Table of Contents

Front page
imprint
dedication
Contents
Foreword
Introduction
1 A prologue to silence
1.1 The initial hopelessness
1.2 “Throwing away the ladder”: Damascius’ arguments for the “absolute necessity” of the “unspeakable”
1.3 Damascius' critique of apophatic dialectic
1.3.1 “No speech will be appropriate to him and consequently no negation”: Criticism of negation
1.3.2 The Proclian “negation of the negation”
1.3.3 Damascius' criticism of Proclian “negation of the negation”
1.4 Infinite negation and the incompletion of dialectics
1.5 Self-abolition (περιτροπή) and the concept of transcendence
1.6 Silence and awareness of transcendence
1.7 The double nothingness
1.8 “It is neither productive nor sterile”: omnipresence or ineffectiveness of the Absolute?
2 Hen dyadikon: From a cataphatic to an apophatic henology
2.1 The henological antinomics
2.2 The One as “Whole before the Whole” and as Shadow of the Absolute
2.3 Transition from dialectical to apophatic henology
2.4 The Damascus One is not a diffusive one
2.5 Unity consciousness and all-unity experience
2.6 Beyond monism and dualism
2.7 The “mystical imperative” of Damascius
3 “Putting the final word”? Summary and outlook
3.1 Worship of the supradivine
3.2 Infinite approach? – Infinite distance
bibliography
Editions and translations
Research literature
Index of Greek terms
Subject index
Gheorghe Paşcalău
The “inarticulate concepts” of the Neoplatonist Damascius
Contributions to Archaeology

Edited by Susanne Daub, Michael Erler,

Dorothee Gall, Ludwig Koenen and Clemens Zintzen
Volume 372
ISBN 978-3-11-058019-8
e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-058220-8
ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-058171-3
ISSN 1616-0452
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A CIP catalog record for this book has been applied for at the Library of Congress.
Bibliographic information published by the German National Library
The German National Library lists this publication in the German National Bibliography; Detailed bibliographic data
are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de .
© 2018 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston
www.degruyter.com
 MAGISTRATE
JENS HALFWASSEN
the son of a prophet and a prophetess
μυστικωτάτης ἀληθείας ἡγεμόνι
(Proclus, Theologia Platonica I, 33, 22sq.)
Ἀλλ' ὅμως ἐκ τῶν ἡμῖν γνωριμωτέρων ἀνερεθιστέον
τὰς ἐν ἡμῖν ἀρρήτους ὠδῖνας εἰς τὴν ἄρρητον (but not for the sake of the Lord)
the son of a prophet
is a prophet.
"And yet, starting from what is more familiar to us, we must
foster within ourselves the unspeakable birth pangs in order to awaken the unspeakable - I do not know
how to express myself - consciousness of this overwhelming
truth."
Damascius, De principiis I 6, 11 – 16
Contents
Foreword
Introduction
1 A prologue to silence
1.1 The initial hopelessness
1.2 “Throwing away the ladder”: Damascius’ arguments for the “absolute necessity”
of the “unspeakable”
1.3 Damascius' critique of apophatic dialectic
1.3.1 “No speech will be appropriate to him and consequently no negation”: Criticism
of negation
1.3.2 The Proclian “negation of the negation”
1.3.3 Damascius' criticism of Proclian “negation of the negation”
1.4 Infinite negation and the incompletion of dialectics
1.5 Self-cancellation (περιτροπή) and the concept of transcendence
1.6 Silence and awareness of transcendence
1.7 The double nothingness
1.8 “It is neither productive nor sterile”: omnipresence or ineffectiveness of the
Absolute?
2 Hen dyadikon : From a cataphatic to an apophatic henology
2.1 The henological antinomics
2.2 The One as “Whole before the Whole” and as Shadow of the Absolute
2.3 Transition from dialectical to apophatic henology
2.4 The Damascus One is not a diffusive one
2.5 Unity consciousness and all-unity experience
2.6 Beyond monism and dualism
2.7 The “mystical imperative” of Damascius
3 “Putting the final word”? Summary and outlook
3.1 Worship of the supradivine
3.2 Infinite approach? – Infinite distance
bibliography
Editions and translations
Research literature
Index of Greek terms
Subject index
Foreword
The present work is a slightly revised version of my dissertation, which was accepted by
the Faculty of Philosophy of the Ruprecht-Karls-University Heidelberg in the winter
semester 2016/17 under the title ARRHETOI ENNOIAI. Transcendence and All-Unity
in the Metaphysics of the Neoplatonist Damascius .
First and foremost, I would like to thank my doctoral supervisor, Prof. Dr. Jens
Halfwassen, for supervising this work. My encounter with his philosophy played a key
role in helping me find my way in philosophy. The first seminar I attended with him
(Heiligkreuztal, WS 2009/10) opened up the horizon of metaphysics to me. His
suggestions have enabled me to delve deeper into the metaphysical tradition of
philosophical thought. This work is dedicated to him for this reason.
I would like to thank PD Dr. Dirk Cürsgen, my second reviewer, for his interest in my
work, for his valuable comments and for his criticism.
Since my studies in Bucharest, Prof. Dr. Gabriel Liiceanu has shown a lively interest in
my intellectual development. During all these years he has accompanied me with his
advice, encouragement and criticism. I am close friends with his former assistant Dr.
Cătălin Cioabă and his family. I was able to present parts of this work to them in the
"Cabana Noica" in Păltiniş, where I also wrote some chapters of my dissertation. Le
mulţumesc din toată inima!
I would like to thank Prof. Dr. Irmgard Männlein-Robert (Tübingen) for her support
during my studies and my work as a research assistant at her chair. I took my first steps
in the field of imperial Platonism under her guidance. In the winter semester of 2015/16
I presented the main results of my research at her research colloquium. I would like to
thank her and her students for the stimulating discussion and for many important tips.
I would like to thank Prof. Dr. Thomas A. Szlezák (Tübingen) for the wonderful
Heiligkreuztal seminars, which I have attended almost every year since 2007. After a
long search, it was only thanks to Prof. Szlezák that I found a convincing approach to
Plato's philosophy.
I would like to thank Prof. Dr. Otfried Höffe (Tübingen), at whose chair I worked as a
tutor (2010 - 2011), for his excellent courses and for his advice and support. In the
winter semester 2017/18 I presented a summary of my dissertation in his research
colloquium. I would like to thank him and his academic students once again for the
lively conversation!
My dissertation has benefited significantly from discussions with two important experts
on Neoplatonism: Prof. Dr. Carlos Steel (Leuven) was kind enough to read and analyze
some difficult passages from Damascius with me during his visiting professorship in
Heidelberg (2013/14). Prof. Dr. Philippe Hoffmann (Paris) was very helpful in
supervising my research stay at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes (2014/15). His
seminars, lectures and expert opinions have greatly enriched my knowledge of
Neoplatonism. I would like to take this opportunity to thank both of them!
This work could not have been done without the help of my friends:
I would like to thank Tanja Werthmann from the bottom of my heart for the friendship
that has bound us together for many years. It is thanks to her enthusiasm for Platonic
philosophy that my thoughts have always been inspired. She read this entire work and
added comments that have helped me to progress.
I would like to thank Marion Pollaert for our Paris Damascus reading group and for
many exciting discussions about Neoplatonism and French philosophy.
I would like to thank my dear friend René de Nicolay for his encouragement and support
and for the unforgettable conversations about Greco-Roman antiquity. His family
welcomed me into their home during my stay in France and showed a keen interest in
my work. Qu'ils soient remerciés de tout mon cœur!
Together with Sebastian Faber, I have begun work on the first German translation of the
Aporias and Solutions Concerning the First Principles of Damascius. I would like to
thank him and my friends Jakob Keienburg, Winfried Lücke and Tolga Ratzsch for their
assistance in writing this work.
I would like to thank several institutions for their generous support during my
doctorate: the German Academic Scholarship Foundation for a three-year doctoral
scholarship; the Graduate Academy of the University of Heidelberg for a completion
scholarship; the Fondation Hardt (Vandoeuvres) for a research stay in June 2013; the
Fondation Lovinescu-Ierunca and its director, Mr. Cristian Mureşan, for the support
during my stay in Paris; the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Paris) for allowing me to use
their magnificent reference library; the Cusanusstift and Mr. Marco Broesch for
allowing me to view the manuscript of Proklian's Parmenides commentary in the
Cardinal's library in Bernkastel-Kues.
Finally, I would like to thank the editors of Beiträge zur Altertumskunde for including
my dissertation in this series and Dr. Mirko Vonderstein (De Gruyter Verlag) for his
kindness and helpfulness.
How much I owe to my family – actually everything – cannot be put into words.
Heidelberg, 27 February 2018
Gheorghe Pascalau
 Introduction
"Those who wish to deify themselves must first become human. This is why Plato also
says that no higher good has come to mankind than philosophy" 1 . With these words,
Isidore of Damascus admonishes the theosophist Hegias to be more cautious in his use
of the magical practices of theurgy and at the same time reminds him of the original
Platonic priority of theoretical knowledge. Immediately after the death of the great
Platonic philosopher Proclus (485), who had led the Academy since 437, signs of decay
became apparent within the School of Athens 2 . The Proclusian system, with its
combination of dialectics and a lively interest in supra-philosophical means of self-
perfection, seemed to have exhausted the possibilities of pagan Neoplatonism. The
direct successors of Proclus tore the two dimensions of this system out of their unity and
pursued them separately. On the one hand, after the death of its "chorus leader", a
tendency to restrict the "mystical" aspect of philosophy became apparent in the
Academy. For example, Marinus of Neapolis, Proclus' successor at the head of the
Athenian School, wrote a commentary on Plato's Parmenides in line with this tendency ,
in which he interpreted the dialogue purely in terms of ideas and no longer
"theologically" like Syrian and Proclus 3 . On the other hand (and this seems to have been
the more pronounced trend), the "liturgical" extension of philosophy, as Proclus had
also cultivated it, was absolutized. The most radical representative of such
unphilosophical piety was Hegias. "To our knowledge, philosophy has never fallen into
such disrepute in Athens as we saw with our own eyes at the time of Hegias" 4 . In the
same era, the "Christian Platonist" 5 Aeneas of Gaza has the eponymous character of his
dialogue Theophrastus say to his interlocutor: "Philosophy has become a beautiful and
rare thing, since even in Athens, where it once shone most brightly, it has been
completely cornered and made null and void" 6 . The dialogue, written shortly after 484 7,
probably alludes to the situation of the Platonic Academy in the last years of Proclus'
illness or after his death 8 . The decline of philosophical study in the School of Athens
after the loss of its spiritus rector is thus attested to on several occasions. In this way,
Edward Gibbon's judgment that the Neoplatonic Academy was nothing more than an
"awe-inspiring ruin" is confirmed, albeit only for the late 5th century . 9
It is not known exactly when Damascius, the Syrian-born rhetoric teacher who
converted to philosophy, took over the office of scholar of the Platonic Academy 10 . It is
even uncertain whether the title of Diadoche , with which he is given in the most
important manuscript of his works, the Marcianus graecus 246 , is rightly given to him
and whether this term can be interpreted in the narrower sense of the word, that is, as
"headmaster". What is certain, however, is that an illustrious mind such as Simplicius
refers to Damascius as his διδάσκαλος and ἡγεμών, which undoubtedly indicates his
brilliant activity as a teacher of philosophy 11 . It is also clear that the writings of the
Damascene were written according to a conscious program and that this program was
based on the traditional curriculum of the School of Athens 12 : He commented on the
Meteorologica , De caelo and perhaps also Aristotle's Categories , which seems to
indicate that he was giving lectures as part of the Academy's Aristotelian "basic course".
Of his numerous commentaries on Plato's dialogues, those that have survived are those
on the Philebus , the Phaedo and the Parmenides . The very form of these commentaries
indicates their didactic purpose: the latter is a development of aporias as they arise in
the course of reading the dialogue and invites the "student" to confront the Diadochi's
problems and solutions with the corresponding commentary by Proclus 13 . The
commentaries on the Phaedo and the Philebus consist of lecture notes. The former even
contains a monograph by Damascius himself on the "argument from opposites" 14 . These
works, as well as the remaining commentaries, which we only know by their titles,
probably arose from the lectures given as part of the Academy's Platonic "main course".
Ultimately, the "university" career of the Diadochi was to culminate in a (probably no
longer carried out) "course" on the Chaldean Oracles 15 , which is promised to the
"students" several times and not coincidentally in the Parmenides lecture, as the
appropriate propaedeuticum for encountering the "most holy books" 16 of late
Neoplatonism. In addition, Damascius wrote a treatise on Number, Space and Time ,
which has been partially handed down to us by his student Simplicius 17 , and a large-
scale treatise in which he conveys his overall view of reality: Aporias and solutions
regarding of the first principles ( De principiis ) 18 . While in the (preserved)
commentaries Damascius develops his interpretation of Plato in constant debate with
Proclus, his main work De principiis, through its systematic character and the
descending movement of the view of being, seems to compete with Platonic theology as
the "developing 'summa' of Proclusian thought" 19 . The Damascene's entire work is thus
oriented towards the cursus completus of the Neoplatonic Academy, testifies to the
awareness of a high responsibility towards the preservation and consolidation of the
Platonic doctrinal structure and thus, reaching back beyond the time of decline, ties in
with the Proclusian model. 20 This should justify the consensus of researchers to see
Damascius as the last scholar of the Platonic Academy.
A further testimony to Damascius' scholarship can be found in his Vita Isidori . This
text, which has only survived in fragments, focuses on Damascius' philosophical teacher
and can be compared with the Vita Procli of Marinus, is both more and less than a
hagiography. The Vita Isidori is less than a hagiography because, in contrast to
Marinus' Πρόκλος ἢ Περὶ εὐδαιμονίας, it presents itself with a more sober gesture and
expressly prohibits the uncritical tendency to "sing the praises of happiness" 21 . The Vita
Isidori is more than the βιογραφία of a single, albeit "divine man" because it actually
takes on the overall presentation of a philosophical era. It is no coincidence that the
alternative title Φιλόσοφος ἱστορία has also been handed down for this work 22 . All the
well-known thinkers of the Alexandrian and Athenian milieu are portrayed in this
veritable history of philosophy and assessed in terms of their intellectual achievements:
Hierocles, Hermeias, his son Ammonios (under whom Damascius himself studied),
Marinus, Hegias and, last but not least, Proclus. themselves appear as lively figures
before the eyes of the reader 23 . However, Damascius' Vita Isidori is not just the
historical description of a pagan fin de siècle 24 . It is itself the fruit of a high
philosophical consciousness and can be profitably read together with the philosophical
writings of Damascius, insofar as its fragmentary state allows this. What is particularly
remarkable is the precise and sophisticated conception of the tasks and method of
philosophy that shines through in the surviving fragments. The entire text seems to have
been nourished by the certainty that "philosophy, which is in decline, must be re-
established" 25 . The philosophical restoration efforts that speak from its lines perhaps
betray the programmatic document of the newly founded Academy, which comes in the
guise of a βιογραφία 26 . If its reformist character is not misleading, the existence of the
Φιλόσοφος ἱστορία is further evidence that Damascius’s “ultimus philosophiae
Platonicae professor factus est” 27 .
When an edict by the Emperor Justinian (529) forbidding non-Christians and heretics
from teaching in public led to the abolition of the Academy in Athens, Damascius, a
staunch supporter of the old Hellenic religion, went to the court of the Zoroastrian king
of Persia, Chosroes I, in Ctesiphon. After the conclusion of the so-called "Eternal Peace"
(532) between the two great empires, he was able to return to the Roman Empire
because a clause in the peace treaty guaranteed him freedom of conscience . 28 The last
evidence we have of him consists in a charming two-line epigram handed down to us in
the Anthologia Palatina (VII, 553) and published at the beginning of the 20th century.
was also discovered on a funerary stele dating to the year 538 and temporarily located in
Homs (Emesa) in Syria 29 .
Damascius' work was most likely written before the Persian exile. Where the members
of the dissolved Platonic Academy worked after 532 is highly controversial. However,
Damascius' writings seem to precede the institutional framework of the Neoplatonic
school. 30 . Both his passionate commitment to an appropriate understanding of Plato and his "scholastic" debate with the interpreters of Plato, especially with Proclus, indicate a lively exchange
of ideas within the framework of a philosophical school. The detailed criticism that Damascius
makes of the conceptual distinctions of his
predecessors and his efforts to place the Neoplatonic doctrine of principles on new
foundations would probably not have had the same conciseness outside a Platonic
school.
It is precisely the revisionary spirit of the Damascene that will also shape his initial
reception in the philosophical historiography of the modern era. For a long time largely
ignored 31 , Damascius' thought was not presented in greater detail until after the
Renaissance by Wilhelm Gottlieb Tennemann 32 . For this, the Marburg historian of
philosophy was able to draw on a small selection of texts from De principiis , which
Johannes Christoph Wolf had published in his Anecdota Graeca 33 . The sixth volume of
Tennemann's History of Philosophy (1807) is devoted to the "history of the enthusiasms
of the Alexandrians and Neoplatonists", an era in which "the Greek spirit" seems to have
"received a new vitality" after a long slumber. The self-imposed task of this era,
according to Tennemann, is "the great goal" towards which Hellenic thought had striven
since time immemorial: to "single-handedly create a self-contained, absolutely certain,
complete science excluding all doubt". However, an oriental influence is said to have a
corrupting effect on Greek science, so that the "creative imagination" now replaces the
"calmly researching reason". The most obvious result of this "creative imagination" is
that the Absolute, which in Kant's sense should only have a regulative function within
thought, is presented as a "real object" "which the human mind wants to grasp through
immediate perception":
The human mind wanted to make everything that can be thought, believed, or sensed into an object of perception,
and, blinded by enthusiasm, forgot that the phan tasie played a trick with the ideas and concepts fused by the images
of the imagination.
Thus, according to the Marburg historian of philosophy, the Neoplatonic “spirit of
speculation” is directed towards a fundamentally “impossible goal” 34 .
, the main representative of later Neoplatonism 35 is, as expected, Proclus, who was said
to have been "well on the way" to "considerably expanding the eccentric philosophy".
Proclus' solid knowledge of Aristotelian philosophy led, within the framework of the
Neoplatonic system, to a "strange, previously unheard of form of acumen or brooding
spirit, which is a prelude to scholasticism" 36 . Although Proclus' "thoroughness" is
acknowledged, Tennemann, from a critical perspective, sees Proclus' "main error" in the
fact that "one concludes from the logical unity, as the principle of thought, to a real unity
as the real principle" 37 .
Given the denigration of Proclus by Tennemann, one is surprised to read a much more
favorable judgment about Damascius in the same History of Philosophy :
Damascius, moreover, deserves some attention among these philosophers. This thinker, who was descended from
Damascus […], distinguished himself from most of his predecessors and contemporaries by the fact that he felt within
himself the interest in science, which had so greatly diminished, more strongly and more vividly.38
With these words, Tennemann refers to the academic decadence in the period
immediately before Damascius's alleged Scholarchat and to his return to a "serious"
philosophy 39 . However, the texts available at the time also enable Tennemann to make a
more objective judgment that goes beyond historiographical conjectures: in the excerpts
from De principiis printed by Johannes Christoph Wolf , Tennemann believes, in
accordance with his critical bias, to be able to recognize a proto-Kantian. Wolf's
Anecdota Graeca provides two passages from Damascius' main work 40 in which
henology and the theory of the triads are subjected to a detailed examination. This
examination leads Tennemann to welcome the moment of critical self-reflection within
Neoplatonism in the person of Damascius:
He [Damaskius] combined a clear understanding and acumen, and thereby escaped on the one hand the deceptions of
the imaginative reason to which his contemporaries had so often succumbed; he examined the attempts of his
predecessors in the investigation of the Absolute, and often with striking acumen revealed the defects of these and the
fallacy of their supposed discoveries. Certainly, if he had possessed as much sagacity and thoroughness and had lived
at another time, he would have made an epoch in an excellent manner . 41
The problems that are said to have preoccupied Damascius are the precise ontological
status of the “primal principle”, the “derivation of things from a principle” and the
“conformity” of philosophical speculation with traditional mythology. As far as the
position and function of the “primal principle” are concerned, Damascius correctly
recognizes its absolute inaccessibility and aptly criticizes all attempts to approach it in
any way. As part of his “revision” of the Neoplatonic concept of the process, Damascius
questions the triadic and enneadic structure of the intelligible. “Let us not count the
intelligible on our fingers, nor let us grasp it with special concepts!…” 42 – Tennemann
refers to this demand when he recognizes in Damascius a forerunner of the sharp
distinction between reason, understanding and sensuality:
Damascius was therefore very close to recognizing the difference between the realm of knowledge and belief, between
intuition and concept, between concept and idea, and to considering the knowledge of the supersensible as
subjectively impossible as inappropriate to our way of thinking 43 .
“subjectively” impossible, but Tennemann is right that for the scholar the intelligible is
unknowable without prior reflection in the differentiating medium of the mind. must
remain. Damascius, in the spirit of Kant, thus saw through the indispensability of the
"ideal" for human thought, but in the absence of a clear distinction between theoretical
and practical knowledge, "he offered all his intellectual power to bring about this
knowledge of the absolute, which was the keystone of the entire edifice of human
knowledge, as far as is possible for the human mind" 44 . For this reason, the "sharp
criticism" that Damascius made of his predecessors ultimately had to remain fruitless.
Moreover, Damascius' "attempts" "increased" the already existing "indifference" and
"coldness" towards Neoplatonic philosophy "through the open admission that the
human way of thinking is in direct conflict with the nature of a final and absolutely
simple primary principle of all being" 45 .
Despite the negative judgment that his anti-metaphysical bias leads him to,
Tennemann's report on Damascius, the first in recent philosophical historiography, is
actually surprisingly positive. It accurately highlights Damascius' critical attitude in the
truest sense of the word. Tennemann's Kantian background does not seem to distort his
interpretation in this case to the same extent as it does in his interpretation of Plotinus
and Proclus. In fact, recent research has also pointed out that Damascius anticipates
certain ideas of Kant's 46 .
Compared to Tennemann's relatively benevolent assessment, the Damascius reports of
subsequent historians of philosophy represent a clear step backwards. It is all the more
regrettable that GWF Hegel was not familiar with the metaphysics of Damascius, of
whom "there are still very interesting writings" 47 . Hegel's speculative power would
undoubtedly have known how to assign the Diadochi his place of honor "at the jolt in the
innermost sanctuary" 48 of philosophy 49 . In contrast, the later historians could not The
references to Damascus' philosophy, which already fell within a philosophical landscape
shaped by neo-Kantianism, could not be anything other than envious. "Inexhaustible in
aporias, but even more inexhaustible in answers to them" - sneers Eduard Zeller 50 . An
"exuberant mysticism" is attributed to the Damascene von Ueberweg-Praechter 51 , and
the historian of religion Johannes Geffcken, who had made the appreciation of the
pagan culture of the imperial period his programme at the end of Greco-Roman
paganism , breaks out into complete diatribes when it comes to Damascius 52 .
The first complete edition of Damascius' Aporias and Solutions concerning First
Principles was not provided until 1826 by Joseph Kopp 53 , followed by Charles Emile
Ruelle, who edited both the treatises contained in Marcianus gr. 246 , namely the
Aporias and Solutions and the Parmenides commentary 54 . The first translator, Antelme
Edouard Chaignet, also offers a remarkable introduction to Damascius' thought,
highlighting the philosophical achievements of the Diadochi and the peculiarities of his
methodology 55 .
Thanks to these works, the historiography of philosophy was able to make its first
acquaintance with Damascius' metaphysics and, despite its classification within the
broader framework of Neoplatonism, to establish the astonishing independence of the
Damascene doctrine of principles. The most original feature of this thinking can already
be seen from the opening pages of the Aporias and Solutions : While the entire Platonic
tradition sees the "One" as the first Principle of reality 56 , Damascius goes a step further
in his metaphysics than the One. The first principle is, according to Damascius, "even
beyond the One". For him, the fundamental basis of reality is the "ineffable"
(ἀπόρρητον), which is "ineffable" to such an extent that it can no longer even be
described as "ineffable" 57 .
The factual interest in late antique Neoplatonism in general and in Damascius in
particular, which grew in the 20th century, had to wait for the excellent edition 58 by Leendert
Gerritt Westenrink and Joseph Combès (1986) before a thorough study of Damascus thought could be undertaken. 59
Meanwhile, the complaint about the
lack of monographic studies of Damascus metaphysics, which was repeatedly heard in
older research, is no longer relevant. Several works dealing with the thought of the last
great systematist of antiquity have already been published and they shed light on the
richness, the profundity, but also the difficulties and exegetical challenges of Damascus
philosophy.
In Dirk Cürsgen's Henology and Ontology. The metaphysical doctrine of principles of
late Neoplatonism (2007) we find the first complete presentation of the Damascene
system 60 ("Damaskios' Metaphysics of the Absolute and Unity", 315 - 459). The
systematic form of presentation is not just an external form for Dirk Cürsgen. It
corresponds to the inner necessity of Damascene thought itself, which sees reality as "a
system of all conceivable and necessary constitution and deconstitution processes". lets
come forward” (446). Cürsgen sees the centre of this system in the “mental One”, which
is the subject of the Damascene Commentary on the Third Hypothesis of Parmenides 61
.
Starting from the psychological centre of system formation, a “double nothing” (449) is
set at the “outer edges” of “metaphysical speculation”, which first of all gives the system
its closed wholeness. At the upper “end” of the ontological and noological system is set
the “logical abyss of an absolute singulum” (447). The Absolute, to which Damascius
refers by means of the term aporrheton , transcends not only Being, but also the One.
All efforts to grasp it, even negative dialectics, must necessarily fail. They represent only
an inner-subjective process which has nothing in common with the intended object.
However, Cürsgen sees the function of the Absolute in the fact that it is precisely its
cognitive transcendence that forces human cognition to reflect on its own powers. The
Absolute thus becomes the "final limit" of thought; "only its inability to know and
insight into this does the subject fully reflect back into itself and allow it to emerge as
remaining purely itself, whereby it sees its perspective, facing it and with its means"
(322). At the opposite "edge" of the system is the privative nothingness of the seventh
hypothesis. This offers the imagination the background for its external projections (434
- 440). In the ascent to the Absolute, the soul projects categorical structures that unduly
multiply and dissect the transcendent. In leaning down to the mirror surface of the
privative nothingness, human thought in turn tests the final possibilities of its projective
abilities. In between lies the constructive performance of the soul, which creates the
whole of reality on its own initiative, but with necessary reference to a negativity that
limits it and is beyond its control.62 In this way, a projective view becomes the focus of
Dirk Cürsgen's interpretation of Damascius.
Cürsgen interprets Damascius' philosophy as "an epistemologically oriented idealism"
(337), because Damascius focuses primarily on the possibilities available to thought to
grasp the Absolute. Reflection on the means of thought compels Damascius, according
to Cürsgen, to transform his theory of the Absolute into a theory of subjectivity:
Damascius is ultimately left with no other choice than to make a turn from the "real", in all its forms, to the knowing
and to examine its constitutive and irreducible influences on what is known in and by the subject, that is, to carry out
a "critique of subjective reason" which shows, subtracts and purely exposes the subject's projections onto the absolute
and the "external" in general (332).
In fact, the subject can no longer exceed its own boundaries, so that there is actually
"nothing" outside the subject: "The attempt at a universal and reflexive self-abstraction
of the subject, measured against an intended self-given, objectively independent
exterior, leaves only nothing behind" (ibid.). It can be argued that Damascius, despite
the subject-centeredness of his philosophy, develops a thoroughly objective ontology.
The One, Being and Spirit are unmistakable realities for thought, which is why Cürsgen
feels compelled to accuse Damascius of a certain inconsistency (338 f.). For this reason,
we must ask ourselves how the internal coherence of the Damascius system can be saved
and how an interpretation must be designed that can take into account both his
subjectivity-theoretical approach and his "realistic" fundamental conviction 63 .
The monograph by Valerio Napoli, Ἐπέκεινα τοῦ ἑνός. Il principio totalmente ineffabile
tra dialettica ed esegesi in Damascio (2008) is primarily concerned with the first part of
De principiis (on the ineffable and the one). Damascius is treated in constant conflict
with Proclus. The main exegetical part of the work opens with a detailed interpretation
of the first aporia (Chapter II, 129 – 201). Largely parallel to and in contrast to Proclus,
the problem of a principle beyond the One (Chapter III, 201-361), the causality of the
first principle (Chapter IV, 261-311) and the negativity of the Absolute and the One
(Chapter V, 311-371) are then treated. The hermeneutics of the last lines of the first
hypothesis of Parmenides in Proclus (Chapter VI, 371-421) and in Damascius (Chapter
VII, 421-473) concludes the exegetical core of the work. The monograph is characterized
by philological precision and a high degree of methodological awareness.
With her article De principiis: De l'aporétique de l'un à l'aporétique de l'ineffable 64, published
in 2004, Marilena Vlad has
made a fundamental contribution to recent research on Damascius. For the
first time in Neoplatonism research, the original aporetic method of Damascius has
been clearly demonstrated. This essay remains the seminal work on the interrogative
form of Damascus metaphysics. Marilena Vlad devotes the third part of her 2011 book
on the problem of principles in Neoplatonism, Dincolo de fiinţă. Neoplatonismul şi
aporiile originii inefabile 65 , to the thought of Damascius. She first analyses the
fundamental aporias with which De principiis begins (275 – 302) in order to uncover
the reasons that lead Damascius to assume an "ineffable" principle beyond the One (302
– 335). Finally, she highlights the originality of the Damascus doctrine of principles by
examining the term aporrheton , which Damascius prefers to use to designate the
transcendent (335 – 357). In this way, the “unsayable” proves to be a symbolic concept
of an apophase that “overshadows” the entire area of principles beyond thought. The
hierarchically ordered principles (One, Being, Idea) are, according to Marilena Vlad,
nothing other than the mere “traces” that arise from the “retreat” of the first principle
into complete inexpressibility 66 .
Carolle Metry-Tresson's work L'aporie ou l'expérience des limits de la pensée dans le
Péri Archôn de Damaskios (2012) focuses on the Diadochi's doctrine of knowledge and
the soul. Using an immanent hermeneutics, the ontological and epistemological
concepts of the Damascian aporias and solutions are analyzed in great detail. The
author devotes particular attention to Damascius' conceptual innovations and
underlines the scholar's "tragic" perspective on human cognitive powers. Aporetics,
duality, ôdis are the key words of her work. Carolle Metry-Tresson's book is not only a
profound monograph on Damascius, but is undoubtedly one of the most important
works on Neoplatonism that have appeared in recent years. However, the anti-
theological reading that Carolle Metry-Tresson proposes cannot be accepted 67 . The aim
of this paper is to show that Damascius' radical apophaticism and his doctrine of the
"superdivine principles" are in no way directed against Proclian theology 68 .
Our work aims to reopen the question of the Absolute in the metaphysics of the last
Diadochi and to deal with it more emphatically from the perspective of the Damascius
dialectic. How did Damascius first come to accept an absolute principle beyond the One
and thereby cross the final boundary of Platonic orthodoxy? This question should guide
the first steps of the work. It will become clear that the Damascius protology leads to a
reflection on the basic concepts of metaphysics, and to a greater extent than was the
case with the other Neoplatonists, who had concentrated primarily on the objects
behind the metaphysical concepts. Only with Damascius does a full awareness of the
problematic relationship between principled reality and its corresponding reflection in
the mind emerge. The radical apophatic removal of the first principles means that
ultimately the subject is left with only its own concepts as a reference to the
transcendent. Damascius' philosophy of the Absolute thus becomes a transcendental
analysis of the metaphysical ἔννοιαι, above all of the concept of transcendence itself,
with the intention of awakening an apophatic consciousness (a ἄρρητος συναίσθησις) of
the absolutely transcendent.
The first part of the work is devoted primarily to the Damascene aporrhetics , the
aporetic doctrine of the first principle as the absolutely ineffable ( ἀπόρρητον). In his
search for a first principle of reality, Damascius is guided by the "classical" dialectical
methods of analogy and negation. He uses these methods to open up a first horizon of
understanding of protology, i.e. the doctrine of first principles. Analogy and apophase
lead Damascius to the assumption of a first principle, the negativity of which he
interprets so radically that the two methods ultimately turn against themselves and fail
due to the absolute unknowability of the primal reason (1.2 and 3). Even the Proclian
solution of a "negation of the negation" is rejected. Damascius replaces the negation of
the negation, which Proclus had designed as a methodical approach to the Absolute,
with a potentially infinite sequence of negations (1.4). The infinite negation is
demonstrated by Damascius in the phenomenon of “self-abolition”, which is a necessary
characteristic of all basic metaphysical concepts and is simultaneously elevated to the
rank of a proper method of philosophizing. However, this method is by no means a
formal discipline of thought imposed on the concepts from outside, but rather is
intended to take into account the essential "inner life" of the metaphysical concepts
themselves (1.5). However, this raises the question of how the dialectician's tireless
negative work is compatible with the mystical "silence" recommended by Damascius
(1.6). Although the earlier Neoplatonists had already thought of the first principle as
"nothingness", hardly any other thinker has proceeded as consistently and as radically
as Damascius in this respect. However, with his extreme apophaticism, Damascius
creates the problem of how to distinguish between the absolute nothingness of the
"unsayable" and the "unhypostatic" nothingness of privation. It will become clear that
Damascius is able to provide a criterion for distinguishing between the two forms of
nothingness. This criterion is found in the soul's attitude to nothingness: while the soul
is "indifferent" to the privative nothingness, the negativity of the Absolute inspires a
restless search for the first principle. This promotes the "projective" performance of the
soul, which attempts to grasp the unattainable Absolute using its own discursive
concepts. This gives rise to the idea of a rich and finely structured architecture of
concepts based on the differentiating thinking of the spirit. This architecture must be
grasped in the "unspeakable consciousness" of the fact that the "most divine principles"
and the Absolute beyond these principles remain ultimately incomprehensible (1.7).
From the perspective of the results obtained, the question must finally be asked how
Damascius is able to solve the problem of the (apparent) self-contradiction of principle
thinking. Can a principle that is thought of together with its principals still be a principle
in the eminent sense? And does a first principle that is completely removed from its
principals still have any "meaning" at all? The answer that Damascius gives to this
question is dialectical: the absence of the first principle in the midst of its principals is
precisely a paradoxical form of all-presence. The radical negativity of the “unsayable”
enables the positivity of the real and its absolute transcendence is what first establishes
immanence (1.8).
The assumption of an absolutely transcendent, which is denied any form of reality not
only in itself but, paradoxically, even for thought , leads to its principles coming
together to form a perfect whole. This whole is actually constituted as a succession of
different forms of totality, which, starting from a pre-holistic One, increasingly lose their
“density” through “decompression” until they completely lose their holistic structure in
the world of the senses. The origin of this unfolding of totalities is the One as “whole
before the whole” (πάντα πρὸ πάντων). Because the ἀπόρρητον denies the ἀρχή
character, an entity with a principle function, namely “the One”, must take the “place” of
the completely removed, first principle. Although the One is interpreted by Damascius
as a pre-holistic whole , this whole is an absolute one. Its absoluteness is thought of so
radically by the last scholar that the One ultimately surpasses its principalities in
sublimity. The second part of the work therefore examines the dialectic of transcendence
and wholeness in the scholar's henology. First, the necessary antinomics of unity
thinking is traced (2.1). Despite a common opinion in Damascius research that the
protology of the Diadochi consists in nothing other than the "dédoublement d'un terme
unique" 69 , it can be shown that the conception of an absolute, henological totality brings
the One closer to the "unsayable" itself. What at the beginning seemed like a mere split
in the allocation of roles, with the "unspeakable" being given absolute transcendence
and the One the function of principle, is now being called into question: the pre-holistic
wholeness of the One is assumed to be so fundamental that ultimately it can no longer
be thought of at all. The One enters into an essential "relationship" with the absolutely
transcendent and reveals itself as a "symbol" of the "unspeakable" itself (2.2). Thus
there is a subtle transition from the dialectical doctrine of unity, with which the
Damascus Henology opened, to pure apophase (2.3). It should be noted that in De
principiis , similar to Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit , the path itself already contains
the goal and that the method represents the result of the dialectic in a spiritual co-
performance. While Damascene metaphysics still started with a positive henology, the
self-contradiction of such a conception is increasingly apparent, which is why in the
"end" the One and the Absolute move together in the same horizon of transcendence.
Thought can no longer judge the "relation" of the two according to the categorical
pattern of identity and difference, because "One" and "Absolute" exceed the intelligible.
Nevertheless, it is an obvious fact that by "touching" the Absolute, the One is also
"obscured", because "as this rests in the immediate vicinity of the overwhelming
principle [...], it remains, as it were, in the innermost temple of that silence" 70 . The "proximity" of the
One to the transcendent ultimately results in the One
being denied goodness and diffusivum-sui character (2.4). In
addition, the dialectical elevation of the One to the transcendent makes the question of
the meaning of the Damascene aporrhetics even more urgent: if there is a clearly
crystallized negative henology in Damascius, what is the point of assuming an absolute
beyond the One? In answering this question, we must not lose sight of the fact that the
transcendence of the One is mediated by its pre-holistic wholeness. In this way,
Damascius develops an apophatic universal unity doctrine sui generis , which deserves
to be examined more closely (2.5). This universal unity doctrine transcends the monism-
dualism dichotomy of the Platonic tradition (2.6) and leads to the development of a
"mysticism" that is absolutely original in the intellectual landscape of Neoplatonism
(2.7).
In the final chapter we will summarize the results of the study, taking into account some
specific problems. First of all we will point out that the radical apophase of Damascus
metaphysics, despite its "atheistic" appearance, is by no means constituted as an anti-
theology (3.1). Since the inexhaustible reiteration of negation in the thought of the
Absolute could suggest a certain proximity of the Damascus doctrine to the model of
"infinite approximation", Damascius' project will finally be compared with the "early
romantic" philosophy of the Absolute and set apart from it (3.2). This will put
Damascius' originality in an even stronger light.
Through the elevation of the first principle into a transcendence beyond the One and
even beyond the "super-One", through the astute dialectic that he developed to justify
this elevation, and through the aporetic method that he based his philosophizing,
Damascius became the most radical transcendent thinker in the West. That Damascius'
apophatic dialectic surpasses all of his Platonic predecessors is one of the theses of this
work. In view of the extreme Damascian apophaticism, however, one may ask whether
the last system of ancient Platonism can still be classified as "philosophy" at all. The
aporias and solutions concerning the first principles , with their obsessive circling
around the same questions, with their constant return to the standpoint of
transcendence, with the eternal assertion of the inadequacy of human knowledge, with
the ever-awake awareness of the unreality of intellectual differentiations, could appear
more like a masterpiece of mystical prose than a serious philosophical treatise. To this
we must counter that it is precisely in the awareness of the transcendence of the
Absolute that the dialectic can unfold in complete freedom, for it is necessary to sharpen
the metaphysical terminology as much as possible to suggest the unattainable. This task
remains, of course, endless. Such an infinity is not represented by Damascius so much in
an explicit form, as a "thesis". Rather, it can be read off from his approach. The scholar
assures us that we must surrender ourselves to silence, that we must sanctuary of our
soul 71 , that we should ultimately shelter the birth pangs of our urge for knowledge in a
"quietistic" harbor 72 , but his own dialectic runs counter to this promise. He tirelessly
returns to the "unspeakable," which not only sits at the top of the hypostasis chain, but
is omnipresent as the inner mystery of things and calls into question the knowability of
the "noetic." Damascius' basic metaphysical position can thus not only be inferred from
his "teachings," but can also be read off the movement of his philosophizing. Like Plato
himself with his dialogues, his last successor also invites us to think along with him
using the guide of what is written . The aporias and solutions are intended as an
"endeictic" text, the meaning of which cannot be reduced to its wording, but always
points to something higher, to the unsaid and, ultimately, to the unspeakable. In order
for his plan to succeed, Damascius must count on the complicity of his reader at every
step. The reader must not reproach the author for occasionally falling back into an
improper way of speaking. Instead, the reader is encouraged to accompany the
dialectical process with a constantly alert awareness of transcendence and to remember
at every moment that no definition comes close to the "unsayable". As soon as they are
announced, terms such as "unsayable" or "unknowable", which appear self-
contradictory when taken literally, must be immediately questioned.
"Damaskius says all sorts of things about the 'unsayable'," a spiteful listener might reply,
"and he writes hundreds of pages about the 'absolutely transcendent principles'."
Damascius does this, but always with the understanding that what he says does not
correspond to what is actually meant. Such a method requires the philosophical
goodwill, the dialectical cooperation, of the reader or listener. The Damascus project can
only succeed if the reader joins the scholar as a fellow philosopher. "Success" here
means opening up a horizon of understanding for the deeper exploration of the question
of the absolute. It is very easy to predict the failure of such an approach: a principle that
is no longer even a principle, an absolute that is no longer even an absolute - it is hard to
imagine anything more despairing. In order for the question to reach its full meaning,
Damascius must therefore assume that the other person shares in his own search. The
reader is asked to play along with the game, not to cling to the literal meaning and not to
hastily reproach the Diadochi for the vagueness and self-contradiction of his statements
about the "unsayable". The language of the Damascene constantly points beyond itself
and the fellow philosopher is instructed to supplement the text with its reference to
something beyond itself. It is precisely in the demonstrated failure of the elevation to the
absolute that the awareness of his transcendence is realized.
There is hardly a text in the history of philosophy that involves the reader as a co-
thinker in its own program in this way. In this sense, there is hardly any product of the
human mind that is as philosophical as the Aporias and Solutions Regarding First
Principles. The reader only understands the text if he places himself at the center of this
work together with the seeker, if he is prepared to take the inner perspective of the
questioner himself. This, in turn, should not be misinterpreted as an invitation to
obedience to authority. Critical distance is also presupposed in the Aporias and
Solutions , because the thinking that animates this work is a critical philosophy of the
absolute.
1 A prologue to silence
1.1 The initial hopelessness
Books are full of the words of the wise, of examples from ancient times, of customs, laws and religion. They live,
communicate and speak with us, teach, educate and comfort us, show us things that are most remote from our
memory as if they were present and place them before our eyes. So great is their power, dignity and majesty and even
divine force that, were it not for books, we would all be uneducated and ignorant, having no historical knowledge of
the past, no example, indeed no knowledge of human and divine things. The same grave that covers the body of men
would also cover their names . 73
Among the books that Cardinal Bessarion bequeathed to the Republic of Venice in 1468
is a parchment codex that corresponds very closely to the above lines in the cardinal's
letter of donation 74 . It is a magnificent manuscript, probably intended for a
distinguished scholar 75 . The manuscript is entitled: Damascius' successor Aporias and
solutions regarding the first principles 76 . At the end of the manuscript is the colophon:
Damascius' successor Aporias and solutions regarding Plato's Parmenides in constant
debate with the commentary of the philosopher (sc. Proclus) on the same work 77 . In the
tabula librorum of the donation, the codex is entitled: Damasceni de principiis in
Parmenidem 78 . This title is misleading, since it is actually two works that have been
combined in one and the same manuscript. The first work is a purely systematic treatise,
while the second is a commentary on Plato's Parmenides , which unfolds in constant
comparison with Proclus' interpretation of this dialogue. The actual treatise "On the
Principles" breaks off in the middle of the explanations of the metaphysical problem of
"participation". In contrast, the Parmenides commentary lacks the beginning that would
allow the interpretation of the first hypothesis and of the beginning of the second
hypothesis. Brought together in the same codex, De principiis and In Parmenidem
complement each other thematically: the systematic treatise on principles deals
primarily with the metaphysics of the Absolute, which according to the Neoplatonic
tradition constitutes the skopós of the first hypothesis, while the explanations of the
Parmenides , which develop in the second treatise as a commentary on passages, trace
the "ineffable" emergence from the Absolute up to its reflection in the most precarious
forms of being and in privative nothingness - themes of the final, negative hypotheses of
the Platonic dialogue Parmenides. There is no doubt that Damascius' De principiis , at
least in the author's project, had a meaningful conclusion that would have completed the
program of a systematic representation of reality. There is no doubt that the Parmenides
commentary also had a meaningful beginning, which explained both the first lines of the
second hypothesis and the entire first hypothesis. Researchers have claimed that the
systematic treatise must have replaced the commentary on the first hypothesis 79 . It is
not only the external, fundamentally different form of the two works that makes this
assumption very improbable. It is above all the content that speaks for an actual loss of a
supplementary commentary on the first hypothesis: De principiis is not a commentary
on the first hypothesis of Parmenides. Rather, this most difficult text of ancient
Neoplatonism 80 is a commentary on what Damascius calls an unwritten hypothesis of
Parmenides: on that hypothesis which deals with the primal ground beyond the One, a
primal ground which is hinted at in the Parmenides precisely by the fact that Plato
completely ignores it 81 .
Damascius' work, especially the aporias and solutions concerning the first principles (
De principiis ), does justice to Cardinal Bessarion's hymn to the importance of books in
the highest sense. This text is "full of the words of the wise" and undoubtedly also full of
religio 82 , for the part of the treatise that has been handed down culminates in an
overview of all the mythological systems of the ancient world. Despite some attempts to
read Damascius' main work atheistically, the mood of this book remains marked by a
deep reverence for the divine. What would "our historical knowledge" have learned from
the conclusion of the book? of ancient Platonism without this evidence of a sincere and
powerful effort to understand the first causes, in an era which for a long time people
wanted to attribute the signs of decline? Nor should one be afraid to see a real numen 83
in this work, which would like to raise us to a true "knowledge of human and divine
things" 84 , as Bessarion puts it. The last scholar of the Platonic Academy will reveal to us
the insight into "divine things" by means of a radical negative dialectic which presents
us with the highest level of such insight in a learned ignorance of divine things. The
knowledge of "human things" in turn will consist in the thinker's self-reflection on the
scope of his intellectual powers. Damascius develops the learned non-knowledge that he
wants to suggest to us using an aporetic method that vividly demonstrates the urgency
of metaphysical questioning and shows us “the things that are particularly remote from
our memory.” 85 And what things are more remote from our memory than first
principles?
With Proclus, Neoplatonism had come to rest and to the self-fulfillment of "its axiomatic
consciousness." 86 Damascius, on the other hand, will question the self-assurance of the
Proclian system: no other representative of the Platonic school has rethought the basic
concepts of his tradition with such radicalness as he did. The main assumptions of the
doctrine of principles, the concept of the process (πρόοδος), the nature of the soul, the
implications of a hypostatic conception of time are pursued by Damascius in their most
extreme consequences and in some cases pushed to the brink of self-abolition. His main
concern is partly to re-theologize philosophy and partly to free it from its theurgic
overlays. In this sense, a “Hegelian” view of history could identify the Damascus system
with a moment of ἐπιστροφή, that is, the return to one’s own foundations, within
Neoplatonism 87 . As a result of the “more philosophical approach” 88 that Damascius
elevates to the method of his thinking, he begins his main work De principiis with an
aporia. The last systematic work of ancient Platonism thus begins with the fundamental
philosophical act of doubt. In doing so, Damascius makes a return to the original
Socratic philosophy 89 and at the same time meets Aristotle’s demand that the “sought
science” must begin with the aporia, because the “hopelessness of thought” reveals an
equally hopeless “in the matter itself” 90 . The extent to which this remark applies to the
opening aporia of De principiis will become clear in the following, because the dilemma
with which this work is introduced cannot be decided by argumentation for either the
first or the second alternative of the disjunction, but points to a fundamental ambiguity
and difficulty in the subject matter itself.
The introductory aporia of the Damascene doctrine of principles consists of a double
dilemma, the parts of which, as Valerio Napoli has noted, form a ‘chiasmus’ 91 :
Is the so-called one principle of the whole (1) beyond the whole or is it (2) a part of the whole, as it were the apex of
the entities that emerge from it? And do we say that (2) the whole is together with the principle or (1) after it and from
it? 92
The whole is understood in the sense of a radical concept of totality ( ἡ τ ῶν πάντων
ἁπλῶς ἔννοια) 93 , as that from which nothing is absent 94 , and as a "limited multiplicity"
95
. The concept of wholeness and the concept of principle thus conceived cancel each
other out. If the principle is transcendent to the whole, the whole ceases to be a whole,
because it lacks something, namely precisely the principle. If, on the other hand, the
principle is immanent to the whole, then the principle is integrated into the whole, so
that there is only the whole, and indeed the whole without principle.
The opening aporia of De principiis thus leads to the insight that the primal cause can
be neither transcendent nor immanent. And yet these two alternatives exhaust the
possibilities of thinking in terms of principles. This aporia is further intensified by the
fact that neither the One nor the unified Being is able to take on the function of the first
primal cause, because both “essences” are forms of the whole. Moreover, the resulting
difficulty is made downright hopeless when Damascius observes that the principle is
always “ordered together with the essences that emerge from the principle”, “for it is in
relation to these latter that the principle receives its designation as principle and its
essence, just as the cause in relation to what is caused and the first in relation to what
follows the first” 96 . Principle is, after all, a correlative concept and requires coordination
with the concept of one or more principalities. It is precisely this coordination, which is
always implied in the concept of a "principle", that contradicts the essential requirement
of any theory of principles, which consists in thinking of the first principle as the sole
and therefore uncoordinated primal cause. If one tries to escape this contradiction by
fleeing into the transcendent, one loses the whole of reality. In the midst of reality, one
will in this case miss precisely the essential thing, namely the first principle. Damascius'
aporia reveals the fundamental tension of any principle-based thinking. It could even
maneuver the principle-theoretical method as a whole into the abyss of ultimate failure.
Yet, paradoxically, it is precisely this criticism of "classical" principle-based thinking
that helps the scholar to develop a new type of protology.
The demands that Damascius makes of a revisionary theory of principles, and which
show that this theory of principles is a task of considerable difficulty, are the following:
The sought-after " one principle of the whole" should not be thought of according to the
categorical model of a relation between principle and principal. But it must not be
conceived as being-immanent, because this would reduce the theory of principles to an
ontology of self-justification. The primal ground must therefore be non-objective, so
that the whole from which it withdraws does not lack "something". Moreover (and this
seems to be the most original consequence that Damascius draws from his principle-
theoretical demands), the whole of being must not in any way refer to the primal
ground, because every possible reference to the primal ground would draw it down into
a connection with the justified entities.
Neither the "unified" of all forms of being nor the One can satisfy these requirements,
because both entities, despite their simplicity, can still be interpreted as modes of
totality. Even if the One is understood in its most radical absoluteness (which
Damascius will do in the further course of his discussion), it still remains in a
relationship to the unified multiplicity. This relationship to the "entities after it"
excludes the One from the status of the "sought-after principle of the whole". "We shall
therefore reasonably seek another principle before the whole, which can no longer be
rightly thought of as a whole and can no longer be arranged together with that which is
derived from it" 97 .
The demands that result from the fundamental aporia of the science of principles are an
indication that our soul has the ‘intuition’ (μαντεύεται) of an absolute that eludes the
anticipation of thought, which always proceeds according to holistic structures: ‘Our
soul therefore intuits that there is a principle of the whole – no matter how one thinks of
it – that is beyond the whole and has no connection with the whole’ 98 . Here, Damascius
alludes to Plato’s Republic 505d11-e4, where it says that ‘every soul’ strives for the good
and has a ‘mantic’ intuition of its great importance, although it finds itself caught in an
aporia with regard to the exact nature of the good 99 . The soul, according to Damascius,
has the paradoxical awareness that, in order to satisfy the rigour of its radical search for
origins, it must transcend its own categorical presuppositions: ‘Consequently, one
cannot call that which is “principle”, “cause”, “first”, or even “before the whole” or
“beyond the whole”’ 100 . The Absolute, towards which the soul is directed in its “longing
for the beginnings” (πόθος τῶν ἀρχαίων αἰτίων) 101 , is even stripped of its theological
integration. Even more decisively than Plotinus and Proclus, Damascius asserts the
superdivinity of the primal source when he writes: "All the less may one call it 'the
whole' in hymn tones. In fact, one may not sing any hymns in its honour" 102 . That which
stands beyond all divine honours must at the same time also transcend divinity, as the
essence of divine beings. In its approach to the superdivinity of the Absolute, the soul
must not only abandon its conceptual thinking. It, which according to Plato is essentially
"something mantic" 103 , and thus also something that presages, should even try to grasp
the premonition itself: "Nor must one try to grasp it with conceptual thinking or touch it
with premonition " 104 . In this way, a consciousness crystallizes in the soul which,
paradoxically, is contrary to every activity of the soul: “the ineffable – I do not really
know how to express myself – consciousness of this overwhelming truth” 105 .
With his doctrine of the radically "unspeakable" as the primal and non-ground of reality,
Damascius developed a negative protology that is unparalleled in the history of
philosophy in its "ruthless" consequence. However, in the face of this theory of the
Absolute, interpretation is confronted with considerable difficulties, which we must now
discuss in order to clarify the exegetical standpoint of the present work:
Since the Neoplatonic predecessors of Damascius had already developed a radical
henology, one can easily be tempted to interpret the philosophy of the last scholar as a
mere pastiche in the "manner" of Plotinus and Proclus. Already Plotinus and Proclus 106 ,
following the first hypothesis of the Platonic Parmenides , denied the first principle the
character of unity and even principle. A theory developed by Proclus The surviving
Speusippus fragment 107 shows that the option of a consistently conceived protology, in
which the first primal cause is even denied the predicate "principle", was already being
discussed actively in the Old Academy. In this sense, Damascius could be seen as a mere
epigone who only enriches the decisive suggestions of his Platonic predecessors with a
literary punch line.
Another possible interpretation would be to understand the Damascen doctrine of the
Absolute as a consequence of his relativized henology. Because the Scholarch tends to
understand the One as a "concept" (νόημα) and still attributes traces of a totality
structure to it, one might be inclined to interpret the Damascen "unspeakable"
(ἀπόρρητον) as a mere "representative" of the "dethroned" Plotinian and Proclian One.
However, the henological part of De principiis will show that the Scholarch understands
the One just as radically as the other Platonists. For Damascius too, the One transcends
the opposition of transcendence and immanence 108 . It is neither knowable nor
unknowable (οὔτε ἄρα γνωστόν ἐστιν οὔτε ἄγνωστον) 109 , for this would already imply a
distinction, whereas the One is merely One and precedes every difference. Basically, the
One is no longer even One (οὐδὲ μὴν ἕν) 110 , because unity is thought of together with
multiplicity. The One, on the other hand, should remain simple and thus without
contradiction. Although Damascius repeatedly emphasizes that the One cancels out and
dissolves every difference in its "simplicity", he ultimately describes it as "super-simple"
(ὑπεραπλοῦν) 111 . It is not even the cause of multiplicity in the true sense of the word,
since this role belongs to the unified being, but precedes the cause (προαίτιον) 112 .
Finally, Damascius describes the One as ineffable (ἀπόρρητον) 113 . If Damascius'
doctrine of unity is therefore to be understood as a negative henology, one must ask in
what sense the last scholarch is still able to take his step "beyond the One" ( ἐπέκεινα
τοῦ ἑνός) 114 as an act of surpassing.
It would therefore be entirely wrong to try to emphasize the originality of the
Damascene at the expense of its predecessors. According to these interpretation
patterns, the Plotinian and Proclusian systems appear as positive unity metaphysics.
Consequently, the special feature of Damascius' doctrine of principles would be an
ascent even beyond unity. However, this interpretation ignores the fact that for Plotinus
and Proclus, who refer to Plato's Parmenides for this , the One is "no longer even One" 115
.
An interpretation that wishes to appreciate the full originality and radicalness of
Damascius' philosophical project must move between the "extreme" positions of the
Damascius interpretation mentioned above. It must neither fail to recognize the
independence of Damascius' thought nor underpin this independence through an
inadequate understanding of the other Platonists. A careful reading of the last
systematic work of ancient philosophy, a reading that takes on the challenges of this
work, will begin with the insight that Plato, Plotinus, Iamblichus and Proclus had
already achieved the utmost in speculative thinking. But it should nevertheless reveal
the daring and metaphysical viability of the Damascius project.
This task is made more difficult by the fact that the Absolute in Neoplatonism is neither
a “hypostasis” nor an “essence” and thus offers no positive indications for a discourse
“about It”, but at most for a language circling “around It” 116 . Plotinus and Proclus
repeatedly fall into a consciously resort to improper language when they want to hold on
to something positive about the Absolute for the purpose of persuading the soul. Thus
Plotinus speaks with an "οἷον reservation" 117 of the self-founded character of the One 118 .
Proclus, on the other hand, applies the definitions ὑποστατόν and ὑπαρκτόν to the
absolute One in order to distinguish it from matter and privative nothingness 119 ,
although he is fully aware of the factual inappropriateness of this purely heuristic
means. Damascius, on the other hand, always strives to maintain complete precision in
this respect. Throughout his entire work he never tires of emphasizing that all our
concepts are incommensurable with the Absolute. However, as already mentioned, it
would be completely wrong to look for the novelty of the Damascene Project by
relativizing Plotinian and Proclian henology where its predecessors had already
achieved the decisive thing.
Where then could the specificity of Damascius' thought be found if one cannot speak of
the Neoplatonic Absolute, if the differences between the Neoplatonic conceptions of the
Absolute cannot be anchored in the guideline of an articulation of this Absolute, since
such an articulation is rejected by both Plotinus and Proclus? Well, Damascius'
originality lies above all in the dialectic that he develops in order to lead to the "ineffable
consciousness of that overwhelming truth". It is therefore the path to this Absolute that
makes the scholar's philosophical program an independent and fascinating form of
Platonism, indeed of metaphysical principle thinking in general. This does not mean,
however, that Damascius' "teaching" of the Absolute is exhausted in a methodology, for
the Absolute is embedded in a dialectic of self-annihilating thought in such a way that
the "method" has decisive repercussions on the appropriate conception of the Absolute
itself. It is also very characteristic of Damascius' methodical care that he does not
immediately plunge into an ecstatic experience of the Absolute, but first of all examines
the "absolute necessity" of the "ineffable" (ἀπόρρητον) based on a rigorous
argumentation, even if the “ladder” of this argumentation – in the Wittgensteinian
manner avant la lettre – is abolished again in a second step 120 . In the following, we will
examine in greater detail the arguments that Damascius puts forward for a radically
conceived doctrine of the Absolute.

1.2 “Throwing away the ladder”: Damascius’ arguments for the

“absolute necessity” of the “unspeakable”
In order to strengthen the position of the Platonic system, of which he is the heir
(διάδοχος), Damascius resorts to a paradoxical strategy. Far from wanting to
philosophize away the possible weaknesses, inconsistencies and difficulties of the
Neoplatonic doctrine, the last scholar declares himself ready to multiply and radicalize
the problems of metaphysics. His dialectical ruthlessness leads him to immediately
follow the fundamental aporia of his main work, which in itself has the explosive power
necessary to shake the entire tradition of principle-based thinking, with a secondary
aporia. This is anticipated by the opening aporia regarding the first principle and has
essentially already been abolished in the discussion of it 121 , but Damascius' philosophizing, like that of Plotinus 122 , takes
place in a spiral movement: it constantly leads back to the same questions in order to
deepen them and expand them into other questions 123 .
This second aporia relates to the topic of radical henology. Is the “traditional” doctrine
of unity of Neoplatonism not sufficient to to provide a satisfactory justification for the
whole of being? The questions that Damascius poses in the context of this problem
clearly show that the scholar is well acquainted with the alternative of a negative
henology , so that the gesture of outdoing in his metaphysics of the absolute is by no
means constructed on an undercutting of the henology of his predecessors. For
Damascius, the One is the collection point of all ontological and noological contents that
develop from it and remain grounded in it. However, human thought shows a clear
tendency to project its own concepts back onto the One in which it is itself rooted and on
which it is dependent:
For we cannot form a simpler concept than that of the One, the absolutely One and absolutely One. Even if we call it
"principle," "cause," "first," and "simplest," these and all other predicates exist in the One only as a unity and in
accordance with the unity. But since we are unable to think these predicates together, we fall prey to division in the
sphere of the One, expressing our own partial views of that One. Yet we consider these predicates also to be
insignificant, because their multiplicity does not correspond to the One. The One is therefore neither knowable nor
nameable, for even in this way it would be a multiplicity 124 .
Although it is without contradiction and in no way understandable as an arithmetical
one, the One loses the status of a first principle in Damascius and will remain the
reference point of all reality only as a “symbolic” manifestation of the ineffable. The
negativity, which in its absoluteness is concentrated and condensed in the ἀπόρρητον,
comes to the One only per consequentiam and under the effect of the ἀπόρρητον 125 .
None of the individual predicates that we attribute to the One (“principle,” “cause,” etc.)
is appropriate to the One in its respective particularity. Rather, all predicates taken
together form a pre-thinkable, absolute unity in the One 126 . “The essence of the One” is
thus for Damascius maskios "all-absorbing" or "all-acting" 127 . It is "a kind of wall around
the whole" 128 . From this the scholar concludes that there is a pre-holistic wholeness of
the One, whose complete infolding surpasses all concepts of thought in terms of
simplicity. Damascius thus sees in the One both the radiant point of all chains of
hypostases and the original totality of all possible totalities: "The One is the absolutely
indivisible apex of the whole - no matter how one takes this whole - and the perfect
embodiment of all entities that, in whatever sense, are addressed as totalities" 129 . The
absolute simplicity of the One, accessible to thought only via negationis, and its pre-
holistic wholeness character are "main characteristics" of the Damascene ἕν. Among
these "main characteristics" must also be included the essentiality of the One in relation
to its principals: "The One is furthermore the essence of the many, and not that essence
which, being immanent in the many, comes from that One, but the essence prior to the
many, which produces the essence in the many" 130 . The One is not only the origin and
the ground of all things. Rather, it is all things, and in such a way that it constitutes their
very essence: "The One is the whole even to a greater extent than it is the whole itself" 131 .
The three ‘characteristics’ of the One which Damascius elaborates, namely the absolute
simplicity of the One, its pre-holistic totality character and its essential presence in
things, could cause thought to pause at the One in its ascent to the first principle, ‘for the
many needs nothing other than the One and for this reason only the One is the cause of
the many’ . 132 But if multiplicity only needs its own unifying ground, ‘what sense then
does our ascent have beyond this? 133 ’ The circular movement which describes the
searching restlessness of thought around the first principle falls into an aporia
(ἀπορούμενος) 134 . One could even ask the scholar back, with the critical voice of the
fictitious listener: “Since we cannot direct our conceptual thinking and our intuition to
anything simpler than the One, how can we guess that there is something beyond the
last intuition and the ultimate concept?»“ 135 . Damascius' reply to this question sums up
the entire program of his theory of the Absolute:
If anyone should make this argument, we shall be patient with his embarrassment, for such an idea is impassable and
inexhaustible. And yet, starting from what is more familiar to us, we must stir up the ineffable birth pangs within
ourselves in order to awaken the ineffable - I do not know how to express myself - consciousness of this overwhelming
truth.136

The inconsistency that Damascius tries to demonstrate to his imaginary interlocutor is

the confusion of the "necessary" with the "sufficient" reason. The One is "necessarily the
cause of the many", but not the "sufficient" principle 137 that can explain reality in all its
aspects. Using various views of reality as a guide, Damascius develops two arguments by
which he wants to suggest the "absolute necessity" ( ἀναγκαιοτάτη χρεία) 138 of the
Absolute, which he later, in the context of a procedure that he calls περιτροπή, cancels
out 139 . The spur to the soul's movement towards transcendence is its innate, essential
"manticism," through which it develops, starting from various signs scattered
throughout this world, the "awareness of that overwhelming truth." 140 "Mantic"
clairvoyance leads to the crystallization of an analogical dialectic. This dialectic,
supported by those relations to which the soul naturally has access, advances towards
the awareness of ever more intense forms of proportionality, until, compelled by its own
demands, it paradoxical, seemingly dialectical reversal (περιτροπή) into the abolition of
all relationality. One of the two Damascene arguments that seek to convince the human
soul of the "absolute necessity" 141 of a principle beyond the One proceeds per analogiam. This analogical
procedure unfolds, in accordance with that correspondence theory of knowledge that
must be counted among Damascius' philosophical innovations 142 , first as an ontological,
then as an epistemological relationship.
The method that could be called “analogy according to being” starts from the insight
that the essence that is taken out of the relations of an order of being or dimension of
being is even higher than this, and concludes from this that there is an analogous
demand for a transcendence that is even beyond any relationality:
Now, in this world too, that which is unrelated is altogether superior to that which is related, and that which is
uncoordinated is superior to that which is related, as the contemplative man is superior to the statesman, Kronos, as
they say, is superior to the Demiurge, Being is superior to ideas, the One is superior to the many, whose principle is
the One, so also, compared with all causes and caused things in general, and with all principles and principalities, that
which transcends all these and is not presupposed in any connection or relation is superior. This is what the analogy
requires. For even the One is essentially superior to the many, the simplest to things which are composed in any way,
and the most comprehensive to those things which are contained in its interior 143 .
In the last step required by the analogical movement, the opposition between
complexity and simplicity, between the relationless and the relational, is also
transcended, so that transcendence no longer has only the meaning of a hierarchical
superiority, but that of absoluteness:
But that transcendent, if one may so call it, is beyond all opposites and even beyond this opposite, beyond the
opposite not only of things of equal rank, but also beyond the opposite between the First and the entities after the
First 144 .
The argument per analogiam also has a second, epistemological form. The ascent in
thinking is equivalent to an intensification of unification, which begins with conceptual-
dialectical thinking and progresses through the stages of the "vision of ideas" (νόησις
εἰδητική) and the "overall vision" of being (συν ῃρημένη νόησις) to the super-substantial
"vision of unity" (ἑνιαία νόησις) 145 which touches on the One itself. If the ever higher
level of knowledge is more fundamental than the one overcome, then the step beyond
the vision of unity will also be equivalent to a step into a more fundamental form of
insight. This insight, which even leaves the experience of unity behind, is actually a
reflected form of ignorance, which does not want to be understood as a privation of
knowledge, but is accompanied by an “ineffable consciousness” ( ἄρρητος συναίσθησις)
of the Absolute 146 . With the ἄρρητος συναίσθησις, Damascius takes up the tacita
intelligentia of Proclius’ Parmenides commentary 147 . The non-knowledge of the
Absolute, which is transparent to itself as non-knowledge, has by no means a privative
character, but possesses in the emptiness of objectlessness the fullness of a transcending
consciousness, which is Damascius calls it “super-ignorance” (ὑπεράγνοια) 148. This
second type of argument from analogy therefore dares to go even further than
unknowability. Just as in the first form of the analogical movement of thought the step
beyond the One meant the overcoming of every kind of opposition, here too the
abandonment of the “unity view” signifies neither a more intensive knowledge nor the
renunciation of it, but the overcoming of the dichotomy of knowability and
unknowability in general: “For the ignorance of the former is absolute, and we know the
latter neither as knowable nor as unknowable” 149 .
The epistemological analogy begins with the demand that "the most sublime must
remain inaccessible to all our concepts and intuitions". The driving force of the
analogical progression comes from the observation that "even in this world, that which
constantly eludes our concepts in ascending movement is more venerable than the most
obvious". Damascius concludes from this that "that which has eluded all our intuitions is
probably the most venerable" 150 . However, Damascius emphasizes that "the venerable",
"the sublime" and similar terms cannot say anything about the Absolute itself, but
rather illuminate our own mental and intellectual attitude towards the first principle.
The scholar sees through the subjective scope of the argument per analogiam. Since the
Timaeus, the soul has been thought of in the entire Platonic tradition as a relational
entity, as a meeting place and mediation of being and becoming, of identity and
difference, of the intelligible and the sensible. The setting in relation belongs to the
essence of the soul itself. The analogical procedure is therefore by no means a method
that the soul acquires “from outside”, so to speak, but rather it arises from the very
essence of the ψυχή itself. The analogical dialectic indicates that the horizon of the
Absolute extends into the realm of the soul. It is by no means the means of describing
the first principle, which withdraws into ever new distances of transcendence, like a
object of objective knowledge. Rather, the analogical discourse of the soul works inward.
In the ψυχή it awakens the awareness that the concepts that should be directed towards
the Absolute actually only arise from the soul's self-orientation and are mere
designations for various stages of the soul's movement on the way to the first principle.
In a presumably intentional demarcation from Proclus, who grants analogical dialectics
a central function in the ascent to the Absolute 151 , Damascius points out that the
analogical ascent can only take place within the soul. While for Proclus the analogical
process actually brings the soul into an objective relationship to the first principle, even
if this relationship is only "objective" from the perspective of the soul and the
principalities of the One 152 , for Damascius the analogy remains within the soul. The
analogy develops into a form of soul self-reference:
For just as that which transcends a particular knowledge is higher than the object which falls under this knowledge, so
too that which transcends every intuition must be more sublime than everything else – not in the sense, however, that
its higher degree of sublimity would constitute an object of knowledge; its absolute sublimity is rather to be sought in
ourselves, as our own affection. This is strange enough, since it is not at all comprehensible with our concepts. If, for
example, the higher-ranking relatively unknowable is more sublime than the absolutely knowable, then it must
necessarily be admitted by virtue of analogy that the higher-ranking absolutely unknowable represents the highest –
with the reservation that the former has neither "the highest" nor "the most powerful" nor "the most sublime" as
properties. These determinations are mere conventions which we have made about that which completely eludes our
concepts and intuitions 153 .
The argument per analogiam has proven to be the first argument that was intended to
convince the doubting soul of the "absolute necessity" 154 of absolute transcendence . This "proof" has a
double character, depending on whether it is related to the "objective" sequence of
hypostatic dimensions or to the levels of knowledge. The second argument is related to
the first. It draws on the basic structure of a hierarchical arrangement of reality. It also
adopts the proportional progression of the via analogiae , so that it can be considered
an extension or sub-type of "analogics". But while the argument from analogy represents
an old Platonic legacy and was developed in Neoplatonism into a veritable analogical
dialectic in order to lead, together with the negative dialectic, to the consciousness of the
absolute primal cause 155 , Damascius sets accents with his second argument that had not
been heard with comparable sharpness before him. This other argument is based on the
observation that “the unknowable, just like the knowable, is immanent in beings” 156 . For
Damascius, there is not only a sequence of levels of intelligibility that is condensed and
simultaneously transcended in the One, but also a counter-sequence of
“unknowabilities” that reaches its climax in the absolute unknowability of the
ἀπόρρητον and thus a dialectical reversal:
As we call one and the same object large and small in relation to something specific, so we call it knowable and
unknowable in relation to something different. In other words, just as the same thing, by participating in the two
ideas of small and large, is at the same time large and small, so it is both the one and the other by participating in the
knowable and the unknowable. For just as the knowable already exists, so the unknowable also exists beforehand,
especially when it is of a higher rank than the knowable 157 .
The axiom that has a fundamental effect here is that "that which is of higher rank could
never be the privation of a form of being which is of lower rank, especially if it has its
existence in the intelligible" 158 . This implies that that which is incomprehensible to
perception in the noetic realm must not be understood as a privation within the
intelligible. The unknowability of each level of reality remains related to the respective
subordinate cognitive faculty: the unknowability of the One, which is hardly touched by
the "unity view", is unknowability for the "total view" of Being (συν ῃρημένη νόησις),
which finds access to the unified but not to the absolute simplicity of the ἕν. The unified
being, in turn, is unknowable for the “insight of ideas,” which is able to access the
structured cosmos of ideas, but not the ἡνωμένον. The cosmos of ideas itself remains
closed to our discursive soul 159 , “for only the spirit would be able to grasp the ideas by
looking at them,” while “we, who make do with dialectical arguments, do not yet possess
this spirit.” Thus, every order of being is unknowable for the cognitive faculty
subordinate to it. The unknowability of a dimension of being thus remains constantly
related to the subordinate cognitive power. It is therefore only immanent to the levels of
reality as relative unknowability, but “it is nevertheless immanent to them” 160 . The
unknowable is present at every ontological level, up to the One 161 and, even beyond this,
to the absolutely unknowable itself. In other words, the inability to know is a "lack" and
a "privation". However, the "lack" and the "privation" belong only to the soul and to
matter 162 . How could they possibly belong to the spirit, "in which everything is present,
and even more so to the intellect"? 163 Therefore , the unknowability of the higher
hierarchical levels must not be seen as a “lack” or a “privatization”,
unless we mean by this lack a higher-ranking privation, just as we mean by "non-idea" the super-ideal, by "non-being"
the super-substantial, and by "nothing" the truly unknowable, in the sense of a transcendence of the whole 164 .
The unknowability of the noetic does not in any way indicate a privation in the
intelligible, but, on the contrary, an essential characteristic of all ontological
dimensions, which condenses in an ascending direction to that which is eminently
unknowable. "The ineffable and unknowable are therefore multifaceted..." 165 , concludes
Damascius, who thereby opens up a new perspective on the realm of being and spirit
within Neoplatonism. While for Plato, Plotinus and Proclus it is always only the
intelligibility that becomes constantly more intense in the upward movement, the last
scholarch also tries to uncover the "undermining" effect of negativity at each level of
being 166 . The ontological comparative of “traditional” Platonism, which culminated in a
superlative fulfillment of being at the level of πρώτως ὄν, α ὐτοόν or ὅπερ ὄν 167 , is replaced by an
apophatic comparative in Damascius – or at least supplemented by one. This apophatic
comparative transforms the hierarchy of positive being-contents into a ladder of ever
more intense moments of negation. The serial continuation of negativity begins with the
super-existent abyss of ἀπόρρητον, so that the Absolute overshadows all ontological
dimensions with its negativity. Damascius' original step beyond his Platonic
predecessors consists in the paradoxical demonstration that the productive function of
the transcendent principle manifests itself as the creation of nothingness . 168 All
Platonists have considered the first principle as The cause of the positive and the good is
thought of. For Damascius, even the omnipresent negativity is a principle of the
Absolute, the presence of the “unspeakable” at all levels of reality.
However, Damascius' theory of negativity is confronted with a problem. The insight that
the Absolute constitutes the basis of negativity in all intelligible and "intellectual" (or
"Noeric") dimensions leads to the question of whether a process of "many ineffables"
from the first ineffable can be assumed. In this case, the ineffable would fulfil the
function of a henad, that unifying principle that governs its own chain of hypostases
determined by it. Since every structure of successive entities receives its ἰδιότης
("essential peculiarity") from the henad that rules within it 169 , a special series of
hypostases of "ineffables" could be distinguished in the architecture of reality:
Since we make statements about the things of this world starting from the things of this world, and since the monad
rules everywhere among these things its corresponding series of numbers - for there is one soul and many souls, one
spirit and many spirits, one being and many beings, one unity and many henads - the same argument requires that
there be one ineffable and many ineffables. One would therefore have to say that the ineffable is productive in an
ineffable way. In this case the ineffable would produce a multiplicity corresponding to itself 170 .
The network of hypostases of Neoplatonism thus sees itself expanded by a new,
numerically determined series (ἀριθμός) of forms of being. This σειρά (“series”) of
ineffables would have its source and root in the Absolute, which is eminently ineffable:
Therefore, one must perhaps assert that this essence, because it is ineffable, enables all beings to participate in an
ineffable way. The presence of something ineffable in every being would then be due to this participation. In general,
we agree that one is essentially more ineffable than the other: the one more ineffable than being, being more ineffable
than life, life more ineffable than spirit, and so on, always in the same proportion, and much more in the opposite
direction, from matter to spiritual being, in the one case according to the lower order, in the other according to the
higher order, if one may express it this way 171 .
The first consequence of this thesis would be that one would have to “allow an ineffable
process to emerge from that and, in a certain sense, an ineffable sequence of things
arising from it.” 172 The second consequence would be that one would be compelled to
postulate not just two, but three monads with their corresponding chains of hypostases:
the substantial, the unitary and the ineffable.
Damascius traces this problem back to a misunderstanding of his theory of the Absolute.
His metaphysics of the ineffable, the thrust of which was given by the opening aporia of
De principiis , is based on the principle that "there is nothing that is common between
the here and now" 173 . The assumption of a serial multiplication of negation starting from
an absolutely negative principle violates precisely this axiom. The analogical definition
of an "ineffable process" according to the model of the "flow" through which the
remaining τάξεις come into being from their respective monads leads to a distorted view
of the Absolute, for it transfers "everything that can be said to the ineffable as well, as if
the ineffable were everywhere suffering the divisions of the ineffable" 174 . A progression
of negation moments from an eminently negative principle would project the conceptual
distinctions of unity and multiplicity, the division into “primary, middle and final
hypostases” and finally also the three-step process of persistence-progression-return
onto the absolutely incomprehensible:
But if, as we said, we cannot transfer the expressions "that" or "those" to the ineffable, which we want to remove
beyond the One and the Many, then we cannot postulate an ineffable before the Many and another which, through the
participation of the Many, would experience the same dissection as the Many. There is therefore, it has no
participation in the unspeakable, nor does it pass on any of its gifts to the entities that come from it… 175
Based on Damascius' premises, another argument against an "unspeakable process"
could be developed. Although this argument remains unspoken, it is included in the
rejection of the assumption of a sequence of unspeakables. The principle of multiplicity
in its progressive unfolding is the henad, the divine unity, which has already
"experienced" a certain determinacy and thus also one-sidedness in its emergence from
the transcendent One. This now determined unity is, as a monad, both the origin and
the immanent ground of the plurality, which develops through the multiplication of the
unity inherent in it. The serial progression of the multiplicity from their respective
grounds of unity makes the procession of the hypostasis chains from the particular
henads appear as the development of number series from their monads. It is the same
unfolding that governs the realm of numbers and in the ontological and spiritual
dimension of reality. For this reason, the late Neoplatonists can rightly refer to the
hypostasis chains simply as “numbers” (ἀριθμοί). However, the tops of all hypostasis
rows, the henades, are dependent on the original, transcendent One. This ensures both
the comprehensive and the elementary unity of reality through its present absence 176 . It
is ultimately the manifestation of this absolute One that unfolds as the original henade
and as the indwelling of the monad in the circular procession of reality, because the
cause and driving force of the process can only be the unity 177 . Through their dynamic
multiplication, the “wave-like” expansion of the levels of being arises. Without the ἑνάς
as an epiphany of the transcendent One, the procession around the One is neither
possible nor conceivable. For this reason, a procession from the super-unity, in which
This super-unity cannot be conceived as super-unity , that is, as a negative reason that
would provide the constitutive element of a series. The entire reality is divine and the
emergence of the intelligible and intellectual entities is nothing other than a theogony.
The horizon and the enabling reason of the history of the gods, however, is the One.
Because the principle of the emergence always remains the One, 178 there cannot be an
emergence of many “super-unities” and of “unspeakables” from the “first” super-unity.
Damascius thus attempts to make the "absolute necessity" of the "positing" of the
ineffable clear using two arguments. One of these arguments proceeds by analogiam
and has the dual character of an ontological and an epistemological proof. The second
argument sets itself the task of awakening the "ineffable consciousness" of the Absolute
using a series of negation moments as a guide. This second argument also ultimately
relies on an analogical ascent movement, but it deviates from the classical models of
"analogics": just as each level of being is more unknowable and "ineffable" than the one
immediately following it, there must also be a highest level, which is to be conceived as
condensed, absolute unknowability and ineffability. Damascius gives this highest “level”
the name ἀπόρρητον, but without committing himself to this designation, for he can
just as easily name the transcendent principle as τὸ πάντῃ ἄρρητον 179. Why the
scholarch nevertheless prefers the word ἀπόρρητον is something we will have to ask
ourselves in the further course of the present work.
At the end of the second analogical argument, as we have seen, a “peripeteia” occurs that
calls the entire μέθοδος into question: at the moment when the seeker reaches the
consciousness of the absolutely negative as the culmination of a hierarchy of
negativities, he must necessarily realize at the same time that the nothingness of the
Absolute can be neither the cause nor the motive of the emergence of negativities. The
discourse that had persuaded the soul of the “absolute necessity” of the “positing” of a
negative-transcendent principle now cancels itself out. A procession from the unsayable
remains itself unsayable, and therefore also unthinkable 180 , because “nothingness is the
cause of nothing” 181 . Moreover, together with and due to the impossibility of the
emergence of unsayables from the absolutely ineffable, any relationality of the
ἀπόρρητον to the levels of being is also eliminated. The analogy itself cannot and must
not approach the Absolute:
There is nothing in common between the former and the latter. Nothing that is said and suspected can belong to it:
neither the one nor the multiplicity, neither the productive or producing power nor the causality - no matter how one
thinks of it - nor any form of analogy or any other similarity 182 .
The argument from analogy and the apophatic comparative (which itself draws on an
analogical structure) thus undergo a dialectical reversal: they contribute to the maturing
of a full consciousness of the Absolute in the searching soul, but as soon as this
consciousness has reached its fullest radicality, it turns against the arguments that led to
its crystallization. Paraphrasing Wittgenstein, one could say: Damascius's sentences
"explain" in that "the person who understands them ultimately recognizes them as
nonsense when he has climbed beyond them through them - on them" 183 . From the
perspective of a deeper awareness of transcendence, Damascius can no longer even
decide between the singular and the plural, because "the one and the other do not
behave like things in this world" 184 . Unity and multiplicity are ultimately only one-sided
products of the thinking soul. The intellectual particularities dissolve in the all-
encompassing absence of the unsayable :
One must not even say "that" or "those", neither "one" nor "many", but rather one should surrender oneself to silence,
remain in the wordless inner temple of the soul and not join the procession 185 .
The movement that Damascius' reflection describes appears paradoxical at first glance:
a threefold proof leads to the so-called "ineffable consciousness" of the Absolute. But as
soon as the consciousness of transcendence becomes radicalized, the proof is cancelled
out. It is the goal itself that shows the path to be "impassable and inexhaustible. " 186

