The Cambridge Companion to Plotinus

Each volume of this series of companions to major philosophers contains specially commissioned essays by an international team of scholars, together with a substantial bibliography, and will serve as a reference work for students and non-specialists. One aim of the series is to dispel the intimidation such readers often feel when faced with the work of a difficult and challenging thinker. Plotinus was the greatest philosopher in the 700-year period between Aristotle and Augustine. He thought of himself as a disciple of Plato, but in his efforts to defend Platonism against Aristotelians, Stoics, and others, he actually produced a reinvigorated version of Platonism that later came to be known as ‘Neoplatonism’. In this volume, sixteen leading scholars introduce and explain the many facets of Plotinus’ complex system. They place Plotinus in the history of ancient philosophy while showing that he was a founder of medieval philosophy.

• First comprehensive introduction to Plotinus • Of interest to classicists and theologians interested in Neoplatonism • As with the other Companions, this book is systematic and accessible

Introduction Lloyd P. Gerson; 1. Plotinus: the Platonic tradition and the foundation of Neoplatonism Maria Luisa Gatti; 2. Plotinus’s metaphysics of the One John Bussanich; 3. The hierarchical ordering of reality in Plotinus Dominic J. O’Meara; 4. On soul and intellect Henry J. Blumenthal; 5. Essence and existence in the Enneads Kevin Corrigan; 6. Plotinus on the nature of physical reality Michael F. Wagner; 7. Plotinus on matter and evil Denis O’Brien; 8. Eternity and time Andrew Smith; 9. Cognition and its object Eyjolfur Kjalar Emilsson; 10. Self-knowledge and subjectivity in the Enneads Sara Rappe; 11. Plotinus: body and soul Stephen R. L. Clark; 12. Human freedom in the thought of Plotinus Georges Leroux; 13. An ethic for the Late Antique sage John M. Dillon; 14. Plotinus and language Frederic M. Schroeder; 15. Plotinus and later Platonic philosophers on the causality of the first principle Cristina D’Ancona Costa; 16. Plotinus and Christian philosophy John Rist.