Brief Notes on Various Topics - 92

13 April 2026

Brief Notes on Various Topics - 92

1.  The First Principle’s Presence

“Everything imitates the principle according to its capacity by tending towards eternity and goodness.”

(Plotinus, The Enneads, Ennead 5.4.1, Second Edition, edited by Lloyd Gerson, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2025, page 582, ISBN: 978009604970)

“. . . all [things are] imitating the First Principle as far as they are able by tending to everlastingness and generosity.”

(Plotinus, The Enneads, Ennead 5.4.1, That Which is after the First, translated by A. H. Armstrong, Loeb Classical Library, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1984, page 143, ISBN: 9780674994898)

“. . . all things to the utmost of their power imitate the Source in some operation tending to eternity and to service.”

“Plotinus, The Enneads, Enneads 5.4.1, The Secondaries and the First, translated by Stephen MacKenna, Larson Publications, Burdett, New York, 1992, page 461, ISBN: 978943914558)

1.1  There are single sentences in Plotinus that are exquisite, filled with meaning and beauty.  This is one of those sentences.

1.2  In the clause closing the sentence before the one quoted Plotinus refers to fire warming things, to snow cooling things.  And then he moves into a generalization from this observation to an insight about ‘all things’.  That insight is that all things are imitating the nature of the ultimate in accordance with their specific, limited, nature. 

How are things imitating ultimate nature?  By generation, by productive activity.  Fire is hot and the heat of fire produces warmth in objects that are near it.  Snow is cold and the coldness of snow cools those things close to it.  I take these to be analogies to how The One overflows and creates, emanates, generates, the world.  When looked at in this way we can sense the presence of the One even in ordinary material things.  This brings the highest metaphysics of Plotinus down to the material realm so that the material realm is not isolated, or separate from, the transcendental.  The transcendental and the material are not the same, but they are related in a manner that, once recognized, assists the philosopher in his journey of ascent to the Good and the One.

1.3  I view the phrase ‘eternity and goodness’ as a way of saying the One and the Good.  Here I would say that ‘eternity’ is a way of speaking about the One.  The One is ultimately ineffable, but there are names for the One that are used to communicate with each other about this transcendental reality.

Frequently in the Enneads ‘eternity’ or ‘the eternal’ is used to refer to the noetic, the second hypostasis, rather than the One.  It is not unusual for Plotinus to use terms that subtly change their meaning depending on which level, or hypostasis, Plotinus is referring to.  And Plotinus does not always signal a shift of meaning of this kind.  As a reader becomes more familiar with how Plotinus makes these shifts the reader becomes more tuned in to when that happens.

1.4  It is possible to interpret ‘eternity and goodness’ as meaning that everything imitates the noetic forms that are the source of particular things, and following that imitates the ultimate through generous creativity, or goodness.  I can understand this kind of interpretation because it elegantly encapsulates the three levels of existence, or hypostases, starting with material things, then rising to the noetic, and then rising further to the transcendental Good. 

But Armstrong’s translation leans towards seeing this phrase as another way of expressing the One and the Good.  Armstrong translates that all things are imitating the First Principle and Armstrong does not distinguish between everlastingness and generosity as to their level, which hypostasis they reside in; suggesting that both are ways of talking about the ineffable, the transcendental.

MacKenna seems to be making the same point when he says that all things are imitating the ‘Source.’  The ultimate source is the ineffable One.  I don’t read MacKenna as saying that ‘eternity’ and ‘service’ represent names for different hypostases.

It may be the case that Plotinus is compressing multiple meanings in this sentence and that reading eternity as referring to the noetic is one reading Plotinus had in mind, while reading eternity as another way of talking about the ineffable is another reading.  Multiple meanings are not unusual in Plotinus (or Plato) so it would not surprise me if this is the case here.