1.3 Damascius' critique of apophatic dialectic

1.3.1 “No speech will be appropriate to him and consequently no
negation”: Criticism of negation
From stage to stage, the analogical dialectic has led to the crystallization of a consistent
concept of the Absolute. The ascending movement of the analogical method was based
on the observation that even in the here and now, entities that elude our concepts have a
higher ontological rank than what is closest to us. It was therefore possible to conclude
that the absolutely ineffable and unknowable "stands" on the highest "level" of reality
and actually even beyond it. But since this insight also awakened the awareness that the
Absolute "has eluded all our intuitions" and can therefore no longer be caught up with
by an analogical sequence of steps, the argument ultimately turns against itself. From
the perspective of a strict concept of the Absolute, paradoxically there is no "going back"
on the very same path that led to the formulation of this concept of the Absolute. Any
similarity between the first principle and its principals has been abolished by the goal
achieved by the analogical method. Since it is precisely similarity that constitutes the
basis of analogy 187 , the analogical dialectic as such is simply and simply deprived of its
foundation.
The failure of the analogical method is particularly significant and consequential,
because it should actually be the logical reflection of the return ( ἐπιστροφή) to the first
principle. For example, for Proclus, similarity is the characteristic of the perpetual
ascent of all being to the principle from which it has separated itself in the process of
emergence:
Thanks to the similarity to the former, in every dimension of being a monad is hypostasized analogously to the Good,
which relates to the entire chain of hypostases that corresponds to it in exactly the same way as the Good relates to all
orders of gods 188 .
In this way, an essential structural moment of ontology in Damascius, together with the
self-cancellation of the analogical dialectic, begins to waver. We will see below what
consequences this has for Damascius' "mysticism". Nevertheless, the analogical "proof"
contributed to the establishment of a more consistent concept of the Absolute or, rather,
to use Damascius' own words, to the radicalized formulation of a "demand of thought"
(ἀξίωμα τῆς ἐννοίας) 189 for a transcendent primal ground.
Will the negative dialectic then be able to fully satisfy this “demand of thought”?
According to the little scholar, there are two modalities of ascent: first by means of
analogy, and secondly through negations 190 . Since the first beginning of his questioning
search for a first principle 191 , Damascius has consistently “defined” the Absolute
negatively 192 . Our soul “possesses the clairvoyance” (μαντεύεται) of a transcendent
principle that is “ uncoordinated with the whole of being ” (ἐπέκεινα πάντων
ἀσύντακτον πρὸς πάντα) 193 . The soul also knows that “that thing must not be called
‘principle,’ nor ‘cause,’ nor ‘first,’ nor even ‘before the whole,’ or ‘beyond the whole.’ ” 194
The primal ground of being is absolutely “relationless” ( ἄσχετον) 195 , it remains
“inaccessible to all our concepts and intuitions” ( ἄληπτον…πάσαις ἐννοίαις τε καὶ
ὑπονοίαις) 196 , it is “unspeakable” (ἄρρητον 197 , ἀπόρρητον 198 ) and cannot be grasped by
the thinking mind (ἀπερινόητον) 199 . In an accumulation of negative “determinations”,
the first principle is described as “the absolutely and absolutely inexpressible, non-
objective, uncoordinateable” and as that which cannot even be “thought of”. (Hebrews
1:14) Heb. 1:13; compare Hebrews 1:14; Hebrews 1:13; and Hebrews 1:14; cf. Romans
1:13; 1:14 ; The sought-after first principle of the whole of being is indicated throughout by
means of negations 201 . However, the implementation of the apophatic method is
associated with a certain “danger”: the first and highest principle of the whole of being is
“nothing of the whole” (οὐδὲν τῶν πάντων) 202 in the sense of the higher nothingness,
which is opposed to the merely imagined nothingness of pure privation 203 . But if the
absolute principle is the ineffable nothingness beyond being and even beyond the One,
then the searching thought could see itself compelled to see the essence of the Absolute
in this very nothingness:
If, therefore, it is really not ordered together with the whole and has no relation to it and is nothing of the whole, not
even the One itself, then this is precisely what constitutes its essence, to which we as knowers take a position and
which we can also convey to others whom we initiate into its knowledge in this way 204 .
Since in this case the negativity is concretized into a "substance" of the Absolute, we can
either recognize this negativity as negativity or we are not in a position to determine the
nullity of the first principle at all. If we do not know about the negativity of the Absolute,
how are we then able to make the statement that the Absolute is "unknowable"
(ἄγνωστον)? If, on the other hand, we recognize the nullity of the first principle
precisely as absolute negativity, then the primal ground of being is no longer
"unknowable".
By formulating the above dilemma, Damascius points to the tendency of negative
protology to condense the absoluteness of the first principle into a separate entity
(φύσις) 205 . Damascius' exposure of this problem contains an implicit question to the
doctrine of principles of his Platonic predecessors: If the first principle is absolutely
unknowable, how can we know at all that this absolutely unknowable thing is the first
principle?
The scholar initially reacts to this aporia with a radical subjectivization of the negation
process, which runs parallel to the subjectivization of the analogical dialectics. Just as
analogy is now only thought of as an inner psychological experience and operates
exclusively with psychological “material”, apophatic dialectics is also reinterpreted as a
dialogue between the soul and itself. It is by no means objective determinations that we
deny to the first principle in our search for the original reason of reality, but our own
“passions” (πάθη) are purified and gradually discarded in the ascent to the Absolute.
This internalization of the via negativa is symbolized by the example of a blind person
who claims that the color is not warm. The blind person is of course right in this, but he
has not said anything about the color. The blind person has only denied something that
is accessible to him (namely the warmth that he knows through the sense of touch) to
the color, which must remain fundamentally incomprehensible to him. The only thing
that is recognized in this process is his own ignorance 206 . Therefore, our ignorance has
no relation to the Absolute, of which we do not even know whether or not it is absolute
negativity and thus pure “unknowability”. The object of our understanding remains only
the state of the soul in the face of the “demand” of a radical transcendence: “So too,
when we describe that as ‘unknowable’, we say nothing about it, but we only
communicate with it about our own experience of it” 207 . The unknowability of the
Absolute is therefore to be located exclusively in our soul: καὶ τοίνυν ἐν ἡμῖν ἡ
ἀγνωσία ἐκείνου ὁ ἀγνοοῦμεν 208 .
Someone could, however, object that just as the knowable (τὸ γνωστόν) 209 shines as a kind
of “light” 210 within the “known” 211 , so too the unrecognized 212 the incomprehensible (τὸ
ἀγνοητόν) 213 is inherent. The ἀγνοητόν would thus dawn like an inner darkness or
concealment (σκοτεινότης…ἢ ἀφάνεια) 214 into the “essence” of the first principle.
Whoever claims this, however, forgets, according to Damascius, that ἀγνοητόν, just like
ἄγνοια and ἄγνωστον, only describes the attitude of our soul in its orientation towards
the first principle. Actually, the ἀγνοητόν does not only indicate the attitude of our soul,
for, as Damascius will write following Proclus215 , the Absolute is unattainable even for the “highly praised spirit” (πολυτίμητος νοῦς) 216
and for the “divine insight” (θεία γνῶσις) 217. Where logos is no longer possible, apophatic
discourse also fails: “For if the One is, says Plato, then it is not even one. But if it is not
even one, then no speech will be appropriate for it and consequently no negation either”
218
. Socrates' statement in the Theaetetus remains that if we do not know something,
nothing can be negated about it 219 .
In all other entities, "privation" (in the sense of negation) always leaves a residue of
positivity: the incorporeal, although invisible, can be grasped by the mind, while the
superspiritual, although inaccessible to the νόησις, retains a certain form of
substantiality (ἄλλο τι ὅμως). The Absolute, on the other hand, only reveals itself to the
closing eye (περὶ ὃ πᾶν ὄμμα μύομεν, καὶ πάντῃ μύομεν). It is the unknowable, not as
the relatively unknowable, but in the sense of that ἄγνωστον which allows no access
(ἀντιλαβή) to itself and can no longer be touched even in the sense of intuition.
Unknowability is not a predicative determination that would apply to an already existing
entity, because nothing can be predicated of "Him" (ο ὐδέ τι ἀπλ ῶς ἀξιο ῦμεν α ὐτο ῦ
κατηγορεῖν): neither Being nor the One, neither the character of originality nor
transcendence. The unknowability is also not a characteristic that could be
retrospectively attributed to the negativity of the Absolute, because the absolute
nothingness from which the Being that emerges and at the same time does not emerge is
actually no longer even nothing, just as it is not a transcendence, a super-principle and
an absolute. Even these determinations are far from describing the "essence" (φύσις) of
the ineffable; they only describe the sublations (ἀναιρέσεις) of that which is always
already subordinate to ἀπόρρητον 220 .
How can we then say anything at all about “It”? By abolishing the things that are
immediately accessible to us one by one, by abstracting from them step by step, by
considering them unworthy of satisfying the demand for the positing of the first principle,
an inauthentic intuition of the inexpressible forms in our soul. This ascent, which
combines negation and analogy, shows that for Damascius the apophase and the setting
into a relationship are more closely intertwined than is the case, for example, with
Proclus, who clearly separates the two dialectical methods . Thus the Scholarch
describes analogy and apophatics as the two varieties of one and the same reasoning,
namely the “hybrid conclusion,” with the help of which matter, privation and non-being
are also “ recognized . ” In its final step, the analogical method turns against itself,
because "there is nothing that is common between the here and now..." With the failure
of the analogical dialectic, apophatics is also called into question. It operates with
negative determinations that represent mere "conventions" ( ὁμολογήματα) 225 and, with their endeictic
capacity, in no way touch the radical negativity of the unsayable, because they only
express the state of our soul (ἡμέτερον πάθημα) 226 .
Even the “concrete opinion” (δόξασμα) 227 , according to which the Absolute is “not an
object of opinion” 228 , remains empty (κενόν) 229 and concerns only ourselves. Moreover,
this “concrete opinion”, which turns against itself and cancels itself out, is described by
Damascius with an expression that we will not yet must be examined more closely, as an
"idle within ourselves" (ἐν ἡμῖν κενεμβατοῦν) 230 . If, then, the whole orientation of our
search for the Absolute is destined to remain aporetic and merely self-referential, by
what means will the inarticulate consciousness of the Absolute crystallize in our soul?
How will we ever attain the certainty of "this overwhelming truth"? The "non-concept"
(ἀγνόημα) 231 of the Absolute, which "forms" (συνίσταται) 232 in the soul - in what form is it
"demonstrable" (ἀποδεικτόν) 233 ?
The soul 234 is constantly searching for the first, all-founding principle and ascends from
level to level to “That” which transcends all knowledge and the whole of being itself. In
the first principle, the unknowability which is already inherent in intelligible entities is
multiplied to a “truly unknowable which is transcendent in all respects” (τὸ ὡς ἀληθῶς
ἄγνωστον κατὰ τὴν πάντων ὑπεροχήν) 235 . The first principle is absolutely
unknowable in the sense that it no longer even possesses the characteristic of
unknowability (ὅπερ οὕτως ἐστὶν ἄγνωστον, ὡς μηδὲ τὸ ἄγνωστον ἔχειν φύσιν) 236 .
Even the consciousness of the supposed unknowability of the Absolute must necessarily
miss the object it intends (μηδὲ ὡς ἀγνώστῳ προσβάλλειν ἡμᾶς) 237 , because of “That”
which is completely without relations, it cannot even be known whether or not it is
unknowable at all 238 . Even the unknowability, by which we thought we could rise to the
ἀπόρρητον, must be removed from it, so that every reference of our thinking to “the
beyond of the One” (τὸ τοῦ ἑνός ἐπέκεινα) 239 disappears and an “absolute ignorance” is
established in our soul. from Him” (παντελὴς ἄγνοια περὶ αὐτό) 240. If the Absolute is
even removed from the “atmosphere” of unity 241 , what then remains as content in the
thought of transcendence? Nothing remains, in the sense of nothingness , but in such a
way that this absolute nothingness is no longer even nothing ( ἅτε καὶ οὐδενὸς ὄντος,
μᾶλλον δὲ μηδὲ τούτου ὄντος, τὸ οὐδέν) 242 .
The ἀπόρρητον is the absolutely unknowable and no longer even the absolutely
unknowable. It is the absolute nothing and it cannot even be imagined as absolute
nothing. The transformation of the apophatic ascent into a double negation seems to
provide the required "proof" 243 of the first principle. The double negation is, as is well
known, a central element of Proclian metaphysics. Is Damascius returning to a Proclian
position?
1.3.2 The Proclian “negation of the negation”
Proclus, whose metaphysics Damascius critically draws on, lets his dialetica methodus
244
culminate in a theory of the "negation of the negation": Nam per negari et ipse (sc.
Parmenides) remouit [spat. vac.] abnegationes 245 . The so-called negatio negationis 246 is
intended to enable the philosopher to speak "of the One" and yet avoid substantializing
talk "about the One". Damascius questions the possibility of getting so close to the
Absolute with the help of such a dialectical tool. His criticism of Proclus' negation of the
negation testifies to the lively discussions that were stimulated by the idea of a "negation
of the negation" in the Neoplatonic school of Athens 247 .
The theory of the “negation of the negation” was brought into being by a text-
hermeneutic problem of the Platonic Parmenides 248 . After Parmenides has denied the
One the fundamental determinations of being in the first hypothesis of the dialogue, he
finally removes the One even from the horizon of being and unity. Consequently, neither
any name nor any concept, science, consciousness or opinion corresponds to “this non-
existent” 249 One. The young Aristotle answers Parmenides' final question ( Ἦ δυνατὸν
οὖν περὶ τὸ ἓν ταῦτα οὕτως ἔχειν;) with the words: Οὔκουν ἔμοιγε δοκεῖ 250 . This
question and the answer that follows it, which Proclus finds to be highly "paradoxical"
and "aporetic" 251 , can be interpreted as a resolution 252 of the entire first hypothesis and
as a necessary impetus for the new approach to the second, "positive" hypothesis. In
fact, such a position has been advocated in modern Platonic studies 253 . This
interpretation goes back to an ancient model. In the third century, the Middle Platonic
thinker Origen defended the thesis that "the first hypothesis ends with an impossible
conclusion" 254 , which is why the beingless and nameless One is also devoid of any reality
and essence 255 . Proclus' critical reply to Origen's interpretation of the first hypothesis is
based on the observation that the supposed impossibility of the negative-henological
conclusion must be attributed either to an internal contradiction of the premise or to a
faulty implementation of the logical conclusions 256 . Since both can be ruled out, the
conclusion of the first hypothesis must be regarded as true. Proclus, therefore, assumes,
against Origen, the “reality” of a being-transcendent One: “There is indeed necessarily
the One in itself” ( oportet enim esse le autounum ) 257 . This corresponds both to the
phenomenological state of affairs ( ex rerum neces sitate ) 258 , as well as the testimony of
Plato, who in the Politeia suggests a negative-dialectical approach to the One Good 259 .
From Proclus' analysis it follows that the final question of the first hypothesis, together
with its answer, must be understood differently than Origen does, even if this should
contradict the superficial meaning of those words.
In addition to the solutions proposed by two predecessors (presumably Porphyry's 260
and Iamblichus's 261 ), which he accepts as justified with a certain qualification, Proclus
develops four further explanations of the words that conclude Parmenides ' first
hypothesis . Of these four solutions, we will refer primarily to the second, because it is of
central importance for the problem of the "negation of the negation" 262 . This second
argument implicitly refers to Plato's hypothetical method. Parmenides starts from "his
own One" 263 as a borderline experience of thought: "If the One is One..." 264 . This
"Parmenidean One" 265 is the existing One, which Parmenides identifies as The term
"grounding" is used 266 because the spirit, which has an essential relationship to the
intelligible One, must start from that essence that is thoroughly familiar to it on its
dialectical path to the first principle. However, Parmenides gradually denies the existing
One all determinations, until at the end of the Hypothesis of the One he even negates
Being and Unity itself 267 . This "One" is no longer the fully determined, existing One that
was initially used as a hypothesis as the basis for the dialectical exercise, but the One in
its transcendence beyond Being:
This time, too, Parmenides began with his own One, as we have often said. This One is the One affected by the Unity.
But by looking only at the One as the One in itself and not at the affected One, but at the true One, after he had
recognized the participation, he directed the discourse towards the pure concept of the One. For this reason he
necessarily chose an apophatic approach for all those determinations which he had cataphatically gained from the
affected One (and not from the One itself) 268 .
Thus, in the spirit of the Phaedo and the Politeia , Parmenides has risen to the
ἀνυπόθετος ἀρχή. There cannot be a more fundamental "hypothesis" than the non-
existent and non-unified One. But "the unintentional principle" would not be conceived
radically enough if one understood the sequence of negations as a meaningful and
appropriate statement about the One:
In order not to mislead thinking into thinking that it is ultimately capable of thinking and expressing the One
sufficiently through negation, or at least sufficiently as “negative objectivity,” it must abolish the act of negation itself
in its non-thinking origin, without at the same time allowing negation to become an affirmation that posits something
. 269
In a final step, which is expressed in the final exchange between Parmenides and the
young Aristotle, the One is even purified of its negative determinations: merito ultimas
utique dicet et ipse abnegationes ab uno 270 . Because the One has no name, while
negations necessarily have a certain reference point 271 , even the negations must miss the
unnameable, being-transcendent One. As the origin of truth, the One stands even higher
than truth itself. Nothing can therefore be "proven" on the touchstone of the One 272 . The
ἕν exceeds the dichotomy of truth and falsehood, which is why the apophatic statements
about the One are not "true" in the full sense of the word 273 . For this reason, in a final
dialectical step, Plato must free the One from the truth claim of the negations ( merito
ergo ultimo et ipsas abnegationes remouit ab uno ) 274 by declaring that even in the
apophase it is "impossible" (ἀδύνατον) to be "about the One" in itself (περὶ τὸ ἕν) 275. In
this way, Parmenides' "aporetic" question and his interlocutor's "paradoxical" answer
are explained. The absolute One remains completely "unsayable" and "unknowable" 276 .
While Proclus repeatedly declared the “productive negations” to be the most appropriate
logical-ontological directive of the first principle in the course of the dialectical
development 277 , he now even denies the abnegationes generativae to the absolute One
278
. With a jab at Plotinus 279 Proclus demands that one should deny the productive power
of the One itself 280 . The soul of the seeker sees itself called upon to strip away all
busyness and no longer even to struggle with the question “what the One is or is not” 281 .
The “concept of negated contents” 282 is rejected. The “entire dialectical method”,
including its apophatic component, is now abolished.
With these analyses, Proclus founded his doctrine of the "negation of the negation,"
which was to find a reverberating echo in the history of philosophy up to Meister
Eckhart and Nicholas of Cusa 283 . Despite the unanimous admiration that the subtle
Proclusian idea met with among the representatives of the Platonic tradition, it
continues to raise difficult questions. What exactly is the "negation of the negation"? Is
it only a second negation of the negative statement and does it stand on the same logical
level as this? In order to understand Damascius' criticism of the "negation of the
negation" and to be able to judge its appropriateness, we must first ask ourselves what
the concept of a "negation of the negation" actually means.
As the origin of truth, the One transcends not only truth itself but also its opposite. The
One transcends every opposite. 284 This is why both positive and negative statements are
false when they refer to the uncoordinated and transcendent. The “transcending
negations” (ὑπεραποφάσεις) 285 that describe the negativity of the One are higher than
the affirmations, but the negations must also be eliminated because they threaten to
objectify the One with their objectifying power. The “removal” of the negations from the
absolute One can therefore no longer take place in the mode of negation. Rather, it is a
question of a "laying aside" of the negations of the One 286 or a "removal" of the negations
of that ( fert et abnegationes generatiuas ab ipso ) 287 . The intended subject of the
abstraction movement is the One itself, although the insubstantial One cannot really be
intended as the object of the dialectic. What is actually intended by the act of letting go
of the negative determinations is the "abolition" of the One "from the negations" that
encompass "that" as a final spiritual horizon:
Now this kind of negation is absolute, unitary, first-caused and is led from the totalities into the unknowable and
inarticulable transcendence of simplicity. One should ascribe such a kind of negation to the first God and then one
should also remove him from the negations 288 .
But what does this “abolition from negations” mean? Negation is a form of intellectual
activity. It is the thinking of what something specific is not : ἡ δὲ τοῦ ὅ τι οὐκ ἔστι
νόησις ἀπόφασίς ἐστιν 289 . The “abolition from negations” therefore denotes a liberation
of the soul, which has to actualize its immanent unity, from objectifying thinking and
from the one-sidedness of the logic of the understanding:
"What is it then?" - this is precisely, as Plato himself writes in his letters , the origin of all evil for the soul, namely that
it seeks to determine the principle and entrusts the knowledge of that principle to reason, whereas we should awaken
the One within us... 290 .
These words, which allude to the (pseudo-)Platonic Second Letter , show clearly that the
doctrine of unity, correctly understood, internalized and translated into the concrete
practice of life, has a truly soteriological dimension. We will encounter a similar, albeit
differently emphasized, "proclamation of salvation" in the Henology of Damascius. The
removal of negations is tantamount to overcoming thought in general, including
apophatic thought, since this too belongs to the order of the spiritual. The "negation of
the negation" is therefore not a new, perhaps "higher" form of negation, but a
dissolution of the negating spiritual activity as a whole. "Abolition from negations" also
means, however, that the One that is "abolished" from all references and even from the
negative relations to its Others, by no means passes into nothing, but "preserves" its
super-existent reality. “What cancels itself out does not thereby become nothing” 291 . The
transcendent insubstantiality of the One is the non-hypostatic character of privative
nothingness. The "abstract" nothingness is a product of the imagination, while the
transcendent nothingness of the One is striven for by the soul in an "entheastic" manner
292
and is accessible to theological and religious ecstasy. But even this striving ( tensio ) 293
for the One must be overcome in the perfection of becoming one with it. The search for
the origin had begun precisely with a tense orientation towards the One 294 . Now the soul
must resolve the tension of its reference to the Absolute. The dialectician takes this last
step beyond the striving for the One by "laying aside even the negations themselves
through negation" ( nam per negari et ipse remouit abnegationes ) 295 . The purifying
power of dialectics leads to the soul finally being purified by dialectics itself 296 .
The "abolition" of the first primal ground from the negations surrounding it points to
the "unspeakable and inarticulate superunity" (ἄρρητος καὶ ἄφραστος ὑπερένωσις) 297
of the Absolute. However, with the ἀναίρεσις of the One from the horizon of multiplicity
and objectivity, its "reality" is also preserved at the same time. In this way, Proclus is
directed against Origen's thesis of the non-hypostatic and merely imaginary character of
a pure unity thought in itself . The "reality" of the first principle means the "actual"
presence of the transcendent in and with all things. “Because the One is not different in
anything ,” Plato’s Parmenides said , “it will not be different from anything .” 298 The
Absolute is therefore also present in the human soul, in the form of the “One in us”:
For we too, who are assigned to the level of souls, possess images of the very first principles and participate in the
entire soul, in the spiritual dimension and in the divine Henade. We must therefore awaken the powers of those
principles that are present in us and direct them to the comprehension of the superior entities. And how shall we
approach the One if not by awakening the psychic One , which dwells within us as an image of the One?... 299
It is this “inner One” on which the dialectical exercises are carried out 300 , it is the “One
of the soul” which is gradually freed from the multiplicity surrounding it, so that in the
end the immanent unity dissolves into the absolute unity of the One itself:
Thus, by evoking and inflaming the One within us, let us unite the soul with the One itself, and as it were shelter it in
the harbor. Thus we set ourselves above all intelligibles that dwell within us, and abstract ourselves from all our other
activities, in order only to be in communion with That and to revolve around That, having previously given up the
thoughts of the soul which revolve around the secondary entities . 301
From the soul's point of view, the achieved communion with the ἕν is an experience of
"unification". "In itself", however, the One is actually "unspeakable and inarticulate
superunity". The ascent of the soul to its origin thus constitutes a paradoxical unification
with the superunity 302 . In the "harbor" 303 of the ἕνωσις, where the journey of the seeker
begins closes, the soul finds its peace and its support 304 . However, the abolition of the
"soul One" into its absolute primal ground cannot occur in Proclus without the negation
of the negation. The dialectical moments of apophatics, which take place in the pure
essence of the soul One, lead to the complete purification of the soul's ground into pure
unity. However, even this pure unity is by no means sufficient, precisely because it is
still unity . In order to hide the unity of the soul, which has been abstracted from the
variety of life's relationships thanks to the work of negative dialectics, in the super-unity
of the Absolute, the negation must be transformed into a double negation. Without this
turning of the negation back on itself, we would forever be caught in the self-deception
of an objective One that is inherent in us - a One that would remain separated from the
true super-unity of the Absolute. The abstraction of the psychic One from the
multiplicity surrounding it threatens to sink to a mere solipsism of the inner One 305 if the
purification of the τὸ ἓν τῆς ψυχῆς is not completed by overcoming the process of
abstraction itself. The negation that has limited our immanent unity is to be expanded
into the infinity of super-unity thanks to the negation of the negation 306 . The
consistently carried out ἀπόφασις culminates in a ἀποφῆναι τὴν ἀπόφασιν and
thereby shelters the unity of the soul in the safe and self-sufficient "harbor" of the
ὑπερένωσις 307 .
The entire originality of Damascius's undertaking must be measured against this ideal of
self-realization and self-transcendence, as formulated by Proclus. Driven by the
meanders of his metaphysical unrest, Damascius is forced to realize that it is "not
possible to negate negation." We will now follow the meandering trail of his reflections.

1.3.3 Damascius' criticism of Proclian “negation of the negation”

The "so-called positing of the absolutely unsayable" 308 requires that the first principle be
conceived as "nothing". However, Damascius, just like Proclus, sees in this radically
negative conception of the Absolute the danger that the negativity of the first principle
will again be misinterpreted as something factual. For this reason, the scholarch
emphasizes that the Absolute must not even be imagined as "nothing": "...We become
completely entangled in contradictions and cannot grasp the former at any end, since it
is nothing, and in such a way that it is not even this, the nothing" 309 . Rather, the
Absolute is the doubly nothing (τὸ μηδαμῇ μηδαμῶς ὄν), that nothingness that does
not even designate the other of being, but the annihilation of being as a whole, including
its immanent contradictory ramifications in being and non-being. Up to this point, it
seems as if Damascius is actualizing the double negation, as it was developed as a
dialectical method by Proclus, in his own philosophy. For Damascius, however, the
“ineffable” is still beyond absolute nothingness, because the μηδαμ ῇ μηδαμ ῶς ὄν only
designates the dissolution of being, while the ἀπόρρητον is to be understood as an
abstraction from the One itself: “Consequently, it is the absolute non-being or even
beyond this, because the absolute non-being is only the negation of being, while it is also
the negation of the One, the «even-not-one»” 310 .
Theoretically, Damascius underpins this escape movement of protology even beyond the
double negation by interpreting negation as a form of comprehensible speech: ἀλλὰ
καὶ ἡ ἀπόφασις λόγος τις 311 . The negated is therefore itself an object: καὶ τὸ
ἀποφατὸν πρᾶγμα 312 . But what is a πρᾶγμα for Damascius? Πρᾶγμα in its “strong”
meaning designates the idea filled with concrete and positive content 313 . This in turn is
the “limited” 314 and “differentiated” 315 object of thought of the mind. Moreover, adopting
Aristotelian thought, Damascius equates the mind with the πράγματα 316 , which
indicates that πράγματα primarily refers to the contents of thought. By virtue of the
“otherness”, which first, albeit on the basis of In a "hidden" way, on the level of the
"fatherly spirit" (πατρικὸς νοῦς) 317 , and then to fully unfold from the order of being of
the νοητὰ καὶ νοερά 318 , every idea is distinct from the other ideas 319 . The spirit, whose
life is the activity of thought 320 , regards its objects as "self-delimiting ideas" 321 . The unity
of the noetic and the totality of intelligible life break down at the level of the spirit into a
variety of strictly differentiated ideas. Seen conversely, the "titanic" nature of the spirit
has the effect that everything it looks at is spontaneously broken down into the
multiplicity of thought forms, each of which wants to belong to itself. A fully valid
principle, which is also to ground the activity of the mind, must therefore transcend the
determinacy of the forms of thought. It must elude the objectifying gaze of the mind and
must not have any relation to the whole of being that the mind thinks:
with our minds everything that is even halfway knowable and guessed, right down to the One , we demand […] that
we take as a basis the absolutely unattainable, the uncoordinateable and the transcendent – in the sense of
“transcendent” that it is no longer even transcendent in the truest sense of the word 322 .
But how can the consciousness of this transcendence be achieved? For everything we
focus on and strive for is automatically transformed into "substance" and basis for the
thinking mind. In contrast, the nothingness of the Absolute "eludes even the positing of
the One" 323 . The mind tries to make this flight of the ineffable understandable through
the negation of the One, of nothingness, indeed of the Absolute itself, and yet what is
negated is always translated into an object of thought. We want to catch up with the
flight movement of the first principle beyond all determinations in an "ineffable
consciousness" of transcendence. However, for this we only have the objectifying power
of the mind at our disposal, which transforms everything it grasps into a πρ ᾶγμα. Even
in its highest dialectical activity, the apophase, the mind modifies what is encircled from
afar and reflects it as the object of a differentiating and comprehending thought: “Even
the negated is an object”.
Can the double negation not then become effective at this very point in the "system" and
lead to the crystallization of an "ineffable consciousness" of the Absolute? According to
Damascius' conception of dialectics, this is not possible, because for the scholar even the
negation takes place in the "all-encompassing" medium of the spirit, which has a holistic
structure 324 and is the comprehensive idea of all differentiated ideas 325 . Negation, which
is a mental operation, has the form of a λόγος, from which it cannot free itself even in
doubling and in application to itself. Every dialectical movement, even that which runs
counter to the spirit and seeks to break away from it, is constantly caught up by the νο ῦς
and integrated into it. Therefore, the double negation, insofar as it is a mode of spiritual
activity, cannot reach the superspiritual: ὥστε οὐδὲ ἀποφῆναι τὴν ἀπόφασιν δυνατόν
326
. Even the complete abolition is, as Abolition stricto sensu , powerless in the face of the
“demand of thought” 327 to allow a consistent, albeit inarticulate consciousness of the
Absolute 328 to mature:
The inexpressible is, in a certain sense, negative. I say "in a certain sense" not because it is somehow positive or
objective, but because this term or this thing is neither negation nor positing, but rather complete sublation. This
sublation is not only not a non-something (for the non-something also belongs to beings), but it is actually not even
itself, namely sublation 329 .
If one compares Damascius' understanding of negation, from which his critique of
double negation arises, with Proclus' conception of negatio negationis , one
immediately notices the crucial difference between the two thinkers: for Proclus, the
abolition of the series of negations in a second negation does not mean that an
intellectual movement is transferred into a somewhat higher, more comprehensive
intellectual movement, but rather that the spiritual, still thinking dimension of negation
is completely eliminated. The negation of the negation is basically a "negation of
negations and of negation " 330 , so that through the second, final act of negation,
thinking and dialectic dissolve into the ecstasy of mystical vision. On the other hand,
Damascius, through the universality of the equation of ἀπόφασις and λόγος, means
every negation as a mode of the logical and every “negable” in general as a positive
object, so that for him even the doubling of the negation is ultimately just another
variation of the λόγος. The second negation, which is only apparently higher, instead of
crossing out the first, turns into the zero point of the same negation and is taken back to
an equal status with it by positive, logical thinking. What Damascius accuses Proclus of
is therefore the application of the logic of the understanding to an area in which
thinking should transcend itself, because he interprets Proclus' double negation as if
what is negated were the mere opposite of a positive content and thus of equal status
with it. But for Damascius, this is precisely the special characteristic of the “rules of
logic” (λογικαὶ ἀξιώσεις), that they “extend to the elements of the same class in which
the relata have, as it were, the same value or a similar nature” 331 . For the Damascene,
the ἀποφατόν stands on the same level as the content it negates, and is therefore
completely equivalent to it – an interpretation that ultimately seeks to trace the
immanent dialectic of the concept ἀποφατόν: the “negated” or “negable” designates,
already through its mere grammatical form, the positive object that is to be abolished in
the negation. Since for the Damascene the "first" negation was a modality of the
positive, the "negation of the negated" cannot free itself from its classification in the
relational system of the thetic. The double negation, as the desired climax and as the
completion of the dialetica methodus , will necessarily fail in its attempt to awaken an
"awareness" of the absolute 332 .
For this reason, Damascius prefers to designate the Absolute not so much the ἄρρητον,
which is common in the broader context of Platonism, but rather the ἀπόρρητον, which
originally had cultic connotations. While the former designates the unsayable, in the
sense of that which cannot possibly be expressed in words, ἀπόρρητον, as the central
term of ancient mysteries, refers to a religious act which can be announced but is subject
to strict silence 333 . Due to their location in life, the two terms can be linked to one
another. clear hierarchy: While the ἀπόρρητον only means that which is forbidden by
holy statute, ἄρρητον denotes the ineffable of the mystery liturgy itself. Not even an
impious, wicked will could allow the ἄρρητον to appear in the guise of human words
before the ears of the uninitiated, while the revelation of the ἀπόρρητον was possible
and therefore subject to the death penalty. The higher standing is therefore clearly the
ἄρρητον and not the ἀπόρρητον. The grammatical form of the two terms already
indicates their meaningful difference: ἄρρητον is a negativum , whereas ἀπόρρητον is
not 334 , but only denotes the rejection or abolition of a content. In comparison with the
latter, ἄρρητον has no content at all, the surrender of which a pious mind would have to
be concerned about 335 .
In distancing himself from the religious tradition, whose word usage he transfers into
the terminology of his metaphysics, Damascius reverses the hierarchy of the mysterious
"concepts". More often than the expression ἄρρητον, the Diadoche resorts to the term
τὸ ἀπόρρητον, which he seems to favor as a designation for the Absolute. Our previous
explanations now enable us to understand this use of the word more closely: the
Damascus Absolute is not a negativum , and therefore strictly speaking not something
"un-sayable," but at most the infinite execution of an inexhaustible negation as such,
which, however, is never concretized in a negative object and cannot even lay claim to a
positive disclosure of the Absolute in its objectless execution. Transcendence is
therefore pure denial of all thinking, even negative thinking. It is a contentless
ἀπόρρητον (in contrast to the negatively filled ἄρρητον) and the pure act of the
rejection of any positing, which can be continued ad infinitum and is potentially
repeatable with every newly introduced object. The endeictic meaning of the word
ἀπόρρητον, which in the mystery language traced the gentle circling of a sublime secret,
is preserved. Nothing is said of the Absolute and nothing is denied (in the sense of an
accurate and self-sufficient denial), but it is only pointed to in the awareness of its
super-transcendence. The fact that even the designation ἀπόρρητον finally disappears
from the field of vision of what is actually intended and is withdrawn at the climax of the
dialectical self-abolition 336 is entirely in keeping with the radical Damascene “apophase”:
ultimately, the Absolute can no longer even be pointed to 337 .
In his criticism of Proclus' negation of the negation, Damascius ignores the fact that
Proclus is well aware of the limits of the logic of the understanding in the area of
henology, that for Proclus too the law of contradiction cannot be applied to the One338
and
that the negatio negationis is therefore not meant in the sense of a normal theory of
negation, but rather as a symbolic call for self-transcendence of thought. The last
negative act of Proclus' dialectic leads thought beyond the dichotomy of truth and
falsehood, of positive and negative, where the super-negation of the One transcends
every opposition and finally sinks objectifying thought into the unity of subject and
object. This improperly so-called "negation" is without contradiction; it is no longer the
negation of a positive object to which it would cling as if to a substrate. It is the negation
of the act of negation itself.
The spiritual transcendence that is achieved in the negation of the negation corresponds
entirely to Prokl’s demand for a negation that is not limited to the intellectual realm, but
must be cultivated as a general attitude to life:
For if we are to approach the One by means of these apophatic insights, we must also free ourselves from our own
sensitivities, lay aside the multicolouredness of life, strip ourselves of the manifold thinking, let the soul become only
itself, simplify it in this way with regard to the divine and to the reception of the divinely inspired power, so that, after
having lived in a negation of our inner multiplicity, we may rise to the multiplicityless concept of the One 339 .
Apophase is not a mere mental exercise, but a way of life. The apophatic way of life
means that the act of negation is ultimately no longer entrusted to thought, but to spirit-
transcendent life. In the late Neoplatonic hierarchy of being, the intelligible life reaches
deeper than the spirit. The spiritual differentiation into separate forms of being (ε ἴδη)
has not yet taken place at the level of the intelligible life. For Proclus, "negation" as a
mystagogical symbol for the purification of the soul from its busyness primarily
describes a basic dimension of life gathering towards its original source. Only in the
mediation through the ἐνθεαστικὴ δύναμις, that is, through the enthusiastic power of
divine life , does the negative also become an aspect of spiritual movement. The
apophase cannot therefore be reduced to the spirit. In its highest form, as the negation
of the negation, it unfolds its unifying power precisely in the transcendence of the spirit.
It therefore runs counter to the meaning of the radical apophase, as conceived by
Proclus, if Damascius wants to integrate it into the realm of the spirit. However, it is
worth asking whether Damascius' admittedly inaccurate criticism is not valuable in the
sense that it allows us to gain important insight into the methodology and basic attitude
of Damascian metaphysics. For the scholar, even the distinction between spirit and life
is a product of differentiating, limiting, one-sided thinking and, as a result, a product of
νοῦς:
For even that which is differentiated is not present in Being as something differentiated, since Being itself is by no
means something that exists apart from life and spirit. For all these are names and objects (πράγματα) of an ideal
nature (τῆς εἰδικῆς…φύσεως), whereas that essence was utterly and utterly without distinction, as we say. On the
middle plane it differs to a certain extent. But in the spirit the known, the knower and the knowledge, as well as the
other objects, have already differed… 340 .
The intelligible, the highest level of the ontological hierarchy, is, according to
Damascius, completely undifferentiated. It is only in the order of being of the "noetic
and at the same time noeric" entities that the division of the intelligible begins, in order
to then reach its full development on the level of the spirit. Even the distinction between
being, life and thought does not yet exist at the level of pure, intelligible being. The
names of the hypostases and their triadic structure are the exclusive property of the
νοῦς, which, however, shows a pronounced tendency to project its immanent "titanic"
disunity 341 onto pure, undifferentiated being. From this, Damascius will elsewhere
develop a pronounced criticism of Proclian hypostasis proliferation 342 , which he
interprets as an external projection of the spirit onto the perfectly unified being 343 . For
the purposes of our presentation, however, another consequence of the Damascene
"noology" is of importance, namely the paradoxical conclusion that if every difference is
merely a characteristic of the spirit, even the distinction between the spiritual and the
superspiritual can only be made from the perspective of the spirit. The difference
between the spirit and the principles above the spirit is itself something spiritual, which
is why any attempt to play off difference against difference and negation against
negation, in the sense of an abolition of difference and negation, must necessarily fall
back into the differentiating, positive-negative medium of the spirit. Wherever one
makes distinctions, one moves in the realm of the intellect. For Damascius, the negation
of the negation is a form of exclusion, and thus at the same time the delimitation and
objectification. These are, however, the distinctive activities of the spirit. The ἀποφ ῆναι
τὴν ἀπόφασιν does indeed attempt to detach itself from the spirit, but is constantly
caught up by it. The insight we draw from this is, first of all, one that teaches us above all
about the "mood" of Damascene metaphysics: this develops as a "restless" 344 , potentially
never-ending dialectical exercise. But even from the perhaps willful one-sidedness and
misinterpretation of Proclian approaches, it can be seen that Damascius, under the
conditions of his own system, develops an "aporrhetic" sui generis , which is intended to
lead to a special form of consciousness of transcendence.

1.4 Infinite negation and the incompletion of dialectics

The aim of Damascius' "Aporrhetics" is to evoke, starting from what seems more
familiar to us, "the ineffable birth pangs" that are intended to promote the inarticulate
consciousness of the Absolute . 345 Damascius thus formulates a philosophical and
existential task that is equivalent to the Proclian ideal of deepening the consciousness of
our belonging to the One:
…Let us examine what kind of discourse is appropriate to such a sublime vision, and in what manner we might
properly undertake the study of the subjects before us […] in order to understand the force of Parmenidean
arguments, to follow his insights into the really existing entities, and to rise in rapture to the ineffable and
incomprehensible consciousness of the One 346 .
But while Proclus did not take back the expression “ineffable consciousness”, Damascius
immediately restricts the same formula with an “ I do not know quite how to express
myself” (οὐκ οἶδα ὅπως εἴπω). Because for Damascius the Absolute is not the One, but
even beyond it347 , consciousness cannot find its absolute fulfillment in a collective or
communal awareness of the One. Although ἕνωσις remains an important existential
experience for Damascius too, to which he repeatedly invites us, the soul that seeks its
first reason is at the same time aware that unification does not lead it to the highest. The
meaning of the "entheastic" experience in Proclus was that in striving towards a
community with the Absolute, all determinations that could hinder the turning to the
One were discarded - even the determination of unity and the One itself. The
Damascene theory of the Absolute now proposes the concept of an aporrheton , which
by its very nature transcends not only the One, but also the Super-One. The Proclian
One is already the Even-Not-One and the Nothing. In the philosophy of Damascius, the
Absolute is no longer even nothing. This initially appears to be an exaggeration by
Damascius, which stems from an inadequate interpretation of Proclus' henology.
Werner Beierwaltes' statement applies to the meaning of the philosophical project that
Proclus has in mind:
Through the negation of the negation which prepares this unification and unity, the One, which was evident to
negative-dialectical thinking as the nothingness of negated beings, manifests itself in a still dissimilar correspondence
as the intangible limit of thought and language. As a consequence of this thought, it could not rightly be said: "The
One is not even the nothingness", since the sentence: "The One is the nothingness" is the highest statement of the
denying thinking which is now abolished in the unification 348 .
This remark, formulated from a systematic point of view, is of particular importance,
because it hits exactly on the most difficult problem of the interpretation of Damascius.
For Damascius, the unsayable is explicitly "not even nothing": "That is why we become
completely entangled in contradictions and cannot grasp the former at any end, since it
is nothing, and in such a way that it is not even this, the nothing" 349 . Is this thought
figure of Damascius merely a misinterpretation of the intentions of his predecessors or
even the feigned misunderstanding of a pompous orator who wants to show off his
originality? It seems that at least at first glance, especially if one takes into account the
continuation of Beierwaltes's comment:
From this it becomes clear again that negation in the sense of Proclian Parmenides' commentary does not mean the
transformation into pure positivity, but the negation of the denying thought itself, that is, its abolition as a no longer
"active" preservation in the non-thinking One itself 350 .
But this is precisely where the reinterpretation of the double negation in Damascius lies:
what is intended by Proclus as an abolition of the negation appears to the last scholar as
a withdrawal of the apophase into the positive objectivity of the spirit, which is why the
negation of the negation seems to the Damascene to be insufficient to grant access to
what is actually unattainable.
The transcendence of the Absolute, even beyond the Super-One and absolute
Nothingness – is it just the exaggeration, the desire for originality of a former rhetoric
teacher? And yet "it is not our intention to indulge in rhetorical exercises and to talk a
lot about things that are not understood" 351 , writes Damascius. We must listen to his
sincerity when he wants to "stimulate" the inarticulate "birth pangs " 352 in the soul of his
reader in order to open up a more radical awareness of transcendence. Damascius
knows very well that the concept of absolute transcendence is associated with considerable
philosophical difficulties. But he also knows that a consistent doctrine of principles
absolutely requires the assumption of an absolute transcendence and that we cannot
abandon our "bold exploration" of the absolutely and unthinkably first, although we are
always thrown back by the movement of language and thought on this side of the final
horizon of our search.
What paths open up to the restless seeker who immerses himself in the thought of the
unthinkable? The analogy has proven to be a false path that folds back on itself. The
sequence of steps, which begins with what is more familiar to us and leads to the
“innermost temple” of the Absolute, begins, after its first, hopeful approach 354 , to go
round in circles. For a consistent and radical concept of the Absolute, as defined and
specified by analogical dialectics, breaks through the confines of its own definition and
turns against itself and against the analogy thanks to which this concept of the Absolute
was first developed. At the same time, it becomes clear that thought draws the material
for the construction of analogical dialectics from itself, so that it fundamentally cannot
reach the unthinkable. The ascent of the soul to the “Olympus” 355 of the first principles
turns out to be a rotary movement without a secure “base” 356 , which leads only into the
interior of the soul. The soul merely compares the objects it is familiar with with one
another, without being able to soar up to the truly unknown 357 . In the “attack” on the
first principles, the “titanic” thinking, that is, the judging thinking, must realize that in
approaching these principles only its own inner conflict is “illusioned” to it . 358
So what paths are open to the seeker? After analogy, even negation could only lead us
astray for a short while. Apophase is itself merely a mode of "hybrid thinking" that
synthesizes disparate elements of knowledge. Negative dialectics are closely linked to
analogy. It is based on the apophatic comparative, which has an analogical basic
structure. From level to level, the proportion of negativity in the hypostases increases.
All positive determinations are gradually abandoned. Finally, even the negative
determinations are abolished. That which is known in the ascent to the Absolute
through various levels and dimensions of being is always only what is known and
attainable to us. However, what remains beyond our reach is precisely that which we are
actually striving for. In the negative dialectic, too, Damascius demonstrates the folding
back of subjectivity on itself: in the process of abstraction, we negate what is familiar to
us from the ineffable, our own experiences, passions and clumsy conceptual means.
"That" of which we wanted to develop a deeper awareness eludes us with every step. In
what way, under these conditions, will we give our "longing for the original essence" 359
an appropriate attunement to the Absolute? How can this "longing" be fulfilled with the
concrete content of an "ineffable consciousness" of that "overwhelming truth"? If
negation and even the negation of negation "run into emptiness," is there still a
possibility for the "human One" 360 , which is the real and better human being 361 , to sink
into its ineffable primal ground? In what way could "the non-concept" ( ἀγνόημα) 362 ,
which forms in our soul "around that" be "demonstrated"?
If every negation is an object, so that the negation of the negation is also transformed
into an object, the objectifying tendency of the mind, when it prepares to think the non-
objective, can only be abolished by abstaining from negation itself. But can this really be
achieved? Is the renunciation of negation and thus the self-dissolution of thought really
achievable? The culmination of our thinking activity in the withdrawal of thinking
activity itself and in "silence" is an ideal that is addressed several times by Damascius,
for example in the following words: "In one sense, then, one thing is sayable, in another,
inexpressible. But the former should be honored with absolute silence, and, actually
even more radically, with that absolute ignorance that despises all knowledge" 363 . On the
other hand, we can hardly put our curious efforts to the first principle to rest:
However, if we say all this about it, that it is ineffable, that it represents the innermost temple of the whole, that it
cannot be grasped with the mind, and thereby abolish our own concept, we must be aware that these designations are
terms and concepts that arise from our efforts to concept of the Absolute. These birth pangs lead us to a bold
exploration of that Absolute, and yet they remain only in the vestibule of the innermost temple. Of course, they are
not able to reveal anything about that Absolute, but only indicate what we ourselves suffer in the search for it, our
own aporias and our own failures. They do not even do this in a clear way, but only by means of references, and even
these references are only intended for those who are able to understand them 364 .
We have an innate desire for the first principle, a desire that corresponds to the negative
origin of our soul. The ineffable is also present in the human soul. That is why we are
concerned with the search for the first principle, that is why we cannot stop "daringly
exploring that Absolute." And yet Damascius invites us to practice silence. How can we
achieve this state of silence when, under the constant attraction of the Absolute, we
cannot even touch it with the slightest hint?
Precisely because it cannot be guessed at all, it represents for us the most wonderful thing. For if we had guessed at
anything, we would have sought something else before the guess. Thus we shall either progress to infinity or we shall
necessarily come to a standstill in the absolutely ineffable 365 .
The soul is tense for the sudden appearance of the Absolute. In its tense focus on the
ineffable, it is at the same time aware that it defines the Absolute as something and
objectifies it. The objectification of the non-objective can only be abolished together
with the soul's striving, for it is this urge itself that defines and names the ineffable as
the goal of the search. However, the soul cannot hope for a dissolution of its focus on the
Absolute, for the Absolute is no longer the One and even no longer, one could add in the
spirit, if not in the wording of Damascius, the Super-One. Thus, no “community” with
the not-even-super-unit can be expected, as Proclus promised us with regard to the One
when he urged us to “abstract from all our other activities in order to be only in
community with that one (ἐκείνῳ μόνῳ συγγενώμεθα) 366 ”. The resolution of the
ἀνάτασις, ἐπίτασις and tensio of the soul was the end and climax in the Proclusian
commentary on the first hypothesis of Parmenides. But this could only happen because
because the "harbor" of rest, where the soul can "cast anchor" 367 , was understood as
union with the One. In contrast, the Damascus Aporrheton transcends the scope of
henological thought in its entirety: one, unity, superunity. While Proclian metaphysics
represents a dynamic "identity system" 368 so that in this sense even the negation of the
negation proves to be a spiritual mediation to the superspiritual, Damascius returns
several times to the idea of impoverishment in the face of the Absolute: The idea of the
Absolute, about which we are "concerned", is "inexhaustible" 369 . No "means" can fathom
it. The "limit of discourse" is the overwhelmed, in a sense disarmed, "impoverished
silence" 370 . Finally, with a telling oxymoron, Damascius recommends that we give up
“the busy aporia and lack of means” 371 with regard to the Absolute. After all, it is the first
principle itself that reveals itself to the aporetic struggles of our soul as a “hopeless
primal ground” that strips thought of all its “means”: ἀμήχανος ἀρχή 372 .
For Proclus, there was a clear and strictly adhered to sequence of dialectical moments,
which culminated in the apophase and in the divinely ecstatic vision of the absolute
One. In contrast, the various dialectical methods in Damascius are intertwined. Analogy
and apophatics are both forms of one and the same "hybrid reasoning" that are to be
underestimated by the scholar, with the help of which matter is also "thought". The lack
of a solid hierarchy in the dialectical instruments is also the origin of a certain
impression of opacity that sometimes grips the reader when reading Damascius' work.
The reason for this feeling lies above all in the fact that the limits of the methodological
means are not as clearly drawn as in Proclus. The thought figure of the apophatic
comparative, which Damascius uses in a first step to suggest the direction of his theory
of the Absolute, consists of a Interweaving of analogy with negative dialectics.
Damascius himself admits – admittedly in the context of his henology, but the One is
nothing other than the “symbol” of the inexpressible – that his thinking goes in circles,
being constantly “fascinated” by the same aporias ( ἔτι τα ῖς α ὐτα ῖς ἀπορίαις
ἐνδεδέμεθα) 373 . The discourse on the Absolute, when it begins with the subordinate
entities, becomes entangled in all kinds of contradictions 374 . And where else could the
Logos begin than with the subordinate entities?
We, "who make do with dialectical arguments," do not even possess the mind that is
capable of seeing ideas 375 . Our knowledge of the first principles could be achieved either
intuitively or in the form of the syllogism and the "hybrid reasoning." The unified vision
with which we are equipped is "quite crude" and cannot really be called "intuition,"
which only the gods possess. Furthermore, syllogistic reasoning is also futile because the
premises themselves lose their support through ignorance of the simple principles. The
"hybrid reasoning," with its two subtypes, analogy and negation, ultimately fails because
of the synthesis of cognitive data that are of different origins 376 . Even the negation of the
negation cannot escape the realm of positive thought in order to gain access to the
absolute negativity of the "unspeakable." But the soul cannot stop striving for the first
principle, for this is its original reason and its true essence. What way out of the aporia
is open to human thought if it is precisely the striving for the absolute that objectifies it
and misses it? An abolition of the divisive, tense search ( tensio ) can no longer be
imagined in Damascius as in Proclus, because no negation of the negation can bring the
soul closer to the no-longer-super-unity. It is at this systematic point that Damascius
provides the first proof of his full speculative power. The answer he gives to the problem
just mentioned enriches the history of Neoplatonism with a very special point. We want
to show that Damascius' solution to this aporia is not only original, but also
metaphysically sound.
If the tense orientation of the soul towards transcendence cannot be resolved in the
relaxation of the ἕνωσις, then we should try to find out whether the exact opposite of
this relaxation, namely a Paroxysm of searching restlessness, which could be the
appropriate access to the Absolute. In fact, Damascius does not expect the abolition of
objectifying thought to come from a calming and overcoming of the "birth pains"
(ὠδῖνες) of our soul, because it is constantly striving to produce a concept of the
Absolute. Rather, the inarticulate consciousness of the Absolute is awakened precisely in
the intensification, in the extreme "stimulation" 377 of those "birth pains". Thus,
paradoxically, the abolition of the dialectic in Damascius occurs precisely because the
dialectic never arrives at a fixed result that could instill in the finder a feeling of self-
sufficiency. The "birth difficulties" of dialectics must never be completed, for otherwise
the mind would bring to light a πρᾶγμα, a hypostatized object of thought, and this
πρᾶγμα would not be able to correspond to the "absolutely non-objective" (πάντ ῃ…
ἄθετον) . 378 What does Damascius propose? Instead of the negation of the negation,
which would reach the "harbor" of a merely apparent 379 rest, an infinite sequence of
negations must be set. The work of negating should never cease, for otherwise one
would obtain the completed result of a defined object, which in principle, precisely
because of its definition, its limitation and its determinacy, could not be identical with
the Absolute sought. The fact that the sequence of negations must never end requires
that the work of dialectics potentially continues ad infinitum 380 . Infinite negation
implies that the dialectician will not stop thinking through his concepts again and again.
He will keep his mind alert to the movement of self-abolition inherent in the concept of
the Absolute. His sense will be sharpened for the fundamental inadequacy of any means
of thought in the face of the “inarticulate demand” 381 of the Absolute:
That or those do not behave like things in this world. One must not even say "that" or "those", neither "one" nor
"many", but rather one should surrender to silence, remain in the wordless temple of the soul and not join the
procession. But if It must be indicated by something, one should resort to the negations of those predicates and say:
"It is neither one nor many, neither productive nor sterile, neither primal nor non-ground”, while these negations also
– I do not know exactly how – completely cancel each other out into infinity (ἐπ' ἄπειρον) 382 .
The first principle of Damascius is not "productive" (γόνιμον), although it is by no
means "sterile" (ἄγονον). Nor has there been any emergence from the unsayable,
because otherwise a whole "chain of hypostases" (σειρά) of unsayables would have to be
assumed. The leading structural feature of the Damascius "hierarchy of being" is
therefore no longer that limitless generative power which, originating from the first
principle, permeates and determines the whole of reality, as Proclus impressively
described it to us, especially in the Elements of Theology . The activity of the dialectician
will itself no longer imitate the creative abundance of the first principle. The task of the
philosopher in Damascius will not consist of producing concepts which reflect the first
and highest principle in the dimension of the soul and the intellect. Rather, the soul of
the dialectician should feel the most intense "birth pains" when thinking about the
Absolute. But these are "childbirth pains" which cannot and must not find their release
in an actual birth of that sublime truth. If this birth really did occur with a concept of the
Absolute, it would only consist in the production of a "hybrid conclusion", an analogical
or apophatic train of thought which, in forming a certain concept, starts from other
concepts which are completely foreign to what was originally intended: ἀφ' ἑτέρων
ἕτερα ἐννοοῦντα 383 .
The “birth pangs of knowledge” (ὠδὶς γνωστική) 384 , which the scholar wants to initiate
in the soul that is searching for its original reason, refer not only to the Absolute, but
also to its manifestation as a unity principle, but this because the One stands in the
closest vicinity of the Absolute and “is obscured by its proximity” (ο ὗ τ ῇ γειτονήσει
ἐπιλυγάζεται καὶ τὸ ἕν) 385 . It has, in a sense, the function of a statue of the Absolute
that is only “guessed” 386 , still halfway guessable with the eyes of thought, which is why it
is not only “intelligible” to our Spirit is considered a revelation of the unsayable: "Since
it is in the immediate vicinity of the hopeless principle, if one may express it this way, it
remains in the innermost temple of that silence" 387 . The One as a "symbol of the
unsayable principle" 388 receives its share of negativity from the ἀπόρρητον. The
negativity of the ἕν is the superlative in which the apophatic comparative culminates,
before the increasing series of negations finally turns into the "super-ignorance" 389 of the
Absolute, turns against itself and cancels itself out. As a symbolic representation of the
negativity of the unsayable, the One stimulates the painful urge of the search for truth 390
. But it is the concept of the Absolute itself towards which, through the One, the
"torments of creation" 391 of our thinking are directed. Ultimately, the “creative agonies”
of human reason as it strives to produce a coherent concept of the One can be
understood as the “birth pangs” of the soul struggling with the “conception” ( ὠδίς) of
the aporrheton :
But now we apply that insight to the One thus constituted and say that it is not what we say. Nor do we know it as one
and as a whole at the same time, but rather it is the labor that we feel because of these concepts. That is precisely what
it is. By this I mean the labor of knowledge. For the knowledge of the One has only advanced to labor. But when it is
about to pass to birth and articulate production, it falls away from that One and produces entities that are derived
from it 392 .
The dialectician will be reluctant to define a specific term for the first principle, because
as soon as this has happened, it is no longer a question of what was originally meant, but
of another object that is merely derived from it. It is precisely the fact that it is a
question of a limited, strictly defined object that makes the dialectical attempt appear to
have failed. The Absolute is located precisely at the opposite pole of determining
thought, whose "objects" are the ideas:
And if I may express myself in a differentiated way, the truly knowable is that object which is considered in a certain
definedness and thus already somehow represents an idea. For this delivers itself in its own particularity to the
determining knowledge. Knowledge begins precisely with such an idea. The former, on the other hand, remains
opposed to the idea, since it is absolutely ineffable and does not tolerate any access 393 .
In the middle between the ideas and the ineffable are the One and the unified Being, of
which the latter stands in a closer relation to the ideas, while the ἕν tends more towards
the Absolute (τὸ δὲ πρὸς τοῦ ἀρρήτου) 394 . Because the One is the first expression of
the ineffable, these two "essences" are sometimes considered by Damascius in a
metaphysical entanglement. The danger of objectification threatens the appropriate
attitude of the soul towards both the ἀπόρρητον and the One. For this reason,
Damascius' direct addresses to his listeners and readers mostly refer to the threat of
objectification. The Damascene imperatives, which are modeled on the Plotinian ἄφελε
πάντα, point to the necessity of removing the boundaries of thought, to the need for a
change of perspective that is intended to correct our tendency to reduce ourselves to the
“pragmatic” and the “tangible”: “Man, beware of introducing the ‘something’!” 395 and
“Let the unity that is inherent in every thing, the unity that seems to be fragmented, be
reduced to the common, indivisible and true One!” 396 . The danger of reducing the
universal unity to a limited, restricted concept of the particular unity is essentially
perceived by Damascius as a threat to the thought of the Absolute itself. For the One was
“the first to arise from the ineffable”, it has “obviously separated itself least from it” and
“is still overshadowed by the unknowability of the former” 397 .
The desired abolition of τι and πρᾶγμα in henology brings us closer to the "unspeakable
consciousness" of the Absolute. From the supra-objective One, thinking can learn to
attain a consciousness of the Absolute beyond the One. Since the negation of the
negation cannot free us from πρᾶγμα and τι, the dialectical exercise of negation must
never end. The negation of the negation is thus converted into a potentially
inexhaustible negation. Damascius replaces the Proclian ἀποφ ῆναι τὴν ἀπόφασιν with
an endless series of negations, with a sequence of negations that extends into the
unforeseeable and indeterminate. Thus, in the suspension of the dialectical result, in the
constant delaying of a result, the non-objectivity of the "inarticulate demand"
(ἀπόρρητον ἀξίωμα) 398 of a radically absolute is preserved. But this demand is based on
the "laboring knowledge" of the ἀπόρρητον and the One 399 , which cannot and must not
find its success in the actual birth of a concept of the ἀπόρρητον and the One.
The One remains as the “Holy of Holies” 400 in the “innermost temple” of the Absolute. It
is, as it were, the “icon” of the first, ineffable principle, which is worshipped in the
inaccessible space of the sanctuary. The “iconic” function of the One enables us to faintly
sense the Absolute itself, although this exceeds even the last sense. Kept in the
innermost temple chamber of the Transcendent, the statue of the One is “darkened” by
the darkness of that “super-ignorance” itself. Therefore, the “iconic” effectiveness of the
One cannot advance to the conceptual “idol” or, better said, sink down. The “icon” of the
ἕν remains in the penumbra of the The mind, whose task it is to define and define ideas,
feels unspeakable "birth pains" in the attempt to produce a concept of the absolute One. Its peculiar constitution, however,
prevents it from actually giving birth to a concept of the
incomprehensible . The only thing the mind achieves in this
effort is the condensation of the "torment of creation" itself. This must therefore remain
"sterile" in a certain sense because it is unsuccessful. In another sense, this is precisely
how the objectification of the non-objective is avoided and the unproductive torments of
childbirth are referred back to themselves. They gather in the "unspeakable
consciousness... of that overwhelming truth". Only the concentration of the urge for pain
in itself, in its own hopelessness and hopelessness, can open the mind’s ears to the call:
“Man, beware of introducing the ‘something’!” 402 . It is precisely in the “restlessness” of a
ceaseless search 403 that the mind reaches the reflection on the transcendent:
Consequently, the spirit, insofar as it is the observer of certain things, will also be in labor pains with the concept of
that entity, without, however, concept to bring to light. Quite the contrary, he lets the labor fold itself up in on itself
and increases it into the simplest and absolutely incomprehensible, into the essence which is indeterminable by that
determination which encompasses the whole in its entirety and in particular and the individual in each case 404 .
Even the synthetic achievement of our vision of unity is not sufficient for the radical
demand for a deeper consciousness of unity, which itself is only the preliminary stage to
the ignorant knowledge of the Absolute:
But the first birth pangs of the faculty of knowledge, which remain within and do not emerge, will not accept this
collection either, because it is pregnant with multiplicity and yet has not yet given birth to multiplicity, whereas the
first birth pangs give birth to the absolutely simple One that transcends all multiplicity. This One is ineffable and yet it
carries within itself the conception of the knowable One, if one may express it that way, which, however, does not
belong to that [transcendent] One. The essence of the One, however, is not absolutely ineffable and allows the birth
pangs 405
to receive the analogically knowable only as an aid to an inarticulate intuition, without the birth pangs
passing into knowledge and the analogically knowable into what is really known 406 .
What does it mean that "the first birth pangs of knowledge" (τ ῆς γνωστικ ῆς δυνάμεως
πρώτη ὠδίς) "remain within and do not come forth" ( ἡ ε ἴσω μένουσα καὶ οὐ
προïοῦσα) 407 ? What is this "inside" in which the painful urge of knowledge collects itself
in itself and turns back on itself? In another passage, Damascius had urged us to “rather
surrender ourselves to silence, to remain in the word-removed innermost temple of the
soul and not to join the procession” 408 . The “word-removed” ἄδυτον of the ψυχή is the
equivalent of being within the temple structure of the soul, for the inaccessible space of
the Absolute itself, from which, "as from a holy of holies, everything" in solemn
procession "emerges from the ineffable and in an ineffable manner" 409 . The interior, in
which the henological "childhood pangs" are referred to themselves and intensify 410 , is
the inaccessible "realm" of the Absolute, ruled by darkness and silence. In this
inaccessible space, the One resides as an image of the first principle 411 . It remains in the
"innermost temple of that silence" 412 . The soul, plagued by "aporetic birth pangs", wants
to come down with a concept of the One and is unable to do so, precisely because the
One, as a theophany of the ineffable, cannot be understood . The ὠδῖνες of the
searching soul, awakened to the consciousness of transcendence, are locked in the
innermost chamber of the Absolute 413 .
In the context of the laborious "conception" of the Absolute, Damascius' self-
understanding as a philosophical teacher also becomes clear. His task as a scholar
consists in a "formal indication" of the meaning of the soul's intellectual effort.
Damascius only indicates the direction that the ὠδ ῖνες of the restlessly searching soul
should have. It is expressly a matter of an upward movement towards the Absolute,
which is only "formally" indicated, without it being described in concrete terms.
However, this does not happen for the existential-philosophical reason of leaving the
fulfillment of content to the individual existence, but because the The reference point of
the aporias must remain non-objective, which is why we cannot even speak of a concrete
content of the ὠδῖνες. The "conception" of the Absolute must remain in a constant state
of suspension so that its non-objectivity can be preserved:
This is exactly what Plato advises us, in accordance with the oracles, if we are able to do it: to forget our concepts and
to rise to those birth pangs that according to their essential constitution, they can recognize that One and yet cannot
proclaim it to anyone, but at least they can remove the obstacles from the path of such a tendency to imagine
(προβολή), such as the question "What is it then?" and the requirement "to think of it as something" 414 .
In these sentences, Damascius refers to the One, but this is a “medium” that is
transparent to the ἀρχή in the background:
Much has also been said before about the essence of the One, because of its necessary connection with the principle
which even transcends the One. For we hold on to the essence of the One in an attempt to speak of that principle
which it was not possible to hold on to . 415
We can indeed "know" this One, but only in the mode of a mental effort that will never
produce a concrete concept of the One. The Scholarch can, following the instructions of
Plato and the Chaldean Oracles , describe the ascent to the "birth pangs" of the
consciousness of unity (πρὸς τὴν ὠδῖνα ἐκείνην ἀναδραμεῖν), he can formally
indicate the approach to the One, but he is not able to put the reflection on the One into
words (ἀπαγγέλλειν δὲ μηδενί). For the One is the ‘iconic’ revelation of the ‘absolutely
inexpressible’ (πάντῃ ἀπόρρητον) 416 and ‘remains, as it were, in the innermost part of
the temple in that silence’ (ὥσπερ ἐν ἀδύτῳ μένει τῆς σιγῆς ἐκείνης) 417 .
At this point, the heterodoxy that Damascius sometimes consciously allows himself to be
"guilty" of in relation to Plato should be emphasized. The maieutic metaphor that the
scholar uses in his theory of the Absolute is obviously a reference to Plato's Theaetetus.
When Damascius sees the task of his text of principles as “stimulating the unspeakable
birth pangs in us (ἀνερεθιστέον) in order to awaken the unspeakable […] consciousness
of this sublime truth”, this is reminiscent of the Socratic description of the art of
midwifery (αἱ μαῖαι … δύνανται ἐγείρειν τε τὰς ὠδῖνας καὶ μαλθακωτέρας ἂν
βούλωνται ποιεῖν) 418 . But while Socrates sees himself as the midwife of truth and
accuses himself of "sterility", Damascius goes a step further and extends the Socratic
"sterility" with regard to knowledge to all souls who are in search of the Absolute. The
Platonic Socrates claims that "he himself is not wise at all", and that "no discovery has
been granted to him as the offspring of his soul" (εὕρημα τοιο ῦτον γεγονὸς τῆς ἐμῆς
ψυχῆς ἔκγονον) 419 . The task of Phainarete's son, however, consists precisely in finally
calming the child's distress which he has specifically encouraged: ταύτην δὲ τὴν
ὠδῖνα ἐγείρειν τε καὶ ἀποπαύειν ἡ ἐμὴ τέχνη δύναται 420 . The aim of Socrates'
dialectic is therefore to watch over the actual "birth of souls" 421 . But while the Socratic
midwifery has a positive meaning and is able to test whether "the youth's mind is giving
birth to an illusion and a lie, or rather to something fruitful and true" 422 , the Damascus
maieutics are consistently negative. The Scholarch could say with Socrates: "Those who
follow me also have this experience in common with those giving birth: they are in labor
pains and are full of hopelessness, day and night, much more than they are" 423 . And
indeed this is what the Scholarch tells us when he calls on himself and us, his readers, to
"fill the measure of the aporetic labor pains" 424 . The relief that Socrates' art promises,
however, is not for Damascius' maieutics. no longer accessible. Socrates' assumption
that Theaetetus is "in labor because he is bearing a fruit within himself" ( ὠδίνειν τι
κυοῦντα ἔνδον) 425 is interpreted by Damascius as meaning that the urge for pain must
remain constantly present in the soul's interior and must not find its release in an actual
release from the truth 426 . Damascius even dares, in a certain sense, to turn away from
the more mystical "Plato" of the Second Letter , from whom, however, he, just like
Proclus, takes over the valuable idea that the question of the what of the first principle is
"the origin of all evils". While the author of the second Platonic letter claims that the
"birth pains" in the soul arise from the question of the nature of the supreme "King" and
must therefore be eliminated 427 , for the Damascene, an abolition of the ὠδῖνες is
precisely not possible and actually not desirable. For it is precisely in the sharpening and
deepening of the conceptual "torments of creation" of the soul that the
incomprehensible nature of the first principle is recognized. A conclusion of the negative
dialectic in the negation of the negation cannot be brought about, which is why the
restlessly examining soul must negate all, even the negative concepts, "infinitely" 428 .
1.5 Self-abolition (περιτροπή) and the concept of transcendence
The question arises as to what an “infinite series of negations” actually means. What
does it actually mean that the negations “completely cancel each other out into infinity”
(αὗται μέντοι αἱ ἀποφάσεις ἐπ' ἄπειρον ἀτεχνῶς οὐκ οἶδα ὅπως περιτρεπόμεναι) 429 ?
The most important intellectual task of Damascus philosophy has been summed up in
the question “in what way the non-concept of that, insofar as it is constituted in us, can
be demonstrated” 430 . After a long arc that includes the criticism of Proclian negation of
the negation, Damascius answers: “…The complete self-abolition of concepts and
intuitions – that is the proof we have in mind of that of which we are speaking” 431 . But
what is, in essence, the “complete self-abolition of concepts and intuitions” ( ἡ πάντ ῃ
περιτροπὴ τῶν λόγων καὶ τῶν νοήσεων)?
To answer this question we must undoubtedly begin with the One (τὸ ἕν), for the One
occupies the position within the hierarchy of reality which is closest to the Absolute. The
simple primal cause of things is, in the hierarchy of reality, the secondary essence after
the aporrheton. In a certain sense the One is even the primary essence, for the ineffable
is non-hypostatic and no reference to it is possible for the searching soul 432 . In another
respect the One is at the same time the last thing that can still be halfway thought and
guessed at. However, this does not mean that the One has a positive content. Rather,
Damascius understands the "positivity" of the One to mean that the human mind has
the positive certainty of the negativity of the One. The absolute One is inaccessible to
the thinking of both mortal beings and immortal gods; but after all, absoluteness and
inaccessibility constitute the “paradoxical ‘essence’ of the One” 433. In contrast, the first,
ineffable principle even transcends the dichotomy of knowability and unknowability. So
we cannot even claim to know the unknowability of the Absolute:
If, therefore, the One constitutes the last object of knowledge among those things that are still halfway known or
suspected, then the beyond of the One is also the primary and absolutely unknowable, which is unknowable to such
an extent that it no longer even possesses the unknowable as an essence. Thus we can no longer even intend it as
unknowable, because we do not even know whether it is unknowable. For the ignorance of the former is absolute, and
we know the latter neither as knowable nor as unknowable 434 .
The consequence of this "over-ignorance" 435 about the Absolute is a complete (and this
also means: infinite) reversal movement that cannot find its equilibrium line because a
point of support and rest is never reached in the abyss of the ineffable 436 . The absolute
nullity of the first principle presupposes that it is not even this: nothingness. The
meaning of Damascius' speculation lies in a constant self-annihilation of the concepts,
even the negative ones, that form in the spiritual sphere of the Absolute:
Therefore we become completely entangled in contradictions (περιτρεπόμεθα πανταχ ῇ) and cannot grasp the That at
any end, since It is nothing, and in such a way that It is not even this, the Nothing. Consequently It is the absolute
non-being, or even beyond this, because the absolute non-being is only the negation of Being, while It is also the
negation of the One, the "not even one" (τὸ οὐδέν) 437 .
Another passage can give us a hint as to the Damascene meaning of περιτροπή. By
thinking of the Absolute that no opinion relating to it could crystallize, we seem to make
the positive statement of the first principle that it is ἀδόξαστον. However, this is no
more than a mere statement of our own mental states. Basically, our discourse about the
Absolute is directed against itself and we are forced to realize that our opinions have no
connection whatsoever with what is constantly intended and constantly missed. If, in an
"infinite approach" to what is basically unapproachable, we start from the predicates
and cognitive faculties that are familiar to us, we become entangled in contradictions.
These contradictions are generated by our own conceptuality as soon as it finds itself
caught in the field of tension of the Absolute: “Thus, this time too, discourse in its self-
abolition (περιτρεπόμενος) reveals that as ineffable, by entangling itself in all possible
contradictions in its departure from the subordinate entities” 438 . It is precisely this
contradiction that causes the restless soul of the dialectician to enter into a moving
dialogue with itself. Within the framework of this “soliloquium”, any thesis that may be
formed about the Absolute will be put to the test in the next moment, only to be
canceled again in the next step:
"But we think that the ineffable cannot be an object of opinion!" - The concept, however, is abolished, as Plato says 439
,
and in reality we cannot even think this. - "What then? Do we not hold it to be true and do we not believe that the
ineffable is of this kind?" - Yes, of course: we hold our own affections when circling around the ineffable to be true. -
"Nevertheless, we possess this opinion within ourselves." - An empty opinion, however, as a view of the empty and the
indeterminate. For just as we entertain opinions about these non-existent things, born of the imagination and
artificially composed, as if they were existent [...], so too, when we express any opinion about the completely non-
existent or about the subject of this writing, it is our own opinion and an idleness within ourselves. This opinion and
this idleness are what we grasp, and in doing so believe that we grasp the former. But the latter has no relation to us.
To such an extent it has transcended our comprehension 440 .
From the passages quoted above, the meaning of the Damascene περιτροπή is perfectly
clear: it is a dialectical movement in which the demand of thought for an absolute
principle folds back on itself. This implies a kind of "short circuit" in our thinking of
transcendence. The περιτροπή describes the closed circuit within the conceptuality with
which the spirit dares to approach the Absolute. The claim of the human intellect to
conceive the primal reason of being undergoes a reversion on itself and leads to "birth
pangs" that must necessarily remain trapped within the limits of the spirit, without
being able to leave the enclosure of the νοῦς in the liberation of an actual conceptual
formation 441 . This is where the constant unrest 442 of the Damascene dialectic of the
Absolute and the One comes from.
The human mind experiences even in his orientation towards the One he experiences
similar "birth pangs" as in his search for the aporrheton, for the One is nothing other
than a privileged "symbol" 443 of the Absolute: "We notice that even our efforts to give
birth to a knowledge of the One experience the same thing, namely that they are
similarly exposed to unrest and self-cancellation (περιτρεπομένας)" 444 . The attempt to
present the One in the form of an "articulated" 445 thought only progresses as far as the
"birth pangs" of concept formation. As soon as our cognitive faculty prepares to move on
to the creation of a concrete concept of the absolute One, we only succeed in producing
concepts that are merely derived from the intuition of the true One. In this respect,
Damascius, following the traces of a lost treatise by Proclus, speaks of an inarticulate
claim to a radical conception of the absolute One:
It is precisely this that the wisdom-loving Proclus in his one-volume treatise ( Monobiblos ) called an ‘inarticulate
demand’, namely the demand that corresponds to that laboring knowledge, while he called the ‘articulable demand’
that which is appropriate to a knowledge that has already been articulated 446 .
The tension between our fascination with the absolutely One, which concerns us in an
eminent way, not least existentially, and the impossibility of “delivery” with a tangible
concept of the absolute, opposite-free ἕν is also the origin of that fundamental
henological antinomics that determines our thinking throughout:
This is also the reason for the perpetual duplicity of opinion-forming and judgment about the One, according to which
the One is sometimes knowable and sometimes unknowable. For the One is in a certain sense both this and that 447 .
But the deeper reason for the dichotomy, which is essential to henology, lies in the
proximity of the One to that principle which even transcends the One. The self-abolition
of the "inarticulate demand" of an absolutely conceived One is the consequence of the
presence of the One in the immediate vicinity of the Absolute, by whose "super-
ignorance" the One is "also obscured" 448 :
For this very reason, Plato's arguments also cancel each other out with regard to the One. For the One is close to the
absolute self-abolition of the First (ἡ πανταχῇ τοῦ πρώτου περιτροπή). It differs from that self-abolition, however, in
that it is absolutely One and <All> according to the One. Yet that (secondary) One is One and All at the same time,
while this (absolute) One is beyond the One and the Whole and simpler than both. That self-abolition, finally, is not
even this 449 .
In the above passage, “the unsayable” is simply described as absolute “self-abolition”
(περιτροπή). The absolute self-abolition of the “unsayable” is close to the relative self-
abolition of the One. It is of great importance to hold on to the meaning of the self-
abolition of the concept of unity, because it is on the basis of the unity-theoretical self-
abolition that the radical nature of the idea of transcendence is revealed: the henological
self-abolition that Damascius has in mind is based on the “inarticulate demand” to think
of a radically simple One. The absolutely One is thus opposed to an infinite multiplicity,
which is not simple, but the exact opposite of simplicity. Radical simplicity, however,
implies that there is nothing else and that nothing else is possible other than the
absolutely simple One. In this way it becomes clear that the "inarticulate demand" to
think of the absolute One must necessarily turn against itself. The insight into the
radical simplicity of the One leads to the abolition of the opposition between One and
Many and finally to the dissolution of the concept of the One itself, since the One can
only be thought of in relation to the multiplicity. The "inarticulate demand" to think of
the One absolutely has thus experienced a self-abolition.
The origin of henological self-abolition lies, however, as we have seen, in the higher and
more radical "self-abolition of the first" 450 . But in what sense can one say that the self-
abolition of the concept of the absolute is more fundamental than the self-abolition of
the concept of the one? Well, what the self-application of the "inarticulable demand",
which is elementary for henology, brings about is the idea of absoluteness: we should
think of an absolutely simple one as the principle of manifold reality; but in the concept
of the " absolutely simple" the opposition between one and many is abolished. The
turning point of περιτροπή is therefore to be located in the concept of an absolute 451 .
Furthermore, how does the self-abolition of the concept of the Absolute take place and
in what way does the περιτροπή of the "unspeakable" play into the περιτροπή of the
One? In its search for a sufficient foundation of being, the human soul is driven ever
further in the sequence of principles by the claim to a first foundation of reality. The
antinomic consideration with which De principiis opened stated that the first principle
of the whole could neither exceed the whole (for in this case the whole would lack
something, namely its principle, so that the whole would lose its holistic character) nor
could it be located in the whole itself, because in this way the whole would "reabsorb" its
principle and thus remain without principle. The only possible “solution” to the
introductory “aporia” of the Principles was the demand for a more radical conception of
first principle: “…There must therefore be a principle of the whole that transcends both
the whole itself and the simplest wholeness and all-consuming simplicity that
characterize the One” 452 . This claim to a deeper foundation of the whole of being and of
thought initially took the form of a mere hunch: “Our soul therefore suspects that there
is a principle of the whole – no matter how one thinks of it – that is beyond the whole
and has no connection with the whole…” 453 . The guiding principle of the protology thus
formulated instructed us to climb “higher” from level to level. A concept of
transcendence thus gradually takes shape in our soul, because the “absolute necessity” 454
of a satisfactory foundation of being in a first principle allows us to “surpass” ( trans-
scandere ) every hypostatic level and finally even the One 455 :
Moreover, we understand the One thanks to a purified intuition, which is directed towards the simplest and most
comprehensive. But the most sublime must remain inaccessible to all our concepts and intuitions, since even in this
world that which constantly eludes our concepts in ascending movement (πρὸς τὸ ἄνω) is more venerable than the
most obvious. Consequently, that which has eluded all our intuitions will probably be the most venerable . 456
If we could only vaguely guess at the first principle, it would not be radical enough
according to our fundamental claim:
Precisely because it cannot be guessed at all, it represents for us the most wonderful thing. For if we had guessed at
anything, we would have sought something else before the guess. Thus we shall either progress to infinity or we shall
necessarily come to a standstill in the absolutely ineffable . 457
The first principle is "the absolutely ineffable" (τὸ παντάπασιν ἀπόρρητον) 458 and the
"absolutely transcendent" (τὸ πάντῃ ἐπέκεινα) 459 . Yet it is precisely the concept of
absolute transcendence that undergoes the most essential dialectical reversal. In this
way, the scholar is compelled to devote a more profound reflection to the concept of the
transcendent, taken in itself. This takes place, as it were, by bracketing any objective
interest that the concept of the transcendent might still have for philosophizing
existence. Unity, simplicity, foundational function, in short: everything that could fill the
concept of ἐξῃρημένον with a concrete, intuitive content must give way to the zeal for
the idea of absoluteness in its most perfect purity. The analysis that Damascius
undertakes of the concept of transcendence ( 460) is of a radical nature that is unparalleled
in the history of philosophy. It deserves to be quoted in its entirety:
Because we can grasp with our minds everything that is even halfway knowable and guessed, right down to the One,
we demand that, if we can speak the inexpressible and think the unthinkable, we take as a basis the absolutely
unattainable, the uncoordinateable and the transcendent – in the sense of being “transcendent” in such a way that it
is no longer even transcendent in the truest sense of the word. For the transcendent will always transcend something
and will not be transcendent in the absolute sense, since it stands in a relation to the transcended and is arranged
together with the transcended in the comprehensive order of principles 461.
If the transcendent is to have a truly
transcendent character, then it must no longer even be transcendent. The term “transcendent” does not correspond
quite exactly to its content, for it also expresses an arrangement. As a result, the transcendent should even be denied
the predicate “transcendent” 462 .
If one considers what the term "transcendence" actually means, one must realize that
the meaning of this term contradicts its meaning. For the idea of transcending all
reality, as soon as one becomes fully aware of its implications, even presupposes
transcendence beyond the relationship between the transcendent and the transcended.
There is therefore a fundamental contradiction inherent in this term, because the
content of the term contradicts the form in which this term is thought. Our thinking
cannot understand "transcendence" other than in a relation, namely the relation of the
transcendent to the transcended. Yet the term "transcendence", if one thinks it through
to the full, contains precisely the basic idea of a transcendence beyond the relation
"transcendent-transcended". Damascius writes of the ineffable principle beyond the
One:
But that "transcendent" - if one wants to call it that - is beyond all opposites and even beyond this very opposite,
beyond the opposite not only of things of equal rank, but also beyond the opposite between the First and the entities
after the First 463 .
What Damascius is pointing to is a dialectical reversal that is inherent in the concept of
transcendence. This fundamental contradiction, which is inherent in the concept of the
"Absolute", is by no means a general deficiency of transcendence "theories", but rather a
reference to an essential dimension of the idea of transcendence itself. Self-negation and
self-abolition are inherent in this idea, and this is exactly what Damascius actually
means with his concept of περιτροπή 464 .
In this sense, the talk of a " super- transcendence" is by no means a rhetorical "flower,"
but the most appropriate expression for the necessary dialectical change to which the
concept of "transcendence" is subjected. Because "transcendence" is always associated
with the idea of a relation to the "immanent," the interpretive concept of "super-
transcendence" can be used to describe the overcoming of this relation. Of course, the
self-contradiction cannot be eliminated in the concept of "super-transcendence," but at
least the tendency of this concept to cancel itself becomes more apparent.
Damascius, guided by a reflection on the theory of principles about the first primal
cause of reality, discovers that there are protological concepts that contain an inherent
contradiction. These are precisely the central concepts of metaphysics, such as
"transcendence," "absolute," "simplicity," or "one" 465 . Damascius attempts to
demonstrate that the "meaning" of such concepts - to adopt Gottlob Frege's terminology
466
- does not correspond to their "significance," and even contradicts it. Thus , in essence,
the name of the ‘transcendent’ does not confirm its own referential intention (οὐ γὰρ
ἐπαληθεύει τῷ ἐξῃρημένῳ τὸ οἰκεῖον ὄνομα κατὰ ἀκρίβειαν) 467 . Nevertheless, it is
the soul’s claim to truth that causes it to constantly reflect anew on its protological
concepts, which would also be entirely in the spirit of Frege: ‘The striving for truth is
therefore what drives us everywhere to advance from sense to meaning’ 468 . For
Damascius, “the ineffable consciousness of that overwhelming truth ” 469 forms the ultimate
horizon of philosophical existence. Only that the meaning of the “non-concept” 470
Aporrheton shows itself to be inexhaustible and incomprehensible, because such an
ἀγνόημα must fundamentally remain non-objective 471 472 .
At this point in the investigation we should pause for a moment to point out a difficulty
that could endanger an adequate understanding of the Damascus idea of transcendence.
One might be tempted to describe the introspection and the endless search for
principles as the absolute. However, for Damascius the transcendent is by no means a
mere function of our subjectivity, but something absolutely and objectively unavailable.
Although this unavailability does not objectively apply to the absolute, from our point of
view it describes the actual and undoubted, and therefore also transsubjective, self-
expulsion of the first primal ground beyond all horizons of understanding. Damascius
allows the ineffable to be elevated above the One, so that any attempt to bring the super-
One into harmony with our subjectivity, for example in the form of a mystical union, is
doomed to failure from the outset. This does not imply that the Absolute can be
captured in our subjectivity in a secondary step as an infinite approximation to the
unapproachable. Such a capture of the transcendence would distort the essence of the
unrelated through a subjective reference to it.
In what sense can we then still understand the Damascus Aporrheton as an objective
absolute, if the first principle must be completely non-objective for the scholar? This
aporia expresses the entire challenge of the philosophical program of Neoplatonic
philosophy, which consists in thinking of the original ground as the "unthematic" 473 and
yet as an overwhelming, unavoidable presence. The criterion that shows us the
feasibility of such a project is undoubtedly the ancient academic ordering principle of
"non-sublation" (μὴ συναναιρεῖσθαι) 474 , which also governs the ἀρχαί hierarchy of late
antique Platonism as a determining reason. This ontological criterion, which functions
as a veritable “law”, states that “the superior area in each case subordinate acts as a
formative, shaping boundary (Peras) and that with the more original, the derived and
dependent are also "sublated"...“ 475 . Damascius knows this law very well and applies it in
three ways. The purpose of recourse to the fundamental Platonic law of (non-)sublation
476
is "to start with what can be said by everyone and what can be known through
perception, in order to ascend to the intelligible entities and to shelter the birth pangs of
truth in the silence that surrounds it as if in a harbor" 477 . The old academic principle of
order is initially summarised by the Damascene in the axiom which states that "the
needy is by its nature and everywhere superior to the needy" 478 ; In doing so, he will
attempt to show that every intelligible entity and even the One as a pre-holistic totality
are dependent on their components 479 . Only the ineffable is therefore absolutely
indispensable, and in such a way that it does not even need to be indispensable. The
second "variation" of the criterion in question comes closest to the "classical"
formulation of this principle in the context of the Old Academy, because it "places that
which requires something higher in secondary position after this same higher" 480 . This
proves that even the absolute and negative One is dependent on a higher principle, from
which it receives its absoluteness and negativity, as if through a kind of
"overshadowing". Thirdly, Damascius will search for ever more perfect worlds. Based on
this "method" 481 it then becomes clear that the "hidden diacosmos" of Being is dependent
on the "even more ineffable cosmos" of Being . mos” of the One and this itself is
ultimately transcended by the “ineffable encompassment” of the Absolute 482 .
The criterion of co-sublation - especially in its second application, which probably goes
back to Plato's lectures - actually has only one purpose for Damascius: it is supposed to
lead us to absolute objectivity, to the original evidence of the ground that is exalted from
being and is completely independent of our subjectivity. The ascent based on the
principle of μὴ συναναιρούμενον must awaken in the soul an awareness that "there is"
the Absolute independently of it and of all other totality structures of reality. It is – to
borrow an expression from Iamblichus – “the consciousness of our own nothingness” (ἡ
συναίσθησις τῆς περὶ ἑαυτοὺς οὐδενείας) 483 that reveals to us the overwhelming
power of the absolute primal ground. In other words, insight into the contingency of the
human condition reveals to us the “absolute necessity” 484 of the transcendent principle.
This forms the demarcation foil against the background of which human conditionality
first stands out as such, and offers unconditional support to existential non-necessity.
The insight into the fundamental neediness of human existence leads to the imperative
of assuming a transsubjective principle that must remain untouched by our reference to
"It" and must therefore be absolute . Far from being a mere function in the self-
justification of our subjectivity, the Absolute is rather the non-objective counterpart of
the subject.
For Damascius, the only way to maintain the “unspeakable consciousness” of this non-
objective opposite in the soul is through the method of infinite negation. By describing
and presenting the phenomenon of περιτροπή, Damascius ultimately does nothing other
than to follow up on a valuable suggestion from Proclus, which he radicalizes and
elevates to a central dimension of his philosophy. Proclus had already noticed that the
idea of an absolute principle includes an infinite movement of negation. According to
Proclus, this movement of negation arises from an asymmetry between the spirit that
wants to know and proceeds dialectically and the unknowable per se, which eludes even
the most thorough thinking. In its attempt to encompass and express the absolute, the
Logos gets into a constantly self-circling contradiction:
For if there is no discourse about the One, then the discourse which spreads about it does not correspond to the One
either. And it is not surprising that in the desire to grasp the ineffable conceptually, the discourse is steered towards
impossibility, since all knowledge loses its own power as soon as it touches on that which is not concerned with it as
an object of knowledge. Thus perception will cancel itself out if we designate the knowable as its object, knowledge if
we assign to it the intelligible, and so will each of the other cognitive faculties. If, therefore, there is a discourse about
the ineffable, this discourse does not cease to cancel itself out and to fight against itself 485 .
In this passage, the περιτροπή idea is expressed quite clearly. However, Proclius' insight
into the essential self-contradiction of the concept of transcendence is deepened by
Damascius. The περιτροπή discovered in the ἔννοια of the Absolute is even elevated by
Damascius to a real method of his philosophizing. The influence of skepticism on this
central figure of thought of Damascian metaphysics should by no means be
underestimated 486 .
It is the same process of self-abolition, potentially repeatable indefinitely, that also
governs the use of the term "unsayable" for the first principle. For if the unsayable is to
be truly unsayable, then it should not even be called "unsayable": "Perhaps the
absolutely unsayable is unsayable in the sense that one cannot even positively state the
unsayable about it..." 487 . Damascius must therefore announce that by using the name
"unsayable" he wants to abolish this name itself: "We define the name "unsayable" in
such a way that it is not even a name" 488 . He resorts to this and similar resources only as
if they were subtle hints, although he immediately becomes aware that the absolutely
unsayable cannot even be vaguely alluded to 489 . The concrete terms he uses are nothing
other than designations for the experiences of the soul in its endeavour to understand
the reason for its own existence 490 . We want to come to an agreement about the first
principle, but in doing so we only express the embarrassment that arises in our thinking
from the return to the original reason 491 . The statement of the unsayable consequently
turns against itself 492 . This also implies: it turns inwards. In speaking about the
Absolute, we are actually speaking about ourselves 493 . We should Damascius commands
us to remain in the "innermost temple" of the soul. The "innermost temple" of the soul is
nothing other than a metaphor for the consciousness of transcendence, because the
basis of the soul is the transcendent. Any understanding, any premonition is forbidden
in this "innermost temple", "because if we had only suspected something, we would have
sought something else before the premonition. So we will either progress to infinity or
we will necessarily come to a standstill in the absolutely ineffable" 494 .
It is precisely at the end of these last words that one could formulate an objection to our
thesis of the existence of an infinite series of negations in Damascius and of the
incompletion of his dialectic: for the scholar repeatedly invites us to remain silent and at
times seems to argue for the absolute inexpressibility of "his" first principle precisely on
the basis of the impossibility of a regressus ad infinitum . How are an infinite series of
negations and a philosophy that always remains open compatible with the culmination
of our attitude to the absolute in absolute silence? In what way could the interplay of
endless negation and mystical silence in Damascius be made tangible? We will now
address this problem.

