Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 96

25 May 2026

Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 96

1.  More on the Unity of the Platonic Tradition

I was thinking about my previous post that focused on the disagreements among scholars regarding the continuity of the Platonic tradition.  To refresh readers, some scholars take a developmental approach both to the tradition of Platonism as a whole, and also to Plato as an individual thinker and philosopher.  Others regard the Platonic tradition, and the thought of Plato, as fundamentally unified both in the individual thought of Plato and in the Platonic tradition as a whole.

What I have been thinking is that the unity of the Platonic tradition, and of Plato’s writings, flows from the unity of the tradition’s primary focus which is the Good and the One, the ineffable transcendental.  Ultimate reality, that reality from which all else emerges, is primal, changeless, unending, unlimited, beyond affirmation and negation.  Platonism is rooted in the experience of this reality of an eternal transcendent unity and I think it is this that gives Platonism its own sense of being a unified tradition.

2.  The Political Perspective

One aspect of contemporary Platonism that I have noticed is a tendency to view Platonism through a political lens and/or through ideological categories.  One of the most influential streams of contemporary Platonism is the one that is rooted in the analyses of Leo Strauss who has had a significant impact on many people’s interpretation of Plato at this time.  There is a lot of controversy around Strauss and how his views have impacted specific events over the last few decades.  But that’s not what I want to focus on (as an aside, both Strauss’s detractors and defenders regarding these events make what I call a ‘good case’ for their points of view).  I want to offer that Strauss’s emphasis on politics in Platonism is in itself problematic.  What I have observed is that his critics, with some exceptions, tend to accept that Plato is primarily, or at least significantly, a political philosopher and both Strauss himself, Strauss’s followers, and Strauss’s critics, for the most part, share this perspective.  This sidelines what I consider to be the actual focus of Plato’s teachings which is to transcend the material world, including politics, but not exceptionally politics.  

The emphasis on politics turns Plato into a worldly philosopher who can be compared to other political philosophers; this in turn transforms Plato into a modernist by shaping Platonism into an ideological theory like other ideological theories.  I think this is unfortunate.

I don’t mean to say that Plato does not speak about politics.  But Plato writes about many things and I don’t see politics as having a special emphasis in his writings.  For example, Plato writes a lot about poetry and its effect on the soul and on the human community; but I don’t think that means that Plato has a primary focus on aesthetics (on the other hand, Plato does have a primary focus on beauty because beauty can lead to the Good and the One).  Another example is Plato’s writings on music; but I don’t think these passages about music turn Plato into a music theorist.  In a similar way, when Plato does talk about politics, which I think is rarer than is often suggested, I don’t infer from this that Plato is a political philosopher.

I think it is difficult to see this comparison (between Plato’s writings on politics and Plato’s writings on poetry or music) because at this time our culture overemphasizes the significance of politics.  I’m not saying that politics has no significance, but I wouldn’t say music has no significance either.  My suggestion is that politics is just one aspect of our lives in this material world and not the most important aspect.

What I think is necessary for Platonists today is to view Platonism as primarily a spiritual tradition and to view Plato as a spiritually realized human being whose writings are a roadmap to the transcendental. 

3.  Some Remarks about Soul

It has occurred to me that the disputes about soul, the soul’s nature, its placement in the metaphysical layers (hypostases) of Platonism, and other issues, has come about because Platonism has presented us with a view of soul that is complex and that this complexity invites variations in understanding and emphases.  I started thinking this way after reading two brief essays about soul in Platonic Pathways which is a collection of essays from the Fourteenth Annual Conference of the International Society for Neoplatonic Studies.  The first essay is by Gregory Shaw, ‘Alienation and Divinization: Iamblichus’ Theurgic Vision’, and the second is by Sam Webster, ‘Iamblichus’ Method for Creating Theurgic Sacrifice’.  When I was working at a Spiritual Bookstore, I met Sam Webster and had some discussions with him at dinner after the event.  I’ve never met Gregory Shaw, but Shaw is well known for interpreting Platonic theurgy as a kind of Western Tantra.  In both of these essays the complex soul found in Platonist works is accepted as a kind of starting point.  This seems to be normal for the Platonic tradition; for example, you find Plotinus discussing the parts of the soul, how these parts function, how these parts relate to each other, how these parts interact with the metaphysical levels of existence, and so forth.  It seems to be the case that Platonists don’t disagree about the complexity of the soul, but they do disagree about how that complexity is distributed.