1.5  Ennead 3.7, Eternity and Time, deals with how Plotinus understands the relationship between these two realities.  Plotinus unpacks his understanding of eternity and time in a way that at first seems complex, but after a second or third reading it comes into clearer focus.  Here is a quote from Ennead III.7 that I think is relevant to the quote from Ennead 5.4:

“What, then, should we say eternity is?  That it is intelligible Substance itself, in the same way that one might say that time is the entire heaven, that is, the cosmos?  For they [the Pythagoreans – translator’s footnote] say that some hold this latter belief about time.  For since we imagine and think that eternity is something most majestic, and what pertains to the nature of the intelligible nature is most majestic, and it is not possible to say that there is something more majestic than either of the two – that which transcends the intelligible nature may not even be termed ‘majestic’ – one might for these reasons come to identify them.  And a further reason would be that the intelligible universe and eternity are both inclusive and include the identical things.

“But when we say that one set of things [the intelligibles] lies in another – eternity – and predicate eternity of them – for Plato says that ‘the nature of the model happened to be eternal’ [Timaeus 37D3 – translator’s footnote] – we mean once again that eternity is different from the intelligible nature and, quite the contrary, are maintaining that eternity is related to it or in it or present to it.  But the fact that each is majestic does not indicate their identity.  For majesty might perhaps also come to one of them from the other.  And the inclusiveness of one is of parts, but the inclusiveness of eternity is that of the whole together not as a part but because all things that are such as to be eternal are eternal due to eternity.”

(Gerson, see above, page 337)

Here is the passage from Timaeus, 37D3, that the translator referenced in a footnote:

“Now it was the Living Thing’s nature to be eternal, but it isn’t possible to bestow eternity fully upon anything that is begotten.  And so he began to think of making a moving image of eternity: at the same time as he brought order to the universe, he would make an eternal image, moving according to number, of eternity remaining in unity.  This number, of course, is what we now call ‘time.’”

(Plato, Complete Works, edited by John M. Cooper; Timaeus, translated by Donald J. Zeyl, Hackett Publishing Company, Indianapolis, Indiana, 1997, page 1241, ISBN: 9780872203495)

I see the quote from Ennead 3.7 as indicating that Plotinus does not consider the intelligible, or the noetic, and eternity to be the same.  Eternity is present to the intelligible, but I would say that eternity comes before the intelligible.  I suggest this because the intelligible, that is to say noetic realities, arise due to differentiation, and the eternal is before differentiation.  When the eternal is subject to differentiation, we get the moving image of eternity that is time.

Eternity and the noetic are intimately related and because of that noetic objects are eternal; but the eternity of noetic objects (which, tellingly, Whitehead refers to as eternal objects) is due to proximity to the One.  Eternity is another way of saying Unity.  The unity of noetic objects is also due to their proximity to the One, and to their proximity to the Eternal. 

1.6  The place that eternity holds in Platonism is a difficult topic.  It is not easy to sift through what Plotinus says about this and because of that difficulty people can come to different conclusions.  Some have said that the One is beyond eternity just as the One is beyond being.  But the One is also beyond Unity, beyond the One.  As Plotinus writes, whatever anyone says about the One falls short of its actuality, for the One is even beyond actuality.  In other words, I agree that what is ultimate transcends eternity, but I think there are good reasons to think of ‘eternity’ as a useful name for that which transcends name and form.

And, to be honest, I think that Plotinus does use ‘eternity’ as another name for the One; now and then, not always.  Sometimes, perhaps most of the time, Plotinus uses eternity, or the eternal, when referring to noetic realities, the intelligibles.  But just as Plotinus will use terms like unity to refer to noetic realities as well as the unity of the One, so also Plotinus will skillfully unpack eternity in ways that depend on the level of reality, or hypostasis, that is being referred to.

1.7  All of the writings of Plotinus are based on his experiences of the noetic and the transcendental (the intelligible and the One).  Reaching out across the chasm that separates the material world from that which is incorporeal, Plotinus illuminates that which is eternal by proximity, and that which is eternal remaining in unity.