1.6 Silence and awareness of transcendence

Existence is fully aware of the unattainability of the Absolute (“for if we had only
suspected something, we would have sought something else before the suspicion”) and
yet cannot give up the search for the Absolute – in this tense state the Damascus soul
drama takes place, which is staged as a cosmic and supra-individual tragedy using
philosophical symbolic concepts. The human soul is often dependent on striving for its
transcendent principle, although the nature of its cognitive powers fundamentally does
not allow the goal of this striving to ever be achieved. Damascius explicitly refers to this
insoluble contradiction in the context of a discussion about the knowledge of unified
Being. This is the absolute One, in such a way that the realm of first principles forms a
super-intelligible continuum, where any differentiation into individual "hypostases" can
only be traced back to the intervention of discursive thinking. We can therefore begin
with the level of ἡνωμένον in order to reveal the anatomy of the Damascene striving for
the Absolute:
In the desire to reach the truly undifferentiated and profound sum of everything, we have thereby fragmented
ourselves. Fearing the terrible fragmentation of our concepts, which is also truly of a titanic nature and is not carried
out by any divisible and isolated mind, but in an impious and presumptuous way by the absolutely indivisible itself,
we have contented ourselves with holding on to the triad. Since we were in danger of being dragged down into the
utmost fragmentation and in the intention of warding off this collapse, we have dared to predicate the triadic
distinction of the intelligible. In this way we wanted to grant some rest to our intuitions, which are incapable of more
intensive self-collection and yet cannot, out of longing for the beginnings of the whole being (πόθῳ τῶν ἀρχαίων
αἰτίων τῆς ὅλης φύσεως) , abandon the contemplation of the intelligible 495 .
Because of the “nostalgia” that the soul feels for its principles – principles on which it
depends and on which it derives – it cannot renounce the search for the first causes. The
fundamentally plural constitution of existence, which can also be traced back to its
mythical history 496 , represents an obstacle on this path. The soul’s desire for its own
origin is, however, the psychological and anthropological manifestation of a more
general tendency which, as a veritable ordering principle, runs through the entire
hierarchy of being. In fact, all the levels of the ontological architecture require the
restoration of their initial essence: thus, the process of origin and the differentiation
reveal their primary role precisely in becoming the reason for the spirit’s striving to
remain in its own original ground; this striving takes place in the Return as a “longing
for the primordial essence” (πόθῳ τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως) 497 . In special cases, some ideas
even tend to leave their firmly defined place within the order of the mind and become
parts of intelligible life, that is, to free themselves from the rigid definition that is
characteristic of intellectual objects and to integrate themselves into the movement of a
concrete life process 498 . According to Damascius, this happens precisely “out of a
longing for the essential principle” (πόθῳ τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως). Through this desire for
the initial cause, the ideas "tend" to the more intensive unity of the spiritual life (εἰς ἓν
συννένευκεν) 499 . One level higher than the intelligible life, the emergence of the plural
substance (οὐσία) from the absolutely unified being (ἡνωμένον) takes place according to
the model of the internal multiplicity of this unified being. But since the ἡνωμένον is
characterized by perfect union, the emerging “elements” of the substance also
immediately melt together into a condensed form of the “mixture,” again due to their
“longing for the primordial essence” (πόθῳ τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως) 500 .
The desire for the restoration of a primordial state thus structures the whole of reality,
from the intelligible substance down to the human soul. He attributes to his master
Isidore, whose life Damascius regards as the exemplary fate of the soul, an "immense
longing for the Bacchic rapture of the divine" (πόθος ἀμήχανος τ ῆς περὶ τὸ θεῖον
βακχείας) 501 . This means that the philosopher's soul longs for the restoration of the
original unity, such as was characteristic of Dionysus before his dismemberment by the
Titans and as it shines anew after the revival of the god 502 . It is this higher unity that
existence also strives towards this in the passage from De principiis quoted at the
beginning . In that passage it was said that the soul, fearing an even greater
"disintegration of our concepts", sees in the triad the support that corresponds to its
nature. Although it cannot reach the divine unity of the ἡνωμένον with its own means,
the soul cannot resist the desire for it.
Behind the "beginnings of the entire being" and the "primordial being" stands the
Absolute itself, from which, "as from the innermost core of a temple, everything
emerges" 503 . For Damascius' first principle is even exempt from the linguistic distinction
between singular and plural 504 , so that the aporias regarding the first principles are
ultimately aporias regarding the very first principle and can only find a halfway
satisfactory solution in this way 505 . Our concepts of the various hypostases arise in such
a way that the thinking soul tries to think the transcendent in its various manifestations,
fails in this attempt and produces a whole chain of "hen-ontological" substitute
concepts. The various manifestations of the transcendent are: the transcendence of the
"both-and", the transcendence of the "neither-nor" and the transcendence beyond these.
The transcendence of the "both-and" is the coincidentia oppositorum that constitutes
the mode of transcendence of being. The transcendence of the "neither-nor" is the
transcendence of the absolute One. Even beyond these forms of relative transcendence
is the absolute transcendence of the "unsayable". Absolute transcendence is at the same
time the transcendental ground of the other two forms of transcendence.
The One and the unified Being do indeed possess an “objective” reality outside the
knowing subject. However, as we use them, the concepts of these hypostases are only
the products of the individual soul, which their inner difference is reflected on the
“projection surface” of the Absolute 506 :
If someone forces the idea (προβολή) to make that One tangible, then instead of its object it produces a secondary or
tertiary concept which seems to represent that One by bringing together what is separate, and which interprets the
principle as the first, the all-embracing, the all-generating, the striven for by all, the best of all. In doing so, the idea
will either enumerate everything in order of which that One is the cause, or the best and most sublime of all, like the
concepts mentioned above, and especially "one" and "many" according to its already mentioned conception as causes
507
.
This passage is taken from the henological part of De principiis . But attributes such as:
“the all-encompassing”, “the all-creating”, “that which all strives for” can be assigned
with the same impressiveness to the unified being as to the absolute One. The unified
being is namely “substantialised in the One and around it” 508 . The One itself, in turn, is
obscured by the unknowability of the absolutely ineffable 509 . The sharp The difference
between the individual hypostases is first brought into the indifference of the super-
intelligible by the thinking soul. But what constantly makes us start anew in the attempt
to know the unknowable is the attractive power of the ineffable itself, which forms the
background of the system of principles.
In order for existence to be motivated to search for the first principle, an imprint of the
primal ground must also be present in it. This image of the Absolute in the soul strives
of its own accord to its transcendent model, as Damascius considers for a moment:
"How could we even suspect anything of this essence if there were not a trace ( ἴχνος) of
that principle in us that led to it?" 510 But there is the danger, which has already been
warned about several times, that in the effort to rise to the first principle, one
transforms it into a concrete object of the intellect. The method of infinitely repeated
negation seemed to free existence from the confines of a "pragmatic" attitude in the face
of the Absolute. And yet Damascius's aversion to an infinite regress in the thought of the
Absolute speaks against establishing incessant negation as a regular method:
Precisely because it cannot be guessed at all, it represents for us the most wonderful thing. For if we had guessed at
anything, we would have sought something else before the guess. Thus we shall either progress to infinity or we shall
necessarily come to a standstill in the absolutely ineffable 511 .
How can the resigned retreat into the hidden chamber of silence be reconciled with the
tireless work of consciousness, which strives to keep the “non-concept” (ἀγνόημα) of the
Absolute “in a dialectical suspension” 512 ? How, in turn, can the restless circular
movement of dialectics be reconciled with the promise of the little scholar, who bids us
to “shelter the restlessness of the search for truth in the silence that surrounds it, as in a
harbor” 513 ? And can we really follow the advice of the Damascene when he calls on us to
“let go of our busy aporia and embarrassment” in the face of “that entity” 514 ? For there is
nothing more valuable for existence than the deepened awareness of its origin, an
awareness that is constituted in a paradoxical “ascent” 515 to the uncoordinated. And if
the ascent to the absolutely necessary 516 is indispensable because “from there, as from
the innermost part of a temple, everything emerges, from the ineffable and in an
ineffable way,” how can Damascius then still ask his readers “to give themselves over to
silence, to remain in the wordless innermost part of the soul, and not to join the
procession” 517 ?
What is this "silence" that Damascius wants to persuade us to adopt? For "it is not
enough to be silent to be done with silence once and for all," as a contemporary
philosopher puts it 518 . "Silence, precisely because it does not explain itself, is subject to
infinite ambiguity..." 519 . Thus, far from setting the final limit to thought, silence becomes
a philosophical problem. "One first sign clearly shows that silence opens up a problem
and by no means closes it: the endless effort we feel in remaining silent in the face of
that of which we cannot speak" 520 .
So what is the Damascus silence and how is it compatible with the design of a never-
ending negative dialectic? What is it that is concealed in this silence? For the mystical
silence of the Platonist is a deliberate silence and by no means the indifferent
wordlessness of someone who conceals the unknown out of ignorance. The aphasia of
the seeker is a silence that sets in . It is the exact opposite of the silence that is given to
those who are still unconscious and senseless "from the beginning" . The mystic's
renunciation of language is the result of self-censorship. As such, this renunciation can
only occur as a result of reflection. That is why Damascius says that the knowledge of
that which what is accessible to our cognitive powers is always accompanied by the
awareness that what is known is not what is actually sought:
But if the ultimate knowable is indeed the One, then we know of nothing that would transcend the One. Are all these
doctrines then just idle quibbling over words? No, rather, in the consciousness of our knowledge, we are at the same
time conscious of the inability of these knowledges to express in a proper manner, if one may put it this way, the
fundamental first assumption 521 .
In every moment of knowledge we are simultaneously aware of the negative reverse side
of our object of knowledge. Due to this fact we are ultimately led to the view of unity:
"We are constantly climbing the steep slope to the ever more indivisible and are
somehow aware of the one form, even in its fragmentation" 522 . In every act of
consciousness, therefore, the awareness of negativity and unknowability resonates. In
this way, Damascius anticipates a fundamental insight of Hegel, for the Athenian
scholar also believes that consciousness is "the unity of itself and its opposite" 523 .
Our concepts of ideas, of the completely unified being and of the absolutely One are
consequently "transparent" in relation to the unknowability of the Absolute. In general,
"transparency" is a fundamental characteristic of all forms of being for Damascius and
the scholar resorts several times to the symbolic concept of "diaphania". For example,
we cannot understand ideas directly, but only through our own ideas, which stand like
panes of glass between us and the intelligible:
For we cannot even know the spiritual ideas, as Plato himself says in his letters, and yet we seem to strive to obtain
them in many ways, in that we do not have access to them directly, but as it were through certain transparent bodies,
the ideas that awaken in us . 524
All hypostases and their corresponding intellectual concepts illuminate each other to
their innermost core, so that every knowledge in its transparent nature allows the
outline of the higher to shine through. In a spiritual-ontological discussion prompted by
the question of how the spirit knows being, Damascius will write that at the same time
as its self-knowledge, the spirit also forms a consciousness of being:
It must be said, then, that just as the mind has distinguished itself as distinct from Being, and thereby caused the
latter to appear as something separate from it and as something indistinguishable, in the same way, by knowing itself
and allowing itself to be circumscribed by self-knowledge, it becomes conscious of the indefinite essence of Being
(ᾔσθετο τῆς ἀπεριγράφου τοῦ ὄντος φύσεως) and also of the fact that Being does not know, but merely makes itself
known… 525 .
As a result of this thought, one can say that for Damascius every insight is accompanied
by the awareness of the higher and points beyond itself. The highest, however, is the
absolutely unknowable. Because the higher "beings", including the highest itself, radiate
into the innermost being of all subordinate levels of being, the distance to the higher is
perceived as an immanent difference: the distance between my self and the principles to
which I strive is reflected in myself, as a microcosmic image of the whole. And not only
in myself: in every hypostasis the distance and absence of the superior can be "felt", as it
were. This awareness of the absence of the higher and highest ranking in the midst of
the lower ranking, however, translates into a presence of the superior within the inferior
526
. This dialectical turn also occurs as a result of the περιτροπή method that is
characteristic of the general attitude of Damascene philosophy. Thus, dianoetic thinking
proves to be insufficient for the recognition of ideas. ence, the knowledge of ideas for the
opening up of unified being, the synopsis for the comprehension of absolute unity, and
the unity view finally for immersion in super-transcendence 527 . All forms of knowledge
and all objects of thought surpass themselves in the course of a general movement of
flight that carries them along and carries them away to the Absolute. This continued
being pointed beyond oneself is, however, the characteristic of an overwhelming and
intrusive absence: the noticeable absence of the Absolute in the midst of its principles.
It has become clear from the previous discussions that, from Damascius' point of view,
existence cannot renounce the search for the ineffable Absolute. For the ineffable is just
as present in the soul itself as it is at the "top" and actually at every level of the chain of
hypostases. That is why Damascius calls on us to "remain in the soul's innermost
temple, which is removed from words, and not to join the procession" 528 . The innermost
chamber of the soul's sanctuary corresponds, in the context of an analogy that
juxtaposes the objective pyramid of being and the psychic interior architecture, to "the
innermost temple of that silence" 529 , where the One "remains": the human being's own
self is supposed to stand still in the inaccessible "chamber" of the soul, just as the One
remains in the inner space of the Absolute 530 . Inside and outside are reflected in the talk
about “that” which is neither immanent nor transcendent. If the ineffable is present in
man himself as the innermost chamber of the soul, how could he ever forget the
ineffable primal source? And must he not first learn how to open up this inner space
before he can enclose himself in its “silence”? That is why Damascius urges his reader to
“stimulate the ineffable birth pangs in us in order to awaken the ineffable – I do not
really know how to express myself – consciousness of this overwhelming truth” 531 . Only
then can we “let go of our busy aporia and embarrassment” 532 . But will it ever be
possible to How can it ever be possible to let go of precisely that which moves us most
and, in the literal sense, reaches into our innermost being? Damascius himself will
constantly remember the ineffable primal source, and its silent effectiveness is at work
throughout the scholar's writings. To think incessantly, to negate incessantly, to remain
silent incessantly - is all this compatible? The uninterrupted work of dialectics can only
be reconciled with an infinitely deeper silence if the silence ceases to be considered an
expression of "irrationality". Damascius' thought has evaded this danger: the search for
the first principle has - as the Scholarch initiates it - the structure of an orderly "ascent"
(ἀναβησόμεθα, writes the Scholarch in a prominent place) 533 and appears as a regular
"method" (μέθοδος) 534. Dialectics and silence do not contradict each other, quite the
opposite: they must necessarily accompany each other. For Damascius this also means
that there can be no final stripping away of thought, a "purification from dialectics" 535 in
the Proclian manner. The development of the dialectic and the immersion in silence run
parallel to each other. Damascius' silence is therefore nothing other than the inarticulate
consciousness of transcendence that guides the execution of the dialectic 536 .
“Impassable and inexhaustible” is the “thought” that “there is something beyond the last
idea and the last concept” 537 . Nevertheless, the searching soul must encourage the “birth
pangs” of a “non-concept” of the transcendent. This “labor” does not find relief in the
birth of a “concept” of the Absolute, but it does crystallize an “ineffable consciousness”
(ἄρρητος συναίσθησις) 538 of the primal ground, which Damascius calls “consciousness”
only in an improper sense (“I don’t really know how to express myself”) 539 . The ineffable
birth pangs of the soul are everlasting. The ineffable reflection on the Absolute will also
be everlasting.
The inarticulate consciousness as a paradoxical, self-questioning mode of reference to
the Absolute is probably a distant echo of those limit concepts that are coined in the
Turin Parmenides commentary for the self-clamping knowledge of the transcendent
God . 540 The author of the commentary (presumably Porphyry) opens up the possibility
of "perpetuating" in an "incomprehensible grasp" and a "non-thinking thought" of God.
Thanks to the "training" in this form of transcendent knowledge, thought will find its
rest in an "unspeakable pre-comprehension" (ἄρρητος προ{σ}έννοια) 541 of God. Such
pre-comprehension "images" God "through silence". In the process, the consciousness
that one is silent and that one is imaged is itself erased. The ἄρρητος προ{σ}έννοια, as
the "image of the unsayable," is ultimately itself the unsayable, albeit "in an unsayable
manner" and without being conscious of it in the full sense. The "unsayable pre-
comprehension," which is the "image of the unsayable" and essentially the unsayable
itself, anticipates a central figure of Damascene thought: the soul should withdraw into
the ἄδυτον of its innermost being 542 , which corresponds to the ἄδυτον of "that silence"
543
, that is, the Absolute itself.
We have seen that in Damascius every knowledge is accompanied by its negative
correlate 544 , that unknowability constitutes the dark side of knowledge and cannot be
separated from it. Ignorance and the failure of language (ἀφασία) it produces 545
accompany the course of the dialectic at every step. For how could thought know the
direction in which it must move if a radical self-reflection did not open up the way (the
μέθοδος) for it and familiarize it with its goal? The silent consciousness of
transcendence underlines the eloquence of the dialectic and leads it to the horizon of its
most proper purpose: to its self-disclosure from an absolute initial ground. Thinking is
constituted from this. It must lead itself back to this. Only in this sense can the call of
the little scholar be understood when he tells us to "shelter the birth pangs of truth as
into a harbor in the silence that surrounds it" 546 . The harbor of an unswerving silence is
the all-encompassing 547 goal of our dialectical efforts.
However, one might ask whether the silence in which Damascius sees the "limit of the
word" (πέρας τοῦ λόγου) 548 does not contradict the "limitless" (ἐπ' ἄπειρον) 549 reversal movement of the negative
dialectic. After having demonstrated the immanent self-abolition of the concept of
transcendence and having rejected the Proclian negation of the negation as a possible
starting point for an ascent to the Absolute, Damascius proposes his own method of
περιτροπή and writes:
…The complete self-abolition of concepts and intuitions – that is the proof before us of that of which we speak. And
what will be the limit (πέρας) of the discourse, except an unswerving silence and the agreement that we know nothing
of that into the knowledge of which, since it is unattainable, no one may even penetrate? 550 .
In contrast, a few lines later, Damascius declares that the infinite development of
negations is the only acceptable way of pointing to the Absolute:
But if It is to be indicated by anything, one may resort to the negations of those predicates and say: "It is neither unity
nor plurality, neither productive nor sterile, neither primal ground nor non-ground," while even these negations - I do
not know exactly how - completely cancel each other out into infinity .
Of course, the scholar will later add that the super-transcendent cannot even be spoken
of in a hint 552 , so that this unlimited series of negations seems to be superfluous. But
self-censorship cannot be maintained. We constantly fall back into the discussion of the
very first principle, and the entire philosophical work of the Damascene proves
sufficiently that one is everywhere compelled to refer to the unthinkable Absolute. Thus
thinking that constantly questions itself is the only possible method of preserving the
inarticulate consciousness of the Absolute in its pure form. And yet Damascius asks
himself whether anything other than an overwhelmed silence (σιγὴ ἀμήχανος) can be
the πέρας of the word 553 . But what does πέρας mean and how can it be reconciled with
the ἄπειρον of dialectics?
Πέρας can in no way mean the end of the search for the first principle, because we can
never silence the "mantic" intuition of the Absolute. Rather, πέρας in this context
denotes the determination and not the end of the dialectic. The sentence quoted above
should therefore be translated as follows: "And what will be the determination of the
dialectic if not an overwhelming silence and the agreement that we know nothing of that
into whose knowledge, since it is unattainable, must not even be penetrated?" It is
therefore the "unspeakable consciousness" of transcendence that controls and
determines the infinite, potentially indeterminate progress of the dialectic . In what
other way could the soul experience the direction of its tireless movement of thought if
the ἄδυτον within it were not directed towards the non-objective opposite of the
subject? We, who “make do with dialectical arguments” 554 , cannot, by virtue of our
mythical history, dispense with the inexhaustible work of understanding. For
understanding simultaneously implies conceptual diheresis, and this is nothing other
than a manifestation of our origin from the race of the Titans, who besiege the
“Olympus” of the intelligible 555 and tear apart the unity of the God of life. Because of our
mythological history, we are exposed to being thrown into multiplicity. Yet the
sanctuary of our soul, shrouded in silence and darkness, represents the perspective of
unity that makes self-collection possible 556 .
"Thus we shall either advance to infinity, or we shall necessarily come to a standstill in
the absolutely ineffable" (καὶ ἤτοι ἐπ' ἄπειρον, ἢ ἀνάγκη ἐν τῷ παντάπασιν ἀπορρήτῳ
στῆναι) 557 , writes Damascius in a passage already quoted. The passage is, however,
uncertain, because it was subsequently corrected by Bessarion, the owner and reader of
the most important manuscript ( Marcianus gr. 246). Westerink and Combès consider
instead: οὕτω ἐπ' ἄπειρον ἕως ἂν στῇ ἐν τῷ παντάπασιν ἀπορρήτῳ 558 . We translate:
"And so we advance into infinity until we come to a standstill in the absolutely ineffable"
(στῶμεν instead of στῇ). The paradox of this thought corresponds entirely to the
Damascene dialectic: thought moves into infinity when it is directed towards the
Absolute, and it is precisely through this that it comes to rest. We cannot think the
concept of the Absolute in an exhaustive way, because the movement of self-abolition
inherent in this concept is potentially infinite. Nevertheless, we come to a standstill
because the constant return to an even more radical concept of the Absolute produces an
awareness of the over-transcendence of the Absolute. This awareness of transcendence
accompanies and determines the inexhaustible negative dialectic, which must constantly
be started anew and become ever more fundamental.
Another objection to our interpretation of the relationship between dialectic and silence
in Damascius could be formulated: the scholar seems to harbor a real horror at the
prospect of thought advancing into the void . Thus, in the very first pages of his
Principles, he admonishes us: “But if the One is the cause of the whole and the essence
of the whole, what sense does our ascent have beyond this? Not that we are striding into
the void when we grasp at nothingness itself” 559 . The conclusion that he draws a few
pages later from the interiority of our talk of the Absolute seems to want to eliminate
precisely this nightmarish idea of an infinite multiplication of empty thoughts: “So we
will either progress into infinity or we will necessarily come to a standstill in the
absolutely inexpressible” 560 . Damascius – a philosopher of “rest” and “standstill”?
Negation, analogy, syllogism – for him, all of this is part of a reasoning that is constantly
moving in the void . 561 And yet we cannot help but grasp at the void as soon as we circle
around the “non-concept” of the first principle. After all, Damascius can certainly
reconcile himself with the idea of floating above the abyss of absolute nothingness,
provided that one distinguishes between two conceptions of nothingness:
But if this is nothing, then the nothing may be twofold: on the one hand, the nothing that is higher than the One, and
on the other, the nothing that is in this world. And if with these statements we dare to take a step into the void, then
this step into the void may also be understood in two respects: on the one hand, as the step that leads to immersion in
the ineffable, and on the other hand, as the step that leads to the absolutely nonexistent. For the latter is also
ineffable, as Plato says, but as something of lower rank. The former, on the other hand, is ineffable as something of
higher rank 562 .
Pure nothingness is therefore twofold, which is why there is a danger that by daring to
take a “step into the void” one does not delve into the silence of the unsayable, but
rather into the muteness of the privative nothingness. The awareness of the difference
between these two forms of nothingness must therefore be awakened. Without a method
aimed at this, without an orderly "ascent" 563 to the "higher-ranking" nothingness, the
soul's search threatens to be reduced to the meaningless shallowness of the merely
privative nothingness. The endless questioning and the consciousness of transcendence
reflecting itself and the entire dialectical process together form the methodological
prerequisite for the desired immersion in the inexpressible 564 .
Thus, in a very original version, Damascius seems to satisfy Martin Heidegger's demand
for a proper method of silence in philosophy. Damascius' "aporrhetics", like Heidegger's
"sigetics", is a way of thinking and by no means a renunciation of it: "Silence is the 'logic'
of philosophy insofar as philosophy asks the fundamental question from a different
beginning. (...) Silence has higher laws than any logic" 565 . Researchers have asked
whether Damascius did not attempt, with some indecision and inconsistency, to say
goodbye to metaphysics 566 . It would also be worth asking whether metaphysics can be
abolished in any other way than through metaphysics and within metaphysics itself. The
philosophy of Damascius has this in common with the late thinking of Martin Heidegger
that in its doctrine of principles it attempts to take a step back from metaphysics – not
outside of metaphysics, however, but into the “essence” of it 567 .
Silence has proven to be the “limit” of dialectics, not in the sense of a conclusion to the
philosophical discourse, but precisely as a determination of it. The limit, however,
marks the contact and, in fact, the Mixture with the unlimited and indeterminate,
because according to Damascius, correlative concepts are never to be thought of
separately from one another, but as a whole. Even at this systematic point of the
Damascene doctrine, the scholar's fascination with the concept of totality, which guides
his entire henology and ontology, is palpable. Silence and dialectic together form the
same path of search for the first principle. Unlike Proclus, the Damascene does not seem
to be able to accept "purification from dialectics". This is entirely in keeping with the
personality of Damascius, whom his student Simplicius called a ἀνὴρ ζητητικώτατος 568
, "a man endowed with the most astute spirit of research" - literally: a man who searched
restlessly. In the Vita Isidori , which can be read in part as an intellectual
autobiography, Damascius himself writes that he had been passed on the "power of
dialectical intercourse" by his master Isidore 569 . In an impressive scene in this text,
which we have already quoted in the introduction to this work, we meet the same Isidore
who accuses a member of the School of Athens, named Hegias, of the theurgic excesses
of the post-Proclian Academy. It is obvious that Damascius, who reports on the dispute,
shares his master's opinion:
"I am of your opinion, my dear Hegias," said Isidore to him, "that the work of hieraticism has a more divine nature.
But those who intend to deify themselves must first become human. This is why Plato also says that no higher good
has come to man than philosophy..." 570 .
The indispensability of dialectics is already evident in the external form of Damascius'
philosophical writings, especially in his commentary on Parmenides : the aporias that
move the scholar's thinking could be multiplied ad infinitum 571 . Furthermore, in
Damascius, by withdrawing the objective character that Proclus had attributed to the
system of hypostases and by increasing the subjectivization of the pyramid of being, the
order of entities is transformed into an " open hierarchy" 572 . This is suggests at the same
time that the work of dialectics could possibly restlessly further problematize this
hierarchy.
Dialectics proves to be an indispensable element in the return of human existence to its
original source. The "non-concept" (ἀγνόημα) of super-transcendence produces a
perpetual dialectical reversal movement in the searching soul. It is the reflection on this
essential self-abolition of the concept of transcendence that evokes and keeps alive the
"unspeakable consciousness" of that "overwhelming truth". Damascius notes, of course,
that the choice of the word "consciousness" can only be understood as a stopgap
solution. Since absolute transcendence cannot even be pointed to 573 , the ἄρρητος
συναίσθησις is intended here to designate a “state of consciousness” sui generis : a
consciousness of the primordial Unground that constantly questions itself, negates
itself, cancels itself out and yet is unavoidable and stubbornly asserts itself.
In this sense, one could say that the permanent sobriety of Damascene thought
expresses a "doom" of consciousness, according to the pithy phrase of Schelling's late
philosophy . 574 In the "transparent" configuration of the συναίσθησις, thought cannot be
silenced. Yet in the incessant imposition of consciousness, we are simultaneously aware
of the orientation of our thought towards the "absolutely silent" (πάντ ῃ σιγώμενον) 575.
This reflection of consciousness into its unspeakable and transcendent ground is the
supremely ignorant silence that alone can satisfy the demands of radical principled
thinking.
With his concept of an ‘ineffable consciousness’, Damascius stands in direct succession
to the Proclian philosophy, which promises us an ‘ecstatic ascent to the ineffable and
incomprehensible consciousness of the One’ (πρὸς τὴν ἄρρητον καὶ ἀπερίληπτον
τοῦ ἑνὸς συναίσθησιν ἐνθεαστικῶς ἀναδράμωμεν) 576 . According to Proclus, the entire
dialectical method, or at least its higher, “enthusiastic” section, should proceed “in the
consciousness of the absolute transcendence of being” (δεῖ … ἐνθεαστικ ῆς δὲ ὁρμῆς ἐν
τῇ συναισθήσει τοῦ πάντων ἐξῃρημένου τῶν ὄντων) 577 . In the brightness of the "light"
that shines in us after an intensive effort towards the One, we become "aware" of the
One: ... per quod possibili nobis modo illius fit perceptio (συναίσθησις?) secundum
diunissimum nobis ipso participantibus 578 . The awareness of the One manifests itself as
an inexpressible reflection on participation in the One, in which we are at the same time
aware that this participation represents only something subordinate which has to
replace the impossible comprehension of the incomprehensible: "Since the soul is
nevertheless incapable of comprehending the incomprehensibility of the One and of
recognizing its unknowability, it is content in its process with the inexpressible
consciousness of its participation in the One" 579 . However, for Proclus, what we have
called “consciousness of transcendence” is itself no longer part of the constitution of
thought. Of the two types of “activity” ( operatio ) that Proclus distinguishes – the
“desiring” ( appetitiua ) and the “insightful” ( inspectiua ) – he declares the first to be
the most fundamental because, despite the unknowability of its object, it nevertheless
causes all beings to burn with love for it; on the other hand, the “insightful” activity
decreases and disappears completely as soon as it is directed towards something
incomprehensible. has 580 . For this reason, Proclus lets “silent understanding” ( tacita
intelligentia ) 581 precede the “expressive” one. This tacita intelligentia is probably a
more sublime, if not the most sublime, form of “desiring” orientation toward the One. It
summarizes the above-mentioned Proclian expressions of the consciousness of unity (ἡ
ἄρρητος καὶ ἀπερίληπτος τοῦ ἑνὸς συναίσθησις, ἡ συναίσθησις τοῦ … ἐξῃρημένου,
indicibilis perceptio ) and anticipates the Damascenian consciousness of transcendence
(ἡ ἄρρητος … συναίσθησις τῆς ὑπερηφάνου ταύτης ἀληθείας) 582 .
It is probably a radicalized adoption of Proclus' ideas when Damascius speaks, albeit
with some reservations, of an inarticulate awareness of the Absolute 583 . However, since
for Proclus the "ineffable consciousness" refers to the One, which can be reached in a
complete mystical experience of unity, every form of consciousness is abolished in the
union with the One 584 . At the very least, the exclusion of the tensio , the striving towards
the Absolute, of which Proclus speaks at the end of his commentary on the first
hypothesis of Parmenides 585 , probably also implies the abolition of the consciousness of
unity in the final fulfillment of unity itself 586 . For Damascius, however, the Absolute,
which even transcends the One, is no longer accessible to any experience of unity. Only
the tireless aporetic thinking, which demonstrates the presence of the inexpressible in
the midst of discourse itself, can lead to an orientation towards the Absolute. This
orientation is realized only in the form of an inarticulate consciousness of transcendence
587
.
The silencing of the Absolute is to take place as an essential consciousness and as a
determining limit of philosophy. The limit is always the contact with the unlimited and
indeterminate, the dividing line between the fullness of being and pure nothingness. The
negative exercises of dialectics thus become for the scholar a border crossing along the
"wall" (θριγκός) 588 of the first principle. But how is the "innermost part of the temple" of
our soul connected with this "idleness within ourselves"? What is the relationship
between these determining metaphors of Damascus philosophy and the absolute
nothingness of the unsayable? We will have to look for the answers to these questions in
Damascius' doctrine of the soul. Another central question should concern us first:
Damascius distinguishes between the "higher-ranking nothingness" of the Absolute and
the "lower-ranking nothingness" of mere privation. But how can we distinguish between
these two concepts? If both forms of nothingness "come into being" through the
complete abolition of all meaning, how can one even speak of a hierarchy in the realm of
pure non-being? How is it possible to assign one nothingness to the first principle and
the other to the purely and indifferently unhypostatic?
1.7 The double nothingness
Already in the first pages of De principiis, Damascius highlights the ambiguity that
governs the concept of pure or absolute nothingness. With regard to the negativity of the
Absolute, he writes: "But if this is nothing, then let the nothingness be twofold: on the
one hand, the nothingness that is higher than the One, and on the other, the
nothingness that is in this world" 589 . Even more telling than the lines in which the
Scholarch addresses his doctrine of the two levels of non-being is the terminology he
uses when speaking of pure negativity. To point to the "yawning abyss" 590 of the
privative, Damascius resorts to the same terms and metaphors that he used to indicate
the primordial nothingness of the Absolute. Five conceptual constellations can be
identified against the background of the Damascan theory of negativity. These five
concepts describe just as many ambiguities in the talk of non-being, which was once
described as “high-ranking heres”, but can then also be understood as a “lower-ranking”
nothing. In the following, we will go through these five ways of looking at the negative
and then ask ourselves the following question: If the concept on the basis of which we
understand pure non-being can be interpreted in two ways (firstly with reference to
principle-based negativity, secondly with reference to privative negativity), how can a
distinction be made between these two “types” of nothing?
1) As we recall, even the most timid of all claims to knowledge, intuition, was not
destined to rise to the level of the transcendent: ‘For that which transcends the One we
cannot even intuit (ὑπονοεῖν)’ 591 . But even the slightest intuition eludes the purely
privative nothingness which, according to Damascius, constitutes the subject of the
seventh hypothesis of Parmenides : ‘This hypothesis therefore denies the entire
accompaniment of the One and makes us familiar with that whose existence is in no way
intuited (ὑπονοούμενον), even to the slightest extent’ 592 .
2) Under the repelling attraction of the concept of transcendence, our thoughts were
drawn into an inward-directed circular movement, which necessarily always ran past
the object at which it was aimed, in order to reveal only the subject's world of ideas:
"Not that we step into emptiness when we grasp at nothingness itself" 593 - the scholarch
admonished us at the beginning of De principiis. The fall into the unhypostatic can,
however, happen in two ways, depending on which "slope" of the pyramid of being it
occurs on:
…And if we dare to take a step into the void with these statements, then this step into the void should also be
understood in two respects: on the one hand as the step that leads to immersion in the ineffable, and on the other
hand as the step that leads to the absolutely nonexistent. For the latter is also ineffable, as Plato says, but as
something of lower rank. The former, on the other hand, is ineffable as something of higher rank 594 .
The “idleness within ourselves” 595 has a twofold potency: firstly, it is the well-tempered
dialectical game that runs methodically controlled and is determined by a guiding
consciousness of transcendence. Then again, it can sink to the mere willfulness of the
imagination, which presents the subject with the impossible dissolution of reality and
replaces it with imagined figures and even worlds. The images created in this way must
under no circumstances be seen as principles of the One, but rather as an example of
purely privative nothingness: “But how could it not be absurd to claim that our
phantasies , which run into the void, catch up with the One’s own products?…” 596 . It is
significant that one and the same process, “the idleness within ourselves,” can lead in
both directions: to that of overwhelming, primordial nothingness or to the gaping,
abysmal dissolution of the whole of being, where the imagination goes astray.
3) The more intensively we strive for the first primal cause in the constant attempt to
understand the connection between being and principles, the more impressively we
become aware of its “unattainability” (ἀτευξία) 597 . Our objectifying language transforms
the awareness of our own lagging behind a fully articulated concept of transcendence
into the concrete, in a sense “external” idea of a constant movement of flight of the
transcendent itself:
But the most sublime must remain inaccessible to all our concepts and intuitions, since even in this world that which
constantly eludes our concepts in ascending movement is more venerable than the most obvious. Consequently, that
which has eluded all our intuitions will probably be the most venerable . 598
The same retreat, this time however downwards, is “carried out” by the purely privative
nothing. The empty idea of absolute non-being is only the discursive by-product of the
negative dialectic. The dia The noetic process, with its play of setting and abolishing, is
indeed indispensable for us to think about principles, but as a marginal product of its
activity it also produces the purely privative nothing, which is, as it were, stolen by the
imagination and abused for the creation of enthusiasms, delusions and dream images.
The "hollow space" created by the activity of negation is replaced by the imagination
with surrogates of the now stripped-off reality. This "substitute" of reality, which has
been abolished in negation, can no longer be assigned to the objective, concrete context
of the One, since it is "abstract" and imagined. The further the principles reach with
their power of influence into the "gaping abyss" 599 of reality, the more this privative
nothing eludes their formative and "concretizing" grasp:
That first principle always produces the primary entities before the secondary ones. On the other hand, this pure non-
being is always deprived of the entities that precede it, and always falls away from the primary principles in
proportion as these extend further and further 600 .
These lines express a contrary movement, one "upwards", into the unattainability of the
absolute, the other "downwards", into the instability of the nonexistent. The lines of
flight of both movements are, however, nothing other than the external projection of the
conceptual "idleness" that takes place within the soul.
4) The beginnings of protology lay in the search for a first principle that was to form the
basis of the whole of being. Since the discovery of the primal cause was based on
aetiological thinking, it is only reasonable that in the introductory part of De principiis
the Absolute is described as the cause of reality: “But if we are looking for any reason for
assuming the Absolute, then of all reasons the most compelling is that everything comes
from there as from the innermost core of a temple, from the ineffable and on
inexpressible manner” 601 . But the concept of the “absolute” already contains the idea
that the first principle of the whole has no relationship to this whole, and therefore also
not to that of causation. The emergence of things from the transcendent is unthinkable.
The passing away of things into an absolute nothingness is just as unthinkable. And yet
reality must have taken its origin from a first principle and will necessarily have to
resolve itself into the nothingness of this and that, insofar as we are talking about this
and that as specific objects. Despite the Eleatic prohibition against imagining an
emergence from nothing and a passing away into nothingness, the protological
“spontaneity” of our reason forces us to base our thinking, which is essentially
processual, on these two assumptions: we cannot avoid “thinking” an emergence from
non-being and a passing away into non-being. But what can "thinking" mean here when
insight is directed towards its own abyss? Thinking is always concrete, content-rich and
determined. How will thinking be able to include pure nothingness, the groundless and
inconsistent in its conclusions? The obstacle expressed in this problem is overcome by
the fact that the paradoxical thinking of the unthinkable condenses into a conceptuality
that works against itself, constantly cancels itself out, and problematizes its own
possibility in the act of conceptual representation. Damascius calls the quasi-notions on
the basis of which we conceive the emergence from nothing and the passing into
nothingness ἄρρητοι ἔννοιαι:
As soon as that (first) principle is posited, it has already, in some way or other, produced all things together with
itself, projecting them from itself, if one may say so. But when this (privative) non-being is posited, insofar as this is
possible, it annihilates everything and makes everything disappear. Therefore, the seventh hypothesis (which deals
with privative nothingness) is opposed to the first, not simply by reason of the conclusions, for these do not have the
power to completely abolish that (first) principle, but by reason of our inarticulate concepts , by means of which we
see everything appearing from there 602 but disappearing here 603 .
These concepts are inarticulate because, once formulated, they turn against themselves
and negate themselves. They must therefore be preserved in a state of suspended
consciousness. This self-questioning consciousness is probably the "ineffable
consciousness" which – albeit with the reservation that it is an improper expression – is
described by Damascius at the beginning of De principiis as the state which must be
assumed in the face of that "overwhelming truth" 605 . In his Henology, Damascius
describes the suspended state of our consciousness, which maintains itself in an open
attitude towards the first principle, as an "inarticulate demand" 606 , using an expression borrowed from Proclus .
Furthermore, the aporetic birth pangs of the soul can be summarized in a paradoxical
concept of the first principle, which Damascius calls "non-concept". (He asks himself:
"How, then, can our lack of concept of that, insofar as it is constituted in us, be
demonstrated?" 607 ) But this "lack of concept" is certainly nothing other than the
"inarticulable concept" which, according to the passage from the Parmenides
commentary quoted above, refers both to the Absolute and to the privative nothing. Our
terminological instruments are therefore the same in looking up to the first principle
and in leaning down over the gaping emptiness of the privative.
5) Another "familiarity" between the Absolute and the privative Nothing consists in the
methodical approach to the "inarticulable concepts" that attempt to capture the
consciousness of these two forms of non-being. In both cases, it is a kind of dialectical
reversal that stimulates and keeps alive the reflection on the twofold Nothing. The
philosophical tool of περιτροπή has already proven its effectiveness in the face of the
"inarticulable demand" for a radically negative principle. Now it is the same περιτροπή
that also produces and governs the self-contradictory idea of an absolutely non-
hypostatic in the sense of the purely privative:
The concept of the completely non-existent has in any case abolished itself (περιετράπη), once Plato had conjured it
up, and threatened to sink into the sea of dissimilarity, or better said: into the sea of abysmal emptiness 608 .
In general, the “non-concept” of the negative primal ground is dangerously close to the
“inarticulate concept” of the completely nonexistent, and our opinions about the
Absolute show a certain affinity to the occasional aberrations of the imagination:
An empty opinion, indeed, (is the opinion about the ineffable), like the opinion about the void and the indeterminate.
For just as we entertain opinions, born of imagination and artificially composed, about these non-existent things, as if
they were existent (as we also consider the sun to be a foot wide, although it is not so small), so too, when we express
any opinion about the non-existent at all or about the subject of this work, it is our own opinion and an empty
movement within ourselves 609 .
The conceptual circle that describes the reflection on the absolute nothingness in our
soul is always the same, regardless of whether it is about the higher-ranking nothingness
of the Absolute or the lower-ranking nothingness of the privative. The self-dissolution of
the concept of transcendence cannot even be grasped concretely as such, because in
such a case it would offer a positive foothold to the thinking of the Absolute: "This
sublation is not only not a non-something, since the non-something also belongs to
beings, but it is actually not even itself, namely sublation" 610 . Likewise, the complete
privation of being, insofar as it still leaves a residue of positive conceptual content, is not
exactly what is actually intended with the concept of an absolutely privative
nothingness. A radically negative is ultimately supposed to even cross out the crossing
out of being, like the "non-concept" of the first reason:
Absolute non-being is the complete passing away that necessarily occurs through the dissolution and dispersion of
beings, or better said: of the non-existent One. It is this non-existent One that is fragmented in passing away, and it is
obviously opposed primarily to absolute non-being as its complete privation, in such a way that this privation is not
privation in the true sense of the word, because it does not cling to being in the same way as blindness clings to the
eye. Rather, it is still the privation of non-being and no longer even privation 611 .
The abolition of the abolition is no longer even abolition. The privation of the privation
is no longer even privation. Are the dialectical processes that stimulate reflection on the
higher-ranking and the lower-ranking nothing one and the same act of thought? And do
they perhaps stem from the same ground, which is sometimes conceived as the primal
ground and sometimes as the abyss ?
The five conceptual constellations that were worked out and discussed above express an
ambiguity that is inherent in negativity thinking. The transcendence of the "ultimate
premonition", the "idleness within ourselves", the constant movement of flight, the
"inarticulate concepts" and self-abolition are just as many manifestations of our
necessary tendency to speak of pure nothingness and to reflect on it. However, the
question arises: How can we decide which of the two forms of non-being is to be
assigned to the absolute and which to the merely private? If in both cases there is talk of
a radical erasure of all contents of being, can it still be determined in this empty space
what is "above" and what is "below", what is "beyond" and what is "this world", or where
something "higher in rank" and something "lower in rank" are to be placed? What
criterion can be used to draw a distinction in the absolutely indeterminate?
The question contains the answer, as so often in Neoplatonism: the very fact that we
pose this problem points us in the direction of its solution, our "interest" in nothingness
and the complete commitment of our thinking to absolute negativity form the sought-
after criterion of distinction for the two dimensions of the otherwise so even and
indifferent "appearing" space of non-being. What we wish to grasp, what we want to tie
our principled thinking to, is the fertile nothingness of the first reason. On the other
hand, the flatness and lack of difference of the privative does not "interest" us at all. The
soul does not feel challenged by this unproductive form of non-being. It is not tied down
in an aporetic attitude by the merely imagined negativity, and this also means: the soul
does not feel any fascination with the privative nothingness. The only challenge for
existence is the Reconstruction of its own justification in an absolute origin. Absolute
origin, however, implies absolute nothingness. It is precisely the justifying power of the
first principle that prompts the soul's philosophical search. Its self-understanding
depends on the deep insight into the non-existence of the primal ground. Only
principle-based negativity can become the driving force of aporetic thinking. In contrast,
"the sea... of unhypostatic emptiness" 612 stretches out before the eyes of the soul like a flat and motionless
wasteland.
Damascius himself addresses the problem of the “distinction” between the two forms of
nothingness in the second question of the list of aporias that opens his commentary on
Parmenides ’ seventh hypothesis : “…Why do these negations 613 not also belong to the
one principle of all totalities?” 614 . In our opinion, the crucial point in Damascius’ answer
to this question highlights precisely the difference in the attitude of the soul towards the
two dimensions of negativity:
In general, the first hypothesis started from the assumption that the One is, and then showed that it is not even One.
In doing so, it first made the One the object of the soul's labor pains, which tend toward it, and then abolished it in
turn, according to the One's incomprehensible and absolute transcendence beyond all entities. But here the present
hypothesis (ie the seventh) abolishes even the labor pains of our conceptualization, so that it does not leave even a
vague idea of the One 615 .
the main difference between the first and the seventh hypothesis of Parmenides is that
the object of the dialectical exercise with which the main part of the dialogue begins is at
the same time the object of a striving of the soul. In contrast, the merely privative
nothingness does not in any way stimulate the "unspeakable birth pangs within us." 616
The idea of a total nothingness that would arise through the complete abolition of the
One is only the vain play of our imagination. It is in fact in the starting point of a partial
privation that the general privation of the whole is imagined. However, a general
privation of the whole is impossible because “the whole never passes away” 617 .
Damascius' thesis that the entire distance between the nothingness of the other world
and the nothingness of this world can be measured by the soul's fascination with the one
and its indifference with regard to the other - a thesis that is admittedly more implicit in
the attitude of his writings than it is discussed expressis verbis - is entirely a
consequence of that subjectivization of our speech about the Absolute that is
characteristic of Damascius' philosophy 618 . His view is perhaps the echo of a discussion
that can be found in Proclius' commentary on Parmenides . When it comes to
determining the σκοπός of Parmenides , Proclus claims, with a critical point that is
probably directed against the Neoplatonist Origen 619 , "that the discourse (of the first
hypothesis) deals with an object that has a reason for existence ( ὕπαρξις), and that this
mere One is not unhypostatic, as some have assumed" 620 . Proclus must therefore, in a
certain sense, recognize a "reality" in the One in order to maintain its distinction from
the privative, purely imagined nothing. In contrast, the Damascene revolution in the
ancient doctrine of principles consists precisely in the fact that something absolutely
unhypostatic - that is, in the literal sense, nonexistent - is thought of as the original
reason 621 . Of course, Proclus is well aware that “reality” is not necessarily identical with
“being” 622 and his entire metaphysics of the Absolute revolves around a radically
understood absolute principle. He grants the One a “hypostatic character” in the
broadest sense, but not being:
Even if that which the discourse is about is something real ( ὑφεστώς τί ἐστι), it is clearly not something that has
being, for Plato even denies the One being. It therefore remains only that the object of the first hypothesis must be
counted entirely among the entities that come after being, such as the world of creation or matter, or among those
that are above being. The object of the first hypothesis can in no way belong to the entities that are subordinate to
being, for every entity that comes after being participates in time, as does the world of creation (but Plato even denies
the One participation in time), or it is in some way, like matter. Of the One, however, Plato shows that it does not even
exist . Thus this, of which the proofs of the first hypothesis deal, stands above Being 623 .
In order to solve the problem of the "nature" of the object that the first hypothesis deals
with, Proclus has to go back for a moment behind the basic assumptions of his system.
In this context, he finds himself compelled to grant a certain being to matter in order to
establish its difference from the One. In contrast, Damascius turns his attention to the
soul, to its impulses and tendencies, in order to discover reasons for the distinction
between sublime and privative nothingness. The One that is posed as the object of
speech in Parmenides ' first hypothesis , according to Damascius, stimulates the birth
pangs of our soul, while the privation of the seventh hypothesis brings our thinking to a
standstill. Philosophy ends with privative nothingness as the result of a purely logical
operation. But philosophical reflection is brought into a productive state of unrest by the
claim to think the radical non-being of the very first principle.
Parmenides quoted above also reveals another difference to Damascius. While Proclus
relies on the "proofs" of the first hypothesis to develop a concept of the absolute One
("Thus this, of which the proofs - ἀποδείξεις - of the first hypothesis deal, stands above
Being"), Damascius has no justification that could put us on the safe track of the
Absolute, because this, by virtue of its non-hypostatic character, constantly eludes our
grasp. Only self-abolition can lead to reflection on the Absolute.
Of course, the subject-centered metaphysics of Damascius receives crucial inspiration
from Proclus. The Damascene reflections on the two forms of non-being and on the
assignment of privative nothingness to fantasy are inspired by Proclus, whose ideas the
last scholar continued and radicalized. Proclus had already established the affinity that
exists between the idea of perfect privation and the concept of the negative primal
ground. For this reason, he demanded a strictly regulated methodology that would give
us the awareness of an orderly ascent and an unquestionable progression, at the end of
which would be the experience of the absolute and principled negativity of the One:
What is needed is therefore the power of proof in the preliminary exercises, the activity of the mind in the exploration
of being – for the orders of being are denied to the One – and the rapturous striving in the reflection on that which
transcends all beings, so that we are not inadvertently pushed out of the negations into non-being and into its abyss
by the unlimited imagination 624 .
A few pages later, when the question arises as to whether the apophatic path is merely a
means of our own cognitive weakness, Proclus draws an even stronger line between the
One and Nothing in his commentary on Parmenides . He lets the former be the goal of a
divinely inspired elevation, while the latter is a mere toy of the imagination: "Although
the One prior to Being is a non-being, it is by no means a nothing. For if it is One, it can
no longer be called 'nothing'." Damascius crosses precisely this dividing line when he
understands the first principle as nothing and not even as nothing. But Proclus
continues with a thought that will also bear fruit for his successor:
We will therefore address the One as non-being and think of it as such on the basis of the similar non-being that is
within ourselves. For even in our inner One there is a seed of that non-being. We assert that the One transcends all
beings, only insofar as we are not thereby inadvertently led into the indeterminate and merely imagine non-being
instead of striving for it entheastically. For this would not only separate us from the One, but also from the
knowledge of Being 625 .
Damascius thus takes over from Proclus the attribution of the lower-ranking non-being
to the faculty of the imagination, while the higher and sublime non-being of the first
principle constitutes the object of a correspondingly more reverent attitude of mind. But
while for Proclus the negativity of the One represents the object of a fulfilled,
"entheastic" and mystical experience, the Damascene Absolute, which even transcends
the One and the union, can no longer be captured by any experience. The "hypostatic
character" of the One, of which Proclus sometimes speaks, is certainly not to be
understood in the literal sense. Rather, this improper choice of words by the Lycian
describes the One as the waiting place and basis of our spiritual standstill. Damascius'
bold way of speaking of the Absolute as nothing and, ultimately, as unhypostatic, has
above all the function of shifting the concept of the primal ground from the objectifying
focus of our spiritual gaze. For the last scholar, the Absolute eludes our grasp completely
and a “saturated”, satisfactory and final experience of the ἀπόρρητον is not possible.
is actually not a negative term at all 626 . While ἄρρητον expresses the difficulty or
impossibility of saying, ἀπόρρητον rather denotes the distance and remoteness of the
first principle 627 . With this word discovery, Damascius probably wanted to express the
constant flight of the Absolute 628 . The translation of τὸ ἀπόρρητον by "the ineffable"
equates this concept with that of ἄρρητον, which does not exhaust the linguistic
richness of the Damascene choice of words and even alienates it 629 . For it is certainly not
irrelevant that a critic of negative dialectics is not satisfied with a negative term
(ἄρρητον) to describe the Absolute, but prefers to resort to a symbolic term that traces
the constant retreat of the primal ground behind all horizons open to us. One might well
ask whether the German language could not perhaps do justice to this evasive and
slipping movement of the ἀπό-ρρητον with a word like "das Ent-Sagte". In any case,
Damaskios is fully aware of the novelty, if not of his choice of words, then at least of his
philosophical intention and the project arising from it 630 . In this sense, the "Ent-Sagte"
could certainly be recognized as a metaphysical new creation. Damaskios' ἀπόρρητον is
"a word in the image of silence" 631 .
1.8 “It is neither productive nor sterile”: omnipresence or
ineffectiveness of the Absolute?
Damascius had begun his meditation on the Absolute as a reflection on the first
principle of being. However, step by step the rigour of his demands led him to remove
all determinations from the primal cause he was seeking. speak, even those that are
included in every complete concept of a first principle . Thus, at the beginning of the
investigation, when Damascius' reflection on the first reason was still guided by a search
for principles and the radical demands on a coherent protology had not been fully
formulated 632 , it was said that the ineffable was the origin of the entire processional
emergence of reality:
But if we seek any reason for the assumption of the Absolute, the most compelling of all reasons is that from there, as
from the innermost core of a temple, everything proceeds from the Ineffable and in an ineffable manner. For it is not
as the One produces the multiplicity and the Unified the Different, but as an Ineffable and in an ineffable manner it
produces everything equally . 633
However, Damascius had already begun to make his fundamental claims to a “theory” of
the Absolute. This should be more sublime than all causes and caused things and
compared to all principles and principates 634 . Damascius thus claims a transcendence of
the first principle even beyond the principle-being, in the spirit of the Speusippus
fragment transmitted by Proclus 635 . Immediately after he proves the absolute necessity
of the “fundamental first assumption” 636 by presenting the highest principle as the “holy
of holies” of a reality conceived as a temple precinct, Damascius, in his apophatic zeal,
sets out to strip away from the original source all the previously mentioned
determinations, including the term “temple interior” (ἄδυτον):
When we say all this about it, namely that it is ineffable, that it represents the innermost temple of the whole, that it
cannot be grasped with the mind, and thereby abolish our own concept (περιτρεπόμεθα τ ῷ λόγ ῳ), we must be aware
that these designations are terms and concepts that arise from our efforts to give birth to a concept of the Absolute.
These birth pangs lead us to a bold exploration of that Absolute, and yet we only stop in the vestibule of the innermost
temple 637 .
The thinking of the first principle had now already begun, driven to its limits by the
ruthless dialectic of the Damascene, to to describe an arc that would soon close into a
circle. In this circular thinking, which is directed against itself, what was initially taken
as a basis is gradually seen through as a mere tool for our speculation. As the awareness
of transcendence of his listener or reader matures, the scholar can finally take the bold
step of bringing the negative power of his terminology to the fore and allowing what was
initially asserted to collapse in on itself. While at the beginning of his search for
principles the Absolute was understood as the starting point of a regular "procession" of
hypostases, albeit one that exceeds rational comprehension ("in an unspeakable way"),
at the end of the "aporrhetic" part of his main work Damascius, with the highest degree
of protological effort, simultaneously reaches the lowest point of our knowledge of the
ἀρχή. It is the decisive peripeteia of thinking in which knowledge, which has already
turned into ignorance, turns into super-ignorance. Having reached the ultimate basis of
our speech and our concept of the Absolute, Damascius says: "It does not allow itself to
be partaken of Him, nor does It pass on any of its gifts to those entities that come from
It" 638 . Damascius' statement initially appears to be only the radicalized development of
an older idea, especially since such a consequence was already contained in Proclus'
quotation of Speusippus. However, no one had ever expressed it with such ruthlessness.
As soon as one becomes aware of its full content, it reveals a break with the tradition of
force metaphysics, as expressed, for example, by Plotinus: "And the good is gentle and
mild, it is the more tender and dwells with man as he wills it" 639 .
Even the form in which Damascius dresses up his disenchanting saying seems
paradoxical upon closer inspection: the ineffable gives nothing to the entities that come
after him (οὐκ ἄρα μετέχεται, οὐδὲ μεταδίδωσί τι ἑαυτοῦ); yet these entities are "from
Him" (ἀφ' ἑαυτοῦ). In this way, Damascius answers a question that he had asked
himself shortly before regarding a possible causality of the Absolute 640 . Several
characteristics seemed to indicate the admissibility and even necessity of an origin from
the highest principle: Firstly, the term “principiate” implies dependence on and origin
from the first ἀρχή as well as participation in it. Secondly, there is nothing that could
limit the absolute power of the primal ground, so that nothing could come between the
omnipotence of the principle and its principalities. Thirdly, the order of reality
presupposes that the hypostases in the descent increasingly move away from a first
principle, but in the ascent experience a constantly growing assimilation to it, so that
they also become ever more suitable for participation in the Absolute. Finally, we could
possibly not "sense" anything at all of the "existence" of the ineffable if there were not an
image and a "trace" (ἴχνος) of the primal ground in our soul. Guided by these
considerations, Damascius considered for a moment the possibility of an emergence
from the ineffable. But he was quick to immediately deny a deduction of being from the
Absolute: the ineffable would in this case be the cause of ineffability; but in this way we
would also transfer everything that can be said to the ineffable, "as if the ineffable
everywhere suffered the divisions of the sayable" 641 . Furthermore, the claim of a
derivation from the primal ground would add a third sequence of entities to the two
parallel series of hypostases that can be demonstrated on the basis of Parmenides '
second hypothesis 642 , that is, the substantial and the unified: the hypostasis chain of the
"ineffables". Such an idea is not acceptable, however, because we would "do exactly what
we previously rejected, namely, introduce unity and multiplicity into the ineffable, the
sequence of primary, middle and final hypostases, and finally persistence, emergence
and return to that". In general, we would "many times mix the sayable with the
ineffable" 643 . For these reasons, Damascius denies the idea of an emergence from the
highest principle. Thus, the first ἀρχή does not fulfill its most important task. It does
not do justice to the very determination that led to its "positing". Together with the
principle character of the first “principle”, the view of an ontological derivation from it is
also excluded: “Consequently, this time too, discourse in its self-abolition
(περιτρεπόμενος) reveals the former to be unsayable, since it entangles itself in all
possible contradictions in its departure from the subordinate entities” 644 .
In this way, Damascius demonstrates the inherent contradiction of the Neoplatonic
conception of a πρόοδος from the Absolute. Moreover, the analysis of the scholar will
prove the same περιτροπή phenomenon even in our conception of the existence of a
process from the One . The concept of a πρόοδος from the ἕν also undergoes a
dialectical reversal, which is brought about by the idea of absoluteness, which is
immanent in the concept of unity. For neither the One itself as absolute simplicity, nor
that which precedes it, nor finally that which is subordinate to it (because the latter
already presupposes the process) can be the principle and the beginning of the process.
The abolition of the idea of a future nature of reality from the One can be traced back to
this aporia:
The discourse threatens to dissolve itself into its own starting point (περιτρέπεσθαι), because every process makes a
distinction and constantly requires an intermediate cause for the distinction, and this ad infinitum ( ἐπ' ἄπειρον) 645 .
However, something strange happens precisely with the self-abolition of the πρόοδος
concept. The concept of a process from the first principle abolished itself due to the
insight that a radically understood first principle could not even be a principle, i.e.
neither the cause nor the basis of a "procession of being". The concept of a derivation
from the One abolished itself in turn because an absolutely posited One denied any form
of distinction, i.e. also the idea of a descent from its simple "essence". We see that it is
actually always the same self-abolition that runs through the individual stages of reality
in various forms. The immanent contradiction of the concept of absoluteness forces any
view of the origin of reality from a first principle to self-dissolution. From the higher-
ranking nothingness to the lower-ranking nothingness, through the middle levels of the
absolute One and the unified Being, all levels of the hen-ontological hierarchy
experience the effect of a fundamental inner-conceptual discrepancy. This is the
immanent self-contradiction of the idea of transcendence. At every level of the ladder of
hypostases, a self-cancellation is at work: “And what should be surprising about that” –
asks Damascius immediately after establishing the περιτροπή of the Absolute and its
process – “if we also come into similar aporias when thinking about the One, and even
when thinking about the absolutely unified and the absolute Being?” 646 However, the
περιτροπαί that force our thinking to question itself as it slides up and down the
hierarchy of Being are nothing other than the corrosive consequence of that essential
negativity which characterizes the original, fundamental concept of transcendence 647 .
as a whole constitutes a large-scale περιτροπή. At the moment when the scholarch
denies the possibility of an emergence from the Absolute and when the listener of the
Platonic school leader realizes that the "corrosive" effectiveness of the concept of
absoluteness attacks all hypostases, a dialectical reversal occurs: a πρόοδος from the
transcendent does not exist and fundamentally cannot exist, which is why the other
"subordinate" transcendent principles, the One and the unified Being, also close
themselves off to the emergence. However, this happens by virtue of the
"contamination" of the One and of the unified Being with the self-cancelling content of
the concept of transcendence, so that, surprisingly, one can speak of a presence of the
ineffable Absolute on the levels of reality inferior to it, insofar as it is precisely the
imitation of the Absolute that establishes the transcendence of the entities immediately
following it (the One and Being). A further περιτροπή, which takes place, so to speak, on
the level of meta-discourse, allows the Damascene to return again and again to the
paradoxical omnipresence of the ineffable in every single hypostasis. As an example, we
quote a passage from the Damascene Parmenides commentary, which we take from the
context of a critique of the Proclean πρόοδος doctrine:
…It must be said that the ineffable of every entity, which comes from the ineffable principle, remains eternally
transcendent with respect to the entities below it, precisely because of this and because of the analogy. This ineffable
of every entity can be described as neither productive nor sterile, because it stands above everything that comes after
it, just as the one principle behaved in relation to the whole 648 .
We learn from this passage that there is a special ineffability of every single essence (τὸ
ἑκάστου ἄρρητον) and that this ineffability of the respective hypostases represents the
effect of a principle of absolute ineffability (ἀπὸ τῆς ἀρρήτου ἧκον αἰτίας). It is
precisely this share of absoluteness which ensures the transcendence of every level of
being over those subordinate to it (δι' αὐτό γε το ῦτο κατὰ ἀναλογίαν μένει τε πάντων
ἐξῃρημένον ἀεὶ τῶν ἐφεξῆς). For Damascius, the "individual" ineffability that is
inherent in each level of the hen-ontological hierarchy turns out to be something that
can be called "neither productive nor sterile" (οὔτε γεννητικόν ο ὔτε ἄγονον). The
careful reader of the scholar's philosophical works will certainly remember having
encountered this expression before. It is the same formula that Damascius had applied
to the ineffable itself in De principiis :
But if It is to be indicated by anything, one may have recourse to the negations of those predicates and say: "It is
neither unity nor plurality, neither productive nor sterile (οὐδὲ γόνιμον οὐδὲ ἄγονον), neither primal ground nor
non-ground, " while even these negations - I do not know exactly how - completely cancel each other out into infinity.649
One and the same expression is used by the scholar both in reference to the highest-
ranking and to the particular unsayable. This once again illustrates the derivation of the
latter from the former.
But one must take Damascius' decision to free the immanent transcendent of every
being from the dichotomy of "fertility" and "sterility" completely seriously. The
inarticulate at the "top" of the pyramid of being is "not at all productive and not at all
sterile". Its precipitation in things, that inarticulability mentioned above and which is
inherent in this world, is itself "neither productive nor sterile". In view of the rigor of the
Damascius' demand, the idea of a genetic connection between the immanent
inexpressible and the absolutely inexpressible must be abandoned. It would completely
contradict the scholar's intention if one were to interpret the transcendence in things as
the production of the transcendence outside of things. This would be in stark contrast to
the radicalism of the Damascene project, which seeks to conceive the first principle as
something completely unsayable, of which not even its productive power can be stated.
Shall we then, to use Damascius' own words, "put the final word" 650 and renounce any
further discourse on the Absolute? Is the purpose of the first part of De principiis ,
undoubtedly the most fascinating but not the final one, that of (self-)censorship? Can
we trust the Neoplatonic search for God and principles to have such a reduced aim? And
is the extensive and complex continuation of the Damascene system merely an
“interesting” scholastic footnote to a profound but inconsequential prologue of silence?
The question must be asked in what form the ineffable affects the entire system of
hypostases of Damascius, as it is reflected in his own philosophical system.651 We have
seen that the "effect" of the ineffable cannot be understood as positive productivity,
because the Absolute is superior to this, as it is to its opposite. If, therefore, the influence
of the first, negative principle on the hierarchy of hypostases is by no means to be
interpreted as the production of the immanently ineffable in every being, we must
consider in what other way the "effect" of the Absolute could be traced and put into
words. Since the questioned principle of the first principle cannot exert itself as a
dynamic effectiveness – and Damascius will sharply criticize the Plotinian view of the
primal ground as the “power of all-being,” which he takes literally652 – since the
transcendent does not impose itself as a universal generative force, only one possible
interpretation of the paradoxical “effectiveness” of the Absolute remains: the shadow
cast by the “height” of transcendence over immanence is nothing other than the
omnipresence of the Absolute within reality. It is not the “effect” of the ineffable that is
inherent in the One and in being, but it is the ineffable itself that is present everywhere
in things. If a hypostasis chain of “unspeakables”, with a monad and its corresponding,
numerically determined and serial escort ( ἀριθμός), is not conceivable at all, then the
“futureness” of the immanently unspeakable from the absolutely unspeakable means
precisely the presence of the latter in all entities: “The one principle of the whole passes
through all things, so that the unspeakable is also present in all things” (διὰ πάντων
πάρεισιν ἡ μία τῶν ὅλων ἀρχή, ὥστε καὶ τὸ ἀπόρρητον ἐν πᾶσιν) 653 .
But the question arises as to how exactly the presence of the transcendent in the midst
of its “principiate” is to be understood. What does it mean that the Absolute manifests
its presence at every level of the pyramid of being? In no case can the ineffable “core” of
all entities be interpreted in the sense of an “effect” that might be brought about by an
“activity” of the Absolute. This would bring about a causal sequence of apophatic non-
entities. and Damascius has already demonstrated the absurdity of such a conception.
Rather, it is the "principiate" themselves that cling to the constantly evading "principle"
and constitute themselves as emerging from it. They rush after the constantly fleeing
"principle" and reflect its absolute transcendence in a relative transcendence that they
preserve in relation to their own principiate. The absolutely transcendent thus becomes,
for the entire hen-ontological hierarchy, the model of transcendence in general. The
"effectiveness" of the Absolute is therefore not an actual production of reality, but a
dependence of the latter on the "failing" principle (ἀπόρρητον)
But how can the dependence of the subordinate entities on their "ineffable" principle be
understood in concrete terms? We can hope to find an answer to this question from the
continuation of the passage quoted above on the "ineffable of every entity". In this
section of his commentary on Parmenides , Damascius had claimed that the immanent
transcendence of the individual hypostases stems from the absolute transcendence of
the ineffable. Now he sets out to apply this insight to the realm of pure and unified
being:
Now perhaps that which persists is also productive, and is even the principle of all things subordinate to itself, albeit
in a transcendent manner and as something which persists in itself and not by acting through the secondary entities.
This would then be the activity of the higher principles, which is praised as being indefinite and which is detached
from the secondary entities. This activity does not experience any process, but runs through the whole without mixing
with it, and everywhere transcends the entities which it governs by remaining with itself 654 .
This central passage requires some explanation: “That which persists” (α ὐτὸ μὲν ὃ
μένει) is the absolute being, which is the theme at this point in the commentary.
However, the reflection on the specific productivity of the hypostasis of being becomes
the occasion for a more general reflection on the “efficacy of the higher principles,
praised as indefinite” (ἀπερίγραφος ἐνέργεια ὑμνουμένη) in general. It is an “efficacy”
that does not exercise itself in the mode of emergence, but rather expresses itself
precisely by persisting in its transcendence and “transforming the whole through runs
without mixing with it" (διὰ πάντων ἀμιγῶς χωροῦσα). Although it is present to all its
principalities, this activity remains forever identical with itself (πανταχο ῦ τ ῶν δι' ὧν
πάρεισιν ἐξῃρημένη ἐφ' ἑαυτῆς) 655 . How is this to be understood? Immanence is only
possible on the basis of transcendence, this-worldliness on the basis of other-
worldliness, emergence on the basis of absolute persistence. The complete unity of being
enables the manifold appearance of the "subordinate entities" through itself, through its
mere unshakable existence. As something that remains in itself, the unified being
becomes "productive", but "in a transcendent way". This apparent paradox is by no
means a hieratic, impressive and meaningless metaphor. Precisely because of its
transcendence, the unified being protects the multiplicity of its principalities, which
constitute themselves into a plurality on the demarcation foil of the ἡνωμένον. In this
sense, Damascius can certainly claim that the unified works ἐξ ῃρημένως, i.e. "in a
transcendent way".
This movement of thought clearly illustrates the specificity of Damascus philosophy: the
“procession” of metaphysical entities takes place as an unfolding of dialectical concepts
that evoke or generate each other in the interplay of opposition 656 . What is What was
theogonic history of being for his great Neoplatonic predecessors, especially Iamblichus
and Proclus 657 , becomes in Damascius a dialectical process that is kept going by the
tension between positivity and negativity, transcendence and immanence. This is
certainly connected with his renunciation of the traditional force metaphysics of
Platonism, which is replaced in the last scholar by an absolute presence metaphysics.
The dynamic and objective "emanation" of divine figures takes the form of a conceptual
dialectic that takes place on the level of the spirit. This in no way leads to a
detheologization of the Neoplatonic system, but rather to a dialectization of the
metaphysical history of the gods.
In the passage discussed above, the "productivity" of unified being is also "immobilized"
to a certain extent and interpreted using dialectical pairs of concepts: persistence-
emergence, priority-subordination, otherworldliness-inwardness. The very conceptual
content of such concepts as "remaining in itself" or "unified being" presupposes the
diversity of the entities that are distinct from it and are subordinate to it. Therefore,
strictly speaking, one can no longer speak of a "progression", because the world of
multiplicity is already given at once when the Absolute is established. The system of
objective-energetic movement of "classical" Neoplatonism is transformed into a static
system by Damascius in the context of a veritable "revolution" (in the sense of a turn to a
purely spiritual, dialectical standpoint). In the eternity of the spirit, the νο ῦς preserves
an unwavering overview of its concepts.
We return to our question: How exactly is it to be understood that "that which remains"
produces the secondary entities "in a transcendent manner"? In what sense can
Damascius say that the "efficacy praised as indefinite" of the primal causes "does not
experience any process"? And what does the scholar actually mean when he claims that
the ineffable, which is inherent in every hypostasis, "comes from the ineffable principle"
and "remains eternally in a transcendence with respect to the subordinate entities"? The
transcendence of a metaphysical entity establishes the worldliness and inner-
worldliness of its principal entities. Their unity releases the subordinate hypostases into
the freedom of a perfect wholeness. The diversity of the future entities unites into a
perfect totality thanks to the removal of their principle. The polarity of the objective
concepts of being calls forth the opposites, one from the other. Already in the At the
moment when we conceive the unified being as the origin of what is subordinate to it,
the differentiated multiplicity is also thought of and posited as the principle of the
unified. We wanted to think of pure unity and absolute transcendence, but our thinking
thereby turns, dialectically, into the concept of difference and immanence. Thus the
Damascene can write that the principle is "productive" in that it merely persists in itself.
But if we say that "that which persists" unfolds its effectiveness in the modality of
transcendence, then even the distinction between unity and multiplicity, between
primary and subordinate, must be transcended. For we have already seen that the term
"transcendent" is self-contradictory. Our thinking thus transcends the duality of unity
and multiplicity into a higher unity, the absolute One itself:
Rather, the One has not been fragmented at all, but, remaining as one and the same, it is present in everything and at
the same time in each individual as his own essence 658
. In doing so, it does not fragment itself, because it is all in one
unity and therefore does not need fragmentation 659
.
This One should be thought of as that which is without opposites. As such, however, it is
placed close to the absolutely transcendent.
It is thus clear to us that the idea of the "production" of the whole is mediated by the
concept of transcendence: we ask about the specific productivity of the principles and
thereby see "the transcendent manner" of their productive power. The transcendent
modality of the justification of being, however, refers us to ever higher and more
comprehensive levels of reality. What guides us is the idea of transcendence itself.
Damascius' main thesis is that only in the manner of the otherworldliness, of
transcending, can a metaphysical principle unfold its justifying function. As a result of
such a consideration, Damascius claims that "the ineffable of every essence", the
internal transcendent of the individual hypostases, "derives from the ineffable
principle". It is the claim of absoluteness of transcendence that makes the idea of
metaphysical productivity possible. The establishment of being can only be conceived on
the basis of transcendence. The immanent transcendence of a level of being refers to the
ever higher, more powerful greater transcendence of the superior level of reality. The
guiding principle of such an ascent, however, is the pure concept of absolute
transcendence. In a certain sense, every particular being singled out from a certain hen-
ontological dimension is the incomplete reflection of the absolute transcendence, which
condenses and dissolves in the ἀπόρρητον. The respective, particular otherworldliness
of the hypostases is only the diminished image of the absolute primal ground. In this
way, it can certainly be said that the ἄρρητον, which rules everywhere within the
pyramid of being, and in each case to a greater or lesser degree, means the
omnipresence of the fundamental ἀπόρρητον.
Through the removal of the Absolute, the whole of Being is preserved as a whole 660 .
However, this removal of the first principle is to be understood neither as beyond nor as
within the whole of Being. The absolute transcendence of the ineffable rather implies the
dialectical transformation of the same into an omnipresence of the ἀπόρρητον, albeit of
a negative nature, so that this omnipresence cannot be held in the form of a positive
presence. Thus the requirement posed by the opening aporia of the Damascene
Protology is fulfilled: the first principle is neither absent from the totality of Being –
otherwise this totality of Being would not be a totality in the strict sense – nor “merely”
“caught” within the ontological totality, because in this case the totality of things would
remain without principle. The fundamental achievement of the Damascene is to have
recognized that the hen-ontological whole is incomplete without its immanent
negativity. The perfect, "rounded" positivity is not complete without the negative.
Negativity, however, implies freedom and independence from the positive. The negative
must transcend positivity and encompass it from the "outside". But since the positive is
itself because of the negative, the negative also creeps into the positive. In this sense,
negativity is both transcendent and omnipresent within reality. As it remains outside
positivity and in a transcendence with respect to it, negativity is no longer even negative.
For, towering above every thingness, negativity increases into an absolute otherness and
transcendence with respect to being and for this very reason "turns around", so that in
the end the Negativity finds its way into positivity. The objectivity of the first principles,
which is inaccessible to our minds, is an absolute. However, the thinking of these
principles, and above all the thinking of the first principle, reveals itself as the
paroxysmal restlessness 661 of a dialectic that is never “saturated.”
The radically transcendent, as the complete concept of the Absolute, is dialectically
present in every particular and relative transcendent. We say "concept" to do justice to
the noological, spiritual-subjective perspective of the scholar. For Damascius, every talk
of the Absolute takes place from the perspective of the spirit. But because the spirit itself
is a future entity and develops from a negative primal source, it itself rests on the chasm
of non-being. Just as the entirety of the spiritual architecture rises on the "hollow space"
of a void foundation, so do the partial concepts of the νο ῦς as individual νόες. The
presence of the negative is at work in each one. But negativity means self-reference and
self-abolition. Therefore, the thinking of every principle, of the One and of Being, no less
than that of the Absolute, is directed against itself. Does this imply a self-abolition of
philosophy? Not at all. The role of philosophy and dialectics consists precisely in
perceiving and illuminating the negativity inherent in metaphysical concepts, in
awakening awareness of the inner abyss of being and in describing the positivity of the
ontological in relation to its negativity.
The conclusion that follows from the previous considerations is that it is precisely the
absolute, inarticulable transcendence of the first principle that enables the constitution
of its principals into a perfect totality. The paradox is only apparent when it has to be
said that only on the basis of the radical absoluteness of the origin can the unification of
the founded into a coherent totality come about. This is conceivable thanks to the non-
hypostatic character of the ἀρχή, whose most rigorous thinker is Damascius. It is
therefore clear why the most consistent of all metaphysicians of transcendence is at the
same time the most subtle analyst of the concept of "totality". One of the fundamental
contributions to Damascius research has even highlighted the peculiarity of Damascius
philosophy in comparison to the other "Neoplatonisms". want to see precisely in the fact
that this has brought the concept of totality to the foreground 662 .
Consequently, it cannot be claimed that Damascius, after the installation of the super-
ignorant silence, continues as if nothing had happened. It is precisely because of the
withdrawal of the Absolute that the dialectical history of being comes together to form a
system . The protection of the hidden principle frees being into perfection, that is, into
the completeness of its own essence. Thanks to the positing of the abysmal primal
ground, the hen-ontological totality can become central in metaphysics. It permeates the
whole of reality in graduated forms, as "elementary" (στοιχειωτόν), "totality" ( ὁλότης)
and "wholeness" (παντότης), from the pre-holistic One to the phenomenon of time 663 . In
the following we want to understand this descent into temporality, which is constantly
tied back to the Absolute and remains conscious of its omnipresence.
2 Hen dyadikon: From a cataphatic to an apophatic
henology
2.1 The henological antinomics
The Absolute is "the one ineffable encompassing of all entities at the same time, so
ineffable that it is neither one nor encompassing and no longer even ineffable" 664 . The
ineffable is ineffable to such an extent that it even loses the predicate of ineffability.
With this, thought has reached the final limit of its possibilities, the point where
discourse sinks into an inarticulate consciousness of transcendence: "Thus, the reach of
our discourse may also find its limit, by asking the gods for indulgence for this
presumptuous request" 665 . These words form the conclusion of the "aporrhetic" part of
De principiis. The Absolute now ceases to be explicitly thematic within the discourse.
But just as the painter Apelles 666 achieves the desired artistic effect precisely when he
stops directing his strenuous will towards the object of his art, so too does the
transcendent reveal its overwhelming greatness only at the moment when discourse has
given up the objectification of the absolute. Again and again the ineffable shines through
in the seemingly unified and closed fabric of the Damascus system. When one least
expects it, it announces its presence with a momentary brilliance, only to be
immediately taken back into a timid and reverent silence.
The consciousness of transcendence is most powerful when it refrains from attempting
to grasp the first principle in an objective way, that is, from looking it in the face, so to
speak. For the first, absolute principle is “non-objective” 667 . The consciousness of
transcendence is consequently necessarily mediated. This explains the special type of
interweaving of ἄρρητος συναίσθησις and dialectic in Damascius' philosophy. If the
consciousness of transcendence can only be expressed in the mediation To keep the
Absolute awake, we must ask: What mediating entities can stimulate the "ineffable birth
pangs in us, to awaken the ineffable - I don't really know how to express myself -
consciousness of this overwhelming truth"? 668 An exhaustive experience of the Absolute
cannot be given to us. But what other experience allows us to sense the inaccessibility of
the Absolute as inaccessibility? Talking about the Absolute is just talk about our own
passions. But what passions are we talking about here? How are these πάθη constituted
in us? That is, in the environment of which entity do these passions develop? In a word:
what is it exactly that grants us the inarticulate consciousness of transcendence?
The henological part 669 of De principiis begins with the question of mediation:
As for that essence, let us abandon our busy aporia and embarrassment! Instead, let us turn to the One itself and
examine whether it is entirely expressible or rather the essence we seek in the middle between the inexpressible and
the expressible! 670
The theme of unity had already been discussed several times in the section dealing with
ἀπόρρητον, due to the proximity that exists between the Absolute and the One:
Much has also been said before about the essence of the One, because of its necessary connection with the principle
which transcends even the One. For we hold on to the essence of the One in an attempt to speak of that principle
which it was not possible to hold on to… 671
The proximity of the One to its original cause simultaneously brings us ourselves into
the proximity of the Absolute. Our own unity is the closest thing to us and through the
experience of unity we gain insight into the abyss of the Absolute. The circling of the
ineffable continues in this way in Henology 672 .
First of all, the question arises as to the sayability or insayability of the One itself. In
other words, the problem is formulated as to “whether the One is in any way knowable
or absolutely unknowable” (εἴ πῃ γνωστόν, ἢ πάντῃ ἄγνωστον) 673 . In the manner of the
skeptic in utramque partem disputare, several arguments for and against the
knowability of the One are contrasted. For the purposes of the present work, it will be of
particular importance to understand how this henological antinomic is resolved and
why a certain semblance of equality could arise between the two “columns” of the
argument – an semblance which has even led to the opinion in Damascius research that
the scholar would not finally decide for the knowability or unknowability of the One 674 .
The Damascene’s apophatic piety is expressed once again at this point, because the
scholar’s skeptical reserve has a decidedly mystical touch:
But who can set himself up as the arbiter of such lofty speeches, which are opposed to one another in dispute over
such a difficult matter? The purest truth on this subject is known only to the gods themselves. However, we too must
be permitted to venture to bring the aporetic birth pangs to maturity, insofar as divine providence and our own ability
allow us to participate in the truth we are seeking 675 .
Damascius lists the following arguments for the recognizability of the One:
1) The first way to grasp the One concretely could be called the "method of reduction
and synthesis" 676 . If our thinking can work out the concept of a perfect unity through
"reduction" (ἀναλύειν), then a divine mind will be all the more able to do so. The One is
therefore comprehensible, at least by a superhuman cognitive faculty 677 .
The fact that we conceive the One as a "something" that is opposed to multiplicity shows
us that we can think the One. Even if this knowledge is definite and "ideal" (ε ἰδητικόν),
we are nevertheless able to think the "indeterminable One before the Ideas" (τὸ πρὸ
τῶν εἰδῶν ἀπερίγραφον ἕν) by forming the concept of the "simplest essence" (τὸ
πάντῃ ἀπλούστατον) 678 .
Furthermore, every idea and every being is a specific unity, without "being an idea" and
"being a being" on the one hand and "being one" on the other being identical. Since we
can unite the ideas into the totality of the spirit and the beings into absolute being, it is
certainly possible to combine the specific units into an undifferentiated one. For just as
the synthesis of an infinite number of mathematical points only results in a single point,
so the combination of an infinite number of units only results in a single,
undifferentiated unity 679 .
Ultimately, everything that presents itself as an object of knowledge has the form of
either a unitless multiplicity, a multiplicity that participates in unity, or again a pure
unity. The first alternative cannot be maintained in consistent and coherent thinking,
but in the last two cases, the One is something thinkable.
2) After listing the operations above that can lead to the articulation of a thought of the
One, Damascius tries to define the cognitive faculties that convey to us the essence of
the One. All our thinking takes place sub specie unitatis , because unity accompanies all
our acts of thought. But we are also able to form the concept of an absolute unity in a
conscious way. This happens firstly thanks to a "hybrid reasoning" (νόθος λογισμός), by
transferring the application of this form of knowledge from non-being below being (ὕλη)
to non-being above being (ἕν), whereby the "hybrid reasoning" has recourse to analogies
and negations; secondly, thanks to an "intuition" ( ἐπιβολή) or "a universal knowledge”
(ἑνιαία γνῶσις). Such a form of intuition is primarily the way of knowing of the gods,
but we too can acquire this ability if, to speak with Plato, we ‘direct the ray of light of our
soul upwards’ and ‘allow the calyx of our unified knowledge to open’ (τὴν αὐγὴν τῆς
ψυχῆς ἀνακλίνωμεν, τὸ ἄνθος αὐτὸ προβαλόμενοι τῆς ἑνοειδοῦς ἡμῶν γνώσεως) 680 .
But if there is a unity vision, then the One must be the knowable object of this unity
vision 681 .
3) Furthermore, the "participable God" must know himself. By the μεθεκτὸς θεός,
Damascius probably means the unified being as the first henad in which the individual
beings participate. Because the "participable God" has a perfect self-knowledge, he
knows not only his essence, but also the unity that constitutes him. Thus the One is
knowable 682 .
4) In general, since a particular idea is knowable as an idea and a particular being as a
being , why should not a particular one also be knowable as one ? That then the
knowledge of the one is not immediate (οὐκ ἀμέσως) should not be surprising, for the
knowledge of ideas is also mediated by perceptible things, and yet we know the ideas 683 .
5) The following arguments for the knowability of the One take the form of conclusions
which start from the concept of a pre-ontological, unified totality: If everything has its
origin in the One, then knowability also has its origin in the One, and the One itself is
knowable. Furthermore, if the knowable is existent and the existent is knowable, then –
since the knowable is one – the One is also knowable. Finally, if the One is everything
and knowability is a part of everything , then knowability will also be a part of the One.
The One is therefore knowable 684 .
After going through the arguments for the knowability of the One, the corresponding
arguments for the unknowability of the same follow, in reverse order:
1) Even the unknowable is part of the whole. If the One is everything , then it is also
unknowable 685 .
2) If the One is the whole in the strict sense, then it is completely undifferentiated, and
the knowable will no longer be distinguished from the unknowable. But if it is known,
then it must also recognize (since being recognized and knowing are correlative
concepts and only occur together). If knowledge comes to the One, then it will either
recognize what is before it (but the ineffable is unknowable), or itself (and self-
knowledge will cause a duality in the One) or finally its principalities (but then its
activity will be directed towards what is of lower rank). None of the three alternatives is
possible, consequently knowledge cannot come to the One. Without possessing a
cognitive faculty, the One cannot be recognized either, since γνωστόν and γνωστικόν
only occur in correlation 686 .
3) The knowledge of individual, concrete units does not necessarily imply the
knowledge of the "absolutely One" (τὸ ἁπλῶς ἕν) 687 . In this second column of his
skeptical exercise, Damascius also denies that there is any cognitive faculty through
which we could grasp the One. Thus, the syllogistic method of knowledge is suspect to
the Damascene from the outset, since the syllogism seeks to progress from an entity that
is known to us to something that is still unknown to us. But if the “simple” concept is
unknown to us, we cannot carry out the synthesis in the syllogism: “In general, if one
does not know the simple, one cannot understand the whole premise and consequently
also the whole syllogism” (Ὅλως δὲ εἰ μὴ οἶδεν τὸ ἁπλοῦν, οὐκ ἂν εἰδείη τὴν ὅλην
πρότασιν, ὥστε οὐδὲ τὸν ὅλον λογισμόν). Of the two forms of "hybrid reasoning",
negation and analogy, the former abolishes what we know in order to leave what we do
not know. Knowledge through analogy fails because of its exemplary implementation in
the sun parable of the Republic: seeing requires light in order to reach what is seen, and
light is a third thing that comes from outside, so to speak. But in knowing the One, the
light of truth can no longer come from outside, because the One is the origin of the
intelligible light, it is therefore beyond this light and cannot itself be seen in it 688 .
4) The knowledge of the One always carries with it the correlative concept of
multiplicity. The absolute One, on the other hand, which we seek, knows no opposite
from which it could be distinguished (τοῦ δὲ ἑνὸς ἡ ἔννοια ὀφείλει ἀναντίθετος εἶναι
καὶ μία παντελής) 689 .
5) Furthermore, being known and the One are not the same, because then the One
would no longer be an absolute unity. (But they are not different either, for in that case
the predicate of difference would belong to the One, and the One would no longer be
itself.) But if the One should be knowable, then either by participation, by cause, or by
subsistence. If the One is knowable by participation , then there is before it the
knowability in itself, in which it participates. If the One is knowable by cause , then it is
not itself knowable, but is merely the cause of knowability. If the One is knowable by
subsistence , then it is a unity merely through participation; the "substance" of the One
would then be the mixture of unity and knowability (τὸ συναμφότερον ἕν γνωστόν),
which attains its unity only through participation 690 .
6) If the first principle has the character of all-unity and if knowability means at the
same time determinability and isolation, then the One, as an indeterminable all-one, is
not knowable 691 .
7) Finally, the One occupies the highest level within the structure of "reality", beyond
the spirit, intelligible life and being. Each of these three levels of being corresponds to a
particular form of return to the One. Knowledge is the last of the three paths of ascent,
and above these three ἐπιστροφαί there is the return in the mode of ἕνωσις. Since the
first principle “requires” of beings that they rise to the One in the first form of
ἐπιστροφή, that is, “as One to the One through unification and not through knowledge”
(ὡς ἓν πρὸς ἓν δι' ἑνώσεως, ἀλλ' οὐ διὰ γνώσεως), the One remains unknowable 692 .
Despite the skeptical model of a confrontation of equal "dogmatic" views, the
Damascene's preference for a negative-dialectical conception of the One is obvious. This
is not least due to the scholar's unity-theological and apophatic piety, due to a religious
consideration that prevents him from wanting to know "too much" about the nature of
the One. A clear indication that Damascius firmly supports the absolute unknowability
of the One is not only the more intense pathos of his argumentation as soon as negative
henology is mentioned, but also the fact that he has a larger number of arguments to
offer for the inscrutability of the One. However, the Damascene juxtaposition of thesis
and antithesis, which is followed by a decisive position in favor of the latter, is by no
means about the mere victory of one argument over the other. Rather, the conflict
between the two views has the meaning of a genuine antinomy, in the Kantian meaning
of this word 693 . The discord of the double view of ἕν is deeply rooted in our minds and
actually stems from the spirit-transcendent and paradoxical nature of the absolute One.
Damascius thus asks about the peculiar justification of the positive conception of unity.
He by no means dismisses it as groundless, but declares himself willing to justify the
thesis of the knowability of the One in a restricted sense, and implicitly asks how its
probability , if not its veracity, could be justified.
In order to prepare the ground for a thorough negative henology and at the same time to
shed light on the meaning of the knowability of the One, Damascius first raises the
problem of the relationship between the One and the Many. The concept of the "One" is
caught up in a relationality, and we have already had occasion to note that Damascus'
philosophy is largely carried out as a pure conceptual dialectic, because "of the
correlative concepts, one follows the other everywhere" 694 . For this reason, when
speaking of the One, the question of its relationship to the multitude must necessarily be
asked. The very approach to the question is, despite or precisely because of its
simplicity, of astonishing originality: for instead of deducing the multitude from the
One, according to the old Neoplatonic tradition, the Damascus dialectic puts the
plurality together with the ἕν 695 . This is completely plausible when one considers that
the One cannot even be asked about outside the horizon of the multitude and difference.
In surprising heterodoxy towards the dogmatic habits of his school, Damascius writes:
But now at least this much must be held that after the One there is everything. For there is not only the One, but also
the differentiated multiplicity subordinate to it. That the latter is not that One is obvious. Consequently the
subordinate entities are differentiated from it, if not insofar as each one represents a One, then at least insofar as it is
not-One. This non-One is not a negation, but the positing of that which is beside the One (θέσις τοῦ παρὰ τὸ ἕν) 696 .
The doctrine of the equality of one and many is the consequence of the Damascene view
of the process of origin. The Scholarch had discussed the πρόοδος in the counterthesis of
his antinomian movement and we must now return to it in order to better understand
the relation ἕν – πολλά.
When it came to denying the knowability of the One, Damascius defined knowledge as a
form of turning back. Turning back, however, is nothing other than that metaphysical
movement which abolishes the process of the unfolding of being in its origin, for the
ἐπιστροφή – as it will later be called in the section of De principiis on the philosophy of
being – is precisely the “correction of the emergence” from the principle (τῆς ἐκστάσεως
ἐπανόρθωσις) 697 . The question of the cognitive turning back to the One therefore
depends on the concept of the process of emergence. But is an emergence from the One
even conceivable? From the point of view of those entities that are subordinate to the
One, the idea of an exodus from the ἕν is self-contradictory, because this would imply a
detachment from the One and thus a fall into nothingness:
It is not possible for anything to come out of the One and then return after the process of coming out. For how could it
come out, since it has not differentiated itself? And how could anything be differentiated from the One and not fall
into nothingness? For that which transcends the One in the slightest degree is not-one, and therefore nothing 698 .
From the point of view of the One, the assumption of a process is threefold impossible 699
. The emergence of reality from the unified primal ground presupposes a differentiation.
But what will be the origin of this differentiation? The One does not experience any self-
distinction. It is the "cause of unification" ( ἑνώσεως γὰρ τὸ ἕν αἴτιον) 700 and by no
means the originator of differentiation. The separation will then be brought about either
by that entity which stands before the unified principle - which is absurd, since in in this
case a differentiating power would take precedence over the unifying one - or of the
hypostases that come after the One. "But how will the cause (ie the One) suffer anything
from the effect of the caused?" 701 Therefore, if neither a self-differentiation of the One
itself, nor the Absolute beyond the One, nor finally the entities after the One can bring
about the process from the absolutely simple primal ground, such an extraction of the
hypostases and the generation of plurality from the One is unacceptable:
Nothing, therefore, comes from the One, nor does the process of originating from there, but only from that primary
entity, which can also distinguish itself from the things subordinate to it, just as these also differ from it… 702
But by “that primary essence” is meant the unified being.
Based on the argument outlined above, Damascius undertakes nothing less than the
overthrow of a cornerstone of Neoplatonic philosophy, the central idea of the emergence
of metaphysical entities from their unified original source. If the application of the
concept of "emanation" is already inappropriate for the metaphysics of Plotinus and
Proclus, its inappropriateness in the case of Damascius is all the more obvious. Not only
can there be no talk of a "flow" of the hypostases from an excess of power of being, but
even every form of distinction must be stripped away from the concept of the One,
which amounts to the radical negation of any differentiation starting from ἕν 703 .
Retracing Damascius' rejection of the emergence from the One will now enable us to
better understand his new definition of the relationship between the One and the Many:
Damascius begins with the "simple" comparison of the One and the Many, which as
conceptual opposites presuppose each other and in a certain sense "complement" each
other. His systematic theory of unity is thus the beginning of dialectical henology.
However, this apparent equality gradually dissolves in favor of a priority of the One,
because the Many is to be distinguished from the One as non- One and is dependent on
it precisely for this reason:
And yet this too is a One, not insofar as it is not-One and is beside the One, but because even this not-One has not
completely separated itself from the One. Rather, it remains in some way rooted in the One, and the not-One is due to
the One 704 .
A difference between the non-One and the One ultimately only exists "for the observer"
(τῷ ἐπιβλέποντι) 705 . This means that it is only a perspective illusion that the "observing"
mind suffers when it projects its inner eidetic difference onto the One. Basically, the One
has never left the non-One. Damascius' writing takes on almost Plotinian accents when
he speaks of a real (metaphysical) "loyalty" that preserves the all-embracing unified
principle even against those entities that alienate themselves from it. This turning away
from the One is in no way due to the simple primal ground's own division. It is not the
self-withdrawal of the ἕν that is to blame for the non- One becoming the non -One. This
one moves away from its origin out of its own will and assumes that it can shape itself
into the other of the One. But the One constantly catches up with the self-differentiation
of the non-One:
On the other hand, the One still clings to the Non-One and does not depart from it, even insofar as this is Non-One.
For the Non-One, whatever it may be alongside the One, is still One according to participation, because it has become
Non-One. Now, then, the Non-One makes itself Non-One, while the One makes the Non-One One, by anticipating the
difference of the Non-One by virtue of its union. The Non-One is therefore different from the One because it becomes
Non-One 706 .
Damascius even seems to want to allude to the religious vocabulary of apostasy when he
speaks of the apostasy that the non-One is guilty of towards the One . 707 The apostasy
from the One is always only one-sided. It is the multiplicity and the non-One that
"believe" that they have renounced the One, and do not know that the all-founding
presence of the One has preempted their self-differentiation by taking it back into its
absolute simplicity. Even in the forgetfulness of unity, the world of multiplicity retains
the One as its very own basis of being:
The One, on the other hand, does not differ from the non-One, since it also makes the non-One into One, even when
the latter turns away. It is so far from being different that it does not even separate itself from the apostate , but with
its unifying participation it even takes up in advance the differentiating reason for existence ( ὕπαρξις) of that
apostate. For without the One there could not even be a reason for existence ( ὕπαρξις), so that participation (in the
One) also establishes the reason for existence; but this means that the union establishes the distinction 708 .
Damascius' doctrine of the eternal rooting of the non-one in the one goes hand in hand
with the negation of the ontological process from the ἕν discussed above. In the depths
of its being, being has actually never separated itself from the one. Yet within it there is a
lack of awareness of its belonging to the one. Awakening this awareness is the goal of
human existence and the spiritualized life of the soul. However, this awakening does not
even take the form of an epistemological return, because the multifaceted reality has
basically never left its unified origin for a single moment. Diversity already remains in
the one, although without having discovered its own fundamental condition of being.
Only the awareness of this anchoring in the absolutely simple principle must be brought
to its full development. Tearing oneself away from the slumber of forgetting unity
constitutes the experience of ἕνωσις:
Every single thing becomes One and Not-One, so that the Not-One has a hold thanks to its anchoring in the One and
does not dissolve into nothingness. But insofar as the Not-One is One, it is still together with the One. To put it more
precisely: As One, the Not-One did not emerge from the One. What is more: The Not-One did not even emerge from
the One as Not-One , but the One constantly anticipates even the slightest distinction of the non-One. Consequently,
the non-One in no way turns back to the One from which it did not emerge 709 .
From the Damascene's point of view, it is actually not enough to say that the plurality of
beings remains within the grasp of the One. Diversity is not only rooted in the One, but
is rather the One, albeit without knowing it or "wanting" to know it, which is why the
emergence of a fully valid consciousness of unity in the multiplicity is equivalent to a
rediscovery of one's own essence. But the question arises as to how the area of plurality
could have come into being in the first place, when the innermost essence of all
multiplicity is nothing other than the One itself. The approach of dialectical henology
itself provides an explanation for this problem: since the many and the non-one are
founded alongside the One and in it, since τὸ ἕν with its unifying grasp abolishes the
distinction of its opposite in itself or has even always abolished it, this distinction is only
the one-sided self-differentiation of the multiplicity starting from the One. From the
"standpoint" of the unified principle, the falling away of the many and the non-one from
their supporting original source has never taken place. It is only the movement of
turning away that makes the observing consciousness believe that it is distant from the
one. This arbitrary reversal is accompanied by a narrowing of the field of vision: the
complete horizon of oneness narrows to a special field of vision, the limits of which are
privation and nothingness. The process of differentiation into the dimension of
multiplicity is therefore self-inflicted and one-sided 710 . Damascius illustrates this
situation using the example of a person who turns away from the sun. Such a person
could believe that he has moved away from the sun, but he always remains, without
knowing it, in the omnipresence of Helios:
The sun is present to the man who has open eyes but cannot see because of some eye disease, as well as to the one
who can see, even if he should not be present to the sun because of his own apostasy 711 .
With this line of thought, Damascius justifies his doctrine of one-sided opposition,
which not only determines the relationship between one and many, but will also be
effective in numerous other “places” of his system 712 . In this context, he introduces the
principle of a speculative logic, which differs from the logic of the understanding, which
only governs the relationship between equal entities: “We do not want to fear the logical
principles, for these extend to the elements of the same class in which the relata have, in
a certain sense, the same value or a similar nature” 713 .
The complex of ideas of one-sided opposition is probably inspired not least by
Iamblichus, a philosopher whom Damascius held in particular high esteem. In response
to Porphyry's objection regarding the appeasement rites and the gods' capacity for
suffering expressed in them ( 714) , Iamblichus had responded with a similar thought
pattern that emphasized the one-sidedness of the gods' distance. The so-called "wrath of
the gods" is by no means a form of revenge, writes Iamblichus, but rather our own, self-
inflicted dete "turning away from the good-giving care of the gods" (τ ῆς ἀγαθοεργο ῦ
κηδεμονίας τῶν θεῶν ἀποστροφή). This turning away movement is similar to the one
we perform under the fierce midday sun when we ourselves choose the shade and the
semi-darkness. In contrast, religious service, which aims at appeasing the gods, is
equivalent to a “return” (ἐπιστροφή), which frees us from the “privation” (στέρησις) 715 of
divine care and puts us back into “harmony” (κοινωνία) with the latter:
This anger is by no means, as is believed, some old and stubborn rage, but a turning away from the good-giving care
of the gods, which we have specially accomplished, just as we cover our heads under the light at the height of day,
thereby leading ourselves into darkness and depriving ourselves of the good gift of the gods. The service of mercy can
therefore make us turn back at once to the higher participation, direct the divine care that has been withdrawn from
us to the community, and bind the participating and the participating entities together in universal unanimity 716 .
As for Iamblichus, so too in the metaphysics of Damascius, God is omnipresent. Man
who closes his eyes cannot, by this gesture, dispute the luminous presence of God any
more than he can dispute the omnipresence of the sun: "When we close our eyes, we
leave the sun, which does not leave us, even when it sets. So God is also present
everywhere, but we separate ourselves from him through the unworthiness of our
conduct" 717 .
The return of multiplicity to the One takes place according to the respective standard of
its distinction from it. However, since in the true sense of the word no distinction has
taken place at all, but everything has always been founded in the One and immersed in
the perfect unity of the ἕν is, the actual realization of the return must be asked: The One
is the true, deeper essence of every entity. An awakening to the consciousness of
belonging to the One is like a return to one's own ground of being and thus a discovery
of the respective self. The One hovers before every entity in the form of its
corresponding goal and thus also in the form of its own self-perfection. As the
undifferentiated of the self-differentiating, the One takes on the names of its
"principiate", although the same "entity" is constantly thematized, from the first to the
last hypostasis 718 . Only these hypostases gather in different densities around the One as
their respective center. According to the standard of their self-dissolution, the
ontological structures also find their way back to their center:
If, then, something has thus differentiated itself from the Undifferentiated, what prevents that which has
differentiated itself from healing its differentiation by turning back, so that not only the One is present with it, but
itself is present with the One? It is evident that it is present with the One according to the standard of differentiation,
from near or from far. Just as every entity is essentially different from the One, so too it is capable of turning back to
the One. And just as the One remains undifferentiated in relation to everything that differentiates itself, so it remains
the same in relation to everything that turns back, and is the one, undifferentiated end of all beings. As one and the
same it is together with every individual emerging entity and is named by its distinguishing quality, as, for example,
"the substantial One," "the One of intelligible life," "the spiritual One," remaining itself everywhere One, but receiving
its epithet from the participating entities. I do not at all say that it is divided by the many particular qualities of the
gods, but I look at the absolutely One, which is immanent in each one and is prior to the particular One. Nevertheless,
I transfer to the One the designation of the entities to which it is present, even if it is indistinguishable and
everywhere a whole One. In this way, then, it is the same end which each entity attains according to its own difference
and to which it gives its respective name, according to its own perfection, because it receives this from that end. By
this it posits it as that which it attains and from which it attains something 719 .
As the basis and essence of all beings, the One claims the role of a foundation in relation
to the many and the non-one . The ἕν is neither the power that establishes being – with
which Damascius believes he is turning against Plotinus – nor the cause of the
subordinate and not yet being – which is probably meant to be understood as a criticism
of Proclus. Rather, the One is already everything, which is why it must be addressed as
the reason for existence (ὕπαρξις) 720 of all entities:
For that too is all according to the basis of the One, it is together with each one as its own root, and appears to each
one as its own end. Precisely what the whole is in a separate form, this is also that One according to unity, and not
according to power, as one might well think, or as the cause of that which has not yet come into being, but, if one may
say so, as the existing basis of beings, and indeed as the only basis, that is, as the only existence of all-sustaining
essence 721 .
We now understand in what sense we can speak of an antinomic henology in Damascius.
The conflict between the two views of the One does not arise from the coincidence of
scholastic doctrines, but is inherent in the constitution of our own view of the One and
actually already inherent in the One itself. The One is the fundamental existence of all
beings. As a result, it will "bear" the existence of every individual entity. To a
perspective-shortened view, it will even seem as if the One were to take on the
particularities of its "principiate". The omnipresence of the One is the reason for the
view that the One is isolated and exists as something special in each being. But every
particular being is also recognizable. Thus the All-One appears as recognizable,
according to the "theses" on the cognoscibility of the ἕν listed above. However, the
recognizability of the One must not be reduced to a "thesis", to a particular positing.
“Thesis” and “antithesis” must be thought together and thereby overcome. This thought
together should be “according to the undifferentiated ground of existence” (κατὰ
ὕπαρξιν τὴν ἀδιάκριτον), which is not “the united one before the whole”, but in its
“over-simplification” transcends the whole (τὴν πάντων ὑπερηπλωμένην) 722 . What
initially appeared as “dialectical henology” is now transformed into a theory of
transcendence of the One:
Now, as the One accompanies every other entity, so it is together with the knower as a knowing One and already exists
beforehand as an object of knowledge, not in such a way that it is partly a subject of knowledge and partly an object of
knowledge, but rather as both together, beyond these two, or, to be more precise, in a transcendence beyond both
together. For the One is everything, not on the basis of distinction, but before distinction 723 .

