readoldthings

Every thing which participates is inferior to that which is participated by it; and that which is participated is inferior to that which is imparticipable.

For that which participates, since it is imperfect prior to participation, but becomes perfect through participation, is entirely secondary to that which is participated so far as it is perfect by participating. For so far as it was imperfect it is inferior to that which it participates, which causes it to become perfect. But that which is participated by a certain one and not by all, is on this account allotted an hyparxis or essence subordinate to that which is common to all things, and not to a certain one thing: for the latter is more allied but the former less to the cause of all.

The imparticipable, therefore, is the leader of things which are participated; but the latter are the leaders of participants. For, in short, the imparticipable is one prior to the many; but that which is participated in the many is one and at the same time not one; and everything which participates is not one and at the same time one.

COMMENTARY

This proposition is spelling out the ideas that we've already encountered in straightforward and simple terms. This is a hierarchical ontology, with forms having their cause on one level of being and proceeding through succeeding levels of being, down to the last of things.

I'm going to repeat something that I've discussed before. This may be unnecessary, but it's worth reminding ourselves that when we talk about "superior" and "inferior," we're not talking about "better" and "worse" in some kind of abstract sense. To think of God as a king and the highest gods or angels as spirits surrounding his throne is a metaphor. (As a metaphor, it may have worked better for people who were actually governed by kings.) Participants come after the Participated; the Participated come after the Imparticipable. This is an ontological description, not a political hierarchy. To return to the imagery we used last time, Color Itself (or Light Itself, which is invisible) is the Imparticipable. The Color Red Itself is Participated. The Red Pen is a Participant. Participants don't look cross-eyed from under their Red Sox hats at the Participated and say "You think you're betta than me!?" Things simply are as they are.

Proclus also introduces another idea in this proposition of which we'll be hearing more soon: The perfect. Participants, we are told, "are imperfect prior to participation," but "become perfect through participation." We will have more to say on this in the future.

Moreover, among the Participated and the Imparticipable, the very highest are those whose reach extends the furthest. Color Itself, for example, is manifest in the color spectrum and in one particular quality shared by physical objects, viz. visible color. Color is only one of many physical qualities; physical qualities are only one subset of all qualities. Quality Itself is thus prior to color. And the One is prior to all things.

Click here to support this blog.

Every imparticipable produces the things which are participated: and all the natures which are participated strive for imparticipable essences.

For that which is imparticipable, having the relation of a monad, as subsisting from itself and not from another, and being exempt from participants, produces those things which may be participated. For either it is of itself barren, remaining within itself, and possessing nothing worthy of honor, or it will impart something from itself. And that which receives indeed from it will participate it; but that which was given will subsist. But everything participating of another by which it is generated, is secondary to that which is similarly present to [23] all things, and which fills all things from itself. For that which is in one only is not in others. But that which is similarly present to all things, in order that it may illuminate all, is not in one thing, but is prior to all things. For it is either in all things, or in one of all, or is prior to all. But that indeed which is in all things, being distributed into all, will again require another thing which may unite that which is distributed. And all things will no longer participate of the same thing, but this of one and that of another, the one being divided. But if it is in one alone of all things it will no longer be common to all, but to one thing. Hence, if it is common to all things able to participate, and is common to all, it will be prior to all. But this is imparticipable, [because it neither is nor can be participated by anything.]

Taylor's translation is a bit different:

Every imparticipable gives subsistence from itself to things which are participated. And all participated hypostases are extended to imparticipable hyparxes.

COMMENTARY

Taylor notes in his translation that the text is somewhat garbled in the original. Still, it's easy to see what Proclus is talking about here.

Previously we were introduced to the concept of movement through three terms:

The Immovable

The Self-Motive

The Alter-Motive

The Immovable does not move, but moves others. The self-motive moves itself and others. The alter-motive is only moved. These three exist in a hierarchy, beginning with the immovable, proceeding through the self-motive, ending in the alter-motive.

Now we are being introduced to the same sort of structure, but this time it's being applied to the concept of participation. And so we have:

The Imparticipable

The Participated

The Participants

To understand what he is talking about, we need to return to our whole picture of the universe, which consists, as we have seen, of several different levels. First we have the level of Being. After Being, we have Intellect. After Intellect, Soul. After Soul, Body. Actually, there are two more levels which we can fit in there, but that's a subject for another time. Let's stick with four for now:

Being

Intellect

Soul

Body

At every level, there is that which is participated, and that which is imparticipable. To be participated means that it has contact with the level beneath it. To be imparticipable means that it does not.

It might be easiest to understand this if we start form the lowest levels. Your body participates in soul; we know that because you're alive and reading these words. Your body is a participant; your soul, participated. But there are souls which are not in bodies, and which never descend to the level of body; moreover, Soul Itself is not a body of any kind. These are imparticipable.

Moreover, of souls, some reach upward to the level of Intellect, but others do not. Intellect or nous is a faculty which seems to be peculiar to human beings, and perhaps to some animals-- Today, we'd probably assume that means dolphins or elephants, but the only animal which Plato mentions as having a nous is the crane! Our souls participate in Intellect, but there are Intellects prior to soul which are not participated.

Finally, at the level of Being, we have the One, which is imparticipable, and the unities, which are participated. These are also called the First God and the particular Gods. Note that the One is actually prior to Being and to every particular being. As Thomas Taylor says, "imparticipable being, is that which participates nothing of being, but is the source of being to others."

An easy way to understand it may be to think of colors. On my desk there is a red lighter, a red box, a red cup, and a text-message on my phone bordered in red. All of these objects can be said to participate in the color red. The color red itself is not a red object-- and, what's more, you can never actually encounter it, because any specific instance of red you encountered wouldn't be Red Itself, but another red object. And so Red Itself is participated. But prior to Red Itself is Color Itself, which is even further removed from the world of our experience. Color Itself is not participated; you can see a white wall or a black cat, but never a color wall or a colored cat. Every color you encounter is particular. These are akin, on a very different level, to the One and the Unities. The One is like Color Itself, prior to every color; Red Itself and Blue Itself and Green Itself are like the Unities (Henads or Gods), which can be participated. Make sense?

***

This is always going to be a free blog, but if you find the work I do here helfpful, consider clicking here to make a donation.

Every thing which subsists primarily and principally in each order is one, and is neither two, nor more than two, but is wholly one alone.

For, if it be possible, let there be two things which thus subsist, since there will be the same impossibility if there are more than two; or let that which subsists primarily consist of each of these. But if, indeed, it consists of each it will again be one, and there will not be two things which are first. And if it be one of the two, each will not be first. Nor, if both are equally primary, will each have a principal subsistence. For if one of them is primary, but this is not the same with the other, what will it be in that order? For that subsists primarily which is nothing else than that which it is said to be. But each of these being different is, and at the same time is not, that which it is said to be.

If, therefore, these differ from each other, but they do not primarily differ so far as they are that which they are said to be, — for this primarily experiences that which is the same, — both will not be first, but will be that of which both participating are thereby said to subsist primarily.

Corollary.— From these things it is evident that what is primarily being is one alone, and that there are not two primary beings, or more than two; that the first intellect is one alone, and that there are not two first intellects; and that the first soul is one. This is also the case with every form, such as the primarily beautiful and the primarily equal. Thus, too, with respect to the form of animals, and the form of man, the first of each is one; for the demonstration is the same.

COMMENTARY

This one is also straightforward enough. At every level of being, the level itself is one and one alone. Being Itself is one. Why? Because if there were two principle beings, they would both share Being Itself, which would then be... Being. Itself. The same holds at the levels of Intellect and Soul. The First Intellect is one, and the subsequent intellects proceed from it; the First Soul (the Universal or World Soul) is one, and subsequent souls proceed from it.

This same structure holds at the level of forms or ideas. The Beautiful is one; if two things both share beauty, then the Beauty that they share is Beauty Itself. Note that a whole series of beautiful things are not beauty itself; as an idea, Beauty subsists at a different ontological level from things which are beautiful. The same is true of Equal itself, which is that by virtue of which equality can be found in subsequent objects. And we can say the same for the whole series of forms. The Good, the True, and the Beautiful; the Same and the Different; Justice Itself, Wisdom, Courage, and Temperance Themselves are all one and prior to those things which participate in them.

Every order, beginning from a monad, proceeds into a multitude co-ordinate to the monad, and the multitude of every order is referred to one monad.

