CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

PLOTINUS AND THE JEWISH GNŌSTIKOI*

Plotinus, the last great Greek philosopher and founder of the infl uential Neoplatonic school, was born in 205 in Lykopolis on the Nile, present- day Assiout in Upper Egypt. At that time, Catholics and Manichaeans thronged the streets of Lykopolis. From 232 to 243 he studied Platonic philosophy in Alexandria with a certain Ammonius Saccas. Desirous to become acquainted with Indian thought, he joined the court of emperor Gordianus III on an expedition against the hereditary enemy of the Roman Empire, Persia. After the assassination of Gordianus, Plotinus went to Rome where he founded a school. Later he went to the South, to Campania, where he founded a Platonic community, called Platonopolis. He died in 270. Plotinus has traditionally been cast as a fi re-proof rationalist, the crowning and consummation of Greek philosophy, who arrived at his systematic world view through the interpretation of Plato, Aristotle and the Pythagoreans: the Ground of Being, the One, produces the Mind (world of ideas) which in its turn produces the Worldsoul. Matter is evil, it is absence of light and goodness. If the Stoic philosopher Posidonius with his Sympathy of the All and the Platonist Eudorus of Alexandria had anticipated some of Plotinus’ ideas, this was held to be nothing but a preparation and anticipation of Neoplatonism. There is hardly one Western philosopher who has not read Plotinus.

Ego Porphyrius

Thirty years after the death of Plotinus, his pupil Porphyrius edited the writings of Plotinus. He arranged them systematically, not chronologi- cally, dividing them into 6 × 9 = 54 Enneads, giving them titles and putting them in codices. To this he added a Life of Plotinus, the sixteenth chapter of which may be translated into English as follows:

* Previously published in: Il Manicheismo. Nuove Prospettiva della Ricerca, Turnhout 2005, 287–329. 584 chapter thirty-four

There were in his time in Rome many Christians, Catholics, but also heretics besides these. They originated from classical philosophy, people like Adelphius and Aquilinus and their followers. They had in their possession many works of Alexander the Libyan, of Philocomus, of Demostratus and of Lydus. Moreover, they brought an Apocalypse of Zoroaster, of Zostrianus, of Nikotheos, of Allogenes and of Messos, and other such fi gures. They deceived many people and themselves as well, pretending that Plato had not fathomed the depth of spiritual Being itself. Accordingly, Plotinus constructed many refutations of their ideas in his seminar meet- ings which they attended: in addition to this, he wrote the work, to which I assigned the title: Against the Gnostics. He left to us the task to contend with the rest. Amelius proceeded with a refutation in as many as forty books of the work: Zostrianus. I myself, Porphyrius, added many arguments to show that the Apocalypse of Zoroaster is spurious and modern and recently composed, fabricated by the founders of the sect in order to give the impression that the ancient Zarathustra himself had proclaimed the doctrines which they themselves wished to represent. (English translation after Bentley Layton)

Interpretation

Michel Tardieu has written an excellent commentary of this passage with a survey of the relevant secundary literature from 1933 to 1990. He shows that the report of Porphyrius is tendentious. We accept most of his views. Nowhere in his writings does Plotinus mention Christians. As has been stated above, the city of Lykopolis had a great number of Catholic and Manichaean inhabitants. A local philosopher, Alexander of Lykopolis, wrote against Manichaeans living in his town and confronted them with an old-fashioned version of Middle Platonism as taught by Eudorus in Alexandria in the fi rst century B.C.E. In Alexandria, Catholicism had come of age and had become respect- able: Origen was both a fi ne philosopher and a brilliant intellectual. In Rome, the Catholic Church had outgrown the Gnostic crisis of the second century. It now had an apostolic confession, an inspired canon of the Bible and a monarchic episcopacy. It was on its way to become the offi cial Church of the Roman Empire. Plotinus ignores all this. He resembles the authors of the Corpus Her- meticum, who wrote their treatises at about the same time in Alexandria, did not introduce any Christian ideas and did not even refute them. When heretical Christians penetrated into his school and attended his seminars, he felt embarrassed. He wrote a long treatise, in which he