2.2 The One as “Whole before the Whole” and as Shadow of the Absolute
The One is everything at the same time in a perfect unity, and therefore also the
knowing, the known and the knowing. From this, Damascius develops a dialectical
discussion, which is again staged as a “soliloquy”:
"The One knows then?" - Well, this is a property of distinction. - "Then it is not known?" - This too is something that
belongs to distinction, at least if it is true that "knowing" is opposed to "being known." No such determination is
appropriate for that One, for not even "the One" is appropriate for it, nor "the Many." Even these determinations
fragment our comprehension 724 .
The intentionality of thought is first of all directed towards the One as something
recognizable, but this only happens “from a distance”, that is, from the perspective of
the spirit soul, which occupies an inferior position within the hierarchy of being. In the
ascent to the absolute simplicity of the first principle, the self with the higher realms of
reality, which amounts to an increasing unification of the fragmented being:
So in our ascent have we encountered the One as knowable, or have we wanted to encounter the One as such and in
doing so have dissolved into the unknowable? Well, both are true: we also encounter the One as something knowable,
and from a distance, and as soon as we are united with it, we transcend our ability to know the One and are placed in
the state of being the One , that is, in the state of being the unknowable instead of the knowable. This connection of
One to One now stands above knowledge, whereas previously we spoke of the relationship of a knower to the
knowable 725 .
The elevation to the One takes the form of an ever-narrowing circle around the
immovable, but also "nonexistent" center of the Absolute, which is also completely
unattainable precisely because of its non-hypostatic character. Thanks to the unity of
ideas, the folding self reaches the higher unity of holistic being and thus comes close to
the "over-simplified" One. However, the transcendent simplicity of the ἕν is not
conceived by Damascius as an absolute negation of multiplicity, but rather as the
complete "compression" of plurality. The self-gathering of the multiplicity around the
ineffable Absolute reaches such a degree of unity in the One that the totality of the ἕν
turns into super-unity and transcendence. By reducing its contents to ever more unified
concepts, thought can finally focus on the One itself:
For divisible ideas come together, test one another, and find their perfection in that summit which gathers towards
the one and the simple, by a certain convergence, such as that which takes place in a circle at the centre, when the
many radii drawn from the edge of the circle converge to the centre. We too are in a state of division, but when we
focus on the indivisible, a certain impression of the knowledge of ideas is stirred in us, just as the one, uniform and
spiritual folding of the circle from all sides and towards the centre gives a vague idea of the invisible centre. In the
same way we also ascend to being, first of all by comparing every idea which occurs to us as something already
divided with the We understand the mind not only as indivisible, but also as unified. In doing so, we melt together the
immanent multiplicity of every idea, if we may express it that way. Then we also simultaneously summarize all the
different entities and abolish their circumscriptions, just as we let many waters flow together into a single,
uncircumscribed water. The only difference is that we do not think of the entity that is united from all, as it were as
the one water, but of the entity that precedes all entities, just as we recognize the idea of water before the
differentiated waters. In the same way we simplify ourselves to the One by first gathering (the multiplicity into a
unification) and then again sublating the gathered entities into the oversimplified transcendence of that One, which is
exalted above these entities (εἰς τὴν τούτων ὑπερηπλωμένην τοῦ ἑνὸς ἐκείνου ὑπεροχήν) 726 .
To describe the One, Damascius uses the expression: "the whole before the whole"
(πάντα καὶ αὐτὸ πρὸ τῶν πάντων) 727 . But what exactly does "the whole before the
whole" mean? The pre-wholeness of the One has a double meaning. It is to be
interpreted firstly as an indication of the founding character of the One, which
encompasses all things in a perfect simplicity and at the same time brings them into
being. The "property" of the One of being "the whole before the whole" also means that
the ἕν constitutes the essence of every individual which enters into the totality of being.
The whole before the whole is therefore the One also in the sense that it is with each of
the things which together form the whole:
Now the One, as the whole before the whole, is both knowable and knowing, just as every other entity is, although not
exactly as I say and as every entity is, for these entities are caught up in difference and stand in opposition to one
another. Rather, the One is together with each of the different entities, and indeed in each of their own way 728 .
According to Damascius, the true self of every individual being is the One in itself. This
One is by no means the specific and particular ἕν that arises in discursive thinking
through a process of abstraction, but rather that One that is at the same time the
absolute primal ground of the whole of being:
For the one of man is the truer man, the one of the soul is the truer soul, and the one of the body is the truer body. So
also the one of the sun and the one of the moon are the truer moon and sun. And yet the one is not one of these
different things, even if it constitutes their truer essence, but only that one which is prior to each one 729 .
From the previous discussions it has become clear that the One is ‘the whole before the
whole’ not only in the sense that it also founds the whole which it encompasses, but
above all because of its presence in each of the individual things which make up the
whole of being. The One thus becomes the very essence of the whole and is the whole to
an even greater degree than it is the whole itself ( ἔτι μειζόνως πάντα τὸ ἓν ἢ τὰ πάντα
ἐστίν) 730 – a formulation which is reminiscent of Augustine’s Confessions both in its tone and in its
content 731 . However, for Damascius, the One is by no means a god, but rather
superdivine, just as it is also “supersimple” (ὑπεραπλοῦν) 732 and even, in an
identification with the Absolute itself, “ineffable” (ἀπόρρητον) 733. The superdivinity of
the One can be deduced from the fact that “no God is ineffable without first being
unitary” 734 , while the super-simple primal cause “is not even one” (ο ὐδὲ μὴν ἕν) 735 . If
unity is therefore a condition for being a god, then the essence that transcends even the
ἕν stands beyond divinity. For this reason one can certainly not speak of “pantheism” in
the Damascene philosophy, but rather of a panhenotism , of a doctrine of all-unity sui
generis. In this doctrine of all-unity, the reason for the existence of all things (the
ὕπαρξις) is the One itself, while the idiosyncratic particularities of the multiplicity (its
ἰδιότητες) represent only a substantially inconsistent turning away from the universal
primal reason of the ἕν.
If the One is present in the innermost being of every being as its basis of existence, then
the self-discovery of existence occurs as an awakening to the awareness of its
fundamental unity and as a discovery of its belonging to the All-One:
We are constantly climbing the steep slope towards the ever more indivisible and are in a certain way conscious of the
one-form, even in its fragmentation. We consider this fragmentation as nothing compared to the concentrated
comprehension of that one-form. We could not even see the latter together if a certain imprint of concentrated
contemplation had not stirred within us… 736 .
In our soul, then, there is a "trace" of the presence of the One, just as there was a "trace"
of the Ineffable here below, which allowed us to sense the paradoxical, absent presence
of the Absolute 737 . The One itself is ultimately only the "symbol" of the Aporrheton , just
as the unity of the One is merely a symbol of the over-simplicity of the ἕν. The whole
itself can be seen as a cipher for the all-encompassing character of the One:
Now, when we look up to simplicity and the One, we lose its all-embracingness and its all-perfection. But when we
think of everything as a whole, we dissolve the One and the simple. The reason for this is that we are dismembered
and look at dismembered particulars. Nevertheless, we long for the knowledge of that Essence, however this may
come about, and weave all things together, for perhaps by this very means we may be able to participate in the great
Essence. But we are wary of the consolidated multiplicity of the Whole or the narrowed particularity of the One, and
we give ourselves up to We are satisfied with the "simple" and the "first" as designations for the most venerable
principle. In this way we also assign to it the designation "the one", as a kind of symbol of simplicity. Finally, "the
whole" is also the symbol of all-embracingness. But that which stands above or before the two we can neither
understand nor name 738 .
For Damascius, the "whole" is nothing other than the manifestation of the perfectly
unified totality of the One. The precisely thought ἕν, present in the imagination, is in
turn an expression of the over-simplicity of the absolute One. The One, finally, is an
expression of the radical transcendence of the Absolute. In this sense, Damascius
compares the One with a statue and the ineffable with the Holy of Holies where this
statue is located. The context of this illustrative speech is once again a discussion about
the identity of knowability and unknowability in the One, which gives the scholar the
opportunity to "determine" the "relationship" between the Absolute and the One:
Is the One, then, unknowable in its own essence, even if the unknowable is something other than the One? The
unknowable, however, wants to be in itself and together with no one else. But while the One is unknowable as that
which is opposite to the knowable, that which transcends the One is absolutely ineffable. We by no means admit that
we know or do not know this, but we assume the attitude of super-ignorance ( ὑπεράγνοια) towards it. By touching
this, the One too is obscured, for while it is in the immediate vicinity of the overwhelming principle, if one may
express it this way, it remains, as it were, in the innermost temple of that silence 739 .
In the “innermost temple” of the Absolute, a movement of flight begins, which sweeps
all metaphysical entities along with it and causes them to become intertwined. The One
becomes the mysterious symbol of the ineffable itself, and unity in turn becomes the
“symbol” of the simplicity of the absolute One. Beyond this symbolic separation between
the transcendent principles, a complete indifference reigns in the midst of the super-
intelligible realm. Only the differentiating gaze of the spirit carries the separation and
the eidetic classification into the absolute identity of the first ἀρχαί 740 . Damascius’
philosophy is thus constituted as a symbolic protology 741 , which makes the theurgic
vocabulary fruitful for a “sober”, purely conceptual-dialectical metaphysics.
For the purpose of his symbolic protology, Damascius evidently draws on the "hieratic",
high-priestly vocabulary of Iamblichus. Some passages from Abamon's answer to
Porphyry's letter to Anebon should be used for comparison:
Of the sacrificial acts that are always performed in the worship of the gods, some have an ineffable and super-rational
cause, others have been dedicated from eternity as symbols (σύμβολα) to the higher beings, others again preserve
some other image (εἰκών), just as nature in the process of creation has formed certain visible forms of the invisible
rational causes… 742
Therefore, the ritual names of the gods and the other divine characteristics (συνθήματα) have the power to elevate the
priests to the gods and to unite them with them 743 .
Furthermore, for Iamblichus, certain cultic acts are to be understood as symbols
(ἔνδειγμα), which actually refer to metaphysical and divine-historical contexts 744 .
The reader of Damascius will find such vocabulary in the writings of the last scholar, as
for example in the following passage, which we select for illustration:
"Monad," "limit," "father," "ground of being," and "ether," are, if you will, different things in this fragmented world, as
their names suggest, while in the transcendent realm they are all testimonies or symbols of a single essence. Likewise,
the One, although different from each of the above objects, is a symbol ( ἔνδειγμα) 745
which refers to the same essence.
In a similar way, let us further consider "the many" as the image ( ὑπόδειγμα) which, by analogy, refers to the other
essence, the one which is subordinate to the one just mentioned. Its names are "the unlimited," "the indeterminate
duality," "the mightiness," "the chaos," and whatever else one may think of for the purpose of a representation which
contributes to a greater degree to knowledge 746 .
Damascius thus applies the language of ἱερατικὴ θεραπεία 747 and ἱερὰ ἁγιστεία 748 to
metaphysical entities. While Iamblichus's thinking culminates in the theory of an
intellectually interpreted theurgy, Damascius' system takes on the aspect of a "theurgic
philosophy" in which the emphasis is on pure thought. For Damascius too, the salvation
of the soul takes place in a form of activity, because the bliss of the inner life is achieved
through "deed". However, this activity is no longer identical with the cultic universal
formation of the prince of God, but rather consists in the tireless implementation of the
conceptual dialectic. It is the referential character of philosophical concepts that
awakens the consciousness of unity and transcendence in the sunken soul and calls it to
reflect on its belonging to a higher and more intensive life.

2.3 Transition from dialectical to apophatic henology

What has been mentioned so far should now be articulated in more detail. The
definition of the One as "whole before the whole" is by no means understood by
Damascius as a positive determination of the ἕν. Rather, the interpretation of the One as
πάντα πρὸ πάντων is the exact opposite of this: it is the formal proof of the
transcendence of the One. The path that leads the scholars from a dialectical henology,
which stands on a subordinate level in the "shadow" of the Absolute, to a radically
negative henology, which even suggests an identification of the One with the Absolute,
will be described and followed below. At the end of this path, attempts to relativize the
Damascene doctrine of unity must be questioned and the paradoxical and dynamic
relationship that exists between the One and the aporrheton must be considered more
precisely.
First of all, it is important to draw attention to a formal characteristic of Damascus
philosophy in general: the form that the scholarch gives to his metaphysics is by no
means that of a final, rounded lecture, in the context of which each step could be
considered a solid preliminary stage of the next, so that truth was built upon truth in an
uninterrupted chain. In Damascius, metaphysics is to the highest degree dramatized,
that is, the form in which it appears is not only seen as an expression of the content, but
is included in the philosophical material itself. The "external" but at the same time
unmistakable sign of this fact is that the development of Damascus thought is driven
forward by constant self-correction. In this way, the method of the last scholar returns
to the original Socratic, "interrogative" form of the φιλοσοφία 749 . Each step of his
explanations is true only from the point of view of a higher truth which absorbs the first
step into itself. Often it is even the case that the first step simply contradicts the second
(a peculiarity which contributes to the particular difficulty of reading Damascius), while
the second cancels out the first in itself. It is a dialectical method which has a lot in
common with the "Phenomenology of Spirit".
This should be noted before we direct our next efforts to examine how Damascius turns
his initially positively conceived henology against itself by resorting to the περιτροπή
procedure, transforms it and converts it into a radically negative doctrine of unity.
By removing the ineffable principle from the overall context of reality, it was possible to
secure it as a perfect, self-contained, and therefore "coherent" totality. The One showed
itself to us at the beginning precisely in the form of such a totality. It is that secondary
entity according to the aporrheton which, placed on the immediately following "being"
level, already came into the "duty" of containing the ontological wholeness within itself
through the compulsion of system classification. The surplus of transcendence
attributed to the Absolute thus allows the ἕν to slip into an equation with the totality of
reality. But this unity totality must not be thought of as συναίρεμα 750 , as the addition of
objective to objective, so that the unified primal ground of the whole would ultimately
be only the sum of everything that contains objects. Rather, opposing views must correct
each other so that a “hunch” or a “consciousness” from the paradoxical and
overwhelming nature of the One: συναισθανόμεθά πῃ καὶ ἐν τῷ μερισμῷ τοῦ
μονοειδοῦς 751 . The idea of a unified whole should be corrected by the knowledge that the
One simultaneously constitutes the nature of each individual, the essence of the
individual himself. This view of the One corresponds to our need to bring our own self
into connection with the transcendent One 752 . In general, our thinking is constantly
trying to establish connections and only with the greatest effort does it manage the leap
into transcendence. From this natural need arises a representation of the process of
emergence from the One, to which a spontaneous and unavoidable antinomy attaches:
"In general, we desire to gain insight into what exactly we possess of that universal
primal source" (καὶ ὅλως ἐπιποθοῦμεν ἰδεῖν ὅ τι ἔχομεν ἡμεῖς ἀπ' ἐκείνης τῆς κοινῆς)
753
. It is nothing less than our individual being that we trace back to that "sublime" One.
For the One "is the whole to an even greater degree than it is the whole itself". The
simple primal cause of everything represents the authenticity of the whole and in this
sense it is close and familiar to every individual. However, this devotion of the One to
every particular existence must not be misinterpreted as a process of separation into the
multiplicity of individuations. Precisely because every individual being is in complete
possession of the whole unity and is fundamentally this whole unity (of which only the
consciousness and not the presence, which is already infallibly given, needs to be
actualized) – precisely because of the complete devotion of the One to every being, the
thesis of the isolation of the One must be dialectically withdrawn: “And yet the One is
not one of these different things, even if it constitutes their truer essence, but only that
One which is prior to each one” 754 . Was the idea of the One devoting itself to every
individual existence just a momentary illusion? Not at all, because human thought,
which is always one-sided, had to go through the efforts of a contradictory view in order
to learn, thanks to the perspective tornness, that reconciliation of opposites which is
inherently alien to the "titanic", i.e., judging nature of the soul.
It is the paradoxes of the process that give Damascius the opportunity to clarify the
relationship between wholeness and particularity in the context of the One:
In the face of such aporias, we want to start again and call upon the saving God here too. That One is everything and
not just one, but is everything in the manner of the highest simplicity. This simplicity is the reduction of everything
and is pre-holistic. The One does not create unity, because that which creates unity also stands in a difference.
Furthermore, it does not create multiplicity, and for the same reason, nor is it that which gives the other entities their
particularity, but it is simply and plainly a principle which brings about commonality and totality (κοινοποιὸν ἁπλῶς
αἴτιόν ἐστι καὶ παντοποιόν). It does not produce all the different entities as a whole, just as it does not produce the
united entities. There is a single cause of both the former and the latter, and this is prior to both kinds of being. The
One therefore produces neither anything united nor anything differentiated, but the whole in every possible way. For
the essence of the One is neither different from nor united with anything, and does not go hand in hand with the
changes of any part of the whole. For in such a case it would no longer be the whole, but that together with which it
would be differentiated. The One has not particularized itself, but rather rejects the particular. No part, then,
separates itself from the One in order to reach the individual in a particular or other way 755 .
In this passage, the possibility of a process of emergence from the absolutely simple One
as well as participation in the One is denied. Although the ἕν constitutes the innermost
essence of every single individual, it has not isolated itself, because it has not
experienced any descent. Damascius wants to prevent the One from condescending to
the world of multiplicity. Our particularizing view of the ἕν must be expanded to include
the whole. In In this sense, Damascius considers for a moment a general participation
in the One – a participation that could begin not with the individual, but only with Being
as a whole: “Perhaps a common and unique participation of the whole emerges from it
(sc. the One) and advances towards the whole” 756 . This would, however, lead to a
distinction between participation (μέθεξις) and reason for existence ( ὕπαρξις), which
cannot be assumed in relation to an entity whose most important characteristic is
absolute simplicity:
In this case, the participation is differentiated from the cause of existence. But no differentiation (i.e. in the One) has
yet taken place, neither of the cause nor of the cause of existence nor of the participation. Consequently, nothing
proceeds from it, since nothing remains in it so that it could proceed, for the persistence always precedes every
process. One cannot yet speak of differentiated entities in relation to the undifferentiated essence 757 .
Damascius's Neoplatonic predecessors would resort to the symbolic concept of "folding"
to explain the original relationship between unity and multiplicity 758 : for Plotinus, the
whole of being is "folded up" in the "One", as in a "seed", and only requires dynamic
development in order to be able to fully articulate itself. Interestingly, Damascius avoids
the vocabulary of "folding in" and "unfolding"; moreover, the scholar will expressly
criticize the way of speaking of the One as the "root" of multiplicity, which is also a
Plotinian metaphor 759 760 . Why does the Damascene renounce the impressive conceptual
metaphor of “folding” (σύμπτυξις), which was held in the highest esteem within the
philosophical tradition to which he himself belongs and also seemed to be particularly
suitable for illustrating the problematic relationship between unity and multiplicity in
the Neoplatonic “monisms”? The answer is undoubtedly to be found in the “critical”
methodology of Scholarchen, who urges us to reduce all one-sided concepts of the mind,
such as "unity" and "multiplicity" or "simplicity" and "totality", to their a priori original.
However, this reduction must not be carried out in a "linear" and "genealogical"
manner, because such a procedure could only take place in the mode of synthesis -
which is why Damascius rejects the assumption of a process and a return as objective
phenomena - but rather through a decisive leap into transcendence. Reality is thus not
led back to the One in the manner of a "folding in". The transition from the wholeness of
being to the pre-holistic wholeness of the One does not take place within a continuum of
thought , but as a result of a swing into the absolute beyond. This "proposition" into the
immemorial essence of the One occurs at the end of the deliberately paradoxical phrase
" the whole before the whole" , which in the Damascene lecture constitutes the preferred
"reference scheme" (ἔνδειγμα) of the One. The ἕν is πάντα πρὸ πάντων not as the
"seed" or "root" 761 of the whole, from which it is ultimately separated by the gap of non-
participation and the failed process. Rather, the self-contradictory statement of the
Damascene about the pre-holistic wholeness of the One must be read "peritropically":
The One is the whole before the whole in the sense of a sublation of the whole into
transcendence. It is from this transcendence, however, that the whole is first founded.
As a result, even the distinction between "before" and "after" must disappear in the
sphere of vision of the One. Finally, the "symbolic" assertion of the pre-totality of the
One indicates that the unified primal cause of everything is no longer even πρὸ πάντων.
These connections are illuminated in Damascius in a new "soliloquium". Such fictitious
dialogues, which pepper Damascius' De principiis , are not intended to reflect the lively
dynamics of the philosophical lecture (as is sometimes the case for Plotinus' Enneads );
nor are they merely the rhetorical device of the learned writer who raises objections to
himself in order to have them immediately overcome again. Rather, Damascius's
soliloquies stage the essential conflict of human thought, which is expressed in the
approach to the superintellect. ligiblen thrown from one opposite into the other. The
veritable Soliloquium de uno , in which Damascius tries to clarify the dialectic of self-
giving and self-withdrawal in the nature of the One, deserves to be quoted in its entirety:
"Then the whole does not participate in the undifferentiated essence?" - Yes! I shall answer. - "Does it then give
anything to the whole or not?" - Yes, of course: the most valuable of all, namely, itself as the whole reason for being,
and not as a participation from its own essence! - "In this case, will not the undifferentiated essence belong to those
beings who have received it, and no longer to itself?" - No, indeed: rather, it will belong neither to itself nor to those
beings, for it is neither transcendent nor immanent, it exists neither in reason for being nor in participation - for all
this is in a distinction. But it is absolutely undifferentiated, and is not subject to the whole or to the particular. For, to
tell the full truth, the undifferentiated essence is neither in the whole nor before the whole, since these determinations
also constitute in a certain sense distinctions. But the former is simple, undifferentiated, and by this means all-one 762 .
In Damascius' metaphysics, the One does not allow participation in itself. This calls into
question the concept of the process and the foundation of being. Should the ἕν then sink
to an unproductive, "sterile" entity? Damascius hastens to add that the simple primal
cause of the whole guarantees far more than the mere participation of being in the
absolute unity. The One is everything: its essence forms the foundation of all existence
and in this sense it surpasses every measure of participation and causality. The One is
not something that gives itself over, but rather a reason for existence, the most perfect
and actually sole reality, from which any splintering represents only the perspective
illusion of the contemplating spirit. Not even the assertion of "pre-organism" can be
applied to the unbroken breadth of the horizon of unity, in which there is no room for
opposites. This apophatic exaggeration, which in a second, transcending step withdraws
the definition of the One as “the whole before the whole” and exposes it as a symbolic
reference scheme, is more than just an expression of negative-henological rhetoric. The
revocation of the unitary theory of pre-totality is primarily intended to intensify the
programmatic tension of our most extreme concepts of understanding. Apart from that,
the self-cancellation of the πάντα πρὸ πάντων also refers to the opening aporia of De
principiis: The One is neither in the whole nor before the whole (ο ὔτε ἐν π ᾶσιν ο ὔτε
πρὸ πάντων), just as the "unspeakable" is neither a part of the whole nor the beyond of
the whole. In this way it becomes clear once again that Damascius knows how to make
the transcendental analysis of the central metaphysical concepts that he had undertaken
in the first part of De principiis fruitful for henology. With his theory of unity, the
scholar does not begin anew, but is concerned with applying the transcendental
program with which his main text opened to the various areas of reality opened up in
the Neoplatonic tradition. With the abolition of the One both from the whole and from
the horizon of pre-wholeness, the natural dialectic of "metaphysical" reason, as it was
impressively demonstrated in the first section of the Aporias and Solutions , is also
demonstrated for the level of reality of the One.
The discovery of the essential dialectic of our unitary thinking leads Damascius to a
radical critique of language and linguistics in general. This is carried out in the form of a
revision of those conceptual words that claim to refer unequivocally to the super-
intelligible: "We do not have a clear name for the all-one, because "the one" is something
other than "the whole" and "the whole" in turn is something other than "the one"" 763 .
One and whole must be thought of together as all-one - a task that demands the greatest
of our intellectual capacity, since our thinking has a tendency to one-sided everything
and to view it in the form of a particular "something". The fact that we hold the all-one
terminologically as τὸ ἕν does not happen in its own way, because nothing comes from
it, as Damascius tirelessly impresses upon us. We address the one by starting with its
functionality within the multiplicity. We call "one" that respect in which the plural being
achieves its own realization as a unified being: "As a result, it is not a principle, because
the multiplicity in this One is united, but rather by what the multitude is united – that is
the One” 764 . What Damascius wants to say with this subtle turn of phrase is that in our
philosophical speech we cannot refer to a concrete content of the One. All we can do is
point in the direction of a general striving for being, in this case to the vanishing point of
ontological synthesis. We refer to this vanishing point in an improper way as τὸ ἕν,
although it remains unnameable in itself. The sentence just quoted expresses a telling
reversal of the situation: the highest metaphysical entities, especially the One, no longer
receive their onomastic character thanks to their (basically inexplicable) content, but
from the perspective of that general ontological movement of flight that is directed
towards them.
The radical nature of the Damascene project is also expressed in the subliminal criticism
he makes of the main provisions of Proclus' Henology. By criticizing a differentiation
between "participated" (μετεχόμενον) and "non-participable" ( ἀμέθεκτον), Proclus's
vocabulary of unity theory is clearly targeted, especially the language used in the
Elements of Theology . The One cannot be divided into "participated" and "non-
participated": for Damascius, the One is everywhere, in its fullness and in its entirety,
only the multiplicity that is turned away from it and yet supported by it must become
receptive to the revelation of its omnipresence.
From the perspective of the One, the universe forms a perfect unity. Only through its
self-integration into the universe can the individual find its true destiny. The individual
experiences the realization appropriate to him within a koinony of being, which is
governed by the One as the sole reason for existence. A true fruitio uni is expressed in
the Damascene henology:
Now all things depend on the One; in this way they enjoy it (αὐτοῦ ἀπολαύει) and are held by it. - "But what? Does
nothing like it come from it?" - Not at all! For it was not possible that in the course of a descent of being it should
become distant from itself. For nothing else has come into being that could have interposed itself. It was contrary to
divine justice that the undifferentiated essence should become different from itself or that absolute simplicity should
pass into any kind of duality 765 .
However, in order to realize such "enjoyment" of the All-One, the consciousness of
belonging to the All-One must be awakened. The fragmented self must realize that it is
dependent on the unified basis of existence, and even that it "in principle" completely
identifies with it.
But how can the consciousness of unity be realized when Damascius denies that the
intended ἕν is synonymous with our idea of unity? If the One is no longer even One,
what will the privileged experience of becoming "One" consist of? What is the existential
task of the One in the Damascus system?
Before we address these questions, we must return for a moment to the problem of the
original relationship between the One and the Many, and listen again to the words
which the Scholarch utters in the constant circle of his philosophical endeavours.
The One has shown itself to us as the “principle of principles” (τ ῶν α ἰτίων α ἴτιον) 766 , as
the primal cause of all being, which “causes the whole according to the all-supporting
simplicity that is prior to activity, power and existence” 767 . In this and similar
determinations, a nuance becomes visible that can serve to capture the originality of the
Damascene despite his belonging to the broader Neoplatonic system: while the
Neoplatonic thinkers rely primarily on statements of eminence and transcendence, it is
the anteriority metaphors that predominate in the last scholar’s expositions. The One
and the Unified, as well as the Absolute itself, which precedes them , are not so much
elevated above the other entities and realms of reality as they are in a (one-sided)
anteriority relationship to them. This relationship is one-sided because it only exists
from the perspective of posteriority. The "prior" integrates the subordinate into its
essential lack of difference and abolishes the opposition to it within itself. This should
not mean that statements of anteriority are absent from the other Neoplatonists or that
they play a lesser role. To claim this would be quite wrong. Nevertheless, one can note
that the search for the constant metaphysical prior of the intelligible entities is the
special concern of the Damascene. Not the splendor of the Emi The characteristic
feature of Damascene philosophy is not the lack of common language, but the effort to
discover and demonstrate what is pre-eminent 768 .
In this sense, the Scholarch invites us to a thought exercise whose purpose is precisely
the maturing of an awareness of anteriority. He begins with an emphatic reference to
the fact that everything that has been revealed to us in the course of our henological
efforts is the revelation of a hidden essence: "These unambiguous and truly indubitable
visions of that transcendent truth - how shall we express them, how shall we enumerate
them?" 769 This is followed by a meditation in an aporetic style that takes up the
fundamental embarrassment of the Damascene "system" anew and develops it further:
is there only the One in itself or can multiplicity also lay claim to meaningful reality?
"For nothing is after the One and It itself is alone, or the Others are completely in a
certain difference from it, provided that after the One there are also the Others" 770 .
Damascius asks us to ascend - or rather to go back - to the point where the hen-
ontological difference first begins to emerge: the difference between one and being,
between simplicity and diversity. The ascent or, better said, the regression into the
primal ground should begin with the manifestations of the pre-intelligible and seek that
subtle, waning moment when reality begins to turn away from its principle. This
moment coincides with the "point in time" when concepts separate themselves from
each other and from the primordial intuition from which they arise. It is the moment of
the birth of articulated concepts which, however, are not allowed to see the light of fully
developed reason, but are held in the twilight of the consciousness of anteriority and
transcendence. Damascius calls this halted process of unfolding reality and thought pre-
differentiation (προ[σ]διορισμός). 771 From the perspective of subject-object
coordination, which determines Damascius' epistemology, it could be said that the
"external" process of primal differentiation is inferior to the "internal" process of
process of generating protological concepts. The metaphysical “birth pains” that must
not progress until the concepts are finally determined are the reflection of that state in
which the multiplicity of being begins to emerge from its original unity. Damascius
would like to take us back to this threshold:
…But, in order to use this also for the purpose of a reference which starts from the lower levels of being – a reference
which, however, remains vague and is directed to birth pangs which burst with desire for that which is, but can never
give birth to it, but which already experience birth in the very act of labor – in order to resort to this allusion, let us
define in a certain, quite subtle way, which should also be the least obvious, a pre-differentiation (προ[σ]διορισμός) 772.
By this I mean the very first of all pre-differentiations, which is almost swallowed up by the undifferentiated, so that
the secondary essence seems to be the power of the primary – a power which is welded together with the ground of
existence, as many theologians have already expressed in coded form 773 .
The pain (ὠδίς) that the soul feels when producing profound thoughts must not result in
a determination of the creative process. Rather, the creation of concepts remains in the
state of mere draft. The dialectical movement attempts to capture that privileged
moment in which the "conception" of concepts takes place - whereby the expression
"conception of concepts" must also include the maieutic meaning. Damascius thus
strives to capture the moment when thoughts in their oneness activity, but still carry
something of the “primal night” from which they arose 774 .
The basic concepts that Damascius has in mind are the "inarticulable concepts" or the
"non-concept" that is mentioned in other places in his work. They correspond to the
vision of the Orphic primordial night from which the first spiritual entities are born 775 .
The aim of philosophical efforts is to develop protological concepts that do not have
their meaning in a concrete content, for we have already seen that for Damascius
metaphysical concepts are without exception subject to self-abolition. The value of the
"inarticulable concepts" is rather to be found in the fact that, due to the intensity of their
power of reference and the density of their significance, they stir up and keep alive the
consciousness of transcendence. The contradiction that is inherent in them consigns
them to silence and keeps them imprisoned in the secret dungeon of the soul. But the
symbolic impressiveness of these primal views and their orientation towards the highest
principles of the world and of human existence condense into a conceptual "explosive
charge" that feeds the dynamic process of dialectics and makes the explanation of
transcendence an endless task. They are birth pangs " bursting with desire for that
which can never give birth to it , but rather experience giving birth in the very act of
labor" 776 .
The primal views, the non-concepts and unarticulated concepts of metaphysics form
that underlying difference, the "primal division" (προ[σ]διορισμός) of thought into its
opposites. Damascius wants to lead us back to that almost incomprehensible moment in
which being begins to separate itself from the all-unity. We should become witnesses to
this primal process and capture the "very first of all pre-differentiations" in the flash of a
fleeting moment - that προ[σ]διορισμός, "which is almost swallowed up by the
undifferentiated, so that the secondary essence seems to be the might of the primary."
This being-establishing force (δύναμις) 777 goes with its reason for existence (ὕπαρξις) in
a perfect fusion. So, with Damascius, one should trace the "emanation" of the
hypostases back to the absolute origin and try to see there the glimmer of their
emergence. But our ideas of the "dynamic unfolding" and the "ground of existence" are
only unreliable notions of the mind. One should go back beyond these differences and
finally see that what emerges is "basically" identical with its principle:
One could also think of something else that is even more unified than this power and that reigns in the midst of those
entities that are before every ground of existence and before every power. And one could proclaim that the secondary
comes after the former, and even more: that the secondary is the latter and not merely that which comes after the
latter, and that the secondary is itself and not merely that which is derived from it - and whatever other statements of
transcendence one can find 778 .
The distinction between the future and its deductive principle, between multiplicity and
its origin, cannot be made from the standpoint of the One. In this sense, Damascius
develops a henological metaphysics of coincidence, which he incorporates into his
theory of the Absolute and subordinates to the concept of aporrheton . Viewed sub
specie unitatis , every difference and every diversity is abolished, just as sub specie
absoluti no transition to reality can be seen. The scholarch tells us to take the standpoint
of the transcendent all-unity - or, since human nature stands in our way, to at least
reflect this standpoint in our consciousness. We can and must understand that the
actual and sole truth can only be grasped from the perspective of the pre-holistic
totality, as the One has shown itself to us. It is doubtful whether we are actually capable
of folding our being into the primordial all-unity, whether we are able to reverse the
process of the hypostases and to grasp the "emanation process", whether we will finally
make the leap into the transcendence of the whole before the whole in our concrete
existence. The content, the how of self-transcendence into the all-unity remains
questionable, which is why Damascius' metaphysics only stops at the threshold of a
doctrine of salvation. The scholar sees his task as a successor to Plato and as a
philosophical teacher in encouraging a reflection on the "sublime" and "transcendent
truth". Damascius does indeed interpret the metaphysical sian entities rise to such
heights of apophase that successful models of realization of existence, with the exception
of aporetic self-restraint, become uncertain. Nevertheless, we still retain the
consciousness of transcendence and this is the unmistakable trace of the Absolute in this
world.
We have seen how Damascius wants to abolish the fragmentation of our thoughts into
the One as a whole before the whole. But what initially appears to be a theory of
ontological totality slides into a radical doctrine of transcendence: the aporias of the
process allow us to sense a unity of one and many. Their solution requires the complete
merging of all opposites into a coincidentia oppositorum , which stands under the sign
of the overwhelming all-one . The idea of the all-unity must be grasped in such an
original way that no other thought is opposed to it, indeed that no other thought exists
alongside it. If the One is not already the whole, the emergence of the totality of being
cannot be explained. An outpouring of multiplicity from an absolutely simple primal
source is in no way comprehensible. (In this way, Damascius attacks the entire
"procession" doctrine of his school.) For this reason, the One must enter into an identity
with the Whole and lose the contours of its mere simplicity, without, however, breaking
itself down into an articulated totality. This conceptual effort transports the All-One into
the distances of transcendence. This is not the transcendence of an inexhaustible
neither-nor, as was typical of the pure concept of absoluteness, but rather that "form" of
transcendence that "arises" due to radical simplicity and principledness. We are thus
witnesses to a transition into transcendence, a transport into the vastness of the
ultimate primal ground. The transcendence of the All-One is a mediated transcendence.
The determinations that enable the transfer of the Whole before the Whole into the
immemorial beyond are simplicity and principledness.
Even an interpretation of being in terms of superior and inferior entities is not valid
from the perspective of the All-One - which is where the monistic revolution of the
Damascene reveals its Parmenidean roots. No division into primary and secondary
entities is tenable, because in the form circle of the pure, opposite-free unity, the
difference simply cannot shine through. The All-Unity, which absorbs every thought that
comes along, even if it wants to oppose it, and integrates it into the perfect roundness of
its being, ultimately surpasses itself and becomes closely familiar with the Aporrheton.
The order of superior and inferior hypostases only makes sense from our point of view:
"...This is how one could express oneself if one wanted to project the subordinate onto
the highest entities." In the super-intelligible realm of the All-One, even the whole of
reality, including its “proceeding”, is sunk into the apophase of ἓν πάντα:
But to speak in accordance with the truer birth pangs, neither these entities have differed from the former, nor the
latter from these. They are not even properly united with one another, they are neither themselves nor other, neither
similar nor dissimilar, neither one nor many, neither coordinated nor subordinated. For not even the "before the
whole" is worthy of the former, nor is the "after- that entity" due to the whole. They are therefore neither first nor
secondary, neither primary nor grounded. For all such determinations stand in a mutual difference. But the former is
undifferentiated - undifferentiated not in the sense of being opposed to the differentiated, but rather as the absolutely
simple and as an undifferentiated whole. For everything is according to the One, and indeed according to that One
which is the whole and not merely one 779 .
From this and similar passages, what has already been mentioned several times
becomes clear, but to which we must now return with greater precision: after τὸ ἕν was
initially defined as a pre-holistic whole, which is why it had to be eliminated from the
"race" for the "wreath of victory" of absoluteness 780 , it is now brought ever closer to the
Absolute. It has "leaned out" to the slightest extent from the innermost part of the
temple of the Aporrheton , and it even still remains in its darkness, like a statue of a god.
This "symbolic" image of the transcendent is not allowed to leave the Holy of Holies
with the festival procession. Damascius explains to us more and more frequently that
the One can no longer even be named as One. We learn that the essence of the One is
completely "hidden". Finally, the transcendent All-One is even given the name
Aporrheton , which completes its identification with the Absolute. Of course, the rapture
of the Total-One into transcendence appears to us as the result of a dialectical process.
The overlay of the simple primal ground is a mediated one: simplicity and the character
of principles are the intermediate stages of this dynamized transcendence. But the
increasing equation of the One with the inexpressible should suggest two things to us:
firstly, it makes it clear to us that the investigation of the concept of transcendence,
which De principiis opened up, did not simply want to introduce a "new" entity, but
rather aimed at offering a transcendental analysis of transcendence in general, thereby
securing the basis for the investigation of other metaphysical entities. This
transcendental analysis of transcendence in its pure form had the purpose of providing a
yardstick for all possible variations of the otherworldliness. Damascius thus places the
radical metaphysics of the coincidentia oppositorum , which we saw him develop in his
Henology, against the background of his aporrhetics. But this ambiguity in the talk of
the Absolute itself and the absolute One should also make us aware of a second thing:
the difference is an achievement of thought. In the system of Neoplatonism, difference
only appears at the level at which the first flashes of the spirit become noticeable 781 . In
the superintelligible, that is, in the realm beyond intuitive reason, no difference can be
spoken of. A division into absolute in itself and absolute one cannot therefore be made
stricto sensu . This is only possible from the particularizing perspective of discourse -
whereby the philosophical task, which the scholar sees as his own, consists precisely in
awakening an acute awareness of the one-sidedness that necessarily arises through our
human limitations. The awareness of our limitations is at the same time the reflection
on that "essence" that exceeds these limitations 782 .
In Damascius' De principiis, towards the end of the henological section, the "essential
affinity" that exists between the ineffable and the One becomes increasingly clear, even
in the choice of words. The relationship between the One and the Whole in the All-One
can no longer be spoken of even by resorting to the common definitions "same" and
"other" (οὐδὲ τὰ αὐτά ἐστιν, οὐδὲ ἕτερα) 783 , just as in the discourse on the
Aporrheton the distinction between singular and plural had become inadmissible
(ἐκεῖνο ἢ ἐκεῖνα οὐ προσοιστέον τῷ ἀπορρήτῳ) 784 . In the horizon of the Aporrheton
one could not speak of any gradation of hypostases, which is why the idea of a serial
multiplication of "unspeakables" at the origin of a monad of the unspeakable had to be
rejected 785 . Likewise, the All-One rejects the division into primary and secondary
entities 786 , which could only find its justification from the point of view of the observing
mind. Furthermore, the One is not even One 787 , just as the ineffable, if it is to be truly
ineffable, may no longer even be called “ineffable” 788 . The same self-abolition that
determines the concept of transcendence 789 – or, better said, determines it as
indeterminable – also exerts its destructive power on the concept of ἀρχή 790 : The One,
which should be described along the lines of a search for principles, even loses its
principle-character. Finally, the apophatic inscrutability of the process is expressed in
almost the same words both for the case of aporrhetics and for that of henology: "For
not as the One produces the multiplicity and the united the distinct, but as an ineffable
and in an ineffable way It (sc. the aporrheton ) produces everything equally (ἀπόρρητον
ἀπορρήτως τὰ πάντα ὁμοίως)" 791 . This was stated in the first part of De principiis , and
the reassured reader could at least hope to have learned something about the production
of being starting from the One. But now, after a more intense experience of the
henological “birth pains”, Damascius writes about the πρόοδος from the One: “We must
purify the act of production, since it does not correspond to our nature and is brought
about neither by activity nor by ability or existence, but by the One before these three in
an ineffable way (τῷ ἑνὶ πρὸ τῶν τριῶν ἀπορρήτῳ τρόπῳ)” 792 . While the monads
that follow immediately after the One produce only partial aspects of reality, (symmetry
– the order of the whole, beauty – the “sympathetic” mixture of the totality of being,
truth – the “true” ground of existence), the One is responsible for the positing of the
whole as a whole, and indeed “in an ineffable manner” ( ἐκείνου [sc. το ῦ ἑνός] δὲ πάντα
ὁμοῦ ἀπορρήτως) 793 . Both “essences”, the unity-transcendent Absolute and the absolute
One, bring about reality “in an ineffable manner”. Damascius does not fail to emphasize
the difference between the two forms of "procession": the procession from the Absolute
is simply ineffable, "unspeakable," in the sense that it cannot be thought of at all.
Religious awe is said to envelop the absolute origin and the first budding of light from it.
The procession from the One is also ineffable, but due to the absolute simplicity of the
One, which becomes productive "neither through activity nor through power nor
existence." The One brings forth by virtue of the One - a tautology in which the whole of
Damascus monism is expressed.
In this way, after a long dialectical approach, henology is taken back into aporrhetics .
The stages of thought on this path, which say that the One is the whole before the whole,
that "It" represents the "ground of existence" of all reality, that multiplicity constitutes
the positing of what is "besides the One", etc., ultimately prove to be limited intellectual
views that are to be integrated into a higher, "transcendent truth". The Damascene's
method is thus reminiscent of the dialectic of the Phenomenology of Spirit , in which
every standpoint is seen as a moment of a higher and, ultimately, a supreme and all-
encompassing wholeness. But just as striking as the similarities are the differences to
Hegel's idea of totality: the final horizon to which everything leads for Damascius is an
absolute transcendence that can no longer be reached by any experience or dialectical
means. At most, a συναίσθησις of a special kind can give us an idea of the that (not the
what ) of this ineffable. This is the impressive message of the first part of Damascus' De
principiis , in which the main coordinates of his "theory" of transcendence are set. The
aporias and solutions regarding the first principles resemble a sequence of circles and
their procedure is strongly reminiscent of Proclian methodology. Each individual
chapter of this veritable Summa dubitationis finds its climax in the vision of a totality:
the totality of the all-one, of unified being, of the "organic" perfection of intelligible life
and of the spiritual structure of ideas. But the circles of Damascene meditations do not
close in on themselves, but return to the beginning of large-scale reflection: their “ends”
are found again in the aporrhetics.
Although Damascene metaphysics began by demonstrating certain traces of positivity in
the One, with the aim of making room for an even more sublime "essence", the One
ultimately reveals itself as an aspect of the Absolute itself. This intertwining of
aporrheton and the One is brought about by a counter-movement: the more the
Absolute is projected into the heights of complete inaccessibility, the lower the system
position of the spirit is set, which in Damascius loses Plotinus' ecstatic all-unity and
therefore takes on a discursive quality. The Damascene no longer seems to be able or
willing to distinguish the διάνοια from the νοῦς with final rigor. This has the
consequence that Damascius himself increasingly realizes in the course of his analyses
the high degree to which every differentiating intervention in the world of the super-
intelligible depends on the perspective of the contemplating spirit. A distinction
between the absolute and the one can only be devised with the means of the intellect.
The structure of the mind is that of a whole that is already differentiated within itself.
The intellectual (“noeric”) whole is composed of various ideas that participate in one
another but are also decidedly separate from one another. With the means of the vision
of ideas, the mind looks up to the realm of the superintelligible, onto which it naturally
reflects the eidetic particularities of its contents. Such an activity of determination
results in “hypostases” being differentiated in the superintelligible that should not allow
differentiation in themselves, because differentiation is exclusively an achievement of
the mind and should not be applied to superintellectual entities. This concerns the
distinction between one and many, between the first, “permanent” principle and the
secondary, “emerging” principle. But this also concerns the separation between an
absolute in itself and an absolute one. The distance between the two “essences” becomes
ever smaller as our awareness of the limits of our knowledge grows, so that finally the
One, which was initially separated from the ineffable, comes into the immediate vicinity
of the former, is obscured by its super-unknowability, and even receives the name of the
“ineffable”. It is the one-sided view of our mind and the language that only expresses
itself in fragments that split the connection of the super-spiritual into different forms of
thought. In this sense, Damascius anticipates a serious type of modern criticism of
metaphysics: the accusation of the unjustified, substantially “uncovered” hypostasis of
purely intellectual concepts. His criticism of metaphysical boldness sometimes even
seems “linguistic-analytical.”
However, there is a deep discrepancy between the modern way of understanding and
practicing philosophy and the Damascene mentality, which is particularly striking to us
after the analyses carried out so far: While the self-confidence and, so to speak, the
entire "pride" of modern philosophy in the Cartesian tradition is based on being able to
develop "clear" and "distinct" ideas, i.e. concepts of reason that relate to their objects
with unambiguous rigor, the meaning of Damascene philosophizing is to be sought at
the exact opposite pole of such a view. The clearly defined ideas that want to remain in
their own possession, as the scholar puts it, belong to a subordinate level of being,
namely the discursive spirit that must be overcome. This overcoming is to be achieved
through the development of a radical consciousness of transcendence, a συναίσθησις of
the "overwhelming" or "transcendent truth". But for this to happen, the deceptive,
selfish and narrow clarity of the spiritual concepts must be broken. Damascius is not
concerned with the clarity and distinctiveness of ideas, but, quite the opposite, with
their liquefaction. The conceptual standpoints must merge into one another so that we
can receive the vision of the dissolution of boundaries, the consciousness of the all-unity
and the absolute. The concepts that the Damascene's astute dialectic knows how to deal
with coolly and soberly serve the scholar, paradoxically, only as a means of ecstasy. The
purpose of the Damascene meditation is not to make ideas more precise, but rather the
controlled dissolution of their definiteness and sharpness 794 . The Damascene critique of
“differentiated concepts” (διωρισμέναι ἔννοιαι) 795 aims to design or refer to
undifferentiated concepts (ἀδιόριστοι ἔννοιαι) 796 , because only these can correspond to that absolute identity which reigns in the
superintelligible realm.