For the monad, having the relation of a principle, generates a multitude allied to itself. Hence one causal chain and one whole order has a decrement into multitude from the monad. For there would no longer be an order, or a chain, if the monad remained of itself un-prolific. But multitude is again referred to the one common cause of all coordinate natures. For that in every multitude which is the same has not its progression from one of those things of which the multitude consists. For that which subsists from one alone of the many is not common to all, but eminently possesses the peculiarity of that one alone. Hence, since in every order there is a certain communion, connection, and sameness, through which some things are said to be coordinate, but others of a different order, it is evident that sameness comes to every order from one principle. In each order, therefore there is one monad prior to the multitude, which imparts one ratio and connection to the natures arranged in it, both to each other and to the whole.

For let one thing be the cause of another, among things that are under the same causal chain or series; but that which ranks as the cause of the one series must necessarily be prior to all in that series, and all things must be generated by it as coordinate, not so that each will be a certain particular thing, but that each will belong to this order.

Corollary.— From these things it is evident that both one and multitude are inherent in the nature of body; that nature has many natures co-dependent on it; and that many natures proceed from the one nature of the universe. Further, that the order of souls originates from one first soul, proceeds with diminution into the multitude of souls, and reduces multitude into one; that in the intellectual essence there is an intellectual monad, and a multitude of intellects proceeding from one intellect, and returning to it; that there is a multitude of unities in The One which is prior to all things; and that in these unities there is a striving for The One. Hence, after the Primal One there are unities; after the First Intellect there are intellects; after the First Soul there are souls; and after Total Nature there are natures.

COMMENTARY

Here again we have a relatively straightforward proposition. In the Platonic cosmos, everything existing proceeds from the One. This same order is reflected at every level of being. The first order which proceeds from the One are Ones-- or, rather, Unities (Henads), since in them there is both oneness and multiplicity.

After the level of the Unities we have Intellect. Here again we have a unity, Intellect Itself, which proceeds into the multitude of particular Intellects. After Intellect we have Soul. We begin with the Universal Soul, and expand outward into individual souls.

Finally we have Nature. It's worth taking a moment to consider how we use that word. In a very real sense, our own language is in fragments. We've inherited concepts from the Renaissance and medieval worlds, from the Classical world, from pagan antiquity. By the late Middle Ages, in our society, these concepts were gathered into a coherent world-picture. (It is worth noting that, in the West, that world-picture was the idea which underlay a civilization, which can be called Christendom.) Modernity in a real sense has been nothing but the shattering of that world-picture, and modern philosophy has been nothing more than a sustained attack on our inheritance. The result is that we speak and think with a jumble of fragmentary words whose original definitions lie half-understood in the context. "Are you feeling enthusiastic?" "He's in high spirits today." "What a great idea!" "I'm feeling somewhat melancholy." "Do you have the energy?" "She has got a lot of potential." "What inspired you?" "He's very intelligent." "That's just, like, your opinion, man!" All these sentences contain concepts of which the speaker often has only a vague awareness of their original meaning.

So too with that word, "nature." We use this term in two different senses. If someone asks me why the cat won't stop laying on my keyboard while I'm trying to write, I might respond, "It's just his nature." If I feel like going for a walk in the woods, I might say, "I'd like to spend some time in nature."

For the Neoplatonists, Nature refers to a level of being, proceeding from Soul. The meaning of the term is captured far better in the sentence "It's just his nature" than "I'd like to spend some time in Nature," though the latter is part of it. The cat has a nature, both as a cat and as this particular cat, just as you have a nature, as a human being, a man or woman, this particular man or woman. All of these proceed from Nature Itself, just as all individual souls proceed from Soul Itself, all Intellects from Intellect Itself, all unities from the One Itself.

It's also worth noting that there are at least two ways to conceive of that first and final level of being, the level of Unity. For Proclus and his confederates, the unities who proceed from the One are the Gods who proceed from God. But Christian, Jewish, and Islamic thinkers have also worked with these ideas. For Dionysius, the unities are not conceived as separate gods, but as names of God, which are themselves expressions of divine activity. A similar concept is found in the Kaballah, in which every Sphere of the Tree of Life is governed by one of the names of God. The Names are not separate Gods, but neither are they arbitrary distinctions; Adonai Ha'Aretz is the Divine Name of Malkuth, the sphere of the physical world, while Shadai El Chai is the Name that governs Yesod, the sphere of the Moon. The Islamic world, too, took up these ideas on various occasions and worked with them. From the 10th through the 12th centuries, the powerful Fatimid Caliphate relied on a theology derived ultimately from Plotinus, Proclus's predecessor, that saw Allah as the Primal One, with the 99 Names of God as Proclus's henads. Though Proclus himself is a pagan, all of his students are not. The Great Tradition is not a religion but a philosophy, and gives us a way to approach any religious tradition.

The essence of soul is beyond all bodies, the intellectual nature is beyond all souls, and The One is beyond, all intellectual hypostases.

For every body is movable by another, but is not naturally competent to move itself, but by the presence of soul it is moved of itself, lives through soul, and, when soul is present is in a certain respect self-movable, but when it is absent is alter-movable, because any self-movable nature which it may have it receives from soul, which is allotted a self-movable essence: since, to whatever nature soul is present, to this it imparts self-motion. Soul is, however, by a much greater priority that which it imparts by its very being. Hence it is beyond bodies, which become self-movable by participation, because it is essentially self-movable. Again, however, soul which is moved from itself has an order secondary to the immovable nature, which subsists immovable, in activity or energy. Because of all the natures that are moved, the self-movable essence is the leader; but of all that move, the immovable is the leader. If, therefore, soul, being moved from itself moves other things, it is necessary that prior to it there should be that which moves immovably. But intellect moves, being immovable, and energizing always in the same manner. For soul through intellect participates of perpetual thought, just as body through soul possesses the power of moving itself. For if perpetual intellection or thinking was primarily in soul, it would be inherent in all souls, in the same manner as the self-motive power. Hence perpetual thinking is not primarily in soul. It is necessary, therefore, that prior to it there should be that which is primarily intelligent: and hence intellect is prior to souls.

Moreover, The One is prior to intellect. For intellect, though it is immovable, yet is not The One; for it thinks itself, and energizes about itself. And of The One indeed all beings, in whatever way they may exist, participate; but all beings do not participate of intellect. For those beings to whom intellect is present by participation necessarily participate of knowledge; because intellectual knowledge is the principle and first cause of gnostic energy. The One, therefore, is beyond intellect, nor is there anything beyond The One: for The One and The Good are the same. But The Good, as has been demonstrated, is the principle of all things.

COMMENTARY

This one is a mouthful, but it breaks down the entire Neoplatonic cosmology. Taking it term by term, Proclus leads us from material bodies to the nature of the One itself, employing the terms and ideas that he's already taught us. Let's go through it piece by piece.

Now we're back to the discussion of motion: the unmovable, the self-motive, and the alter-motive, and here we see how these terms line up with the levels of being. The nature of body is to be moved by another, but it is not naturally able to move itself. Body is therefore the naturally alter-motive.

Under certain conditions, however, body becomes self-motive in a sense. That condition is precisely the presence of Soul. Soul is naturally self-motive, and its presence allows bodies to be self-motive by participation in Soul.

Now, it's worth noting that there is some disagreement among the thinkers who followed Plotinus as to the nature of that participation. Some contemporary scholars have suggested that Neoplatonism can be divided, in a way, into an Eastern and a Western school. The Western school is represented especially by Plotinus himself and by his disciple Porphyry. The Eastern is represented by Iamblichus, a student of both Plotinus and Porphyry and sometime rival of the latter.

For Plotinus and his school, for an embodied soul is similar to a light shining on a wall. The wall become illuminated, but the source of the light is outside, and the light itself remains effectively outside. Proclus's view, derived from Iamblichus, is somewhat different. For the "Eastern School" the living body is truly what it seems-- a body in which soul is really present.

Gregory Shaw, one of the great living scholars of the Neoplatonic tradition, suggests that this is because Iamblichus and those who followed him were more accepting of the ideas of Aristotle, and more committed to the idea of a harmony ("symphonia") between Plato and Aristotle. For Aristotle, the soul is the cause of the body, in every sense-- including the source of movement within the body (De Anima 415b). But Aristotle's soul isn't outside of the body-- elsewhere, he compares the relationship between body and soul to the relationship between the wax and the candle. The wax is the material substance, the candle the form, nor does it make any sense to talk about one candle inhabiting more than one body of wax. Proclus's education began with a complete reading of Aristotle as a kind of "Outer Mystery;" only once Aristotle's ideas were mastered was he then introduced to the "Inner Mysteries" of Plato. I believe his cosmology as expressed here reflects this. The ensouled body really is ensouled by a form as present to it as the shape of the candle is to the wax. But that isn't the end of it.

