Plotinus on the Ineffable and the Transcendent

17 April 2024

Plotinus on the Ineffable and the Transcendent

I’m posting three quotes from Ennead V.3, “On the Knowing Hypostases” that are found in different parts of this Ennead.  After each quote I will give the page number and the translator; at the conclusion of these quotes I will give the full bibliographic reference.

First Quote

“It (the One) must not be one of the things before which it is, and you are not to call it Intellect (Nous, Mind): not even the Good, then: no, not even this if ‘the Good’ means one of all things; but if it means that which is before all things, let the name stand.  If, then, Intellect (Nous) is Intellect because it is multiple, and thinking itself, even if it derives from Intellect, is a kind of internal occurrence which makes it many, that which is absolutely simple and first of all things must be beyond Intellect.  And certainly if it is going to think, it will not be beyond Intellect, but will be Intellect; but if it is Intellect, it (the One) itself will be multiplicity.” (Armstrong, page 111)

“Thus we come, once more, to a Being above the Intellectual-Principle and, since the sequent amounts to no less than the All, we recognize, again, a Being above the All.  This assuredly cannot be one of the things to which it is prior.  We may not call it Intellect; therefore, too, we may not call it the Good, if the Good is to be taken in the sense of some one member of the universe; if we mean that which precedes the universe of things, the name may be allowed.

“The Intellectual-Principle is established in multiplicity; its intellection, self-sprung thought it be, is in the nature of something added to it (some accidental dualism) and makes it multiple: the utterly simplex, and therefore first of all beings, must, then transcend the Intellectual-Principle; and, obviously, if this had intellection it would no longer transcend the Intellectual-Principle but be it, and at once be a multiple.” (McKenna, page 451)

Second Quote

“It is, therefore, truly ineffable; for whatever you say about it, you will always be speaking of a ‘something’.  But ‘beyond all things and beyond the supreme majesty of Intellect’ is the only one of all the ways of speaking of it which is true; it is not its name, but says that it is not one of all things and ‘has no name’, because we can say nothing of it: we only try, as far as possible, to make signs to ourselves about it.”  (Armstrong, page 117)

“Thus The One is in truth beyond all statement: any affirmation is of a thing; but ‘all-transcending, resting above even the most august divine Mind’ – this is the only true description, since it does not make it a thing among things, nor name it where no name could identify it: we can but try to indicate, in our own feeble way, something concerning it.”  (MacKenna, page 452)

Third Quote

“How then do we ourselves speak about it (the One)?  We do indeed say something about it, but we certainly do not speak it, and we have neither knowledge or thought of it.  But if we do not have it in knowledge, do we not have it at all?  But we have it in such a way that we speak about it, but do not speak it.  For we say what it is not, but we do not say what it is: so that we speak about it from what comes after it.  But we are not prevented from having it, even if we do not speak it.”  (Armstrong, page 121)

“How, then, do we ourselves come to be speaking of it?

“No doubt we deal with it, but we do not state it; we have neither knowledge nor intellection of it.

“But in what sense do we even deal with it when we have no hold upon it?

“We do not, it is true, grasp it by knowledge, but that does not mean that we are utterly void of it; we hold it not so as to state it, but so as to be able to speak about it.  And we can and do state what it is not, while we are silent as to what it is: we are, in fact, speaking of it in the light of its sequels; unable to state it, we may still possess it.”  (MacKenna, pages 453 and 454)

(Plotinus, Ennead V.3, On the Knowing Hypostases, translated by A. H. Armstrong, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, 1984, page numbers follow the quotations above, ISBN: 9780674994898)

(Plotinus, The Enneads, Ennead V.3, The Knowing Hypostases, translated by Stephen MacKenna, Larson Publications, Burdett, New York, 1992, page numbers follow the quotations above, ISBN: 9780943914558)

1.  In footnotes, Armstrong refers readers to the first hypothesis of Plato’s Dialogue, Parmenides as a source for Plotinus’s thoughts about the transcendence of the One beyond Intellect, or Nous.  Armstrong also writes in a footnote on page 110, “Intellect only constitutes itself as Intellect because it eternally falls short in its endeavour to reach the one and there is perpetually in need of and perpetually desires the One.”

I understand this footnote, and the quotes, to mean that the One is a complete, or full, unity, whereas Intellect, or Nous, is not.  This is because Nous is differentiated into aspects; the three primal aspects are Being, Life, and Mind (also Nous, or Intellect).  From these three primal differentiations all further Noetic differentiations flow.

2.  The ascent to Nous is done through purification and the practices of asceticism; that is to say the turning away from sensory experience, including mental experience.  Noetic realities lack specific, that is to say differentiated, content; Noetic realities are the empty vessel in which material content can arise.