I suspect that one of the reasons that I shifted my understanding of soul from this complex cluster of parts view to the idea that the soul is partless was in part (no joke intended) due to a desire to simplify the presentation of soul in Platonism, though I wasn’t aware of this consciously.  And there are passages in Ennead VI where Plotinus refers to the inherent simplicity of the soul and that the soul, or at least the higher part of the soul, is undivided; as I recall Plotinus is contrasting the divdedness of the material body with the simplicity, and implied unity, of the soul.  I’m not saying that Plotinus views the soul as partless in the way I am suggesting; on the other hand, the simplicity of the soul leans in that direction.

As I have said before, I view the soul as the presence of transcendent unity, the Good and the One, in the material individual.  Without the presence of this transcendent unity there would be no particular things, no things at all.  It is soul, as the instantiation of the One, the instantiation of transcendent unity, that provides a sense of unity to our lives.  This happens because the soul is everywhere (a point Plotinus makes) and therefore permeates bodily existence.

The ‘presence’ I am referring to is like the presence of moonlight in a pond.  It seems that the moonlight in the pond is a separately existing entity but that is a mistake in perception.  Moonlight is actually ‘everywhere,’ but only appears to be isolated in the pond.  Similarly, the individual soul is the everywhere of the One when manifesting in the realm of time and matter; time and matter produce the misunderstanding of the soul’s limitation and separation and perhaps time is the ultimate origin of the complexity of theories about the soul.

In Platonist literature the soul has many functions; that is why the soul is complex in the writings of Platonism.  Conceptually, I transfer these functions of the complex soul to mind and thereby preserve the functions of traditional Platonism even as I alter the placement of these functions.  My view is that whenever I notice that a function of soul is an act of differentiation, or depends on differentiation, I use that as a signal to transfer that function to mind.  By ‘mind’ I am referring specifically to the act, or function, of differentiation in the individual.  The noetic is the source of differentiation because it is at nous that differentiation first appears.  Mind, then, is the presence of the noetic function of differentiation in the material individual.

This view of soul differs from the standard view of Platonism in that Platonic literature views the soul as an emanation of nous.  I take a different view.  I think of soul as a ‘first thing’ which means soul is a seemingly separate manifestation of the everywhere and everywhen nature of the Good and the One.  Mind is a ‘second thing’, that is to say a noetic thing and it is in mind that differentiation is found.  The soul does not make differentiations because the Good and the One are unity as such.  Due to the third level’s nature as temporal and material, the soul seems to be individuated and differentiated from other souls. 

From the theurgic perspective, the soul is separated from the One and ‘trapped’, or ‘isolated’, from the Good and the One.  From the perspective of traditional Platonism the soul is an emanation from nous and has knowledge of, and/or experience of, the Good and the One when the soul turns to that which is higher than the noetic; or part of the soul has this background. 

From the perspective of what I have outlined as the partless nature of the soul, the soul does not descend, the soul does not completely descend as in the theurgic perspective, nor does it partially descend as in the traditional perspective found in Plotinus.  Instead, I am suggesting that the soul is the actual presence of the Good and the One, the actual presence of eternity, in the material individual, but that this does not happen through emanation; instead it happens through differentiation.  This presence happens because of the everywhere, everywhen, and everything nature of the Good and the One, which is also true of the soul because the soul is the presence of the Good and the One.  Here is a schematic for comparing these views:

Traditional Platonism -- The soul is partially descended into  the body

Theurgic Platonism -- The soul is fully descended into the body

My reconfiguration -- The soul has never descended into the body but the soul is present to the body; the soul is the presence of eternity

3.1  I suspect that the complexity of the Platonic view of the soul may be an indication of, or due to, accretions over time.  This is a view that some Platonic scholars have held and it makes sense to me.  I think these accretions have their source in traditions before Platonism emerged.  Platonism inherited a range of views from earlier traditions such as Pythagoreanism, Orphism, Egyptian spirituality, and perhaps some Mystery traditions as well.  The complexity of the soul in Platonism might be due to these multiple sources and an attempt to reconcile different ways of viewing the nature of the soul and how the soul works.

This is similar to the way Platonism reconciled divergent Presocratic views such as that of Parmenides and Heraclitus; by placing the views of Heraclitus as applicable to the material realm, while the view of Parmenides is applicable to the Noetic, and particularly Being as such.

