The Platonic Doctrines of Albinus

by Albinus, Jeremiah Reedy (Translator), Jackson P. Hershbell (Introduction)

Overview

Among the many Platonists of the second century A.D., Albinus is one of the most important. He belongs to the period commonly known as 'Middle Platonism' which stands between the teachings of the Old Academy and the Neoplatonists.

The Platonic Doctrines is the only complete philosophical textbook surviving from the ancient world and is the only fully-preserved work of Platonism from the time of Plato until that of Plotinus (circa 205-270 A.D.). The work was clearly intended to be an introduction to Plato's writings and is presented here in a definitive English language translation for the first time.

The Platonic Doctrines surveys the topics of dialectic, metaphysics, mathematics, theology, physics, and ethics. The work provides good insights into the philosophical thinking which immediately preceded Plotinus, and anticipates some of the mystical theology of later centuries.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781609254827
Publisher:	Red Wheel/Weiser
Publication date:	01/01/1991
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	82
File size:	451 KB

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THE PLATONIC DOCTRINES OF ALBINUS

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By Jeremiah Reedy

Phanes Press

Copyright © 1991 Jeremiah Reedy
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-60925-482-7

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CHAPTER 1

Didaskalikos of Albinus

1

May the following serve as a summary of Plato's principal teachings. Philosophy is a striving after wisdom or a release and a redirecting of the soul from the body that occurs when we turn ourselves to the intelligible world and the things which truly are. Wisdom is knowledge of things divine and human. The word 'philosopher' is derived from 'philosophy' as 'musician' is from 'music' The philosopher must in the first place have a natural penchant for doctrines which can prepare him and lead him to knowledge of Being which is intelligible and does not change and is not in a state of flux. Next the philosopher must have clung to the truth with desire, and he must in no way entertain falsehood. In addition he must be temperate by nature, as it were, and naturally restrained with respect to the passionate part of the soul. For the one who aims at learning to relate to the things which are and directs his striving towards them would not be an admirer of pleasures. The person who is going to be a philosopher must also have an open mind, for there is no greater obstacle than pettiness of mind for a soul that is destined to contemplate things divine and human. He must also have a natural penchant for justice and, for that matter, for truth, freedom and temperance. He should also have an aptitude for learning and a good memory, for these are also characteristic of the philosopher. When these noble qualities coincide with the right kind of education and a proper upbringing, they render a person perfect as regards virtue; if, on the other hand, they are neglected, they become the source of great evils. Plato was thus accustomed to designate these talents with the same names as the virtues temperance, courage and justice.

2

There are two ways of life, the contemplative and the active. The chief object of the contemplative life is knowledge of the truth, while that of the active life consists in doing those things indicated by reason. The contemplative life holds the place of honor; the active life is a consequence of it and is an absolute necessity. That this is so should become clear from what follows. Contemplation is an activity of the mind contemplating the intelligibles. Action is the activity of the rational soul operating through the body. The soul, when it contemplates the divine and the thoughts of the divine, is said to experience bliss, and this experience is called 'wisdom,' which one could say is nothing else but assimilation to the divine. Hence such an activity would be worthy of choice, honorable, most to be aspired to and most appropriate for us; it lies freely in our power to possess, and it forms the end which is set before us. Action, however, and the active life, being accomplished by means of the body, can be interfered with. Their performance is demanded by what we see in the contemplative life, calling for application to human conduct. The serious man will turn to public affairs whenever he sees that they are being poorly managed by others. Thus he will consider serving in the military, serving on a jury, or going on an embassy if circumstances require it. But he considers what concerns the establishment of laws and the constitution of civil life and education of the young as the best activities in the practical life and to be preferred in this area. From what has been said we see that it is fitting for the philosopher never to desist from contemplation but always to foster and increase it and to approach the practical life as something secondary.