Above Soul is Intellect (nous). Soul moves itself, and, embodied, moves matter. Intellect, however, is immovable. Intellect is "perpetual thought," and is therefore not primarily in souls. We can know this because not all souls participate in thought or intellection (which is higher than thought), any more than all bodies participate in soul. Consider a soulless body, like Aristotle's candle, and then consider a body with the simplest form of soul, such as a plant. The plant does not think, has no sensation, and does not even move. It does, however, feed and reproduce itself. Aristotle tells us (De Anima 415a) that "the nutritive soul is found along with all the others and is the most primitive and widely distributed power of soul, being indeed that one in virtue of which all are said to have life." This is the difference between the plant and the candle. If Intellect were in souls naturally or primarily, then the plant would think and would perceive the forms above thought as readily as a sage. This is not the case, however. Therefore Intellect is prior to Soul, as Soul is prior to Body.

Prior to Intellect is the One. Here Proclus tells us something interesting, which will come up again later. Everything whatsoever which has any being of any kind participates of the One, but not all beings participate in Soul or Intellect. The power of the One therefore extends as far as to the very last of things, while that of Intellect and Soul are limited. Again, the implications of this are important-- but we'll come to them in due time.

Every thing which is primarily inherent in a certain nature of beings is present to all the beings which are arranged according to that nature, conformably to one reason, and in the same manner.

For unless it was present to all of them in the same manner, but present to some and not to others, it is evident that it would not be primarily in that nature, but in some things primarily, and in others secondarily, which sometimes participate of it. For that which at one time exists, but at another time does not, does not exist primarily, nor of itself: but it is adventitious, and comes from some other place to the things in which it is thus inherent.

COMMENTARY

This one is, for once, fairly straightforward. Everything which is inherint in the nature of a certain type of being, is equally present to every being of that type, and in the same manner.

For a simple illustration of this concept we might think of number or of color. Color is equally present to red, green, and magenta; number is equally number in 3, 5, and 1,283.

Where it becomes interesting is when we call to mind the teaching in Plato's Phaedrus, that every human soul is arranged under one of the twelve Olympian Gods. The Olympians, bear in mind, are not the highest powers in the cosmos, either in that dialogue of Plato's or in the work of Proclus. In the Phaedrus, Plato explains that at the end of a cycle of creation all the souls arranged under each of the gods will be, in effect, gathered back into that God to return to the higher realms. (That is a simplified explanation, but it will do for now). Now, the twelve Olympians map to the twelve constellations of the Zodiac, and they also map to the spheres and elements of the astrological world thusly:

Sphere of Saturn: Ceres

Sphere of Jupiter: Jupiter

Sphere of Mars: Mars

Sphere of the Sun: Apollo

Sphere of Venus: Venus

Sphere of Mercury: Mercury

Sphere of the Moon: Artemis

Aether as a Whole: Athena

Element of Fire: Hephastus

Element of Air: Hera

Element of Water: Poseidon

Element of Earth: Hestia

(While the sphere of Saturn is the sphere of the grain-mother Ceres, in practice the planet Saturn is overwhelmingly viewed as the planet of its eponymous deity.)

The Neoplatonic cosmos of Proclus is also the cosmology of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, with its Great Chain of Being. In this way of looking at the world, all souls and all things generally are gathered under the natures of the planets and the elements. Old men, beggars, and friars; cats and crows; yew trees and barley; lead and obsidian; graveyards, monasteries, and the color black; all these are under the rulership of Saturn. When any is present, Saturn himself is, in a certain sense, present, constituting the being of each. Of course, it follows from there that if one wishes to increase the presence of Saturn in one's life, one could do worse than to wear black, and perhaps to dwell near a graveyard, or a monastery, and to keep cats around-- but of course, it being the case that the gods are the active forces in the universe, and we the passive, it should rather be said that if you find such things, you see the activity of Saturn Himself.

Of course, neither astrology nor astrological magic is a necessary component or consequence of Proclus's philosophy, much less Plato's. But for those of us interested in this sort of thing-- well, this is how it works.

Every thing which imparts being to others is itself primarily that which it communicates to other natures.

For if it gives being, and makes the impartance from its own essence, that which it gives is subordinate to its own essence, which is truly greater and more perfect, since every nature which is able to constitute any thing is better than that which is constituted by it—hence the giver is essentially superior to that which is given, but is not the same with it, for the one exists primarily, but the other secondarily. For it is necessary that either each should be the same, and that there should be one reason and definition of each, or that there should be nothing common and the same in each, or that the one should subsist primarily, but the other secondarily. If, however, there is the same reason and definition of each, the one will no longer be cause, but the other effect; nor will the one subsist essentially, but the other in a participant; nor will the one be the maker, but the other the thing made. But if they have nothing which is the same, the one will not constitute the other from its very being, because in that case it imparts nothing. Hence it follows that the one which gives is primary, but that the other to which existence is given is secondary; the former supplying the latter from its very being.

COMMENTARY

This strikes me as a rather important point, and as illustrating one of the distinctions between the Platonism of Proclus and the mainstream of the Christian tradition as we have received it.

"Everything which imparts being to others is that which it communicates to others." In the mainstream Christian tradition, God creates the world ex nihilo, that is, out of nothing. Moreover, God creates the world all by himself: In principio creavit Deus caelum et terram. In the beginning, the Lord created the Heavens and the Earth.

In the Platonic tradition, by contrast, creation unfolds by a series of emanations. The terms to keep in mind here are "same" and "different." Proclus tells us, "For it is necessary that either each should be the same, and that there should be one reason and definition of each, or that there should be nothing common and the same in each, or that the one should subsist primarily, but the other secondarily." If we have a cause and a caused, they are either exactly the same, or totally different, or else-- one is primary, and the other secondary. But if they are totally the same, then it's useless to speak of one causing the other, or even to speak of "one" and the "other." On the other hand, if they are totally different, then one cannot "impart being" to the other. They have nothing in common, and the one cannot create the other. The solution is the third option: The one exists primarily, the second, by participation. Both partake both of sameness and difference, and these terms mean something real.

To return to Christianity: Many of Christian philosophers and all of the best drew extensively on Hellenic philosophy, often directly from Plato or Aristotle, sometimes by later thinkers like Plotinus (Hello, Augustine) or Proclus himself (paging Dionysius.) However, those who were accepted as orthodox (or Orthodox) invariably felt the need to modify the tradition.

For Proclus, the First Principle is the One or the Good. The One constitutes the Gods or Henads, the Unities. These unfold progressively. The First Triad is the Good-- not the Good Itself, but the Good as part of the triad of terms, the Good, the True, and the Beautiful. The Good in this sense is both the leader of the triad just mentioned, and itself triadic, composed of the terms Desirable, Sufficient, and Perfect. From this first triad are emanated a whole series of triads, constituting the principles of Being, Life, and Intellect. The final term of the final Intellectual Triad is the Demiurge, who creates the universe that we know. He is identified mythologically with Jupiter. The first term of his triad is his father Saturn, to whom he looks as his paradigm or model for creation.

But it doesn't end there. From Jupiter are constitued another triad of gods, who are also creators or Demiurges: Jupiter, Neptune, and Pluto. And from these unfold the further series of gods who dwell in the sky, the sea, and the land. Each, ultimately, has its role in creating our world.

Proclus derives these ideas from Plato himself. In the Republic, Plato reveals the Good Itself, which produces the Noetic or Intellectual world of the eternal forms or Ideas. In the Timaeus, the teaches that a creator God, who was all good (and in whom there was no jealousy because he was good), created our universe by looking to the perfect universe of the forms. And he created the universe as itself a blessed God. But because the Creator was good (and not a jealous god), anything he created would be eternal as he is; he therefore created younger gods who were immortal but not eternal in the same sense as he was, and gave to them the mission of creating bodies for living things that are born, grow, and die.

The Christian tradition essentially took these ideas and simplified them. Rather than being good, the Creator is the Good; these two are identical. And rather than delegating the creation of matter to subordinate gods, the creator creates both the physical world and the subordinate gods or angels. He then gives the angels the job of... well, it isn't always clear what they do or why they're necessary, which is why there have been so many different ideas about them over the millennia. The Old Testament tells us that he does indeed distribute the nations among the gods, as Plato also believed. Dionysius basically gives them the jobs of Proclus's divine triads, except that they're more like guys who showed up to work for a business that had already started rather than helping the boss to open it, or to have any ownership themselves. The Protestant traditions, when they remember the angels at all, seem to have turned them into Caspar the Friendly Ghost types who turn up every now and again when the boss gives them a mission. Other traditions are somewhere in between.

