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Plotinus on Theurgy and Magic 1 HANDOUT Public Lecture Plotinus on Theurgy and Magic HANDOUT [P1] Porphyry Life of Plotinus 10.33-35 When Amelius grew ritualistic and took to going round visiting the temples at the New Moon and the feasts of the gods and once asked if he could take Plotinus along, Plotinus said, “They ought to come to me, not I to them”. What he meant by this exalted utterance we could not understand and did not dare to ask. [trans. Armstrong] [P2] Ennead IV.4.40.1-9 But how do magic spells work? By sympathy and by the fact that there is a natural concord of things that are alike and opposition of things that are different, and by the rich variety of the many powers which go to make up the life of the one living creature. For many things are drawn and enchanted without anyone else’s magical contrivance: and the true magic is the Philia and also the Strife in the All. And this is the primary wizard and enchanter, from observing whom men came to use his philtres and spells on each other. [trans. Armstrong] [P3] Ennead IV.4.26.1-4 Their [i.e. the heavenly bodies] knowledge of prayers is the result of a sort of linking and a particular disposition of things fitted into the whole, and the same applies to their accomplishment of what we pray for; and in the arts of the magicians everything is directed to this linking: this means that magic works by powers which follow on sympathetically [trans. Armstrong modified] [P4] Ennead IV.4.41.4-10 … for if the string is plucked at the lower end, it has a vibration at the upper. But often, too, when one string is plucked another has a kind of sense of this by its concord and the fact that it is tuned to the same scale. But if the vibration can even pass from one lyre to another in so far as sympathy exists, then there is also one single harmony in the All, even if it is composed of opposites; and it is in fact composed of parts which are alike and all akin, even when they are opposites. [trans. Armstrong] [P5] Ennead IV.4.43.1-6 But how is the good man affected by magic and drugs? He is incapable of being affected in his soul by enchantment, and his rational part would not be affected, nor would he change his mind; but he would be affected in whatever part of the irrational in the All there is in him, or rather this part would be affected; [trans. Armstrong]. [P6] Ennead IV.4.44.1-5 Contemplation alone remains incapable of enchantment because no one who is self- directed is subject to enchantment; for he is one, and that which he contemplates is himself, and his reason is not deluded, but he makes what he ought and makes his own life and work. [trans. Armstrong] [P7] Porphyry Life of Plotinus 10.3-9 This man’s attack [Olympius] on him [Plotinus] went to the point of trying to bring a star- stroke upon him by magic. But when he found his attempt recoiling upon himself, he told his intimates that the soul of Plotinus had such great power as to be able to throw back attacks on him on to those who were seeking to do him harm [trans. Armstrong modified] Giannis Stamatellos (Post Doc) – Center for Neoplatonic Virtue Ethics 1 University of Copenhagen – April 2011 Public Lecture Plotinus on Theurgy and Magic [P8] Porphyry, Philosophy from Oracles in Augustine, City of God XIX.23 For God, as being the father of all, has indeed no lack of anything; but it is well for us when we adore him by means of justice, chastity, and other virtues, making our life itself a prayer to him by imitating him and seeking to know him. For seeking to know him purifies us, while imitation of him deifies us by bringing our disposition in line with this. [P9] Iamblichus De Mysteriis II.1.1 I think I must say something about these things in a more theurgical manner … It is not thought that connects the theurgist with the gods … Rather the efficacy of the ineffable acts, which operate divinely beyond all thought, and the power of the symbols, which are understood by the gods, effect theurgic union. This is why we do not set these acts in train by thinking: for if this were the case their activity would be intellectual and determined by us; but neither of these is true; for, without our thinking, the symbols themselves and of themselves effect their own operation; and the ineffable power of the gods, to whom they refer, itself and of itself recognizes its own images. [P10] Proclus On the Hieratic Art 148.1-10 Just as lovers move on beyond the beauty perceived through the senses until they reach the sole cause of all beauty and all perception, so too, the experts in hieratic matters, starting with the sympathy connecting visible things both to one another and to the invisible powers, and having understood that all things are to be found in all things, they established the hieratic science. Selected Bibliography Armstrong, A. H. (1955) ‘Was Plotinus a magician?’, Phronesis 1, 1: 73-79. _____, (1966-1988) Plotinus. Greek text with English translation in 7 vols. Heinemann. Clarke, C. E., Dillon, M. J. and Hershbell, P. J. (2006) (eds.) Iamblichus: De mysteriis: Translated with an Introduction and Notes. Brill Dodds, E. R. (1951) The Greeks and the Irrational. Universtiy of California Press. ____, (1965) Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety. Cambridge: Cambridge Un. Press. Edwards, M. (2006) Culture and Philosophy in the Age of Plotinus. London: Duckworth. Helleman, W. E. (2010) ‘Plotinus and Magic’, International Journal of the Platonic Tradition 4, 2: 114-146. Kalligas, P. (2009) Plotinus’ Ennead IV: Ancient Greek text, translation and commentary. Athens, Centre of Edition of Ancient Greek Authors, Athens Academy. Merlan, P. (1953) ‘Plotinus and magic’, Isis 44: 341-348. Shaw, G. (1999) ‘Eros and Arithmos: Pythagorean theurgy in Iamblichus and Plotinus’ in Ancient Philosophy 19,1: 121-143. Smith, A. (1993) Porphyrii Fragmenta. Leipzig/Stuttgart: Teubner. _____, A. (2004) Philosophy in Late Antiquity. Routledge. Stamatellos, G. (2007) Plotinus and the Presocratics. SUNY Press. Wallis, R. T. (1995) Neoplatonism, 2nd ed., London: Duckworth. Giannis Stamatellos (Post Doc) – Center for Neoplatonic Virtue Ethics 2 University of Copenhagen – April 2011 .
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