3

According to Plato, the philosopher's pursuit rests on three things: on the contemplation and understanding of things that are, on doing what is right, and on reflecting on reason. The knowledge of 'what is' is called Theoretic philosophy; that which concerns what is to be done is called Ethics; and that concerned with reasoning Dialectic. The last is subdivided into Division, Definition, Induction and Syllogistics. Syllogistics, in turn, is subdivided into the Demonstrative, which deals with the necessary syllogism; the Tentative, which is seen in the case of the probable syllogism; and thirdly the Rhetorical, which deals with the enthymeme, the so-called imperfect syllogism, and also with sophism. Rhetoric is not the philosopher's chief concern but it is necessary. One branch of Ethics can be viewed as dealing with morals, the second part with the management of the household and the third with the city and its survival. Of these the first is called Morals, the second Economics and the last Politics. That part of Theoretic philosophy that treats of what is unmoved, of first causes and of such things as are divine, is called Theology. The part dealing with the motion of stars, their courses and periodic returns and the structure of the cosmos, is called Physics. That which employs geometry and other branches of mathematics is Mathematics. Such then is the division and the classification of the branches of philosophy. We must speak first about dialectical theory as it appealed to Plato and first of all about the criterion.

4

Since there is something that judges and something that is judged, there would also be that which results from them which one might call judgment. One might properly call judgment the criterion, but more commonly this term is applied to that which makes the judgment. This is twofold: that by which what is judged is judged, i.e. the agent, and that through which it is judged, i.e. the instrument. The former would be our mind, the latter, through which, would be the natural instrument that judges principally truths but also secondarily falsehood. This is nothing else but natural reason. Obviously the philosopher by whom affairs are judged could be called the judge, but reason through which truth is judged (which we have called an instrument) is also a judge. Now reason is twofold. One type is certain and precise but is completely incomprehensible to us; the other is infallible regarding the knowledge of things. Of these two the former is within the power of a god but impossible for a human being. The latter is possible even for a human. Human reason in turn is twofold: one part deals with intelligibles, the other sensibles. The first, dealing with intelligibles, is understanding and scientific reason; the other, which deals with sensibles, is doxastic reason and opinion. Because of this, scientific reason has certainty and stability in as much as it relates to what is certain and stable. Persuasive and doxastic reason is characterized rather by probability because it deals with what is unstable. The starting points of understanding which is concerned with intelligibles, and opinion which deals with sensibles, are intellection and sense perception respectively. Sense perception is an effect on the soul mediated through the body which presents the report primarily of the faculty affected. Whenever an impression corresponding to a sensation arises in the soul through the senses (which is what perception is) and does not fade away over time but persists and is preserved, its preservation is called memory. Opinion is a combination of memory and perception. For whenever we encounter some perceptible object for the first time and perception of it takes place in us and from this comes memory, and then we encounter the same object of perception again, we compare the preexisting memory with the perception arising from the second encounter, and we say to ourselves, 'This is Socrates' or 'a horse' or 'fire' or something similar. This is what is called opinion, as we combine the preexisting memory with the fresh perception. When these two, after being compared to one another, agree, we have a true opinion; when they disagree, we have a false opinion. If someone with an image of Socrates in mind meets Plato and thinks because of some resemblance he is meeting Socrates again, then taking the perception of Plato to be that of Socrates he combines it with the memory he has of Socrates, a false opinion results. That [medium] in which memory and perception take place Plato likens to a lump of wax. When the soul remodels in thought those things which were received from perception and memory and looks at them just as it looked at the originals from which they were produced, Plato calls this 'representation,' and sometimes 'imagination.' Plato defines thought as the dialogue of the soul with itself, and speech is the stream from the soul flowing through the mouth with sound. Intellection is the activity of the mind as it contemplates the primary intelligibles. It appears to be twofold: one kind took place before the soul entered the body as it contemplated the intelligibles; the other after its entry into the body. The first of these which took place prior to the soul's incarnation is intellection, strictly speaking. Once the soul is in the body, what was formerly called intellection is now called natural or innate conception, in as much as it is intellection of a sort stored up in the soul. Thus when we say that intellection is the starting point of scientific reason, we do not mean what was just mentioned but that which occurred when the soul existed apart from the body which, as we said, was called intellection but now "natural conception." Plato also calls natural conception both 'knowledge pure and simple' and the 'soul's plumage,' and sometimes 'remembrance.' Natural and scientific reason which exist in us naturally are constituted of these pure and simple ideas. Thus since there is both scientific and doxastic reason and since there is both intellection and perception, there exist also those things which give rise to them, namely the intelligibles and perceptibles. And since some intelligibles are primary, namely the Ideas, and some are secondary, namely the forms which inhere in matter and are inseparable from it, intellection will also be of two kinds, the one of primary intelligibles, the other of secondary ones. Again, among perceptibles some are primary, for example qualities such as whiteness, and others are accidents of bodies, such as the whitish hue in the colored object. In addition to these there are composite bodies such as fire and honey. Thus perception of primary perceptibles will be called primary, and perception of secondary perceptibles secondary. Intellection judges the primary intelligibles not without scientific reason intuitively and not discursively, and scientific reason judges the secondary intelligibles not without intellection. Sense perception judges the primary and secondary perceptibles not without doxastic reason. Doxastic reason judges the composite body not without perception. Since the intelligible world is the first intelligible, and the perceptible world is a congeries, intellection judges the intelligible world with reason (that is, not without reason); doxastic reason judges the perceptible world not without perception. We have seen that there is contemplation and action; right reason does not judge in the same way those matters that fall within the sphere of contemplation and those that require action, but in the area of contemplation it considers what is true and what is not while in the sphere of action it looks to what would be appropriate, what would be out of place and what should be done. For, thanks to the innate conception we have of what is beautiful and good, we judge whether such and such is so or not, using reason and referring to our innate concepts as established criteria.

