← Home
Select Works of Plotinus · 150 of 752 · tr. Thomas Taylor

Select Works, Section 159

Section 3 3. Ever illuminated, receiving light unfailing, the All-Soul imparts it to the entire series of later Being which by this light is sustained and fostered and endowed with the fullest measure of life that each can absorb. It may be compared with a central fire warming every receptive body within range. Our fire, however, is a thing of limited scope: given powers that have no limitation and are never cut off from the Authentic Existences, how imagine anything existing and yet failing to receive from them? It is of the essence of things that each gives of its being to another: without this communication, The Good would not be Good, nor the Intellectual-Principle an Intellective Principle, nor would Soul itself be what it is: the law is, "some life after the Primal Life, a second where there is a first; all linked in one unbroken chain; all eternal; divergent types being engendered only in the sense of being secondary." In other words, things commonly described as generated have never known a beginning: all has been and will be. Nor can anything disappear unless where a later form is possible: without such a future there can be no dissolution. If we are told that there is always Matter as a possible term, we ask why then should not Matter itself come to nothingness. If we are told it may, then we ask why it should ever have been generated. If the answer comes that it had its necessary place as the ultimate of the series, we return that the necessity still holds. With Matter left aside as wholly isolated, the Divine Beings are not everywhere but in some bounded place, walled off, so to speak; if that is not possible, Matter itself must receive the Divine light [and so cannot be annihilated].
§ Ask Guru about this passage →
Themes
Active Contemplationpraxis

A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness.

The passage characterizes the Divine Mind's existence as an active process of mentation and self-observation.

All passages →
Apophatic Theologytheology

Describing the divine only by negation—God transcends all positive categories and concepts; the via negativa.

[auto] The author defines the Divine by negating logical distinctions and separations that apply to human thought.

All passages →
Divine Simplicitytheology

The doctrine that God has no parts, divisions, or composite attributes; pure undivided being.

[auto] The passage centrally argues that in the Divine Mind, Thinker and Thought are one and the same Act without separation or parts.

All passages →
Emanation Hierarchycosmology

A chain of divine beings or principles flowing downward from a single transcendent source (the One or the Father), each level less perfect than the one above.

The text outlines the flow from Supreme Mind to Reason-Principle to Soul, while critiquing specific intermediary separations that would deny intellection.

All passages →
Gnosis Direct Knowledgesoteriology

Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone.

The author argues that the Soul must derive Reason directly from the Intellectual-Principle to possess true intellection without intermediaries.

All passages →
Logoscosmology

The divine reason, word, or ordering principle through which the universe was created; mediates between the transcendent God and the material world.

The text explicitly discusses the 'Reason-Principle' (Logos) as an emanation from the Supreme Mind and its necessary relationship to the Soul.

All passages →
Opposites Transcendedanthropology

The dissolution of binary oppositions (male/female, inner/outer, above/below) as a mark of spiritual completion.

[auto] The passage asserts that the distinction between thinker and thought cannot be made in the Divine, transcending this binary opposition.

All passages →
Self Knowledgesoteriology

The recognition of one's own true divine nature as the primary path to liberation; 'know thyself' as soteriology.

[auto] The text explicitly describes the Divine Mind as thinking itself, observing itself, and possessing knowledge of its own knowing.

All passages →
Unity Of Beingtheology

The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim.

The text implies a non-dual reality within the Divine Hypostasis where intellective act and consciousness are unified.