2.  Stages of the Practice of Ethical Restraint

There is not a lot of writing about ethical restraint in the Platonist tradition or in how ethical restraint is presented in the Dialogues of Plato.  But restraint is discussed outside of this context, and surprisingly it is usually in a therapeutic context, often centered on addiction.  In this kind of literature ‘restraint’ has a practical focus on how someone can actually overcome the sensory, and sensual, thing(s) that seem to control their lives.  Often there is a three stage presentation of how restraint works:

The first stage is avoidance.  Sometimes the expression ‘just don’t go there’ is used; as in an alcoholic should just not go to a bar, or to a party where alcohol is served.  This has application to a large variety of situations where people are trying to overcome the seductions of the senses.

The second stage is sometimes called ‘self-command.’  This is learning how to make initial steps in internalizing effective resistance to sensory seductions.  A lot of literature is centered on this second stage and the authors of these works offer simple means for reminding the person on the path of renunciation (in a lay and secular context) is helped because most of these suggestions are internal reminders, sometimes prayers, that serve to deflect the seduction of the senses when it appears.  It might be as simple as ‘day after day I will reject alcohol.’  Or it might be simpler, ‘I reject alcohol.’  Or it might be longer such as the much used Serenity Prayer.  The Serenity Prayer might be condensed to the person saying ‘courage’ in their mind to remind them to pull away from what is tempting them.

This second stage is a kind of internal civil war where old and powerful habits are being contested by a new perspective.  This conflict between the older way of life with the possibility of a new way of life can become intense.  These internalized sayings, or prayers, are reminders that the individual wants to move into a new situation and wants to give up on habits that are self-destructive.

The third stage is sometimes called ‘mastery’ but I prefer the term ‘stability’ meaning that the change to a new way of living has stabilized and the internal civil war is basically over.  There is a greater sense of calm and also a feeling of accomplishment.  Of course it is always possible to slide back into old habits and for that reason the practices of the second stage remain a part of the person’s inner life.

I don’t recall in Platonist literature this kind of analysis where the stages of renunciation are discussed; it might be in the literature somewhere, but I don’t recall running across it.  My feeling is that this kind of information would be something that would be discussed between teacher and student rather than being the topic of an essay; or at least it looks that way to me. 

In the Platonist literature there is some indication that people did fall away from the practices of ethical restraint.  For example, in the opening section of Porphyry’s On Abstinence, Porphyry writes to Firmus, a friend of Porphyry’s, that Porphyry has heard that Firmus has fallen away from vegetarianism and returned to eating meat.  Porphyry views this as Firmus having given up on the Way of Philosophy and is writing to Firmus to encourage him to return to a philosophical life, a vegetarian life. 

This kind of falling away is common; it happens to many people.  Overcoming sensual seductions, even when a person knows that succumbing to them is unhealthy and damaging to themselves and others, is not easy.  Knowing this, one can be sympathetic.  The important thing is to encourage the individual who has fallen away from their renunciation practice to try again.  It may take many tries.  But that’s OK.  Just keep trying and eventually the new way of life will establish itself, stabilize itself.

3.  William Lane Craig

William Lane Craig is a Protestant Christian Apologist.  Craig has a large following.  Craig has studied philosophy extensively and is familiar with contemporary approaches to philosophy.  Craig is familiar with logic and modern modes of analysis from the analytic tradition (a surprising number of Christian apologists use tools from the analytic tradition in their work).  Craig is an effective apologist for his tradition.

Craig has written one book (“God Over All: Divine Aseity and the Challenge of Platonism”), and posted several videos, where he criticizes adopting Platonist metaphysics in the Christian tradition (this is more common in the Protestant tradition than it is in Catholicism or Orthodoxy).  Craig is aware of the influence that Platonism has had on Christianity, but Craig thinks that the Platonic influence undermines Christianity in significant ways.

If I understand Craig correctly, Craig is disturbed by the way Plato talks about intelligibles, or noetic objects, also known as eternal objects.  Craig refers to these as ‘forms’ which is a standard usage.  Craig’s understanding of Platonic forms is that they are eternal and unchanging; that’s true, I mean that the forms are understood to be that way in Platonism.  But Craig argues that this undermines the uniqueness of God because being eternal and unchanging are characteristics of God that are considered by Craig in the exegetical tradition he grows out of, to be unique characteristics of God.  It follows that this undermines the independence and uniqueness of God because there are other things in the cosmos that share at least some of the attributes of God.