In any case, part of what this all means is that, insofar as our own being is imparted to us by God, God is primarily that which we are secondarily. We are not created ex nihilo but ex Deo; there is, indeed, for Proclus, a divine spark within each of us.

Every thing which moves itself primarily, is able to return to itself.

For if it moves itself, and its motive energy is directed to itself, that which moves and that which is moved are at the same time one. For it either moves in a part or is moved in a part, or the whole moves and is moved, or the whole moves, but a part is moved, or the contrary. But if one part, indeed, is that which moves, and another part is that which is moved, it will not be essentially self-motive, since it will consist of things which are not self-motive, but which appear indeed to be so, yet are not so essentially.

If, however, the whole moves, but the part is moved, or the contrary, there will be a certain part in each which in one and the same subject moves and at the same time is moved. And this is that which is primarily self-motive. If, however, one and the same thing moves and is moved, it will have the energy of moving to and within itself, being motive of itself. But it returns to that toward which it energizes. Every thing, therefore, which primarily moves itself, is able to return to itself.

COMMENTARY

In the last few propositions, we've been introduced to two different concepts: 1. The Self-Motive. 2. The Self-Convertive. The first refers to anything which is able to move under its own power, rather than being moved by another; this is explained as a medium between the immovable, which only moves others, and the alter-motive, which is only moved. The second refers to anything which is able to become one with itself.

We have learned that the self-convertive is necessarily incorporeal. No body is able to be converted to itself. Now we learn that there is an identity between the self-motive and the self-convertive. Anything which can move itself, can return to itself. And, therefore, anything which can move itself is incorporeal and has an essence which is free of any body whatsoever.

It follows that anything which is self-motive is incorporeal, and has an essence which is free of any body whatsoever.

A reader here, JP Russell, pointed out that the existence of the "self-motive" frees Proclus's cosmology from determinism. That is, if everything were only immovable or alter-motive, nothing could move itself; even allowing the Immovable to be God, the universe would be a clock set into motion once, with everything determined beforehand. The self-motive, therefore, is what we normally think of as the will. From this proposition we learn that the will itself is incorporeal and free of the body. The body, which cannot return to itself, cannot move itself; it is alter-motive.

Every thing which is able to return to itself has an essence separate from every body.

For unless it was separate from every body whatsoever, it would not have a certain activity or act apart from body: since it is impossible that, the essence being inseparable from body, an activity (act) proceeding from essence (body) should be separate. For in this case its activity would be better than its essence, because the latter indeed would be indigent of bodies, but the former unindigent and self-sufficient. If therefore any thing is inseparable in essence from body, it is similarly inseparable in activity (act), — or, rather, it is much more inseparable. But if this be so, it will not return to itself: for that which returns to itself, being something other than body, has an activity separate from body, and which is not either through or with body, since the activity, and that to which the activity is directed, are not at all indigent of body: hence that which returns to itself is wholly separate from bodies.

COMMENTARY

Proclus continues to challenge, and so again I'm going to work through this one line at a time.

We're still talking about "things which are able to return to themselves." We learned last time that such things are, by their nature, incorporeal. Bodies are necessarily composed of parts, and it is impossible for the parts to become one, that is, to return or convert to one another. And so this proposition seems to be an extension of the previous one.

Proclus continues, "unless it was separate from every body whatsoever, it would not have a certain activity or act apart from body." Thomas Taylor translates this as "if it was inseparable from any body whatever, it would not have a certain energy separate from body." We can assume, then, that "act or activity" translates the Greek "energeia." Energeia is a term coined by Aristotle. Energeia or energy refers to activity. Something which was not separate from bodies would not act in a way that was separate from bodies. Or...

If it did, "in this case its activity would be better than its essence." The incorporeal being prior to the corporeal, an incorporeal act or energy would proceed from a bodily essence, which is impossible.

Anything which acts on the physical plane is physical; anything which acts incorporeally must have an essence which is incorporeal and separate from bodies (corpora).

ON AN INCORPOREAL ESSENCE, AND WHAT THE CHARACTERISTIC OF IT IS

Every thing which is able to return to itself is incorporeal.

For no body is, by reason of its nature, competent to return to itself. For if that which is converted to anything is conjoined with that to which it is converted, it is evident that all the parts of the body which is converted to itself will be conjoined with all the parts. For a thing is converted to itself, when both that which is converted, and that to which it is converted, become one. This however is impossible in body, and, in short, in all partible things. For the whole of that which is partible is not conjoined with the whole, on account of the separation of its parts, which lie outside one another. No body, therefore, is naturally able to return to itself, so that the whole may be converted to the whole. Hence, if there is anything which has the power of returning to itself, it is incorporeal and impartible.

ANOTHER TRANSLATION:

Everything which is coverted to itself is incorporeal.

For no body is naturally adapted to revert to itself. For if that which is converted to any thing is conjoined with that to which it is converted, it is evident that all the parts of the body which is converted to itself, will be conjoined with all the parts. For this it is for a thing to be converted to itself, when both that which is converted, and to that to which it is converted, become one. This however is impossible in body, and in short, in all partible things. For the whole of that which is partible is not conjoined with the whole, on account of hte separation of the parts, some of which are situated differently from others. No body therefore is naturally adapted to revert to itself, so as that the whole may be converted to the whole. Hence if there is anything which has the power of reverting to itself, it is incorporeal and impartible.

COMMENTARY

This introduces a very important concept in Neoplatonic metaphysics. This is the concept of conversion or reversion, which we'll see again and again as we proceed. In discussing this proposition, I'd like to go through Proclus's commentary line by line.

Proclus first tells us, "Every thing which is able to return to itself is incorporeal."

From this, we already know several things. 1. There is a concept of "returning to self" or "conversion to self." We don't yet know precisely what this is, but we can be sure it's important. 2. Not everything is able to do this. 3. Everything which is able to return to itself is incorporeal. That is, this is something which only things that don't have bodies can do. All things without bodies? We don't know yet.

Next: No body, by reason of its nature, is able to return to itself. That is, there is something about body as such which precludes return. What is that?

Now we learn: "That which is converted to any thing is conjoined with that to which it is converted." Therefore, conversion means to be conjoined to something. For a thing to convert to itself, then, means to be conjoined to itself. But we're not talking about two things stuck together, like a pair of legos. Rather, "both that which is converted, and that to which it is converted, become one."

That, therefore, is why bodies cannot be converted to themselves. To be a body is to possess parts. One part is a hand; another, an eye; another, a spleen. These are united into a whole, but the hand, the eye, and the spleen cannot become one thing.

Anything which can be converted to itself, therefore, is both not a body, and not divided into parts.

ON THE IMMOVABLE SELF-MOTIVE PRINCIPLE OR CAUSE

Every being is either immovable or moved. And if moved, it is either moved by itself, or by another: and if it is moved by itself it is self-motive, but if by another it is alter-motive. Every nature, therefore, is either immovable, self-motive, or alter-motive.

For it is necessary, since there are alter-motive natures, that there also should be that which is immovable, and the self-motive nature, which is a medium between them. For if every alter-motive thing is moved because it is moved by another, motions will be either in a circle, or they will proceed to infinity. But neither will they be in a circle, nor proceed ad infinitum, since all beings are limited by the Principle of things, and that which moves is better than that which is moved. Hence there will be something immovable, which first moves. But if this be so, it is necessary that the self-motive exist. For if all things should stop, what will that be which is first moved? It cannot be the immovable, for this is not naturally adapted to be moved; nor the alter-motive, for that is moved by another. It remains, therefore, that the self-motive nature is that which is primarily moved. It is this, too, which unites alter-motive natures to that which is immovable, being in a certain respect a medium, moving and at the same time being moved: for of these, the immovable moves only, but the alter-motive is moved only. Every thing, therefore, is either immovable, or self-motive, or alter-motive.

Corollary.— From the premises, therefore, it is evident, that of things which are moved, the self-motive nature is the first; but that of things which move other things the immovable is the first.

COMMENTARY

I have to admit that I don't completely understand Proclus's reasoning in this proposition. Let's talk it through and see what we can come up with.

This proposition deals with motion. I'm sure he means more than physical motion, but it's probably easiest to picture physical motion.

Some things are moved by other things. This is what is called being "alter-motive." Imagine a billiard ball, hit by another ball. This is alter-motion, being moved by something outside of oneself.

