[Discussion] On the Gods and the World, Ch. II

[sdi]

My gratitude to those who participated in last week's discussion of Sallustius' On the Gods and the World—I am learning much, and we've hardly begun! So let's pick the puzzle-box back up, shall we?

II. That God is unchanging, unbegotten, eternal, incorporeal, and not in space.

Let the disciple be thus. Let the teachings be of the following sort. The essences of the Gods never came into existence (for that which always is never comes into existence; and that exists for ever which possesses primary force and by nature suffers nothing): neither do they consist of bodies; for even in bodies the powers are incorporeal. Neither are they contained by space; for that is a property of bodies. Neither are they separate from the First Cause nor from one another,* just as thoughts are not separate from mind nor acts of knowledge from the soul.

* Thomas Taylor notes, "The reader must not suppose from this, that the gods are nothing more than so many attributes of the first cause; for if this were the case, the first god would be multitude, but the one must always be prior to the many. But the gods, though they are profoundly united with their ineffable cause, are at the same time self-perfect essences; for the first cause is prior to self-perfection. Hence as the first cause is superessential, all the gods, from their union through the summits or blossoms of their natures with this incomprehensible god, will be likewise superessential; in the same manner as trees from being rooted in the earth are all of them earthly in an eminent degree. And as in this instance the earth itself is essentially distinct from the trees which it contains, so the highest god is transcendently distinct from the multitude of gods which he ineffably comprehends."

Comments

[temporaryreality]

"largely because of the second point: the gods are "superessential," that is, above/prior/before Being itself. Indeed, the confluence of the gods, if I recall right, is what generates Being"

Huh, interesting. I'm still balancing the several cosmogenic tales I'm most familiar with in light of this. No, I don't expect them to agree, but I'm still holding them up next to each other (these are the big bang theory (it does posit a First Cause of sorts) , the Cosmic Doctrine's version of things, and the Dao de Jing's Dao as the originator of Heaven and Earth). I don't have much to say about how they stack up or compare to what Taylor's noting...

Thanks for the graphic - it's a nice visual as well as fulfilling its educative purpose. It's reminiscent of umbrellas or lotus leaves, or even inversed turtles, all the way up! :D

[boccaderlupo]

Apart from the "big bang," I am unfamiliar with those cosmogonies, but will be interested to hear what you find.

One other general conclusion about Neoplatonism: the waters get pretty deep pretty quick with this material, and different writers seem to introduce divergent ideas. For some, intensive, deep contemplation of the various hypostases leads to valuable insights; for others (like myself), a more superficial understanding of the major concepts will suffice, especially when it comes to its relevance/explanatory power with regard to your praxis. This is why I like Sallustius: he's effective at outlining the major ideas without (IMO) compromising them, and offers the option of wading out deeper, should one wish to do so.