Even Proclus, in the methodological preamble to his commentary on Alcibiades , had

seen the purpose of midwifery in producing “irrevocable concepts” (δε ῖ … μαιείας μὲν
εἰς τὴν προβολὴν τῶν ἀδιαστρόφων λόγων) 797 . The Damascene maieutics, however,
is directed against the Proclian and, quite properly, against the entire Platonic-Socratic
art of midwifery. While the Platonic tradition saw the meaning of midwifery in the
production of certain insights that were infallible and "not a wind egg," the significance
of the Damascene dialectic lies precisely in the proof of the inherent self-cancellability of
metaphysical concepts. Maieutics is not intended to make "giving birth" easier for the
last scholar, but rather to stimulate the "labor pains" and to see in the "sterile" labor
itself the expected "fruit" of concept production. These are "inarticulable concepts," that
is, concepts to which language is not allowed to give any definiteness. Damascius wants
us to become witnesses to the extremely turbulent inner life of the protological concepts
themselves. The "peripeteia" of the concepts of transcendence and ἀρχή, of unity and of
perfect wholeness are "presented" to us, as it were. Their overthrow takes place before
our eyes. Where a Cartesian-inspired philosophy seeks the clarity of precise
demarcation, Damascius employs the full passion of unpredictable dialectical reversals.
The concepts thereby acquire a dynamic vitality of their own – a vitality which, in
keeping with the nature of the human soul, is self-contradictory and leads to uncertainty
798
.
aporrheton and One are lost in the mist of that Orphic primal night 799 to which
Damascius wants to lead us back. However, this does not mean that there is no
difference for us at all between the ineffable in itself and the absolute One. Aporrhetics
has already sufficiently shown the transcendental surplus of the purely "thought"
Absolute, while the One is our different projections a monistic background. However,
the following must be noted: Although the category of "difference" cannot be predicated
of the supra-categorical realm, this also implies that the correlate of difference, namely
identity, cannot be attributed to the transnoetic either. The Absolute and the One are
not different from one another , but in such a way that they are also not identical with
one another . The basic categories of "identity" and "difference" form the main pillars on
which the activity of the mind is based. The most intimate constitution of thought itself
causes everything to which it extends to be conceived according to a holistic relational
pattern. All objects, precisely insofar as they are objects for the contemplating mind ,
are placed in different relationships to one another in the act of noetic contemplation.
But if the Absolute and the One are to transcend the mind, metaphysical reflection can
no longer take place according to the categorical pattern of sameness and otherness.
“Are the Absolute and the One different from each other?” – For Damascius, this
question would be just as wrong as the expected answer: “No, they are one and the
same.”
But how can the mind reflect the paradoxical "relationship" that exists between the
Absolute and the One? What means are still available to thinking to catch up with the
interlocking and diverging of the Aporrheton and the Hen ? Every form of relationality,
and therefore every form of thinkability, must be overcome in the approach to the
inexpressible and the One. The paradoxical relationship between the Aporrheton and
the Hen should be reflected in the soul's consciousness of transcendence. The mind
must engage with this non-relation in such a way that it becomes aware of it as a
modality of transcendence. The "relationship" that exists between the Absolute and the
One transcends the dichotomy of identity and difference and must therefore itself be
illuminated as transcendence. The ἐπέκεινα in the ἐπέκεινα το ῦ ἑνός is thus understood
in its most radical meaning: the aporrheton is not a stage or hypostasis "before" the
One, but a transcendence of the horizon of unity and all-unity in general. Between the
Absolute and the One there is now neither any form of distance nor any kind of
approach. In the realm of transcendence, even the "relations" between the metaphysical
entities must be regarded as "transcendent".
The “relationship” between the Absolute and the One is not least reflected in Damascius’
dialectical method. The fact that there is no “proximity” of the simple primal ground to
the aporrheton can also be seen in the Damascene critique of apophatic henology:
Because the negation of the negation has lost its transcending power, the negation of the
negative One cannot lead us to the search for a first principle is of little use.
Consequently, starting from the One, there is no longer any direct path that could reveal
to us the depth of the Absolute: even the negation of the One, that is, the negation of the
negative, is no longer sufficient to describe an adequate reference to the aporrheton .
Only the consciousness of transcendence is able to measure the inexhaustible distance
between the "two" non-essences in the infinity of the apophase.
But will not Damascius himself contradict us, since he tirelessly describes the closest
intimacy of the One to the Absolute? In what sense can he write that the One "is in the
immediate vicinity of the overwhelming principle" 800 ? The meaning of the symbolic
concept of "proximity" is more clearly illuminated in the following line: "The One is in
the vicinity of the absolute self-abolition of the First" 801 . The "proximity" spoken of here
means that the One is subject to the sphere of influence of aporrhetics , that the same
dialectical movement that governs the radical concept of transcendence is also discussed
in henology. The metaphysical height of the idea of unity implies that the absolutely
simple primal ground is most directly exposed to protological self-contradiction.
emerged from the inexpressible , it is One" 802 , but otherwise it retains the "aporrhetic"
nature of its unfounded origin. The unity-transcendent negativity of the One
consequently leads Damascius to locate the One in the "innermost temple of that
silence" 803 , in the realm of absolute transcendence. We must start from this last image in
order to adequately understand the passages in which the direct relationship between
the Absolute and the One is addressed: the "innermost temple" is one of those
metaphors to which Damascius repeatedly resorts. It is namely "in the word-removed
innermost temple of our sea le" 804 that we must persevere in order to open up the
consciousness of the Absolute to ourselves. "Inside" and "outside" are spatial
determinations, however, which, like all other determinations, must be overcome in
contemplation of the Aporrheton . The two images, the Holy of Holies of the Absolute
and the Holy of Holies of the soul, flow into one another, and if we were to say that the
hidden chamber of the ineffable is one and the same as the secret dungeon of our soul,
we should not fear that we would miss the scholar's intentions too far. By placing the
One in the immediate "proximity" of the Absolute, Damascius wants to make us
understand that the "neighborhood" of the Hen to the Aporrheton ultimately describes
the "familiarity" of the One with the "innermost temple" of our soul's depths. Damascius
cannot aim at a real communion of the One with the Absolute, for such a communion is
impossible in view of the radical otherworldliness of the ineffable. Rather, the One rests
as a symbol of absoluteness in the innermost depths of our soul and gives us "the
slightest and most vague intimation of itself" 805 as well as the consciousness of radical
transcendence.
2.4 The Damascus One is not a diffusive one
When the One is pushed into such remote transcendental realms, when even its
relationship to the aporrheton is lost from the sphere of thought of our mind and we
must again describe this complete remoteness as ἀπόρρητον, the question arises again
and more acutely as to what the function of the One might still consist of. Why must we
even assume the existence of the One, and in this paradoxical and exuberant form at
that? What is the role of the One within reality, in other words: where is its productivity,
its "fertility" to be found? Since the lines of flight of the henological realm narrow
towards the "image point" of the Absolute, unity thinking will necessarily be influenced
by the aporrhetic dialectic. Of the ineffable, however, we know that it does not lend
anything to the "subordinate" reality from and of itself, that no gift comes from it. But
what about the Damascus One? – this is now the question, even more urgent than
before, on which the coherence of the Damascus system depends in a decisive sense. Is it
possible for the last scholar Is the One still the Good in the original Platonic sense, and if
so, is it then a diffusivum sui?
"Bonum est diffusivum sui" - this widespread scholastic doctrine goes back, according to
Klaus Kremer's thesis 806 , to the 38th sermon of Gregory of Nazianzus. The magnificent
Christmas homily of the Theologos 807 , probably held in the Church of the Apostles in
380, who had just been appointed Bishop of Constantinople, contains the following
succinctly formulated passage in its central part, dedicated to the ο ἰκονομία of the
Incarnation of God:
Because it was not enough for goodness to simply indulge in the contemplation of itself, because the good had to flow
and emerge from itself so that more beings could receive the benefit - for this is precisely the mark of the highest
goodness - it first thinks of the angelic and heavenly powers. And what was thought became action, filled with the
word and perfected by the spirit 808 .
Goodness necessarily radiates its gentleness, so that "the Word of God" moves towards
its "own image", "takes on flesh through flesh and mixes with the spirit soul on the basis
of my spirit soul" 809 : the rich man bare himself 810 . God, as goodness itself, could not, by
his very nature, limit himself to his contemplative self-reflection, which is why he flows
out of his superabundant being. This self-giving is in a sense already included in the idea
of absolute good. It is indispensable to the essence of ἀγαθότης, so that God, by virtue of
his inner and self-founded necessity, must emerge - with the assumption of flesh and
human existence 811 .
The thesis motivated by Gregory 's anti-Arian polemics812 regarding the self-giving of
God as the absolute good probably goes back to Plotinian views or is at least
systematically related to them. Plotinus makes a similar statement, and significantly so
in the context of a refutation of the Gnostic "tragedy" 813 which stages atrocities and acts in the worlds of the spheres . In the
context of the Gnostic "tragedy", the appearance of the cosmos and the metaphysical
entities is not based on an obvious, logical-ontological necessity, but is the result of
merely arbitrary, "archaic" events. According to Plotinus, the number of principled,
divine and demonic hypostases, on the basis of which the setting of new levels of being
takes place, is completely arbitrary in Gnosis: either it proliferates beyond all rational
reasons or it is unduly reduced. Above all, the Gnostic hyperbolization of divine self-
expulsion, which results in the isolation and ineffectiveness of the positive principles of
being and the reduction of the work of creation to the powers of darkness, could be
objected to from a Plotinian perspective by the fact that every metaphysical entity is
essentially dynamic and productive:
But it is necessary that each one should pass on its essential content to another, otherwise the good would not be
good, the spirit would not be spirit, the soul would not be soul, that is, if after the first life something did not also live
in a secondary way, as long as the primary exists 814 .
to the Gnostic location of the soul constitution and the demiurgic process in that
vacuum that would arise through the withdrawal or limitation of the good, saying that
the most important characteristic of the soul, the spirit and the good is that it is
constantly beyond itself. It is true that through the creative act of each entity an
axiologically less important being arises. However, this is not to be underestimated for
that reason; rather, it is good by virtue of its origin and itself principled and worthy of
veneration due to its integration into the beauty of the overall context. Above all, one
could say that the good is limited from Plotinus's From this point of view, we cannot
even talk about it, because the essence of the good includes self-denial and the unlimited
ability to establish being.
In his understanding of the diffusivum sui character of the good, Proclus goes even
further than Plotinus did in the context of the polemic Against the Gnostics . For
Proclus, the demiurgic power of ideas is itself an expression of the principle that is
superior to them. The good manifests itself as creative power, not only by bringing other
entities into being, but above all by giving them the possibility of producing further
levels of reality. Not only the concrete hypostatic constitution of the hierarchy of being is
a principle of the good, but also its dynamic constitution, the ability to bring ever new
areas of reality to light:
…The creative ideas, by virtue of the good, bring about the process of ascension to secondary entities, imitating the
source of all good, which, thanks to its own goodness, has founded all the divine orders of being, if one may say so 815 .
Moreover, for Proclus, the very identification of the "principle of all beings" with the
good is the guarantee that one need not seek anything higher than this principle. For a
principle that would transcend the good would have to bestow on its principalities a
more excellent gift than the good itself. But that there could be something "better" than
the good itself is self-contradictory 816 . Thus, for Proclus, goodness becomes the
indispensable and insurmountable keystone of the entire system, the seal of the
completeness of everything that is real.
The idea that the ἀγαθόν does not withhold anything from its goodness, but rather
brings out the ontologically best within the necessary framework of the hierarchical
order of being and under the general condition of the model-image relationship, is
already present in Plato's Timaeus . It is said of the Demiurge that "he was good". "But
with the good, a reservation never develops in relation to anything" 817 . For this reason,
the ontologically optimal is realized in the process of creation, albeit with the restrictive
participation of a "third species" (the given "matter") 818 . The cosmos thus comes into
being like an excellent, and at the same time living, work of art, as an "image of the
intelligible: a perceptible God" 819 . For "neither it is still in keeping with divine justice
that the best should produce something other than the most beautiful” 820 . In the
Phaedrus , on the other hand, the phthonos – envy, which is to be regarded as
personified, in the sense of the epitome of self-enclosure – is banished from the circle of
the luminous gods: Φθόνος γὰρ ἔξω θείου χοροῦ ἵσταται 821 . The reason for
interpreting the good as unconditional per se is the equation of the ἀγαθόν, the
“unconditional principle”, with the absolute One – equation which is indicated above all
in the Politeia and reflected in the testimonies to the doctrinal discussions of the Old
Academy. The basic determination of every being and the primary condition of its
existence – the unity that encompasses the multiplicity of ontological content – is traced
back in Platonic thought to a principle which, as the “idea of the good”, is at the same
time the embodiment of absolute self-surrender. The very essence of the individual,
namely its unity and individuality, is thus derived from a primal ground which, in its
transcendence beyond all limiting determination, has overcome the dichotomy of inside
and outside, of self-possession and self-waste in the bestowal of absolute goodness. The
analogy with the omnipresence of light, which is already established by the mere
presence of the sun god 822 , illustrates the expansion of luminous goodness in the output
of a principle whose essence is precisely this expansion 823 . The tradition of agathology
conceived in this way, in which, by virtue of the transcendence of being of the One Good,
the categorical distinction between sameness and otherness is transcended so that the
goodness of the first primal ground may pour out over all principles without envy,
stretches back from Dionysius Areopagite 824 to Plato. What is Damascius' attitude
towards this venerable tradition? In what way does "the Diadoche" fit into the "golden
chain" of this tradition of thought?
First of all, it should be noted that the vocabulary of agathology, which plays a central
role in Proclus and Dionysius the Areopagite – especially such compounds as
ἀγαθοδότως, ἀγαθουργία, ἀγαθουργός, ἀγαθοπρεπής 825 , etc. – is completely missing in
the work of Damascius. This is of course due to the The separation of the idea of
goodness from the concept of unity is a separation that is more pronounced in
Damascius than could be the case with the other Neoplatonists due to their systematic
presuppositions. Proclus had already begun to "shake up" the clearly Platonic equation
of one good and traced these two improper designations of the Absolute back to the
modes of dialectical-ontological movement: the one to the process, the good to the
return. But no thinker of transcendence will exclude Plato's philosophy of the good as
decisively as Damascius - a systematic decision that is surprising and prompts reflection
precisely because of its self-evidence. For it is in a sense the "naturalness" in dispensing
with the language of the metaphysics of goodness that indicates that the absence of
"agathoglossia" in Damascius is already inherent in the foundations of his philosophical
edifice. How can this silence on the subject of goodness in the last scholar be explained?
The self-restraint of human thought, typical of Damascius, reduces both the "One" and
the "Good" to the status of mere endeictic aids to emphasize something that is
essentially inexpressible. Even the essence that comes after the aporrheton is thus
separated from the "One" and the "Good." That which is subordinate to the aporrheton
826
, which is no longer even ἕν and ἀγαθόν, is thus brought into the sphere of influence
of the Absolute. We have already seen what the "closeness" of the One to the
inexpressible, which has been alluded to several times, actually means. The spatial
metaphor (ἐγγυτάτω 827 , ἐγγύς 828 ), while retaining its figurative connotations of
"circumference" or "surroundings", is in no way transferable to the relation between the
Absolute and the One, because this relation is "in principle" a non-relation. The
paradoxical relationship between the two non-entities should be interpreted in the mode
of transcendence. The transcendental aporrhetics, which determines the consciousness
of the Absolute, therefore influences henology. By "aporrhetics" we understand the
natural dialectic of the idea of transcendence - that self-abolition which depletes the
"substance" of the protological concepts and forces them to constantly negate
themselves.
Because of its simplicity and lack of need, the One suffers a similar self-cancellation as
the pure concept of the Absolute, which is transformed into a “non-concept” due to its
contradictory nature. With a reference Damascius writes of Parmenides ' first
hypothesis : "This is precisely why Plato's arguments cancel each other out with regard
to the One. For the One is close to the absolute self-cancellation of the First" 829 . Several
correspondences demonstrate the dialectical reversal of the idea of unity as an influence
of aporrhetics on henology. One of these correspondences is the questioning of the
process of origin: "That All-One, on the other hand, does not emerge at all, because
before it was the ineffable, of which there was nothing to say, not even in a hint. Nothing
emerges from it, not even the All-One" 830 . The process of origin and the sharing
presuppose a principle of distinction. Such a principle cannot be defined from the
standpoint of absolute unity, just as it cannot be identified in the area of the relationless
and "aporrhetic". In both cases, it is the dialectic of the concept of absoluteness that
prevents the constitution of a coherent idea of the “procession” of being from a superior
primal ground.
One might ask, however, whether a dynamic view of the relationship between One and
Being might not "save" the concept of the process of emergence. Referring to Plotinus, it
would be possible to think of the One as an absolutely transcendent origin in relation to
which spiritual being would then establish itself. Through the attraction it exerts and
which enables the light of the spirit within its own sphere, the absolute One reveals itself
to be infinitely powerful without abandoning its transcendence. The Plotinian Hen is
thus, due to the authypostatic event that takes place in its realm, "absolute creativity" 831 .
It is sought after and loved by the contemplating spirit and yet does not slip into the loss
of self of an outward-directed activity. Through the mere fascination of its all-founding
unity, the ἕν creates the substance of the spirit – whereby “fascination” is to be
understood here in its etymological meaning as “connection” (to itself and to the
primary). The simple primal ground remains in a complete transcendence, while its
unity becomes productive without its own intervention, as the noetically constituted
being is constantly concerned with the preservation of its own ἑνότης 832 through the
absolute One. The ἕν therefore works without being active in the positive-categorical
sense. Will it then be sought after and loved as a passive entity? This too cannot be said
from Plotinus' point of view, because the One suffers nothing. It transcends the
determining pair of activity and suffering. Its "ability" to stimulate and empower the
being-like spirit to self-constitution, however, allows the One to shine forth as δύναμις
πάντων.
The Plotinian model shows us how the self-constitution of spiritual being is conceivable
while simultaneously maintaining a radical metaphysics of transcendence and unity.
The relationship between the absolute principle and its principate can be interpreted
from the perspective of the latter as "power", as dynamic development. Couldn't
Damascius fall back on the same figure of thought in order to make the unfolding of
reality "from" an absolutely simple and even unit-transcendent primal ground visible?
However, we have already seen how the Scholarch endeavours to abolish the force
metaphysics of the Neoplatonic tradition. For Damascius, the Plotinian model of primal
ground and corresponding dynamis is a form of dualism that does not correspond to
apophatic henology. Our contemplating mind may well think up such a dualism. In this
sense, the Diadoche sets out to understand the necessary, in a sense "transcendental"
ground of the Plotinian perspective. According to Damascius, Plotinus is partly right in
his explanation of the development of being based on a concept of ontological self-
empowerment, which is presented as the dynamis of the One. But even this
differentiation between the One and productive power, introduced so carefully and with
nuance by Plotinus, should be reduced to the principle of these two partial concepts - for
as such they reveal themselves to the transcending spirit. Our spirit is essentially
diverse. In its original state, however, it is dualistic and the dissection of the All-One
into the twofold structure of primal ground - power of being goes back to this essential-
dualistic structure of the νοῦς. Damascius remains true to his principle-theoretical self-
censorship when he criticizes the talk of the One and its dynamis as a characteristic of
dualism and recommends the reduction of these concepts to their common primal
concept, but does not consider the complete realizability of this primal concept in our
thinking and in our existence to be possible with absolute certainty. The only thing that
can be reflected is the "pre-difference" between the original ground and the power,
between the principle and the unfolding of the principle. We should reflect in our
consciousness that point at which the transformation of the One into the Whole has not
yet been completed, at which a look back at the unity and an anticipation of the
multiplicity open up. The moment of "pre-differentiation" is the only one that is
accessible to our vast nature.
Damascius asked us, in a return to the decisive moment of the process, to recognize the
identity of power and primal cause, whereby the identity of the two hen-ontological
aspects already implies their difference for our dialectical thinking. The scholar called
the joint articulation of identity and difference "pre-differentiation," the "point" at
which the separation of the other from the same is taken back into its essential affinity:
…So let us define, in a certain, very subtle way, which should also be the least obvious, a pre-differentiation
(προ[σ]διορισμός). By this I mean the very first of all pre-differentiations, which is almost swallowed up by the
undifferentiated, so that the secondary essence seems to be the power of the primary - a power which is welded
together with the ground of existence, as some theologians 833 have already expressed in coded form 834 .
In this passage, Damascius makes the probably Porphyrian way of speaking of the One
as the "ground of existence" (ὕπαρξις) of being fruitful for his own henology. According
to the little scholar, we should practice our dialectical abilities in order to be able to
understand the original congruence of ground of existence and productive power.
The basic idea of Damascene Henology could be summarised as follows: an emergence
from the One is not permissible due to the strictness with which the concept of unity
must be conceived. It is an independent principle of multiplicity that causes the
ontological plurality to emerge from the original unity 835 . “Independent” should be read
here as a meaningful word: the principle of multiplicity is “placed” on “itself” alone. It is
– just like the Plotinian spirit – self-founded. But this self-production occurs as the
outcome of a stable principle of eternal self-identity and unity. Although this principle
does not emerge from itself for a moment, it causes, precisely as a background and
delimiting foil, the independence and arbitrariness of the secondary principle, the basis
of multiplicity and distinction 836 . What is immediately subordinate sets itself apart from
what is superior in its own way. That from which the subordinate stands out becomes
the reason for existence, the unshakable foundation of plurality and difference. Self-
surrender in the sense of an "emanative" process does not exist in Damascene henology.
In such a sense, the concept of the agathological diffusivum sui is to be kept away from
the doctrine of principles of the last scholar 837 . However, the One becomes productive in
another respect: It works from the depths as the supporting principle of the multiple
being. The One develops a "hyparctic" function. It is no longer to be illustrated as an
eternally flowing "source" of living force, but as an always-existing, general primal
source of difference and individuality. The One can only be described as "good" in this
sense, that it cannot be thought away from the plurality. It clings to the plurality of being
even when the latter turns away from it. The voice of the Damascene becomes an echo of
the personalizing language of Plotinus when he writes that the One, as the foundation of
the plurality, does not "intend" alienation from it:
But the One gives itself to each and every one according to the superior, not as matter, for it does not even give itself
as form, but as the first principle it bestows the first participation. The One is, in other words, the reason for being
present in the participating entities, which does not wish to separate itself from them at all, even if they proceed from
the One, insofar as they participate in the multiplicity 838 .
The “classical”, kinetic view of the effectiveness of the first principle – even if this
effectiveness in the pre-Damascene systems was only indirectly kinetic because it merely
stimulated the movement of self-foundation – takes a back seat in the philosophy of the
Diadochi. It is replaced by a static, monistic hen ontology. In this sense, the Scholarch
uses the Porphyrian terminology of the first principle as the reason for existence
(ὕπαρξις); however, he firmly rejects Porphyrios' energetic perspective. Significantly,
Damascius transfers the effectiveness (ἐνέργεια) to the unified being, because the One is
"unrevealed" 839 , i.e. the hidden primal reason of reality. Only being will reveal itself in
an overwhelming self-revelation as a mixture of all principles and a synthesis of all
opposites. As the first self-founded being, being is also the first self-revealed entity.
Damascius will even announce that he received the definition of being in a dream 840 .
This dream vision reveals being as activity (ὃ ἑκάστου ἐστὶ τὸ ἐνεργείᾳ) 841 . The
vision in which being reveals itself is nothing other than the demonstration, presented
in the medium of performativity, that ὄν can only be understood in the light of a
revelation. The act of manifestation in which being receives a definition is in itself the
essential characteristic of being.
All activity is kept away from the One, from "that unrevealed, absolutely
undifferentiated principle" 842 . Only as the foundation of being and all-supporting primal
cause is the One absolutely present. Damascius praises his ο ἰστικὴ ἁπλότης 843 . In the
rapture of panhenotism, the sublime predications of totality are accumulated
hymnically: The One is "all-supporting" (πάμφορον), "all-essential" (πανούσιον), "all-
knowing" (πάντροπον) 844 . The holistic attributes mean just as many integration
determinations: The One "devours" everything 845 , as it were the primordial god who
precedes the Olympian, demiurgic generation of gods. But this integrative concept of the
One turns against itself. The "hyp-arctic" nature of the One must not be opposed to its
"expansion" (ἐκτένεια) 846 in the form of power. The "Chaldean" distinction between
ὕπαρξις and δύναμις should not be applied to the Damascene One, which is why the ἕν
can no longer even be described as ὕπαρξις in the Neoplatonic-scholastic sense 847 . In the
self-contradictory phrases that all clarifying and differentiating determinations in the
"pre-differentiation" of the consciousness of unity, as well as in the whole "conceptual
frenzy" of the Damascene, the thoughtful silence, the calm consciousness of the all-unity
is expressed.
2.5 Unity consciousness and all-unity experience
Damascius' complex answer to the question of the emergence from the One has
managed to shake one of the cornerstones of Neoplatonic metaphysics. The problems
that the Damascene analysis has uncovered lead to a bracketing of the concept of the
emergence and to an abolition of the traditional idea of the diffusivum sui character of
the One-Good. Only from a limited, human perspective can one speak of the emergence
from the first primal ground. This has neither emerged from itself nor has the
multiplicity distanced itself from it, for the All-One is actually the reason for the
existence of the multiplicity. By questioning the emergence, the concepts of return and
participation also become problematic: "But if the One gives nothing away, how will the
second or third-rate entity receive anything? How, if the One produces nothing from the
whole, will it still be a principle?" 848 On this basis we are entitled to ask: "Does the whole
not participate in the essence of the One?" 849 . In the following we will have to ask about
the nature of our access to the One. If the process of origin, return and participation
become questionable, how can the reflection on the One and the experience of unity still
take place?
We know that we are dependent on higher, determining principles, and the awareness of
our dependence on transcendent ἀρχαί causes us to spell out the entities beyond
existence in a “bold” dianoetic way. We transform the inaccessible realm of
transcendence, by which we are carried, into metaphysical “events” that are nothing
other than the subjective processes of our own existential fulfillment. By awakening a
pronounced awareness of the incomprehensibility of the super-intelligible, we achieve
the prudent, cautious attitude of the lover of wisdom who has recognized the boundary
between this world and the next:
No one should ask, then, whether the One produces and whether the Other is produced, for if the One acts, it also has
power and existence. The whole then becomes a trinity and ceases to be one: it becomes existence, power and efficacy.
It has indeed already been said that the One is prior to efficacy, power and existence. For It is One and not a Trinity.
But these three moments are also one prior to the other entities. Because of the embarrassment of our thinking and
our interpretation, we say that It "produces". But we must clarify the manner of production, because it is alien to us
and takes place neither through efficacy nor through power or foundation of existence, but through the One before the
Trinity in an ineffable way 850 .
This is not to say that the One has not come into being. Such an assertion would violate
the transcendence of the One and would translate henological apophatics into clarifying
definitions, even if these definitions were to take a negative form. The transition to
multiplicity has actually taken place and the world of plurality and diversity forces itself
upon us as phenomenal evidence . 851 However, due to the factual constitution of our
existence, we can no longer travel the path to the background of our existential
givenness. We can only penetrate as far as the "pre-differentiation" of the reason for
existence from its very own functionality in multiplicity. Our thinking is thus
illuminated by the profound awareness that the One remains the supporting reason for
existence of all different diversity, without this inarticulate awareness being able to
teach us about the way in which the Other and the Many have emerged from their
simple principle.
The great and bold innovation of the last scholar compared to the other Neoplatonists
consists not least in the "reduction" of central ontological entities to mere intellectual
categories. In Damascius, the trinity of persistence-progression-reversion largely loses
its hypostatic concreteness and takes its place in the discursive capacity of the soul 852 ,
which, thanks to such predications, illuminates and systematizes metaphysical reality.
In return for its loss of reality, Persistence, advancement and return acquire the status
of eminent categories of human existence. In this way, they become veritable
"existentials". The constellation of such "existentials" constitutes the inner order of the
soul and at the same time, in the mode of external projection, determines the view of the
ψυχή on its "surrounding" metaphysical "world":
The essences have not emerged or not emerged in the way we conceptually think. The way in which the unified
process of emergence occurs is quite different. We are not yet in a position to conceptualize it because we are divided
into persistence, emergence and reversal, while the unified process of emergence transcends the distinction between
such moments 853 .
The "unspeakable" process corresponds to a form of reversal that also exceeds one-sided
human understanding. The outflow of being from the All-One takes place by virtue of a
"unified process" (ἑνιαία πρόοδος) 854 . The unfolding process is overtaken by a spiritual
reversion that directs it back to its origin and that occurs analogously to the holistic
positing of being as a "common ascent" (κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή) 855 . It is in reflecting on the
overall ontological return, which raises and contains reality as a totality in its principle,
that we may hope for an answer to the question of how one can arrive at the experience
of the One as the ἓν πάντα. In the following, we will therefore devote ourselves to the
problem of return in Damascius' metaphysics. This forms the counterpart to the
aporetics of the process and is closely linked to the philosophical difficulties that
determine the concept of participation (μετοχή). The concept of participation in the
One, together with the intelligible phenomenon of πρόοδος from the One, forms the
concluding part of the henological section of De principiis. In order to fully illuminate
the approach to ἕν in Damascius' thought, it is necessary to take a detour via the
dialectical moments of return and participation. In this way, we will be able to answer
the Questions about the emergence of the One and its functionality within the
multiplicity should be better prepared.
In the philosophical history handbooks of the 18th and 19th centuries, the "Alexandrian
philosophy" or "Neoplatonism" was often identified with a doctrine of emanation. In
most cases, the fact that the term emanatio was taken from the Latin heresiographers,
especially Iraeus of Lyon 856 , and referred to various mythologoumena of Gnosis 857 , remained
unreflected
. The application of the "Gnostic" emanatio to the metaphysical process of the
positing of being, as it is conceived in the Platonic systems, goes hand in hand with the
frequent equation of Neoplatonism and Gnosis. However, an investigation of the Greek
equivalents of emanatio in the Platonic writings (e.g. ῥεῖν, ῥοή, etc.) could produce the
surprising result that the corresponding terms occur relatively rarely and, if they occur
at all, then mostly in metaphorical contexts which appeal to the imagination of the
"soul" with a purely persuasive intention. Without wishing to completely deny the
representational advantages of the use of the term "emanation", the argument should be
put forward against the identification of Neoplatonism with a "theory of emanation" that
it is not primarily the process of emergence that leads to the constitution of the
hypostases of being, but rather their return (ἐπιστροφή) to the absolute principle of the
whole and to the individual, less comprehensive principles in the descending order of
the hypostases. The conceptual figure of ἐπιστροφή can already be found in Plato, in the
same dual form as in the later Platonic tradition: as the soul's reflection on ideas and as
the spirit's turning back to the "idea of the good". If we can believe Pierre Hadot, who
speaks of a whole "métaphysique de la conversion" 858 in the West, the concept of
"turning back" permeates the history of philosophy from Plato to Hegel, the young Marx
of the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts , and even reappears in Husserl 859 .
The paradigmatic representation of the doctrine of the return undoubtedly originated
with Plotinus, and precisely according to the two aspects of this movement already
indicated by Plato: firstly, as the return of the soul to the totality of being of the spirit,
and secondly as the return of the spirit to its transcendent scendent primal ground. In
these two movements of reversal and ascent, one can notice that the return to the origin
is always experienced individually. While one could still claim that the soul's becoming
whole in the spirit is only individually reflected post actum , because the fusion with the
whole of being implies a surrender of oneself, Plotinus repeatedly emphasizes the
"solitude totale" 860 of "becoming united" (ἑνωθῆναι) with the One itself. Thus the last
line of the programmatic treatise On the Good or the One (VI 9) describes the "contact"
of the first principle as a "flight of the Unique to the Unique" (φυγὴ μονοῦ πρὸς
μόνον). In the same treatise, Plotinus even expresses the loneliness in the highest
mystical moment as an imperative to his reader: πειράσθω ἀποστὰς πάντων μόνος
εἶναι 861 . At this point, one can identify an interesting difference between the Plotinian
and the Damascene conception of "union". While in Plotinus the soul must let go of
everything, and consequently even of the totality of the spiritual contents, in order to
ascend to the One, Damascius emphasises that - since the process of emergence from
the One initially took place in the form of the whole of being - the return can
consequently only take place in community with the whole of being. He bases this thesis,
which corresponds entirely to his doctrine of universal unity, on Iamblichus. However,
with his doctrine of the "common ascent", Iamblichus does not seem to have had in
mind the position of a universal unity doctrine, but rather, as far as can be seen from the
sparse fragments, the sacramental harmony of all spiritual beings in a religious koinē.
Damascius adopted this concept and "ontologized" it.
In the following, Plotinus's doctrine of the return ( ἐπιστροφή) will be briefly explained
so that it can help us to better understand and more clearly define the corresponding
thought figure in Damascius. In the second part of the chapter, Damascius' own concept
of the "common ascent" (κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή) will be discussed in the context of his Hen
ontology and taking into account the influence of Iamblichus.
The representation of the reversal, as conceived by Plotinus, encounters fundamental
hermeneutic difficulties, because every depiction of the metaphysical processes using
the means of language must take place in temporal succession. In contrast, Plotinus
endeavours to think of the various unfolding and folding moments of the constitution of
the mind as a unity. Life, Spirit and Being, which are bound up in the circular structure
of a process of emergence which is at the same time also a return, do not yet have the
fixed order which will be characteristic of the later Platonic systems. If, therefore, the
attempt is made in the following to establish a sequence among the moments of the
emergence of the spirit, then it is in the constant awareness that a living movement
connects the Plotinian stages of being, which have not yet solidified into the fully valid
"hypostases" of the after-time.
The first moment in the process of emergence from the first principle is described by
Plotinus as the “manifold and infinite life” ( ἡ ζωή…πολλὴ καὶ ἄπειρος οὖσα) 862 . The
life which remains around the One and contemplates this without objectifying visual
intention is still in a state of indeterminacy (πρὸς ἐκεῖνο μὲν οὖν βλέπουσα ἀόριστος
ἦν) 863 . This “indeterminate” life is probably identical with that pure light (φ ῶς) into
which the difference between the seer and the seen will merge and which will also
constitute the goal and resting point of ecstasy. As soon as the infinite life, which
surrounds the first principle as a radiance of light, gathers itself in a visual intention
(βλέψασα ἐκεῖ), it is defined and in this way receives certainty, limit and form (ε ὐθὺς
γὰρ πρὸς ἕν τι ἰδοῦσα ὁρίζεται τούτῳ καὶ ἴσχει ἐν αὑτῇ ὅρον καὶ πέρας καὶ εἶδος)
864
. The limited life becomes spirit (ὁρισθεῖσα γὰρ ζωὴ νοῦς) 865 . The spirit returns to
the One, but, due to its dyadic nature, it misses the absolute unity of the intended object
of thought. The spiritual contemplation of the One can only take place in a mode of
unity that is deficient (ἐνδεέστερον) compared to the absolute One, namely in the
diversity of the "being One" (ἓν ὄν). Starting from the absolute One and in accordance
with its essential duality, the spirit creates an infinite wealth of being unities, the ideas,
in which it reflects the transcendent unity of its original ground. The diversity of being is
therefore the result of a failure, of the spirit's attempt to focus and objectify the infinity
of the One as something (τι), which amounts to a turning away from the absoluteness of
the One. The transcendent principle "remains" throughout this entire process as the
necessary and yet constantly unattainable νοητόν, although not in the sense of
something "thought," but only as something "to be thought" 866 of the spirit.
The above description could give the impression that in the realm of the intelligible
there is a sequence of life-spirit-being. However, Plotinus emphasises that life always
takes the form of the life of the spirit and that the spirit does not produce ideas in a
subjectivist way but considers them as real objects, as concrete "images" ( ἀγάλματα) -
which is why an early treatise even tentatively speaks of a priority of being over spirit
(τὸ ὂν τοῦ νοῦ προεπινοεῖν ἀνάγκη) 867 . This fluctuating hierarchy within the moments
of being marks the “Plotinian tendency not to solidify the hypostases that are
distinguished from one another in a rigid and transitional or relationless manner, but to
make their interrelationship clear through similarity” 868 .
The task and "goal" (τέλος) 869 of the reverse movement, the return to the absolute unity
of the first principle, is the abolition of the multiplicity structure of the spirit, and
consequently also the correction of that objectifying thought intention which had led to
the reflection of the Absolute in the dyadic medium of the spirit. The resting point of the
ascent thus becomes pure seeing without a "focal point", which takes the form of a mere
"living towards" 870 (ἔζη πρός) the One-Good. The initial moment of the ascent
simultaneously becomes the final goal of the opposite movement. Above all in chapter
35 of the Ennead VI 7 it becomes clear that the return to the One is the reverse path of
the genesis of the spirit. It is worth considering the question of who it is who actually
accomplishes this ascent. Willy Theiler believes that he can read from the central
chapters of the Ennead VI 7 that Plotinus describes “in a peculiar way, while putting the
spirit aside, the soul being directly touched by the One” 871. This could be supported by a passage in the same Ennead
in which Plotinus says of the soul that in its search for the One it even exceeds the spirit
872
. But ultimately access to the One takes place in a transcendence of the spirit “with the
spirit itself” 873 , that is, with the original spirit, which as infinite life is “indeterminate
seeing” (ἀτύπωτος ὄψις) 874 and “striving per se” (ἔφεσις μόνον) 875. Because of the
moment pure striving in this "initial state" of the spirit, Plotinus calls it a "loving spirit"
(νοῦς ἐρῶν) 876 . The goal of the ascent is therefore the undifferentiated, barely or rather
not at all graspable moment of contact with the One at that point where the process of
emergence began "for the first time", that is, in the still undetermined, supra-intellectual
life. Plotinus marks this point, with reference to the third hypothesis of Plato's
Parmenides , as ἐξαίφνης, as the "moment" in which the soul realizes the transition
from the temporal to the untimely, from being to the non-being of the super-being. At
the indivisible point of this ἐξαίφνης the soul is no longer soul and no longer life and
spirit, but mere, absolute unity. At this moment she is absolutely alone : “Even if all
things around her were to perish, that would be just fine with her, so that she could be
alone with this one. Such is the degree of well-being she has attained!” (Hebrew: ε ἰ δὲ
καὶ τὰ ἄλλα τὰ περὶ αὐτὴν φθείροιτο, εὖ μάλα καὶ βούλεται, ἵνα πρὸς τούτῳ ᾖ
μόνον˙ εἰς τόσον ἥκει εὐπαθείας) 877 . This becoming one, which as such is only
subsequently reflected, takes place in a “stepping out” (ἔκστασις) 878 from all inner-
worldly relationships, but also from every performance of intelligible life.
The Plotinian conception of individually experienced ecstasy is in marked contrast to the
doctrine of "common ascent" (κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή), as it is developed in the
philosophical system of Damascius. The ontology of the Diadochi is based, as we shall
see, on the principle of "being united" (ἡνῶσθαι), so that the hierarchy of being is
constituted as a descending sequence of levels of union. The return to the One as "the
whole before the whole" can only take place in community with the whole of being itself
and not individually. But before we turn to the "collective return" as understood by
Damascius, one important moment of Plotinian thought, which is of importance for the
development of Damascius' system, should be addressed.
Pierre Hadot has rightly pointed out that in the treatment of Plotinian mysticism, not
only the "union" (ἕνωσις) can be discussed, because even before a "simplification"
(ἅπλωσις) and a fusion of the soul with the One takes place, the intermediate stage of
the "spiritualization" of the soul (νοωθῆναι 879 ) must be reached 880 . This state of
becoming spiritual is described by Plotinus as an awakening to the consciousness of
belonging to the νοῦς. wrote 881 . As a unity of ἕν and δυάς, as an infinite, unarticulated
vitality that received its order by turning back to the One, the spirit is the totality of
everything that is in the strict sense. The spirit encompasses all existing units that have
"come into being" through the interaction of the One and the Indeterminate Duality,
and is itself the first "existing One" (ἓν ὄν). The νο ῦς is therefore itself an idea, the "idea
of all ideas", a perfect whole, while all its contents reflect this wholeness under the
prevalence of a particular determination. Since the spirit encompasses all ideas, it also
contains the form of the soul itself and is actually the highest form of realization of the
soul. As a preliminary stage to union with the Absolute, the soul must become whole.
This happens through the insight that it is a part of the spirit. Since in the spirit every
idea simultaneously represents the totality of ideas, the soul awakens to the awareness
that it itself constitutes the "all" of ideas. The abolition of individuality in the all-unity of
the spirit takes place as ecstasy:
For we and our things are in relation to what is, we ascend to the mind and to what is first after it, and we think of
those things, and yet we have no images or imprints of them; and if not, we think of them, being themselves. Now if
we participate in true knowledge, we are that, not by grasping it in ourselves as separate, but by being in that. But
since other things, and not only we, are that, we are all that. We are all together, then, by being that; we are all, and
therefore one. When we turn our gaze to what is outside of that with which we are connected, we do not know that we
are one, just as a number of faces are turned outward, all of which are connected inward at one vertex. But if a man
can turn back, either of his own accord or because Athena herself turns him around for his salvation, he sees himself
as a god and the universe. At first, of course, he will not see himself as the All, but then, not knowing where to place
himself and how to draw the limit to which he himself reaches, he will refrain from delimiting himself from all beings
and will thus arrive at the entire All, not needing to advance anywhere, but remaining where the All is founded 882 .
The fusion with the spiritual being, which is mentioned in the passage quoted above, is
the most intensive form of thinking and life. "We" see the totality of ideas of the spirit.
At this stage of ascent, a community of all rational beings is obviously experienced. This
community is then abstracted from in a second step, in the privileged moment of
becoming unified, in accordance with the Plotinian imperative: "Leave everything alone"
(ἄφελε πάντα) 883 .
This "ontological" form of Plotinian ecstasy, which represents the prerequisite for
becoming united with the absolute One, will play an important role in the crystallization
of Damascius' doctrine of universal unity. It may at first seem paradoxical that the most
radical representative of a negative dialectic simultaneously conceives his henology and
ontology as a doctrine of universal unity. Damascius' "panhenotism" is already
predetermined by the opening aporia of his main work De principiis : If one thinks the
concept of the whole consistently (ἡ τῶν πάντων ἁπλῶς ἔννοια) 884 , then the principle of
this whole is, as it were, "reabsorbed" into the whole itself, so that the whole and its
principle form a "homogeneous" totality. The actual primal ground of the whole eludes
any relationship to the whole and to the knowing mind, whose thinking draws on
wholeness structures. In a potentially infinite series of negations, Damascius denies the
primal ground of the whole any positivity, no matter how slight (i.e. also the quality of
being the "primal ground of the whole") and describes it as "that which may not be
expressed" (ἀπόρρητον), without thereby wanting to condense the inexpressibility and
unknowability into an essence in itself, which would belong to the abolished "primal
ground". Nevertheless, the whole, the unity of unity and multiplicity, requires the ἕν as a
foundation of its totality. The One forms the "ground of existence" ( ὕπαρξις) for the
constitution of the whole of being, but not in such a way that the whole would thereby
integrate its origin, for an "order of being" (σύνταξις) that included its principle within
itself would ultimately remain "without principle and without cause" ( ἄναρχός ἐστι καὶ
ἀναίτιος) 885 . Rather, the One, thanks to its integrative and pre-grounded simplicity,
transcends the totality of being and yet, unlike the ἀπόρρητον, remains in a relationship
to it.
Since the simplicity of the first principle forms the foundation of being, there can be no
talk of an αἴτιον-αἰτιατόν relationship between the ἕν and the whole. really be the
question, because the One does not "cause" reality, but is reality itself as its basis of
being: τὰ κυρίως πάντα ἐκεῖνο 886 . For this reason Damascius describes the One as
προαίτιον. The individual intelligible and sensual beings are, however, not always
"conscious" of their belonging to the One, which amounts to a turning away ( ἀπόστασις)
from the One, which, however, takes place within the sphere of influence of the One
itself. The One, by virtue of its all-encompassing nature, even holds the "apostate"
multiplicity together, just as the sun radiates its light even to those who close their eyes
to it. In this way, Damascius succeeds in thinking of a fundamental monism without
excluding diversity.
Pure unity and pure multiplicity, which in the first principle form an absolute unity as
"the whole before the whole" (πάντα πρὸ πάντων), are only subsequently distinguished
as such by the spirit. The mere ἕν and the mere πλ ῆθος thus become the first henades,
which, in union with one another, give rise to the "descending" chain of hypostases,
beginning with the "unified", the representative for the ὄν of the earlier Neoplatonists,
and ending with the νοῦς, which only reaches its complete differentiation after an
enneadic sequence of steps.
The "unified" (τὸ ἡνωμένον) is the whole of being itself as the perfect identity of unity
and multiplicity. It has not yet really left the pre-holistic one, but is "unified" with it and
"substantialized around it" (περὶ τὸ ἓν οὐσίωται) 887 . Damascius usually avoids adding
the expected ὄν to the term ἡνωμένον, which is actually a defining word, because being
in the narrower and stricter sense is merely the first stage of the triadic sequence being-
life-spirit, which unfolds from the unified. Each ontological dimension corresponds to
its own form of wholeness, which experiences increasing differentiation as it descends.
In fact, according to Emile Bréhier's words already quoted, one of Damascius' main
innovations within the Neoplatonic system of thought seems to consist in structuring
the order of being not according to degrees of unity, but rather according to degrees of
unification . 888 The Damascene "peculiarity" thus lies in an ontology that is constructed
according to the principle of "being unified" (ἡνῶσθαι).
Human thought dissects the absolute simplicity of the One and the Unified into pure
unity and pure multiplicity, which it then reassembles into whole structures in a
constantly failing attempt to The only way out of this solipsism is to conceptually
recreate the unity of the higher "essences". The only way out of this solipsism is a self-
transcendence of thought. This self-transcendence does not take place in the form of
ecstasy, but rather as self-immersion in deeper levels of consciousness, where thought
seeks to reflect the super-intelligible. These fundamental levels of consciousness are: the
inarticulable consciousness of the "unsayable" 889 and the reflection on the
"monoeidetic", that is, on the One as the reason for the existence of the multiplicity of
forms 890 .
In the hen-ontological context, the intelligible light becomes important, as it has the role
of measuring the entire distance between νοῦς and νοητόν and at the same time
mediating between the two: the light of the One is refracted in the “rainbow” of the
Enneadic structure of being when it passes through the “cloud” of the Unified 891 . The
Unified is like a “crystal” (ὕαλος) that is illuminated from within 892 . We do not perceive
the ideas themselves “immediately” (ἀμέσως), but thanks to those things that are
transparent to the intelligible light (ὥσπερ διὰ τίνων σωμάτων διαφανῶν) 893 . For
Damascius, the whole series of hypostases becomes a system of mirrors 894 that transmit
to each other the light of the one “sun,” or a series of panes of glass that allow the
original unity to shine through. Despite its multiple refraction through various media,
the intelligible light awakens in the mind, and thus also in the human soul, insofar as it
participates in the mind, a desire for the unified light of the first principle. The aim of
the spirit is therefore to transcend itself as spirit, guided by the intelligible light. Its self-
transcendence does not occur through its own "cognitive reversion" ( ἐπιστροφὴ
γνωστική), for it is precisely this that has led to its "delimitation" (περιγραφή) as spirit
and to its fragmentation into individual and specific ideas. Through the reversion
according to knowledge, the spirit sees being only at a certain distance from it
(πόρρωθεν) and always only as an "appearance" (φανόν) 895 . Since the reversion of
knowledge has led to the constitution of spirit, another form of reversion should lead to
the unified and to the One itself. In the course of the ascent, a surrender of the whole
structure (πᾶν-εἴδη) takes place on the part of the spirit, the higher forms of unity: first
the totality structure (ὅλον-μέρη) of intelligible life and then the elemental structure
(στοιχειωτόν-στοιχεῖα) of pure being. The spirit that has become being finally turns
towards the One itself in an "being-like turning back" (ο ὐσιώδης ἐπιστροφή). This
ἐπιστροφή is no longer just a "turning back" but a "unification" (ἕνωσις) 896 .
In the context of a discussion about the pre-existence of "individuals" ( ἄτομα) at the
level of the "more general" hypostases, Damascius comes to the conclusion that the
mind encompasses all the individual forms and produces them according to an efficacy
which it itself receives from a higher cause. Of this cause - meaning, of course, the One -
Damascius writes:
The Cause sustains the whole and holds together all that is produced ad infinitum. It is the one Cause which has
prefigured the totality of all these things, and in a sense the individual forms of all time, not only me and you
individually, and yet both me and you and all that was before and ever will be 897 .
By virtue of its all-encompassing nature, the One possesses all past and future particular
forms in its time-transcendent unity. Although the One “has not assumed an individual
form, but rather rejects the individual” 898 , it is nevertheless “together with each
individual as his individual origin and appears to each as his individual goal” 899 .
However, the consciousness of belonging to the One must first be awakened, which
happens in a process of self-reflection, since the first principle is also present in us and,
as the “human One,” constitutes the essential moment of our soul structure. With the
“One in us,” the individual soul rises to the absolute One, and with that unity that dwells
in the spirit, we rise to absolute Being 900 , which is united with the One itself and is
united in it. This ascent always takes place from wholeness to wholeness, from the whole
spirit to the whole intelligible life and finally to the whole of being.901 In this way the
ascending spirit, having sublated its wholeness structure into the totality of life and
finally into the elemental nature of being, experiences ever more unified forms of
temporality until it comes to rest in the eternity of the unified.
According to Damascius, the constitution of reality in the starting point of the One did
not take place all at once, but “step by step” (κατὰ βραχύ) 902 , in that the ἕν in its strict
unity, so to speak, increasingly “relaxed” (χαλᾶται τὸ ἓν) in order to make room for the
diversity of the different entities (χώραν παρεχόμενον ε ἰς ὑπόστασιν) 903 . Since the
general structures of being preceded the individual entities in a slow procession ( ἄλλων
πρὸ ἄλλων ἐκφαινομένων, τῶν ὁλικωτέρων πρὸ τῶν μερικωτέρων) 904 , the spirit in its
return to the One must also take the opposite path through the long sequence of
“totality”. As soon as the spirit has reached the level of all-being, it can turn back to the
absolute One, to which everything individual is alien, in community with all entities,
whose differences are now abolished:
If anyone seeks the useful and the good in themselves, let him be aware of the community that arises between all
things by virtue of knowledge, according to the insight into the universal affinity. Let him also observe the path of all
things that prepare themselves for the ascent to the one principle. On this path, knowledge is appointed as a precursor
to those who ascend, which corrects their error. For it is, as it were, a forward eye that guides the desire that is
directed to that one principle, by letting the light that is proper to that desire shine forth. For this reason, of all that
leads to the goal, knowledge is the most perfect. Furthermore, by shaping the lower in accordance with the form of the
higher, it causes the lower to return to the higher, and indeed to the highest of all, through the common ascent to
Being (ἡ εἰς τὸ ὂν κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή). For we touch the ineffable not through knowledge but through Being. But
Being touches the ineffable through a perfect union, so that through Being everything else also touches the ineffable 905

.
These lines are part of a discussion about the effects of knowledge on spiritual life. What
is meant is the ἐπιστροφή of the spirit as “correction of the process” (τ ῆς ἐκστάσεως
ἐπανόρθωσις) 906 and as “regaining of perseverance” in the unity of being ( ἀνάκτησις τ ῆς
μονῆς) 907 . The mere mention of a cognitive and being-like return must not obscure the
fact that there is also a return of intelligible life, which mediates between the other two
forms of return, since "the knowledge of the spirit, through life, essentially returns to
being" 908 . The spirit is not capable of uniting itself with the "unsayable", since
knowledge, the specific way of its return, always remains in the duality of subject and
object. Only pure being "touches" the ἀπόρρητον. This is of course by no means the
absolutely "unsayable", but merely the "unsayable" one.
However, the most intense mental activity can lead to the mind transcending itself and
evolving into being:
Since the spirit wanted to touch Being and to assimilate itself to it, it brought together its own knowledge into a
unified synthesis of all acts of knowledge, and by achieving a single unified act of knowledge, it armed itself with its
combined forces, one might say, for the ascent to the truly undifferentiated object of knowledge. It did not allow the
knower to consist in a difference from the object of knowledge, as a unity with another unity, but, by transforming
knowledge into Being through an intensive union, it directed itself towards the object of knowledge and perceived it
as Being. As a knower, it strove, as it were, towards the object of knowledge, because it was far from it, but as soon as
it touched it, it became aware that the contact was not that of a knower with the knowable, but of being with being.
Consequently, the ascent to that being is more of being, while the return to oneself is of knowledge 909 .
What is clearly stated in this passage is that there are two levels of "union" ( ἕνωσις): the
first is the "union" as synthesis (συναίρημα) of cognitive acts, which takes place at the
level of the spirit. The highest and most perfect, however, is the differenceless "union"
with the Unified, which is "substantialized around the One" and remains in contact with
the One.
According to the words of Damascius, which have already been quoted several times, the
One is “the Whole to an even greater extent than it is the Whole itself” 910 . The Whole, in
turn, represents “the all-sustaining activity of the One” (τὰ πάντα ἐνέργεια παντοῦχός
ἐστι τοῦ ἑνός) 911 . Thus the highest and most intensive unity can only be experienced in the “perfect community of the
Whole” (ἡ ὅλη κοινωνία τῶν πάντων) 912 . In the strict sense, the whole means the united
itself, for “all beings are in it, so that even the difference is contained in it as a unity” 913 .
The “being consisting of all entities” (ἡ ἐκ πάντων οὐσία) is a “holistic cosmos” (κόσμος
ὁλοτελής), which is why the ascent to it does not take place individually. Yet fusion with
the unified does not in any way equate to a loss of identity, for it is only through its
inclusion in the universal order of being that the individual belongs to itself to the
greatest extent (τούτων ἕκαστον αὐτὸ ἑαυτοῦ κυριώτερόν ἐστιν ἐν τῇ μιᾷ συντάξει
τῶν πάντων) 914 . Paradoxically, it is only by means of the ‘unlimited union’ with the
totality of being that the individual can touch that One which grounds him as an
individual 915 .
Compared to Plotinus, a certain terminological shift is evident in Damascius: while
“union” represents the actual constitutional mode of the “united”, “simplicity” is the
characteristic feature of the One, which Damascius transcends into the transcendent as
“over-simplified simplicity” (ὑπερηπλομένη ἁπλότης): “For everything has integrated
the one essence of the united into the one union of the whole, while the One itself, if one
may express it this way, has subsumed everything into the one simplicity of the whole” 916
. The goal of man is to return to the simplicity of the first principle through union with
the All-Being (δεῖ δὲ παντελῶς ἀπὸ πάντων ἐπὶ τὴν μίαν ἀναπλοῦσθαι τῶν πάντων
αἰτίαν) 917 . Here he will find the source of his own individuality. But this primal source of
individuality cannot be touched in separation from the whole of Being, for Being is
"substantiated in the One and around it" 918 , as Damascius says with a paraphrase of
Iamblichus.
The idea of "common ascent" (κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή), which is central to Damascius,
seems to have been significantly influenced by Iamblichus, although we can no longer
verify the exact extent of this influence based on the current state of sources. The most
important evidence of a "common return" in Iamblichus comes from Damascius
himself, in a form modified by his own ontology, which is why the exact systematic place
of this idea in the work of the philosopher from Chalcis can no longer be determined
with absolute certainty. The most important testimony to the κοινὴ ἐπαναγωγή is
found in Damascius' lecture on Plato's Philebus. The quotation is from Jamblichus’ own
commentary on this dialogue, where the Chalcidian presumably glosses passages 61a-
64a:
Why does the cause give itself away to the mixed being? Because the cause is everything in a perfect way. For the
simple cannot have the ineffable power which encompasses everything beyond the one (= the individual). The divine
Iamblichus asserts this very thing, namely, that it is impossible for an individual being to participate in the general
orders of precedence except in community with the glorious chorus of those who are led up in spiritual harmony. The
Athenians also used to pray to Athena Polias only for the city, because the goddess protects the community, and not
for each individual person 919 .
The interpretation of this passage is difficult. John Dillon links the quotation to
Iamblichus's religious ideas. The passage is, according to Dillon, "an advertisement for
organized religion" 920 . In contrast, Bent Dalsgaard Larsen sees in this testimony the
expression of "a cosmological perspective with ethical implications":
We cannot gain direct access to the absolute principle of everything. Therefore, the path to participation in the order
of life as a whole does not go through individuality, but through the community of souls that are inspired by the same
ideas and feelings. The Absolute cannot be encountered in any other way than through the harmonious relationship
between people and things. Thus Iamblichus links man's path to the good with the foundation of the universal being
921
.
The two interpretations of Iambliche's thought figure are perhaps not in irreconcilable
opposition to one another, if one considers that for the late Neoplatonists every order of
being simultaneously represents a class of gods. For this reason, every ontological
connection also has a theological dimension. But it is certain that, at least in the
fundamental-philosophical context of his main work De principiis, Damascius turns
Iamblichus's doctrine of "common ascent" into a purely ontological one:
He (sc. Iamblichus) maintains that the individual cannot ascend to that (sc. One) unless it places itself in the order of
being of the whole and ascends together with the whole to the common principle of the whole. If, therefore, all things
strive together towards that, and no single one can do so by itself in separation from the others, then it is clear that all
things have also come forth together from there, not each individual by itself, but one from the other 922 .
This paraphrase of Iamblichus clearly shows that Iamblichus' teaching, which was
perhaps intended to be more cultic, was interpreted as a purely metaphysical movement
by Damascius and made fruitful for his system. However, this should not be interpreted
as an "enlightenment" attitude towards a supposed religious or mythographic
"obscurantism". The entire metaphysical-ontological system of the last scholar breathes
a deeply religious spirit. The architecture of his philosophical edifice, however, is
designed to reveal the metaphysical-a priori reasons for divine-historical phenomena.
We now see how the central idea of a universal turning to the One, which is for
Damascius central, arises from the ecstasy of the being of Plotin's philosophy of spirit,
which is subordinate to the actual, henological rapture. The significance of this concept
is connected with the reinterpretation of the doctrine of unity: The One is no longer the
absolutely simple in the sense of rejecting the whole and setting itself apart from it, but
the integratively simple, which absorbs the whole into itself and dissolves its inner
differences, which offers support to the totality of being and is present to each of its
elements. The ascent to the One understood in this way cannot, consequently, take place
in the form of an absolute isolation of the self. The One, which for Damascius has lost
the status of the "punctual", expands into the All-One and requires a corresponding
approach that would be able to reveal the first primal cause as the ἓν πάντα. For this
reason, Damascius feels compelled to provide a phenomenological description of that
intelligible movement which brings us all together into a unified primal consciousness,
in order to then lead the community of the whole of being to the super-intelligible All-
One. The beginnings of such an overcoming of all differences can already be found, as
we have seen, in Plotinus. "During the meditative ascent of the train of thought into the
spiritual world," the "various selves [...] lose their earthly selfhood, bound to the hybrid
being" 923 . The individual consciousnesses thus become for Plotinus a single Nous-form:
πάντα ἄρα ἐσμὲν ἕν. With this saying, Plotinus meant two things: firstly, the fusion
that takes place “between all conscious, ἡμεῖς-speaking beings”, and secondly, the
unification of all spiritual contents into an absolute spirit 924 . However, this noological-
ontological unification was for Plotinus only the preliminary stage to the μόνος πρὸς
μόνον- Relation 925 , in which the mystical experience reaches its perfection. A "relation"
of this kind, in which every relationality and every duality is actually eliminated, can
only refer to an absolute unity.
In the metaphysics of the last Diadochi, it is precisely the “henadic” character of the One
that is renounced in favor of a hen-ontological mysticism of all. As a result, the total
return that raises us to the ἓν πάντα is given the highest honor within his system.
However, the union does not occur with this, because the All-One “is before the whole,”
but with the unified Being. This is the first thing that gives us a touch of the All-One
beyond Being.
This form of "panhenotic" ecstasy, which presupposes the unification of all
consciousness, has not yet been sufficiently reflected upon in the history of learned
philosophy, perhaps because ecstatic phenomena have always been treated as starting
point from the paradigmatic, Plotinian-defined μόνος πρὸς μόνῳ experience. The
axiom according to which henological rapture is always based on a hypertrophy of the
feeling of individuality has even been declared a dogma: "Transcendence can never be
and never become common and universal: rather, it simply isolates. One cannot
transcend together; rather, everyone here must do everything alone. He who transcends
is alone. For with what should he be together who transcends everything?" 926 .
"What should he be together with who transcends everything?" asks a voice of the 20th
century. "What should he not be together with?" Damascius would reply from the
perspective of his monism. We will see later what existential-philosophical implications
the Damascius philosophem of common ascent has. First of all, however, we must ask
more closely what role the principle of multiplicity plays in Damascius' protology.