This complexity continued within the Platonist tradition, particularly in the tradition’s post-Plotinian period.  I’m referring to the disputes about whether the soul is fully descended or partially descended, a dispute that continues to this day.  The complexity of the soul presented in the dialogues may have created fertile ground for generating further differences of view within the Platonist tradition itself.

3.2  There seems to be a natural tendency to make systems of thought complex over time.  Plotinus criticizes the Gnostics for unnecessarily making Plato’s intuition about hypostases and how they work into a complex, and at times difficult to access, multiplication of levels and regions.  Some people enjoy the mental gymnastics such complex systems of thought are dependent upon, but Plotinus regards Gnostic complexities as distractions and I also think that Plotinus thinks these complexities are mental creations that are not based on actual experience of these multiplied levels and regions.

But here is my intuition about the soul: I don’t think the complexity of the soul in Platonism is necessary.  Perhaps I am wrong about that; nevertheless, I am following the path of understanding that this intuition has opened.

3.3  I have posted about this in the past.  I bring it up again because I like to share my thoughts about this topic (the nature of the soul) and because as my investigations into this topic proceed I uncover new insights that I want to share with readers.  Putting these thoughts down and posting them is in itself a way of ‘thinking out loud’ about the soul; through the process of writing them down and sharing them with others I am able to see more clearly what my thoughts are and where they are leading.

4.  Alienation

I’ve been thinking that as someone becomes more and more steeped in Platonism, and becomes more and more of a Platonist, that a sense of alienation from the society at large is an almost inevitable result.  I see this particularly with the impact of Platonist ethics on someone who practices the path of Platonism and cultivates both the Virtues and the Restraints.  Take, for example, Plato’s teachings on non-harming and non-retaliation found in Crito and The Republic.  This is not how people normally live their lives; these teachings are a great challenge and internalizing them, living by them, emphasizes how the life of a Platonist differs from the life that is offered by the society in which the Platonist dwells.

5.  War as Anti-Ethics

An important feature of war is that during war participants are allowed, and even honored, to engage in actions that when done in peacetime are considered immoral, even heinous.  Killing another person during peacetime will bring to the person who did this a great deal of condemnation.  During war, in contrast, killing others, many of whom are total strangers, may bring praise and lifelong admiration.  This is true even when the usage of modern weaponry results in mass casualties.

It is in this context that I read the opening section of Laws where the three participants in the dialogue discuss if the laws of a State should be for the purpose of always being ready for war, or whether they should be for the purpose of creating and upholding peace.  I think it is the longest discussion of peace and war in the Platonic Dialogues and I think its reasoning is deep and subtle.

Ethics in Platonism, including the Virtues and the Restraints, are principles which in turn are instantiations of the principle of the necessity for purification.   Causing harm disorders the soul and makes it more difficult to access higher realms of existence.  And because this is a principle, it is generally applicable, without carveouts for exceptions such as war. 

I write this on Memorial Day here in the U.S.  May peace blossom in the hearts of all.

6.  Is Western Philosophy Exhausted?

Now and then I run into a contemporary philosopher who thinks of Western Philosophy as done; that basically Western Philosophy has run its course and is unable to generate any further insights or make progress.  I have a different view.  Looking at metaphysics, I don’t see the goal of metaphysics as one of reaching a final and complete statement about ultimate reality.  I see the work of metaphysics as presenting understanding of ultimate reality, but because ultimate reality is beyond affirmation and negation, because ultimate reality is eternal, all metaphysical statements regarding ultimate reality hover around what they are talking about but are not what they are talking about as such.

There’s nothing wrong with this; I don’t even think it is particularly exceptional.  Cookbooks present variations on how to make bread; there is no final recipe for making bread.  It is an activity that continually renews itself.

My feeling is that when I run across this kind of sentiment it is always, if memory serves, from someone who is affiliated with a University.  I can understand how such feelings would arise in this context because the liberal arts are being steadily trimmed, and even ejected, from Colleges and Universities and there doesn’t seem to be anything to be done about it at this time.  But the field of philosophy is not confined to any specific institution; you find it wherever someone seeks a resolution to the question of eternity.