Craig offers that a way of resolving this, which Craig argues is something that at least some Christian Platonists took, is to reconfigure the forms as ‘ideas in the mind of God.’  I think Craig is right that this is a way that Christians can retain a sense of the noetic while at the same time arguing for the uniqueness, the divine aseity, of God.  However, according to some histories of Platonism I have read, the view that Platonic forms are ideas in the mind of God was put forward in a Platonist context among the Middle Platonists and was likely absorbed into Christianity from those resources.

Personally, I prefer a more traditional way of viewing the forms; that the forms are emanations of the One, of the fully transcendental, of God.  The difference between the forms and the One is that the forms are differentiated from each other whereas the One is undifferentiated unity that is beyond differentiation, before differentiation.  If you want to understand the presence of differentiation in the forms, consider that the eternity of the forms differentiates them from all that is ephemeral.  In addition, forms are differentiated from each other, but at the same time fully transparent to each other. 

The view that forms are ideas in the mind of God collapses the noetic realm into the realm of that which is ultimate; in this case God.  From this perspective, the three hypostases now become two and the noetic realm of forms disappears. 

I think that Craig thinks of God as having characteristics which is standard Christian theology; with the exception of some Christian mysticism.  In contrast the One is beyond characteristics and beyond being.  The One is beyond affirmation and negation, whereas the forms do have characteristics and traits.

The discussion between Christianity and Platonism has been going on for two thousand years.  The discussion has a dialectical feel to it in the sense that both sides are committed to uncovering metaphysical truth.  I think the differences between the two traditions is a kind of creative, fire producing, light giving, presence that has led participants to focus on certain issues intensely.  I think that is a good thing. 

(As an aside, when I say these kinds of discussions have a long history, a good example of this centered on a treatise written by Proclus called On the Eternity of the World.  It contains eighteen arguments for the eternity of the world.  It is my personal favorite of the works of Proclus.  This work was disliked by Christians because Christians have the view that the world was created by God and will end at some point in the future as part of God’s plan.  From this perspective the world is not eternal.  In response to this treatise of Proclus, a Christian writer, Philoponus, wrote a critique of this work by Proclus titled Against Proclus on the Eternity of the World.  I think I have mentioned this before on this blog, but it has been a while and I think it fits in with the discussion about William Lane Craig.  The dispute between Proclus and Philoponus is not exactly the same point of divine aseity, but both of them are engaged in distinguishing Christianity from Platonism; and I think the points they raise are related.)

4.  Haiku

The sound of spring wind

Isn’t the same as the sound

Of eternity.

 

 

Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 86

2 March 2026

Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 86

1.  Some Remarks on Metaphysics

I’m a fan of metaphysics.  I don’t mean only the metaphysics found in Western Philosophy.  I also mean metaphysical thought found in cultures like India and China; though India and China use different vocabularies than what is in use in the West.  The connection I see is that metaphysics focuses primarily on the transcendental and on immaterial realities (hence ‘after physics’) and one can certainly find profound works with that kind of focus in these non-Western cultures. 

I view Plato as primarily a metaphysician in the sense that Plato’s writing has the overall purpose of guiding people to the Good and the One which is an immaterial reality and the immaterial source for all things; I like to refer to this as ‘the presence of eternity.’  I think this is the focus of the Platonic tradition as a whole.  Many other things are discussed in Platonism, but it is my feeling that these other things that are discussed are discussed because they assist in the journey to the One.  For example, the Platonic tradition’s focus on ethical restraints and the virtues has the function of showing people how to purify themselves, how to become less distracted by sensory experience, and this assists people in turning towards the Good, the One, and the Beautiful. 

Because I have this view I, at times, spend time on uncovering why metaphysics came under such widespread attack in the modern period (beginning approximately with Hume and Descartes) in the West.  It helps me to understand where I am in terms of the culture that I inhabit and why I sometimes feel so estranged from it. 