2.6 Beyond monism and dualism

Since the days of Plato and the Old Academy, and even since the poet-philosopher
Empedocles, who for the first time traced the movement of the entire being back to the
interplay of two primary causes, the Philia and the Neikos , one of the fundamental
questions of Greek philosophy has been: How is the How can we explain the
contradiction that manifests itself in reality? Can it be traced back to a conflict of
principles or can the tense unity of reality be derived from a single original cause?
Without wishing to trace the individual stages of this path of thought, which is
essentially identifiable with the history of the Platonic tradition in which this question
rose to become the main intellectual task, we will now, within the more modest
framework of the present topic, ask ourselves a question that is closely related to our
investigations: What is Damascius's contribution to the question that kept the entire
"golden chain of Plato" in tension for centuries? As a latecomer in the history of the
Platonic Academy, can he still contribute something essential to the high intellectual
conversation of his school?
We saw that for the Damascene the existence of multiplicity is a concrete, undeniable
fact. With a gesture that was almost phenomenological, he established the existence of
the many alongside the one (θέσις τοῦ παρὰ τὸ ἕν) 927 . But how is the many to be
interpreted “in principle”? What is its basis and what is the relationship of this basis to
the one itself? The strong emphasis on henological transcendence that gradually
becomes audible in the Damascene discourse, even to the point of a fusion of the
absolute one with the ineffable itself, “there” where neither identity nor difference can
have a place, opens up a horizon for the understanding of multiplicity, but does not
immediately resolve the aporias that are connected with the assumption of multiplicity
and its principle. On the contrary, the removal of the One into a transcendence, which is
in no way diminished by its “synthematic” identification as “whole before the whole” but
is even increased, makes the question sound even more urgent: How is multiplicity in
isolation from the “One”, which is no longer even One, still conceivable?
The reality of the many is the most obvious immediacy for the little scholar. Not only the
reference to the πράγματα itself, which Damascene philosophy is guided by to the same
extent as the authority of the divine tradition, but also the ontological factuality of
human existence forces the evidence of multiplicity upon us. This factuality is
historically conditioned, and is anchored in the mythical past of the human race.
Humans are created from the “heat vapor” that arose from the lightning strike with
which Zeus punished the audacity of the Titans – it says in an Orphic mythological
poem that handed down to us by Damascius (though through the pen of his pupil) 928 .
The Titans, who in Orphic “theology” are not equated with the venerable gods of the pre-
Olympic generation, but are made out to be renegade sons of Zeus 929 , had dared to kill
the little Dionysus-Zagreus in their father’s absence. The circumstances of this deicide,
with their symbolic potential, correspond to the Neoplatonic worldview: Dionysus is
lured out of his hiding place thanks to a mirror held up to him by the Titans. The first
act of this drama thus already indicates the metaphysical meaning of the primal crime
committed by the Titans, namely the doubling or even multiplication of the divine unity
930
. In the next scene of this cosmic drama we see the Titans tearing the holy person of
the god apart and eating it. Athena is able to save the heart of Dionysus, which enables
Zeus to bring his murdered son back to life on his return 931 . The criminal Titans are
turned to ashes by the angry father of the gods with his lightning bolt, from which the
human race arises 932 . The anthropogony from the ashes of the Titans points to the
fundamental ontological inferiority of man as a creature that has sprung from a wicked
race. In this respect, this myth casts a deep shadow on human existence and could
certainly be seen as a symbol of a pessimistic view of existence, if it were not for the
secret presence of the Dionysian Substance in the ashes of the Titans, who had
consumed the sublime person of the god, would sanctify the human being at its core.
This tragedy, which takes place in divine spheres and which must have played a central
role in Orphic theology and which Damascius has handed down to us, is for the scholar
what the history of salvation is for a Christian theologian. It is a historical fact that must
be taken as a starting point and that can unfold a profound explanatory potential if one
knows how to subject it to the right hermeneutics in order to bring its hidden meaning
to light. The descent of man from the daring race of the Titans - a descent to which Plato
alludes in the Laws 933 - has, for Damascius, decisive effects on the intellectual activity of
our soul. We cannot refrain from projecting the differentiation of our own concepts onto
the "most holy" and highly indivisible 934 , that is to say, onto the absolute One itself. Last
but not least, there is a subliminal reference to the Orphic identification of the Titans
with the giants. While in the archaic poetry of Greece the two primal sexes were
distinguished from one another, although the "Gigantes" appeared as avengers of the
Titans who had been displaced by the Olympians, in Orphic speculation a fusion of these
two classes of mythological beings took place. In Orphism it is now the "Titans" who, led
by the arch-villain Typhon, storm the Olympus of the gods. For Damascius, however,
Olympus is nothing other than the symbol of intelligible being. The snow-clear peak of
the seat of the gods becomes the transcendent ἄκρον of the pure ὄν. We all carry a
"longing" (πόθος) for this "primal being" in our souls 935 . This “longing” can, however, be
interpreted as consciousness and, in this respect, despite the Damascene transcendence
of pure being, also as a premonition and silhouette of the ὄν in the ψυχή. This results in
a veritable “titanic war” for human existence, in which our soul must conquer the
“Olympus” of unified being with the meager means of its diverse and differentiated to
assail the limited concepts of the understanding: “But should self-collection
(συναίρεσις) overwhelm us, what would be strange about that, since we are being wiped
out in a titanic war?” 936 .
The presence of multiplicity in the human soul is therefore a mytho-historical fact. It
does not require any special proof, but must only be uncovered phenomenologically and
its origin traced back to the historicity of existence. In Neoplatonic thought, however,
mythology is nothing other than dynamized and dramatized metaphysics. This does not
take the form of allegoresis, in which mythology is merely the figurative garb of
metaphysics, but in a real identity of these two modes of understanding being.
Neoplatonism sees the ontological origin of the unity of metaphysics and mythology in
the fact that every deity is a metaphysical entity, or more specifically: an idea.
Consequently, the phenomenon of multiplicity, which is openly visible in the visible
world, in the structure of the soul 937 and in the mythical historicity of man, must be
derived from a metaphysical primal source. The “titanic” fragmentation of the soul’s life,
the “different forms of thought” (διακεκριμένα εἴδη) of the spirit and the observable
separation that prevails in the midst of the sensory world demand a justifying principle
of such plurality.
The interpretation of the absolute One as "whole before the whole" forms the horizon for
the definition of the principle of multiplicity. It is not unity that represents the essential
characteristic of the One, but totality, although in an exaltation beyond being, so that the
transcendent One is only an anticipation of the concrete whole of all beings. But if the
One anticipates the totality of being and this totality actually already exists , and indeed
in absolute simplicity, then the One as a whole before the whole absorbs the principle of
multiplicity and differentiation. The Damascene rejection of the process of origin
thereby receives a firmer foundation in terms of principles: the One not only releases the
totality of being from its transcendent primal ground, "It" is even the totality of being, in
what it has to show as its most noble essence, namely unity and simplicity. The process
of origin from the One is already the One in itself, because a foundation from the One
outside of the One itself cannot be thought of. Such a process has the same all-
embracing and all-founding breadth as the "persistent" One. In Damascius' system, the
"emanation" is thus paradoxically thought of as a remaining within the all-presence of
the One and is consequently inscribed in the peculiar Damascene "Panhenotism". The
scholar understands the unified process of being from the One as a “ common process
that has grown together from the two essences [of the One and the Many] ”, and as a “
self-collection that arises everywhere before any division ” ( τὴν γὰρ ἐκ τῶν δυεῖν
κοινοφυῆ πρόοδον καὶ συναίρεσιν τὴν πρὸ ἑκάστου μερισμοῦ πανταχοῦ).
προϊοῦσαν ) 938 . As contradictory as it may seem at first glance, for Damascius the
emergence from the One is not a dispersion at the outset of the ἕν, but an "emerging
self-gathering" (συναίρεσις προϊοῦσα). This is based on the fact that the specific
"activity" of the One is the wholeness, that is, the embracing of the many in a pre-
founded unity, while unification is an essential characteristic of the unified being. That
is why the process of emergence of multiplicity from the One receives such paradoxical
designations as “unified process” (ἑνιαία πρόοδος) 939 and “undifferentiated generation”
(ἀδιόριστος γέννησις) 940 .
The countermovement corresponding to the unified process is the "common return" 941 .
This countermovement should not, however, be understood as a contradiction to the
"unified process", for it keeps the beings that are set by the One within the horizon of the
One. The common return is by no means a movement that counteracts the common
process , but rather a movement that counteracts it , leading those who are ascending
back to ontological universal harmony. Fusion with the transcendent is not possible, but
at least the way to harmony with the All-One is opened up for us. The ideal of this ascent
to the perfection of oneness is the eminent existential task for man in general and the
standard of the philosopher's dialectical procedure in particular. The dialectician should
namely understand the immanent contradiction of metaphysical concepts and in doing
so overcome the contradictions of discursive thinking. Because as soon as the reversal
movement is established, which constantly turns the positive content of the concepts
into the negative, the mutual attraction of the metaphysical concepts also becomes clear.
“One” and "many", "simplicity" and "totality", "immanence" and "transcendence" not
only condition each other in pairs, but also each other beyond its immediate opposite.
This gives rise to the awareness of the general belonging of the concepts of being to a
hen-ontological συναίρεσις, which reveals the true essence of reality as a differenceless
all-unity:
…But it is better to ascend in a universal and perfect way from all entities to the one oversimplified simplicity of the
One beyond all entities, and not only from a single opposite, even if all entities were included in this opposite. For all
entities would be included in this opposite only according to two particular properties. On the other hand, one must
simplify in a holistic way from the whole to the one primal ground of the whole 942 .
But what does all this tell us about the principle of multiplicity in Damascius? Well, it is
precisely the interpretation of the One as all-one that leaves no room for the
introduction of a separate principle of multiplicity. The second principle, the original
basis of multiplicity, the "indeterminate duality" of the Platonic tradition, is integrated
into the One and appears as if it were unified with it or, better said, holistically. How
then does the principle of multiplicity differ from the principle of unity? This is precisely
what Damascius will deny: that the distinctions that our mind makes can also be valid
for the realm of the super-intelligible. But must there not be some basis for the external
projection of the mind that would justify the intellectual differentiation of a principle of
unity and a principle of multiplicity, even if this differentiation were only perspective?
Damascius sees such a clue in the distinction between “essential property” ( ἰδιότης) and
“number” (ἀριθμός) in the superintelligible realm. The principle of diversity is much
and not many – in other words, it is a multiplicity , that is, the “essence” and not the
“number” of the plural:
The second principle was a duality as a duality of one; it was many and infinite as multiplicity and infinity each taken
merely in one. Due to the essential characteristic (ἰδιότης) the second principle was many and infinite 943 .
The distinction between "essential property" and "number" plays a central role in
Damascius' metaphysics. It enables the Diadochi to speak of concrete metaphysical
conceptual constellations without thereby splitting the transcendent-unified intelligible
into different hypostases. In terms of number, there cannot be several principles in the
realm beyond the spirit, because at the level that exceeds reason, one cannot yet speak of
a number. In this sense, the "two" principles that govern the structure of reality form a
unity. In order for such a unity to be truly perfect and appropriate to the purity of the
principle level, it must not tolerate any opposition alongside it and must be just as much
wholeness and multiplicity as it is pure unity. This is why the scholar tirelessly
impresses upon us that we must respect the lack of opposition of the transcendent One
and that multiplicity must be abolished in its absoluteness. No contradiction may
overshadow the integrity of the One, because such a contradiction would cause the One
to lose its all-encompassingness and ultimately its very unity. Number therefore has no
place at the level of the hypernoetic. Nevertheless, aspects must be distinguished. To a
certain extent, differences in the undifferentiated must also be identified. The standard
for distinguishing aspects in the superintelligible principle is provided by its
functionality within reality. The concept of "essential peculiarity" serves this purpose,
which describes a determination - albeit a holistic one , as Damascius emphasizes - in
the universal principle. The ἰδιότης does not yet allow the principle to become an
individual cause. It protects and preserves its universality, since all principles of being
form a single primary cause. However, the "essential peculiarity" gives the principle a
special "shimmer" (ἔμφασις) and a different expression in each case, according to the
differentiated functionality of the principle within the constitution of being. It is human
thought that, in its return to the All-One, isolates the essential peculiarities of the
principle into disparate intellectual concepts. The task of the philosopher consists above
all in reflecting this back-projection and thus preserving the knowledge of the All-Unity
in its pure form.
The concept of “essential property” serves the scholar to preserve the unity of the All-
One and yet to speak of certain “expressions” of the All-One. These “expressions” are
actually a “pre-differentiation” (προδιορισμός) of what will only appear in the further
course of the hypostasis development. They are not concrete determinations that would
transform the superintelligible into tangible beings, into a comprehensible unity
(ἕνωμα) or into a partial concept (διάκριμα), but rather more "predeterminations" that
announce the thought figures of the spirit 944 . The νοῦς itself reflects its categorical
structure on the unified principle and breaks it down into partial concepts in order to
make it comprehensible: "But in truth there [in the mixture of the unified being] several
components have not even appeared together with the one. From the spirit we project
these differentiating intuitions onto that mixture " 945 . The Damascene "projection
idealism" has its basis in an ontology of the νο ῦς that is integrated into a concretely
conceived system of hypostases. The first difference appears on the level of the νο ῦς
νοητός, that is, in the third dimension of the first order of being. For the highest peak of
being, this cannot even be the case, which is why only the "titanic" design of the spirit, in
its return to the "Olympus" of the unified and super-intelligible entity, reflects the pair
of concepts identity and difference. But at least the spirit can withdraw its perspective,
differentiating view into the consciousness of a "pre-differentiation" when thinking
about the super-spiritual.
The reduction of the fundamental opposition and the substantial content of the
principles to “essential characteristics” means that the One is no longer thought of as
singular but as unity 946 , the Dyas no longer as two but as duality, and the Triad no
longer as three but as pure and undifferentiated trinity. For the Diadochi, the first
principles are thus pure “essences” that combine to form a single, integrative essence 947 .
With the tools of differentiation between “essential property” and “number”, the
Damascene now sees himself as sufficiently armed against dualistic theories of
principles. He rejects these without exception, even though they had determined the
entire tradition of Neoplatonic principle thinking. Not only the deduction of being from
the pair of principles πέρας-ἄπειρον, Damascius rejects not only the idea of the opposite
monad-dyad as conceived by Syrian and Proclus, but also the Iamblichean assumption
of a monad-dyad opposition as the origin of reality. Given the supposed subservience of
Damascius' philosophy to Iamblichean metaphysics, this criticism is surprising and is
capable of calling into question the widely held opinion of the Diadochi's blind
obedience to authority, especially with regard to Iamblichus. Damascius' points of
criticism are two in number: the first and more fundamental one stems from his general
dissatisfaction with dualistic systems. If one traces the contradictions observable
everywhere in the world back to a first opposition of principles, one must ask what
exactly creates the unity of this opposition in the first place. On the basis of what
principle can one say that the first two principles form an opposition? If one traces the
primary opposition back to a unified origin, then the very concept of such an ἀντίθεσις
requires that one assigns to it a principle of duality and multiplicity, and thus again an
opposition. The line of thought could be continued in the same way ad infinitum 948 . This
is Damascius' first and fundamental objection to dualistic systems in general, regardless
of their finer differentiation in content. We have already anticipated his own approach
to the solution above. Due to his distinction between "number" and "essential property",
Damascius sees himself in a position to assert the unity of the first principle and to
emphasize its double expression, as a principle of unity and multiplicity.
This fundamental criticism of dualistic explanatory models is supplemented by a more
detailed examination of the concrete pairs of concepts in the Platonic tradition. Proclus
– perhaps following in the footsteps of his master Syrian – assumed the two principles
πέρας and ἄπειρον as mediation from the absolute One to the concrete multiplicity 949 .
Iamblichus, on the other hand, seems to have placed the duality of monad and dyad
after the ineffable and the effable One 950 . Damascius reduces the two pairs of principles
to one another and finally to the higher συζυγία of One and Many. According to
Damascius, there is no need for a mediating binary of ἀρχαί, which would explain the
emergence of the bipolar structured reality starting from the One. The highest principles
themselves, the One and the Many, can make the foundation of being completely
understandable. The ἀρχαί of the One and many, by virtue of the criticism of dualistic
views referred to above, cannot be thought of as “counter-differentiation”. Nor is it the
case that one principle would establish the positive and unified, the other the negative
and pluralistic systoichy within reality. Both principles are the origin of the whole of
reality, but each in a different form, as unified and as pluralistic being. For the two
principles form a perfect unity, the absolutely simple “whole before the whole”. Above
all, against the Iamblichean division into monad and dyad, Damascius wants to
maintain that
we too begin with the one principle of the whole and, after this one, establish the two principles in correspondence
with the double systoichy, starting from the one entity that has grown together and is splitting itself. However, the
two principles are not differentiated from one another, but one does not yet want to emerge from the ineffable, but is
rather "swallowed up" by it, while the other is already included in the state of emergence and is only specified by the
decompression itself, because the emergence together with it forms a unified substance 951 .
From the perspective of such a radical conception of the absolute homogeneity of the
spirit-transcendent, the second principle, the primal source of multiplicity and
distinction, enters into a perfect unity with the One itself:
Everything that we suspect would exist in that realm as a multiplicity (= the second principle, the dyad or the
dynamis ), unless it is the One itself as the unified - even this must be considered from the point of view of the one-
form. For one could not even say that union as the opposite of multiplicity exists in that realm, because in that case
the opposite multiplicity would also be present in the intelligible together with union, but rather that union which is
really one before union and its opposite . And if we think in this way of the intelligible entities, what shall we expect of
the two principles which exist before any intelligible? Not that they are united to a far greater degree, or, better said,
that they stand before the unified as a whole and that both are precisely one? 952
In the above passage, two pairs of principles are mentioned. The higher pair of
principles is superintelligible, while the subordinate pair of principles consists of the
intelligible unity and the intelligible multiplicity that constitute the unified. Both pairs of
principles form a unity. Moreover, the second pair of principles is nothing other than
the presence of the superintelligible in the intelligible.
The highest principles of reality, the One and the Multiplicity, thus form a single,
coherent entity, which is, however, characterized by different essential characteristics.
In the absence of a recognized and established terminology for the designation of the
All-One, Damascius proposes a whole series of conceptual innovations. "Twin peak" (ἡ
δίδυμος ἐκείνη μία κορυφή) 953 and "dual one" (ἓν δυαδικόν) 954 are intended to suggest to
the reader the double manifestation of the one and undifferentiated, super-intelligible
entity 955 :
It would perhaps be better – but is even this permissible? – not to describe the principles as “two”, as if they were two
monads. Rather, one should make the “two” principles into a dual One ( ἓν δυαδικόν), just as one might think of the
One of duality. But even that does not reach those principles, because this One is a specific One and a different One
accompanies each new number. So it is better to take up the One common to all things, this two-fold (δυοειδές) and,
insofar as it includes all beings, the united and the differentiated, to ascribe it to the essence of the so-called «two»
principles 956 .
But what appeared to us in the re-enactment of the Damascene dialectic as an aid in
solving the question of the duality of principles, namely the recourse to the concept of
"essential peculiarity", should be abolished after the maturation of an appropriate
awareness of the pre-differentiation that prevails in the super-intelligible realm. The two
principles are one and many "neither in essential peculiarity nor in number", but "in a
transcendence beyond all such concepts". There is no conceptual distinction in the
realm beyond the mind, but "starting from the differentiated beings, all these concepts
are projected onto the undifferentiated principles that precede all beings" 957 . Diheresis is
"the offshoot of multiplicity", or more precisely, of the "dyad that brings about
multiplicity" 958 . A diheretic pattern of thought must therefore in no way be applied
retroactively to the origin of division. This origin, as a multiplicity in itself, cannot be
separated from its supposed "opposite", the One. On the hierarchical level before the
mind, no division of metaphysical entities can be conceived. The articulation of thought,
as has often been said, only begins in a subordinate dimension of the hen-ontological
ladder: "The distinction between these primal grounds is outlined on the third level in
the order of being of the intelligible in an intelligible and hidden way, while the said
primal grounds are united in the united itself" 959 .
The question therefore arises as to how the differences are transferred to the
undifferentiated. By "projection", of course: we have a spontaneous tendency to reflect
what the spirit "senses" of the transcendent onto the sublime being beyond the spirit
(ἀπὸ γὰρ τοῦ νοῦ ταύτας ἕλκομεν ἐπ' ἐκεῖνο τὰς διακριτικὰς ὑπονοίας) 960 . But can
the projection thesis, which Damascius repeatedly puts forward, really solve the aporia?
We are thus approaching the central problem of Damascius research, to which we must
now give an answer. The aporia can be formulated as follows: The Scholarch incessantly
emphasizes that all distinctions in the superintelligible are made from the standpoint of
the spirit, and yet at the same time he speaks of a multitude of principles - each with its
own essence (the "one", the "many", the "unified") and with a special functionality. The
Diadoche tirelessly emphasizes that the internal differentiations in the area of the
superspiritual occur through "transfer" 961 or "projection" on the part of the νοῦς or the
spirit soul. But does this imply that such a spiritual external projection is a kind of
hallucination of the intellect? Furthermore, that we only have to eliminate the
"hallucination" in order to "preserve" the superintelligible pure and unified?
In seeking a satisfactory answer to these questions, we must not forget that for
Damascius the spirit itself is a concrete form of being, that it does not constitute a
separate entity alongside the other hypostases, but is in continuity with them. In the
spirit's return to the unified being, it is being itself that returns to itself or strives beyond
itself towards the one. The categorical articulation that the spirit projects onto pure
being is by no means something that is foreign to being and that comes from "outside".
The spirit is and remains a product of the unified being and of the absolute one,
although we cannot understand the mode of spiritual production starting from the
unified and the one - not to mention the "ineffable" production from the "ineffable". The
conceptual structure that the spirit projects onto the unified being and reflected on the
One, is already inherent in the unified being and in the One, but in the mode of
anteriority, as "whole before the whole", as absolute, all-encompassing simplicity. The
distinction of entities and principles, which Damascius sees as the achievement of
intellectual activity, must be inherent in the intelligible and superintelligible, where the
spirit itself has its origin. Ultimately, the spirit arises through the gradual
decompression of the unified being. While the "elements" of being melt together into an
"elementary" unity and the organic "parts" of intelligible life flow together into a
complete "totality", the "wholeness" of the spirit is formed from "ideas", each of which
asserts its own particularity. However, the ideas of the spirit are nothing other than the
particularized "parts" of life, which in turn reproduce the "elements" of being in a
particular form. The spiritual structure is thus in continuity with the higher levels of
being. It ultimately has its origin in the realm of super-being, on the hierarchical level of
the "most super-divine principles" (αἱ ὑπερθειότατοι ἀρχαί) 962 . At this level, everything
spiritual is prefigured, so that the projections of the spirit are ultimately only back -
projections of being itself.
The "transfers" of the spirit to the superspiritual have a concrete, objective reason.
However , the way these transfers occur cannot be demonstrated in the superspiritual.
At first glance, such nuances seem to be only idle efforts of a philosophy that is on the
threshold between two modes of thought, an ontological-objective one and an
intellectual-subjective one - and in fact Damascene thought has been accused of a
certain inconsistency 963 . But this inconsistency is only apparent and must be understood
as the expression of a deeper metaphysical and anthropological attitude. Far from
oscillating between objectivity and subjectivity, Damascene thought sees itself as a sort
of inconsistency. Zener sees the objective origin and speculative counterpart of the spirit
precisely in the fully valid objectivity of the "super-divine principles". The fact that the
spirit knows about the existence of an absolute, infallible truth, but is unable to access it
in an unadulterated way, increases the mood of isolation that is the basic condition of
Damascus philosophy. Man is aware that principles prevail beyond thought, on which
his self-understanding depends. And yet the possibility of self-transcendence to these
sublime objects is only open to him to a limited extent. If it were merely a matter of a
projection or even a production of entities in the neutral medium of the super-spiritual,
the human spirit could, as it were, come to rest by eliminating its fantasizing.
For Damascius, the spirit-transcendent is thought of primarily in the mode of
anteriority. The beyond of the spirit is not primarily the completely other, but the
foreground. For this reason, Damascius develops a particular preference for concepts of
anteriority, which reveal the constantly uncatchable, yet undoubtedly existing
foreground of the thinking spirit: He speaks of the "pre-differentiation"
(προ[σ]διορισμός) of the first two principles, of the "foreground" (προαίτιον) 964 of the
One, which is the "whole before the whole", of the "pre-unified" (προένωμα) of the
unified being. The determinations of being are already announced at the level of pure
multiplicity, but only in the sense of “a foreshadowing, a prior cause or a prior analogy”
(προέμφασις ἢ προαιτία ἢ προαναλογία) 965 , just as numbers have their προϋπόστασις 966 on the same ontological
level . At the level of the One, these determinations of being are completely “anticipated”
(προειλῆφθαι) 967 . Although the earlier Neoplatonists had also cultivated a “rhetoric” of
anteriority, the emphasis on protological priorness had at least not been expressed with
the same terminological ingenuity as in Damascius.
present in the superintelligible , even if not in the way the mind thinks them. For this
reason, Damascius comes up with such paradoxical formulations as: "The concepts
themselves cannot be grasped by our understanding" (οὐδὲ γὰρ αὐτὰ τὰ νοήματα
ληπτὰ ταῖς νοήσεσίν ἐστιν ταῖς ἡμετέραις) 968 . This statement suggests the existence of
a class of concepts fen that could be called "absolute concepts". They are probably
identical with the "inarticulable concepts" that Damascius mentions elsewhere. The
"transcendent concept" (μετανόημα) of unified being probably also belongs to this class
969
. Such concepts are not mere inventions of the mind, which creates its own world and
forms approximate notations of what it knows. As spiritual contents, the concepts are
objective and reliable, but one-sided. They arise from higher, transcendent entities (the
"elements" of being and the organic "parts" of life) and are not produced spontaneously
by the mind. The art of the dialectician therefore consists precisely in seeing through the
spiritual-beyond-the-mind origin of the spiritual concepts and in reading in them the
trace of the transcendent. The reflection of the transcendent in concepts, however,
manifests itself in an immanent tension, in an insoluble contradiction that is inherent in
the metaphysical concept. This conceptual tension also provides the necessary tension
that enables thought to make the leap into the consciousness of transcendence.
In summary, one can say that for Damascius, the concepts of the mind are not concepts
invented by the spirit soul. They arise from the gradual decompression of the absolutely
unified being and are in the unbroken sequence of metaphysical entities: "elements" -
"(organic) parts" - "ideas". These correspond to the three forms of totality that make up
the concentric circles of reality: the "elementary" of being - the "totality" of life - the
"wholeness" of the spirit. The projections of the spirit in its "reading" of being are not
merely subjective transfers of something alien to the essence to the purely objective of
being. The spirit itself is a form of being and when it returns to being we are dealing
with a self-reflection of being itself. It is no coincidence that he speaks of a return of
being and thus transfers into the ontological a category that in pre-Damascan
Neoplatonism was reserved for purely spiritual processes.
It is not difficult to see from the above explanations why the Damascene uses the
ambiguous, half “realistic”, half “subjectivist” speech when it comes to the precise
differences in the area of principles: The spirit itself is a “variation” of being, a product
of the οὐσία. As spirit, it constitutes itself in a turning away from the higher principles,
which leads to the development of an independent, noological “landscape”: “The spirit,
insofar as he abandons the more sublime principles on his own initiative, he appears as
spirit, and indeed only insofar as he abandons them” 970 . In all other respects, however,
he is united with the unified being: Κατὰ τὸ ἡνωμένον ἄρα συνέστη ὁ νοῦς 971 . In the
spiritual projection onto the unified being, “real”, existential contents are thus reflected
onto being, but in a multiplication, difference and particularity that cannot correspond
to the transcendent simplicity and unity of the “intangible principles” (α ἱ ἄληπτοι
ἀρχαί) 972 .
This explains why the Damascene, despite the eminent role he ascribes to the
imagination and the "imaginative tendency" in the elaboration of metaphysical concepts
973
, clings to the objectivity of truth and speaks tirelessly of ἀλήθεια. The spiritual
concepts are not "inventions" of thought, but have their basis in the ontological, from
which they are only alienated by their particularity. What the correction of this apostasy
consists in is easy to see from the previous discussions: the self-limitation of the one-
sided intellectual concepts is to be abolished in the sense of an increasing all-unity
sense. The particularization of the spiritual ideas is to be reversed: the ideas must
become effective, organic parts of a "boiling" 974 flow of life. The parts of life, in turn, are
to converge into an "elementary" being. The isolated discursive concepts (νοήματα)
finally liquefy into “ a unified transcendent concept of all such concepts” 975 , which,
however, remains inexpressible and can only be illuminated in the mode of an
inarticulable consciousness.
2.7 The “mystical imperative” of Damascius
Through the transformation of the foundation of unity and being theory in the transition
from the philosophy of Plotinus to the Damascene system, The "call of awakening" 976
which synthesizes the metaphysical message and brings out its ethical implications also
changes. In the "mystical" imperative 977 : "Leave everything alone!" (ἄφελε πάντα) 978
Plotinus summed up his entire negative henology and at the same time gave it an
existential dimension. In the assimilation to the absolutely simple primal ground, the
"Plotinian" soul gradually "strips itself" 979 of all alien accessories 980 . It finds harmony
with the first principle at the moment when its negative activity coincides, as it were,
with the negativity of the One. There is no difference between the nothingness of the
soul, which exposes itself in the ascent, and the transcendent nothingness of the
Absolute, which is why the self, insofar as it knows how to evade any positive
determination, becomes co-original with the οὐδὲ ἕν 981 of the transcendent and
experiences a complete unification with it. That the metaphysical flight of this
abstraction movement has an ethical significance is already evident from Plotinus' "first
work", the treatise On Beauty . It is impressive to see that even in the first attempt at the
development of the system, the motif of aphaeresis, with which the "late" treatise On
Cognitive Beings and the Transcendent was to culminate, plays a central role. In the
Ennead I 6 Περὶ τοῦ καλοῦ it is demonstrated that the ladder of beautiful beings
culminates in the super-beauty of the good itself 982 . "But what is the way, what is the
means" that lead to this "overwhelming beauty"? 983 In order to bring the answer to this
question closer to the viewer, Plotinus makes a comparison with the "maker of a statue"
(ποιητὴς ἀγάλματος) 984 , whose task is to remove the "superfluous" material, to remove
the "mate rie” and to free the figure trapped in the stone mass 985 . It is therefore a work
that is mainly carried out in a “negative” way and can therefore serve as a metaphor for
the “negative” task of spiritual self-education:
How can you behold the glorious beauty that has a good soul? Turn to yourself and look at yourself; and if you see
that you are not yet beautiful, then act like the sculptor who, from a bust that is to become beautiful, chisels away
(ἀφαιρεῖ) something here, smoothes something here, smoothes that, clarifies that, until he has completed the
beautiful face on the bust: so you too chisel away (ἀφαίρει) what is useless, and straighten what is crooked, clean up
what is dark and make it light, and do not cease "working on your image" until the divine splendor of virtue shines
forth for you, until you see discipline "enthroned on its holy, pure pedestal" 986 .
The existential-philosophical form of the abstraction movement, which is masterfully
symbolized in the lines quoted above, is linked to an epistemological aspect. This
consists in "the comprehensive mobilization of the potential for unity in thought itself"
987
. The work of moral self-education is actually the living reflection of the dialectic of
negation, which initially takes place purely intellectually. Ethical perfection is therefore
based on insight, is highly metaphysically conditioned and has its basis in the negativity
of the One itself, which in this way also becomes fruitful in the midst of human
existence. Conversely, it can be said that the "nullity" of the first principle is not a mere
teaching object, but necessarily - to use a Proclian expression for the present Plotinian
context - leads to an "apophatic life" (ἀποφατικ ῶς ζ ῆν) 988 that reveals the entire
existential fruitfulness of henological negativity. The origin of the abstraction movement
is the absolute simplicity of the One, which rejects all multiplicity 989 . The Plotinian
primal ground is "nothing" by virtue of its simplicity, which negates all determinations.
Conscious or unconscious goal of all our life relationships and the highest fulfillment of
the human striving for self-conformity and harmony of all inner psychic forces, the
Plotinian ἀρχή receives the symbolic name of the "One". It is thus the "monadic" face of
the First, towards which we are moving in our existential movement, although "in itself"
the Plotinian Absolute is neither simplicity nor monad and "not even one" 990 .
Through the systematic changes he makes in the area of henology, Damascius will see
himself compelled to transform the content of his admonitions to listeners and readers
accordingly, but while retaining the imperative tone and the direct approach to the soul,
which demands instruction. The first principle is removed to him into the vastness of
unattainable transcendence. Even for Plotinus, the Absolute was "not even one", but
from his point of view, at least for the sake of our own existential perfection, we may
intend the unity, otherworldly origin as ἕν 991 . The harsh censorship of the Damascene
will now prohibit us from doing this too. After the first principle has been removed from
all possible references, only the All-One remains as a halfway experienceable entity.
What attitude should we take towards it? Through the transcendence of being and unity
of the first primal ground, the reality “subordinate” to it is constituted into a perfect
totality, which is, as it were, encompassed by the negativity of the Absolute 992 .
Is then the One that follows the aporrheton and in a certain sense represents its
symbolic, tolerably expressible manifestation no longer simple? Yes, this too. The One is
simple, and indeed in the most radical sense of the word “simple”, but its simplicity
dissolves into an absolute wholeness that even abolishes the individual determination of
simplicity in itself. Self-abolition is at work here again, because the wholeness of the One
is to be understood so strictly that the individual determination “wholeness” itself
merges in the “all-devouring” essence of the One. The totality of the One thus becomes a
completely simple, pre-holistic wholeness (πάντα πρὸ πάντων). In this, simplicity and
wholeness form an absolute unity that transcends the division of thought into a
reductive and synthetic faculty. Existence must find an appropriate path to this
absolutely simple, pre-total totality.
The Damascus motto, which illuminates man's access to the pre-grounded wholeness of
the All-One, is coined after the Plotinian imperative, but takes on a peculiar character
due to the changed hen-ontological basis. The φωνή of the last scholar no longer reads:
"Leave everything alone!", but rather: "Let the One that is present in every thing, the
One that seems to be fragmented, be brought to the common, indivisible and true One!”
993
. In the style of his speech, which constantly turns against itself, Damascius, a former
teacher of rhetoric, resorts to the stylistic figure of epanortosis , which he had already
used in the discourse on the Absolute, and in the same breath corrects his just
formulated slogan:
Rather, the One has not been fragmented at all, but, remaining as one and the same, is present in everything and at
the same time in each individual as his own being. In doing so, it does not fragment itself, because it is all in one unity
and therefore does not need fragmentation 994 .
The comparison of the Damascene admonition with the Plotinian "call to conscience"
clearly shows the difference between the philosophical attitudes of the two thinkers:
while Plotinus' philosophy culminates in a radically negative henology, the Damascene's
apophatic doctrine of unity is mediated by the idea of totality. In perfect correspondence
with their henologies, the maxims are also formulated on the basis of which the human
soul is to discover the fundamental meaning of its existence: the "Plotinian" soul must
"put away" all determinations in order to find the absolute, supra-unified unity of the
not-even-one. In contrast, the "Damascene" soul is called upon to bring together all
determinations into an absolutely unified totality 995 .
The Damascus motto quoted above is supplemented by another, which this time warns
us against the danger of objectification. The communication of this recommendation
follows a new assertion of the transcendence of the One, which stands beyond being one
and whole, because these determinations also merge into the pre-holistic wholeness of
the absolutely simple primal ground and merge with the remaining predicates:
If, therefore, one must abolish the something and the quality from the knowledge of the one, then one should abolish
the one too, for this too is a something within the whole. Even the whole should be abolished, because the whole too is
a something in the multitude. If within the whole every part is a something, then the whole taken together is again a
plural something 996 .
However, in this way the question arises – since it is neither one nor whole – what then
might the One be, strictly speaking? (τί ἂν ε ἴη;) 997 According to Damascius, who here
refers to the Second Letter of “Plato” 998 , this is precisely the beginning of all evil: that
one wants to inquire first of all into the what of the One 999 . In this sense, the Scholarch
calls on his reader to become aware that one must under no circumstances limit the One
with positive determinations: “Man, beware of adding the what (τὸ τί) to the One! It is
precisely this that prevents you from knowing the One, namely that you expect to hear
something (τί)…” 1000 . The work that “the Man” has to carry out on the concept of the
One, initially appears as a movement of abstraction, which is in direct succession to
Plotinus:
But when you have abolished (ἀφέλοις) the what and the how , the One appears to you as what it is, insofar as this
can happen. For the One is precisely that: neither something nor of any kind; but it is prior to these - a being that can
neither be expressed (since every name is something and refers to something specific) nor easily grasped by thought
1001
.
Despite the Plotinian tone of the admonition quoted here, its specific Damascene
coloring is immediately apparent when the Diadoche suggests that we understand
aphaeresis as a stripping away of the individual and the particular. The shedding of the
what and the how leads to the creation of an experience of totality , which is of course
placed under the auspices of absolute simplicity:
The One, on the other hand, is, as has often been said, undifferentiated. Consequently, all these opposites must be
placed in the essence of that One and expressed in all , and in such a way that none of these opposites in themselves
consists in distinction. To be more precise, one cannot even speak of "all" opposites, for these opposites form a One
before the All, which at the same time simplifies this All (πάντων τούτων ἁπλωτικόν) 1002 .
It is not enough to add up all the individual elements to achieve the pre-holistic,
completely simple wholeness of the One. Damascius thus makes it clear that no mental
operation that brings together concrete conscious contents is capable of reproducing the
experience of universal unity. Rather, this remains the preserve of a conscious process
sui generis , which is fundamentally different from a reifying activity:
Every concept is something specific and refers to a specific object. Even if you were to combine all the concepts, they
are somehow constituted and something specific because they refer to specific objects. Consequently, the mind,
insofar as it is the mind that observes specific things, will also be in labor with the concept of that essence, but will not
bring this concept to light. On the contrary, it will fold the labor upon itself (συνάγει) and increase it. into the simplest
and absolutely incomprehensible, into the essence which is indeterminable with that determination which
encompasses the whole in its entirety and in particular and the individual in each case 1003 .
The Damascus "call of awakening": "Man, beware of adding the what (τὸ τί) to the
one!" is intended to open up an awareness that the goal of human existence is not a
concrete, clearly defined object. The only attitude to existence that can satisfy this non-
objective goal is that of self-transcendence. The call to "man" is not accidental: it refers
to Damascius's highly developed anthropology. It is worth spending a moment on
Damascus' anthropology, because only from the perspective of his image of man can the
scholar's philosophy of existence be more thoroughly understood.
Damascius' anthropology is developed above all in his commentary on the third
hypothesis of Plato's Parmenides . For the Diadochi, the theme of this hypothesis is the
essence of man. While in the pre-Damascian commentary tradition various more
general types of soul were declared to be the skopós of the third hypothesis 1004 , the last
Scholarch proves that the section immediately following the second, "theogonic"
hypothesis has the "individual soul" (ἡ μερικὴ ψυχή) 1005 or "our soul" (ἡ ἡμετέρα ψυχή)
1006
as its theme. This is constituted around “our” own “one” (τὸ ἡμέτερον ἕν) 1007 , or
around “the human one” (τὸ ἀνθρώπειον ἕν) 1008 as its essential basis. For Damascius,
therefore, nothing other than the Un The object of investigation of the third hypothesis
is man in his essentiality. Only in this way can it be explained that the One of which we
are speaking can both rise to being and sink into the realm of becoming, and is both
eternal and temporal: "The investigation of Parmenides must necessarily refer to a
substance that does not always follow the gods, but sometimes also becomes rebellious
from them" 1009 .
Parmenides, Plato had pursued the consequences of his explanations of the “existing
One” (ἓν ὄν) in a continuation of the second hypothesis in 1010 , the beginning of which
(Ἔτι δὴ τὸ τρίτον λέγωμεν) in 1011 justified an independent treatment as a “third
hypothesis” in the eyes of later interpreters:
If the One is as we have discursively developed it, must it not, since it is one and many and neither one nor many, and
since it participates in time because it is one, sometimes participate in being, but because it is not (one), sometimes
not participate in being? 1012
Through its participation in being, determined by time, the One is subjected to the cycle
of creation and decay and exposed to all possible “happenings” 1013 : unity and
multiplicity, composition and differentiation, similarities and dissimilarities, growth,
decrease and equalization, movement and rest. The change from one “happening” to the
opposite takes place within “the strange nature of the moment,” which “stands in the
middle between movement and rest” and “is not in any time” 1014 .
The Damascus interpretation of the “third hypothesis” 1015 is characterized by a radical
elaboration of the opposites, which are probably only implicit in the Platonic model. The
thematic one in this hypothesis is, according to Damascius, “One and not-One”, “Many
and not-Many”, “Being and non-Being” 1016 , “Whole and not-Whole” 1017 , “Dividable and
indivisible” 1018 , “The same and other and neither the same nor other, and so on for the
remaining opposites" 1019 . Above all else, however, this One is subject to arising and
passing away, and yet eludes both arising and passing away 1020 . This does not concern
merely the accidental form of the One, but its substantial basis (α ὐτὸ τὸ ὑποκείμενον)
1021
. Only one being can satisfy such a degree of contradiction: that is man. It is therefore
the individual soul of man, according to Damascius, that constitutes the object of
investigation of Plato's fundamental metaphysical analysis in the third hypothesis of
Parmenides . “Its essence” (τὸ εἶδος αὐτῆς) 1022 , the “soulful one” (τὸ ψυχικὸν ἕν) 1023 ,
is “a becoming one” around which the soul as a whole gathers itself: τὸ ἓν γιγνόμενον
συναγερμός ἐστι τῆς ψυχῆς 1024 . Because becoming reaches into the substance of the soul
and determines it completely, human ψυχή is essentially temporally constituted. Not
only has it, contrary to Plotinus’s intention, descended in its entirety 1025 , but also its
οὐσία, together with the corresponding ἐνέργειαι, is governed by time and is subject to
change 1026 – whereby Damascius, by updating Iamblichean ideas, turns against Proclus’
doctrine of the soul 1027 .
The isolation of the human soul from the higher beings is further emphasized by the
following: According to Damascius, the thematic One in the third hypothesis does not
stand in an “emanative” series with the remaining forms of unity. Proclus must have
assumed that the One to which the apophatic-kataphatic predications are applied in the
“third hypothesis” is the “demiurgic One” of the last passage of the second hypothesis
was 1028 . Thus, for Proclus, the One of the third hypothesis stood in the "emanative"
continuity of the henological development. Damascius criticizes him for this. Rather, the
soul is its own origin: "This mixture is self-founded in the soul (α ὐθυπόστατον), I mean
the One and the Non-One, the Being and the Non-Being" 1029 . The beginning of the
hypothesis (Τὸ ἓν εἰ ἔστιν οἷον διεληλύθαμεν ) does not indicate the resumption of the
same unitary being, but only the logic of predication, which has already been
satisfactorily demonstrated in the second hypothesis and does not need to be repeated
here 1030 . A new One thus appears on this level of reality, namely on the basis of its own,
self-original act: "This now also shows that our soul is self-founded, although it
possesses its self-founded character in a blurred form" 1031 . The soul is self-founded
insofar as it constitutes itself with reference to its higher principles (spirit, being, one).
This does not mean, of course, that the individual "person", with his or her respective
biography, has arbitrarily called himself or herself into being. The self-foundation of the
soul only means that its essence has no temporal beginning and will continue to exist for
an infinite time. It came into being through an incorporeal activity and its substance
cannot completely perish. The "perishing" of the soul is actually only a loss of self in
multiplicity and a turning away from its immanent unity. In contrast, its decision to
gather itself means a renewed "emergence" and a "revitalization" of its essence.
In this sense, the human soul is both being and non-being, a being of contradiction, and
stands at the centre of reality, that is, at the intersection of the lines of flight that lead
high up into the beyond and deep into the underworld 1032 . It is the meeting, in the
happiest case the harmony of all opposites, but not in that sublime indistinguishability,
which is only due to the "divine One", but is subject to the determination of temporality.
The soul is subject to time, which governs its entire being and not only its actions and
omissions. The reason for its "coming into being" and "passing away" lies in the
temporality of the soul's substance. In this way it imitates the God with whom it has the
closest familiarity, the "joyful" 1033 and yet suffering Dionysus. Just like him, the soul can
"die" and "rise again" (ἀποθνήσκουσά τε καὶ ἀναβιωσκομένη) 1034 . “Dying” and
“resurrection” here mean that the soul is able to gather its own being into a unity or
loses itself in the fragmentation of the most diverse life relationships 1035 . “Life is
fragmented for us and we lead several lives,” Plotinus had proclaimed 1036 . The Plotinian
lamento finds an echo in Damascius' philosophy of existence, albeit under the changed
auspices of his own hen ontology:
When the soul descends into becoming, it presents thousands upon thousands of life forms, and even before it
exercises these life forms, the soul undoubtedly appropriates them substantially! But when it ascends, it directs these
life forms, puts them together and lets them disappear. But it determines itself, as far as it can, according to the
united and indivisible. The soul steers itself upwards and downwards, by its inner steering wheel. It moves itself out
of its own being 1037 .
The soul is the union of all opposites, but this does not prevent it from being particular
and graded within itself. This increases its inherent contradiction all the more:
Although the soul in its entirety is divisible and indivisible through and through, its apex is rather indivisible, its
lowest ground, on the other hand, more divisible, while in its middle the indivisible and the divisible are in balance.
Finally, for Parmenides too, the apex of the soul is more one, many, beings, as well as all that constitutes each being in
itself, while the lowest ground of the soul is more not-one and not-many in equal measure; but in its middle the
extremes are in balance. Thus the apex of the soul is also extremely atemporal, while its lowest ground is above all
temporal; the middle, however, is both at the same time 1038 .
Essentially, the soul has a double essence: one is "unified and Olympian" (τὸ μὲν
ἡνωμένον καὶ ὀλύμπιον αὐτῆς εἶδος), the other is "in the process of becoming" (τὸ ἐν
τῇ γενέσει) 1039 . Both εἴδη, however, form a unified substance which is equally separated
from both the higher principles and the lower hypostatic levels and occupies its own
level of being in the hierarchy of reality. The soul therefore carries out its activities with
its entire being and not through parts of its substance that still remain in the divine
realm or are already entangled in natural events:
As a whole through and through, the soul has become and has not become, as a whole through and through it could
well carry out all its activities, in the intelligi bles as well as in the deepest underworld. Yet it is sometimes determined
entirely according to that which has come into being and sometimes entirely according to that which has not come
into being 1040 .
If the soul were in a different position, it would be impossible to explain how, while
simultaneously dwelling among the spirit beings, it could still move, albeit with a
different part of its being, "in the utmost baseness" ( ἐν τ ῇ ἐσχάτ ῃ…κακί ᾳ) 1041. It is more
reasonable to assume that the whole soul is capable of ascending to the bright abode of
its Olympian father as well as plunging down into the darkness of Tartarus, where its
titanic relatives have been banished. The human soul is equally capable of assimilating
itself to the gods or of becoming an animal (καὶ προσάγει κατ' οὐσίαν ποτὲ μὲν τοῖς
θεοῖς, ποτὲ δὲ τοῖς θηρίοις) 1042 . The soul accomplishes all this from its own nature, on
the basis of its self-founded character, without expecting external assistance for its
deification 1043 or allowing itself to be misled into self-abasement by its circumstances:
“This is precisely the essence of self-movement (that is, of the soul): that it makes itself
what it wills” (ἐν τούτῳ γὰρ ἔχει τὸ εἶναι τὸ αὐτοκίνητον, ἐν τῷ ποιεῖν ἐαυτὸ ὅ τι
ἂν βούληται) 1044 .
In light of the above, it becomes clearer why the direct approach to the soul of the
listener or reader occupies an important position in the performance of Damascus
philosophy. By virtue of its self-founded nature, the human soul has the freedom to
decide either for its "Olympic and unified being" or for an entanglement of its lighter
being in the material relationships of life.
The soul's loss of self, however, does not only occur through its fragmentation in the
realm of the sensible. The discursive thinking of the soul is already a form of
fragmentation. The variety of individual concepts drags the soul into diversity and
obscures its view of the whole of being. Discursive thinking in individual concepts
therefore corresponds to the "titanic" origin of man. In contrast, the essential unity of
man, i.e. "the human" or "the spiritual one", is nothing less than the god Dionysus
himself, just as he also appears in the "titanic" substance of man at is essential. The
return of the plural, conceptual thinking to the original unity of the inner and living idea
is equivalent to a "resurrection" of the "torn" Dionysus. The particular concepts are to be
reduced to the integrative concept of all-being in order to be able to evoke the divine
universality of man. For this reason, Damascius admits in his lecture on Plato's Phaedo
that "the Titanic life" is primarily "unreasonable" because it "torns the rational life
apart". On closer inspection, however, "the Titanic life" is at work everywhere,
consequently also in the intellectual realm, "since it has its origins in the Titans as gods".
Damascius sees an expression of our "Titanic" origins in the spirit soul's desire to
possess itself:
The self-conceited self-determination of rational life and its will to belong only to itself, and thus neither to the higher
nor to the lower beings, is also an influence of the Titans on our inner being. Due to this influence we tear apart our
inner Dionysus by destroying our essential equality and our community with both the higher and the lower beings. In
this state we are Titans. But as soon as we enter into community with that (inner Dionysus), we each become a
Dionysus and are thereby perfect 1045 .
Each individual becomes a Dionysus in the full development of his true, divine nature.
But of course there are not several Dionysus figures, according to the number of human
souls, but one and the same Dionysus dies in each of us through spiritual conflict and
comes to new life as soon as we gather ourselves out of multiplicity into a unity. A
decisive dimension of the Damascus doctrine of universal unity is, consequently, the
abolition of individuality. After all, the higher nature of the soul is "Olympic and
united", that is, designed for an ontological community with the universe. If it succeeds
in gathering itself out of dispersion, it can begin the ascent to "unified being" (τὸ
ἡνωμένον). This is “substantialized by the One” and gives the soul, which has now
become a unified whole, the intimation of the pre-holistic One itself. In the context of
his universal unity doctrine, Damascius addresses his reader directly in the “you” form.
In connection with the “common men turning back”, that the One “has anticipated the
individual forms of all times, not only me and you as individuals, and yet both me and
you and everything that was before and ever will be” 1046 . From the perspective of the
One, there are therefore no differences between I and you. Individualities must be
dissolved 1047 . For this reason, Damascius also rejects the immortality of the psyché in the
sense of the individual soul as a mere delusion. Such a delusion is, however,
understandable and at the same time justified insofar as it can be integrated into the
specific logic of the nihil privativum : By bracketing the fully determined and holistic
being in the imagination, nothing but lies and deception is produced, including the
erroneous assumption that “my ego is numerically immortal as the same” (Φαντάζομαι
γὰρ καί, ἂν οὕτω τύχοι, δοξάζω … τὸν ἐμὲ τῷ ἀριθμῷ τὸν αὐτὸν ἀθάνατον) 1048 .
This bracketing takes place as a turning away from the real, hen-ontological totality,
which is why its setting can only be pure, self-contained fantasy 1049 . The positive
function of individuality should consist exclusively in serving as a mediator to the
general. At first glance, Damascius' reflections on the topic of individuality seem to
avoid the very problem posed by the fact of individuality. But the scholar's reflection on
the phenomenon of particularity and isolation is inscribed in the dialectical
methodology of his philosophizing. The individual is, precisely insofar as it is an
individual , an expression of the One itself and therefore no more, but also no less than
a representative of the universal: “With the individual we come into contact with the
universal” (τῷ δὲ ἰδίῳ πρὸς τὸ κοινὸν συναπτόμεθα) 1050 . The choice of the term συνάπτεσθαι is significant:
Damascius can no longer speak of a complete fusion with the universal in the sense of
the One , because the One “is the whole before the whole”. Only a grasp (ἅπτεσθαι) in
the mode of community (συν‐) is possible. Damascius also speaks of “general
participation” (κοινὴ μέθεξις) 1051 . Since the One constitutes the authenticity, that is, the
individuality of each being, and since this One cannot experience any specialisation or
distinction, it is paradoxically always the same One that establishes the respective
particularity of beings. Only in harmony with one another within a perfect whole can
individual beings hope to gain access to the One and thus to the illuminating reason for
their existence: “…Among these entities, each one is primarily itself and belongs above
all to itself when it fits into the one arrangement of the whole” 1052 .
Damascius' metaphysics no longer thinks of the simplicity of the One as the simplicity of
the unified, the "henadic", as the earlier systems of Neoplatonism had done. Proclus, for
example, sometimes describes the One as the highest henadic, which, although it
surpassed the henadic in immeasurable transcendence, can nevertheless be indicated by
means of the "simplicity" and "monadicity" of the subordinate ἑνάδες. In contrast, the
simplicity of the Damascene One is rather the simplicity of a compact and all-
encompassing whole. The One of the last scholar becomes the all-One. The immediate
consequence of this infinite expansion of the "essence of the One" is the necessity of a
common participation and a common return in order to return everything that has
turned away from the One to it again. But to what "activity" of the One does this
common return to the all-encompassing primal ground respond? What exactly does the
One "realize" and what is its "task" within the hierarchy of being? At this point, another
innovation of the Damascene is revealed, because if the One loses its "henadic" function,
"unification" can no longer be its expression in the world. The very thing that
Neoplatonism had tirelessly impressed upon us, namely that the effectiveness of the One
consists in unification, is rejected by the Damascene. Since unity in the sense of perfect
simplicity, of the punctual and abstracted no longer constitutes the "essence" of the ἕν,
but the specific "essence" of the first primal cause is sought in the all -unity, the
corresponding "activity" of the One also changes from ἕνωσις to wholeness:
The one principle is so far from producing distinction that it does not even produce unification (ο ὐδὲ ἑνίζει). For the
one does not produce anything specific; however, unification is something specific, just as differentiation is. Rather,
the one makes each one a whole - no, not each one, for that would be the task of that principle which produces
multiplicity and distinction, while the principle which is higher and more venerable than each one makes everything
into an all-one, if one may say so, for in truth it does not even make everything into an "all" 1053 .
Particularly in the Proclian system, in which the hypostatic stages are differentiated with
strict precision and numerous nuances, the most noble manifestation of the One
consists in the Henosis , which radiates “It” to the various divine and ontological classes.
These, in turn, experience unification in accordance with the degree of their respective
adequacy to the gifts of the One-Good: the divine figures, which are summarized as
metaphysical-ideal entities under the term “Henads”, represent the Henosis in an
eminent manner 1054 . But also the subordinate Levels of being only exist insofar as they
can imitate the henosis of the divine world according to their ability. It therefore
represents a break with an entire world of perception when Damascius writes:
Just as we did not think it right to say "other" or "same" of Him, because there is not even sameness and otherness in
Him, so He is neither united nor different, since there is not even union and distinction ( ἕνωσις καὶ διάκρισις) in
Him. For the same reason, persistence, advancement and return have not been differentiated in Him . 1055
We already knew from pre-Damascene henology that there is neither unification nor
differentiation in the One. But the Scholarch intensifies this rejection by rejecting not
only differentiation from the One but also union with it:
How, indeed, can that be distinctive which does not even have the right to bring about unity? Moreover, how can that
be distinguished from the secondary, or even unite with it, which does not await even the slightest union or difference
(ἕνωσις ἢ διάκρισις) in relation to anything? 1056 .
Just as the One can only be guessed at 1057 , the metaphysical processes that originate in the
One or are directed towards it can no longer be understood with the help of
differentiated concepts, but are transparent in their peculiar pre-differentiation only to
the "intuition" (ὑπόνοια). The process of emergence from the One precedes all
conceivable modalities of the process of emergence 1058 . Participation in the One, on the
other hand, is neither to be interpreted as presence nor as "illumination" from a super-
intelligible realm 1059 - which calls into question two "canonical" explanatory models of
the connection between ἕν and πολλά: the Plotinian pattern of interpretation of the
unlimited "presence" (παρουσία) of the principle in the midst of its principalities and
the Proclian metaphor of the henadic mediated "illumination" ( ἔλλαμψις) of the
multiplicity from the original source of the One. However, this blocks any urge
"upwards" from direct access to the One. The "disappointing" denial of an assimilation
to the One is consequently not long in coming. Even in the experience of unification,
according to Damascius, it is not the One itself with which we merge, but one of the
entities dependent on it, more precisely the unified Being (τὸ ἡνωμένον):
We do not resemble Him at all, since there is no quality in Him. Rather, we resemble one of those entities which are
subordinate to Him, because we do not even unite ourselves with Him, but with the One which comes after Him. The
One was not only One, but also Whole, if I may express myself thus, the Before-the-One-and-the-Whole 1060 .
While the "royal road" of European mysticism, which culminates in Meister Eckhart,
leads precisely because of the lack of qualities 1061 of the Supreme to the call for man to be receptive to the attributeless Absolute and
consequently to become a being "without qualities" himself (after the famous title of Robert Musil's novel 1062 , which was demonstrably influenced by Rhenish mysticism
), Damascius
takes a direction that runs counter to the great tradition of the search for meaning and
God: The freedom of the One from all qualities already seals in his eyes the hopelessness
of the attempt to merge as an individual with the One as "the whole before the whole",
because the particular always remains characterized by certain "peculiarities". Since the
path to the absolute unity of the primal ground is denied to us, we must be content with
a holistic approach instead of a unification, but this does not take place in the sense of
the transcendent pre-totality of the ἄρρητον ἕν, but rather aims at the elevation to the
totality of the unified Being, which is subordinate to the absolute One and
“substantialized around the One” 1063 .
In order to assert the inaccessibility of the One, Damascius feels compelled to challenge
the "ecstatic" implications of Plato's own writings. When the Politeia states that the
philosopher kings must "direct the ray of light of their soul upwards" "in order to
contemplate that Being who gives light to all things" 1064 , Plato could well have in mind
the union of the light of the soul with the source of all light in the manner of a unio
mystica . Damascius, however, hastens to respond to the critical objection that may
have arisen within his school or his own mind in favor of the complete accessibility of
the One and which may have been based on this Platonic passage, with a sharp
differentiation between light and source of light:
"But this 'ray of the soul' - what does Plato mean by that?" - Undoubtedly the "ray of the soul" unites with the light
that emanates from the former, but not with the latter itself. - "What then? Does not the light itself that flows down
from the latter unite with the latter?" - Well, if one expresses oneself in a figurative analogy, it does unite, but in truth
it does not. For the latter does not wait for union with another, a union that not even the mathematical point would
tolerate. - "But why is the light immediately subordinate to the latter?" - Because of all entities, the light was the first
to appear, or because it had not yet completely evaporated from the innermost parts of the temple 1065 .
The intelligible light that has its origin in the temple chamber of the One does not
completely separate itself from it. Presumably the seat in the life of this The image
depicts the event of the Eleusinian "Mystery Liturgy" 1066 , which was no longer current
during Damascius' lifetime and which, according to ancient evidence, culminated in a
sudden apparition of light in the "Anaktoron", the "Holy of Holies" of the Mystery
Building ("Telesterion") of Eleusis 1067 . In Damascius' image, the radiance streaming
forth is not separated from its source in the ἄδυτον of the temple, but feeds on it and
actually remains together with it in the innermost part of the sanctuary. The
metaphysical reading of this metaphor identifies the light that floods through the temple
building with the truth that illuminates being and nature. We can unite the "ray of light"
of our own soul with the light of truth that emanates from the One 1068 . However, we
cannot ascend to its source, because the origin of truth lies in the ἄδυτον of the reality
conceived as a temple complex. The aforementioned “temple interior” is nothing other
than a symbol for the ἄρρητον ἕν, whose holy “precinct” we are not allowed to enter 1069 .
The talk of the “innermost part of the temple” is ingenious and varied. Damascius
speaks of the “innermost part of the temple” of the ineffable, of the “innermost part of
the temple” of the soul and, in the passage just discussed, of the “innermost part of the
temple” of the One. One can perhaps find in this the view that reality is not a single
temple, but a regular temple complex, with sanctuaries of increasing importance, each
with its own ἄδυτον – just as Proclus sometimes speaks of the ἄδυτα in the plural 1070 and
as Damascius himself does in one passage (admittedly restored through philological
intervention) 1071 . But the talk of the ἄδυτα could also be understood as a pluralis
intensivus and the three ἄδυτα - of the ineffable, the One and the soul - could be
intertwined into a single "holy of holies", which is also what the author of these pages
tends to do. In this sense, Damascius would always speak of the same "innermost part of
the temple", as a metaphor for absolute transcendence, in which dividing lines between
the supernatural primal ground, the transcendent unity ground and the soul ground can
no longer be drawn. The talk of the "innermost part of the temple" of the transcendent
One, from which the light of truth radiates, is intended to illustrate the inability of the
spirit soul to use the guide of intelligible truth to discover its origin. The ascent of the
soul must stop before the “innermost temple” of the One, so that no experience of the
absolute ἕν can bring the root of truth to light. Damascius does indeed allow for a
“union” (ἕνωσις), but this “union” only takes place with the light of the One, as he
interprets the unified being, but not with the One itself 1072 . Moreover, the “union” is in a
certain sense the eminent mode of constitution of the unified 1073 , so that, due to the
systematic structure of the hierarchy of being, the ἕνωσις of the soul necessarily leads to
the all-being, but not beyond it. Furthermore, since the unified is the initial- 1074 , the "
union" with the unified Being also means that the soul cannot dissolve into ecstatic
rapture, but continues to feel the "sting" of a protological "world-weariness": the soul
never loses the consciousness of its difference from the Absolute.
The metaphor of the “inaccessible interior of the temple” of the One is not least linked to
an originally Platonic image which Damascius interprets in his own way. It is the
extremely important passage in the Philebus where Socrates, in his search for that which
could provide a “happy life” 1075 , claims to have already entered the “vestibules” of the
Good 1076 . In Plato’s intention, the passage in question probably marks a “recess” which is
bound to the given conversational situation and the aim of the dialogue. The Philebus
has human life and its optimal constitutional form in mind above all, which is why the
metaphysical meaning of the Good, which forms the background of the entire
discussion, must remain unthematic. For the discussion leader Socrates and his
dialectical counterpart Protarchus, the power of the Good “evaporates” into the essence
of the Beautiful 1077 . This means that in the context of the Philebus , the good itself eludes
immediate access and appears above all as beauty, because this can also shine in the
sensual. If Socrates and Protarchus prove incapable of grasping the good “with a single
idea” (μιᾷ ἰδέᾳ), and therefore have to interpret it as a triad of entities that only form a
relative unity (οἷον ἕν) 1078 , this happens because the metaphysical approach of the
dialogue is too brief. It is in this sense that Socrates, in the present dialogue framework,
necessarily has to stop in the “vestibules” of the actual “dwelling place” of the good.
However, he can certainly be trusted to have a fully valid spiritual grasp of the highest
good.
Not so the Damascus interpretation of this passage from the Philebus . For Damascius,
as for the "esoteric" Plato, the good that is suggested in the Philebus is the One itself. But
Socrates was not able to grasp it at all, not because of the inadequacy of the dialogue
situation or even his own cognitive powers, but because of the cognitive transcendence
of the One itself. But in the light of the one truth that radiates from the One, Socrates
can at least, by virtue of the ability to see the unity, see the essential affinity of the three
monads that emerge from the One - beauty, truth and symmetry:
Even Socrates in the Philebus, according to his own testimony, could not look forward to that One, and therefore he
illustrated It by means of the Trinity, which has its proper place in its vestibules, no doubt because he saw within the
Unified the Triad sparkling in the uniform splendor of the Henade 1079 .
The "unified splendor of the henade" (ἡ μία αὐγὴ τῆς ἑνάδος) is the intelligible truth
that the Diadoche connects with being. In the brightness of this truth, Socrates sees
through the triad unfolded "within the united" (ἐν ἡνωμένῳ) 1080 to its unified essential
basis. The light of the soul can only unite with the intelligible and "divine light" (τὸ
θεῖον φῶς) 1081 , following the guideline of which it experiences the "divine fusion" (θεία
ἕνωσις) 1082 with the universe. The One, although the origin of the noetic light and source
of being, remains separated from its principalities and no immediate experience can
lead up to “It” 1083 .
However, Damascius allows a certain approximation to the One, because “the One is not
absolutely ineffable, but only not expressible with words” 1084 . This is not meant to mean
that the One has a positive essence, because "it cannot be grasped either with
affirmation or negation" 1085 , but only that the One cannot be completely equated with
the ineffable itself and therefore still offers our imagination some support. In the
"grasping" of the One, Damascius distinguishes two steps: The first consists in recourse
to a preferred concept, namely to an ἁπλὸν νόημα 1086 of the One. This is the discursive
side of the experience of unity. But we must not stop at this intellectual access to the
One. In considering the ἁπλὸν νόημα we must become aware that the "simple concept"
of the One does not do justice to the task intended for it. This task should consist in
pointing out the absolute simplicity of the One, by virtue of which the ἕν is the
transcendent source of all multiplicity. The ἁπλὸν νόημα is thus by no means used as a
fully valid concept of the One. Rather, the Diadoche uses the "simple concept" as a
means of ecstasy, which should prompt us to reach a deeper level of the experience of
unity in a second step. On the basis of the ἁπλὸν νόημα of the One, we must develop an
"intuition" (ὑπόνοια) of the transcendence of the One: "But to us, or rather to the
blessed contemplators of such mysteries, the One only reveals itself to be intuition, and
even then only up to the threshold of the birth pangs and the state that we have
described above" 1087 .
The concept of “intuition” that is central to Damascius brings to fruition the entire
transformation that takes place in the transition from the older, “classical”
Neoplatonism to the Damascene “reform”: there is no longer any talk of an ecstatic
fusion with the One in the tone of Plotinus or Proclus in the last Diadochi. What was
previously “ecstasy” now becomes “enstasis” 1088 , a retreat of the subject into the ἄδυτον
of its own in neren. The “intuition” expresses nothing other than that the
comprehension of the One “before the Whole” takes place in the mode of a distanced
state of consciousness.
When Damascius nevertheless speaks of a ἕνωσις 1089 , he does not mean the soul's
absorption into the ἀπόρρητον ἕν, but the union with the unified being. In his
interpretation of Platonic imagery, the Damascene identifies the intelligible light with
the "unified being" (ἡνωμένον ὄν) of his own ontology. Damascius does indeed let the
soul, striving to become the "sun" of the One, "burn" like a second Phaeton and become
the light itself. But it is precisely this metaphor that excludes an alignment with the
source of light: the soul rushing towards the One identifies itself only with the light of
the simple primal ground 1090 , that is, it becomes the holistic, intelligible truth and
“senses” in this light the transcendence of the One as the primal source of truth:
At first we try to look at the sun, and from a distance we do look at it. But the closer we go to the sun, the less we see
it. In the end we see neither the sun nor anything else, but instead of an enlightened eye we have become absolute
light . 1091
In the light of the discussions so far, the harsh criticism of the older antiquity research
on Damascius' "exuberant mysticism" 1092 seems all the more inappropriate. Despite the "playing with finely structured concepts", which was a real
"need" for him and in which he was "even more of a master than Proclus" 1093
, Damascius gave "mysticism the most unlimited
validity". Such remarks reveal the strong tendency to mechanically transfer the image
that people had formed of the other Neoplatonists, which was distorted by numerous
prejudices, to Damascius 1094 . Apart from the systematic bias against metaphysical
speculation with which they went about their work, the automatism of this transfer was
bound to lead to a misjudgement of the Damascian mentality. On the other hand, we
have seen that Damascius in particular severely limits the possibilities of mystical
ecstasy and union with the Absolute, which is why he can hardly be accused of a
"tendency to enthusiasm" 1095 . The bracketing of the unio mystica in the last scholar is of course not
done out of an intention to question metaphysical speculation and a higher meaning of
human existence 1096 . Rather, he develops a metaphysical view sui generis , which we will
endeavor to describe in more detail below.
Why then does Damascius put the ἕνωσις in its place? What is the significance of
renouncing the soul's bold flight of fancy? What is the meaning of such
(self-)censorship? The answer to such questions is provided by Damascius' own
writings: these constitute an intensive meditation not only on "first principles" but also
on how we think or should think about first principles . With untiring emphasis, which a
jealous reader can easily perceive as a stubborn idea, Although this might seem to be a
complete lack of understanding, Damascius always returns to the original insight of his
thinking, which he continually deepens and articulates more precisely in the course of
the system's development: there is a separation between the super-intelligible and what
is accessible to the intellect, which cannot be overcome by the latter. The manifold
intellectual concepts with the help of which we think are only imperfect reflections of a
unity that we have lost - to which is added the despairing awareness that this very idea
of unity is in turn only understood from the perspective of an intellectual concept. For
the absolute One is ultimately no longer even a unity. At the crystalline dividing wall
between the intelligible and the super-intelligible, the "ray of light" of our soul makes a
bend and returns to itself, so that every thought that we may develop about the
transcendent draws on the substance of the here and now. The only thing that is open to
us is the awareness that the separated belong to an all-unity. This universal unity can
also actually be realized in a "common return," in a holistic approach to thinking and a
dissolution of the particular "forms of thought" (εἴδη) to universal "elements" (στοιχεῖα)
of being. However, the attainment of the Absolute beyond this universal unity is
completely denied to us.
The rejection of mystical ecstasy in Damascius therefore serves the purpose of giving the
apophatic its due rights. It is precisely the liberation of the apophatic realm from
“brazen reconnaissance” 1097 on the part of philosophy that not only preserves the piety of
the worshipper of God, but also guarantees the freedom of philosophy, which can fully
develop within its realm as a transcendence-conscious dialectic. But what is the task of
dialectics in its relationship to the apophatic “superstructure” of thinking, to the
metaphysical “level” of the super-intelligible? In the light of higher principles, but
caught within finitude, thinking is now given the task of developing concepts that point
beyond itself. Such “inarticulate concepts” (ἄρρητοι ἔννοιαι) 1098 , such as B. the “non-
concept” (ἀγνόημα) 1099 of the Aporrheton , the “simple concept” (ἁπλὸν νόημα) of the
One, which can only be thought “up to the threshold of birth pangs” 1100 , or the
“transcendent concept” (μετανόημα) of the unified being 1101 , are indeed in the Thought
constitutes, however, the ability to actualize "the ineffable consciousness" of infinite
transcendence in finite thought. "The concepts themselves cannot be grasped by our
understanding" 1102 , says Damascius of the νοήματα of the super-intelligible principles,
thereby indicating that their constitution in our thinking bursts the boundaries of it and
awakens in it the sense of the unattainable breadth of the transcendent, on which we are
dependent without being able to grasp it. The tension of this contradiction, the
περιτροπή, has aimed it, at the center of thought itself, at that which is beyond thought.
In this way, Damascius succeeds in establishing a connection to transcendence in the
midst of immanence, a connection which is, however, only established from the latter,
because the concept of ἐπέκεινα implies the transcendence of any relationality.
However, dialectical thinking, by virtue of its "peritropic" nature, has the ability to
reflect even this contradiction in the consciousness of transcendence.
The tension between the thought substance of the protological concepts and their
intended object means that the metaphysical ἔννοιαι have a special function. This no
longer consists in their immanent philosophical content, because the essence of such a
content is precisely the contradiction between the content and its conceptual form.
"Transcendence", "absoluteness" or "one" all exhibit such an immanent contradiction.
The role of the protological concepts now consists in Damascius in the movement of
their self-transcendence, in their ability to express or suggest a "hint" ( ἔνδειξις) to
something higher and super-intelligible. The function of the metaphysical concepts is
therefore seen in the fact that they are always already beyond their narrower, conceptual
boundaries and "point" to the transcendent. In this way, the philosophy of Damascius
constitutes itself into an endeictic metaphysics , even more than that of Syrian and Proclus ,
from whom it found the corresponding inspiration .
It will now be clear why, in a metaphysics whose basic concepts seek to transcend
themselves, the imperatives and "calls to awakening" cannot be seen as mere rhetorical
ornamentation. The appellative form in which Damascius' philosophy often appears is
already rooted in its nature. Such admonitions as: "Let even the One that is present in
every thing, the One that seems to be fragmented, be reduced to the common, indivisible
and true One!" or "Man, beware of adding the What (τὸ τί) to the One!" aim to open up
an awareness in the soul that it should seek the transcendent in what is closest to it.
Because things are transparent to the higher principles that constitute their essence,
these shine through in the world. Even in the most extreme separation of the original
One, the ἕν is still recognizable. It is only necessary to open the eyes of the spirit in
order to sense the foundation of the whole beyond being: "We are constantly climbing
the steep hill to the ever more indivisible and are somehow conscious even in the
fragmentation of the one-form" 1104 . The reason for this is that the principles of the
positive and the negative have entered into the constitution of the soul. The soul-ground
shows a certain affinity to the Absolute, where it becomes the ἄδυτον of the ineffable.
For Damascius, this soul-ground is actually an abyss of the soul 1105 . Through the levels of
the hierarchy of hypostases, the human being's own self no longer has a way to the most
sublime heights of the super-intelligible, to which the Plotinian soul could still soar. Yet
in the symbolic protology of Damascius it is possible to sense the power of
transcendence in the reflection on the scope of the spiritual concepts. The awareness of
the limits includes the reference beyond these limits, even though the awareness of
transcendence cannot dissolve in an ecstatic overcoming of the conceptual enclosure.
Rather, it remains trapped in the soul as ἄρρητος συναίσθησις. These are the "aporetic
birth pangs" (αἱ ἀπορητικαὶ ὠδῖνες) 1106 that cannot be released in a birth with the
truth. The corresponding maieutics, which knows how to remedy such “birth pains”,
does not have the task in the Damascene dialectic of alleviating the ὠδ ῖνες, but, quite
the opposite, of stimulating it in order to point to the sublimity and supremacy of the
metaphysical principles. In this sense, the scholar does not see his calling as a teacher of
philosophy in any way in a proclamation of teachings, for the highest principles are not
objective, but in a reference to the spirit-transcendent primal sources of reality, a
reference for which the philosophical spirit itself must provide the material: “Plato also
advises us, in accordance with the oracles, to do the same, if we are able to do it: to
forget our concepts and to rise to those birth pangs which, by their very nature,
recognize that One and yet cannot proclaim it to anyone, but which at least remove the
obstacles from the path of such a tendency to imagination (προβολή), such as the
question ‘What is it then?’ and the demand ‘to think of it as something’ ” 1107 .
Thus, the meaning of Damascene philosophy consists in a "formal indication" of
conceptual-transcendent entities, which are, however, suggested by means of a pure
conceptual dialectic. In general, "purification" and "purity" play an eminent role in the
discourse of the scholar 1108 , because the purpose of his metaphysics is to analyze the
protological concepts in the sharpest possible way, so that the entire contradiction
between their concrete content and their referential intention can come to light. This
has been shown to us masterfully with the help of the concept of transcendence, the
"ambiguity" of which cannot be blamed on a vagueness in the dialectical procedure
itself, but must be traced back to the very nature of thought. The recurring phraseology
of the "purification" and "purity" of conceptual thinking is also connected to the
Damascene's worldview, which can be captured very well by the transparency
metaphors that he loved: one should sharpen one's eyes in order to notice the higher
principles in the things at hand, in order to see the light of the "elements" of being
shining through in the thought forms of the spirit, in order to see the splendor of unity
in the differentiated concepts. The only thing that matters is the permeability of thought
to the higher, and it is only with consideration that the Diadoche tirelessly refines his
conceptual apparatus, examines the traditional terminology with precise meaning, and
rejects many of the established thought structures of his school. The pedantry and
dogmatism with which he sometimes appears to act and which have earned him the
dislike of the older historians of philosophy in particular 1109 are primarily an expression of
his project to break the dogmatic resistance of a conceptual architecture that claims to
be unambiguous and reliable, while in fact it is an "overwhelming tive” 1110 and
“transcendent truth” 1111. His main concern is to ensure the permeability of the dialectical
determinations for the transcendence that lies behind them.
The degree of transparency for the absolute primal cause and the effectiveness in the
crystallization of an "ineffable consciousness" of the beyond of existence provide the
Damascene with the most important criterion for his re-examination of the school's
concepts. It is in this sense that he questions venerable thought structures of the
Platonic tradition and attempts to coin new expressions for the ineffable. Against the old
accusation of hair-splitting, to which Damascius is said to have indulged in order to
criticise the already sterile fantasies of his Neoplatonic predecessors 1112 , one can now
point to the liberality of the last great, systematic thinker of antiquity: he openly
declares his support for the Pythagorean, Platonic, Orphic and Chaldean terminology,
for the religious views of the most diverse cultures 1113 , insofar as they seek to elevate the spirit to
the “most super-divine principles” (αἱ ὑπερθειότατοι ἀρχαί) 1114 1115 . Thus, Damascius'
"referential metaphysics" provides the philosophical basis for his "convergence or
concordance hermeneutics" 1116 , which he develops in the general spirit of the
Neoplatonic school of Athens, but which he expands substantially and deepens
methodically. It is by no means "gullibility" 1117 that leads Damascius to his many cultic
and mythographic parallels, but rather the deep conviction that, against the background
of a consistent metaphysics of transcendence, the ultimate causes can no longer be
differentiated with unambiguous certainty and, as it were, taken possession of. The
learned, yet silent reference to the transcendent is the last thing that remains for the
philosopher after an exhaustive practice of dialectics. In this sovereign attitude towards
rigid conceptual systems, the ideal of an assimilation to the deity is also expressed. The
philosopher who transcends dogmatic means of expression and examines the limits of
understanding from the perspective of a “overwhelming truth”, it is like the gods who, in
full possession of transcendent knowledge, freely and arbitrarily choose the language of
their revelations:
The gods, even if they sometimes instruct some of us on these or other subjects, do not tell us the things they
themselves think, or the way they think them. They speak to the Egyptians, the Syrians, or the Greeks in their own
mother tongues, otherwise it would be quite in vain to speak to them. And so they sensibly use the human way of
speaking and thinking (ἀνθρωπίνη διάλεκτος) when they wish to communicate their own knowledge to men 1118 .
 3 “Putting the final word”? Summary and outlook
“If someone
feels moved by these aporias to assert that the One
already represents a sufficient principle and
puts the final word […], we will
indulge his embarrassment, for such an idea
is, it seems, impassable and inexhaustible
…” (DP I 6, 7 – 13) 1119
3.1 Worship of the Superdivine
Damascius' main text ends - at least in its surviving part - as it began: with a strong
assertion of the transcendence of the "intangible principles" 1120 . Even the threefold
nature of being-life-thought is exposed as a one-sided human understanding of the
intelligible and is used only as a symbolic means to "point out from the objects familiar
to us the essence that remains in the inaccessible interior of the temple and allows us to
sense itself from afar" 1121 . It is not only the super-intelligible 1122 that eludes us. Even the
noetic, despite its literal meaning, is closed to the human mind because it "does not
correspond to us": Εἰκότως ἄρα τὸ νοητὸν ἡμῖν οὐ προσβάλλει 1123 . The reason for this
general flight into the unattainable, in which the highest ἀρχαί are included, is the first
principle. This not only produces everything positive "in an ineffable way", but also gives
its principalities a portion of negativity that becomes ever more dense from level to
level. Absolute transcendence thus becomes the primary source of the relative
transcendence of the entities of the intelligible and superintelligible realms. The One, as
a “symbol” of the Absolute, is the highest expression of the primordial nothingness ity:
It is obscured by the proximity of the inexpressible 1124 . Even the noetic triad exceeds
intellectual vision. While for Proclus the triadic in its spirituality was completely
transparent, indeed it constituted the very structure of spiritual transparency,
Damascius, with reference to the gods of the Chaldean oracles , does not shy away from
calling the first intelligible triads a "supercosmic abyss" 1125 . Reality breaks down into
partial areas of transcendence. This revolutionary way of looking at the objects of
metaphysics will feed the beginning of a new tradition through a subterranean stream,
as it were: the apophatic doctrine of the Trinity of Dionysius the Areopagite probably
arises from such a source. The fact that for the Areopagite the Christian Trinity
represents the object of a negative theology seems to have been made possible by the
decisive suggestions that came from the last Diadochi 1126 .
Even more strongly than his predecessors, Damascius emphasizes the non-hypostatic
character of the aporrheton. No concession is made to the reader, who at least in the
other Neoplatonists could still find clues for a concrete understanding of the first
principle. Not even in passages σαφηνείας χάριν does Damascius allow himself to be
carried away by addressing the Absolute as οἷον ὑπόστασις or as ὑπόστατόν τι, as
Plotinus and Proclus occasionally did for the sake of exposition. The Absolute is in no
way. Does the Absolute not "exist" then? This unreality carries the whole of reality, it is
– admittedly only ἀπορρήτως – its origin. The non-hypostatic, unreal character of the
unsayable must not mislead us into an “an-archic” way of thinking 1127 . The first principle
remains the all-encompassing and determining basis of reality throughout, albeit in
such a way that it is in itself neither “first” nor “principle” – and precisely in this way
releases reality into the freedom of its oneness and wholeness, into the coherence of its
self-disclosure.
Since the Damascene aporrhetics has no "essence" as its object, and even sets itself the
task of abolishing objectification, it constitutes itself as a transcendental analysis of
absoluteness in general. Metaphysics thus takes on the guise of a transcendental
reflection on the basic concepts of protology and for this purpose develops "meta-
concepts" that are intended to point beyond their own content ( ἀγνόημα, μετανόημα,
ἄρρητος ἔννοια). Only in the distance of an "unspeakable consciousness" that has to
question itself ("I don't really know how to express myself") can the abysmal infinity of
the absolute be captured as in a dark mirror. The fact that even the faintest intuition, not
only of the "content" of the Absolute, which cannot exist, but even of its mere existence ,
is problematized in the act of referring to transcendence and taken back into an
"unspeakable consciousness" emphasizes the destruction of every πράγμα, on which the
Damascus dialectic works tirelessly. With this intention, Damascius also develops the
model of an inexhaustible negative dialectic, with which he attempts to replace the
Proclian negation of the negation and which should not be understood as a competing
method - because this too would have to convert its referential intention into a πράγμα -
but rather as a diagnosis of an inevitable regressus ad infinitum of principle-based
thinking. This progression into infinity is included in every concept of transcendence
(περιτροπή). It reflects our own inner psychological abyss (τὸ ἄδυτον τῆς ψυχῆς) as
well as the factual grounding of thinking on a foundation of radical unknowability.
The first principle is unreal in the most radical and paradoxical sense. Every statement
we dare to make about it, and even its reversal into the negative, collides with the non-
existence of the Absolute. According to Damascius, who criticizes the transcending
negation, believes he unmasks it as a form of "hybrid reasoning" (νόθος λογισμός) and
therefore rejects it, even the concept of transcendence must be denied to the unsayable.
Does the Absolute thus evaporate into a protological "atheism"? Does the eminent
language of the apophase turn into anti-metaphysics? Finally, are we dealing with the
Damascene aporrheton as a neutral structural category of "discourse", similar to
Derrida's "différance"? Two sensational works have attempted to demonstrate
Damascius' proximity to Derrida's philosophical project 1128 . However, the Damascene
Aporrheton still retains the sense of the sublime nen: It is the τιμιώτατον 1129 , it is ὑπὲρ
πάντα 1130 , even above the One 1131 . Of course, the Scholarch hastens to add that the
Absolute "has the highest venerability only insofar as it is to be found in ourselves and
represents our own experience" 1132 . Ultimately, neither "the highest" (τὸ ὑπέρτατον)
nor "the most powerful" (τὸ κράτιστον) nor "the most venerable" (τὸ σεμνότατον) can
correspond as attributes to the Absolute 1133 . Is it therefore only the order, the provisional
nature of the discourse, that suggests the divine superiority of the aporrheton at the
beginning and demands reverent consideration for it, so that at the end the divine
“deception” can be torn apart and the aporrheton can be interpreted as a mere “void” of
the positive discourse?
The neutral meaning of the Damascene Ineffable is confirmed at first glance by the
bracketing of its divinity. While Proclus equated the One with "divinity in itself"
(αὐτοθεότης) 1134 , Damascius quite definitely describes the principles as "super-divine" entities 1135. This superlative of a statement of
transcendence is remarkable in every respect. Such boldness had not been heard in the
Platonic tradition until Damascius. Only in Dionysius the Areopagite will echoes of this
daring be heard 1136 , admittedly without the almost dizzying superlative of the
Damascene. If the noetic and hypernoetic principles are of a "super-divine" nature, how
much more so the Ineffable itself, which is no longer even a principle...
The canonization of the superdivinity in the Damascus Aporrhetics can reveal another
implicit consideration: “No God is ineffable without first being a One,” writes Damascius
in 1137
. It follows with Necessity that that "essence" which still surpasses the One must even
transcend divinity. The divinity of the Damascene gods is thus a conditional divinity, for
it is determined by the One, just as the divinity of the Platonic θεοί in the Phaedrus
presupposes the realization of the vision of ideas 1138 . The conditionality of divinity in
Platonic philosophy could be seen as further proof of the validity of Wilamowitz's
remark that θεός functioned as a "predicate concept" in the religious thought of the
Greeks 1139 . The fact that being God required certain properties and actions – in Plato the
vision of ideas, in Damascius participation in the One – seems to indicate that, at least
in some areas of Hellenic theology, θεός did not designate an independent, free,
substantial form, but a form of being whose nature, together with others, is derived from
another 1140 . If θεός is indeed a “predicate concept” – and in Platonic metaphysics it
seems to be understood as such – then it too must be transcended in the ascent to the
“unconditional principle” (ἀνυπόθετος ἀρχή). For Damascius, however, the aporrheton
is nothing other than precisely this “unconditional principle”.
Does the super-divinity of the Aporrheton speak for its hypostatic inconsistency, for its
"pure" unreality? Is "It" only the negative foil of the positive discourse, a rhetorical by-
product? Another thing seems to confirm this: no hymns can be sung in honor of "It". It
thus eludes not only the cult, but also personal religiosity, which can be impressively
demonstrated for the Neoplatonic environment, especially in the hymn poetry of Proclus
1141
. "The former must not be called "principle," not "cause," not "first," and not even
"before the whole" or "beyond the whole." All the less may one call it "the whole" in
hymn tones. In fact, one should not sing any hymns in its honour, nor should one
attempt to grasp it with conceptual thought or touch it with intuition" 1142 . With this,
Damascius goes against the spirit, if not the letter, of the anonymous hymn to the
Transcendent: "O You, Beyond All, How Can You Be Called Otherwise?" 1143 . The
sublimity of the Absolute over all predicates, even over that of ἐπέκεινα, makes its
hymnic praise impossible, for a hymn consists of nothing other than the festive and
reverent litany of the predicates of God. The divine qualities which in ancient hymns
reproduce the form of the person being called upon and specify the direction of the turn
are partly predicates of origin. But the most original, that which has not even grown out
of chaos, has no γενεαλογία 1144 , the invocation of which could provide the structure of a
hymn. The ineffable is also not the original source of its principles, or at least only "in an
ineffable way": "It is not participated in, nor does it bestow anything of itself on those
entities which come from it" 1145 . This means that no Olympian offspring could be
proudly counted, nor thought of a brilliant effectiveness, as is usual in ancient hymns to
the gods. The request for a gracious disposition with which the hymn to the
transcendent ends (Ἵλαος εἴης) stands in direct contrast to the complete rapture of the
Damascene Aporrheton , which “is nothing to us” 1146 .
When Damascius rejects negative dialectics, he simultaneously renounces the most
important form of Neoplatonic hymn. For Proclus, Parmenides ' first hypothesis
constituted a veritable "theological hymn" to the Absolute: ὕμνον διὰ τῶν ἀποφάσεων
τούτων ἕνα θεολογικὸν ἀναπέμπων εἰς τὸ ἕν 1147 . Of course, the invocation should take
place in silence, a requirement that both the culmination of the apophase in silence and
the unconscious dependence of the whole of nature on the One again grasps: σιγῇ τὸ
ἄρρητον αὐτοῦ καὶ πρὸ τῶν αἰτίων άντων ἀ ἴ ναιτίως αἀτιον (sc. θεμιτόν) ῖ νυμνεῖ ν.
The above-mentioned hymn to the transcendent , in paradoxical opposition to its own
turning to it, also formulates the question: “How will the Word praise you? You cannot
be named with any word” and states that all beings who know the “intelligible secret” of
the Absolute sing a “silent hymn”: …εἰς σὲ δὲ πάντα/ Σύνθεμα σὸν νοέοντα λαλεῖ
σιγώμενον ὕμνον. There seems to be no more radical attitude, and yet Damascius
surpasses even the boldest program of ancient metaphysics with his doctrine of an
unhypostatic Absolute that has no effectiveness, that does not even provide the
unifying basis of reality, to which no elevation in the sense of the unio mystica is
possible, and which can neither be guessed at nor hinted at. Because nothing is owed to
the original source, because it produces nothing – except in a completely ‘unspeakable’
way that surpasses our concept of ‘production’ – because it even transcends
unknowability, so that not even the existence of a ‘mystery’ can be ascertained, every
tendency towards hymnic enthusiasm is inhibited at the moment of its emergence and
turned inwards, to fall completely silent in the ‘inmost temple of the soul’ ( ἄδυτον τ ῆς
ψυχῆς).
However, Damascius makes us feel a deep reverence towards the “unspeakable” and
adopt a serious attitude that can be called nothing less than religious 1148 and that will
defy a “deconstructive” interpretation with each new reading of his writings:
But we thought it appropriate not to call it the “beyond everything” but rather the “absolutely incomprehensible” and
“absolutely inarticulate” – these terms would probably best meet the demands of thought. But also Thus, thinking
expresses nothing, but in self-restraint renounces language and in this way worships that absolute unknowability 1149 .
According to Damascius, ancient theologians honored the first primal cause precisely
through silence (σιγῇ τιμήσαντα τὴν μίαν πρὸ τῶν δυεῖν) 1150 , an honor that is also
given to other “nameless” principles 1151 : σέβας … τῆς ὑπερβαλλούσης ἐκείνης ἑνώσεως
1152
. Damascius' role model, Isidore, strives to worship the gods, not those who
presumably live in temples, but those who have their eternally unshakable position in
the unspeakable itself:
He neither appreciated the current religious politics nor did he want to worship the statues of the gods, but he strove
for the gods themselves, who are not hidden in the innermost parts of the sanctuaries, but in the ineffable of absolute
unknowability – whatever this ineffable may be 1153 .
It is probably to one of these gods, if not to the highest one, who as Henade includes all
the other gods 1154 , that Damascius addresses a request for forgiveness for the audacity of
the human λόγος, who constantly longs for the truth of the principles, but because of his
natural weakness finds himself torn back and forth and causes confusion in thinking
about principles. It is also the gods who have given us the cosmos as the "first
perfection" so that it may serve us as a "pointer" ( ἔνδειξις) to the "invisible, intelligible,
unified and ineffable perfection" 1155 . Thanks to the mediation of the gods, the world
becomes for us a large-scale system of reference in which every entity points to
something higher and ultimately to the "ineffable" itself. The endemic task of the
metaphysician, of which we have already spoken, is thus founded in the effectiveness of
the gods themselves. These are not themselves the Absolute. But they point to the
Absolute, in whose ineffability they conceal themselves. Beyond the gods there are the
"most super-divine principles" which are "nameless". In particular, that entity to which
we give the inappropriate name "the One" remains like a statue of the ineffable "in the
innermost temple of that silence" 1156 . Damascius also invites us "to surrender ourselves
to rest, to remain in the innermost temple of the soul, removed from words, and not to
join the procession" 1157 . This "procession" is nothing other than the emergence of the
hypostases, which arbitrarily leave their first primal source. Only in the "procession" can
hymns of praise be heard; indeed, the entire "procession" of the hypostases (πρόοδος) is
nothing other than a hymn of praise to the first principle. In the "innermost part of the
temple of that silence", on the other hand, no hymns are heard. When the soul
withdraws into its inner ἄδυτον, it has reached an absolute standpoint.
The gods themselves have always remained "in the ineffable of absolute unknowability".
Their instruction should lead us to this ineffable too. There is thus something supra-
divine beyond the gods, to which the soul should turn in reverence, and in whose
presence the gods themselves observe sacred silence. This is by no means an
enthusiastic exaggeration of a "period of decline". The reverential attitude towards the
supra-divine is in the tradition of ancient Hellenic belief. Even in classical times, Zeus
was depicted making a sacrifice with a phial in his hand. To whom does the supreme
god sacrifice? To a power that is greater than himself. For the ancient Greeks, it was
Moira 1158 . Reverence for fate has been replaced by the spiritualization of religiosity in
Platonism. However, a silent veneration of the supreme divine continues to exist. Even
the supreme god stands in the shadow of the absolute.