Brief Notes on Various Topics -- 44

28 April 2025

Brief Notes on Various Topics – 44

1.  I’ve been thinking, more like pondering, about the division in Platonism between those who regard the soul as ‘fully descended’ and those who do not regard the soul as fully descended.  ‘Descended’ in this context means ‘descended into the material realm from higher realities; either the noetic or the ineffable transcendental of the Good and the One.  This division emerged in the late Classical Period; it was one part of various disputes between Porphyry and Iamblichus.  The dispute has left a lasting impression on the Platonist tradition.  There are those who regard the soul as always resident in the transcendental, exemplified by Plotinus, and there are those who regard the soul as separated from the transcendental, exemplified by Proclus (see the last section of the Elements of Theology).

1.1  I think my recent focus on this unresolved split within Platonism was stimulated at this time by my reading Theurgy and the Soul by Gregory Shaw; Shaw takes the view of Iamblichus and critiques Plotinus on this issue.  To be fair, Shaw’s criticism of Plotinus is nuanced in the sense that he points out where Iamblichus likely misunderstood Plotinus. Even so, I think overall that Shaw misrepresents Plotinus, but that’s to be expected from someone like myself who is so dedicated to Plotinus as a guide and an embodiment of transcendent wisdom. 

1.2  As I was thinking about this it came to me that the idea of the partial descent of the soul is not an unusual, or eccentric, view within a Platonic context.  I think partial descent is something we have all experienced.  For example, think of attending a lecture that is introducing a complex topic (perhaps in a classroom context, perhaps online, perhaps in person at a venue).  You are interested in the topic but there are parts of the lecture that you don’t understand, while there are other parts that immediately make sense.  This is a very common experience when, for example, learning a new language or beginning a branch of mathematics, and so forth.  What I want to suggest is that this is an example of a ‘partial descent’ of the topic into one’s mind.  When we have this experience, we know that our understanding is partial and that there is more to learn.  In a similar way, the partial descent of the soul into matter leaves the soul with only a partial understanding of its own place in the cosmos; more needs to be studied and understood and this is accomplished through renunciation, study, and contemplation.

1.3  There are other examples of partial descent in our experience of the world.  When the light of the moon appears in a pond, that is the partial descent of the light of the moon into the pond.  In a similar way, the soul can be thought of as analogically the partial descent of the light of the One into the pond of individuated material existence.

1.3.1  Another example, among many that can be chosen, is the material tree as an instantiation of, or emanation from, the form of treeness.  Each tree is descended from treeness but the material tree is only a partial representation of treeness.  All trees are like that; they have a limited reality here, and a transcendent reality there where treeness resides.

1.4  The partial descent of the soul also resembles the descent of higher, abstract, realities into materiality.  The descent of the One, in the sense of Unity, is partial in the material world.  The unity of a material being happens because of material beings’ participation in the One, in Unity itself.  But the unity of material beings is only a partial unity; if it were a full unity, a full descent of the One into material embodiment, then material beings would be the One itself.  The partial unity, or Oneness, of material beings is on display as becoming and begoning.  The One, and Noetic realities, do not participate in becoming and begoning, but material beings do and that is why the Oneness of material beings is only a partial Oneness.

1.5  It is my feeling that the idea of the full descent of the soul came into Platonism from Christianity.  What I am getting at is that the Christian view of fallen humanity is that because of the fall humans need an intermediary to connect with God because human beings are too sinful to make such a connection on their own.  The intermediary for Christians is Jesus who is considered to be fully human and fully Divine, fully God.  Because of this complex nature Jesus can save human beings from their fallen condition.

In a similar way, those Late Classical Platonists who argued for the full descent of the soul also argued for intermediaries, plural, consisting of the Gods of the Greek pantheon.  Through carefully constructed ritual the practitioner could contact one, or more, of these intermediaries who had the ability to lift the separated and fully descended human soul to noetic, and possibly higher, realms.

I understand that usually those who study the history of Platonism view Platonism and Paganism in the Late Classical period as deeply in opposition to Christianity; but I tend to see them as in significant ways engaged in the same project which in this case is based on the idea of the human soul as fully separated from the transcendental.

1.6  Returning to the context of Platonism and its internal disputes, I think that there has been a tendency to look at this dispute within Platonism in a way that is too analytical; in addition, there is a tendency to use language that is too technical when discussing this issue (too technical in the sense that the language used obscures rather than clarifies).  If, instead, we look at this issue through the procedures of analogy and metaphor, particular to our own experience, then the assertion that the soul is not fully descended into the material realm makes intuitive, and logical sense (logical in a Platonic sense) with a clear experiential basis.

