Pauline anthropology is of a fundamentally Hebrew nature : the body‑σῶμα is a holistic concept that designates man as creature in the world. The body is the way “I” is present in the world : man does not have a body, he is a body. Portraying the whole person, the body is the “temple of the Holy Spirit”, the setting for a sacred presence that transcends humankind (1Cor 6 : 12‑20). However, this body is also the scene of a conflict between flesh and spirit. The flesh‑σάρξ concept does not apply to a part of man but to the whole of man as a precarious, fragile and mortal being. As such, the human being stands up as an enemy of God, taking his human condition on as the foundation of his values (Rom 8 : 5‑8). The Spirit‑πνεῦμα is God’s sphere of influence in the world, to which one becomes affiliated through his spirit. Flesh leads to death while the Spirit turns to life. These two forces compete for the human body. Yet, such a dualism is not by nature ontological but historical : one remains capable of choosing between remaining a prisoner of mortal flesh or letting the Spirit of God dwell in him (Rom 8 :10).

The Augustinian definition of the concept of natura rules out any form of dualism : all nature depends on God, it is what God wanted ; but, in the case of man, nature changes according to the actual relation to God, just as the image of God in the soul can be distorted by sin or reshaped by grace. This historical conception of nature sets Augustine against the Manichaean and Pelagian conception of nature as a static datum.

Sāṃkhya, which is one of the oldest systems (darśana) of Indian Philosophy, advocates an uncompromising dualism in its theoretical metaphysical teachings. There is a fundamental dualism or split at the very heart of reality, and this dualism or split is the fundamental fact of existence.According to Sāṃkhya, there are two co‑present and co‑eternal realities. The first one is the principle of pure Consciousness, the Puruṣa, which is inactive, indifferent, eternally free and Alone. Puruṣa is the soul, the self, the spirit, the subject, the knower. The other of the two co‑present and co‑eternal realities of Sāṃkhya is Nature or Prakṛti : it is the primordial and unconscious “stuff ” of the entire unmanifest and manifest world, whereas Puruṣa is the presupposition of individual consciousness. Nature or Prakṛti is the ultimate material principle and thus the substratum from which manifest, in the presence of the self (puruṣa), the gross and subtle bodies including the mental organs of all living beings. But Sāṃkhya is not a dualism of mind and body or even a dualism of subject and object.In classical Sāṃkhya the world is not derived from consciousness, nor is consciousness derived from the world. The classical Sāṃkhya refuses to understand the world simply as a product of consciousness. It refuses to see the world as an illusory projection of consciousness, and thus it rejects any idealistic monism. Similarly, it refuses to see consciousness simply as a product of the world, and thus it rejects any kind of materialism or naturalism. Thus, it steers an intermediate course or path between the Indian notion of a conscious, cosmic Self or its equivalent, which is the ground of all being, on the one hand, and the notion of a conscious self, which is only an empirical, relative construction, on the other. It maintains, rather, a fundamental dualism, the opposite poles of which function in a kind of dialectical interaction. The fact of consciousness and the fact of the world are two irreductible realities in constant interplay with one another. Though quite separate and unconnected, Spirit and Nature mutually interact to bring about the process of creation, self‑awareness and, finally, enlightenment. But Spirit or Puruṣa and Nature or Prakṛti are always only in proximity to one another, never in actual contact. This is a puzzling notion if one thinks of Puruṣa and Prakṛti as two things. Puruṣa and Prakṛti are two realities of a completely different order.Right knowledge is the knowledge of the separation of the Puruṣa from the Prakṛti. The individual soul (jīva) has to realize itself as the pure Puruṣa through discrimination between Puruṣa and Prakṛti.From a rational point of view, classical Sāṃkhya can be regarded as a bundle of contradictions. Some problems regarding its interpretation are the problem of the nature of the Sāṃkhya dualism and the problem of the connection or relationship of Puruṣa and Prakṛti. The Sāṃkhya system clings to spiritualistic pluralism and dualistic realism, but its very logic indeed impels it to embrace idealistic monism or absolutism.

