The Platonic Doctrines of Albinus

by Albinus, Jeremiah Reedy (Translator), Jackson P. Hershbell (Introduction)

Among the many Platonists of the second century A.D., Albinus is one of the most important. He belongs to the period commonly known as 'Middle Platonism' which stands between the teachings of the Old Academy and the Neoplatonists.

"The Platonic Doctrines" is the only complete philosophical textbook surviving from the ancient world and is the only fullypreserved work of Platonism from the time of Plato until that of Plotinus (circa 205270 A.D.). The work was clearly intended to be an introduction to Plato's writings and is presented here in a definitive English language translation for the first time.

"The Platonic Doctrines" surveys the topics of dialectic, metaphysics, mathematics, theology, physics, and ethics. The work provides good insights into the philosophical thinking which immediately preceded Plotinus, and anticipates some of the mystical theology of later centuries.

Genres: Philosophy

82 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1990

About the author

Albinus (Greek: Ἀλβῖνος; fl. c. 150 AD) was a Platonist philosopher, who lived at Smyrna, and was teacher of Galen.[1] A short tract by him, entitled Introduction to Plato's dialogues, has survived. From the title of one of the extant manuscripts we learn that Albinus was a pupil of Gaius the Platonist. The original title of his work was probably Prologos, and it may have originally formed the initial section of notes taken at the lectures of Gaius. After explaining the nature of the Dialogue, which he compares to a Drama, the writer goes on to divide the Dialogues of Plato into four classes, logical, critical, physical, ethical, and mentions another division of them into Tetralogies, according to their subjects. He advises that the Alcibiades, Phaedo, Republic, and Timaeus, should be read in a series.

Some of Albinus's fame is attributed to the fact that a 19th-century German scholar, J. Freudenthal, attributed Alcinous's Handbook of Platonism to Albinus. This attribution has since been discredited by the work of John Whittaker in 1974.

Another Albinus is mentioned by Boethius and Cassiodorus, who wrote in Latin some works on music and geometry.

Reviews

[Truls Ljungström · Rating 1 out of 5]

En oerhört svår volym att hitta, men den fanns på en ockultistsida. I princip ett slags very-short-introduction-bok från antiken, om Platon. Fokus ligger på det biologiska--> metafysiska, vilket väl beskriver hur platonismen utvecklades. Inte värd att läsa.

[Erick · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is one of the primary sources for Middle Platonism. It is sort of a textbook or introduction to Plato and Platonism in general. It takes the themes, subjects and primary teachings of Plato's dialogues and distills them into a fairly thorough compendium. Some teachings are later than Plato, but these are not overwrought here.

[Ashley · Rating 2 out of 5]

After Dan Wheeler recommended this short book from his YT channel, I had to take a look at this “any child shall learn it” book. Well, thanks to Dan, I already had great pleasure reading Dr Coomaraswamy’s articles and books. But as for Albinus, at least this particular book, I think it will dumb people down in several ways.
1. His dialectical skill is questionable when discussing the motion and locomotion of God. He put the ineffable God into a simple category by using adjectives/tagging and failed to make a conclusion as such practice of discussion is meaningless in the first place.
2. Witt’s “numbers” -centric footnotes Gematria-related.
3. Logic flaw in chapter 10 about unity of God’s abilities.

I suspect Albinus was taught by an already corrupted teacher of a dogmatic system that took out Plato’s some words and made it to look like Plato was focusing on “soul needs to be punished if it wanders away.” Yet that was some Catholicism/Paganism influences in Albinus lifetime.

The originality of Plato’s teaching had already been distorted before the mid-Platonism period arrived.

It’s a very short book, so I can’t say it’s a complete waste of my time. But if one’s versed in the original Plato’s writing, and if one’s hyper logical, by reading this book will surely find it only works for a child of maybe 6 yrs old.