Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 6

17 February 2024

Brief Notes on Various Topics – 6

1.  I’ve been reading Ennead III.9, Against the Gnostics.  One of the criticisms Plotinus makes of the Gnostics is that they unnecessarily generate elaborations; that is to say their system is unnecessarily complex.  “So we must not go after other first principles but put this first, and then after it Intellect, that which primally thinks, and then Soul after Intellect (for this is the order which corresponds to the nature of things): and we must not posit more principles than these in the intelligible world, or fewer.”

(Plotinus, Ennead II.9, Against the Gnostics, translated by A. H. Armstrong, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1966, pages 225-227, ISBN: 9780674994867)

A comment like this inclines me to think that Platonism isn’t really complex.  I think the difficulty people have accessing Platonism has more to do with its specialized vocabulary and that its intuitions, such as the transcendental, run counter to the dominant contemporary culture. 

2.  There is a tendency among some spiritual traditions to attempt to force, or even coerce, people into awakening.  The role of the teacher from this perspective is to disrupt mechanical habits that block access to the awakened state.  This way of looking at spirituality justifies sometimes very dramatic or very aggressive behaviors on the part of the teacher.  It is my observation that the results of teachers acting from this view are often damaging.  The analogy I like to use is that it is as if a gardener, in order to make a plant blossom, yelled at the plant, slapped the plant, kicked the plant, and otherwise tried to order the plant to bloom.  But the plant has its own schedule and will blossom when it is ready.

In contrast to this approach are teachers who nourish the souls of their students; this resembles a gardener watering, fertilizing, trimming, and otherwise caring for the plants in the gardener’s garden.  Socrates could be confrontative, but he was not humiliating.  And in many ways he cared for and nourished his students’ souls.  And this is how I see teachers of Platonism behaving.

3.  Plotinus compares awakening to a sunrise.  In other words, awakening appears when it is timely for it to do so.

4.  One thing that my long journey to Platonism has shown me is that I have what I call ‘blind spots.’  I don’t think I’m unique in this regard.  I say this based on my experience with the dialogue Phaedo.  I first read Phaedo in college as an undergraduate.  I completely missed the teachings on asceticism and rebirth; I mean that it was as if I didn’t even see them even though I read the whole book.  In fairness to myself, the teacher ignored these teachings and focused on other aspects such as the logical structure of arguments found in the dialogue which left me with the impression that Plato was a kind of ancient rationalist. 

It came to me as a big surprise when, decades later, I reread Phaedo and discovered these teachings on rebirth and asceticism.  By then I had studied Buddhism for many years and I was open to such teachings because of this.  In other words, the lens of my mind had changed.

I think one of the reasons that we often miss spiritual teachings that are clearly presented is that we tend to go to spiritual works to find support for opinions we already hold; in other words, I think we kind of scan a spiritual book, looking for teachings that already confirm what we hold to be true.  This way of reading a spiritual work effectively blocks access to ideas and practices that could undermine, or change, views we already have.

One antidote to this tendency is repetition; to read a spiritual book several times.  Often when this is done things that we unconsciously blocked the first time around move into the foreground.  Another antidote is to discuss the book with others who do not share your own viewpoint; this can be in a class situation, but it is better, I think, to share this kind of conversation with a good spiritual friend.

5.  I don’t recall much discussion about solitude in Platonist works.  That doesn’t mean it isn’t there, but solitude doesn’t seem to have a strong emphasis.  For example, in Phaedo there are sections that talk about the life of a philosopher and a life of solitude is not one of the things that is emphasized.  The suggestions for a philosophical life in Platonism lead, I think, to a relative solitude because you will not be aligning yourself with what ordinary people do.  For example, if you are restrained regarding eating and drinking alcohol, or  if you have abandoned drinking alcohol altogether, this cuts off a large number of social interactions.  And similarly for the other kinds of ethical restraints that are explicitly mentioned.  I think it would be a good idea to explore the role that solitude might have in a Platonic context.