As the most rigorous upholder of monotheism, the pseudo‑Clementine homilist is at strife with the Marcionite dualism. More precisely, he comes up against the Apelles’ doctrine, which is all the more dangerous as it establishes the unicity of God and reduces the demiurge of the world and author of the Law to a created power. The theory of the «false pericopes» of the Scriptures is specially directed against Apelles, in order to protect the identity between the supreme God and the Creator of the world. It seems that the conjectures about the origin of the Evil One, which attempt to avoid a new form of dualism, are also directed towards the refutation of Apelles : to the obedient demiurgical angel is opposed the providential function of the Evil One, who has to put the human beings’ piety to trial ; and against Apelles who maintains the severance between corporeal reality and God’ being, the homilist makes use of the audacious theory of the mixing of the elements to settle both the connaturality of the Evil One and of the body of God and the blamelessness of God with reference to the will of the Tempter, which is contingent.

The use of the terms λογισμός and διάνοια in the writings of Plotinus has already been discussed by H. J. Blumenthal in his book entitled Plotinus’ Psychology (1977). Blumenthal here defended the thesis that the terms were used as synonyms in the Enneads. Indeed, though some passages seem to indicate a difference between λογισμός and διάνοια, in the majority of cases Plotinus nonetheless seems to use these words interchangeably. We propose to analyze in detail the terms λογισμός and διάνοια by referring, inter alia, to Treatise 49 [V 3], 2‑3, where the terms seem indeed to be used synonymously, as well as other treatises such as Treatise 28 [IV 4], where Plotinus seems to give each word a different sense. Other scholars, namely E. K. Emilsson, think that we can establish a clear distinction between logismos and dianoia, by a thorough study of the World‑Soul, which has the dianoia, but not the logismos. After a review of Emilsson’s thesis, we will finally propose that Plotinus employs the word διάνοια when he refers to the soul’s capacity to store data for judgement, while he employs the term λογισμός to describe the process of judging this content, which may be distinguished from other processes.

Trying to reconstruct the specific definition of the noetic act from some excerpts of the fifth and seventh Treatises (Enneads, V, 9 and 4), one manages to circumscribe the operations by which Plotinus establishes in the context the unity between the intellect, the act of thinking, some form of «prime intelligibility» and the other, multiple, intelligibilities. Plotinus is striving to avoid several pitfalls in order not to endanger the unity of the noetic hypostasis and consequently to imperil the only possible way of thinking the One. At least four ways of bypassing possible impediments detectable in the context mentioned can be summarised : (i) averting the idea that the noetic act can be identified to the form and can thus be defined as «the thinking of forms» ; (ii) establishing that the precession of being as an «object of thought» is an a posteriori act of thought, and not the actual and necessary preeminence of the being on the noetic act ; (iii) debunking any temptation of considering thought as a mediation between the first and the second hypostasis ; and finally (iv) avoiding a definition of the noetic act through a sine qua non recourse to power, by establishing a specific statutary order of the noûs according to which the act and the power determine, or not, the possibility of intellection. An analysis of the texts will bring us to reconsider the so‑called theory of the two complementary acts and its Aristotelian origins, and also to recall the debates around Plotinus’ «idealism», demonstrating the appositeness and the specificities of that conception.

According to the well known Platonic distinction of different types of knowing, discursive thought (διάνοια) is second to intellect (νοῦς), and above opinion (δόξα). Intellection intelligizes the entire intelligible cosmos, all at once (ἀθρόως), in an undivided manner. Discursive thought, involving temporal thinking, articulates into plurality the indivisible character of the intellectual life. I argue in this paper that Proclus does not reduce discursive thought to discursivity. Discursive thought is thought, i.e. intellection (διά‑νοια) before being discursive (διά‑νοια), intellection of Psychic Forms, and intellection in the manner of the soul.

For Damascius, the last great Neoplatonist of late Antiquity, the answer to the question “how to go beyond the plurality of human thought for the purpose of really attaining the one ?” is not to be found on the side of the via negativa – which is the dynamics of a rejection of plurality –, but in a positive, unifying and integrative dialectic by which the plurality of the soul is not denied any more, but gathered, contracted and simplified in an undifferentiated unity for the purpose of really attaining the one. Setting himself apart from his predecessors due to a new conception of the ‘one’ understood as ‘all(ness)’, Damascius aims to deconstruct, and then abandon, the via apophatica, for it becomes in his eyes an illusory, unsuitable and counterproductive way in the vertiginous ascent of the soul towards its origin. Indeed, a number of passages of his masterpiece, De Principiis, reveal his radically critical decision to reject the immoderate use of negative discourse to express the one, as well as the cathartic status and the anagogical purpose generally allowed to apophatism. It is stated here that ‘negation’ is only the reflection of our own cognitive powerlessness, a dangerous illegitimate (‘bastard’) reasoning, or simply an artifice of language, even if authorized in certain circumstances. Is the one not beyond any discourse, distinction and exclusion ? Making obsolete any triumphalism of hyperapophatism, judged as unacceptable and contradictory, Damascius offers the human soul the promise of an authentic, as well as lucid anagogy towards the principle.

