Catégorie : Néoplatonisme

Plotinus and Epicurus

Matter, Perception, Pleasure

Angela Longo, Daniela Patrizia Taormina (ed.),  New York: Cambridge University Press, 2016

Description

This volume investigates the reasons why Plotinus, a philosopher inspired by Plato, made critical use of Epicurean philosophy. Eminent scholars show that some fundamental Epicurean conceptions pertaining to ethics, physics, epistemology and theology are drawn upon in the Enneads to discuss crucial notions such as pleasure and happiness, providence and fate, matter and the role of sense perception, intuition and intellectual evidence in relation to the process of knowledge acquisition. By focusing on the meaning of these terms in Epicureanism, Plotinus deploys sophisticated methods of comparative analysis and argumentative procedures that ultimately lead him to approach certain aspects of Epicurus’ philosophy as a benchmark for his own theories and to accept, reject or discredit the positions of authors of his own day. At the same time, these discussions reveal what aspects of Epicurean philosophy were still perceived to be of vital relevance in the third century AD.

(Text from the publisher)

Table of contents

Contributors

Preface

Abbreviations

Transliteration

Introduction – Angela Longo, Daniela Patrizia Taormina

Part I – Historical overview

Chapter 1 – The school and texts of Epicurus in the early centuries of the Roman empire – Tiziano Dorandi

Part II – Common anti-Epicurean arguments in Plotinus

Chapter 2 – The mention of Epicurus in Plotinus’ tr. 33 (Enn. II 9) in the context of the polemics between pagans and Christians in the second to third centuries AD – Angela Longo
Chapter 3 – Epicureans and Gnostics in tr. 47 (Enn. III 2) 7.29–41 – Manuel Mazzetti

Chapter 4 – ‘Heavy birds’ in tr. 5 (Enn. V 9) 1.8 – Mauricio Pagotto Marsola

Chapter 5 – Plotinus, Epicurus and the problem of intellectual evidence – Pierre-Marie Morel

Chapter 6 – ‘What is known through sense perception is an image’. Plotinus’ tr. 32 (Enn. V 5) 1.12–19 – Daniela Patrizia Taormina

Part III – Plotinus’ criticism of Epicurean doctrines

Chapter 7 – Corporeal matter, indefiniteness and multiplicity – Marco Ninci

Chapter 8 – Plotinus’ reception of Epicurean atomism in On Fate, tr. 3 (Enn. III 1) 1–3 – Erik Eliasson

Part IV – Epicurean elements in Plotinus

Chapter 9 – Athroa epibolē – Andrei Cornea

Chapter 10 – Plotinus and Epicurus on pleasure and happiness – Alessandro Linguiti

Bibliography

Index locorum

Index of modern authors

Index of main concepts

Link

http://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2017/2017-01-54.html

Plotinus

 Myth, Metaphor, and Philosophical Practice

Stephen R. L. Clark, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2016

Description

Plotinus, the Roman philosopher (c. 204-270 CE) who is widely regarded as the founder of Neoplatonism, was also the creator of numerous myths, images, and metaphors. They have influenced both secular philosophers and Christian and Muslim theologians, but have frequently been dismissed by modern scholars as merely ornamental. In this book, distinguished philosopher Stephen R. L. Clark shows that they form a vital set of spiritual exercises by which individuals can achieve one of Plotinus’s most important goals: self-transformation through contemplation. Clark examines a variety of Plotinus’s myths and metaphors within the cultural and philosophical context of his time, asking probing questions about their contemplative effects. What is it, for example, to “think away the spatiality” of material things? What state of mind is Plotinus recommending when he speaks of love, or drunkenness, or nakedness? What star-like consciousness intended when he declares that we were once stars or are stars eternally? What does it mean to say that the soul goes around God? And how are we supposed to “bring the god in us back to the god in all”? Through these rich images and structures, Clark casts Plotinus as a philosopher deeply concerned with philosophy as a way of life.

(Text from the publisher)

Table of contents

Preface
Acknowledgments

Part I: Prolegomena
1.         Why Read Plotinus?
2.         How to Read Plotinus
3.         Theories about Metaphor
4.         Dialectic

Part II: Metaphorically Speaking
5.         Naked and Alone
6.         On Becoming Love
7.         Shadow Plays and Mirrors
8.         Reason Drunk and Sober
9.         Dancing
10.       Remembering and Forgetting
11.       Standing Up to the Blows of Fortune

Part III: The Plotinian Imaginary
12.       Platonic and Classical Myths
13.       Spheres and Circles
14.       Charms and Countercharms
15.       Invoking Demons
16.       Images Within and Without
17.       Fixed Stars and Planets
18.       Waking Up

Part IV: Understanding the Hypostases
19.       Matter
20.       Nature
21.       Soul
22.       Nous
23.       The One

Part V: The Plotinian Way

Bibliography
Index of Passages from the Enneads
Index of Names and Subjects

Link

Version at BMCR home site