Nicola Spanu: The interpretation of Timaeus 39E7-9 in the context of Plotinus’s and Numenius’s philosophical circles

The object of this paper is to provide valuable insight into the discussion arisen inside Platonic circles, in particular Numenius’s and Plotinus’s (with special attention to the position of Plotinus’s “Gnostic” disciples) about the true nature of the Intellect (νοῦς). The choice of Numenius’s philosophy as term of comparison with the doctrine developed by Plotinus and his “Gnostic” pupils answers the need to locate the debate about the true nature of the Intellect inside the Platonic context constituted by the interpretation of Timaeus 39E7-9. In this passage Plato apparently speaks of three “entities”: the Intellect (νοῦς), the Creator (ὁ ποιῶν) and the Living (ὃ ζῷον), which have been the object of different interpretations by Platonists. From the information we have about Numenius’s doctrine, of which only a few fragments are extant, it would seem that he believed in three different Intellects (see, for example, VI. 17. 1-8; VI. 22. 1-5 des Places). Plotinus’s “Gnostic” disciples, according to Plotinus’s account of their doctrine (see II. 9. 6. 19-28 Armstrong), would also seem to have posited three different Intellects as a result of their interpretation of Timaeus 39E7-9, namely an Intellect in a state of repose (ἐν ἡσυχίᾳ) and containing all beings, which reminds Plato’s “the Living” as well as Numenius’s “idle” first God (IV or V. 12. 10-15 des Places), a second one which contemplates the first and a third one, often identified with the Soul, which directly creates the sensible cosmos. Similarly, we know that Numenius posited other two principles after the first (see VI des Places). How do we have to interpret this information? Could it be the proof of the fact that the debate around the “true” interpretation of Plato’s work, especially the Timaeus, but also the Parmenides (see now John D Turner– Kevin Corrigan, Plato’s Parmenides and its Heritage, 2 vols. [Atlanta, 2009-2010]) shaped the theological thought of Late Antiquity so much that it could be conceived as the common ground of school of thoughts otherwise profoundly different from each other? Is then the objective of proposing the true interpretation of Plato what constitutes the major drive of the theological work done by Numenius, Plotinus and his pupils and which later on would lay the foundation of Christian theology? These are the questions to which we hope to give an, inevitably – given the broadness of the topic, partial answer by giving this paper.