5

Plato believes the most basic task of Dialectic to be, first, to consider the essence of everything and then the accidents. Dialectic investigates everything that is either from above (i.e. a priori), by means of division and definition, or from below (a posteriori), through analysis. It investigates accidents that belong to essences either through induction, which proceeds from what they entail, or by syllogism, which proceeds from what entails them. Thus according to this account the parts of Dialectic are Division, Definition, Analysis, Induction and Syllogistic. Now then, Division is, on the one hand, of genus into species and on the other of the whole into parts, as for example when we separate the soul into the rational and passionate elements, and again the passionate part into the spirited and appetitive parts. Another example is the division of a word into its meanings as when one and the same noun is applied to many things. There is also the division of accidents according to their subjects as when we speak of goods of the soul, of the body and of external goods, and there is the division of subjects according to their accidents as when we speak of people as good or bad or in between. Now we must first divide the genus into its species in order to discern what each thing is per se in its essence. This would be impossible without a definition, which is produced from division in the following way. When a thing is to be given a definition, one must first discover the genus, for example 'animal' for the human being, then divide it according to its appropriate differentiae going down to the species; for example, animal is divided into rational and irrational, and rational into mortal and immortal. Adding then the appropriate differentiae to the genus, the definition of man results. There are three forms of analysis. The first is an ascent from the sensible things to the first intelligibles. The second is an ascent by means of proofs and demonstration to the premises that are indemonstrable and without a middle term. The third type rises ex hypothesi to non-hypothetical principles. The first type of analysis goes something like this: From the beautiful in bodies we pass to the beautiful in souls, and from there to the beautiful in customs, hence to the beautiful in laws, then to the vast sea of beauty. Proceeding in this manner, we discover finally Beauty itself. An example of the second type of analysis is this: One must first grant that which is to be proved and then consider what truths are prior to it; then one establishes these working backwards from the consequences to what is prior until we arrive at what is primary and agreed upon by all. Beginning with this, we move downward to what is in question using the method of synthesis. For example, suppose I ask if the soul is immortal; after granting this, I ask if it is perpetually in motion. After proving this I ask if that which is perpetually moving is self-moving. Again after proving this, I consider whether that which is self-moving is a principle of movement, and then whether the principle is uncreated. This is posited as something generally agreed upon, the uncreated being also indestructible. Beginning with this as something evident, I construct the following proof: If it is a first principle, it is something uncreated and indestructible. That which is self-moving is a principle of motion; the soul is self-moving; therefore the soul is indestructible. Analysis ex hypothesi goes as follows: A person questioning something posits that very thing, then considers what follows from this supposition; after this, if it is necessary to justify this hypothesis, one posits another hypothesis and asks if the thing previously posited is a consequence of the new hypothesis. One does this until he comes to some non-hypothetical principle. Induction is any logical process that proceeds from like to like or from particulars to universals. Induction is extremely useful for stirring up our innate concepts.
(Continues...)

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Excerpted from THE PLATONIC DOCTRINES OF ALBINUS by Jeremiah Reedy. Copyright © 1991 Jeremiah Reedy. Excerpted by permission of Phanes Press.
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Table of Contents

Contents

Preface          

Introduction          

Notes to the Introduction          

Didaskalikos          

Bibliography