3.2 Infinite approach? – Infinite distance

Finally, the question should be asked whether the Damascene rapture of the first
principle into super-transcendence corresponds to a parallel movement of the infinite
approach to the Absolute. There seems to be some evidence for this. speak: The double
negation of Proclus, which is supposed to lead to the peace of a perfect communion with
the One, is rejected. Instead, Damascius establishes an inexhaustible movement in the
thinking of the Absolute 1159 . The negation of the negation is replaced with a potentially
infinite sequence of negations. The infinite negation is not, however, established as a
fixed method. Rather, it corresponds to a diagnosis that has seen through the inner
workings of the protological concepts. Already by their very nature, the metaphysical
concepts exhibit a tension between their form and their intended object, a tension that
drags them into a never-ending dialectical reversal (περιτροπή). The infinite negation
therefore does not even need to be introduced to the metaphysical concepts from the
outside as a guideline and formal discipline of thought in order to bring about their
ecstatic self-transcendence. It is already laid out in the basic concepts of the science of
principles, so that every νόημα in the context of the first primal ground becomes a
concept of transcendence, i.e. a notion that constantly refers to something higher than
its own content. Dialectics only has to establish this movement, reflect it, understand its
full articulation and finally bring this insight to maturity as an "unspeakable
consciousness" that is constantly questioning itself. But does the insight into the
inexhaustibility of "that essence", which at the same time also destroys the efforts of a
unio mystica , lead to the demand for an infinite approach to that which can never be
fully taken possession of? Damascius would then be the unconscious successor of
Gregory of Nyssa in 1160 and would even anticipate a certain thought pattern of early
Romanticism. The young Hölderlin wrote to Schiller:
…I seek to develop the idea of an infinite progress of philosophy, I seek to show that the indispensable requirement
which must be made of every system, the union of subject and object in an absolute – I or whatever you want to call it
– is indeed aesthetically possible in intellectual intuition, but theoretically only through an infinite approximation,
like the approximation of the square to the circle, and that in order to realize a system of thought, immortality is just
as necessary as it is for a system of action. I believe that I can thereby prove to what extent the sceptics are right, and
to what extent they are not . 1161
Damascius also makes use of skeptical suggestions, even terminological turns of
Pyrrhonism, for his own thinking, and is thus doubly close to the beginnings of German
idealism, which was also fertilized by skepticism. Plotinus himself has incorporated
skeptical motifs into his metaphysics, but while Plotinus emphasizes the elimination of
any searching restlessness in the experience of all-unity (ἐν τῷ παντὶ γενόμενος οὐδὲν
ἔτι ζητήσεις) 1162 , Damascius is in a certain sense on the side of the skeptics, who
recommend themselves as those who are “still searching” (ο ἱ δὲ ἔτι ζητοῦσιν) 1163 . A
scepticism with a metaphysical orientation exerted a great fascination on the early
German Romantics, so that when considering late antique and early Romantic
"idealism" one believes one is faced with similar paradigms. Damascius' relationship to
"critical philosophy" was already highlighted by Tennemann at the beginning of the 19th
century. However, this is "sympathetically linked to scepticism in that it does not
assume a principle secured by evidence by which our fallible convictions would be
certain. But fallibility can also be interpreted as the non-finality of our current state of
knowledge. And then a prospect of increasing knowledge opens up" 1164 , which Schlegel
described as "infinite approximation": "The essence of philosophy consists in the
longing for the infinite" 1165 . A late echo of the Damascene “longing for the primordial
essence” (πόθος τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως)?
At first glance, Damascius does indeed seem to be close to the early idealism of
Tübingen and Jena. For the Diadochi, too, reflection on the aporrheton is an “endless
task” 1166 . Although he ignores the methodological progress of Proclian dialectics by
exposing apophase, the highest form of henology up to that point, as a “hybrid
reasoning”, his aporrhetics are no less considered and strictly ordered: Damascius
speaks of an “ascent of thought” (τοῦ λόγου ἀνάβασις) to the “absolutely and absolutely
inexpressible, non-objective, uncoordinateable and utterly incomprehensible” ( ἁπλ ῶς
καὶ πάντῃ ἄρρητον, ἄθετον, ἀσύντακτον καὶ (Romans 11:11 ) So even for the little
scholar there is an "ascent" to the Absolute, the sequence of which must be carefully
thought out and followed precisely. The circular nature of his questioning thoughts must
not mislead us in this respect. Protology begins with the concept of a "so-called one
principle of the whole", leads to insight into its transcendence, considers the paradox
contained in this concept (the transcendent implies the relation to something
transcended), leads to the necessary assumption of super-transcendence and finally,
from this point of view, calls into question even the most unconditional and
fundamental achievements of consciousness: even the vague intuition ( ὑπόνοια) of the
Absolute and its mere suggestion (ἔνδειξις) must be put aside in order to find "rest"
(ἡσυχία) in an aporetic "unspeakable consciousness" of the unattainable. We see that
despite the meanderings of the Damascene dialectic, there is order and regulated
progress in it. An infinite approach to the Absolute, then?
In fact, the symbolic concept of approach plays a certain role in Damascius. “Because
knowledge requires differentiation […], it is natural that in approaching the One,
differentiation collapses into a unification, so that even knowledge ends in
unknowability” 1168 , writes Damascius, and lets the “eye” of the soul, in its progress
toward the “sun” of the One, finally become “absolute light” 1169 . The purification of a
simple concept of ἕν brings thought closer to the absolute One:
And yet this purification of the concept of unity also brings us into a certain proximity to its essence, only that the
greater the proximity to the One becomes, the more the definite knowledge of it fades. Once this purification has
come within immediate reach of the One, it closes its eyes completely and becomes union instead of knowledge . 1170
Of course, this “unification” does not happen with the One itself, but only with its light,
and the One itself is not the Absolute, as Damascius points out, although it is in its
immediate vicinity. As a result of this ineradicable distance, the symbolic concept of
“distance” becomes more important. Syllogistic knowledge is weak and unreliable
because it can only see “from a distance” (πόρρωθεν ὁρ ῶσα) 1171 . Only “from afar” can
the One be seen as Outline the object of knowledge (ὡς γνωστῷ πόρρωθεν
ἐντυγχάνομεν) 1172 . ‘In the distance’ it hovers, as it were, as something recognizable
before the eyes of our imagination (πόρρωθεν μὲν ὡς γνωστὸν φαντάζεται καὶ
ἐνδίδωσι τὸν ἑαυτοῦ γνωρισμόν) 1173 . Even being can only be determined 'from a
distance'. The principles which constitute being - substance, life and spirit - which
reproduce the super-existent principles of one , many and unity within being, can only
be understood from a distance. In this respect they are like the peaks of distant
mountain ranges which one thinks one can see from afar, albeit only imprecisely: τὰ
ὄρη πόρρωθεν ὅτι μικρότατα καὶ ἀδιάρθρωτα ἔτι ταῖς ἡμετέραις ὄψεσιν 1174 . Or they
resemble the heavenly bodies which, from a tremendous distance, adapt their extremely
bright light to the human eye 1175 . From close up, however, the mountain masses would
completely obscure our horizon and give the lie to the dividing lines that our gaze has
drawn between the individual mountains. Likewise, from close up, the stars would break
our vision with the force of their light. Thus, for Damascius, there can ultimately be no
"closeness" to the principles, for this cancels itself out in the immediacy of the first
primal causes 1176 . On the other hand, "distance" constitutes our ordinary state of
existence.
In the models of infinite progress that we know from the history of philosophy, there is a
"medium" of this progress: it is the infinity of God or the Absolute. What about the
Damascus Aporrheton in this respect? Our Logos stops before the ineffable, it touches
its own "limit" and "determination" (πέρας) at the edge of its veil. Should not the
counterpart of this finitude then logically be the ἀπειρία of the Absolute? The question
is raised by Damascius in the context of his theory of numbers: "Shall we say that
number is infinite and therefore ineffable and unknowable?" In other words, does
number participate in an absolute infinity that would have to be identified with the
Absolute? "Well, number is not infinite insofar as it is number, but by virtue of
participation. This means that it is also limited, although it has the form of infinity to a
greater extent.” The transcendent stands out from this. completely: "Nor do we pursue
the ineffable in this way, but as something holy and symbolic" 1177 . The infinity of the
ineffable has no counter-distinction in finitude. Nor is the infinity of the aporrheton the
origin of a participation in infinity, which would make, for example, number into
something infinite. Number draws its infinity from the principle of multiplicity, just as it
receives its finitude from the One. The infinity of the ineffable, on the other hand,
transcends the dichotomy of finitude and infinity. In terminological terms, it is used
only symbolically in the Damascus aporrhetic , just as the "ineffable" itself is not to be
understood literally, but as "something holy and symbolic". The "infinity" and the
"ineffable" refer to that which exceeds both infinity and ineffability.
However, our concepts are subject to an infinite reversal and our thinking seems to
experience a dead end when it is directed towards the inexhaustible nothingness. What
space and what extent does this run into the void attempt to traverse without
succeeding? Is it not the infinite expanse of the Absolute? For Damascius, this dead end
is nothing other than an "idle within ourselves". Nevertheless, our thinking receives its
direction and its determination from the One as a symbol of the Absolute. A symbol is
nothing other than "the visible object of an invisible". "In the intelligible, however, the
symbol and that whose symbol it is exist simultaneously" 1178 , so that from the One we
receive an indication of the Absolute beyond the One.
the aporrheton is not an absolute infinity. In this respect, the Diadoche also breaks with
a speculative tradition that begins with Plato and leads via Speusippus to Proclus (1179) .
Gregory of Nyssa also joins this philosophical line, although he is not accepted by the
pagan Athenian school (1180) , the end of which is marked by the last Scholarch. The
absolutely ineffable is no longer even infinity. An infinite annexation But the production
cannot exist without the foundation of a “medium” in which it can, so to speak, progress.
What remains? Not the infinite approach to the Absolute, for with every step the
metaphysician takes in the direction of the ineffable, he discovers that it is even further
away than he thought. The last conscious achievements that must admit their inability
are the most fundamental, most unconditional conditions of knowledge: the
premonition and the hint. The premonition must retreat into the paradoxical awareness
of its self-annihilation. The hint returns to itself. It is not the highest categories of being
or being itself that are denied at the climax of the Damascene dialectic, so that the view
may broaden to include the overwhelming power of the first principle. In the end -
which, however, for Damascius, as long as we philosophize, is only a provisional "end" -
the most fundamental, the quietest and weakest modes of human and divine awareness
fall silent. The higher one is not the one who has come the furthest to the Absolute, but
the one who has understood that the infinite approach to the Absolute takes place as an
infinite distance. The one who is closest to the ineffable is the one who knows that he is
the furthest away from it.
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Index of Greek terms
 ἄδυτον 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10
 ἄπειρον 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 f.
 ἀπόρρητον 1 , 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 f., 8 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 1 – 2 , 10 , 1 – 2 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f.,
16 f., 17 , 18 f., 19 , 20 f., 21 , 22 , 23 f., 24 , 25 , 26
 ἀριθμός 1 , 2 , 3 , 4
 ἄρρητον 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 f., 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22
, 23 , 24 , 25
 ἀρχή 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 ,
22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 f.
 ψυχή 1 f., 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 f., 21 , 22 ,
23 , 1 – 2 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 f.
 δύναμις 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11
 εἶδος 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11
 ἕν 1 f., 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 –
2 , 17 , 1 – 2 , 18 , 19 , 20 f., 1 – 2 , 21 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 f., 1 – 2 , 30 , 31
f., 1 – 2 , 32 f., 33 , 34 , 35 , 36
 ἔννοια 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 ,
22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 f., 31 , 32 , 33
 ἐπιστροφή 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12
 ἰδιότης 1 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 3
 μονή 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7
 ἡνωμένον 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13
 νοῦς 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 f., 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 f., 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19
 ὄν 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 f., 14 , 15 , 16
 πέρας 1 f., 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6
 περιτροπή 1 f., 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 f., 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12
 πρᾶγμα 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10
 προδιορισμός, προ[σ]διορισμ 1 – 2 , 1 , 2 , 3
 πρόοδος 1 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8
 συναίσθησις 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10
 ὠδίς, ὠδῖνες 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 4
Subject index
 All-Unity 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8
 Apophase 1 f., 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 f., 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 , 13
 apophatic 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 f., 1 – 2 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 , 8 f., 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 ,
18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24
 aporetic 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19
 Aporia 1 , 2 f., 3 f., 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20
, 21 , 22 , 23
 Aporrhetics 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 8 f., 9 , 10
 Aporrheton 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 f., 1 – 2 , 15 , 16 , 1 – 2 , 17 , 18 , 19
, 20 , 1 – 2 , 21 , 22 f.
 Rise 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 ,
24 f., 25 f., 26 , 27 , 1 – 2 , 28 f., 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 1 – 2
 Expression 1 f., 1 – 2 , 2 f . , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 f., 6 , 7 f., 8 f., 9 , 10 f., 11 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2
, 12 , 13 , 14 f., 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 1
– 2 , 24 , 25 f . , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 f., 30 f., 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 f., 1 – 2 , 38 , 39 , 40 f., 41 ,
1 – 2 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 f.
 determination 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 f., 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 1 – 2 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 f., 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 ,
18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 f., 23 , 1 – 2 , 24 , 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 f., 31 f., 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 f.
 Movement 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 f., 17 , 18 f., 19 , 20 , 21 ,
22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31
 Consciousness 1 f., 2 , 3 f., 4 f., 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 1 – 2 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17
f., 18 , 19 , 20 f., 21 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 , 29 f., 30 , 1 – 2 , 31 , 32
f., 33 f., 34 , 35 , 1 – 2 , 36 , 37 f., 38 f., 39 , 40 , 41 , 1 – 2 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 1 – 2 , 45 , 46 , 47 , 48 ,
49
 the absolute 1 , 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 f., 12 f., 13 f., 1 –
2 , 14 , 15 f., 16 f., 17 , 1 – 2 , 18 , 19 , 20 f., 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 f., 26 f., 27 f., 28 , 1 – 2 , 29 , 30
f., 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 f., 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 f., 42 , 43 f., 44 , 45 , 46 , 47 f.
 the one 1 – 2 , 1 f., 2 f . , 3 f . , 1 – 2 , 4 f . , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 , 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 f ., 12 , 1 – 2 , 13
f., 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 19 , 20 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 21 , 22 f ., 23 , 24 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2
, 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 25 f., 26 , 27 , 28 , 1 – 2 , 29 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 30 , 31 , 32
f., 33 , 34
 the elementary 1
 the whole 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 f., 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 15 f., 16 f., 17 , 18
f., 19 f., 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30
 the United 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 f., 20 f., 21 ,
22 , 23
 the nothingness 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13
 the temple interior 1 , 2
 the unspeakable 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 1 – 2 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 ,
18 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 19 f., 20 f., 21 , 22 , 23 f., 24 f., 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30
 dialectic 1 , 2 f., 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 f., 17 ,
18 , 19 f., 20 , 21 , 22 f., 23 , 1 – 2 , 24 , 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 f., 31 , 32 , 33 f., 34 , 35 f., 36 ,
37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 1 – 2 , 45
 difference 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 1 – 2 , 20 , 21 ,
22 f., 23 , 1 – 2 , 24 , 25 , 26 f., 27 f., 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32
 Unit 1 , 2 , 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 , 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 1 – 2 , 16 , 17 , 18 ,
19 , 20 , 21 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 1 – 2 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 1 – 2 , 32 , 1 – 2
, 33 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 f., 39 f., 40 , 41 f., 42 , 43 , 44
 ecstasy 1 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 , 4 f., 5 , 6 f.
 element 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18
 Understanding 1 , 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 f., 17 f., 1
– 2 , 18 , 1 – 2 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 f., 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30
 shape 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13 , 14 , 15 f., 1 – 2 , 16 f., 17 , 18 , 19 ,
20 , 21 f., 22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 f., 26 , 27 f., 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 1 – 2 , 34 f., 35 , 36 , 37 f., 38 ,
39 , 40 f., 41 , 42 , 43 , 44 , 45 , 46 , 1 – 2 , 47 f., 48 f., 49 f., 1 – 2 , 50 f., 51 , 52 , 53 f., 1 – 2 , 54 ,
55 , 56 , 57 , 58
 Labor pains 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 1 – 2 , 7 f., 8 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 f., 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18
, 19 , 20 , 21 , 22
 united 1 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 f., 9 , 10 f., 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 1
– 2 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 1 – 2 , 24 , 1 – 2 , 25 f., 1 – 2 , 26 , 27 , 28
 Spirit 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 10 f., 11 f., 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17
, 18 f., 19 f., 20 , 21 f., 22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 1 – 2 , 30 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 31 , 32 ,
1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 1 – 2 , 36 , 37
 God, Gods 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 1 – 2 , 18 , 19 f., 20 ,
21 , 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 , 24 , 25 f., 26 , 27 f., 28 f., 29 , 30 f., 31 , 32 , 33 f., 1 – 2 , 34
 Border 1 f., 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23
f., 24 , 25
 Henade 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 10
 Henology 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 f., 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11 f., 12 , 13 , 1 – 2 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18
f., 19 f., 1 – 2 , 20 f., 1 – 2 , 21 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 23 , 24
 Hen Ontology 1 , 2 , 3
 Emergence 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10
 idea 1 f., 2 , 3 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 f., 11 , 12 f., 13 , 14 f., 15 f., 16 , 17 f., 18 ,
19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 f., 24 , 25 f., 26 , 27
 identity 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16
 immanent 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13 f., 14 , 15 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 16 , 17 ,
18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 , 25
 immanence 1 , 2 , 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 5
 Power 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19 , 1 – 2 , 20 , 21 ,
22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 f., 31 , 32 , 33
 Life 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 f., 1 – 2 , 14 , 15 , 16 f., 17 ,
18 , 19 f., 20 , 21 , 22 , 23
 metaphor 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 1 – 2 , 12
 metaphysics 1 – 2 , 1 f., 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 ,
20 f., 21 , 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 , 24 f., 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 f., 38 , 39
, 40 , 41
 metaphysical 1 f., 2 f., 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 –
2 , 16 f., 17 , 18 , 1 – 2 , 19 , 1 – 2 , 20 , 21 , 22 f., 23 , 24 f., 25 , 1 – 2 , 26 , 27 f., 28 , 29 , 1 – 2 ,
30 f.
 Mynade 1
 Mysteries 1 , 2 , 3 , 4
 negation 1 , 2 , 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 , 7 f., 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 f., 12 , 13 , 14 ,
15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 19 , 20 , 21
 negativity 1 f., 2 f., 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 f., 17 f., 18 f., 19 ,
20 , 21 f., 22 , 1 – 2 , 23
 Nullity 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9
 ontology 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12
 principle 1 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 f ., 4 f ., 5 f., 6 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 7 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2
, 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 1 – 2 , 18 , 19 ,
20 f . , 21 , 22 , 23 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 24 f., 25 f., 26 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 1 – 2 , 30 , 31 f., 32 f.
 Process, processuality 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18
 reflection 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17
 Return 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13 , 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 f., 16 f., 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 f.,
21 , 22 , 23 f., 24 , 25 , 26
 Be silent 1 – 2 , 1 , 2 , 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 1 – 2 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 1 – 2 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17
, 18 f.
 Soul 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 f., 9 , 1 – 2 , 10 , 11 , 1 – 2 , 12 f., 1 – 2 , 13 f., 1 – 2 , 14 f., 15
, 16 , 1 – 2 , 17 f., 1 – 2 , 18 f., 19 , 20 f., 21 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 f., 26 , 27 f., 28 f., 29 , 30 , 1
– 2 , 1 – 2 , 31 , 32 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 33 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 34 , 35 , 36 f., 37
 Self-cancellation 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 ,
18 , 19 , 20 , 21 f., 22
 skepticism 1 , 2
 skeptical 1 , 2 , 3 f., 4 , 5
 Part 1 – 2 , 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 f.,
21 f., 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 f., 30 , 31 f., 32 , 33
 Participate 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8
 totality 1 f., 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 1 – 2 , 12 f., 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 19 , 20 ,
21 f., 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 f., 28
 transcendent 1 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 , 4 f., 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 1 – 2 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 f., 1
– 2 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 16 , 17 f., 18 , 1 – 2 , 19 , 20 , 21 f., 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 31 , 32
f., 33 , 1 – 2 , 34 , 35 f., 1 – 2 , 36 , 37 f., 38 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 39 f.
 transcendental 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8
 transcendence 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 1 – 2 , 16
, 17 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 24 f., 25 f., 26 , 27 , 28 ,
29 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 , 34 f., 35 f., 36 , 1 – 2 , 37 , 38
 Concept of transcendence 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10
 Transcendence consciousness 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15
 Triad 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7
 Superunity 1 – 2 , 1 , 2
 super-divine 1 , 2
 Overtranscendence 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7
 inarticulable 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 f., 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 1 – 2 , 10 , 11 f., 12 , 13 , 1 – 2 , 14 , 15 , 16 f., 17 , 18
, 19 , 20 , 21 f., 22 , 23
 Unthinkable 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5
 infinite 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 f., 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 f., 13 , 14 f., 15 , 1 – 2 , 16 , 1 – 2 , 17 , 18 , 19
, 20 , 21 , 22 f., 23 f., 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 , 1 – 2
 unrecognizable 1 , 2 , 3 f., 1 – 2 , 4 , 5 , 1 – 2 , 6 f., 7 f., 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 16 ,
17
 unspeakable 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 , 3 , 4 f . , 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 1 – 2 , 8 f., 9 , 10 f., 11 f., 12 , 13 f., 14 f., 1 – 2
, 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 15 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 16 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 17 , 18 , 1
– 2 , 1 – 2 , 19 , 20 f . , 21 , 22 , 23 , 24 f., 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 30 f., 31 , 32 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2
 Origin 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 f., 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 1 – 2 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 f., 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 1 – 2 , 18 ,
19 , 20 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 21 f., 1 – 2 , 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 , 24 f., 25 f., 26 f., 27 , 28 f., 29 f., 30 , 1 – 2 , 31
f., 32 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 f., 38 , 1 – 2 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 , 43 f., 44 , 1 – 2
 origin 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 f., 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 f., 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19 , 20 f., 21
, 22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 1 – 2 , 30 f., 31 , 1 – 2 , 32 f., 33 , 34 , 1 – 2 , 35 , 36 , 37
 Union 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 f., 8 , 1 – 2 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 f., 14 , 1 – 2 , 15 f., 16 , 17
 Remain 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 f., 12 , 13 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 , 18
 Many, multitude 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 f., 1 – 2 , 5 , 6 , 1 – 2 , 7 , 8 , 9 f., 10 , 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 ,
17 , 1 – 2 , 18 , 19 , 20 , 21 , 22 f., 23 , 24 f., 25 , 1 – 2 , 26 f., 27 f., 1 – 2 , 28 f., 29 , 1 – 2 , 30 f.,
31 , 32 f., 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 1 – 2 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 , 40 , 41 , 42 f.
 Pre-differentiation 1 – 2 , 1 f., 2 f., 3 f., 4 , 5 , 6
 Truth 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 f., 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 , 11 , 12 , 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19 , 20 f., 21 , 22 ,
23 , 24 , 25 , 26 , 27 , 28 , 29 , 1 – 2 , 30 , 31 , 32 , 33 f., 34 , 35
 Being 1 – 2 , 1 , 2 f., 3 , 4 f., 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11 , 12 , 1 – 2 , 13 , 14 f., 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 f., 19
, 20 f., 21 f., 22 , 1 – 2 , 23 f., 24 , 1 – 2 , 25 , 26 f., 27 , 28 f., 29 f., 30 f., 31 f., 1 – 2 , 32 , 33 , 34
f., 1 – 2 , 35 , 36 f., 37 , 38 , 1 – 2 , 39 , 40
 essential peculiarity 1 , 1 – 2 , 2 f.
 Number 1 , 2 f., 3 , 1 – 2 , 4 f., 5 , 6 , 7 f.
 Duality 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 , 9 , 10 f., 11
Footnotes
1 Damascius, Vita Isidori, Fr. 227 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 349a38 – 349b4 Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 292, lines 6 –
11; cf. also Asmus (1911) 130): εἰ δὲ θειότερον χρῆμα, ὡς σὺ φῂς ὦ Ἡγία, ἔλεγε πρὸς αὐτὸν ὁ Ἰσίδωρος, ἡ
ἱερατικὴ πραγματεία, φημὶ μὲν τοῦτο κἀγώ· ἀλλὰ πρῶτον ἀνθρώπους γενέσθαι τοὺς ἐσομένους θεοὺς δεῖ.
διὰ τοῦτο καὶ ὁ Πλάτων ἔφη μὴ ἐλθεῖν εῖζον ἀγαθὸν φιλοσοφίας (Tim. 47a7 – b2), ἀλλὰ τοῦτο συμβέβηκε νῦν
ἐπὶ ξυροῦ ἑστάναι οὐ τῆς ἀκμῆς, τοῦ δὲ ἐσχάτου γήρως ὡς ἀληθῶς. Trans. Gh. Pașcalău. All translations in this
work are by the author, unless otherwise stated.
2 See Cameron (1971): ‘With the death of Proclus in 485, the Academy fell into rapid decline’ (281). On Proclus' life
see Westerink and Saffrey (1968) I, IX – XXVI.
3 Vita Isidori, Fr. *245 (= Suda III 324, 25 sv Mesopotamia = Zintzen (1967) 201, lines 6 f.): For the first time in my
life I have been a priest for several years, and I have not yet been a priest. Fr. 275: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us,
and we pray to him that we may have mercy on him.
4 Vita Isidori, Fr. 221 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 349a21 – 24 Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 284, lines 8 f.).
5 He is described as such on the title page of the Codex Parisinus 1058, by the hand of Konstantinos Palaeokappa
(16th century). See Enea di Gaza, Teofrasto, ed. ME Colonna, Napoli 1958, XIX.
6 Teofrastus (Colonna) 4, 6 f.
7 Teofrasto (Colonna) 66, 11 ff. alludes to the persecution of the non-Arians under the Vandal king Honoric (cf.
Procopius, De Bello Vandalico I 8), which is said to have taken place "yesterday and the day before". For the dating of
the dialogue see Colonna VIII with note 3.
8th See Hoffmann (1994) 555.
9 The late Academy is said to have shared this fate with the consulship, according to Edward Gibbon, The History of
the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. V, London 1887, 89: “Justinian suppressed the schools of Athens and
the consulship of Rome, which had given so many sages and heroes to mankind. Both these institutions had long
since degenerated from their primitive glory, yet some reproach may be justly inflicted on the avarice and jealousy of
a prince by whose hand such venerable ruins were destroyed” (my emphasis).
10 See the very detailed biographical account in Napoli (2008) and Athanassiadi (2006) 191 – 223.
11 Cameron (1971) 282 speaks of a true “réputation de Damascius comme professeur” and sees the expression of this
fame in the “recrutement international” of the students and staff who followed him into Persian exile.
12 For the writings of Damascius see especially Westerink and Combès (2002) XXXIII – LXXII.
13 The full title of the Parmenides commentary, at the end of Codex Marcianus 246, is: Δαμασκίου διαδόχου ε ἰς τὸν
Πλάτωνος Παρμενίδην ἀπορίαι καὶ ἐπιλύσεις ἀντιπαρατεινόμεναι τοῖς εἰς αὐτὸν ὑπομνήμασιν τοῦ φιλοσόφου.
The fact that Proclus is simply referred to as the "Philosopher" probably indicates the authenticity of this title: "Even
if a later redactor had detected Damascius' dependence on Proclus, he would never have called Proclus «the
Philosopher» simpliciter " (LG Westerink, Introduction to The Greek Commentaries on Platos's Phaedo, II.
Damascius, Westbury 1977/2009², 10).
14 The Greek Commentaries on Platos's Phaedo, II. Damascius (Westerink), §§ 207 – 252: For the first time in
history, the Greeks have spoken of the Greeks, and the Greeks have spoken of the Greeks. λόγου διασ ῴζουσα. The
commentary on the Phaedo consists of the ὑπομνήματα of two listeners. The second of these course participants is
identical with the student who also handed down Damascius' lecture on the Philebus . See LG Westerink,
Introduction to The Greek Commentaries on Platos's Phaedo, II. Damascius, 15 – 17.
15 In Parma. III 5, 5 f.: The prophetess. See also In Parm. I 9, 6 f. and 12, 1 – 6.
16 Proclus, The Son of Man, v. 5: The Son of Man. See, however, the commentary by van den Berg (2001) 234 on this
passage. See also Procli Hymni, ed. E. Vogt, Wiesbaden 1957, 30 with commentary 68 – 71.
17 Simplicius, In Phys. 773 – 800.
18 Still cited as DP (according to Westerink and Combès (2002) with volume, page and line references). A German
translation of De principiis is not yet available. The quotations in this work are from the author. The author is
working on a German translation of De principiis. (The translation of DP I 1 – 26 was reviewed by Sebastian Faber
and discussed with him.)
19 Beierwaltes (2007a) 10.
20 Hoffmann (2017) even goes one step further and sees in the Damascus restoration efforts the historically
philosophical motivated attempt to bring about the golden age of the “spiritual” god Kronos.
21 Vita Isidori, Fr. 8 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 335b8 Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 8, lines 13 f.): ᾄδειν μακαρίας. See
Saffrey (1992) 144 with note 4.
22 Suda, sv “Damaskius”.
23 Napoli (2008) 99 speaks of the Vita Isidori as a veritable “manifesto pagano”.
24 Saffrey (1992).
25 Vita Isidori, Fr. 230 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 349b10 – 12 = Zintzen (1967) 296, lines 5 f.): The prophet Isidori is
a prophet of wisdom and wisdom, and of the Son of Man.
26 Westerink and Combès (2002) XIX and XXXVI. See also Hoffmann (1994) 567: ‘…this ambitious project was well
done by a man who was then responsible for the fate of the school’.
27 Jacob Brucker, Historia critica philosophiae II, Leipzig 1742, 349.
28 For the research discussion regarding the return of the Neoplatonists to the Roman Empire, see Tardieu (1986)
and Thiel (1999).
29 For this context see Westerink and Combès (2002) XIX – XXIV.
30 See Westerink and Combès (2002) XVIII f.
31 For Damascius' reception up to Tennemann see Ruelle (1861) 3, Chaignet (1898) LIf., note 4 and Westerink and
Combès (2002) XXVI – XXX.
32 WG Tennemann, History of Philosophy, Vol. VI, Leipzig 1807, 361 – 376. Before that, Johann Gottlieb Buhle,
Textbook of the History of Philosophy and a Critical Literature of the Same, IV, Göttingen 1799, had contented
himself with a brief reference to Damascius (454).
33 Johann Christoph Wolf, Anecdote of Greece, Sacred and Profane, from a manuscript excerpt now first published
in light, donated Latin version, and illustrated notes, Tom. III, Hamburg 1723, 195 ff.
34 Tennemann (1807) III-V.
35 For a history of this term, see Meinhardt (1984).
36 Tennemann (1807) 291.
37 Ibid. 299. For Tennemann’s reading of Proclus see Beierwaltes (1965) 3 f.
38 Tennemann (1807) 361 f.
39 In general, Damascius' reception in the early modern period seems to have been largely determined by the interest
in the fragments of his Vita Isidori . In the few pages of his Damascius report, Jacob Brucker concentrates on the
Philosophos Historia and on the much-despised but lost Paradoxa (Historia critica philosophiae II, 349 – 351).
40 These passages (in Wolf 195 – 262) correspond to DP I 1 f. and III 108 – 167.
41 Tennemann (1807) 362.
42 Damascius, DP III 136, 8 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth, has not yet eaten
anything.
43 Tennemann (1807) 369.
44 Ibid. 370.
45 Ibid. 374 f.
46 For the systematic similarities between Damascius and Kant see Cürsgen (2007) 322.
47 GWF Hegel, Lectures on the History of Philosophy III, Vol. 19 (Glockner ed.), Stuttgart 1928, 93.
48 Ibid. 96.
49 Herder took note of Damascius and excerpted the opening aporia of De principiis from Wolf's Anecdota Graeca .
Pross (2007) assumes that Herder became aware of Damascius in the context of the pantheism dispute. The opening
aporia of De principiis expresses the alternative between a transcendent (= "God") who is indifferent to the world,
and an immanent (= "Spinozistic substance") who is dissolved in the world. It is possible that the "topicality" of the
Damascius dilemma for the dispute over Jacobi's Spinoza booklet aroused Herder's interest.
50 Zeller (1902) 901 – 908, here 904. At least “his writing on the ultimate reasons […] testifies to dialectical
sharpness and a certain degree of scientific independence” (902 f.).
51 Ueberweg-Praechter (1926) 633.
52 Geffcken (1920) 212.
53 Damascus philosophi platonici quaestiones de primis principiis, Frankfurt am Main 1826.
54 Damascii Successoris Dubitationes et Solutiones de Primis Principiis In Platonis Parmenidem, 2 vols., Paris 1889.
See also Ruelle (1861), who, however, sees Damascius' importance not so much in his "abstract" thinking, but in the
wealth of mythological information he provides (3).
55 Damascius le Diadoque, Problèmes et solutions touchant les premiers principes, 3 vols., Paris 1898. See the very
readable Preface I – LIV, especially XLII f. for a very favorable assessment of the Damascene work, which Chaignet
calls “le testament philosophique de la Grèce”. However, Chaignet’s presentation suffers from hasty philosophical-
historical associations.
56 Admittedly, in his doctrine of principles, Iamblichus seems to have dared to step beyond the "One" into a more
radical transcendence, but the evidence for this is extremely sparse. The most important can be found in Damascius.
On this, see Dillon (1987) 880 - 885.
57 A good overall overview of Damascene metaphysics is provided by Ahbel-Rappe (2000).
58 Damascius, Traité des premiers principes, ed. with translations by LG Westerink and J. Combès, I-III, Paris 1986
(2002²).
59 In addition to the researchers of antiquity, two important philosophers have become aware of Damascius. Deleuze
(1968) describes Damascius' De principiis as "one of the most important books of Neoplatonism, which brings into
play a serial and potent dialectic of difference" and refers to a difficult chapter of the Damascius doctrine of
"emanation" (247 with note 1). His source, however, is Chaignet (1898). Agamben (2003) has written a philosophical
story about Damascius. For the motif of the "last philosopher" in Agamben, see Witte (2010).
60 Marie-Claire Galpérine's important introduction to her translation of Damascius, Des premiers principes. Aporie
et résolutions, Lagrasse 1987, 9 – 97, is rather limited to De principiis , although Marie-Claire Galpérine, as one of the
first Damascius researchers, also has a thorough knowledge of the Parmenides commentary. A translation by Marie-
Claire Galpérine of the Parmenides commentary by Damascius exists in manuscript form. (Kindly provided by
Philippe Hoffmann.)
61 In doing so, Dirk Cürsgen draws on key insights from Joseph Combès. See his overview of systematic
correspondences in Damascene thought in Westerink and Combès (2002) LVI – LXXII.
62 The fact that the soul is assigned a central position within the (pentadically structured) system goes back to the
interpretive approach of Trouillard (1972). Trouillard (1972) 361 f. in turn refers to insights of Chaignet (1898).
63 See below (2.6, 249 – 253) our proposed solution to this central problem of Damascius research.
64 In: Χώρα, 2 (2004) 125 – 148. See the appreciation of her work in Napoli (2008) 165 f.
65 Rum.: “Beyond Being. Neoplatonism and the Aporias of the Ineffable Origin”, Bucharest 2011, 275 – 369 (on
Damascius).
66 Vlad (2011) 361: ‘If, in principle, this is ineffective, then the price will be lowered, due to the level of the fences.
“But these words ‘indestructible principle’ do not exist in their own right, they are a way of completely subduing the
principle of one of our enemies.”
67 See the final chapter of this paper.
68 To these works must also be added: Stephen Gersh, Being Different: More Neoplatonism after Derrida, Leiden
and Boston 2014, which draws a philosophical parallel between Damascius and Heidegger; 119: “Damascius could
perhaps be described as the Heidegger of antiquity”.
69 Bréhier (1955) 270: ‘the doubling of a single term, the One, into two other terms which calls the Ineffable and the
One’.
70 DP I 84, 13 – 21.
71 DP I 22, 13 – 15.
72 DP I 27, 8 – 10.
73 Bessarion to the Doge Cristoforo Moro and the Venetian Senate (letter dated 31 May 1468). Quoted by Garin
(1964) 451. Here according to Ordine (2014) 156 f.
74 See the Latin text of the letter in PG 161, 700 – 702. On Bessarion’s library see Mohler (1923) 322, 329 f. and
Mondrain (2013).
75 For the merits of the manuscript (Marcianus gr. 196) and the so-called ‘Collection philosophique’ of which it is a
part, see Westerink and Combès (2002) LXXIII – XC.
76 The prophetess is a prophet and a prophetess of the Messiah.
77 The prophetess Maria Theresa of Avalon is one of the most holy prophets in the world. φιλοσόφου.
78 PG161, 704.
79 A good overview of the dispute on this point is provided by Westerink and Combès (2002) LVI – LVIII.
80 Compare Hoffmann’s verdict (1994) 586: “undoubtedly one of the most difficult texts of ancient philosophy” (my
translation).
81 DP I 9, 10 – 13; DP I 55, 9 – 25; DP II 11, 14 – 18. See Napoli (2008) 427 – 462 and Gersh (2014b) 131 f. with note
40.
82 PG161, 700D, 2.
83 PG161, 700D, 7.
84 PG 161, 700D, 10 f.
85 PG161, 700D, 4.
86 Breton (1973) 192: “…the originality of this discursive moment by which Neo-Platonism gains access to its
axiomatical conscience.”
87 Breton (1973) 184.
88 DP II 1, 15 f.: for the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet.
89 Cf. Cürsgen (2007) 318. Nicholas of Cusa will make a similar turn to a “Socratic” attitude in philosophy, to self-
restraint as a conscious ignorance of the Absolute. See Flasch (2012) 38: “Humanistically educated friends saw in the
position of Cusa the return of Socrates…”.
90 Met. B 995a30 f.: ἀλλ' ἡ τῆς διανοίας ἀπορία δηλοῖ τοῦτο περὶ τοῦ πράγματος.
91 Naples (2008) 129 – 132.
92 DP I 1, 4 – 7: For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might, προϊόντων; and the
Lord your God is with you, and with you all the children of Israel. See Cürsgen (2007) 317 f. A detailed analysis of the
opening aporia can be found in Napoli (2008) 129 – 162.
93 DP I 2, 19.
94 DP I 1, 9: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts.
95 DP I 1, 11 f.: πολλὰ πεπερασμένα.
96 DP I 1, 16 – 2, 3: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me. α ἰτιατο ῖς, καὶ τὸ πρῶτον
τοῖς μετὰ τὸ πρῶτον.
97 DP I 3, 23 – 25: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, for I have not sinned against
you.
98 DP I 4, 13 – 15: When the Lord Jesus Christ is with you, he tells us that he has no right to be called a prophet.
99 Resp. 505d11 – e4: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, has not yet eaten anything,
has not yet eaten anything λαβεῖν ἱκανῶς τί οποτ' ἐστὶν οὐδὲ πίστει χρήσασθαι μονίμῳ οἵᾳ καὶ περὶ τἆλλα,
διὰ τοῦτο δὲ ἀποτυγχάνει καὶ τῶν ἄλλων εἴ ὄφελος ἦν, περὶ δὴ τὸ οιοῦτον καὶ οὕτω καὶ δεῖν ἐσκοτῶσθαι
καὶ ἐκείνους τοὺς βελτίστους ἐν τῇ πόλει, οἷς πάντα ἐγχειριοῦμεν; Ἥκιστά γ', ἔφη. See also Proclus, In Parm. VII
511, 21 – 25: He (sc. apprehension) alone desires and understands not in a secret way, but in a non-incognito
denomination – what are they? –, sed sibi ipsi diuinanti aliqualiter ypostasim illius et a se ipsa et ab aliis omnibus
[spat. vac.] autem est, impotent considerare.
100 DP I 4, 15 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything.
101 DP III 92, 12 f.
102 DP I 4, 17: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me. See Vlad (2011) 315 – 317.
103 PhDr. 242c7: μαντικόν γέ τι καὶ ἡ ψυχή.
104 DP I 4, 18: οὐδ' ἐννοητέον, οὐδὲ ὑπονοητέον. Zeller (1902) 905 already uses “ahnen” to render the Damascus
ὠδίνειν. However, this translation corresponds better to the Damascus ὑπόνοια.
105 DP I 6, 14 – 16: For the first time in history (and the last time in history) is a Christian. Ὑπερήφανος is, as the
etymological dictionaries teach us, not derived from φαίνομαι. Rather, it means “arrogant, haughty, proud” or (less
commonly) “excellent” (Frisk (1970) sv ὑπερήφανος). Damascius may have remembered above all the use of this
word in a principle-theoretical context in Plato: ὑπερήφανος γάρ μοι ἐδόκει ε ἶναι, ε ἰδέναι τὰς αἰτίας ἑκάστου (Phd.
96a7; cf. Westerink and Combès (2002) on DP I 6, 15).
106 On Proclus' “self-derivation” from a Platonic orthodoxy see Halfwassen (2006) 363 – 383.
107 Gaiser (1962) 530 f., T50 with note. See also Dillon (1977) 12 and Halfwassen (1992a) 282 – 289.
108 DP I 111, 1: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken by men.
109 DP I 68, 12.
110 DP I 102, 16.
111 DP I115, 3.
112 DP I 91, 15.
113 DP I 96, 17 f.
114 DP I 5, 19; 22; 9, 12 etc.
115 Cf. Plotinus, Enn. III 8, 9, 53; V 2, 1, 1. See also [Porphyry] In Parm. II, 12 – 14: The prophet (sc. ὁ θεός) is a
prophet of the LORD […] who has spoken in the LORD's name, and who has spoken in the LORD's name, and the
Lord Jesus Christ is with you.
116 Proclus distinguishes between speaking “of the One” ( de uno ) and speaking “about the One” ( circa unum ). The
latter is impossible according to Proclus and is also avoided by Plato: Merito ergo in fine apposuit quod abnegationes
hee non sunt circa unum (περὶ τὸ ἕν). Other than that it is one (or more than one) and other than that it is about
one. Let us now say that about one thing is not – indeterminable, only one is – but one only, if we say so, is wholly
indicative. Quare and dicte abnegationes non sunt circa unum, sed de uno (In Parm. VII 518, 20 – 25). Proclus'
model is Plotinus, Enn. VI 8, 8, 6 – 8, who actually expresses himself even more radically. Compare the adoption of
this philosopheme also by Damascius, DP I 12, 19 – 21: “So we too, when we call that which is ‘unknowable’, say
nothing about it (οὐκ αὐτοῦ τι ἀπαγγέλλομεν), but we only communicate our own experience of it (περὶ αὐτὸ
πάθος)” and DP I 14, 20 – 15, 2 : “Can we therefore prove anything about that which we do not even consider to be an
object of intuition? In saying this, we may already be proving something about that which we do not even consider to
be an object of intuition. However, we do not prove that ourselves…” For the problematic area of talking about the
principle transcendent to Being and Logos, see also Vlad (2011) 11. In Dionysius the Areopagita, talking about God
becomes an exclusive privilege of God himself. Only God can speak of himself “in the proper sense” and “in a knowing
way”: ὡς ἂν αὐτὴ περὶ ἑαυτῆς κυρίως καὶ ἐπιστητῶς ἀποφαίνοιτο (De div. nom. 109, 16 – 110, 1). This speaking
of himself by the transcendent Deity is the self-revelation of God in Holy Scripture: Καὶ γὰρ ὡς αὐτὴ περὶ ἑαυτῆς
ἐν τοῖς λογίοις ἀγαθοπρεπῶς παραδέδωκεν (Ibid. 110, 4 f.).
117 On the so-called “οἷον reservation” see Beierwaltes (1985) 105.
118 Plotinus also speaks of the οἷον ὑπόστασις of the One (VI 8, 20, 10 f.). See also [Porphyry] In Parm. I, 32 f.: ἡ
ἀνεπινόητος ὑπόστασις. See Hadot (1968) I 102 ff. and II 64 ff.
119 See e.g. B. Proclus, In Parm. VII 499, 16 f.: What is the reason for a dispute not being settled in any way [?] in
principle? 22: and not of nonexistent hypotheses. 23 f.: circa subsistens uersatur le unum.
120 See Ludwig Wittgenstein, Tractatus logico-philosophicus, in: Ders., Werkausgabe, Frankfurt a. M. 2006 (1984¹),
Vol. 1, 85, 6.54: “My propositions clarify in that the person who understands me recognizes them as nonsense in the
end when he has climbed through them – on them – over them. (He must, so to speak, throw away the ladder after he
has climbed up it.)/He must overcome these propositions, then he will see the world correctly.”
121 DP I 3, 25 – 4, 12.
122 Emile Bréhier, referring to Plotinus' Enn. VI 2 and referring to an expression by Leibniz, speaks of an "analyse
réflexive" in Plotin's ontology (Plotinus, Ennéades VI, 1ère partie, Paris 1963, 37). Hadot (1957) 111 praises the
"novelty" of Plotin's "méthode d'analyse réflexive".
123 On the Damascene self-understanding regarding the repeated return to the same questions, see DP I 109, 8 f.:
Ἀλλὰ κύκλῳ πολλὴν περιελθόντες, ἔτι ταῖς αὐταῖς ἀπορίαις ἐνδεδέμεθα. (Here in the context of the question about
the emergence from the One, but this circular movement of thought is typical of the entire philosophizing of the
Diadochi.)
124 DP I 5, 1 – 5, 8: The prophetess has spoken in heaven, and she has not spoken in heaven. Ὅ ὶ ὴ ἀρχὴν
λέγοιμεν καὶ αἴτιον καὶ πρῶτον καὶ ἁπλούστατον, ἐκεῖ ταῦτά τε καὶ πάντα τὰ ἄλλα μόνον κατὰ τὸ ἕν· ἡμεῖς
δὲ ‫ אירות מספרה‬,‫ אירות מספרה מספרה‬,‫ אירות המחדר מירות מספרה‬,‫ אירות המחדר נשיות מספרה‬πολλὰ τῷ ἑνὶ μὴ ἐφαρμόζειν. He
who has been through the ages has learned to be faithful and compassionate.
125 See DP I 10, 22 – 11, 5: “Perhaps the absolutely inexpressible is inexpressible in the sense that one cannot even
positively state its inexpressibility, while the One is inexpressible because it eludes any combination of concepts and
names and any distinction between the known and the knower. On the other hand, the One is thought of as the
simplest and most comprehensive, and not only as a unity in the sense of the special property of the One, but as all-
one and as one before the whole, but by no means as that One which constitutes a specific part of the whole."
126 DP I 5, 8 f.: “And yet these predicates also form a unity in him” ( Ἢ καὶ ταῦτα ἐν αὐτῷ κατὰ τὸ ἕν).
127 DP I 5, 9 f.: The prophetess is the son of God, and the prophetess is the daughter of the LORD.
128 DP I 5, 13: The Lord your God is with you.
129 DP I 5, 15 – 17: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you.
130 DP I 5, 13 – 15: And yet the LORD hath given thee atonement, and the LORD thy God hath given thee atonement.
131 DP I 90, 11: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
132 DP I 5, 22 – 24: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me.
133 DP I 5, 19: The son of Judah and the daughter of Judah are the sons of Judah;
134 DP I 6, 7.
135 DP I 6, 7 – 11: … He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a child, has not yet eaten anything. καὶ ἐννοίας;
136 DP I 6, 11 – 16: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not eaten anything, has not eaten anything, has not eaten
anything, has not eaten anything ἐκ τῶν ἡμῖν ἀνερεθιστέον ὰς ἐν ἡμῖν ἀρρήτους ὠδῖνας εἰς τὴν ἄρρητον (but not
οὐκ οἶδα ὅπως εἴπω) συναίσθησιν τῆς The name of the Lord is Hephaestus.
137 The “henologist” mistakenly believes, according to Damascius, that: ἀρκεῖσθαι τῇ ἀρχῇ τοῦ ἐνός (DP I 6, 7 f.).
138 DP I 8, 6 f. Hoffmann (1983) 19 f. has pointed out that the question of χρεία is a methodological innovation of
Damascius in ancient metaphysics.
139 On the περιτροπή see Metry-Tresson (2012) 35 – 39.
140 DP I 24, 24 – 25, 1: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge pudding, has not yet eaten anything,
nor has he eaten anything αὐτὴν ἐπειγόμενον; (“How could we even suspect anything of this essence if there were
not a trace of that principle in us that would lead to it?”) Of course, within the framework of the περιτροπή procedure,
even this recourse to the ἴχνη of the Absolute in the sensible is to be abolished: “There is therefore no participation in
the ineffable, nor does it pass on any of its gifts to the entities that come from it.” (DP I 25, 21: for the first time in
history, the first place in history is the kingdom of heaven.)
141 In Proclus' Hymn to Athene Polymetis, 49 f., he writes: πολύλλιστον δέ σ' ἱκάνω / χρειοῖ ἀναγκαίῃ . Saffrey
(1994) 51 translates as ‘imperially necessary’.
142 See especially Cürsgen (2008).
143 DP I 6, 16 – 7, 1: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might.
θεωρητικὸς τοῦ ολιτικο
ῦ ὁ, καὶ ἰ Κρόνος φέρε εῖπεῦν τοῦ δημιουργοὂ, καὶ τὸ ῶν τἰ ν εῶδἓ ν, καὶ τὸ ῶν τῶν
ολλὧν, ἀ ν ἕ ρχὴ τὸ ὕν, οἀτω καὶ ῶρχἁ ν ῶπασἀ ν καὶ ῦ ρχομένων τὸ πάντα τοιαἐ τα ἐκβεβηκὸς and καὶ ἐν
ῶ
οὐδεμιᾷ συντάξει and I will take you to the temple of the LORD. For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD
your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you. περιεχομένων. On the first principle as the completely
relationless, as the “absolute”, cf. Plotinus, Enn. VI 8, 8, 9 – 14; [Porph.] In Parm. IV, 9 – 12: The prophetess is the
son of a prophet. On this point, see Hadot (1968) I 121 f., who sees Porphyry as a forerunner of Damascius in this
respect.
144 DP I 7, 1 – 4: For the LORD your God is with you, and you have no right to be tempted by any thing. thou shalt
not eat nor drink, neither shall thy meat be consumed.
145 DP I 10, 7 – 14. See also DP I 19, 2 – 4: ἡ θεία γνῶσις and τ ῇ ἑνιαί ᾳ καὶ ὑπερουσίῳ [sc. γνῶσει] .
146 DP I 6, 14 f. For this central passage, see Cürsgen (2007) 321: “This ἄρρητον is only known in an ineffable act of
consciousness […] as super-appearing truth […].” Gersh (2014b) 134 describes ἄρρητος συναίσθησις as “ineffable co-
perception.” The inarticulate consciousness is the co-perception of the transcendent in every moment of the dialectic.
147 In Parm. VII 510, 1: in the original text probably σιγωμένη νόησις. See the retroversion by C. Steel ad loc.
Porphyrian thought probably also played an important role in the development of this Damascene concept. The Turin
Parmenides commentary states that the soul has no criterion for the knowledge of God, which is why it must be
satisfied with "an image of his ignorance" ([Porph.] In Parm. X, 27 f.: α ὔταρκες α ὐτ ῇ τὸ τῆς ἀγνωσίας αὐτοῦ
εἰκόνισμα). The soul should therefore be satisfied with the reflection of the absolute negativity of God. In the medium
of reflection, the transcendence of God is "imaged". This inner-psychic image rejects any eidos that would be inherent
in the knowing subject (28 f.: παραιτούμενον πᾶν εἶδος ὃ τῷ γνωρίζοντι ξύν<ε>ισιν). Just as with Damascius, for the
author of the Turin Parmenides commentary the "mirror image" of the Absolute must not solidify into a concrete
eidos, but must be kept in an unsubstantial state of suspension. On this, see Hadot (1968) I 127.
148 DP I 84, 18. See Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 126, 7 – 10: For the LORD your God is with you… and the
LORD your God is with you… and the LORD your God is with you The Holy Ghost is a Christian. Furthermore 115, 12
f.: the prophetess is the son of God (sc. ‫ )אמירה המנותים‬and the prophetess is the son of God . The proximity of the
Areopagite to Damascius has been highlighted by Lilla (1997) 135 – 155 (for the passages quoted above, see especially
144).
149 DP I 18, 7 f.: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us in our hearts.
150 DP I 7, 20 – 24: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has spoken in the name of the
LORD. ὸ ἄνω τὰς ἡμετέρας ἐννοίας τιμιώτερον προχειροτέρου, ὥστε τιμιώτατον ἂν εἴη τὸ πάσας ἐκπεφευγὸς
ἄὰς ἡμετέρας ὑπονοίας.
151 For the meaning of analogy for Proclus, see Beierwaltes (1965) 329 – 339. Although Proclus' analogy also
proceeds from the principia and cannot say anything "essential" about the essentially transcendent One, it is
nevertheless founded on a correspondence between being and knowing: "The analogical dialectic as a method of
thinking and knowing is ontologically founded in the analogy of the being of beings: because beings as a whole are
hierarchically structured, i.e. united into a graded unity by the power of the One, which is different in each intelligible
or sensible being, analogy is first and foremost possible as an appropriate method" (329). Damascius, on the other
hand, allows analogy to become internal to the soul to a greater extent.
152 See Halfwassen (1999) 416: “Neither the negative nor the analogical dialectic or theology are able to determine
anything in terms of content about the Absolute, which is beyond everything; rather, they only show, by starting from
the established reality, the absolute transcendence of the One and the dependence of all reality on it.”
153 DP I 14, 4 – 16: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your might. ε ἶναι
σεμνότερον, οὐδὲ ὅτι σεμνότερόν ἐστι γιγνωσκόμενον, ἀλλὰ τὸ σεμνότατον ἔχον ὡς ἐν ἡμῖν καὶ ὡς ἡμέτερον
πάθημα, καὶ The prophetess Joseph is a prophet and has spoken English. The prophetess, who is baptized in the
name of the LORD, hath said, For the LORD your God is with you, and with you the LORD your God, and with you
the LORD your God. The prophetess Joseph receives the blessing of the LORD your God.
154 On the ἀναγκαιοτάτη χρεία see also Napoli (2008) 293.
155 See Beierwaltes (1965) 338: “Although analogy and negation are united by their ground, the identity of unity and
goodness as the origin per se, and although neither of the two methods is able to think of their ground as it is in itself,
negation nevertheless has the precedence of cognitive sharpness over analogy, since it makes the ever greater
dissimilarity of the origin the beginning and principle of its path.”
156 DP I 17, 9 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is spoken of, the Son of Man is spoken of.
157 DP I 17, 10 – 17: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thee is with thee, and thee is with thee, and thee is
with thee, and thee is with thee. I have no right to object, I have no right to object, I have no right to object, I have no
right to object ἀγνώστου ἑκάτερόν ἐστιν· and καὶ ὡς ὸ γνωστὸν ἄ
ροϋπάρχειν, ἰ λλως τε καὶ εῖ κρεἴττον εῦη τοῦ
γνωστοῦ.
158 DP I 17, 18 – 20: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me.
159 DP I 10, 7 – 14: “Even if we resort to intuition (νόησις), this intuition is actually intuition of ideas (νόησις
εἰδητική) and we could not reconcile it with the united and with being. But even if we sometimes use the total
intuition (συνῃρημένη νόησις), even this cannot be combined with the One and does not reach the One. Even if we
finally carry out the vision of unity (ἑνιαία νόησις), which receives the initiation of the mysteries in the contemplation
of the absolute One, this vision of unity is nevertheless simplified only to the One, if there is any knowledge of the One
at all, for this is still to be investigated by us.”
160 DP I 17, 10: For the LORD your God is with you, for the LORD your God is with you, for the LORD your God is
with you.
161 For Damascius, the One is “more ineffable” than the United: He who has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen
anything, nor has he ever seen anything, nor has he ever seen anything. ἀδιάκριτον κτλ. (DP I 60, 19 – 21).
162 DP I 17, 20 f.
163 DP I 17, 21 – 23: For he hath not given up his oath, nor hath any righteousness; he hath given up his oath;
164 DP I 17, 23 – 18, 2: He instructed the priests in the prayers of the LORD, and instructed them in the prayers of
the LORD. ὑπερούσιον, κατὰ τὸ ὡς ἀληθῶς ἄγνωστον κατὰ τὴν ὑ
άντων ὑπεροχήν.
165 DP I 10, 15: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee… .
166 See the succinct expression in Cürsgen (2007) 319: “The incomprehensibility and inexpressibility of the first
undermines all solid metaphysical-ontological insights, concepts and thoughts to such an extent that thinking and the
subject are left with only the retreat into themselves…”
167 See Proclus, Theol. Plat. III 51, 22 f.
168 However, see Proclus, Theol. Plat. IV 100, 11 – 20, where it is said that the “unknowability” in mathematical
numbers derives from the “transcendent unknowability” of numbers contained in the intelligible and intellectual
order of being. Here the idea of transmitting not only a positive characteristic but also a negative one seems to be
expressed. However, this “unknowability” derives from the participation of numbers in the henad of the “infinite” (
apeiron ).
169 See Proclus, Elem. Theol., prop. 97.
170 DP I 21, 23 – 22, 6: He has not found any other way to save us from the evil spirits, but has not yet found any
other way to save us from the evil spirits. (I have not found any other place in the world, nor have I found any other
place in the world, nor have I found any other place in the world, nor have I found any other place in the world,) ο ὕτω
δήπουθεν ἀπόρρητον καὶ ἓν ἀπόρρητον καὶ ἔδει γε τὸ ἀπόρρητον γόνιμον εἶναι ἀππορρήτως εἰπεῖν· γεννήσει
ἄρα πλῆθος οἰκεῖον.
171 DP I 25, 1 – 9: He who has not yet eaten, has not yet eaten, has not yet eaten, nor has he eaten, nor has he eaten,
nor has he eaten ἀπόρρητον, ὥσπερ τοῦτο ὁμολογοῦμεν, ἄλλα ἄλλων ἀπορρητότερα ε ἶναι Άύσει, τὸ μὲν ἓν τοῦ
ὄντος, τὸ δὲ ὂν τῆς ζωῆς, τὴν δὲ ζωὴν τοῦ νοῦ, καὶ ἀεὶ ἑξῆς, ἀνὰ τὸν αὐτὸν λόγον, μᾶλλον δὲ τὸν
ἀντίστροφον, ἀπὸ τῆς ὕλης ἄχρι τῆς λογικῆς οὐσίας, ταῦτα μὲν κατὰ τὸ κρεῖττον, ἐκεῖνα δὲ κατὰ τὸ
κρεῖττον, εἰ θέμις εἰπεῖν.
172 DP I 24, 9 f.: He has given birth to a child, a child of three children, and a son.
173 DP I 21, 7 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
174 DP I 25, 11 f.: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in Hebrew, but the name of the LORD is not spoken in
Hebrew.
175 DP I 25, 18 – 22: He, who is a prophet, has sent me to Jerusalem, and I have sent you to Jerusalem. τὸ πρὸ τῶν
μολλοζν ἕτερον θετέον καὶ τὸ ἐν μεθέξει τοῖς ολλο
ῖ ἕς ῃτερον συνδιὐρημένον· οἄκ ὐ ρα μετέχεται, οὐδὲ μεταδίδωσί
ἑαυτοῦ τοῖς ἀφ' ἑαυτοῦ. On the ineffable “causality” of the Absolute, see also Napoli (2008) 292 – 309.
176 See also Proclus, Theol. Plat. II 38, 3 – 8.
177 Beierwaltes (1965) 25 f.: “Unity is present in every number as its principle, in which unity always remains itself,
but, differentiated into duality and gone beyond it, distinguishes each subsequent number from the other precisely
through its own unity – to infinity. Thus unity, since it is unfolded in the span from one to infinity as the principle of
number, is at the same time the simplest and the most diverse, since it itself establishes the respective unity in
difference. It is therefore able to combine the most diverse into unity as an inherent basis, since it is indivisibly itself.”
178 See also DP I 26, 1 f.: “…nor is any God ineffable without at the same time being unitary, although every God is a
unity before he participates in being.”
179 DP II 3, 1. See also DP II 2, 2; 7. On this [Porphyry] In Parm. I, 3 – 5: The prophetess is the son of a prophet, and
the prophetess is the son of a prophet.
180 DP I 8, 10 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is spoken in the name of the LORD.
181 DP I 5, 25 f.: The prophetic word comes from the Greek word οὐδενός.
182 DP I 22, 7 – 11.
183 On Damascius and Wittgenstein see Hadot (1970) 39 f.
184 DP I 22, 11 f.
185 DP I 22, 12 – 15.
186 DP I 6, 12 f.: The prophetic word "God" comes from the kingdom of heaven and earth.
187 On similarity as a determining relation of analogical ascent, see Proclus, Theol. Plat. II 37, 12 f.: The prophetess
Jacob is the first to be called a prophet, and the prophetess is the last.
188 Proclus, Theol. Plat. II 38, 3 – 7: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all
your might. ὅλον τὸν σύζυγον αὑτῆς <ἀριθμὸν> ὃ πρὸς ἁπάσας ἐστὶ τὰς ἄῶν θεῶν διακοσμήσεις τἀγαθόν.
189 DP I 39, 12. See also, with reference to Proclus, DP I 86, 17: ἀπόρρητον ἀξίωμα. This is probably in contrast to
the “principles” or “requirements” of logic (λογικαὶ ἀξιώσεις), “which extend to the elements of the same class in
which the relata have in some way the same value or a similar nature” (DP I 77, 13 – 15).
190 DP I 10, 19: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us.
191 DP I 7, 15 f.: The prophetic word "God" is used to describe the works of the Gentiles.
192 On the “world-negative transcendence” in the imperial and late antique “mental attitude” see also Jonas (1964)
150 – 152.
193 DP I 4, 13 – 15.
194 DP I 4, 15 f.
195 DP I 6, 16.
196 DP I 7, 20 f.
197 DP I 8, 2.
198 DP I 8, 8; 9, 11; 61, 1. The Absolute is, “according to Plato”, to be counted among “the absolutely
incomprehensible entities” (DP I 9, 16: τῶν πάντῃ ἀφθέγκτων). See also DP I 39, 12 – 14.
199 DP I 8, 13; 39, 10.
200 DP I 56, 15 f.
201 For the “hint” in Damascius, see DP I 8, 19. See Westerink and Combès (2002) ad loc. with note 6.
202 DP I 11, 22 and before: 7, 24.
203 DP I 7, 24 – 8, 5.
204 DP I 11, 21 – 12, 2: He has a son, a daughter, a son of God, and a daughter of Judah. The Lord Jesus Christ is
with you, Jesus Christ, and He has mercy on you.
205 DP I 12, 1.
206 DP I 12, 17 – 19. For the interpretation of this passage, see Cürsgen (2008) 77 f. and Metry-Tresson (2012) 206 –
211. Metry-Tresson sums up the parallel between the non-seeing and the non-knowing in a “last axiom that we can
use to draw this analogy”: “ any negation that affirms the negator’s ignorance establishes the fact of privation ”
(210, emphasis CM-T.). See also [Porph.] in Parm. IX, 12 – 20.
207 DP I 12, 19 – 21: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a child, has not eaten anything by a child, nor has
he eaten anything by a child.
208 DP I 12, 23.
209 DP I 12, 25.
210 DP I 13, 1: φανότης.
211 DP I 12, 25 f: τὸ γιγνωσκόμενον.
212 DP I 13, 2: τὸ ἀγνοούμενον.
213 DP I 13, 2. This Damascus neologism is a clear indication of the scholar's effort to reflect fully on what has not yet
been sufficiently thought out, an effort that takes him to the limits of the available philosophical vocabulary. See
Westerink and Combès (2002) ad loc. with note 1.
214 DP I 13, 2 f.
215 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1080, 10 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is spoken in the Psalms, but the Son of
Man is not a prophet. VI 1080, 24 – 27: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy
name is with thee. For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of all things.
216 DP I 18, 23 f.
217 DP I 19, 2 f. and 9.
218 DP I 9, 3 – 5: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might; for I
have mercy on you, and on all your might;
219 DP I 12, 7 – 12. See Plato, Theait. 188c2 – 3: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, has
not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything.
220 DP I 13, 7 – 24.
221 DP I 14, 3 f.
222 However, see Beierwaltes (1965) 339: “Thus dialectics-in-negation, negating or negative dialectics, proves to be
the method most in keeping with the nature of the origin, even compared to analogy, although it will be shown that it
too can only be understood «analogously» ” (my emphasis).
223 On Damascius' concept of matter see Cürsgen (2007) 419 – 423 and Cürsgen (2016).
224 DP I 64, 11 – 14. See Metry-Tresson (2012) 216 – 221.
225 DP I 14, 14.
226 DP I 14, 8.
227 DP I 16, 9.
228 DP I 16, 5: ὅτι ἀδόξαστον.
229 DP I 16, 9.
230 DP I 16, 15. See Vlad (2011) 320 – 327. The “progress into the void” is, according to Vlad, a regular “method” of
the Damascene (326). See [Porph.] In Parm. II, 14 f.
231 DP I 16, 19. The terminological neologism ἀγνόημα, in the sense of the “object of ἄγνοια“ (LSJ sv ἀγνόημα),
must not be trivialized and translated as mere “ignorance” (Westerink and Combès (2002)). Damascius refers to the
specific, self-contradictory terminology that we develop for the purpose of thinking about the Absolute. The concept
of the Absolute turns out to be a “non-concept” in reality, because it cancels itself out. The ἀγνόημα of the
inexpressible is opposed to the ἁπλὸν νόημα, through which we try to think about the One (DP II 22, 13 f.).
232 DP I 16, 18.
233 DP I 16, 18.
234 Cf. DP I 39, 11 f.: the prophetess is the son of a prophet.
235 DP I 18, 1 f.
236 DP I 18, 5 f.
237 DP I 18, 6 f.
238 DP I 18, 7: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
239 DP I 18, 4.
240 DP I 18, 7 f.
241 On unification as the “common breathing air” of the multitude, see DP I 6, 5 f. This metaphor occurs frequently:
DP I 24, 13 – 16, In Parm. IV 96, 7 – 14.
242 DP I 18, 10 f.
243 See DP I 16, 18.
244 Proclus, In Parm. VII 521, 1.
245 In Parma. VII 521, 24 f. Cf. Cf. Steel's retroversion: τ ῷ γὰρ ἀποφάσκεσθαι καὶ αὐτὸς ἀφεῖλεν <πάσας> τὰς
ἀποφάσεις.
246 The expression negatio negationis, commonly used in research, is borrowed from Meister Eckhart: In Ex. N.74
[LW II, 77.6 – 12]. See Steel (1999) 367 f. with note 32.
247 Important contributions to the understanding of Proklian “negation of the negation” are: Beierwaltes (1965) 361
– 367, Halfwassen (1999) 414 – 432 (in comparison with Hegel, but taking into account the differences between the
two thinkers), Steel (1999). See also Cürsgen (2007) 279 – 284 (on the “conclusion of the first hypothesis”).
248 For the final part of Proclian's commentary on the first hypothesis, see Klibansky (1929).
249 Plato, Parm. 142a2: τούτῳ τῷ μὴ ὄντι.
250 Par. 142a6 – 8.
251 Proclus, In Parm. VII 514, 35 f.: If there is no inopinabile conclusion and many dubitations, it dignifies
everything at the same time as the dictum abnegation.
252 Proclus, In Parm. VII 515, 2 f: What, even though not all our prophetic sermons are directed against us, is it not
for nothing?
253 See, for example, Lavecchia (2010).
254 Proclus, In Parm. VII 515, 4 f.: But if it be so, it is impossible to conclude from this hypothesis.
255 Proclus, In Parm. VII 515, 6: anypostaton.
256 In Parm. VII 515, 15 f. For Proclian criticism of Origen see Halfwassen (2006) 367 – 369, 378 – 380.
257 In Parm. VII 515, 18.
258 In Parm. VII 515, 19.
259 Plato, Resp. 534b8-c5: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything , has not yet eaten
anything, has not yet eaten anything ἐλέγχειν, ἐλέγχειν, ἐλέγχειν, ἐν π ᾶσι τούτοις ἀπτ ῶτι διαπορεύηται, α ὐτὸ τὸ
ἀγαθὸν φήσεις εἰδέναι τὸν οὕτως ἔχοντα οὔτε ἄλλο ἀγαθὸν οὐδέν…
260 It is probably Porphyry's thesis that is reported in Proclus, In Parm. VII 515, 31 – 516, 33: The discussions of the
first hypothesis are indeed "impossible", not in themselves, but only in relation to the speculative shortsightedness of
our own soul. The emphasis is on ἔμοιγε δοκεῖ: It only seems to us that it is a reductio ad absurdum , because the
conclusion is incommensurate with our nature: Ex quibus esse palam quod dicta uidebuntur utique et impossibilia
esse, et hec entia possibilia omnia, ut ostensum est, quia longe sunt a nostra natura et alienissima ab eo qui de
primo canone Platonis (516, 29 – 32).
261 Iamblichus' position is summarized by Proclus, In Parm. 516, 33 – 517, 21. Iamblichus understands the τα ῦτα in
the question of Parmenides as a resumption of all the determinations that were denied to the One in the first
hypothesis. That such a "summarizing" negation imitates the "simultaneous, entire emergence of the totalities from
the One" (516, 20) seems to be a typical Iamblichean figure of thought. See Damascius, DP I 119, 19 – 120, 4 and In
Phileb. 227 (= Fr. 192 Larsen).
262 Proclus, In Parm. VII 518, 29 – 519, 29. In the following we will also refer to the central passage VI 1077, 16 –
1079, 20, where the relationship between the hypothesis of the absolutely One and the “Parmenidean One” is
clarified.
263 In Parma. VI 1077, 17: The son of a prophet is come to pass. See Plato, Parm. 137a8 – 137b4: He who has not yet
eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth; he who has not eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth; he who has
not eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth , ἐμαυτοῦ ἄρξωμαι καὶ τῆς ἐμαυτοῦ ὑποθέσεως , περὶ τοῦ
ἑνὸς αὐτοῦ ὑποθέμενος, εἴτε ἕν ἐστιν εἴτε μὴ ἕν, τί χρὴ συμβαίνειν;
264 Plato, Parm. 137c4: εἰ ἕν ἐστιν.
265 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1078, 7; 1078, 15; 1079, 12: τὸ Παρμενίδειον ἕν.
266 In Parma. VII 518, 32 f.: but the hypothesis that there is one is not true.
267 See also Proclus, In Parm. VI 1071, 4 – 7.
268 In Parma. VI 1079, 4 – 1079, 10: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee,
and thy name is with thee, ἀπιδὼν δὲ εἰς τὸ ἓν ᾗ ἓν αὐτὸ μόνον καὶ οὐχ ὡς πεπονθὸς τὸ ἓν, ἀλλ' ὡς
<ἀληθῶς> ἕν, θεασάμενος τὴν μέθεξιν ἀνήγαγε τὸν λόγον εἰς τὴν ἀκραιφνῆ τοῦ ἑνὸς ἔνοιαν, καὶ διὰ τοῦτο
οἶδεν ἐξ ἀνάγκης ἀποφατικῶς, ὅσα τῷ πεπονθότι τὸ ἕν – ἀλλ' οὐχὶ τῷ αὐτοενὶ ὄντι – προσήγαγε καταφατικῶς.
269 Beierwaltes (1965) 361.
270 Proclus, In Parm. VII 518, 36.
271 In Parma. VII 519, 3 f.: the name of the subject.
272 In Parma. VII 519, 7 f.: What is the meaning of possible superfluous substances?
273 “The law of contradiction” is only “violated” by Proclus in his Henology. The principle of contradiction, on the
other hand, governs being and the contents of the mind, according to the Lycian. See Halfwassen (1999) 429 – 431.
274 Proclus, In Parm. VII 519, 8 f.
275 Plato, Parm. 142a7.
276 Proclus, In Parm. VII 519, 9: impossible sayings have (negationes) because there is about one indiscriminate
and incognito existence.
277 On “productive” or “transcending” negations see especially Halfwassen (1999) 421 – 425.
278 Proclus, In Parm. VII 520, 6.
279 Plotinus, Enn. VI 8, 10, 33: The Lord your God is with you. Enn. V 4, 1, 24 – 27: For the LORD your God is
with you , and the LORD your God is with you. ἄλλας δυνάμεις καθ' ὅσον δύνανται μιμεῖσθαι ἐκεῖνο. Enn. V 4, 1, 36:
ἡ πάντων δύναμις.
280 Proclus, In Parm. VII 520, 7 f.: those who cannot generate all the power of the flesh have.
281 In Parma. VII 520, 21 f.: neque querens quid non est aut est.
282 In Parma. VII 521, 4 f.: abnegatorum conceptus.
283 See Beierwaltes (1965) 395 – 398 on the survival of Proklian thought of negatio negationis.
284 Proclus, In Parm. VII 518, 18 f.: the exaltation is simply due to all opposition and negation.
285 In Parm. VII 1172, 27.
286 In Parm. VII 519, 8 – 10.
287 In Parm. VII 520, 6 f.
288 Theol. Plat. II 63, 18 – 22: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of the
Messiah. the son of a prophet is a prophet. He who has learned the word "man" in Hebrew has learned the language
of the Hebrews.
289 In Parm. VI 1080, 23 f.
290 In Parma. VI 1081, 1 – 6: The Lord your God is with you, for he has given you peace and quiet, and you have no
fear of being condemned to be ignorant of his enemies. and I will not forgive you, I will not forgive you, I will not
forgive you, I will not forgive you, πως κατὰ τὴν ἡμετέραν τάξιν δυνατοὶ γενώμεθα. See [Plato], Ep. II, 313a1 – 4.
291 GW Fr. Hegel, Science of Logic, Vol. I, Frankfurt a. M. 2012, 113. In contrast to Hegel's "sublation", however, in
ἐξαιρεῖν, the negative self-relation is also abstracted. The Proclian One, as something sublated from the negations, is
in no way something "mediated".
292 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1082, 8 – 11: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet. He has spoken
to the prophetess, and he has spoken to the prophetess, and to the prophetess μὴ ὂν, ἀλλ' οὐκ ἐνθεαστικῶς
προβάλλωμεν.
293 In Parm. VII 521, 18.
294 In Parm. VI 1094, 14 – 17.
295 In Parm. VII 521, 24 f.
296 In Parm. VII 521, 16. See Halfwassen (1999) 427: “For Proclus, the negation of the negation as the ultimate act of
negating, dialectical thinking […] means the self-abolition of dialectical thinking in the unthinkability of the One
itself, which in its transcendence is beyond all thinkability and therefore cannot be thought even in negation”
(emphasis JH).
297 In Parm. VII 1181, 28 – 31. See also Theol. Plat. V 103, 17.
298 Plato, Parm. 139c8 f.: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we pray to him. See the echo of this idea in
Plotinus, Enn. V 5, 9, 21 – 23: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, eats the bread of his
mouth, and drinks it all (sc. ὁ θεός). He has learned from the prophetess the LORD, who commands us to be holy.
299 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1071, 15 – 19: The Lord your God is with you, for he has given you peace, he has mercy on
you, he has mercy on you, he has mercy on you, he has mercy on you and I will give you the gift of peace and
harmony, and I will give you the gift of peace and harmony. προκειμένων. Ἢπ ῶς ἐγγυτέρω το ῦ ἑνὸς ἐσόμεθα, μὴ
τὸ ἓν τῆς ψυχῆς ἀνεγείραντες, ὅ ἐστιν ἐν ἡμῖν οἷον εἰκὼν τοῦ ἑνὸς;… On the subject of the “One in us” see
especially Beierwaltes (1965), Proclus, 367 – 382.
300 In Parma. VII 518, 13 – 19: What abrogates one thing does not come to pass unto one. Not all men have
anything against themselves, neither against species, nor against prudence; If only one person were to say, "I have
no name," he would say, "there is one who in our minds is conceived," unless one person were to say, "and reject
about one thing," and if only one person were to say, "there is one who rejects the conclusion;" The exaltation is
simply based on omnipresent opposition and omnipresent negation.
301 In Parma. VI 1072, 8 – 15: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has spoken in the
name of the LORD. For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might, περιχορεύσωμεν,
ῆ
μπολιπόντες περὶ δεύτερα στρεφομένας τῆς νοήσεις.
302 See the remarks in Beierwaltes (1965) 368 f. on the relationship of the inner One to the absolute One: "Thinking,
however, does not posit itself as absolute and does not close itself off in a pure, subjectivistically constituted
interiority; rather, precisely in going into itself, it opens itself through its inner, reflexive unity to its pre-reflexive
origin and ground, which itself cannot be thought as it is in itself. The "One in us" as the collecting principle of the
thinking and thought unity of our being therefore always refers to the "One in itself" as the pre-thinking One."
303 For the metaphor of the “harbour”, see also Proclus’ prayer to Athena: δὸς δέ μοι ὄλβιον ὅρμον ἀλωομένῳ
περὶ γαῖαν (Hymn to Athene Polymetis, 32).
304 In Parma. VII 520, 26 – 28: Yet only one man, who advances impetus towards the soul, and surpasses the
indicative position and sermon, and all cognition unites. (Retroversion by C. Steel: δεῖ γὰρ εἶναι τέλος ἐπ' αὐτὸ
ορείας τὸν ῆρμον, καὶ τἀς ῆ ναγωγἵ ς τὴν ῶδρυσιν, καὶ τἄ ν λόγων τὸ ῆ ρρητον, καὶ πάσης τῆς γνώσεως τὴν
ὅ
ἕνωσιν). The theme of the “odyssey” of the soul to the “home” of a higher unity is also alluded to, albeit in a different
context, in Proclin’s Euclid commentary: εἰ δέ ποτε συμπτύξασα (sc. ἡ διάνοια) τὰς διαστάσεις καὶ τοὺς τύπους
καὶ τὸ πλῆθος ἀτυπώτως καὶ ἑνοειδῶς The Lord Jesus Christ is with you, Jesus Christ, and you shall have mercy
on me. ἀδιαστάτους, τοὺς οὐσιώδεις, ὧν ἐστι πλήρωμα. and I will give you the gift of peace, and I will give you
peace, and I will give you peace. τινος Kαλυψοῦς αὐτὴν εἰς τελειοτέραν καὶ νοερωτέραν γνῶσιν καὶ μάνι
μορφωτικῶν ἐπιβολῶν (In Eucl. 55, 13 – 23).
305 Cf. Chlup (2012) 57: "Proclus, too, aims at a mystic union with the One, but his version of it is more modest (ie
than in Plotinus ). Not only does he see the union as taking place at the psychic level only (in the «one in the soul»),
but he also views our human capacities as more limited, putting greater emphasis on the need of divine help".
However, the passages quoted above (In Parm. VI 1072, 8 – 15; VII 520, 26 – 28) are completely sufficient to refute
the view of a union with the One that is merely inherent in the soul. Chlup also speaks of a rather “passive” attitude
(57) that Proclus would speak of towards the One, and forgets that for Proclus a ἐπιτηδειότης, that is, an active self-
formation of man, is necessary for the reception of divine gifts. See In Tim. III 7, 8 – 26, especially: The prophetic
word "the Lord" refers to the name of the Son of Man, which he calls "the Son of Man . " As far as I can see, Chlup
also does not give the negation an appropriate place in his presentation of Proclian philosophy. Against Chlup's thesis
that the experience of the One only takes place on a spiritual level and thus in a kind of "isolation" from the actually
intended absolute One, see Beierwaltes (2012) 369: "This (i.e. the One in us) gathers the manifold forces (δυνάμεις) in
us towards their original unity, in order to prepare thinking to transcend itself in the negation of the negation
corresponding to the One in us"; also 370: "The "One in us" thus becomes the basis of the possibility that the One,
which is not immediately accessible, mediates itself to thinking in time. It is the basis of the commonality (κοινωνία),
established by the origin itself, which we are able to achieve with it."
306 This is precisely why negations are superior to affirmations: the limitless power of negations corresponds best to
the infinity of the One. See Proclus, In Parm. VI 1074, 1 – 16.
307 See also Beierwaltes (1965) 372: “At the same time, this appearance of the pre-reflective One in us as the non-
thinking ‘flower’ of the spirit becomes the perpetual stimulus of thinking to sublate itself, its comprehending concept
of the One, into the One itself through non-conceptual unification.”
308 Damascius, DP I 14, 4 f.: ἡ θέσις, ἵνα οὕτως εἴπω, τοῦ πάντ ῃ ἀρρήτου.
309 DP I 18, 9 – 11: For the LORD your God is with you, and ... τὸ οὐδέν.
310 DP I 18, 11 – 13: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is
with thee, and thy name is with thee. τὸ οὐδέν.
311 DP I 21, 15.
312 DP I 21, 15.
313 See Hadot (1998) 72 – 76 (on the pragmata as ‘réalités transcendantes’).
314 See e.g. B. DP II 176, 15 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet . DP II 203, 10: For the
Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man…and the LORD your God is with you … . An explanation of what he means by
“idea” is given by Damascius in DP II 174, 12 – 16: For the first time in history has been a work of art, and the first
time in history has been a work of art. The Lord Jesus Christ is with you , for he has mercy on me, and I have not
forgotten anything.
315 For Damascius, "that which is (already) differentiated" (τὸ διακεκριμένον) is the specific mode of being of the
spirit, while the intelligible life which precedes the spirit is "in a progressive state of differentiation" (τὸ
διακρίνεσθαι). Finally, the unified being which is elevated above spirit and life is characterized by absolute
undifferentiation (τὸ ἀδιάκριτον). See, for example, DP II 153, 14 – 19; 173, 12 – 15; 106, 4 f. (on the ἀδιάκριτον το ῦ
νοητοῦ).
316 DP II 149, 1 f.
317 In Parma. II 4, 22 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of the Son of Man (or the Son of Man? –
asks the editor).
318 The full development of the difference from the intelligible-intellectual order of being, i.e. starting from the level
of “life”, is achieved by Damascius through a “radicalized” reading of Plato’s Parmenides 143a4 – 145b5. The
Damascene follows Proclus in this. See e.g. Theol. Plat. IV 9, 17 – 21: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have
mercy on us, and on all our hearts. ἑτερότητος τῆς θείας εἰς λῆὐθος ροϊόντες
ῶ καὶ δυνάμεων καὶ οὐσιῶν ποικιλίαν.
319 On the role of difference in Damascius, see Cürsgen (2008) 76: "The system that the last director of the Platonic
Academy in Athens [...] developed can be understood in terms of its central inner motive as a system of the 'twilight of
difference', the gradual unfolding and development of difference, the gradual progress of the realization of difference.
Difference or otherness is the constantly effective, but objectively in its own essence hardly comprehensible, instance
that causes the descending unfolding of the Absolute and drives it forward to the utmost possible perfection without
being able to stop before it."
320 This Proclian thought can probably also be applied to Damascius: ἡ δὲ ζωὴ νόησις (Theol. Plat. IV 7, 24).
321 Damascius, DP II 179, 8: αὐτοπερίγραφα εἴδη.
322 DP I 21, 3 – 8: For the Lord has mercy on me, and I will give thanks for my mercy, and for my mercy. τὰ
ἄφθεγκτα καὶ ἐννοεῖν τὰ ἀνεννόητα), ἀξιοῦμεν ὅμως ὑποτίθεσθαι τὸ ἀσύμβατον πρὸς ἀ
άντα καὶ ἀσύντακτον
καὶ οὕτως ἐξῃρημένον, ὥστε μηδὲ τὸ ἐξῃρημένον ἔχειν κατ' ἀλήθειαν.
323 In Parma. IV 72, 6 – 8: The Lord your God is with you, and I will give you thanks for your blessings, and I will
give you thanks for your blessings, and I will give you thanks for your blessings. the son of a prophet is
slain.
324 The mind as a hypostasis within the hierarchy of orders and dimensions of being is, according to Damascius,
characterized by a πᾶν-εἶδος structure, while the intelligible life is determined by the mode of being of the "parts"
(μέρη) that form a "totality" (ὁλότης). The noetic being, finally, is the "elementary" (στοιχειωτόν), which enters into a
perfect unity with its "elements" (στοιχεῖα).
325 DP II 153, 19 – 21: He who has been saved (sc. ὁ νο ῦς), who has lost his soul, has lost his soul in the sight of the
LORD.
326 DP I 21, 17 f. For the two possible translations of ἀποφ ῆναι (once as “to state”, then as “to deny”) see Metry-
Tresson (2012) 214 f. If ἀποφῆναι in this place had the meaning of “to state”, Damascius would only be criticising the
“simple” negation. The “negation of the negation” would remain unconsidered by him in this case. One would then
not understand why he would want to replace the via negativa with his own “method”, that of περιτροπή, since the
Proclian “negation of the negation” could achieve the same thing. Damascius must therefore necessarily first argue
against "the negation of the negation" in order to make room for the originality of his own attempt to approach the