In this article, we want to analyse the principal characteristics of three faculties of the soul in Proclus’ work : discursive thinking, contemplation and theurgic practice. We will then establish links between these faculties and the process of purification, divided into philosophical, dialectic and telestic types. We will then analyse these types of purification in relation with three metaphors exploited by Proclus : the naked soul, the flower of the intellect, and silence. The goal of this article consists in proving that dianoia (discursive thinking), even if it has to be overcome by other faculties (contemplation and theurgic practice), still operates implicitly in the process of assimilation to the One. In other words, contemplation and theurgic practice are not a substitute for rational thinking, but rather its ultimate achievement.

The aim of this essay is to focus the different strategies the dramaturgy of Hippolitus adopts in order to problematize the use of mythical paradigms, poetic tradition and writing when tragic characters are to deal with the force of desire. Ancient myths, handed down by poets, are quoted and exploited by the nurse in a sophistic perspective that tries to justify natural instincts by cultural tradition. This perspective is opposite to the corpus of orphic writings and the paradigm of purity linked to Hippolitus. Coping with the provocative rhetoric of the nurse and the intransigence of Hippolitus, Phaedra produces her own writing that reacts to the “knot” tied by the logoi of her interlocutors.

Book III of Aristotle’s De caelo does not feature the Platonic concept of χώρα as a main protagonist. Through mere scarce allusions, Aristotle tends to treat it as just another concept of matter, reminiscent in many respects of those of Presocratic philosophers. In this paper, I argue that this biased presentation should be interpreted as Aristotle’s implicit refusal to acknowledge the role of the χώρα in Plato’s reform of participation, which is expounded in the Timaeus. I refer this refusal to Aristotle’s complex epistemological and methodological criticisms of Platonic paradigmatism. Reconstructing this implicit dialogue between Plato and Aristotle also sheds a new light on the stakes and consistency of book III of De caelo, which had remained elusive in earlier approaches. I suggest that book III does not aim to propose a consistent account of the four elements or of generation, but to build a new Aristotelian framework as an answer to the aporiai of Plato’s Timaeus.

How does Plotinus interpret the chora in Plato’s Timaeus ? For him, Timaeus 48e‑52d deals with matter (hyle). The identification of chora with hyle goes back to Aristotle’s Physics IV.2. Aristotle’s interpretation of Plato’s chora as matter was echoed by Theophrastus and the Stoics and prevailed in Middle‑Platonist, neo‑Pythagorean and early Christian authors. In addition to the identification of chora with hyle, the ancient interpreters of the Timaeus conflated hyle with Plato’s ananke (Tim. 47e‑48a). Plato himself distinguishes between chora and ananke. The latter denotes everything that appears in the “receptacle” prior to the ordering of the world by the demiurge, while chora is another name for the receptacle itself. In Plato, the receptacle accounts for the fact both that there are transient images of intelligible beings and that these images appear to occupy a place, i.e. that they are spatially extended. This is why the receptacle is given its alternative name “ground” (chora) and why it is also called “place” (topos) and “seat” (hedra). Although the receptacle itself cannot be spatially extended in the same way as that which appears “in it”, it is the cause of spatial extension. For Plotinus, two characteristics of matter are of primary importance : lack of size and impassibility. In the treatise II .4.[12].2‑5, he highlights the former, and in III .6[26].7‑19 he elaborates on the latter, while commenting once again on the former. In III .6[26].7‑19, he argues that this conception of matter is in line with how Plato conceives of it in the Timaeus. The “receptacle” cannot be acted upon (paschein) nor can it possess any size (megethos). Only the images of true beings “in” it can. In doing so, however, they make matter appear to “stretch out” alongside themselves. But this is not actually the case, because matter itself has no extension. On one point, however, Plotinus’ account differs from Plato’s. According to Plotinus, not only does matter not possess size, but it is not the cause of size either. The size of the appearances derives from the formulas (logoi) of which these appearances are images. Each formula encompasses within itself the measure of the size that its image will assume : the formula of horse encompasses the size of a particular horse, the formula of human being the size of a particular human being. Plotinus describes in more detail how a formula, in unfolding out of the soul, “stretches out”, thus acquiring size. He also makes a comparison between this process and the way in which formulas in the human soul display images of themselves in our image‑making faculty. He characterises this process as a motion starting from the formula and resulting in its “division” (merismos). This is what makes the image of the formula extended, i.e. divided partes extra partes, when it appears against the invisible background of matter. Since matter neither possesses size nor is the cause of it, it can be called “ground” (chora), “place” (topos) or “seat” (hedra) only in an improper way.