The ascent to the One is done through turning away from Noetic differentiation to the unified source from which Noetic differentiations arise.  The turning away is the same in both instances: turning away from sensory experience and turning away from Noetic realities.  But the results differ.  The result of ascending to the Noetic is clarity regarding realities of the cosmos, such as Being and so forth.  The result of ascending to the One is beyond clarity; it is beyond light and darkness, it is both light and dark.

We can speak about Noetic realities, but we can only analogize that which is fully unified and fully transcendent.

3.  “. . . but if it means that which is before all things, let the name stand.”  Here Plotinus is referring to the name ‘The Good.’  But this principle would apply to any of the terms we commonly use when talking about the ultimate, such as: the Good, the One, the Beautiful, the Eternal, and so forth. 

This is not easy to do.  Our mind (small ‘m’) has the habit, a very strong habit, of taking a name in a non-transcendental way.  If I say ‘the store’ I am communicating a material reality.  If I say ‘I feel happy’ I am communicating a psychological reality.  But if I say ‘The One’ I am talking about a reality that has no sensory or mental mark.  I think that without having some experience in contemplation this is hard to understand.

4.  A couple of decades ago I became aware of just how difficult it is for people to understand what is being asked for in contemplation.  I have attended various meditation groups for many years.  I was involved with a group that practiced ‘interior silence.’  After an hour of silence people would share insights.  Often I would hear someone say, “Today I was thinking about . . . “ as a description of their contemplation.  Even though the literature of the tradition explicitly says that contemplation is not time for thinking, the kind of response I quoted was the most frequent report of what was happening.

It took some time, but I began to realize that people are so busy with activities, commitments, and obligations that many do not have even ten minutes in their lives to just think about their lives, their situation.  For such people, and I think they are the vast majority, the opportunity to sit in silence and discursively think about their lives and their situation was highly unusual, so unusual that it felt like a kind of divine blessing, or even a divine intervention.

I sympathize.  On the other hand, Plotinus and the mystical tradition that flows from the Platonic tradition, are suggesting something else.

5.  It is a rare gift to have the path to ultimacy, the Good, the One, and the Beautiful, laid out so clearly, to encounter writing that is rooted in that experience.  I think of that gift as a grace, though I know some people don’t like the use of the term ‘grace.’  But I am comfortable with it.  Understanding The Enneads as a gift and a grace helps me to rededicate myself to the ascetic practices that allow for reaching the source of that gift and that grace.  

6.  Addendum: After reading these passages as translated by Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie I have decided to include them, for the purpose of comparison.  I am aware of the criticisms of Guthrie's translation which was the first complete translation of Plotinus into English; I understand it was published about 1917.  To be fair to Guthrie, most criticisms of his translation point out that there did not exist at that time the kind of critical text that later translators, such as MacKenna, Armstrong, and Gerson et al, had available.  Other criticisms suggest that Guthrie relied on Latin, or French, translations of some of Plotinus's terms so that, in effect, at times the Latin, or French, overpowers the Greek (that's my interpretation of the criticism; not being a scholar myself I may have misunderstood).  

On the other hand, Guthrie was a mystic who practiced contemplation.  (I used to own a manual of contemplation that he wrote but gave it away when I moved and I can't remember the title at this time.)  Guthrie had a wide ranging interest in other mystical writings of that time including Apollonius of Tyana and Porphyry, among others.  I think this, and his practice of contemplation, may give his translation a perspective, or an emphasis, on this experiential dimension that may be absent from other translations.  And over time I have found myself more at ease with his approach to Plotinus.  So here are the three passages as translated by Guthrie for your consideration:

6.1.  ". . . as Unity thus is anterior to universal things, it cannot be any one of them.  Therefore, it should not be called either intelligence or good, if by 'good' you mean any object comprised within the universe; this name suits it only, if it indicate that it is anterior to everything.  If Intelligence be intelligence only because it is manifold; if thought, though found within Intelligence, be similarly manifold, then the First, the Principle that is absolutely simple, will be above Intelligence; for if He think, He would be Intelligence; and if He be Intelligence, He would be manifold." (page 575)

6.2.  "This Principle, therefore, is really indescribable.  We are individualizing it in any statement about it.  That which is above everything, even above the venerable Intelligence, really has no name, and all that we can state about Him is, that He is not anything.  Nor can He be given any name, since we cannot assert anything about Him.  We refer to Him only as best we can." (page 576)

6.3.  "How then do we speak of Him?  Because we can assert something about Him, though we cannot express Him by speech.  We could not know Him, nor grasp Him by thought.  How then do we speak of Him, if we cannot grasp Him?  Because though He does escape our knowledge, He does not escape us completely.  We grasp Him enough to assert something about Him without expressing Him himself, to say what He is not, without saying what He is; that is why in speaking of Him we use terms that are suitable to designate only lower things." (page 577)

(Plotinus, Complete Works in Chronological Order, Ennead V.3, The Self-Consciousnesses, and What is Above Them, translated by Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie, 1918, reprinted by Kshetra Books, 2017, ISBN: 9781974518968)