After a lot of study, I have come to a few conclusions (which are subject to revision).  The most important for me is that metaphysics never really disappeared in the modern period.  The announcement by various modernist philosophers that metaphysics was done was an expression of a wish, or hope, on their part; it was prescriptive.  What they were really saying to young philosophers is that you shouldn’t bother with metaphysics.  But work in metaphysics continued among some philosophers anyway (the most notable case is Alfred North Whitehead). 

It is striking to me that those who continued to engage with metaphysics do not seem to have been interested in responding to those who viewed metaphysics as over and done with; at least I have not found essays that I might consider to be apologias for metaphysics.  Instead, they simply proceeded to engage with the tradition and let those interested find what they had written.  I think this shows some wisdom.  And it shows some patience.  I think the wisdom and patience shown here is a natural result of engaging with the transcendental, of understanding things from the perspective of eternity.

2.  The Individual in Modernity

I’ve become more aware that one of the striking differences between philosophy in the modern period in contrast to philosophy in the classical period is that in the modern period, the period we reside in, it is the individual mind that is the starting point but in the classical period it is what arises in interaction that is the starting point.  For example, Plato’s philosophy emerges from dialogue and dialectic; it would be difficult to think of Socrates as acting like Descartes and thinking of his ego as the starting point of his inquiries.  And this is true throughout the classical period of Platonism; think of Plotinus presenting his essays to his students and getting feedback from them.

This has often been observed; I mean the shift to the individual mind and ego from the ground of interaction and what emerges in a more communal context.  In modern philosophy it is the individual philosopher who critiques and renders judgment.  In Platonic philosophy it is what emerges from interaction, particularly dialectic, that sheds light on the questions being discussed.  These are different processes.  Modern philosophy is critical, classical philosophy is constructive due to its basis in interaction.

It is true that Plato depicts Socrates as withdrawing for the purposes of contemplation in Dialogues such as Phaedrus and The Symposium.  But this kind of contemplative withdrawal is not a withdrawal into the individual mind (small ‘m’ mind), it is an ascent to the noetic and the transcendent which is the ground for the emergence of wisdom.  In other words, it is not the individual mind that is the source of wisdom in classical philosophy, whereas in modernity there really isn’t anything that surpasses the individual mind.

Thinking about this, I wondered if it is possible to replicate the dialectical foundation of Platonism in the culture of today?  It may be that the emergence of dialectical discussion requires particular communal contexts; I’m not sure.  I have observed that it is difficult for contemporary philosophers to step away from the critical stance of modern philosophy.  But it’s not impossible; Whitehead managed to offer a constructive metaphysics in the classical manner.  And perhaps this is the key to reconnecting with a more dialectical philosophical involvement.  Whitehead was deeply involved in the history of philosophy and his attitude towards previous philosophy is what I might call ‘reverence’.  I mean by this that Whitehead often shows his appreciation for his predecessors and, at the same time, he is willing to modify their presentations or Whitehead will spotlight where he thinks they missed something of significance.  This is dialectical rather than critical.  Whitehead does not dismiss previous attempts at metaphysics, he learns from them and having absorbed what they have to say he ventures forth into new territory.  The individualist and hypercritical attitude of modern philosophy is often dismissive of the past and treats the past as if it has nothing of significance to offer.  Whitehead shows us why that attitude is deficient.

So I do think it is possible to replicate the kind of interactive exchange of insight and energy that is foundational for Platonic Philosophy.  Online interaction provides a venue for this, at least potentially.  But I think that most often this interaction happens when we engage deeply with the classic sources of Platonism such as the Dialogues and the Enneads.  It’s a matter of reading them receptively instead of in the modern manner of always having a critical stance.  When reading these works many people have a kind of experience of opening up to dialogue and dialectic.  Dialogue and dialectic take the reader out of their individual ego and their individual concerns and open the way to the larger realms in which our life unfolds.