In his 1906 book The problem of becoming and the notion of matter in Greek philosophy from its origins till Theophrastus, Albert Rivaud puts forward an entirely original (and nowadays largely forgotten) interpretation of the receptacle or chôra in Plato’s Timaeus. On his reading, Timaeus’ introduction of chôra signals the limits of the possibility to explain the formation of the cosmos by means of the opposition between the intelligible and the sensible. Opposing Aristotle and others in his wake, Rivaud firmly rejects the understanding of chôra as matter, without however identifying it as space in the sense of a system of intra‑cosmic coordinates. Instead, he sees the receptacle as a notion borrowed from a philosophical system otherwise alien to Plato’s thought, namely the atomism of Leucippus and Democritus. Neither the atomistic void nor chôra are like the modern space ; rather, in virtue of evoking “the unchanging theater of all changes”, they are “like the chaos, immense, gaping, populated by the infinite crowd of forms”. Rivaud concludes that, by introducing chora as a notion irreducible to the concept of becoming, Plato recognizes that the cosmogonic processes cannot be fully explained either on the basis of the relation of the cosmos to its intelligible model or through the logic of opposites that governs all change in the sensible realm. At the same time, the introduction of chôra (described through a variety of mostly biological metaphors) marks the limits of the artisanal model preeminent in the Timaeus, a model that endows the cosmogonic story with a new transparency and ensures the teleological dimension of the fully formed universe. The aim of the article is to re‑evaluate Rivaud’s audacious reading of the Timaeus with an eye to larger issues pertinent to a variety of ancient cosmogonies.

Plutarch’s Dialogue on Love (Erōtikos), certainly one of his most sublime and intriguing masterpieces, has for a long time puzzled many readers and commentators, concerning both its attitude towards Plato and its precise political and metaphysical scope. At a first level, some have argued that the main theme of the dialogue, from beginning to end, is the praise of conjugal love, and that Plutarch’s revolutionary conception of marriage departs from Plato’s one. At a second level, some have objected that the main point is rather the central praise of the god of Love, which ensures the possibility for true human love, by rekindling the Thespian tradition of the Erōtideia. As regards politics and religion, Plutarch seems therefore to distance himself from Plato. Still, at a third level, many have noticed the great literary and philosophical debt of the Chaeronean towards his acknowledged model, for the dialogue is constantly borrowing from the Symposium and the Phaedrus. Whilst the reference to the latter is clearer, the influence of the former is much more problematic. All scholars have then struggled with the extraordinary absence in the text of the well‑known Erōs‑Daimōn, especially since Plutarch makes direct use of and explicit allusions to Diotima’s speech. How can we plainly explain such an enigmatic absence ? And does it necessarily mean any departure from the essence of Platonic philosophy ? We propose an entirely new reading of the Dialogue on Love based upon the general hypothesis that it dramatically and symbolically represents the birth through the text of the Erōs‑Daimōn. The whole dialogue reveals itself as being a staging of the locus classicus of Plato’s Symposium, the familial triad Plutarch‑Timoxena‑Autoboulos reflecting the philosophical triad Socrates‑Diotima‑Erōs‑Daimōn, which is further supported by the harmonization of the Egyptian triad Osiris‑Isis‑Horus with the Platonic triad Poros‑Penia‑Erōs in the Isis and Osiris. Thus, the birth of the philosophical love in the soul of the reader is finally happening.