All passages →
Related passages · 11 parallels
christian_mysticism|Pseudo-Dionysius: The Mystical Theology|Chapter III-b
“Now in the former treatises the course of the argument, as it came down from the highest to the lowest categories, embraced an ever-widening number of conceptions which increased at each stage of the descent, but in the present treatise it…”
Shared concept: Apophatic Theology — Describing the divine only by negation—God transcends all positive categories and concepts; the via negativa. (derived)
christian_mysticism|Pseudo-Dionysius: The Divine Names|Chapter 4, Section 1l
“Need is there to understand that in proper truth we do but use the elements and syllables and phrases and written terms and words as an aid to our senses; inasmuch as when our soul is moved by spiritual energies unto spiritual things, our s…”
Shared concept: Apophatic Theology — Describing the divine only by negation—God transcends all positive categories and concepts; the via negativa. (derived)
christian_mysticism|The Life and Doctrines of Jacob Boehme|Chapter 7 (part 4)
“28.) "In Paradise the substance of the divine world penetrated the substance belonging to time, comparable to the power of the sun penetrating a fruit growing on a tree, and endowing it with such qualities as render it lovely to the sight a…”
Shared concept: Logos — The divine reason, word, or ordering principle through which the universe was created; mediates between the transcendent God and the material world. (derived)
theosophy|The Secret Doctrine|Page 19 (part 1)
“The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 1 [[Vol. 1, Page]] 325 THE IMPARTIALITY OF SCIENTIFIC DENIALS. [[This page continued from previous section ]] § III. PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE AND DIVINE THOUGHT. "As it would seem irrational…”
Shared concept: Unity Of Being — The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim. (derived)
western_esoteric|The Secret Teachings of All Ages (Manly P. Hall)|The Human Body in Symbolism-j
“When humanity has completed its physical evolution, the empty shell of materiality left behind will be used by other life waves as steppingstones to their own liberation. The trend of man's evolutionary growth is ever toward his own essent…”
Shared concept: Self Knowledge — The recognition of one's own true divine nature as the primary path to liberation; 'know thyself' as soteriology. (derived)
theosophy|The Secret Doctrine|Page 3 (part 7)
“Herbert Spencer has of late so far modified his Agnosticism, as to assert that the nature of the "First Cause,"* which the Occultist more logically derives from the "Causeless Cause," the "Eternal," and the "Unknowable," may be essentially…”
Shared concept: Unity Of Being — The doctrine that all existence is ultimately one substance or one divine reality; non-duality as a theological claim. (derived)
christian_mysticism|The Life and Doctrines of Jacob Boehme|Chapter 1 (part 4)
“Let them, therefore, again go out with their will from their wilful ignorance or malignity and enter again into the will of God." ( Menschwerdung , 3, 5.) All this goes to show that it is useless and vain to seek for divine wisdom, meaning…”
Shared concept: Self Knowledge — The recognition of one's own true divine nature as the primary path to liberation; 'know thyself' as soteriology. (derived)
western_esoteric|The Secret Teachings of All Ages (Manly P. Hall)|The Mysteries and Their Emissaries-a
“DID that divine knowledge which constituted the supreme possession of the pagan priestcrafts survive the destruction of their temples? Is it yet accessible to mankind, or does it lie buried beneath the rubbish of ages, entombed within the…”
Shared concept: Gnosis Direct Knowledge — Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone. (derived)
hinduism|Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, Book III|Sutra 47
“Mastery over the powers of perception and action comes through perfectly concentrated Meditation on their fivefold forms; namely, their power to grasp their distinctive nature, the element of self-consciousness in them, their inherence, and…”
Shared concept: Active Contemplation — A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness. (derived)
western_esoteric|Psychic Self-Defence (Dion Fortune)|18. Methods Of Defence II-a
“THERE are two types of practical psychic work which may be used separately or in combination, the latter method, in my opinion, giving by far the best results, though the exponents of each are apt to decry the other. The method which we wi…”
Shared concept: Active Contemplation — A form of meditation that uses imagery, imagination, or symbolic thought rather than purely empty stillness. (derived)
renaissance_hermeticism|The Heroic Enthusiasts, Part I (Gli Eroici Furori)|INTRODUCTION-i
“The life of man is more than an experience or trial; it is an effort, a struggle to reproduce and represent upon earth some of that goodness, beauty, and truth which are diffused over the universe and constitute its harmony. Long, slow, an…”
Shared concept: Opposites Transcended — The dissolution of binary oppositions (male/female, inner/outer, above/below) as a mark of spiritual completion. (derived)