Porphyry, the Philosopher, to His Wife, Marcella

by Porphyry

Excerpt from Porphyry, the Philosopher, to His Wife, Marcella

This beautiful city at the meeting-place of three continents was a fitting home for all that was best in Art, Science, and Thought. It was natural that Philosophy should revive in this genial influence, and that, side by side with the dream of an universal State should grow up the vision of an universal philosophy, one that should contain within itself all that was essential in all philosophies, should pene trate to the essence of things, and show that the main features of all were identical.

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Genres: Philosophy, Astrology, Religion

83 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 303

About the author

Porphyry's parents were Phoenician, and he was born in Tyre. His parents named him Malchus ("king") but his teacher in Athens, Cassius Longinus, gave him the name Porphyrius ("clad in purple"), possibly a reference to his Phoenician heritage, or a punning allusion to his name and the color of royal robes.

Porphyry of Tyre (Greek: Πορφύριος, Porphyrios, AD c. 234–c. 305) was a Neoplatonic philosopher who was born in Tyre. He edited and published the Enneads, the only collection of the work of his teacher Plotinus. He also wrote many works himself on a wide variety of topics. His Isagoge, or Introduction, is an introduction to logic and philosophy,and in Latin translation it was the standard textbook on logic throughout the Middle Ages. In addition, through several of his works, most notably Philosophy from Oracles and Against the Christians, he was involved in a controversy with a number of early Christians, and his commentary on Euclid's Elements was used as a source by Pappus of Alexandria. (Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Erick]

I didn't find this work all that interesting. Firstly, Thomas Taylor, in his Select Works of Porphyry, noted several cases of Porphyry simply quoting from the Sentences of Sextus and the Sentences of Demophilus in this supposedly personal letter. Secondly, and on top of that, this polemicist towards Christianity didn't mind shamefully and unabashedly stealing ideas and terms from the religion he was a noted opponent of. You can search in vain in Plato's writings for terms like faith, hope and love, and you won't find them. Plato did talk about love as the Greek "eros", but it is very different than Christian notions of love (i.e. as phileo and agape) and he never tied eros to faith (pistis) and hope (elpis). You will also search in vain for that trinity of terms in Hellenistic pagan literature. Porphyry could have only got it from one source. He also speaks of "evil spirits" in here; such an idea cannot be supported in Neo-Platonist theology; indeed, it's inadequate approach to evil is one of my criticisms of Neo-Platonism.

I wouldn't care that Porphyry plagiarized in a period when that was acceptable, but given his reputation as a pioneer of textual criticism, I can only consider him to be a bit of a hypocrite. He criticized Origen for borrowing from Plato whilst being a Christian, but I guess he thought the same rule shouldn't be applied to him with regards to Christianity.

Porphyry was considered to be an important Neo-Platonist. If it was to be gauged on this work solely, I could only find that appraisal puzzling. Of course, most of his works are no longer extant, so it would be unfair to reach any absolute conclusions as to his philosophical merits based only on what remains, but I have no problem judging what's left to judge. He has to be given credit for collecting and publishing Plotinus' writings at least, but his own merits are so far indeterminate.

[Constantinos Nterziotis]

A crystal clear text about the right attitude of approaching the God, the salvation of the soul, the role of philosophy on that process.

[Saffron]

As always, James Holden's footnotes make this a very useful piece to study for anyone interested in ancient astrology.

[Guéorgos]

Ce qui est écrit est probablement très intéressant mais cela demande bien trop de connaissances antérieures : littéralement 4 fois par page il est mentionné qu'il s'agit d'un fragment d'une oeuvre précédente qui a été repris et il faut donc avoir toute la connaissance des pensées antérieures pour pouvoir comprendre correctement l'oeuvre et voir les enjeux intertextuels. Par ailleurs, pour seulement 30 pages il y a exactement 194 notes de bas de page, lesquelles sont très précises et très précieuses, il n'y a rien à redire pour le coup, mais cela rend la lecture assez indigeste d'autant plus que cela nous souligne le fait que l'on passe à côté de beaucoup de choses ...
L'édition est bien faite, il n'y a rien à redire non plus sur ce coup là.


Edition d'Arnaud Perrot, Les Belles Lettres, coll. Classiques en Poche, ISBN 9782251449562

[Aaron Schuschu]

Typical stoic stuff

[Maan Kawas]

Such a fantastic profound book, I highly recommend.

[C. Clarke]

Short and sweet. The introduction, taking up fifty percent of this small volume, is brilliant.

[Vaquita lectora]

''porque es para ti preferible lanzar una piedra al azar
que una palabra, y ser derrotada hablando la verdad
mejor que ganar a través de la mentira;''

[TR]

A very moving meditation about what's truly important in life. Similar to one of Seneca's letters.

[Peter J.]

I really enjoyed this look into the personal life of this great philosopher.

[Clodia Metelli]

I'm glad I'm not married to Porphyry.