2.  The history of Platonism gives me the impression of a very malleable tradition.  I say that because it seems that Platonism finds it easy to adapt to changing environments so that Platonism does not resist, or does not resist very much, putting on the robes of various other traditions such as Greek Paganism, Skepticism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Mathematics, and so forth.  Some traditions are highly resistant to this kind of display; Jainism is one example. 

I think this is because Platonism regards the material domain as inherently unstable and in constant flux.  Looked at in this way I think it makes sense that one would accept the kind of changes and adaptations that Platonism has gone through.  The focus of Platonism is on the transcendental which is, from one perspective, ultimate otherness.  This ultimate otherness is not to be found here in the material domain; it is there in the transcendental.  From this perspective it is not a matter of first importance what robes the tradition wears.

3.  There is a social movement which is called ‘Minimalism’.  When I say ‘movement’ I don’t mean that Minimalism is very organized or that someone can attain an official certificate of Minimalism.  But there are people who act as what I would call guides to a minimalist life.

The movement is strongly devoted to simplifying one’s life by having as few things as possible, cutting back on extraneous things, or things one no longer actually needs.  Some Minimalists have very few possessions indeed.  Others are more moderate in their minimalism.

The Minimalist movement has a strong aesthetic component to it which some emphasize more than others.  I have noticed that there seems to be a Japanese aesthetic influence, which makes sense; and some of those offering Minimalist insights are Japanese.

But there is also a philosophical component.  And at times it seems some minimalists are almost taking a vow of poverty.  I haven’t run across any explicitly religious content from Minimalists; but there is a kind of sense that many minimalists are turning away from the material world having seen through its false promises.  This is often motivated by wanting to have time to do what is important in the life of a minimalist instead of their life being consumed by and wasted on the accumulation of things. 

I take all of this as a positive sign.  It indicates to me a kind of inchoate spiritual yearning.  Perhaps something profound will emerge from this.

4.  Brief is the life of a mountain.

5.  “. . . and the first requirement for a happy life is to do yourself no injury nor allow any to be done to you by others.  Of course, the first half of the requirement presents no great problem; the difficulty lies in becoming strong enough to be immune to injury – and the one and only thing that brings such immunity is complete virtue.  The same applies to a state: if it adopts the ways of virtue, it can live in peace; but if it is wicked, war and civil war will plague it.”

(Plato, Laws, translated by Travor J. Saunders, Plato: The Complete Works, edited by John M. Cooper, Hackett Publishing, Indianapolis, 1997, page 1491, 829a, ISBN: 9780872203495)

“Now those who live happily must first avoid doing injustice to others and suffering injustice themselves at the hands of others.  Of these two, the former is not very difficult, but what is very difficult is acquiring the power that prevents being done injustice – this cannot be completely achieved unless one becomes completely good.  This very same thing applies to a city: if it becomes good it lives a life of peace, but it lives a life of external and internal war if it is evil.”

(Plato, Laws, translated by Thomas L. Pangle, The Laws of Plato, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1980, page 219, 829a, ISBN: 0226671100)

5.1  It’s interesting to see that Plato in this passage makes an explicit case for the city and the individual as being kind of mutual analogies for each other (in the passage immediately preceding the one quoted, Plato also asserts this).  I think this suggests that the Laws, as is true of most of Plato’s dialogues, is written at multiple levels simultaneously and that the Laws is at one level a guide for how to live a good life.

It's not easy to see this in the long passages where the Laws discusses setting up various bureaus and committees in great detail; at least I find it difficult to see how this applies to my life as an individual.  But that is probably due to my own limited understanding.

5.2  It is helpful to see how Plato’s teaching on non-harming, or non-injury, makes an appearance here in his last dialogue.  Non-injury, injustice, and non-harming often have the same valence in the dialogues.

5.3  Plato seems to be suggesting that it is possible for a city, which in Plato’s day would mean a city-state which is close to what we mean by a country, can live in peace.  At other times in the Laws Plato expresses frustration that there has to be discussion about laws for acts that the three characters in the dialogue find abhorrent or disgusting; but (and you can almost hear the sigh) they have to do so because human beings have tendencies in those directions and they must be dealt with.  My conclusion is that Plato likely leans to the view that a City living in peace (both internally and externally) is probably a utopian fantasy.