Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 5

14 February 2024

Brief Notes on Various Topics --5

1.  John Peter Kenney in his book Mystical Monotheism suggests that Plotinus advocated for an ineffable One as a way of countering the infinite regress implied in some versions of earlier Platonism; most of those versions were derived from the Plato’s Parmenides.  I don’t see it that way.  Plotinus’s apophatic approach to the One is derived from his contemplative experience rather than from an analysis of inferential systems. 

David J. Yount in his book Plotinus the Platonist understands this; for example, “I believe Plotinus had the same experience or vision of the Good that Plato did, and so their philosophies come out sounding, if not being, the same.  However, it is not because Plato wrote what he did that Plotinus agrees with it; Plotinus agrees with it because he achieved knowledge of the Good; thus Plato wrote what he did because he also had the experience of the Good.”  (Page xxiii)  And later Yount writes, “. . . it is my unprovable contention that Plotinus exited Plato’s Cave, saw the Good and described it in as much detail as he and his listeners had time to question and investigate – everything from the shadows on the wall to the Good Itself.” (page xxix) I would add, that I think that Yount’s view is provable if you walk the Way of Platonism long enough and enter into contemplation long enough; ‘long enough’ in this context means something like ‘many years.’

2.  I often compare Platonism to Dharmic traditions from India because I think Platonism has more in common with Dharmic traditions than it does with what philosophy has become in modernity.  Lately I have been comparing Platonism to Confucianism.  Points to consider include that rather undefined nature of ultimacy in both systems.  In Platonism the One is ineffable.  In Confucianism Heaven is mentioned, but it is not an idea that is unpacked in detail; it is rather an influential reality.  Heaven isn’t quite apophatic in a Plotinian sense; on the other hand, Heaven isn’t specified in any detail.

Another similarity is that the Confucian Sage is dedicated to the Way of the Scholar Sage; in a Confucian context this means the study of the Confucian Classics such as the Analects and the Book of Rites and the Book of Poetry, and so forth.  I think it is possible to map onto Platonism some aspects of the Way of the Scholar Sage such as the dedicated reading and study of the Platonic Classics, specifically the Dialogues and the Enneads.

Though it is not generally understood in the West, Confucianism has a contemplative dimension.  This dimension is also present in Platonism.

Two big differences are, first, that the Confucian Sage regards serving the State as a noble calling.  In contrast, the Platonic Sage is not inherently drawn to such service.  And second, Confucianism is not an ascetic tradition, though it does have strong ethical commitments that might, in our hedonistic time, be thought of as unnecessarily restrictive.  But asceticism is central to Platonism, it is a primary form of practice.

3.  I’ve been thinking about why I spend time comparing Platonism to non-Western spiritual systems.  I think I am motivated to do so because Western Philosophy has evolved in a manner that makes it almost impossible to understand Platonism if you only view Platonism through the lens of contemporary, or modernist, Western Philosophy.  If I were to focus on a single absence in modernist Western Philosophy it would be that there is no understanding of Philosophy as salvific; the very idea of Philosophy as salvific sounds strange in a contemporary philosophical context.  In contrast, Dharmic traditions, and a tradition like Confucianism, view their philosophical studies as leading to salvation and the overcoming of negative metaphysically rooted conditions and situations.  For this reason I feel a need to link Platonism to, especially, Dharmic traditions, and other spiritual traditions in an attempt to explain what Platonism is about.

4.  I’ve posted several times about the topic of evil recently.  In a book by Eric Fallick, a contemporary Platonist practitioner, there is an essay, Some Thoughts on the Great Problems of Manyness and Evil.  Here is a quote;

“How and why can there be more than the One, especially when everything else is a descent from Its perfection?  How and why do many things come from the One?  Even more incomprehensible, how can evil, which is so evident and undeniable, arise from the Good Itself, and why should this be so?  Indeed, compared to the One Itself, just the existence of anything else, even of those things we ordinarily describe as good, is evil in itself just as those things being other than the Good!  Why are they then, and how can this be so?  Why did our souls descend in the first place and the beginningless cycles of birth and death, genesis, samsara begin?  These sorts of questions, and related variants according to different systems, have been considered and answered by many different people in many different systems of many varieties.  No answer has satisfied everyone and perhaps there is no answer but to realize union with the Absolute through diligent contemplative ascetic practice, at which point both the question and the questioner cease or, to put it another way, the answer is obvious.”

(Eric Fallick, Platonist Contemplative Asceticism: Practice and Principle, published by lulu-dot-com, 2019, pages 164 and 165, ISBN: 9780359773015)

Some things are answered only through practice.  I think this is true even in mundane activities.  For example, an instructor might tell an aspiring musician to hold his hands in a particular way around the instrument.  For the student this position may seem awkward or counterintuitive.  Later on, though, as he becomes more skilled, he finds out that this hand position allows for skillful performance of many pieces of music.  The analogy has some flaws, but I think you get what I’m saying. 

5.  Beautiful things in this world are like the sound of a bell.  They are attractive like the sound of a bell.  They arise due to causes and conditions like the sound of a bell.  The sound of a bell endures and then fades, just like beautiful things endure and then fade.

The beauty of the sound of a bell is the beauty of the noetic and the One manifesting in the dimension of time.  And this is true for all beautiful things.  But noetic beauty is Beauty as Such and does not fade because it transcends time.  Following the beauty of the sound of a bell back to its noetic source and we find ourselves in the presence of eternity.