3.  Plotinus on Renunciation

“Let the human being who lives in the world of corporeal goods be beautiful and tall and wealthy and the sort of ruler over people that one can be here, yet he ought not to be envied for these things, since he was deceived by them. But the wise person would perhaps not even have these to begin with, though if he did, he will lessen their impact, if indeed he cares for himself.  He will lessen their impact and extinguish the advantages of the body by his lack of interest in them, and he will let their power over him die.”

(Plotinus, The Enneads: Second Edition, Ennead 1.4.14, “On Happiness”, translated by Lloyd P. Gerson et al, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK, 2025, page 85, ISBN: 978109604970)

3.1  Plotinus points to a gradual, step by step, renunciation.  The wise person will lessen the impact of ‘corporeal goods’ in his life.  I read this as saying that the wise person takes steps to turn away from ‘corporeal goods’ and these steps might be modest, at least at first.

3.2  It’s interesting, and meaningful, to me that often when Platonism talks about renunciation what we get are broad strokes rather than a meticulously laid out list; the kind of thing one finds, for example, in the Buddhist Vinaya (rule of life for monastics).  Specifics do appear now and then such as in the Phaedo, but even there, if you compare the instructions in renunciation to monastic rules it is pointers rather than a long list of specifics. 

This may indicate that Platonism as an ascetic tradition wants its practitioners to go in a certain direction, but trusts its followers to walk the path as best they can.  It’s kind of like giving advice to a hiker by telling them what kind of equipment they will need for the hike because you have the requisite experience.  But the new hiker will purchase their own equipment and it may contain additions or alternatives to what was suggested.

3.3  I see this kind of relationship in Porphyry’s Life of Plotinus, in the section where Porphyry writes about various disciples.  The instantiation of the Platonic life varies in accordance with their circumstances, but the general direction of renunciation and asceticism is clear.

 

 

Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 84

9 February 2026

Brief Notes on Various Topics – 84

1.  The Ascetic Ideal

I often refer to Platonism as a spiritual tradition that has a foundation in asceticism and purification through the practice of various types of ethical restraint and renunciation.  For short I refer to this as The Ascetic Ideal; I mean that the practice of Platonism is built upon The Ascetic Ideal.

This Ascetic Ideal is woven into the fabric of Plato’s Dialogues, the Enneads of Plotinus, the writings of Porphyry, as well as appearing in other Platonic writings.  A singular feature of The Ascetic Ideal is that we should not base our lives on sensory stimulation, that sensory stimulation is a poor guide for living a good life.  Further, according to The Ascetic Ideal sensory stimulation should be, as far as possible, minimized. 

I was thinking about The Ascetic Ideal recently (I often think about it) because of the presence in the news of a very widespread corruption scandal that seems to be disclosing a network of misdeed among a very large number of elites.  Those who are part of this network, or who are alleged to be part of this network, seem to have lived lives of maximal sensory indulgence; the opposite of a life based on The Ascetic Ideal.

It came to mind while thinking about this, that Plato in both The Republic and Laws goes to great lengths to require rulers to live lives of renunciation.  In Laws rulers are required to not even have gold or silver present in their living quarters; and there are many more restrictions, or ethical restraints.

I think this shows how intensely aware Plato was regarding the temptations of sensory stimulation and how succumbing to those temptations leads not only to personal failings, but also to the corruption of society as a whole.  This is a view, the view of The Ascetic Ideal, that has almost vanished from discussions in the public sphere; for example, could you imagine elected officials being required to divest themselves of excess income (however the society would define excess)?  Or requiring those holding political office to be vegetarians?  And so forth, you get the idea.

We have lost contact with The Ascetic Ideal.

2.  Ennead 6.9.6

“How shall we speak of unity, and how is it to be made to be in accord with thinking?

“In fact, unity must be posited in more ways than a unit or a point is one.  For in these cases the soul takes away extension and numerical multiplicity and leaves off when it comes to the smallest thing, and rests at something indivisible; but a point is in that which is divisible, and a unit is in another thing.  But the One is ‘not in another thing’; it is neither in the divisible nor is it indivisible as being the smallest thing.  It [the One] is the greatest of all things, not in extension, but in power.  Indeed, even the Beings posterior to it [the intelligibles or noetic realities] are indivisible and without parts through their powers, and not magnitudes.