Other things are immovable. These do not move. At the absolute we can imagine the One, which we cannot affect in any way, which we certainly cannot push and move about, but which can move all things.

Between these two are things which can be moved by others, but which can also move themselves. As an example, we can imagine the man playing pool. Obviously he can be moved by forces outside of himself. But he also moves himself, moves his stick into place, and, via the stick, moves the balls.

The trouble is that I cannot figure out why it's necessary, on this proposition alone, to posit three terms. We can say that the man playing pool moves himself, and is thus a third type. But we can also say that his will, which is a property of his soul, moves his body, which is a composition of matter. If we do that, we will be back to two terms: The will will move, and the body will be moved; the existence of a third will be an illusion.

Or is it the case that the immovable is always moving other things, because to be "immovable" is to be immune to change, while the soul is sometimes moving, sometimes not moving? And yet the soul is set into motion by itself, and comes to rest by itself. Thus it acts as a medium between Intellect, which moves, and bodies, which are moved.

I suspect Proclus also has astrology in mind. Everything below the sphere of the Moon is in motion, and everything beyond the sphere of the Fixed Stars is moving other things. But between these two we have the planets and stars, which appear to move themselves, and also act upon things here below. We can work with this idea, but we don't need to.

The trouble with this is that it's clearly the case from observation that the self-motive exists, but it's not clear to me why it should be logically necessary, as Proclus claims.

He tells us to imagine that all things should stop. The balls on the pool table, shortly after breaking, stop their motion, the stick is still in the man's hand, a curl of smoke from his cigarette-- I always imagine smoking a cigarette while playing pool, because I think it looks cool, even though I don't smoke cigarettes and I'm terrible at pool-- a curl of smoke stops halfway to the ceiling. If everything were to freeze, what sets it into motion again? It cannot be something material. Two rocks next to one another on the road will not move unless set into motion. As people of the 21st century, we know that something material will come along and set them into motion, or else we know that they're already really in motion as the Earth moves about the Sun. But material things cannot set themselves into motion, unless there is motion already existing from eternity. If you need to think of it as the "Big Bang," a giant explosion that starts things up, someone has to push the button. Or something. It can be a "Law of Physics." But a Law of Physics is not an Act of Physics. It also can't be a Law of Physics, though, because a Law of Physics is always in place or it isn't a law. It must be both like a Law of Physics, which is an Intellectual Principle, and yet able to move material things, like a Physical Object. Call it an Act of Physics. Even in modern thought, it must exist-- but only one time, at the beginning, after which it conveniently snuck off stage. This is the third term, the self-motive.

Let's start again. Proclus tells us to imagine that all things should stop. In that case, what is the first thing to move? If motion comes from the immovable, it's not clear that it matters. Or is it the case that we should imagine one thing moving first, before other things, and ask where it got that ability? Because clearly, unlike material things, it is capable of acting, and not merely being acted upon. But unlike (I assume) divine or Intellectual things, it is capable of change: being sometimes in motion, sometimes not in motion. Intellect is Active; Matter is Passive. Intellect is not subject to time, but matter is subject to time. Between these two, there must be something which is Active, but which is also in Time, so that it can act, but act in time. If we've been paying attention thus far, we have to conclude that it will derive its capacity to Act from Intellect and will derive it through Participation. But its act will be within the changeable world of Time, which will give it the capacity to affect things which are subject to Time.

And so we have-- I think-- Soul as our connecting principle; like the Immovable, it acts upon things of a lower order; like Matter, it is capable of acting and ceasing within the world of time.

Anyone familiar with Thomas Aquinas will know that he worked with these same ideas, but came up with only two terms, the immovable and the in-motion. This is his "first proof" for the existence of God, the simplified form of which goes: All things are in motion; If all things are in motion, something not-in-motion must have set them into motion, or else motion progresses to infinity; That something is what all men call God.

What do you think, everyone?

Every good has the power of uniting its participants, and every union is good; and The Good is the same as The One.

For if The Good is preservative of all beings — by reason of which it is desirable to all things — that indeed which is preservative and connective of the essence of every thing is The One. For by The One all things are preserved, but dispersion expels every thing from its essence. If this be the case, The Good will cause those things to which it is present to be one, and will connect and contain them through union. And if The One is collective and connective of beings, it will perfect each of them by its presence. The union therefore which unites a thing with all is a good. But if union is a good per se, and Good itself has a unifying power, that which is simply good and simply one are the same, causing beings to be both good and one. Hence those things which in a certain way or respect fall off from The Good, at the same time lose the participation of The One. And those things which become destitute of The One, being filled with separation, are equally deprived of The Good. Goodness therefore is union, and union is goodness, and The Good itself is one, and The One is that which is primarily Good

COMMENTARY

A short proposition with a brief commentary, but through this we learn a great deal about just how Proclus thinks about the First Principle. Here is a summary of all the affirmative statements made in this proposition and its commentary:

1. Every good has the power of uniting its participants.

2. Every union is good.

3. The Good (we are reminded) is the same as the One.

And:

4. The Good is preservative of all beings.

5. The Good is that which all beings desire.

6. The Good/the One preserves and connects the essence of all beings.

7. Dispersion expels everything from its essence.

8. The Good causes things to which it is present to be one.

9. The Good connects and contains the things to which it is present through unity.

10. "A good" is a unity which unites "a thing" with "all."

11. To fall away from unity is to fall away from goodness.

12. Goodness is unity, unity is goodness, and the Good is the One, and the One is the Good

And so we have our first principle, the Good. We also have the concepts of "goodness" and "goods." Just as the Good is the same as the One, goodness is the same as union, and goods the same as unities. We have dispersion, which is a falling away from unity and the Good, and which must, therefore, necessarily be evil. We have the reminder that the Good is that which all beings seek, and the fact which they must attain it through unity.

Contained in this proposition, then, is the entire process of creation, descent, and return. Every being simply by coming into existence will fall away from the Good to a certain extent. Some will necessarily fall very far away indeed. Perhaps as far as the chaos of un-formed matter. The work of every being, then, is to return to the Good, and this is done by making itself good. All by itself? No, by participating in the Good Itself. But how is this done? By way of particular goods-- which is to say, unities.

Those unities are the Henads. Proclus's massive treatise called the Platonic Theology applies the philosophical ideas he outlines here to the particular gods and myths of Graeco-Roman civilization. Most of the Gods you and I know well are actually fairly far down the rung for Proclus in that particular volume. It's clearly the case, however, that one can apply Proclus's philosophical ideas to any particular theology. The unities are the One as participated. Proclus's unknown student who applied his ideas to Christian theology under the name "Dionysius the Areopagite" treated the Henads not as "Gods," but as "Names of God" or Divine Names. (Can you think of an other system which treats the highest powers as Divine Names?)

The mode of ascent for beings like you and me, then, is to unite ourselves to the Good, and this is done by uniting ourselves to particular Goods. In this way we bring order, unity, and goodness to the dispersion and chaos of our selves and our souls.

The Principle and First Cause of all beings is The Good Itself.

For if all things proceed from one cause, [as has been demonstrated], it is necessary to call that cause either The Good, or that which is better than The Good. But if it is better than The Good, is any thing imparted by it to beings, and to the nature of beings, or nothing? And if nothing is imparted by it, an absurdity will result. For we would no longer rank it in the order of causes, since it is everywhere necessary that something should be present from cause to the things caused, and especially from the First Cause, on which all things depend, and by reason of which every being exists. But if something is imparted by it, in the same manner as there is by The Good, there will be something better than goodness in beings, emanating from the First Cause.

For if it is better than and above The Good it will in no way bestow on secondary natures any thing inferior to that which is imparted by the nature posterior to itself. But what can be greater than goodness? Since that which is better than other things is so called because it is a participant to a greater degree of the good. Hence if the not good cannot be said to be better than The Good, it must be entirely secondary to it. If, too, all beings desire The Good how is it possible that there should be any thing prior to this cause? For if they also desire that which is prior to The Good, how can they specially desire The Good? But if they do not desire it, how is it possible that they should not desire the cause of all, since they proceed from it? If therefore The Good is that on which all beings depend, The Good is the Principle and First Cause of all things.

COMMENTARY

This is the identity of the Good and the One. Remember that the Good is that toward which everything is aiming, and that "good" in this context means "excellent" or "beneficent." If there is something above the Good, then it has to impart either something or nothing to the beings that come after it. Clearly, however, it must impart something, otherwise there is no reason to posit it-- a First Cause which caused nothing would be a contradiction. But if it impart something to beings, then that "something" would be better than goodness and more excellent than excellence. Again, this would be a contradiction. And so the First Cause must be the Good itself.

