restraint (including living a chaste, celibate, life).  I believe these are mentioned first by Plotinus because they are foundational.  A good essay on the nature and function of purifications is found in the book Pure by Mark Anderson, in the title essay, the last one in the book.

‘Virtues’ refers to the standard virtue ethics shared by most philosophical traditions in the Classical World.  Porphyry is particularly good at explaining these ethical virtues and their function in a Platonic context.

‘Adornings’; to be honest, I’m not clear about what ‘adornings’ refers to.  MacKenna seems to translate this with ‘right ordering’, but that isn’t very clear to me either.  Speculating, I wonder if ‘adornings’ refers to experiences that help students retain their commitment to the Platonic Way.  These experiences can be as simple as a growing sense of clarity where one was previously confused, or they might be more traditionally ‘mystical’, such as experiencing a sense of oneness, or having a direct experience of the noetic realm.  Or they may refer to a growing sense of, for example, bodily health and balance which was referred to in the story of the Senator who abandoned his decadent life for a life of philosophy and through dedication to the ascetic ideal experienced an increase in his health and overall wellbeing.  But I am speculating here; if any reader has insight on this, please post in the comments or contact me directly.

‘Gaining footholds in the intelligible (the nous)’:  It is possible to have an experience of the realm of forms.  This is done through contemplation.  Having such an experience, even if it is very brief, is ‘gaining a foothold’ in nous (the second hypostasis often translated as the Intelligible, sometimes translated as Mind or Spirit).  Contemplation is not mentioned in the list Plotinus has in the quoted passage, but I believe it is inferred in this context.

“Settling”:  I think Plotinus means by “settling” what some Buddhist traditions mean by ‘stabilization’.  The experience of the noetic is stabilized when we routinely begin to perceive the material world as an emanation from the nous. 

“Feasting”:  I believe Plotinus uses the metaphor of feasting (which takes us back to the topic of ‘comparisons’) as a reference to how the experience of the noetic nourishes our spiritual life and, possibly, lives.  It is like participating in a feast for the gods, with nectar, ambrosia, and abundant food for the soul.  And most importantly, such feasting nourishes us for the divine, and final, ascent to The One.

4.  Above I said that the student advances on the ascent ‘after’ the introductory topics.  But in thinking further about it, I suspect that these insights and practices and experiences are often undertaken in a manner that mixes them up.  I think that was true in my own case.  Still, I think there is some virtue in laying them out in a sequential manner.  For example, Anderson in his essay Pure makes a good case for how purification practices are foundational for further journeying on the path.  As long as we don’t put these topics, insights, practices, and experiences in an inflexible series there should be no problem.  (As an aside, I think past lives will have a significant influence in this context.)

5.  The quote from The Republic assists us in understanding the importance of following this Platonic Way and engaging in the rigorous practices that end in the Good and the One.  It is because all things flow from, and participate, in the One.  The return to the One means to return to the source, it means to understand why there are things and not nothing, it means to no longer dwell in a realm of shadows, it means to dwell in the light of the deathless and unborn, in the light of the eternal.