“The One must be understood to be unlimited not because it cannot be traversed either in extension or number, but by being incomprehensible in its power.  For whenever you understand it either as Intellect or as god, it [The One] is more.  And again, when you unify it by discursive thinking, then, too, it is more than you imagine, in being more unified than your thinking of it.  For it is in itself, since it has no attributes.

“One should think of its unity by means of its self-sufficiency.  Of all things it must be the most adequate and self-sufficient and least deficient.

“Further, any multitude, as long as it has not become a unity, is deficient.  Its substantiality is deficient relative to being a unity, whereas the One is not deficient of itself.  For it is itself.  By contrast, what is many needs all the things it is and each of these things, being with the others and not in itself, needs all these other things, and brings about a deficiency both in terms of a unity and terms of being a whole.  If then, there must indeed be something entirely self-sufficient, the One alone must be the kind of thing which is deficient relative neither to itself nor to anything else.  It seeks nothing, so that it may be, nor that it may be in a good state, nor so that it may be established in the intelligible world.  As it is the cause of other things, it does not get what it is from other things.  How can its good be outside it?  Thus, its good is not an attribute of it; for it is it itself.

“It has no place, for it has no need of a place to settle itself through being unable to support itself.  Something which settles is inanimate, a falling mass, as long as it does not settle.  Other things settle in a place because of the One.  Because of it, they exist at the same time as they take up the place assigned to them.  To seek a place is to be in need, and the principle is not in need of things posterior to it.

“The principle of all things is in no need of all things.  Anything in need, is in need because it desires the principle.  If the One needed something, it would be seeking to be not the One, so it would be in need of what will destroy it.  But everything that is said to be in need, needs its good, that is, what preserves it.  Thus, there is no good for the One, and so it does not have a will for anything.  [I.e., a will for anything other than itself. – translator’s footnote.]  It is beyond good and is good not for itself but for other things, insofar as other things can participate in the Good.

“Nor is it intellection, in order that it may have no difference in itself; nor motion, since it is prior to motion and intellection.  Indeed, what should it understand?  Itself?  So, it would be ignorant prior to its intellection, and it would be in need of intellection in order that it would know itself, whereas it is self-sufficient in itself.  So, it is not ignorant about itself, on the grounds that it does not know or think itself.  For ignorance comes to be about something else, whenever one thing is ignorant of a different thing.  It alone neither knows nor does it have anything which it is ignorant about, but being one and one with itself, it needs no intellection of itself.

“So, there is no need to add ‘being with itself’, to preserve its unity.  Indeed, one should take away from it both thinking and being with itself and the intellection of itself and of other things.  For it should not be ranked with something that thinks, but with the intellection itself.  The intellection does not think; it is the cause for something else thinking, and the cause is not identical with what is caused.  The cause of everything is none of these things.  So, this should not be called ‘good’, which is what it bestows on other things.  Rather, it is the Good in another way, above the other goods.”

(Plotinus, The Enneads, translated by a team headed by Lloyd P. Gerson, Second Edition, Cambridge University Press, 2025, pages 893-895, ISBN: 9781009604970)

2.1  This is a sublime section of the Enneads.  The whole of Ennead VI is filled with insights and, at a literary level, flows from one section to another like a clear mountain stream.

2.2  This section of the Enneads is focused on unpacking the meaning of unity and the One.  Plotinus begins by comparing what one might call transcendental unity with mathematical unity by using concepts such as a mathematical point or a mathematical unit and suggesting that transcendental unity, or philosophical unity, differs from the unity found in a mathematical context.  Plotinus writes, “. . . the One is ‘not in another thing’; it is neither in the divisible nor is it [the One] indivisible as being the smallest thing.”  In this paragraph Plotinus points to the One, to unity, as beyond mathematical contexts, beyond extension (the context of physics), and beyond magnitudes (such as large and small).  “It [the One] is the greatest of all things, not in extension, but in power.”