And so we have as our First Principle an entirely simple overflowing cause, which is both unknowable the source of all beings and that toward which all beings are striving.

This same doctrine is found in the traditions which succeeded Platonism-- and not just in their esoteric variations. The One is Ain Soph on the Tree of Life. But it's also the God of Dionysius the Areopagite, and of Thomas Aquinas. If I recall correctly, Aquinas had access to the Elements of Theology itself, and probably respected it as he believed it to have been written by his hero Aristotle. In Catholicism this is called the doctrine of "Divine Simplicity." It's important to note that, for Proclus, the One is not part of a triad of terms or hypostases, as all succeeding gods: He explicitly denies this in the Platonic Theology, stating in so many words that "The First God is not the head of a triad." And yet, the absolutely simple God of the Catholic Church is also a triad consisting of relationships between three distinct persons. I've seen many attempts to explain how this works but absolutely none that are convincing-- actually, it's far more convincing to say "The nature of God is beyond that which may be known by human reason" than to claim "God is a radically simple unity and is also three distinct persons in relationship." But, as someone you and I know likes to say, your mileage may vary.

ON CAUSE

All beings proceed from One First Cause.

For either there is no cause of any being, or the causes of all finite things revolve in a circle, or the ascent (progression) is to infinity, and one thing is the cause of another, and the presubsistence of essence (cause) will in no respect cease. If, however, there is no cause of beings, there will be neither an order of things second and first, of things perfecting and perfected, of things adorning and adorned, of things generating and generated, and of agents and patients, nor will there be any science of beings. For the knowledge of causes is the work of science, and we are then said to know scientifically when we know the causes of things. But if causes revolve in a circle, the same things will be prior and posterior, more powerful and more imbecile. For every thing which produces is better than the nature of that which is produced. Nor does it make a difference to conjoin cause to effect, and through many or [11] fewer media to produce from cause. For cause will be superior to all the intermediate natures of which it is the cause; and the more numerous the media the greater is the causality of the cause.

And if the addition of causes is to infinity, and there is always again a cause prior to another, there will be no science of any being: for there is not a knowledge of any thing infinite. But causes being unknown, neither will there be a science of the things consequent to the causes. If, therefore, it is necessary that there should be a cause of beings, and causes are distinct from the things caused, and there is not an ascent to infinity, there is a First Cause of beings, from which as from a root every thing proceeds,—some things indeed being nearer to but others more remote from it. The necessity of the existence of One Principle has been demonstrated, because all multitude is secondary to The One.

COMMENTARY

This one seems straightforward enough. There is one cause of all things; this is Platonism 101. Either things are caused or they are not. If they are not, it's not clear how they could exist at all. If they are, then there is either one first cause, or causality is circular, or causality proceeds to infinity. It's interesting to note that Proclus argues from the "science" of causality to demonstrate its existence. That itself is an important tidbit which I believe we should keep in our minds as we proceed.

Why could there not be two first causes of all things? If there were, then either they or the things they cause relate to one another or do not relate to one another. If they do not relate to one another, then we're left with an absurdity, because we will have two separate sets of "all things" which have no possibility of any contact with one another. But this is impossible, because if both sets consist of "all things" then, at minimum, they share something, which is existence. But if there are two first causes which do relate to one another, at least by way of existence, then neither can be the first cause, because they are united by a third thing. That third thing, in turn, must actually be prior to them, because if it is not prior, they will not both be able to share it. Therefore the shared substance of both will be the First Cause.

Therefore there is a First Cause, "a root from which all things proceed," and this is nothing other than the One Itself.

Every thing which is self-sufficient is inferior to that which is simply good.

For what else is the self-sufficient than that which from and in itself possesses good? But this is now full of good, and participates of it, but is not that which is simply good: for that is better than participation and plenitude, as has been demonstrated. If therefore the self-sufficient fills itself with good, that from which it [10] fills itself will be better than the self-sufficient, and will be superior to self-sufficiency. And that which is simply good will not be indigent of any thing: for it does not desire any thing else, since the desiring would indicate a deficiency. Nor is the simply good self-sufficient, for in that case it would be full of good, but not that which is primarily The Good.

COMMENTARY

Imagine ice cream. First there is Ice Cream Itself, which is beyond all particular forms of ice cream. This is the unparticipated Good. Then there is Vanilla, Strawberry, Chocolate, Mint Chocolate Chip, Rocky Road, Cookie Dough, Birthday Cake, Cookies 'n' Cream, and so on. Like Ice Cream Itself, these are undeniably ice cream. Unlike Ice Cream Itself, they may be eaten. They are not "filled with ice cream"; they simply are Ice Cream. These are the Henads, the participable goods.

Imagine an Ice Cream Truck. This supplies its own Ice Cream. That is what it means to "be self-sufficient." Something which is self sufficient fills itself with the Good, as the ice cream truck fills itself with Ice Cream. Unlike the Ice Cream, the Ice Cream truck isn't ice cream. But it does supply its own Ice Cream. Ice Cream Trucks are the Forms, which both participate and are participated.

Last comes you. You don't have any Ice Cream, and you can't supply your own Ice Cream. You are dependent on the Ice Cream Truck for your Ice Cream. You buy your Ice Cream, and once you eat it, it's all gone. If you want more, you have to wait for the Ice Cream Truck, which is always filled with Ice Cream and never runs out in the Summertime, to come round again. This is life in the material world, and this is what it means to be a participant in the Forms, "participating in the Good through another."

ON THE SELF-SUFFICIENT

Every thing which is self-sufficient, either according to essence or energy, is better than that which is not self-sufficient, and depends on another cause for its perfection.

For if all beings naturally desire good, and one thing supplies well-being from itself, but another is indigent of something else, the one indeed will have the cause of good present, but the other separate and apart. To the degree, therefore, that the former is nearer to that which supplies the object of desire, to that extent will it be superior to that which is indigent of a separate cause, and which externally receives the perfection of its nature or its energy. For since the self-sufficient is both similar and diminished, it is more similar to The Good itself [than that which is not self-sufficient]. It is diminished indeed by participating of The Good, and because it is not primarily The Good, though it is allied to it in a certain respect so far as it is able to possess good of and from itself. But to participate good, and to participate through another, are more remote from that which is primarily good, and which is nothing else than good.

COMMENTARY

Today's Proposition concerns the self-sufficient. The first thing that we need to figure out is precisely what Proclus means by this. He begins reiterating Plato's maxim that "all beings naturally desire good" (or The Good). He then gives us two kinds of beings. One "supplies well-being from itself," but the other is "indigent of something." (The word "indigent" means "in want of.") Of these two, the first "has the cause of good present," while the second is "separate and apart."

So we have two types of things.

Thing 1: Has the Good present to it. As we saw last time, the Good is identical with the First Principle, the One. Such beings are "self-sufficent," it seems, precisely because they are present to the One-- or, to use the correct terminology, they "participate in the One."

Thing 2: Is separate from the Good. These types of things "receive perfection externally."

Some things, then, participate directly in the Good. These can be called "self-sufficient." Others participate in the Good in a secondary way, by "participating through another."

So far, then, it seems we have a three-tiered hierarchy:

The Good

Participants in the Good

Participants in the Participants of the Good.

It would be tempting to view the "Participants in the Good" as the Gods, and if the Elements up to this point is all we have to go on, that would have to be correct. The trouble is that very soon, Proclus is going to tell us about the "imparticipable," and the One itself is going to turn out to be imparticipable. The Gods, who are the unities or "Henads," are precisely the One-as-participated. The Forms are the immediate participants in the Henads. And so it must be the case, I think, that "the Good" here covers both the One Itself and the Henads, which are the One-as-participated. The Participants in the Good, which are self-sufficient and perfect themselves, are the Forms. All things in the world of our experience participate in the Forms.

On the First Good, which is called the Good Itself

That which is primarily good, and which is no other than The Good itself, is superior to all things which in any way whatever participate of good.

For if all beings desire good, it is evident that the Primary Good is beyond beings. If it is the same with a certain one of beings, either being and The Good are the same, and this particular being will no longer desire good, since it is The Good itself — for that which desires anything is indigent of that which it desires, and is different from it — or, being is one thing, and the good another. And if some one being and The Good are the same, being indeed will participate, and that which is participated in being will be The Good. Hence, on this hypothesis, The Good is a certain good inherent in a certain participant and which the participant alone desires, but is not that which is simply good, and which all things desire: for this Good is the common object of desire to all beings. But that which is inherent in a certain thing pertains to that alone which participates of it. Hence that which is primarily good is nothing else than The Good itself. The adding of any thing else to The Good is to diminish it by the addition, making it a certain or particular good instead of that which is simply good. For the addition, since it is not The Good but something less than it, will by its association diminish The Good.

COMMENTARY

The subject of today's Proposition is the Good Itself, which is identical with the One.

[What's that you say? You claim you read an earlier version of this post in which the author could not remember whether or not Proclus drew a distinction between the Good and the One or considered them the same? Well, I don't see that anywhere. You must be like one of those silly people who claim that Joseph Stalin was once photographed with Nikolai Yezhov.]

In any case, the point he is making here is that the Good is beyond beings. A few things to note:

First, "Good" in this case does not have the moral connotations that we're used to associating with this word-- or at least, it does not only have those connotations. The Good in the Platonic sense isn't a set of moral rules. We understand this intuitively. I keep a set of pens hidden amid my things because they are very good pens, and if my kids get ahold of them they will lose them. (Ask me how I know this.) When I say that they are good pens, I don't mean that they're very moral pens. They don't give money to the homeless, help old ladies cross the street, or refrain from drinking before 5pm. Nor do they help me to do these things. No-- they're good pens because they're good at being pens. In a similar way, a good runner is not a runner who gives to charity, but a runner who wins races. A good dog plays with children without biting, protects the family, and refrains from pooping on the carpet. A good cat... well, let's leave that for another time. The point is that the "good" of these things could better be understood as their excellence than their morality in the ordinary sense.

It isn't that morality isn't involved, though here we should make some qualifications. "Ethics" is probably a better term than "morality," simply because it isn't quite as loaded as the English word "morality" is. Both of these words, however, "ethics" and "morality," ultimately mean the same thing, as they come from words which mean "habits of behavior" rather than "rule-following." Ethics in the Platonic sense refers to possession of the virtues, which are habits of excellence. To be a virtuous human is to be a good human-- as to be a fast runner is to be a good runner.

Proclus tells us that "all beings desire good." This comes from Plato, of course, who taught that everything aspires after its good. The Good Itself, then, can also be understood as beneficence. This is how everything can truly be said to desire its good; it desire that which will benefit it. And that is to make it a good version of whatever it happens to be.

From this it follows that the Good itself cannot be a being among beings. If that were the case, then that being would no longer seek its good. Moreover, if the Good were a being, it would not be simple, but a compound of Being and Good.

Every thing productive of another is more excellent than the nature of that which is produced.

For it is either superior, or inferior, or equal. Hence that which is produced from this has itself either a power productive of something else, or it is entirely unprolific. But if it is unprolific, by reason of this fact it will be inferior to and unequal to its producer, which is prolific, and has the power of producing. But if it is productive of other things, it either produces that which is equal to itself, and this similarly in all things, and all beings will be equal to each other, and no one thing will be better than another, that which produces always generating that which is equal to itself, in a consequent series; or it produces that which is unequal to itself, and thus that which is produced will no longer be equal to its producer. For it is the province of equal powers to produce equal things: the progeny of these, however, will be unequal to each other, if that which produces indeed is equal to the cause prior to itself, but the thing posterior to it is unequal to it. Hence it is not right that the thing produced should be equal to its producing cause. Moreover, neither will that which produces ever be less than that which is produced by it. For if it imparts essence to the thing produced, it will also supply it with essential power. And if it is productive of all the power which that posterior to itself possesses, it will certainly be able to make itself such as its production is. But if this be so, it will also make itself more powerful; impotency cannot hinder, the productive power being present, nor a defect of will, — since all things naturally desire the Good. Hence, if it is able to render another thing more perfect, it will also perfect itself before it perfects that which is posterior to itself. The thing produced, therefore, is neither equal to nor better than its producing cause: and hence the producing cause is in every respect better than the nature of the thing produced.

COMMENTARY

Having established the concepts of the One and the Many, Unity, and Things United, Proclus now takes a moment to pause and explain the order of creation. The Neoplatonic cosmos is a whole which unfolds from the One and descends layer by layer through the absolute unity of the first of the gods, through the encosmic gods which we can see and know, down to the ranks of angels and spirits (daimones), to souls heroic and ordinary, through the ranks of animals, plants, and minerals, and finally to the last of things. Here he teaches us-- or reminds us, or asks us to bear in mind-- that everything which produces is higher in the ontological scheme than that which is produced. The One itself, though simple, is not inactive; like the Sun, it is a constantly overflowing fountain of life and light. Beyond the One Itself, every power which produces grants existence to that which it produces, and with existence, power; and so every productive power contains that which it produces.

The Platonic cosmos is a hierarchical universe, and here again we can run into difficulties when we come to these ideas with minds shaped by modern ways of thinking. In this case, there are two sources of trouble. The first, of course, is simply materialism. To the materialist way of thinking, matter is primary, or matter+energy, and everything else is either an epiphenomenon of physical processes or, at best, "emerges" from them. This can be seen in Neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory, in which living organisms are understood as the accidental creations of genes, which are themselves mere molecules which happened to become assembled out of an assortment of simpler substances. The organism as a whole has no real existence; it is not a true unity but an assemblage determined by its parts. This is opposite to Proclus's way of thinking. For Proclus and the Platonists generally, the whole as a unity exists at a higher ontological level than its parts.

The second problem comes not from materialist sciewww.youtube.com/watchnce as much as it does the oddities of our religious and political history. The Middle Ages and Renaissance largely accepted the Neoplatonic cosmos, with the Holy Trinity in place of the One and the many ranks of angels standing in place of the gods. To those of us raised in the remnants of the old tradition in the Catholic or Orthodox churches, this can still be a natural way of thinking. The trouble is that the tradition used the metaphor of a kingdom to describe the nature of existence, with God in place of the king, the angels and saints as lords and ministers, and the rest of us as citizens or perhaps soldiers. Even this isn't a problem; the metaphor can be a useful one, but only if we 1. remember that it is a metaphor, and 2. do not bring in concepts drawn from modern political systems, especially those of the 20th century. The hierarchy of a feudal kingdom in medieval Europe was not the same as the top-down command structure of Stalin's Russia, or even Roosevelt's America. Even the kingdoms of the early modern period vastly reduced the power of the nobility and centralized power in the king. God does not relate to the Creation as Stalin to the Soviet Union, or as Louis the XIV to France. The hierarchy here is a hierarchy of being, not political power of the modern type. The Platonic cosmos is a layered cosmos, in which different levels of being determine those which procede from them.

It's worth noting that this idea of a layered cosmos is making a resurgence in our own time. Thinkers at the cutting edge of science, biology and cognition have been exploring these ideas in an updated form which also makes room for emergence from the "bottom up" as well as causation from the "top down." I personally have a lot more time for listening to audio lectures, interviews, and books than for sitting down and reading; if you're like me, you might be interested in some of the following:

Wolfgang Smith on Vertical Causality

Stuart Kaufman on Kantian Wholes. Though Kaufman titles his talk "Beyond Pythagoras," what he calls "Kauntian Wholes" could just as well be called "Procline Unities."

An interview with Denis Noble on whole systems in evolutionary biology. Among many Noble's interesting points is the fact that if a particular gene is damaged, an organism can use alternate genes or even non-genetic processes to do the work of the missing gene.

A long talk by John Vervaeke making the case for the Neoplatonic cosmos in the language of modern physics, mathematics and cognitive science.

Every multitude consists of things united, or unities.

For that each of things many will not be itself multitude alone, and again that each part of this will not be multitude alone is evident. But if it is not multitude alone, it is either united, or unities ( henads). And if, indeed, it participates of the One it is united; but if it consists of things of which that which is primarily united consists, it will be unities. For if there is the One itself, there is also that which primarily participates of it, and which is primarily united. But this consists of unities. For if it consists of things united, again things united consist of certain things, and this will be the case to infinity. It is necessary, however, that what is primarily united should consist of unitites. And thus we have discovered what we proposed at first, viz. that every multitude consists either of things united, or unities.

COMMENTARY

The previous 5 propositions were concerned with the One. This proposition concerns UNITY. The concept of the One can be challenging for the modern mind, shaped as it is by Materialist ontology. I suspect, however, that the concept of unity in Proclus is even more challenging. This is becuase much of modern Materialism was formed in a culture which was still nominally religious. The Protestant reformation and its Catholic equivalent largely preserved God by setting Him outside of the material universe. When we start working with Proclus, it can be easy to grasp him by simply setting the One in the place of the God of Calvin-- real, sort of, but sufficiently outside the world we know as to make no difference.