2.3  Plotinus further unpacks the understanding of the power of the One in the next paragraph, “The One must be understood to be unlimited not because it cannot be traversed either in extension or number, but by being incomprehensible in its power.  For whenever you understand it either as Intellect or as god, it is more.”  It is therefore beyond discursive thinking because “it has no attributes.”

2.4  It is helpful to note that Plotinus uses both negations and affirmations when discussing the One.  For example, Plotinus uses the terms ‘unlimited’ and ‘incomprehensible.’  But Plotinus also uses affirmations to illuminate the nature of the One by referring to the One’s ‘self-sufficiency.’  Plotinus then further unpacks the nature of self-sufficiency in the following paragraph after introducing this perspective.

2.5  The contrast is that all created things are not self-sufficient; they rely on causation to bring them into becoming “. . . whereas the One is not deficient of itself.  For it is itself.”  In contrast, things need all the things that it is and needs other things as well.  But the One is deficient neither to itself nor to anything else.  I interpret this as meaning that the One does not arise due to causation; that is to say there are no conditions that give rise to the One.  Plotinus puts it this way, “It [the One] seeks nothing, so that it may be.”

2.6  Plotinus then goes on to point out that the One is the cause of other things, but the One does not ‘get’, or become, what it is from other things because the One is prior to all other things, including noetic things.

2.7  Now Plotinus returns to the use of the negations by stating that the One has no place. 

2.8  Then Plotinus returns to using an affirmation by referring to the One as ‘the principle of all things’ that is in no need of all things.  In McKenna’s translation he refers to a sovereign self-sufficiency as the principle being pointed to, which I find helpful.

2.9  I think it is significant that Plotinus uses both affirmations and negations in this part of the Enneads.  I sometimes read that Plotinus is using the approach of negative theology, meaning that the ultimate, or the One, can only be approached through the use of negations.  I can understand why people interpret passages like this in that way because the negations are very striking.  But if I closely read a passage like this what I observe is a kind of going back and forth between the use of affirmations and negations that suggests that the One is beyond both affirmations and negations.  I wouldn’t call this ‘negative theology’; I would be more inclined to call it ‘transcendental theology.’  The difference is that in negative theology all affirmations are rejected as being inadequate, but in transcendental theology the function of both affirmations and negations is to assist the reader in going beyond both affirmations and negations.  It is not that these are rejected; rather their context and range are more focused and both affirmations and negations are used to move us into a context that is both beyond, and prior to, any becoming and begoning.

2.9.1  This quote from Plotinus had an impact on Christianity through the writings of Dionysius the Areopagite, in particular his Mystical Theology.  The closing of Mystical Theology states that the ultimate is beyond any affirmation or negation.  This is consistent with Plotinus’s usage of affirmations and negations in this passage and, I suspect, was directly influenced by this passage.

2.9.2  This section of the Enneads also influenced Maimonides in his treatise The Guide to the Perplexed.  This is found in Chapter 57 (I’m using a new translation by Lenn E. Goodman and Phillip I. Lieberman).  Maimonides unpacks the ambiguities generated by the way language is used in this context; he suggests using ‘one’ but not ‘oneness’ and other suggestions for structuring language in such a way as to retain clarity in a transcendental context.

2.9.3  And finally this passage appears in the Islamic world in a work known as the Theology of Aristotle; it was thought for a long period that the Theology of Aristotle was written by Aristotle, but it turns out that it is a collection of passages from Plotinus.  I don’t know the original source of the confusion, but it appears the collection was a work of Porphyry’s, then was translated into Syriac, and then into Arabic where it had a big influence (that’s quite a journey).  I don’t know when it took on Aristotle’s name (presumably Porphyry would not have been confused about that.)  But this passage of Plotinus had an impact on a number of Islamic philosophers and theologians.

2.9.4  It would be interesting to see if modern writers who are interested in Plotinus also reference this passage.  But that’s a project for another day.