As we continue, this becomes impossible. The One is entirely other, superessential-- that is, outside being. But the immediate production of the One is not the chaos of matter that we know. For Proclus, after the One come the Ones-- or, rather, the Unities; in Greek, the Henads. To put it another way, after God come the Gods. It is with their nature that this proposition is ultimately concerned.

Let's go over Proclus's notes one at a time.

For that each of things many will not be itself multitude alone, and again that each part of this will not be multitude alone is evident.

Take a collection of objects. On the desk in front of me, I see a houseplant, a housecat, the book we're reading, an empty cup of tea, a full cup of coffee. Together these are a multitude. None of them, however, is multitude as such: The cup of coffee is a unity; the teacup, a unity; the book, a unity; the plant and the cat are each unities. If the cat were multitude alone, it would consist of infinite cats infinitely multiplied; this is not only horrifying, it is (thankfully) impossible. (Imagine infinite cats knocking over infinite cups of coffee, forever.) Therefore, within each separate thing, some form of unity is present. The cat consists of head and tail and whiskers and so on, united into a single cat; the coffee cup consists of cup and coffee and half and half, bound together in liquid joy. Each of these is itself a multitude, but not multitude as such.

But if it is not multitude alone, it is either united, or unities ( henads).

Here Proclus is drawing a distinction between two different types of united things. A multitude may be either united, or may be a unity or henad. But what does this mean, exactly? We can imagine something which is united. This is the cup, coffee, and cream, all blended together. But what is a unity, and how is it different?

And if, indeed, it participates of the One it is united; but if it consists of things of which that which is primarily united consists, it will be unities. For if there is the One itself, there is also that which primarily participates of it, and which is primarily united. But this consists of unities.

One way to think of this distinction may be to consider the difference between the coffee and the cat. In order for the cup of coffee to exist, I had to get a cup out of the cabinet, pour coffee into it, and pour cream into the coffee. These are separate things, drawn together into a unity. Once I drink the coffee, the cup remains, the unity is dissolved. The cat, however, has a kind of existence which is prior to its parts. When it eats, it assimilates food to a being which has an existence prior to the food. It eats and excretes, it sheds its hair and grows more, but the unity of the cat persists, at least for a time.

In a similar way, immediately posterior to the One Itself there is "that which primarily participates of the One." Immediately after the One Itself, there emerges a kind of second One, which is sometimes called the One Being. This is the One which can be said to have parts, because it consists both of oneness and being or existence. Of course, two separate parts-- "one" and "being"-- can have no unity; they need a third to connect them. In practice, we call these three parts being, life, and intelligence. These parts, however, are radically united; they are together from the beginning, and not separate parts which come together afterward.

This is the sort of situation where a picture can help us to understand what is being said. If only someone had drawn an image of the One Being emerging from the One, perhaps using familiar theological names to help us understand....

Oh hey, what's that? It looks to me like the image of a Divine Triad emerging from pre-existing wholeness, with all this taking place "Beyond the Abyss," that is, prior to any sort of time or existence that we can understand. Thanks, mysterious stranger!

But wait a minute, I'm still a bit confused about something. Why can't the first unity consist of things united? That is, why can't it be like the cup of coffee, put together out of an assemblage of cup, coffee, and cream?

Proclus tells us:

For if it consists of things united, again things united consist of certain things, and this will be the case to infinity.

That is to say, if there are particular things which can be put together, they must already have a certain unity to them. Otherwise, the things we're putting together will consist of infinite infinities, which can never come together in the first place.

Therefore, the order of existence must go:

The One

Unity

Things United

And thus we have discovered what we proposed at first, viz. that every multitude consists either of things united, or unities.

All multitude is posterior to The One.

For if multitude is prior to The One, The One indeed will participate of multitude, but multitude which is prior will not participate of The One, since prior to the existence of The One that multitude was. For it does not participate of that which is not: because a participant of The One is one and at the same time not one — but, on the hypothesis, The One will not yet subsist, that which is first being multitude. But it is impossible that there should be a certain multitude which in no respect whatever participates of The One. Multitude, therefore, is not prior to The One. But if multitude and The One subsist simultaneously, they will be naturally co-ordinate with each other, and intimately related. Nothing in time prohibits this, since neither is The One essentially many, nor is multitude The One, because they are directly opposite to each other by nature, if neither is prior or posterior to the other. Hence multitude essentially will not be one, and each of the things which are in it will not be one, and this will be the case to infinity, which is impossible. Multitude, therefore, according to its own nature participates of The One, and there is no thing of it which is not one. For if it is not one it will be an infinite, consisting of infinites, as has been demonstrated. Hence it entirely participates of The One. If therefore The One, which is essentially one, in no possible respect participates of multitude, multitude will be wholly posterior to The One — participating indeed of The One, but not being participated by it. But if The One participates of multitude, subsisting indeed as one according to its essence, but as not one according to participation, The One will be multitude, just as multitude is united by reason of The One. The One therefore will communicate with multitude, and multitude with The One. But things which coalesce and communicate with each other in a certain respect, if they are impelled together by another, that is prior to them: but if they themselves harmonize they are not antagonistic to each other. For opposites do not hasten to each other. If therefore The One and multitude are oppositely divided, and multitude so far as it is multitude is not one, and The One so far as it is one is not multitude, neither will one of these subsisting in the other be one and at the same time two. And if there is something prior to them, which impells them to harmonize, this will be either one or not one. But if it is not one, it will be either many or nothing. But neither will it be many, lest multitude should be prior to The One, nor will it be nothing. For how could nothing impell together those things which are something or many? It is therefore one alone. For this one is not many, lest there should be a progression to infinity. It is therefore The One itself, and all multitude proceeds from The One itself.

COMMENTARY

In this proposition Proclus continues to demonstrate the dependence of Multitude, or the Many, on the One. If the first principle is Multitude, then there will only be an infinity of infinity infinities, nothing at all united to anything else. But this is impossible. In order for anything at all to exist, we must first have precisely this: the possiblity of anything at all. This is what is meant by "multitude participating in the One." The One cannot participate in Multitude the same way. If the One depended on Multitude for its existence, it would not be one-- precisely because Multitude is infinity infinitely multiplied.

It's important to note how opposite this is to the modern way of reasoning, rooted in materialist science. A scientist starts by looking at multitude, at the fragments of fragments, and extrapolates order from there. This isn't wrong in and of itself. In Plato's work it is precisely by starting with material creation that we ascend to the higher realms. The difference is that the materialist starts with the multitude, and effectively assumes Multitude to be the first principle. How this could be so is a question unasked and unanswered. Modern scientists sometimes treat the idea of "God" as a "scientific hypothesis." In other words, they would attempt to prove the existence or nonexistence of the One by searching nature for it, perhaps with a very large telescope, and then washing their hands of the idea when they failed to find anything.

The Platonic approach is different. The One-- or God, remember always that we can use that name as well-- is not a being among beings. He cannot be found in nature. He is not complex. He does not have a body. He does not have a detailed set of opinions, nor does he demand that others hold a set of opinions about historical events or be cast into the fire forever. He also does not fly into rages, damn entire cities, or obsessively watch young men to see if they masturbate. The God of modern Christianity, whether or not he exists, is no more capable of being the First God than the chaos of the Materialists can be the First Principle. The One is prior to Multitude, and so prior to all particularity. The way of Ascent to Him is both open to all, and a journey that never ends.

Profile

readoldthings

December 2024

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28
29	30	31

Syndicate

Page Summary

Style Credit

Style: Neutral Good for Practicality by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated Jul. 23rd, 2025 11:59 am

Recent Entries

Elements of Theology, Proposition 24

Elements of Theology, Proposition 23

Elements of Theology, Proposition 22

Elements of Theology, Proposition 21

Elements of Theology, Proposition 20

Elements of Theology, Proposition 19

Elements of Theology, Proposition 18

Elements of Theology, Proposition 17

Elements of Theology, Proposition 16

Elements of Theology, Proposition 15

Elements of Theology, Proposition 14

Elements of Theology, Proposition 13

Elements of Theology, Proposition 12

Elements of Theology, Proposition 11

Elements of Theology, Proposition 10

Elements of Theology, Proposition 9

Elements of Theology, Proposition 8

Elements of Theology, Proposition 7

Elements of Theology, Proposition 6

Elements of Theology, Proposition 5