Absolute. On the other hand, the impossibility of " expressing the negation " also implies the rejection of the
"negation of the negation", which is why the two possible translations do not contradict each other at all. Metry-
Tresson (2012) 215 aptly notes that the difference lies above all in their "impact critique" and that the translation of
ἀποφῆναι as "negating" has a greater hermeneutic power. We follow this insight here.
327 DP I 39, 11 f.: the prophetess is the son of a prophet.
328 DP I 6, 14 – 16: ἄρρητος…συναίσθησις τῆς ὑπερηφάνου ταύτης ἀληθείας.
329 DP I 62, 4 – 9: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, for I have not sinned
against you. ἀπόφασις οὐδὲ θέσις τόδε <τὸ> ὄνομα ἢ πρᾶγμα, ἀλλὰ παντελὴς ἀναίρεσις, οὐχί <οὐ τὶ> οὖσα
(but not καὶ οὐ τὶ γὰρ τῶν ὄντων), ἀλλὰ μηδὲ αὐτὴ οὖσα τὸ πάμπαν. The fact that the “sublation” ultimately
cancels itself out shows that a “subtle demarcation” between negation and sublation cannot be consistently carried
out, as suggested by Metry-Tresson (2012) 204, when she wants to demonstrate a renunciation of negation in favor of
ἀναίρεσις in Damascius.
330 Halfwassen (1999) 428 (my emphasis).
331 DP I 77, 13 – 15: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, ὁμοφυ ῆ.
332 For Damascius' criticism of Proclian interpretation of the first hypothesis, especially the final lemma, see also
Steel (1999) 365 – 367.
333 See Kerényi (1962) 37: "There is no doubt that there could be different degrees of secrecy in cults with the same
content. The Greek language makes a distinction between the ineffable secret: the arrheton , and that which was kept
secret under the commandment of silence: the aporrheton. […] The arrheton had the reason for its ineffability within
itself. […] The [sc. ineffable] core was surrounded by less moving actions, which already had to be accompanied by the
commandment of silence."
334 See Béguin (2013).
335 The apophatic terminology of Platonism receives its main impetus from Plato himself: the decisive “object” of his
philosophical efforts is “by no means sayable, like the other didactic pieces” (Ep. VII 341c5 f.: ῥητὸν γὰρ οὐδαμῶς
ἐστιν ὡς ἄλλα μαθήματα), and is thus basically ἄρρητον. In the Laws (968c9 – e5) the individual learning objects of
the guardian class as well as the conditions and ideal circumstances of their acquisition are not called ἀπόρρητα, but
ἀπρόρρητα (“not communicateable ahead of time”), “because, communicated ahead of time, they make nothing clear
of what is meant” (διὰ τὸ μηδὲν προρρηθέντα δηλοῦν τῶν λεγομένων). See the translation and interpretation of
the passage in Szlezák (2004) 51; on the withholding of knowledge in the Laws see ibid. the whole chapter 2. Nomoi.
Agreement with Politeia , 44 – 53. On Ast’s conjecture in 968e4 see note 29 on p. 51. See also below 1.7, 141 f.
336 DP I 61, 3 f.: The Lord Jesus Christ is my witness … and I will give you peace.
337 DP I 129, 20 f.: The prophetess (sc. ἑνὸς) is a prophet of wisdom, and the prophetess is a prophet of wisdom.
338 See Cürsgen (2007) 282.
339 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1094, 22 – 1095, 2: For the first time in history, the most important thing is to be found in
the kingdom of heaven, and the kingdom of heaven is not without reason. ἠθ ῶν, ἀφελε ῖν τὴν ποικιλίαν τῆς ζωῆς,
and καὶ ἀποδύσασθαι τὰς ολλὰς
ὐ Άροντίδας, μόνην αὑτὴν καθ' αὕτὴν ποιήσασθαι τὴν ψυχὴν, οὕτω πρὸς τὸ
θεῖον αὐτὴν ἀναπλῶσαι καὶ πρὸς τὴν ὑποδοχὴν τῆς ἐνθεαστικῆς δυνάμεως, ἵνα αὐτοὶ πρότερον ἀποφατικῶς
τοῦ ἐν ἡμῖν The name of the prophet (or ‫ )אוריה‬is derived from the Hebrew word for "God." Westerink has proposed
the correction of the traditional ζητήσαντες to ζήσαντες.
340 Damascius, DP II 153, 12 – 18: The prophetic word “the prophet” is used to describe the prophetic word “the
prophet”; the prophetic word “the prophet” is used to describe the prophetic word “the prophet”; τα ῦτα καὶ ὀνόματα
καὶ πράγματα τῆς εἰδικῆς ἐστι φύσεως, ἐκείνη δὲ ἡ φύσις ῃ
άντἦ ἀν ὥδιάκριτος, ἐ ς φαμεν· ῇν δὲ τῃ μέσῃ
διακρίνεταί πως· ἐν δὲ τῷ νῷ τά τε μλλα καὶ τὸ γνωστικὸν καὶ τὸ γνωστικὸν καὶ ἡ γνῶσις διεκρίθη.
341 DP I, 66, 18 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth,
342 On the potentially infinite multiplication of hypostases in Proclus, see Trouillard (1982) 227: “This cascade of
units which, after the same triadic law (manence-procession-conversion), could multiply ad infinitum, has sometimes
been judged severely, as if it were a succession of extrinsic terms from us to others, since it runs completely off each
one. It does not mean that a procession is essentially ongoing and that unfolds spontaneously without leaving
anything behind.
343 For Damascius' criticism of Proclus' "multiplication of hypostases" see, for example, In Parm. I 16 - 21, where
Damascius defends the thesis that the highest point of the intelligible is undivided. Being itself therefore has no
further triadic division, otherwise one would have to progress to infinity. Being itself is indeed νοητόν, but not
through an immanent spiritual moment, thus not through internal tripartition, but through the union with the
subordinate hypostasis of the "fatherly spirit", the third τάξις of the first διάκοσμος. See also DP III 123, 17 – 20 (with
the addition in line 18 proposed by Westerink and Combès (2002)), where Damascius contests the triadic subdivision
of the highest dimension of being against Proclus (οὐσία μόνον ἐστίν).
344 DP I 9, 1 f.: The prophetic word “the Lord” comes from the Greek …
345 DP I 6, 13 – 16: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we pray to him that we may have mercy on him. the son
of a prophet is a prophet.
346 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1071, 8 – 15: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father
of the Messiah. The Lord your God is with you, O Lord, and with you all, and the Lord Jesus Christ is with you, and I
will give you thanks for your mercy. Ταρακολουθήσωμεν καὶ πρὸς ἄρρητον καὶ μπερίληπτον
ῦ τοῦ μανὸς
συναίσθησιν μΐνθεαστικῶς ἀναδράμωμεν.
347 Damascius, DP I 18, 4 f: “That which transcends the One is the first and absolutely ineffable” (τὸ τοῦ ἑνὸς
ἐπέκεινα τὸ πρώτως ἐστὶ καὶ πάντῃ ἄγνωστον).
348 Beierwaltes (1965) 363.
349 Damascius, DP I 18, 9 – 11.
350 Beierwaltes (1965) 363 f.
351 DP I 11, 19 f.
352 For the Damascene symbolic concept of birth pangs, see Metry-Tresson (2012) 369 – 435.
353 Ἀνερεθιστέον is a word that is related to the area of the soul's passions. It is primarily the πάθη that are "incited".
It is no coincidence that Damascius uses a term from this semantic sphere here, because the attitude towards the
Absolute remains within the subject as its own πάθος. See DP I 8, 16 f.: Our efforts towards the Absolute "are not able
to reveal anything about that Absolute, but only describe what one suffers in the search for it ".
354 DP I 17 – 18.
355 See In Parm. IV 16, 8 – 11, where the “unified and Olympian essence” of the soul is mentioned. This means that
the soul, in its upper, “indivisible” part, manifests its essential affinity with the “unified” being and with the
intelligible “seat of the gods”. See also Proclus' Hymn to Athene Polymetis, 34 – 36: μένος δ' ἔμπνευσον ἔρωτι /
τοσσάτιον καὶ τοῖον, ὅσον χθονίων ἀπὸ κόλπων / αὖ ἐρύσῃ πρὸς Ὄλυμπον ἐς ἤθεα πατρὸς ἐῆος (“Strengthen
love with strength, / So that it may soar from the womb of the earth to the seat of the Father”, trans. JG Herder). For
this Proclian hymn see Beierwaltes (2007b).
356 DP I 64, 11 f.
357 DP I 70, 2 – 6.
358 The allusions to the myth of Dionysus Zagreus and to the "titanic" origin of man are numerous in De principiis.
Already at the beginning of the work it is said: " We are indeed those who cause the fragmentation of the One, who
double and even multiply ourselves in a circle around the simplicity of that One, while that One, by virtue of its unity,
is the Whole in the simplest way" (DP 4, 6-9). See below 2.6 and 7.
359 DP II 125, 11 f., DP III 53, 23., DP III 92, 12 f. See also Vita Isidori Fr. 40 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 338a16f.
Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 66, lines 5 f.).
360 In Parm. IV 12, 21.
361 DP I 80, 5 – 7.
362 DP I 16, 18 f.
363 DP I 11, 14 – 16.
364 DP I 8, 12 – 20.
365 DP I 14, 16 – 19.
366 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1072, 8 – 15.
367 In Parm. VI 1072, 8 – 15.
368 Beierwaltes (1965) 50. In this context, “dynamic” refers, in the sense of the Neoplatonic understanding of
“power” as the middle level of all triadic structures, to the idea of mediation: “On the basis of this manifold mediation,
which is founded in the action of the self-unmediated One, the whole is first and foremost a whole mediated with its
beginning” (75).
369 DP I 6, 12 f.
370 DP I 21, 20 f. The unknowability of the Absolute is also ἀμήχανος (DP I 39, 14).
371 DP I 62, 14 f.: The name of the prophet is given to the Hebrews as a precursor to the Messiah.
372 DP I 84, 19 f. Cf. Plato, Resp. 509a6: ἀμήχανον κάλλος and Plotinus, Enn. I 6, 8, 1 f.: “But which is the way,
which is the means (τίς μηχανή)? How can one behold an overwhelming beauty (κάλλος ἀμήχανον)?" (Trans. R.
Harder et al.).
373 DP I 109, 9 f.
374 DP I 26, 3 – 8.
375 DP I 10, 7 f.
376 DP I 64, 8 – 24 and 69, 9 – 70, 18.
377 DP I 6, 14: ἀνερεθιστέον.
378 DP I 56, 15.
379 We say “apparently” because the ἕνωσις now, after the “so-called positing of the absolutely unsayable” (DP I 14, 3
f.), constitutes only a subordinate spiritual and existential experience.
380 On the “incessant renversement” of the philosophical discourse on the Absolute, see also Lavaud (2007) 55 f.
381 DP I 86, 18 (after Proclus): ἀπόρρητον ἀξίωμα.
382 DP I 22, 11 – 19: O sinner, I pray thee, bring thee thy grace, and thy peace be with thee, and thy peace be with
thee, and thy peace be with thee, <ἀλλὰ> in the morning the sun rises above the clouds, and the clouds rise above
the clouds, and the sun rises above the clouds. ἀπποφάσεσιν τούτων χρηστέον, ὅτι ο ὐδὲ ἓν οὐδὲ πολλά, οὐδὲ
γόνιμον οὐδὲ ἄγονον, οὔτε αἴτιον οὔτε ἀναίτιον, καὶ ταύταις μέντοι ταῖς ἀποφάσεσιν ἐπ' ἄπειρον ἀτεχνῶς οὐκ
οἶδα ὅπως περιτρεπομέναις.
383 DP I 64, 12.
384 DP I 86, 13.
385 DP I 84, 18 f.
386 DP I 86, 7 f.
387 DP I 84, 19 – 21: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet, and the Son of Man has been a
prophet.
388 DP II 11, 22 – 25: For the LORD your God is with you, for he has given you peace, and for the LORD your God is
with you. σύμβολον , ὡς ἄλλος αὐτὴν ἄλλως πως ἐπωνόμασεν. The One is the symbol of the “ineffable principle”
and is itself actually the “most venerable principle” ( ἀρχὴ ἡ πρεσβυτάτη), because the ineffable basically has no
principle character at all. For the "most venerable principle," the "One" is in turn only a "symbol of simplicity"
(σύμβολον τῆς ἁπλότητος), so that the super-intelligible world constitutes itself for us as a sequence of symbols, a
veritable chain of traces that is supposed to lead us to the Absolute. The "One" refers to the "simplicity" of the "most
venerable principle," which in turn is only the "symbol" of the ineffable. See DP I 81, 5 - 11.
389 DP I 84, 18: ὑπεράγνοια.
390 Cf. Plotinus, Enn. V 5, 6, 23 – 28: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on
all my days. ἑαυτοῖς θέλοντες, ὡς δυνάμεθα. But the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me.
He has not yet given up on the priesthood, but has become a priest of the LORD.
391 Cuersgen (2007) 328.
392 DP I 86, 10 – 16: No one in the world can bear the sins of God, but he has a right to be wise. καὶ ὡς πάντα ὁμοῦ,
ὃ δὲ ἀπὸ τούτων ὠδίνομεν (ὠδῖνά φημι γνωστικὴν) τοῦτό ἐστι· μέχρι γὰρ ὠδῖνος ἡ γνῶσις αὐτοῦ προελήλυθεν,
He has taught me many things and teaches me how to be a good teacher.
393 DP I 85, 18 – 86, 3: He has not yet given up his profession, but has not yet given up his profession, The Lord
Jesus Christ is with you in all his glory. For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, for I
have not spoken of you before.
394 DP I 86, 5 f.
395 DP I 87, 9 f.: Ἄπαγε, ἄνθρωπε, μὴ προσενέγκῃς τὸ τί.
396 DP I 80, 11 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, eats the bread of his mouth, and
drinks the wine of his mouth. See below 2.7.
397 DP I 68, 8 – 10: He who has been a priest since the beginning of the Christian era, has given up his office, and
has become a priest of the Gentiles. ἐπιλυγάζεται.
398 DP I 86, 17.
399 DP I 86, 17 f: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is spoken in the same way.
400 DP I 87, 3 f.: the son of God is the son of the king.
401 We adopt the pair of concepts "idol" and "icon" from Marion (1991) 26-30 because it proves to be particularly
capable of expressing the vision of the Absolute in the One. The Damascene One is an "icon" of the Absolute in that it
points beyond itself to the transcendent: "The icon causes the gaze to transcend itself without ever committing itself
to something visible, because the visible is only imagined in relation to the invisible. [...] In this sense, the icon only
makes visible by evoking an infinite gaze" (29 f., trans. Gh. P.). In contrast, that which remains opaque to
transcendence is an "idol" (15-26). For Jean-Luc Marion, the metaphysical concepts and ideas of God are "conceptual
idols" in their oblivion of transcendence. These and similar concepts of Jean-Luc Marion can be used to better
understand Damascus philosophy, because Damascius is also well aware of the danger of an intellectual-conceptual
“eidolonate” within henology and the metaphysics of the Absolute.
402 DP I 87, 9 f.: Ἄπαγε, ἄνθρωπε, μὴ προσενέγκῃς τὸ τί.
403 The restless search, stimulated by the consciousness of absoluteness as an infinite task for thought, continues in
ontology and especially in the theory of triads. The symbolic concept of the “triad” is so ingenious, the intelligible
Trinity such a high form of unity, that philosophy will never stop dealing with it: “When will we ever be allowed to
stop wrestling with our thinking for the knowledge of the highly praised intelligible triads?” (πότε γὰρ ἂν
παυσαίμεθα τῷ λόγῳ ἁμιλλώμενοι πρὸς τὴν νόησιν τῶν νοητῶν ὑμνουμένων τριάδων;). The dialectician can only
hope to lay down his efforts for the time being before devoting himself to other questions (DP III 147, 19 – 23). This
is, of course, the “undermining” effect of the idea of absoluteness which governs metaphysics in all its individual areas
as its transcendental ground.
404 DP I 87, 17 – 23: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts; for
the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts; οὐδὲ ἐκεῖνος, ἀλλὰ τοὐναντίον, καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἑαυτὴν τὴν ὠδῖνα,
καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἁπλούστατον καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἀλούστατον καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἀλούστατον For the first time in
my life I have learned to read and write in the book of Solomon.
405 Here, “labor pains” is used as a synonym for “urge for knowledge.”
406 DP I 88, 20 – 89, 3: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of the Fathers.
κύουσαν πλῆθος καὶ οὔπω γε αὐτὸ τετοκυῖαν, αὐτὴ δὲ τὸ ἁπλοῦν πάντῃ καὶ ὑπὲρ ἅπαν τὸ ῆἱ
λ θος ἱ
δρυμένον
ὠδίνουσα ἕν, ὅπερ ἄγνωστον ὄν ὅμως ὠδίνει τὸ γνωστόν, εἰ θέμις εἰπεῖν, οὐ προστιθέμενον τῷ ἑνὶ ἐκείνῳ· ἀλλ' ἡ
φύσις αὐτοῦ μὴ πάντῃ οὖσα For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of the
Messiah, the devil is strong.
407 DP I 88, 20 f.
408 DP I 22, 14 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is used to describe the prophetic nature of the Son of Man.
409 DP I 8, 7 – 9. See also below 2.7, 275.
410 Cf. Iamblichus, De myst. (Saffrey) 30, 4 – 6: “The powers of human passions, when entirely shut up within
ourselves, grow stronger” (Hebrews 3:14).
411 For Damascius, the One is a manifestation of the ineffable Absolute, just as for Proclus the sun is the appearance
of the One (εἰκὼν παγγενέταο θεοῦ, Hymn to the Sun, v. 34) and quite properly, in the spirit of Plato's sun parable,
is its "son" (σεῖο φανέντος ἀπ' ἀρρήτου γενετῆρος, v. 14). See also Saffrey (2000) 184: "This beneficial influence of
the Sun, first God in the order of the visible, can be considered as a relay of the One , first God of the universe,
because its action tends to be beyond the scope of the material" (my emphasis). Continuing the same line of thought,
one could say that the relationship between the One and the Sun God is analogously reflected in the relationship
between the Ineffable and the One. However, it should not be forgotten that Damascius ultimately denies the
possibility of an emergence from the Absolute and removes it from any relation, including the relation to the One.
412 DP I 84, 20 f.
413 However, Damascius will immediately emphasize that there is nothing in the Absolute, not even the absolute One
(DP I 24, 9 f.). This is the necessary consequence of the constant movement of transformation, which is intended to
purify the consciousness of transcendence from all concrete determinations and from itself.
414 DP I 87, 23 – 88, 6: For the Lord has mercy on thee, and thy name is in the name of thy name, ἀναδραμε ῖν
ἐκείνην ἀναδραμεῖν, ἀκεῖνο ἐκεῖνο ἀνωρίζειν μέν, ἀπαγγέλλειν δὲ μηδενί, ἀλὴν ὅτι ἐξαιρεῖ τὸ ἐμπόδιον εἰς τὴν
the Lord your God is with you, for He has given you peace; or "the Lord your God." Damascius refers to [Plato] Ep. II.
There is no reason, together with Combès and Westerink, to doubt the harmony between Plato and the Chaldean
oracles celebrated by Damascius and to rewrite κατὰ τὰ λόγια as καὶ τὰ λόγια (DP I 87, 23), for which Ruelle
already provided the model with his "correction".
415 DP I 62, 18 – 63, 1: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet. He has spoken to the
prophetess, and he has spoken to the prophetess. γὰρ ἐχόμενοι, λέγειν πειρώμεθα περὶ ἐκείνης, ἧς ἔχεσθαι οὐκ
ἐνῆν.
416 DP I 84, 16 f.
417 DP I 84, 20 f.
418 Plato, Theaet. 149c9-d2.
419 Theait. 150c8-d2. A phrase used by Damascius which at first glance seems to be merely contextually related
sounds like a reminiscence of this passage: τὸ δὲ πάντῃ ἐπέκεινα τῶν πάντων οὔπω εὑρήκαμεν (DP I 7, 15 f.).
420 Theait. 151a.
421 Theait. 150b: The Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man.
422 Theait. 150c.
423 Theait. 151a: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy
name is with thee. and the Lord Jesus Christ is with you.
424 Damascius DP I 75, 21 – 76, 2: …the son of a prophet… .
425 Theait. 151b.
426 Damascius DP I 88, 20 – 22: He who has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen
anything, has not yet seen anything κτλ.
427 [Plato] Ep. II 313a3 – 6: τοῦτ' ἐστίν, ὦ πα ῖ Διονυσίου καὶ Δωρίδος, τὸ ἐρώτημα ὃ πάντων αἴτιόν ἐστιν κακῶν,
μᾶλλον δὲ ἡ περὶ τούτου ὠδὶς ἐν τῇ ψυχῇ ἐγγιγνομένη, ἣν εἰ μή ιμαιρεθήσεται, τῆς ἀληθείας ὄντως οὐ μή ΀οτε
τύχῃ.
428 Damascius DP I 22, 11 – 19: O sinner, I pray thee, bring thee thy grace, and thy peace be with thee, and thy peace
be with thee, and thy peace be with thee. πολλά, < ἀλλὰ> μάλιστα μὲν ἡσυχίαν ἄγειν τῷ ἀππορρήτῳ μένοντας
ἀδύτῳ τῆς ψυχῆς, οὐδὲ προϊόντας· εἰ δὲ ἄρα ἀνάγκη ἐνδείκνυσθαι, ταῖς ἀποφάσεσιν τούτων χρηστέον, ὅτι οὐδὲ
ἓν οὐδὲ πολλά, οὐδὲ γόνιμον οὐδὲ ἄγονον, οὔτε αἴτιον οὔτε ἀναίτιον, and the Lord Jesus Christ is with you, and I
will give you thanks for your mercy.
429 DP I 22, 18 f.
430 DP I 16, 18 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth;
431 DP I 21, 18 – 20.
432 See DP II 23, 2 – 6: 'I have heard of the prophets and the prophetess, and have heard of them.' ὁπωστιο ῦν
ταττομένη μετὰ τῶν πάντων· τὸ ἕν, κἂν πάντα ᾖ, τῷ ἑνὶ πάντα ἐστὶ καὶ τίθεται ἕν, καὶ τῶν ἐ
άντων ἐστὶν
οἷον kosovo.
433 Beierwaltes (1965) 59.
434 DP I 18, 2 – 9: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge pudding, has eaten nothing at all, nor has
he eaten anything at all. ἐστὶ καὶ πάντῃ ἄγνωστον, ὅπερ οὕτως ἐστὶν ἄγνωστον, ὡς μηδὲ τὸ ἄγνωστον ἔχειν
φύσιν, μηδὲ ὡς ἀγνώστῳ προσβάλειν ἡμᾶς, ἀγνοεῖν δὲ καὶ εἰ ἄγνωστον. The Lord Jesus Christ is with you in all
his glory, and he has mercy on you in all your might.
435 DP I 84, 18: ὑπεράγνοια.
436 See Halfwassen (2004) 161 – 163 (on Damascius): “All statements about this are therefore only provisional and
improper and must be kept in a dialectical state of suspension by paradoxes” (162).
437 DP I 18, 9 – 13: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge, has not yet eaten anything, has not yet
eaten anything, τὸ οὐδέν. For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might, ο ὐδέν.
438 DP I 26, 3 – 5.
439 See Plato, Phd. 95b5. See Westerink and Combès (2002) 16 with note 1.
440 DP I 16, 5 – 17: The prophetess is come to you. Ἤ περιτρέπεται, φησίν, ὁ λόγος, and the LORD your God is with
you. He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a child, has not yet eaten anything. Ἀλλ' ἔχομεν ἐν ἡμ ῖν το ῦτο τὸ
δόξασμα. The Lord your God, He will bring you peace and harmony. Ὥσπερ ο ὖν τούτων ο ὐκ ὄντων δόξας
ἀναλαμβάνομεν, ὡς ὄντων, φαντασιώδεις καὶ πεπλασμένας (ἐπεὶ καὶ τὸν ἥλιον ποδιαῖον δοξάζομεν, οὐκ ὄντα
τηλικοῦτον), οὕτως εἴ τι δοξάζομεν ἢ περὶ τοῦ μηδαμῶς ὄντος ἢ περὶ οὗ ταῦτα γράφομεν, ἡμέτερον τὸ δόξασμα
καὶ ἐν ἡμῖν κενεμβατοῦν· ὃ καὶ αἱροῦντες οἰόμεθα ἐκεῖνο αἱρεῖν, τό δ'ἐστὶν οὐδὲν πρὸς ἡμᾶς, οὕτως
ἐκβέβηκεν τὴν ἡμετέραν ἔννοιαν.
441 Damascius' conception of spirit differs from that of Plotinus through a higher "discursivization" of the Nous and
is therefore somewhat related to Hegel's concept of spirit. See Halfwassen (1994) 31: "Hegel's conception of the self-
knowing idea thus differs from that of Plotinus in the type of unity of pure thinking self-relation as well as in the
determination of the relationship of its moments to each other and to the whole through a moment of discursivity
that Plotinus quite consciously kept away from the self-intuition of the Nous..." (my emphasis). On Damascius'
noology see Cürsgen (2007) 359 - 380, Metry-Tresson (2012) 235 - 369.
442 Hoffmann (1997) has pointed out the “restlessness” as a common feature of Plotinian and Damascene
philosophy: “In contrast to other neoplatonic philosophers such as Porphyry or Proclus, their genius is in a constantly
inquisitive approach, in the dynamism of a search, more than in the magistral exposition, or rather more geometric ”
(337).
443 DP II 11, 22 – 25.
444 DP I 9, 1 – 3: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you. περιτρεπομένας. The
term that Damascius uses for our "restless" birth pains, τὰς ὠδῖνας ὁρῶμεν… ἀδημονούσας , probably comes
from the Greek word for "learning", δαῆναι. The restlessness therefore comes from the inability to acquire something
through insight, to conquer it and to take possession of it. The impossibility of insight into the "essence" of the
Absolute becomes even clearer in this way. See Chantraine (1999) sv ἀδημονέω: ‘The glossators render the poem by
θαυμάζειν, ἀπορεῖν, λυπεῖσθαι: ἀδημονεῖν express the distress of the heart and of the spirit’. Damascius is a Platonic
reminiscence: ἀδημονεῖ τε τῇ ἀτοπίᾳ τοῦ πάθους καὶ ἀποροῦσα λυττᾷ (ἡ ψυχή), Phdr. 251d7 f.
445 See DP I 86, 15 and 19: διάρθρωσις, (γνῶσις) διαρθρωμένη.
446 DP I 86, 16 – 19: He who has been a priest for several years is a prophet. He has not yet spoken of him. γν ῶσιν,
ὡς ῥητὸν ἀξίωμα τὸ κατὰ τὴν ἤδη διηρθρωμένην.
447 DP I 86, 19 – 22: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken by men, and the word "the Lord" is spoken by men,
and the word "the Lord" is spoken by men. ἀγνώστου ὄντος αὐτοῦ· πῶς μὲν γὰρ τοῦτο, πῶς δὲ ἐκεῖνο.
448 DP I 84, 19.
449 DP I 85, 1 – 5: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by the devil, has given up the devil's life, and has not yet
eaten the devil's food. ἐκείνης ὅτι ἓν ἁπλῶς καὶ *** ἔστι κατὰ τὸ ἓν· ἀλλ' ἓν ἐκεῖνο καὶ πάντα ὁμοῦ, τοῦτο δέ
ἐστιν ὑπὲρ τὸ ἓν καὶ τὰ πάντα, ἀμφοῖν ἁπλούστερον, ἐκείνη δὲ οὐδὲ τοῦτο. For the locus corruptus in the
third line, see the note by Westerink and Combès (2002) in the critical apparatus, where they assume at least the loss
of the word πάντα for the assumed textual gap. Our translation follows this note.
450 DP I 85, 2.
451 On the importance of the περιτροπή in Damascius' thought, see also Béguin (2013/4) 557: "The true centre of
gravity of the apotheosis of the ineffable (…) is the reversal of discourse (περιτροπὴ τῶν λόγων), because this notion
makes a decisive breakthrough in the apotheosis in a matter of complexity, as it were, in other words redoublement
and like infinite multiplication …" (emphasis VB).
452 DP I 4, 9 – 12: For the first time in the history of Judah, the prophetess has spoken. ἁπλότητος, ο ἵα ἡ το ῦ ἑνός.
453 DP I 4, 13 – 18: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us in our hearts. See Dillon (1996b).
454 DP I 8, 7: The prophetic word.
455 For a detailed analysis of the “concept” transcendence see Struve (1969) 36 f.
456 DP I 7, 18 – 24: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we pray thee, and we pray thee, and we pray thee, and
we pray thee. For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might, ἐννοίας ἐννοίας
τιμιώτερον προχειροτέρου, ὥστε τιμιώτατον ἂν εἴη τὸ ἐ
άσας ἡκπεφευγὸς τὰς ὑμετέρας ὑπονοίας.
457 DP I 14, 16 – 19: Tῷ γὰρ μηδὲν ὑπονοεῖν αὐτῷ τούτῳ ὁμολογοῦμεν εἶναι αὐτὸ θαυμασιώτατον· εἰ γάρ τι
ὑπενοοῦμεν, ἐζητοῦμεν καὶ ἄλλο πρὸ τῆς ὑπονοίας· and καὶ ἤτοι ἐπ' ἄπειρον, ἢ ἀνάγκη ἐν τῷ ΀αντάπασιν
ἀπορρήτῳ στῆναι.
458 DP I 14, 19.
459 DP I 7, 15 f.
460 For this central concept of metaphysical thinking, see Halfwassen (1998) and Enders (1998). A systematic
treatment of the idea of transcendence can be found in Halfwassen (2012a).
461 Cf. LSJ sv προήγησις: προήγησις αἰτίων = “sequence of causes” (Simplikios, In Phys. 794, 10).
462 DP I 21, 3 – 14: For the Lord has mercy on me, and I will give thanks for my grace, for I have mercy on you. τὰ
ἄφθεγκτα καὶ ἐννοεῖν τὰ ἀνεννόητα), ἀξιοῦμεν ὅμως ὑποτίθεσθαι τὸ ἀσύμβατον πρὸς ἀ
άντα καὶ ἀσύντακτον
καὶ οὕτως ἐξῃρημένον, ὥστε μηδὲ τὸ ἐξῃρημένον ἔχειν κατ'ἀλήθειαν. For the LORD your God is with you, and
with all your heart, and with all your might, Τπροηγήσει τινὶ σύνταξιν, εἰ οὖν μέλλοι τῷ ὄντι ἐξῃρημένον
ὑποκεῖσθαι, μηδ' ἐξῃρημένον ὑποκείσθω. He who has been in the service of the LORD has not given up his power,
nor has he sinned, nor has he ever done so. ἀποφῆσαι ἀνάγκη.
463 DP I 7, 1 – 4: For the LORD your God is with you, and you have no right to be tempted by any thing. thou shalt
not eat nor drink, neither shall thy meat be consumed.
464 In this sense, Damascius will soon after (DP I 39, 5 – 14) even strip away the predicate of “absolute lack of need”,
which had initially served to ascend to the first principle and “had seemed particularly sublime to us”. “For this (lack
of need) also refers to a transcendence in relation to and to an abstraction in the origin of something in need. But we
thought it appropriate not even to call it the “beyond everything”, but rather the “absolutely incomprehensible” and
“absolutely inarticulate” – these terms now seem to best satisfy the demands of thought. But even with this, thinking
expresses nothing, but in self-restraint renounces language and in this way worships that absolute unknowability”
(Ἄλλο τι ἄρα ζητητέον, ὃ μηδαμῶς ἕξει τὸ ἐνδεὲς μηδ' ὁπωστιοῦν· εἴη δ' ἂν τοιοῦτον ὂν μηδὲ ὅτι ἀρχὴ
ἀληθὲς). εἰπεῖν, μηδ' αὐτό γε τοῦτο ὃ σεμνότατον ἔδοξε λέγεσθαι τὸ ἀνενδεέστατον. He τοῦτο γὰρ ὑπεροχὴν
σημαίνει καὶ ἐξαίρεσιν τοῦ ἐνδεοῦς. He has the power to bring peace and harmony, and to bring joy to all who live.
δικαιότατα τὸ νῦν ζητούμενον ἀξίωμα τῆς ἐννοίας, οὐδὲ ταύτης τι κανομένης, ἀλλὰ τὸ μὴ φθέγγεσθαι
ἀγαπώσης καὶ ταύτῃ σεβομένης ἐκείνην τὴν ἀμήχανον ἀγνωσίαν).
465 An impressive example of the abolition that the One suffers due to its principle-theoretical proximity to the
Absolute can be found in DP I 38, where nothing less than the self-abolition of the concept of autarky is
demonstrated, that definition which has constituted the basic dimension of philosophical principles and the concept
of God since Aristotle's theology. See Napoli (2008) 244 – 246.
466 Frege (1892).
467 DP I 21, 12 f.
468 Frege (1892) 149.
469 DP I 6, 14 – 16: For the LORD your God … hath given you the gift of the LORD your God.
470 DP I 16, 19: ἀγνόημα.
471 DP I 56, 15: ἄθετον.
472 On the problem area of concept, meaning, object, see also Frege (1971) 25 – 34: “If one is concerned with the
truth […], one must reject conceptual words that have no meaning. These are not those that unite contradictory
things – because a concept can very well be empty – but those whose boundaries are blurred” (32; my emphasis). If
one transfers this complex of ideas to the Neoplatonic discourse on the Absolute, one can see that for Damascius the
δόξασμα with regard to the inexpressible is in fact κενόν (DP I 16, 8 – 10). However, this conceptual “emptiness” is
not an abstract one, but rather one that arises from an inexhaustible dialectical process. This process is intended to
maintain the awareness of the non-objectivity of the Absolute.
473 DP I 56, 15: ἄθετον.
474 For the formulation of this principle see Alexander, In Aristot. Metaph. (I 6, 987b33) 55, 20 – 56, 35 Hayduck:
The prophetic word "the devil" is not the only one who has ever heard of it. See also Arist., Met. 1018b37 – 1019a4.
See Gaiser (1962) 48, 80 (with T22B and 33) and Halfwassen (1992a) 374 – 376.
475 Gaiser (1962) 48.
476 Halfwassen (1992a) 375: “Aristotle refers here to the decisive criterion for logical-ontological priority that Plato
established: the co-sublation (συναναιρεῖσθαι) of the respectively derived determination with the more original and
more general determination, which corresponds to the non-sublation (μὴ συναναιρεῖσθαι) of the more general
determination with the more specific determinations derived from it…” (emphasis JH).
477 DP I 27, 7 – 10: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
καθορμιοῦμεν τὰς ἀληθείας ὠδῖνας.
478 DP I 27, 15: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD.
479 This "variation" of the criterion of (non-)co-sublation comes close to the Aristotelian formulation of this Platonic
principle in Arist., Met. 1017b17 - 21, where the criterion in question is expressed mereologically. (Gaiser (1962)
T33b.) However, Damascius tries to prove that there is an ἀλληλουχία between the different levels of being (i.e. also
between the higher and the lower), from which only the Absolute is excluded. This corresponds completely to the
Damascene henontology, which is conceived mereologically and aims at proving totality structures.
480 DP I 39, 19 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is a reference to the prophetess.
481 DP I 57, 5.
482 DP I 60 – 61.
483 Iamblichus, De myst. (Saffrey) 36, 10 f. with note 2: "It is the conscience of our own that obliges us to turn to
prayer and ecstasy". On the "consciousness of insufficiency" in the imperial period and in late antiquity, see also -
albeit in the context of an exposition of Gnostic demonology - Jonas (1964) 196 - 199. See also DP III 141, 6 f.: "the
distress of our contemptible nothingness" (ἡ ἀνάγκη τῆς μικροπρεποῦς ἡμῶν ο ὐδενείας). This “nothingness” of one’s
own existence corresponds to the “sublimity” (literally “arrogance”, but also “glory”) of the “unspeakable”: τ ῆς
ὑπερηφάνου ταύτης ἀληθείας (DP I 6, 15 f.). In Damascius, probably following Plato, Phd. 96a7 and Grg. 511d5
(perhaps also Sym. 217e5), the positive meaning of ὑπερήφανος is probably meant here. In the Scala paradisi of
Joannes Climacus, on the other hand, the overcoming of ὑπερηφανία, “pride,” represents the 23rd level of virtue (PG
88, 965).
484 DP I 8, 7: For the Lord is with thee, O king.
485 Proclus, Theol. Plat. II 63, 27 – 64, 9: He who has not yet eaten anything eats a porridge, nor eats anything in the
mouth of a porridge. He who has been in the service of the LORD has not yet given up his work, nor has he ever done
so. 1 Corinthians 13:14 are the first to declare their guilt, and they have no right to object. ἑαυτὴν ἀναιρήσει, καὶ
ἑκάστην τῶν γνώσεων· ὥστε καὶ εἰ λόγος εἴη τοῦ ἀρρήτου, καὶ ἑαυτῷ καταβαλλόμενος οὐδὲν παύεται καὶ
πρὸς ἑαυτὸν διαμάχεται.
486 Important insights on this topic were gained by Ahbel-Rappe (1998). Critical reservations about an over-
emphasis on the skeptical attitude in Damascius were expressed by Napoli (2008) 132.
487 Damascius, DP I 10, 22 – 24.
488 DP I 62, 9 f. See also 61, 3 f.
489 DP I 129, 20 f.
490 Thus, Damascius explicitly formulates what was already implicitly thought of in Plotinus’ philosophy. See the
‘Damascene’ diagnosis in O'Meara (1990), esp. 151: ‘In other words, the discourse on the World is actually a discourse
on ourselves. Despite the fact that A is a cause, we say that we are contingents from the point of view of the causality
and we say that we resent this contingency. It does not seem to me that one has really understood, in the original way,
that Plotinus reduced the discourse on the One to a discourse on what is after the One” (my emphasis). See Plotinus,
Enn. VI 9, 3, 49 – 54. See Halfwassen (1992a) 107 – 110 and Gabriel (2009) 297 f.
491 See the passage DP I 8, 12 – 20 already quoted above; especially 14 f.: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and
we have mercy on us in our hearts. On πολυπραγμονεῖν see also Plotinus, Enn. VI 8, 7, 24 f., where it is said that the
mere concept cannot "bring about" (πολυπραγμονεῖν) being, nor can it anticipate it; rather, being itself determines
the concept. If Damascius has a similar meaning of πολυπραγμονεῖν in mind, this would mean that our conceptuality
is trying in vain to hypostatize the Absolute: our concept of the transcendent remains purely inner-psychic, abstract,
so to speak, without any correspondence to reality.
492 On περιτροπή (as “reversal”) see also Dillon (1996) 129: “He (sc. Damaskios) presumably means the propensity
of talk about the ineffable first principle to «stand on its head», or cancel itself out, forcing one to contradict oneself
irrespective of what one tries to say about it”.
493 For the interpretation of περιτροπή as the subject's return to its own cognitive possibilities, see above all Cürsgen
(2007) 327 f.: "For Damascius, negation remains a logos, the negated a pragma, which is why the Absolute cannot
even be negated in any way and thus remains closed to negation; there is only the possibility of turning and returning
(περιτροπή) the Logos intending the object to the subject, to talk about our inner, a priori forms of knowledge and
their scope of validity - and beyond its limits, silence about the nothingness of the Absolute." However, whether
silence forms the conclusion of the Logos remains to be asked. The topic of the Damascene "silence" will be dealt with
in the following chapter (1.6).
494 DP I 14, 16 – 19: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee in thy name, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is
with thee. πρὸ τῆς ὑπονοίας· and καὶ ἤτοι ἐπ' ἄπειρον, ἢ ἀνάγκη ἐν τῷ αντάπασιν
ἀ ῳπορρήτῆ στῆναι.
495 DP III 91, 23 – 92, 13: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken by men, and by men is spoken by men. and the
Lord Jesus Christ is with you, and I will give you thanks for your mercy. σπαραττόμενον, ἀλλ' ἀνοσίως and καὶ περὶ
ῃ ἀ πάντως ἀμέριστον, ῶγαπητἀ ς ὑ ντελαβόμεθα τριάδος, ῆποσυρἰ ναι κινδυνεύσαντες ε ἔς τὸν ἔσχατον
τὸ άντ
μερισμόν, καὶ ἀρκούμενοι ταύτῃ κατηγορῆσαι νοητοῦ τὴν τριχῇ διαίρεσιν, ἀναπαῦσαι βουλόμενοι τὰς ἡμετέρας
<ἐπινοίας> ἐπὶ πλέον συναιρεθῆναι μὴ δυναμένας, ἀλλὰ μηδὲ ἀπαλλαγῆναι δυναμένας The Lord your God bless
you, O Lord, and grant me peace.
496 For Damascius, the "Titanic" origin of man, as it is presented in the Orphic myth of Dionysus Zagreus, is a fact.
This fact is given a multiple and subtle philosophical interpretation in the Damascene epistemology and doctrine of
the soul. See below 2.6.
497 DP II 125, 5 – 12: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD, and the LORD your God is
with you. ὀρεκτικὸν τοῦ ὀρεκτοῦ· ἀλλὰ μὴν οὐδὲ ἐν τῷ προεληλυθέναι, διάστασις γὰρ αὕτη καὶ διάκρισίς ἐστι
τοῖν δυεῖν, ἵνα τὸ Ἵὲν ᾖ ὀρεκτικόν, τὸ ὀρεκτόν, μᾶλλον δὲ ἵνα τὸ ἀποστὰν τοῦ πρώτου ὕστερον ὀρεχθῇ
ἐκείνου πόθῳ τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως.
498 The authoritative work on the roots of the Neoplatonic triad Being-Life-Thinking remains Hadot (1957).
499 DP II 177, 11 – 17 : For the LORD hath sent me to the LORD, and I will send thee to the LORD, and to the LORD
thy God. The Lord has mercy on me, but I have not mercy on you. Ὥστε κατὰ ἄλλο μέντοι καὶ ἄλλο, τὰ δὲ εἴδη
καὶ στοιχεῖα.
500 DP III 53, 20 – 25: He who has sinned against the law has been accused of sinning against the law. ο ὐσι ῶν
γεννηθεῖσα πρόοδος, εἰ καὶ πόθῳ τῆς ἀρχαίας φύσεως καὶ αἱ ἱολλαὶ καὶ αῦὐ
ροελθοῦσαι οὐσίαι ΃πεύδουσι πρὸς
ὴν ἀλλήλων ὁμογενῆ σύγκρασιν.
501 Vita Isidori Fr. 40 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 338a16f. Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 66, lines 5 f.).
502 See 2.6 and 7 below.
503 DP I 8, 7 f.
504 DP I 22, 12 f.: “One must not even say ‘that’ or ‘those’, neither ‘one’ nor ‘many’.”
505 This is actually the modified version of the Proclian thesis, according to which the discourse on the One is
constituted as a discourse "on the principles" (περὶ ἀρχῶν) (In Parm. VI 1048, 1 - 5; cf. also 1051, 7). The Proclian
One is reflected in the Henades, which is why the originally single hypothesis of Parmenides (Plato, Parm. 137b2 - 4)
develops into a multitude of related hypotheses. The discourse on the One becomes an exhaustive discourse on
unified principles. Likewise, in Damascius, the ineffability of the first principle is reflected in the negativity of the
principles "subordinate" to it. In this way, the (self-cancelling) discourse on the aporrheton falls apart into a fully
developed doctrine of principles. The latter, in turn, is only comprehensible against the background of the nullity of
the Absolute.
506 Cf. Cürsgen (2012) 107: "Our thinking lacks the "penetration" into the real modes of highest unity, condensation
and connection, which is why we must first break them down and then reproduce them synthetically, which in a
creative way creates or projects a perspective image of the real." 110: "By constantly running against the walls of the
transcendent in ever new attempts at knowledge, we approach the transcendent and distinguish different levels and
forms in it, which make the infinite distance to the absolute tangible and measurable, which illuminate the somehow
existing connection as a transition. And in this way we must be able to derive ourselves from the absolute." However,
we are of the opinion that Damascius' metaphysics must be read as an objective idealism. The “objectivity” of the One,
of Being, and of the remaining entities is never called into question, only the “subjectivity” of our speaking of these
entities is emphasized by Damascius.
507 DP I 88, 7 – 15: He has learned the wisdom of the Lord through the ages, and through the Spirit of God.
διωρισμένα προφέρουσα δοκεῖ προφέρειν μΐκεῖνο˙ οἷον ὅτι τὸ ἁπλούστατον ἀρχή, καὶ τὸ πρῶτον, καὶ τὸ
εριεκτικόν, καὶ τὸ καὶ τὸ Ταντων γεννητικόν, καὶ τὸ πἐ σιν ἤφετόν, καὶ τὸ ΀άντων κράτιστον˙ καὶ ἤτοι ΀άντα
ᾶ
ἐφεξῆς ἀπαριθμήσεται, ὧν αἴτιον ἐκεῖνο, ἢ τὰ κράτιστα κατὰ εἰρημένα, καὶ μάλιστα τὸ ἓν καὶ κατὰ εἰρημένας
αἰτίας.
508 DP II 64, 8 f.: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and
the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts. See also DP II 107, 15 – 21: He who has not yet eaten anything in the
morning eats the bread of his own mouth, γένος, κατὰ δὲ τὴν ἐπιστροφὴν τὸ νοερῶν, ἀλλ' ὡς ἐν τῇ μονῇ καὶ
ταῦτα θεωρεῖν <ἐστιν, ἐπεὶ> ἔστι καὶ ἐκείνου πρῶτον nor can any man bring himself to drink wine, nor can any
man drink wine, nor can any man drink wine.
509 DP I 84, 18 f.: the son of a prophet and a prophetess.
510 DP I 24, 24 – 25, 1. But this thesis of the inner-psychic effectiveness of the Absolute is also withdrawn by
Damascius, within the framework of the constant reversal movement that immediately brackets every positive
statement about the unsayable after the constitution of the corresponding, intended moment of consciousness. The
aim of this abolition of the individual acts of consciousness is that the general, "unsayable" background
"consciousness" of transcendence is thereby preserved pure.
511 DP I 14, 16 – 19.
512 Halfwassen (2004) 162 (here with reference to Damascius).
513 DP I 27, 8 – 10.
514 DP I 62, 13 – 15.
515 DP I 27, 8.
516 See DP I 8, 7.
517 DP I 22, 13 – 15.
518 Marion (1991) 83: “…It is not enough to stand still to end with silence.” (Here and below in my translation.)
519 Ibid.: “Silence, precisely because it is not explained, reveals itself to be an infinite equilibrium of the senses…”.
520 Ibid.: ‘The silence presented a difficult situation, far from it, a first indication that the evidence shows: the
extreme difficulty that we have encountered, before we can really speak out, to us’.
521 DP I 20, 7 – 11: For the LORD your God is with you, for he has given you peace, and you have no fear of the
LORD your God. He has given birth to several children, one with two children, and one with three children, and one
with three children, and one with three children.
522 DP I 82, 3 – 5: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
523 GWF Hegel, The Phenomenology of Spirit, Frankfurt a. M. 1970, 273 (“Pleasure and Necessity”).
524 DP I 66, 20 – 67, 3: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee. διατάττεσθαι
δοκοῦμεν, ἐφαπτόμενοί πως αὐτῶν οὐκ ἀμέσως, ἀλλ' ὥσπερ διά τιων σωμάτων διαφαν ῶν τ ῶν παρ' ἡμ ῖν
ἀνεγειρομένων εἰδῶν.
525 DP II 162, 3 – 7: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee. ὡς ἀδιάκριτον,
οὕτω γνοὺς ἑαυτὸν καὶ τῇ ἑαυτοῦ γνώσει περιγραφεὶς ᾔσθετο τῆς ἀπεριγράφου τοῦ ὄντος φύσεως καὶ οὐ
γιγνώσκειν ἀλλὰ γιγνώσκεσθαι μόνον. Unfortunately, the text is uncertain at its central point. What is recorded is
that the first book of the Psalms contains some important works, which the Byzantine editor already found difficult.
(See Westerink and Combès (2002) ap. cr. on this passage.) The lectio περιγραφεὶς ᾔσθετο τῆς is a conjecture of
Kroll.
526 This is precisely the core idea of the passage from DP II 162 quoted above, despite the textual difficulty
mentioned above: It is precisely in reflecting on its own constitution that the spirit discovers the ontological
superiority of the purely intelligible, from which it is constituted. Self-knowledge is always accompanied by a
(secondary) knowledge of the higher.
527 DP I 10, 7 – 14.
528 DP I 22, 14 f.: <ἀλλὰ> the prophetess is a prophet of wisdom, and the Son of Man is a prophet.
529 DP I 84, 20: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet.
530 However, Damascius' method of self-abolition also has an effect on this point: the One remains in the immediate
vicinity of the Absolute and is obscured by its "super-ignorance" by remaining in the inaccessible space of that
overwhelming silence (DP I 84, 13 - 21). However, Damascius again emphasizes that the Absolute does not enclose
anything and that the One does not find itself in it either (DP I 24, 8 - 10).
531 DP I 6, 13 – 16: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD (the Son of Man) and of the
LORD his Holiness. ἀληθείας.
532 DP I 62, 14 f.: The name of the prophet is given to the Hebrews as a precursor to the Messiah.
533 DP I 27, 8. See also DP I 5, 19, where Damascius asks: τίς ἡ ἐπέκεινα καὶ τούτου ἀνάβασις ἡμῶν;
534 DP I 57, 5.
535 See Proclus, In Parm. VII 521, 16.
536 A few decades after Damascius, Joannes Climacus (cca. 579 – cca. 649) will undertake a comparison of
“loquacity” and “silence” in his Scala paradisi (Ἡ κλίμαξ τῆς θείας ἀνόδου), Chapter XI. While “talk” (πολυλογία) is
the “sign of ignorance” (ἀγνωσίας τεκμήριον), “the dispersion of the mental concentration” (συννοίας σκορπισμός) or
“the clouding of prayer” (προσευχῆς ἀμαύρωσις), conscious silence or “the silence in knowledge” (σιωπὴ ἐν γνώσει)
is the “mother of prayer” (μήτηρ προσευχῆς), "wife of rest" ( ἡσυχίας σύζυγος), "invisible progress" ( ἀφανὴς
προκοπή), "hidden ascent" (λεληθυῖα ἀνάβασις. PG 88, 852, 10 – 24). The contrast: busy talk – prudent silence is
also found in Damascius. See DP I 8, 14 f.; 11, 17 – 21; 61, 4 – 6. See also Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 111:6:
The prophetess has spoken in heaven.
537 DP I 6, 7 – 13: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of Israel; – he who
has not yet seen the Son of Man, has not yet seen the Son of Man. ἀπορίας (literally "the greatest blessing of all time")
is the blessing of the LORD your God.
538 DP I 6, 14 f.
539 On the consciousness of the mere “existence” and necessity of the ineffable primal ground, which, however, must
remain “empty of content”, see also Vlad (2011) 328 – 331 and 354.
540 [Porphyry] In Parm. II, 16 – 27: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has spoken in the
name of the LORD. αὐτὸν ὑπο<στάν>των νοήσεως ἐπὶ τὴν αὐτοῦ ἄρρητον προ{σ}έννοιαν τὴν ἐνεικονιζομένην
αὐτὸν διὰ σιγῆς οὐδὲ ὅτι Ανεικονίζεται ανεικονίζεται ανατὸν αρακολουθο
ῦ ὐσαν οἰ δέ καθάπαξ εῖδυἀαν, ἀλλ'
οὖσαν μόνον εἰκόνα ἀρρήτου τὸ ἄρρητον ἀρρήτως οὖσαν, ἀλλ' οὐχ ὡς γιγνώσκουσαν, εἴ μοι ὡς χωρ ῶ λέγειν
δύναιο κἂν Άανταστικῶς αρακολουθῆ
ῆ σαι. See Hadot (1968) I, 116 f and II, 68 – 71 with note.
541 For Hadot's correction προ{σ}έννοια see also below 2.3, 192 – 195. The curved brackets in Hadot's edition (1968)
II, 63 indicate litteras vel voces in textu archetypi coniectura delendas .
542 DP I 22, 14 f.
543 DP I 84, 20 f.
544 DP I 68, 4 f.
545 DP I 15, 4.
546 DP I 27, 8 – 10.
547 On the all-encompassing “character” of the Absolute, see DP I 57, 1 – 5.
548 DP I 21, 20.
549 DP I 22, 18 f.
550 DP I 21, 18 – 22: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you. He who has sinned
against Israel, hath sinned against Israel, and hath sinned against Israel, ἐλθε ῖν;
551 DP I 22, 15 – 19.
552 DP I 129, 20 f.
553 DP I 21, 20 – 23.
554 DP I 10, 8: or the prophetess is come to pass.
555 See In Parm. IV 16, 8 f.: τὸ μὲν ἡνωμένον καὶ ὀλύμπιον αὐτῆς (sc. τῆς ψυχῆς) εἶδος. This indicates the
derivation of the soul substance from the "Olympic fortress" of intelligible being. This derivation of the soul from the
intelligible balances the "titanic" counterforce in the soul that is directed towards multiplicity.
556 For the history of the motif of the chamber of the soul, see Chrétien (2014), who traces this metaphor back from
modernity (Freud) to Origen. In his book, Chrétien highlights the tradition of thought that reveals an identity in the
innermost self of man which mostly remains unknown to us. While in modern times the idea of construction is
gradually gaining the upper hand, this identity – symbolized by numerous types of architectural metaphors – is not
constructed, but a mysterious given: “une identité à explorer, et largely inconnue à nous-mêmes” (202). The chamber
of the soul is in a certain sense even inaccessible, because it is a place of encounter with God and can only be accessed
through his grace. For example in relation to Theresa of Avila, Apartments of the Inner Castle (Moradas del Castillo
Interior): “The noise that makes us impose silence on us cannot be found […]. He who makes silence in us cannot be
that which he is, or that which manifests itself in this silence, all as if it were only the centre, and cannot really
concentrate us” (220). This attitude of serenity, which Chrétien developed for a rich mystical tradition, is the exact
opposite of Damascius’ philosophy of odis . Although the Damascus sage turns inward and closes himself off in the
adyton without wanting to take part in the “procession”, this chamber of the soul is empty: no entity dwells there and
we encounter no god in it. Only the awareness of the absolutely unknowable is awakened and deepened by it.
Furthermore, this retreat into silence in Damascius should not be interpreted as a form of quietism. Rather, it is an
act of effort, a persistence in a state of aporrhetic birth pangs. From the silence we have achieved, with every new
approach to thinking, we fall back into “a bold exploration of that Absolute” and thus into the “vestigial halls of the
innermost temple.”
557 DP I 14, 16 – 19.
558 Westerink and Combès (2002) ap. cr. on the above passage.
559 DP I 5, 18 – 20: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your might; for I
have mercy on you, and on all your might. εἰς αὐτὸ τὸ οὐδὲν ἀνατεινόμενοι.
560 DP I 14, 18 f.: And yet the Lord has mercy on us, for we have mercy on us in our hearts.
561 DP I 69, 16.
562 DP I 7, 24 – 8, 5.
563 DP I 5, 19.
564 See DP I 8, 2: ἐκπῖπτον εἰς τὸ ἄρρητον.
565 Martin Heidegger, Contributions to Philosophy (On the Event), GA 65, Frankfurt a. M. 1994, 78 – 80: (37) Being
and its Silence (the Sigetics) and (38) Silence. Cf. Gersh (2014b) 129: “By this (sc. σιγή) he (sc. Damascius) seems to
mean not that we should abandon the traditional philosophical approach to the highest principles but that we should
henceforth pursue it in a more «sigetic» manner”; also Gersh (2014a) 161.
566 See, for example, the article by Lavaud (2007) cited above.
567 See Martin Heidegger, The Ontological Constitution of Metaphysics, in: Ders., Identity and Difference, Pfullingen
1957, 35 – 73: “The difference between beings and existence is the area within which metaphysics, Western thought in
its entirety, can be what it is. The step back therefore moves from metaphysics to the essence of metaphysics” (47).
This “step back” is intended to lead to the actual “matter of thought”, namely “difference as difference” (43, emphasis
MH). The project of thinking “difference as difference” is certainly close to the radical aporrhetics of Damascius.
568 Simplicius, In Phys. 624, 38 ff.
569 Photius, Bibl., cod. 181, 127a10 – 14 Bekker (in Zintzen (1967) in the appendix p. 319): The most important thing
in the history of Judaism is to be found in the Book of Exodus, the Book of Genesis, For the LORD your God is with
you, O LORD, and with you the LORD your God. See also Asmus (1911) 117.
570 Damascius, Vita Isidori, Fr. 227 (see above p. 1, note 1).
571 The authoritative work on Damascius' aporetic method remains Vlad (2004).
572 Cürsgen (2012) 90 (emphasis DC).
573 DP I 129, 20 f.
574 Historical-critical introduction to the philosophy of mythology (1842), in: FWJ Schelling, Selected Writings, I –
VI, ed. M. Frank, Frankfurt a. M. 1985, Vol. V, 11 – 263, here 202. In Schelling’s case, however, the context is
different: God is thought of as the only God in the primordial consciousness, and consequently as a figure that
excludes all other gods. This figure thus becomes the “relatively one God”. From this “relatively one God” the
multiplicity of gods develops after a necessary process (a “fate” of “consciousness”): “Consciousness is suddenly
caught up in this movement in a way that it can no longer understand. It relates to it as fate , as a fate against which it
can do nothing. It is a real power against consciousness , that is, a power no longer in its power, which has taken hold
of it. Before all thinking, it is already taken over by that principle whose only natural consequence is polytheism and
mythology" (Schelling's emphasis). The dependence (which may even mean being at the mercy of) consciousness on a
"real" counterpart - even when this is brought into consciousness - seems to be a common philosophem of the
Damascene and Schelling.
575 DP I 39, 11.
576 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1071, 13 f. The “ineffable consciousness” of the One is indeed opposed to the cognitive
consciousness, which is realized in a “gnostic” reversal: το ῖς δὲ κατὰ τὴν γνῶσιν (sc. ἡ ὄρεξις), συναίσθησις οὖσα
τῆς τῶν αἰτίων ἀγαθότητος (Elem. Theol., prop. 39).
577 In Parm. VI 1072, 3 f.
578 In Parm. VII 505, 31 – 506, 2: The son of a prophet, who is a prophet of the LORD, is a prophet of the LORD
(retroversion by C. Steel). On the consciousness of unity in Proclus see Cürsgen (2007) 238: “Our (mental)
consciousness (συναίσθησις) of the One is neither expressive nor comprehensible, is inspired and pictorial-symbolic,
for the One in us is an image of the Absolute and the «flower of the soul».”
579 Proclus, In Parm. VII 504, 16 – 19: The incapable self (sc. anima) of understanding the incomprehensible ipsius
by knowing the incognitum, acts secondly in the process of participation in indicible perception. (ἀδυνατοῦσα [sc. ἡ
ψυχή] the prophetess has spoken in the temple of the LORD, and she has spoken in the temple of the LORD.) τ ῆς
ἐκείνου μετουσίας ἄρρητον συναίσθησιν , retroversion by C. Steel).
580 In Parm. VII 509, 27 – 35.
581 In Parma. VII 510, 1: in the original text probably σιγωμένη νόησις. See the retro version by C. Steel.
582 DP I 6, 14 – 16.
583 On the topic of consciousness in Plotinus, see Halfwassen (1994) esp. 9 – 33, Hadot (1997) 31 – 44 with the
relevant passages on the problem of consciousness from the Enneads as well as Hadot (1980).
584 Finally, for Proclus, the One even stands beyond silence (In Parm. VII 505, 17 f.).
585 In Parm. VII 521, 16 – 18.
586 A similar process takes place in Plotinus. See Hadot (1997) 40 – 42: ‘It appears then that conscience, not more
than memory, is not the best of things. The activity is more intense, the less conscious it is. […] By turning our
attention inside ourselves, we must also prepare to test the unity of spirit, then return to the plane of conscience to
recognize that it is "us" who are "low" and lose a new conscience to find our true self in God."
587 See also Werner Beierwaltes' remark that it is "an essential element of metaphysical thinking in general" to "
make the transcendent ground of the 'transcendental' structure of thinking conscious in the thinking itself "
(Beierwaltes (1975) 191, emphasis WB).
588 DP I 5, 13; 24, 4 – 10. The actual “wall” around the “temple area” of holistic being is the One (τὸ ἕν). But the
One is at least the “symbol” of the Aporrheton.
589 DP I 7, 24 f.: He has learned to read and write in Hebrews 10:11, 12 and 13, and to read in Hebrews 10:11, 12 and
13. See also Napoli (2008) 330 – 371, Vlad (2011) 320 – 323.
590 In Parma. IV 115, 14: ἀχάνεια.
591 DP I 62, 11: τοῦ γὰρ ἑνὸς ἐπέκεινα οὐδὲν ὑπονοεῖν δυνάμεθα. The awareness that not even the intuition can
touch the Absolute is formulated by Damascius in the paradoxical, self-cancelling question: "How will we be able to
intuit that there is something beyond the ultimate intuition and the ultimate concept?" (DP I 6, 10 f.). See also DP I
14, 5 f.
592 In Parma. IV 115, 8 – 11: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the LORD hath commanded him, and
the LORD hath commanded him of the Son of Man. The name of the Lord is ὁπωστιο ῦν.
593 DP I 5, 19 f.: The prophetess is the son of a prophet.
594 DP I 7, 25 – 8, 5: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, has not
yet eaten anything μηδαμῶς ὑπάρχον, ἄρρητον μὲν γὰρ καὶ τοῦτο, ὥς φησι καὶ Πλάτων, ἀλλὰ κατὰ τὸ
κρεῖττον, ἐκεῖνο δὲ κατὰ τὸ κρεῖττον.
595 See DP I 16, 15: ἡμέτερον τὸ δόξασμα καὶ ἐν ἡμῖν κενεμβατοῦν.
596 In Parma. IV 117, 16 – 23: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth, For the
Damascene commentary on the seventh hypothesis of Parmenides, see especially Cürsgen (2007) 434 – 440, where
the relationship between the privative nothing and the subjective faculty of imagination is revealed. For a general
interpretation of the last four hypotheses of Parmenides, see Combès (1989b).
597 DP I 8, 18.
598 DP I 7, 20 – 24: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has spoken in the name of the
LORD. ὸ ἄνω τὰς ἡμετέρας ἐννοίας τιμιώτερον προχειροτέρου, ὥστε τιμιώτατον ἂν εἴη τὸ πάσας ἐκπεφευγὸς
ἄὰς ἡμετέρας ὑπονοίας.
599 In Parm. IV 115, 14.
600 In Parma. IV 118, 20 – 119, 1: For the first time in history, when the sun is shining, the sky is shining, and the
stars are shining. For the Lord is with thee, and thee cometh not into thin air. The further downwards the first
principles extend, the more the privative, imagined nothingness retreats into the unsayable and the unhypostatic. The
French editors even translate: “the only, always private, properties which are closer to him, are always presumed
[more closely] by the first, even though they tend to be always more distant” (Westerink and Combès (1997) IV, 118
f.).
601 DP I 8, 6 – 11: He has learned the wisdom of the Lord, and has taught us many things, and has taught us many
things. προϊέναι, ἔκτε μ΀πορρήτου and καὶ τὸν μ΀όρρητον τρόπον.
602 That is, from “that” principle.
603 That is, into this non-being, which is spoken of in the seventh hypothesis.
604 In Parma. IV 120, 12 – 20: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet. He has spoken to the
prophets, and has spoken to the Son of Man. ὑποτεθὲν ὡς οἷόν τε διαφθείρει πάντα καὶ ἀφανίζει. He who has not
yet eaten anything eaten by a child, has given up his mind on the word "baby" (the word "baby"). συναναιρε ῖν), ἀλλὰ
κατὰ τὰς ἀρρήτους ἡμῶν ἐννοίας, καθ' ἃς ὁρῶμεν ἐκεῖθεν μὲν πάντα ἐκφαινόμενα, ἐνταῦθα δὲ ἀφανιζόμενα.
605 DP I 6, 14 – 16.
606 DP I 86, 17.
607 DP I 16, 18 f.
608 DP I 9, 20 – 22: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee. The Lord Jesus
Christ is with you, Father. See Pol. 273d6 – 7.
609 DP I 16, 9 – 17: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall be with you forever. The Lord your God, He
will bring you peace and harmony. Ὥσπερ οὖν τούτων οὐκ ὄντων δόξας ἀναλαμβάνομεν, ὡς ὄντων, φαντασιώδεις
καὶ πεπλασμένας (ἐπεὶ καὶ τὸν ἥλιον ποδιαῖον δοξάζομεν, οὐκ ὄντα τηλικοῦτον), οὕτως εἴ τι δοξάζομεν ἢ περὶ
τοῦ μηδαμῶς ὄντος ἢ περὶ οὗ ταῦτα γράφομεν, ἡμέτερον τὸ δόξασμα καὶ ἐν ἡμῖν κενεμβατοῦν· ὃ καὶ αἱροῦντες
οἰόμεθα ἐκεῖνο αἱρεῖν, τό δ'ἐστὶν οὐδὲν πρὸς ἡμᾶς, οὕτως ἐκβέβηκεν τὴν ἡμετέραν ἔννοιαν.
610 DP I 62, 7 – 9: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken by men (but not by men), but by men who are not wise
men.
611 In Parma. IV 119, 9 – 17: For the LORD hath given thee a holy commandment, and the LORD thy God hath given
thee a holy commandment, τοῦ ἑνὸς ὄντος˙ τοῦτο γάρ ἐστιν τὸ ἰκεδαννύμενον εῦς Άθοράν, καὶ πρὸς τοὡτο, ὡς
ἔοικεν, ἀντίκειται μάλιστα τὸ μηδαμῶς ὄν, ὡς τούτου στέρησις ὂν ἡ παντελής, ὥστε μηδὲ εἶναι στέρησις ὃ
λέγεται, ἅτε μὴ συνηρτημένη τῷ ὄντι, ὡς ὀφθαλμῷ τυφλότης, ἀλλὰ but in the midst of the multitude of angels,
612 DP I 9, 21 f. with clear reference to Plato, Pol. 273d6 – 7.
613 This refers to the negations of the seventh hypothesis of Plato’s Parmenides .
614 In Parma. IV 114, 10 f.: The prophetess has spoken in the old Testament, and her name is Aramaic.
615 In Parma. IV 116, 2 – 8: The prophetess is in the same boat as the prophet, “the prophetess” is in the same boat
with the prophets, πρὸς αὐτὸ τῆς μενατεινομένην ὠδῖνα, αὖθις δὲ ἀναιροῦσα, κατὰ τὴν ἄληπτον αὐτοῦ πάντῃ
ὑπὸ πάντων ὑπερβολήν· ἐνταῦθα δὲ ἡμετέρας ἐννοίας, οὐδὲ δόκησιν ἀπολείπουσα τοῦ ἑνός.
616 DP I 6, 14.
617 In Parma. IV 117, 27 – 118, 3: For the LORD hath given thee a holy commandment, and thy name is in the name
of thy God, and thy name is in the name of thy God. στέρησις, ὅτι οὐδέποτε φθείρεται πάντα.
618 The subject-theoretical revolution that occurred with Damascius' thinking was especially highlighted by Cürsgen
(2007).
619 See the reference in the edition of C. Steel, Proclus, In Parm. VI, 1065.
620 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1065, 2 – 4: For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all the children of Judah, and
with you all the children of Judah. Also 7 f.: “…that, as we have already said, this, which the discourse now carries out
a complete negation, is by no means unhypostatic” (ὅτι δέ, ὥσπερ ἔφην, ο ὐκ ἀνυπόστατον το ῦτο ο ὗ πάντα
ἀποφάσκει νῦν ὁ λόγος, δῆλον).
621 For Damascius, the Absolute is that which “completely transcends the hypostatic reality, so that it is not
hypostasized at all, neither by another nor by itself” (τὸ πάντῃ τὴν ὑπόστασιν ἐκβεβηκός, ὡς μηδαμῶς ὑφεστάναι
μήτε ἀπ' ἄλλου μήτε ἀφ' ἑαυτοῦ, DP II 135, 9 – 11).
622 For this complex of ideas see especially Steel (1994) esp. 85 – 95: “Proclus, par contre, a recours au terme
ὕπαρξις pour designer un type d'existence qui sans toute essence et toute substance, c'est-à-dire la réalité divine de
l'Un et des Hénades” (86 f.).
623 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1066, 4 – 12: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the greatest sinner, and the Son of Man is the
greatest sinner, and the Son of Man is the greatest sinner. τὴν οὐσίαν. He has given birth to several children of
Judah, and has given birth to two children of Judah. ἀλλὰ μὴν οὐχὶ τὴν οὐσίαν∙ πᾶν γὰρ τὸ οὐσίαν∙ γὰρ
τοιοῦτον μετέχει χρόνου ὡς γένεσις· τοῦ δὲ ἑνὸς ἀποφάσκει and καὶ αὐτὸ τοῦτο τὸ χρόνου μετέχειν· καὶ ἔστι
πως ὡς ἡ ὕλη· τοῦτο δὲ οὐδὲ εἶναι δείκνυσιν· ὑπὲρ τὴν οὐσίαν ἄρα ἐστὶ τοῦτο, περὶ οὗ αἱ The Lord has mercy
on me and my people.
624 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1072, 3 – 6: The prophetess is the first to be baptized, the first to be baptized, the last to be
baptized – and the last to be baptized τοῦ ὄντος ἀποφάσκονται το ῦ ἑνὸς – ἐν θείον δὲ ὁρμῆς ἐν τῇ μενα τοῦ
πάντων ἐξῃρημένου τῶν ὄντων, ἵνα μὴ λάθωμεν ἐκον μὴ ὂν καὶ τὴν ἀχάνειαν αὐτοῦ διὰ τῆς ἀορίστου
Άαντασίας ἀπωσθέντες.
625 In Parma. VI 1082, 5 – 12: But the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and I will give
you thanks for your mercy. I have not received the letter of the Lord Jesus Christ, but I have received the letter of the
Lord Jesus Christ, and I have not received the letter of the Lord Jesus Christ. ἐξ ῃρημένον α ὐτὸ ὄντων λέγομεν
μόνον, ἵνα πρὸς τὸ ἀόριστον ὑπενεχθέντες λάθωμεν, καὶ φανταστικῶς τὸ ὄν, ἀλλ' οὐκ ἐνθεαστικῶς
προβάλλωμεν, τοῦτο γὰρ ἡμᾶς οὐ τοῦ ἑνὸς ἀποστήσει μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ τῆς ὄντος γνώσεως.
626 This is one of the main theses of the article by Béguin (2013). Combès (1989a) has also emphasized, especially at
104, that the aporrheton does not really indicate the “unsayability” of the first principle, but rather the impossibility
of speech itself.
627 See Béguin (2013) 559 f.: ‘It remains now to articulate this necessary formulation by reversing the discourse with
the meaning of the term ἀπόρρητον, that Damascius preferred everything else, in order to show that this implicit
appeal does not amount to an “indicable” which cannot be brought back inextricably what is not on the divination in
the circle of determinations and negations, but in an ineffable way the main interest lies in the preposition ἀπο-: the
indicative proves that everything comes from an ineffable and quite secret manner that one cannot understand from
this sacred source, but above all the abruptness and radical rejection of the ineffable (by rapport with the discourse,
with thought, with everything) which a simple private person cannot express” (emphasis VB).
628 See Béguin (2013) 563: ‘the sense of the word is before it leaves or withdraws … ’ (emphasis VB).
629 That the term ἀπόρρητον also has a religious connotation is evident, for example, from Iamblichus, De myst.
(Saffrey) 28, 12 – 14, where it is said that certain cultic acts have a reason that is “unspeakable” (here probably in the
sense of what one may not say ) : For the sake of the Lord, the Son of Man is a prophet, and the Son of Man is a
prophet. αἰτίαν ἔχει. For the difference between ἄρρητον and ἀπόρρητον see also Vlad (2011) 355 f. Vlad sees the
difference between the two terms in the fact that ἄρρητον describes the “unsayable” as opposed to the “sayable”,
while ἀπόρρητον implies the transcendence beyond this opposition.
630 Thus, Damascius speaks in his commentary on Parmenides of that “what we call ‘ineffable’ – in the sense of the
higher one principle or in the sense of the lower realm of matter” (In Parm. IV 115, 6 f.: ὅπερ ἀπόρρητον λέγομεν, ἢ
ἄνω [λέγομεν] ὡς τὴν μίαν αἰτίαν ἢ κάτω περὶ τὴν ὕλην).
631 Paul Celan, Strähne, in the poetry collection From Threshold to Threshold (1955): Barbara Wiedemann (ed.),
Paul Celan. The Poems. Annotated edition in one volume, Frankfurt a. M. 2003, 66.
632 See DP I 7, 15 f.
633 DP I 8, 6 – 11.
634 DP I 6, 20 – 22.
635 Proclus, In Parm. VII 501, 4 – 9.
636 DP I 20, 10 f.
637 DP I 8, 12 – 16.
638 DP I 25, 21 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
639 Plotinus, Enn. V 5, 12, 33 f. Trans. R. Harder et al. For this saying, see Plotinus Hadot (1997) 80.
640 DP I 24, 11 – 25, 9.
641 DP I 25, 10 – 12.
642 Plato, Parm. 142c7 – 143a2.
643 DP I 25, 9 – 18.
644 DP I 26, 3 – 5.
645 DP I 75, 3 – 5: The prophetess is the son of a prophet, and the prophetess is the son of a prophet. ἀεὶ μεταξύ,
καὶ τοῦτο ἐπ' ἄπειρον.
646 DP I 26, 5 – 8.
647 On the Damascene “introduction of an element of ‘unspeakability’ into every discourse and into the reality
reflected by that discourse” see also Gersh (2014b) 131 f. (my translation).
648 In Parma. I 12, 19 – 13, 10: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your
might. ἐξῃρημένον ἀεὶ τῶν ἐφεξῆς· and καὶ οὔτε γεννητικόν οὔτε ἄγονον ἄξιον καλεῖσθαι, ὅτι ὑπὲρ πάντα ταῦτα
πρὸς τὰ μετ' αὐτὸ, ὡς ἡ in the morning the sun shines through.
649 DP I 22, 15 – 19.
650 DP I 6, 8.
651 On the paradoxical “causality” of the Absolute in Damascius, see also Napoli (2008) 275 – 311.
652 See, for example, DP I 78, 23. See also DP I 79, 9 f.
653 In Parm. IV 117, 10 f.
654 In Parma. I 13, 4 – 10: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge, has not yet eaten anything, has not
yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything ἑαυτο ῦ, or at least the prophetic word, or at least the prophetic word,
or at least the prophetic word, or at least the prophetic word, or ὑμνουμένη, ο ὐ προϊο ῦσα, ἀλλὰ διὰ πάντων ἀμιγῶς
χωροῦσα, καὶ πανταχοῦ τῶν δι' ὧν πάρεισιν ἐξῃρημένη ἐφ' ἑαυτῆς.
655 On the idea that a (super-)intelligible metaphysical entity can be present to its principalities “in an unmixed
manner,” cf. Iamblichus, De myst (Saffrey) 23, 17 – 25: “Now as light encompasses the objects it illuminates, so too
has the power of the gods encompassed from without the things that participate in it. And just as light is present in
the air in an unmixed manner - for this is evident from the fact that nothing of light remains in the air once the source
of light has disappeared, while heat still remains in the air even after the radiator has been removed - so too the light
of the gods illuminates in a transcendent manner and passes through the totality of beings, remaining constantly in
itself" (Ὥσπερ οὖν τὸ φῶς περιέχει τὰ φωτιζόμενα, οὑτωσὶ καὶ τῶν θεῶν ἡ δύναμις τὰ The Lord has mercy on
you. He has mercy on you in the sight of the LORD - he has mercy on you in the sight of the LORD. καταλείπεσθαι
καταλείπεσθαι φῶς ἐπειδὰν ἀναχωρήσῃ, καίτοι θερμότητος αὐτῷ παρούσης ἐπειδὰν τὸ θερμαῖνον ἐκποδὼν
ἀπέλθῃ – neither can one nor the other undergo a mortal wound , nor can one learn from this sin . See also
14, 19; 24:3 – 6: For the LORD your God (sc. τῶν θε ῶν φ ῶς) and the LORD your God are with you, for he has given
us peace and love, and we have no fear of God.
656 This is the most important commonality between Hegel and Damascius. See, for example, Hegel's
Phenomenology of Spirit, Frankfurt a. M. 1989, 273 (AA.Ba The Pleasure and the Necessity): "Unity, difference and
relationship are categories, each of which is nothing in and of itself, only in relation to its opposite, and which
therefore cannot separate. They are related to one another through their concept , for they are the pure concepts
themselves; and this absolute relationship and abstract movement constitutes necessity" (emphasis Hegel).
657 On Damascius' relationship to his Neoplatonic predecessors, see: Galpérine (1990), Combès (1989d).
658 Cf. Iamblichus, De myst. (Saffrey) 20, 1 – 6: In the “higher” entities the “lower” ones are produced in a primary
way (πρώτως). From the former, the order, the measure and “that which the individual entities are” (καὶ αὐτὰ ἅπερ
ἐστὶν ἕκαστα) pass to the latter.
659 DP I 80, 12 – 15.
660 See also Combès (1989a) 109: ‘Celles-ci (sc. les henades) tissent la résprimable at the base of the radical negation
of the first hypothesis , as the process has not advanced to rely on the absolute power of deconstitution because the ineffable
does not seem to us to be noticeable. […] It is more ineffective to withdraw, more the spirit becomes confined by
conversion to absence.” From a systematic point of view, the dialectical relationship between transcendence and
wholeness is also addressed by Struve (1969) 23.
661 On the dialectical “unrest” cf. DP I 9, 1 – 3: For the rest of us shall have peace and quiet, and shall have peace
and quiet together. καὶ περιτρεπομένας. The metaphysical fruitfulness of the Damascene “restlessness”
corresponds to the positive evaluation of “unrest” (ἀδημονία) in the sense of “worry” or “contrition” in Joannes
Climacus: In the Scala paradisi (Ἡ κλίμαξ τῆς θείας ἀνόδου), chap. XI, it is said that conscious silence (σιωπὴ ἐν
γνώσει) is “the servant of contrition,” in the sense of restlessness concerned about the salvation of the soul
(ἀδημονίας ὑπουργός. PG 88, 852, 15 – 24).
662 Bréhier (1955) 270: ‘The essential idea of this method is the idea of various degrees of union which can exist
between the terms of a single plurality’. Combès (1989a) 109 speaks very aptly of a ‘degradation of the mixes of
ontological discourse’.
663 For Damascius' theory of time, in which the concept of "total time" plays an eminent role, see Galpérine (1980),
Cürsgen (2018).
664 DP I 61, 1 – 4: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken by men, and by men is spoken by men; for he has spoken
in the name of the Lord, and by men is spoken by men. He has no right to be afraid, he has no right to be afraid, he
has no right to be afraid.
665 DP I 61, 4 – 6: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
προθυμίας.
666 Sextus Empiricus, PH I 12, 28.
667 DP I 56, 15: ἄθετον.
668 DP I 6, 13 – 16.
669 Important interpretations of Damascus henology are: Cürsgen (2007) 335 – 359, Napoli (2008) passim , Metry-
Tresson (2012) 274 – 290 and passim.
670 DP I 62, 13 – 17: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the greatest prophet of all, and the Son of Man is the greatest
prophet of all. ἁπλῶς, ἢ τὸ ζητούμενόν ἐστι μέσον τοῦ ἀπορρήτου and καὶ τοῦ ῥητοῦ. The question of the
relationship between the One on the one hand and the instance that mediates the inexpressible and the sayable on the
other hand has already been asked: “We will now begin again and examine the One to see whether it is to be placed
immediately after the absolutely inexpressible or whether, as with the other intervals, we must place something in
between the inexpressible and the sayable” (DP I 62, 1 – 4: Πάλιν τοίνυν ἀφ' ἑτέρας ἀρχ ῆς περὶ τοῦ ἑνὸς ζητητέον,
ἓν μὲν εἰ μετὰ τὸ Τάντῃ ἀπόρρητον τὸ ἓν τακτέον, <ἢ> ὡς ἐπὶ τῶν ἄλλων διαστάσεων μεταξύ τι θετέον τοῦ
ἀπορρήτου καὶ τοῦ ῥητοῦ).
671 DP I 62, 18 – 63, 1: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet. He has spoken to the
prophetess, and he has spoken to the prophetess. For the LORD your God is with you, for he has mercy on you.
672 See Napoli (2008) 235: ‘If, according to Damascio, a critical analysis of the nature of one on the basis of the
associative parameters in which the modes of transport are concentrated leads to a failure to identify with the
principle in which he is trying to capture the principle of one , it should also be noted that, at last, one cannot restore
or perceive this principle if one does not accept it. […] According to this aspect of the Damascus protology, full of
apocalyptic implications, it is not even possible to speak dialectically of the totally ineffective principle and to refrain
from searching for the last one without speaking of oneself and for oneself. The debate on the ineffable principle
appears structurally different from the debate on one, which, in turn, stops and leads to the need for the totally
ineffable principle” (emphasis VN).
673 DP I 63, 3.
674 Cuersgen (2007) 336.
675 DP I 75, 18 – 76, 2: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet. But the LORD your God is
with you, and with you all, and with all your might, and with all your heart. He has taught us the art of teaching and is
a teacher of Hebrews.
676 See Westerink and Combès (2002) I, 63: ‘The contraction method’.
677 DP I 63, 4 – 8.
678 DP I 63, 9 – 13.
679 DP I 63, 13 – 20.
680 These words are undoubtedly an allusion to the Chaldean oracles.
681 DP I 64, 8 – 65, 10.
682 DP I 65, 11 – 66, 11.
683 DP I 66, 12 – 67, 3.
684 DP I 67, 4 – 18.
685 DP I 68, 1 – 10.
686 DP I 68, 11 – 69, 4.
687 DP I 69, 5 – 8.
688 DP I 69, 9 – 70, 18.
689 DP I 70, 19 – 71, 20.
690 DP I 71, 21 – 72, 11.
691 DP I 72, 12 – 15.
692 DP I 72, 16 – 73, 12. For this comparison of arguments see also Cürsgen (2007) 336 f.
693 Cf. Cürsgen (2007) 336.
694 DP I 67, 8 f.: For the Lord is with thee, and thee is with thee, and thee is with thee.
695 Cf. Cürsgen (2007) 338.
696 DP I 76, 6 – 11: He has given birth to a child, a child of the LORD, and a child of the LORD. and the devil. He
who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a child, has not eaten anything by a child, has not eaten anything by a child,
has not eaten anything by a child ἕν. The prophetess is a prophet of wisdom, and she has mercy on us. See also DP III
153, 12 – 18. Cf. Plotinus, Enn. V 4, 1, 36 – 38.
697 DP II 74, 6 f.
698 DP I 73, 14 – 18: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father. He who has been
in the service of the LORD is infirm; he who has been in the service of the LORD is infirm; he who has been in the
service of the LORD is infirm. The Lord has mercy on us.
699 In this way, Damascius radicalizes a Porphyrian idea. See [Porph.] In Parm. X, 29 – 32.
700 DP I 74, 14.
701 DP I 75, 1 f.
702 DP I 75, 6 – 8: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and I will give you thanks
for your mercy. διακρίνειν ἀπὸ τῶν μετ' αὐτό, or καὶ αὖ ἐκεῖνα ἀφ' ἑαυτοῦ.
703 For the Damascene understanding of the Neoplatonic πρόοδος concept, see Galpérine (1987) 65 – 89, Mazilu
(2011) 114 – 118.
704 DP I 76, 11 – 14: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on him; for the Lord Jesus Christ is
with us, and we have mercy on him. ἐρρίζωται τὸ ἕν ἐστι διὰ τὸ ἕν.
705 DP I 76, 15.
706 DP I 76, 16 – 19: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might.∙
ἐπεὶ καὶ τὸ οὐχ ἕν, ὅ τί ποτε ἂν ᾖ παρὰ τὸ ἕν, ὅμως ἔτι ἐστὶν ἓν κατὰ μέθεξιν διὰ τὸ γενέσθαι οὐχ ἕν.
707 Cf. Julian, Letter 48, 288B-C: …he who has been a slave of the king, has become a slave of the king. The concept
of metaphysical apostasy ultimately goes back to Plotinus; see e.g. B. Enn. V 1, 1, 5 – 11: “They (the individual souls)
took pleasure in this self-determination when they appeared, they gave themselves over to their own movement, so
they ran the opposite way and came to a great distance: and therefore they also forgot that they themselves came from
up there” (trans. R. Harder et al. Τῷ δὴ αὐτεξουσίῳ ἐπειδήπερ ἐφάνησαν ἡσθεῖσαι, πολλῷ τῷ κινεῖσθαι παρ'
αὐτῶν κεχρημέναι, τὴν ἐναντίαν δραμοῦσαι and καὶ πλείστην μπόστασιν
ἠ ἑ
εποιημέναι, ἠγνόησαν καὶ ἑαυτὰς
ἐκεῖθεν εἶναι).
708 DP I 76, 23 – 77, 5: For the LORD hath given thee a commandment, and the LORD thy God, and the LORD thy
God, and the LORD thy God. The Lord Jesus Christ is with you in all his glory, for he has mercy on us all.
διακρίνουσαν ὕπαρξιν· οὐδ' ὕπαρξις εἴη τινὸς ἄνευ τοῦ ἑνός, ὥστε καὶ τὴν ὕπαρξιν ἡμέθεξις υνίστησι,
ῦ τοῦτο δέ
ἐστι, the son of a prophet is a prophet.
709 DP I 73, 18 – 74, 3: He who has not yet eaten anything eats a porridge, has not yet eaten anything, has not yet
eaten anything, ἀλλὰ καθό γε ἕν, ἔτι τῷ ἑνὶ σύνεστι, μᾶλον δὲ οὐδὲ προῆλθεν κατά γε τὸ ἓν ἀπὸ τοῦ ἑνός·
ἀλλ' οὐδὲ κατὰ τὸ οὐχ ἕν, ἀλλ' ἀεὶ προλαμβάνει τὸ ἓν τοῦ οὐχ ἑνὸς ὅπως δήποτε διάκρισιν, ὥστε οὐδὲ
ἐπιστρέφει διαν, ἀφ' οὗ μὴ προῆλθεν.
710 For the complex of ideas of one-sided turning away from the One, see also Hadot (1997) 80 f.
711 DP I 77, 10 – 13: He who has been in the service of the Lord Jesus Christ is in heaven, He has given birth to a
child. See also Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 172, 3 – 6: The demons receive the gifts of the angels from God, but
they close their “eyes” to these gifts (Kαὶ τὰς δοθείσας αὐτοῖς ἀγγελικὰς δωρεάς, οὐ μήποτε αὐτὰς ἠλλοιῶσθαί
φαμεν, ἀλλ' εἰσὶ καὶ ὁλόκληροι καὶ Ταμφαεῖς εἰσι, κἂν αὐτοὶ μὴ ὁρῶσιν ἀπομύσαντες ἑαυτῶν τὰς
ἀγαθοπτικὰς δυνάμεις).
712 The same one-sided opposition also prevails, for example, within the relationship between form and matter,
albeit in the modality of the ontologically inferior. Because difference is an idea, one can only speak of a difference
between the eidetic and matter from the point of view of the former. If one could take the point of view of matter, it
would not differ at all from the idea: "Form is different from matter. But is matter also different from form?
Difference is indeed a form. Consequently, matter is not different. Form differs from matter, but the latter does not
differ; rather, difference remains in form and is not able to advance to matter" (DP I 77, 16-20). The relationship
between one and matter is analogous to the correspondence between absolute and privative nothingness that we have
worked out above.
713 DP I 77, 13 – 15: Kαὶ μὴ φοβώμεθα τὰς λογικὰς ἀξιώσεις· ἐπὶ γὰρ τῶν ὁμοφύλων αὗται χώραν ἔχουσιν,
ἐφ' ὧν τὰ πρός τι ἰσάξιά πως ἢ ὁμοφυῆ. (For this figure of thought, see also Iamblichus, De myst. (Saffrey) 8, 3 f.)
Thus, beyond Proclus, Damascius makes a return to Plotinian views; see Halfwassen (1994) 16: "The activity of the
understanding is constituted by the fact that it keeps opposing determinations apart, its principle is the law of
contradiction to be avoided; if the understanding could view itself as the activity of keeping opposites apart, then it
would have to see itself as encompassing the opposites, and thus perish as a discursive understanding." On the law of
contradiction in Platonism, see also Halfwassen (2015).
714 See Porfirio, Lettera ad Anebo (Sodano) 4 f. apud Euseb. Preparation. evang. V, 10, 10, I 244, 6 – 10 Mras: He has
not yet given up his profession, nor has he given up his profession […], nor has he given up his profession, nor has he
given up his profession. μήνιδος ἐξιλάσεις καὶ ἔτι μᾶλον αἱ λεγόμεναι ἀνάγκαι θεῶν. He has no right to be afraid,
nor does he know that the Lord is with him. For Sodano’s edition, see the review by Nock (1960).
715 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 33, 20.
716 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 32, 18 – 33, 3: He who has been in the service of the Lord is in heaven, ἀποστροφή,
ἣν αὐτοὶ ἀποστρέψαντες, ὥσπερ ἐν μεσημβρίᾳ φωτὸς κατακαλυψάμενοι, σκότος ἑαυτοῖς ἐπηγάγομενοι
ἀπεστερήσαμεν ἑαυτοὺς τῆς θεῶν ἀγαθῆς δόσεως. For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on you,
and on all your mighty works. κοινωνίαν προσαγαγεῖν καὶ μετεχόμενά καὶ μεταλαμβάνοντα πρὸς ἄλληλα. See also
42:9-13 (comparison with a sick person who denies the usefulness of sunlight from the point of view of “his own
conditions”). For the idea of the one-sided opposition between the intelligible (gods) and the beings that participate in
it, see Proclus, Elem. Theol., prop. 142: For the LORD hath given thee atonement, and the LORD thy God hath given
thee atonement.
717 DP I 116, 1 – 4: He who has not yet eaten anything in the morning, has not yet eaten anything in the morning, nor
has he eaten anything in the morning. the son of a prophet is a prophet.
718 On the topic of “repetition of the One in the medium of a minimal difference” see also Gabriel (2009) 276.
719 DP I 78, 1 – 19: He has learned from the prophetess the prophetess, who has spoken of the prophetess in the
temple of the LORD. διάκρισιν, ἵνα μὴ μόνον τὸ ἓν αὐτῷ παρῇ, ἀλλὰ καὶ αὐτὸ τῷνί; He who has eaten and
drank water has become a household name, for he has not eaten anything. Ὡς ὰρ ἕκαστον ἀπ' αὐτοῦ διακρίνεσθαι
πέφυκεν, οὕτω καὶ ἐπιστρέφειν πρὸς αὐτὸ δύναται· καὶ ὥσπερ αὐτὸ μένει ἀδιάκριτον πρὸς ἕκαστον
διακριόμενον, οὕτω καὶ πρὸς ἕκαστον ἐπιστρεφόμενον τὸ αὐτὸ μένει, καὶ ἓν τέλος ἁπάντων ἐστὶν ἀδιάκριτον·
ὡς δὲ τὸ ὂν ἑκάστῳ προϊόντι σύνεστι τῷ ἐκείνου καλούμενον ἰδιώματι, οἷον οὐσιῶδες ἕν, καὶ ζωτικὸν ἕν, καὶ
νοερὸν ἕν, αὐτὸ μὲν πανταχοῦ ἕν, ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν μετεχόντων αρονομαζόμενον
ὔ (but the οὐπω μερισθὲν αὐτό
φημι ταῖς ῖολλαἰς ῶδιότησι τῶν θεἀ ν, ἁλλὰ τὸ ῶπλἐ ς ἑν ῳκάστἓ ῦν πρὸ τοἑ ῶνὸς θεωρῶ, καλὐ δὲ αὅτὸ ὅμως
ἀπὸ τῶν οἷς πάρεστι, κἂν ἀδιάφορον ᾖ καὶ πᾶν ἓν ἑκαστάχου), οὕτω δήπου καὶ τέλει νντι αὐτῷ κατὰ τὴν
ἑαυτοῦ διάκρισιν μΕκαστον διάκρισιν ἀππὸ τῆς ἑαυτοῦ ἐκεῖθεν τελειώσεως ὀνομάζει αὐτὸ, τοιοῦτον τιθέμενον
εἶναι, οἵῳ ἐνέτυχε, καὶ οἵου ἔτυχε.
720 See Combès (1994) especially 135 – 137 (on the ὕπαρξις of the One). On the importance of ὕπαρξις for
Damascius see also Galpérine (1990) 58.
721 DP I 78, 20 – 79, 3: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, nor has he eaten anything at
all. Άαίνεται ὡς ἴδιον τέλος· ἃ γὰρ πάντα μεμερισμένως ἐστί, ταῦτα ἐκεῖνο κατὰ τὸ ἕν, οὐ δυνάμει, ὡς ἂν οἰηθείη
τις, οὐδὲ κατ' αἰτίαν τὴν οὔπω ὄντων, ἀλλ' εἰ θέμις εἰπεῖν, καθ' ὕπαρξιν οὖσάν τε καὶ ὄντων, ἀλλὰ μίαν, καὶ
μίαν μίαν.
722 DP I 79, 11 f. Cf. Combès (1994) 135: ‘From this point of view, the intrinsic necessity is that which is simply
produced and englobed by everything, regardless of causality and even by reason’.
723 DP I 79, 3 – 8: For the Lord is with thee, and thee is with thee, and thee is with thee, and thee is with thee, and
thee is with thee. εἶναι, ἀλλὰ τῷ συναμφότερον ὑπὲρ ἑκάτερον, ὡς δὲ ἀκριβέστερον εἰπεῖν, ὑπὲρ τὸ
συναμφότερον· πάντα γάρ ἐστιν οὐκ ἀπὸ τῆς διακρίσεως, ἀλλὰ πρὸ τῆς διακρίσεως.
724 DP I 80, 16 – 21: He has not given up on the law; he has not given up on the law. O'Neill's son, καὶ τοῦτο γὰρ
διακρίσεως, εἰ καὶ τοῦτο ἀληθές, ὡς ἀντικείμενον τὸ γιγνώσκεται· οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν τοιούτων ἐκείνῳ ἁρμόζει,
οὐδὲ τὸ ἓν ἁρμόζει, οὐδὲ τὰ πάντα· ἀντίκειται γὰρ καὶ ταῦτα καὶ μερίζει ἡμῶν τὴν ἔννοιαν.
725 DP I 83, 7 – 14: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, has not yet eaten anything.
ἀληθὲς ἑκάτερον· and καὶ ἐπειδὰν αὐτῷ πόρρωθεν ἑνωϸῶμεν, ὑπερβάντες ἡμῶν τὸ γνωστικὸν τοῦ εἰς τὸ
ἄγνωστον εἶναι γνωστικοῦ. He who has eaten and drank milk of his fathers is called 'the devil.' He who has eaten and
drunk milk of his fathers is called 'the devil.' For the obvious Plotinian allusions in this passage, see Westerink and
Combès (2002) I, 73 with note 4.
726 DP I 82, 9 – 83, 6: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, nor eats the bread of his
mouth. Τουνινεύουσαν κορυφήν ελευτῶσιν, ὥσπερ εἴς τινα σύμπτωσιν, οἷον κατὰ τὸ κέντρον ἐν κύκλῳ, τὰ
πέρατα τῶν ἀπὸ τῆς εριφερείας
ἐ Ͻπειγομένωἰ εῶς τὸ κέντρον πολλὐ ν εῶθειὕ ν. Kαὶ οἔ τω δὲ ἔχουσι
μεμερισμένως μέν, εἰς δὲ τὸ ἀμέριστον παραβαλλομένοις, ἴχνος τι γνώσεως προδιασείεται το ῦ ε ἴδους ἐν ἡμ ῖν,
ὥσπερ τοῦ κέντρου ἀφανοῦς ὄντος, παρέχεταί τινα ἀμυδρὰν ἔμφασιν ἡ τοῦ κύκλου πρὸς τὸ μέσον ἐπ' ἴσης
ἐ
ανταχόθεν ἐπινοουμένη my sorrows. He who has learned to read and write is instructive, wise men, and teaches us to
read and write, ἀμέριστον οὐ μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ ἡνωμένον, τὰ ἐν ἑκάστῳ πολλὰ συγχέαντες, εἰ χρὴ οὕτως εἰπεῖν∙
εἶτα καὶ πάντα ὁμοῦ λαβόντες διακεκριμένα καὶ τὰς ἀ
εριγραφὰς ὥνελόντες, ὕ σπερ πολλὰ ἓ δατα ὕν ὕδωρ
οιοἀντες ὅ περίγραφον, πλὴν ὐτι οἐ τὸ ἡκ πάντων ἐ νωμένον ῦπινοοὡμεν ἓ ς τὸ ὕν ἀδωρ, ἀλλὰ τὸ πρὸ ΀άντων,
ῦ
ὡς τὸ ὕδατος εἶδος πρὸ τῶν διωρισμένων ὑδάτων. For the LORD your God is with you, for he has given you peace,
and you have no fear of sin. The name of the Lord is He. On the “over-simplification” see also DP I 79, 11 f.: κατὰ
ὕπαρξιν τὴν ἀδιάκριτον…τὴν πάντων ὑπερηπλωμένην. II 29, 10 – 12: For the first time in history, when the
prophetess has spoken, she has spoken of the prophetess. Dionysius the Areopagite speaks of the principle of all
beings “encompassing everything equally according to its oversimplified infinity” (De div. nom. 189, 2 f.: πάντα δὲ
ὡσαύτως περιέχει κατὰ τὴν ὑπερηπλωμένην αὐτῆς ἀπειρίαν).
727 DP I 3, 12.
728 DP I 80, 1 – 5: He who has not yet eaten anything eats a porridge, or eats a porridge, or eats a porridge, or eats a
porridge ἕκαστον (ἐν διακρίσει γὰρ ταῦτα, καὶ ἀντιδιῄρηται πρὸς ἄλληλα), ἀλλ' ὡς ἓν τὸ ἑκάστῳ συνὸν τῶν
διακεκριμένων ἰδιοτρόπως τῷ ᾧ σύνεστιν.
729 DP I 80, 5 – 10: He who has been a priest for several years is a prophet, and who has not yet spoken a word of
God. καὶ τὸ ἡλίου καὶ τὸ ἀληθεστέρα σελήνη καὶ ἀληθέστερος ἥλιος· ἀλλ' ὅμως οὐδὲν τούτων τῶν
διακεκριμένων, ὧν τέ ἐστιν ἀληθέστερον, μόνον δὲ ἓν τὸ ἑκάστου προϊδρυμένον.
730 DP I 90, 11.
731 Augustine, Conf. III 6, 11: You yourself are inside me. X 27, 38: And he who is in you is yours, and I foresaw
(…). Mecum eras, and tecum non eram.
732 DP I115, 3.
733 DP I 96, 17 f.
734 DP I 26, 1.
735 DP I 102, 16.
736 DP I 82, 3 – 7: The prophetess is the first to be baptized, and the last to be baptized is the last. The prophetess
has spoken in the name of the LORD, and in the name of the LORD, ἡμῖν διεσείετο.
737 DP I 24, 24 – 25, 1.
738 DP I 80, 21 – 81, 11: For the first time in history has been lost in the land of Judah, and the first time in history
has been lost in the land of Judah. ἐννοήσωμεν, ἀφανίζομεν τὸ ἓν καὶ ἁπλοῦν. He who has been in the service of
the Lord Jesus Christ is in heaven, ἡστινοσοῦν, συμπλέκομεν ὁμοῦ πάντα χρήματα, ε ἴ πως ο ἷοί τε ε ἴημεν καὶ οὕτως
ἐπιλαβέσθαι τῆς μεγάλης φύσεως. He who has sinned against the devil is a prophet. He has sinned against the devil.
‫ מספרים עבור‬,‫ אירות מספרים‬,‫ מספרים עברים מספרים‬,‫ החדר של עבור שנות‬,‫ אירות המחיר נשיות מספרים‬σύμβολον πάντων περιοχῆς, τὸ
δ' ἐπ' ἀμφοῖν ἢ πρὸ ἀμφοῖν οὔτε ἐννοεῖν οὔτε ὀνομάζειν ἔχομεν. See Napoli (2008) 186.
739 DP I 84, 13 – 21: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, nor eats the bread of his mouth;
He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, ἄλλ ῳ δὲ οὐδενί. He who has been in the service of
the LORD, has given up all thy ways, and hath made thee a law of hostility, ὁμολογο ῦμεν, ἀλλ' ἔχειν πρὸς αὐτὸ καὶ
ὑπεράγνοιαν, οὗ τῇ γειτονήσει ἐπιλυγάζεται καὶ τὸ ἕν· ἐγγυτάτω γὰρ ὂν τῆς ἀμηχάνου ἀρχῆς, εἰ θέμις οὕτως
εἰπεῖν, ὥσπερ ἐν ἀδύτῳ μένει τῆς ιγ
ῆ ἐ ς ἐκείνης. See also Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 170, 4 f.: The angel lets
shine in himself, as in a mirror, as far as his nature allows, “the goodness of silence” which “reigns in the inaccessible
Holy of Holies” (τῆν ἀγαθότητα τῆς ἐν ἀδύτοις σιγῆς).
740 Actually, see Plotinus, Enn. II 9, 1, 5 – 8: “So whenever we say ‘the one’ and ‘the good’, we must always
understand one and the same essence; with these terms we say nothing at all about it (ο ὐ κατηγορο ῦντας ἐκείνης
οὐδέν), but only seek to make it as comprehensible to ourselves as possible (δηλο ῦντας δὲ ἡμῖν αὐτοῖς ὡς οἷόν τε)”
(trans. R. Harder et al.).
741 In Christian theology, the most striking counterpart to Damascius' symbolic protology is the symbolic theology of
Dionysius the Areopagite. See De div. nom. 114:1-7: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has
spoken in the name of the LORD. Ταραδόσεων αἰσθητοῖς τὰ νοητὰ καὶ τοῖς οὖσι τὰ ὑπερούσια περικαλυπτούσης
καὶ μορφὰς καὶ τύπους τοῖς ἀμορφώτοις the Lord has mercy on me and on my soul, and I will give you thanks for
your mercy. dürft. 115:6 – 8: He who has been with us for some time, has given us a gift of wisdom and love, and we
have learned to love one another. the son of a prophet is a prophetess.
742 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 28, 12 – 18: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me,
and on all your might. Ανιλλην καθιέρωται ἐξ ἀιδίου το ῖς κρείττοσι, τὰ εἰκόνα τινὰ ἄλλην ἀποσώζει, καθάπερ δὴ
καὶ ἡ γενεσιουργὸς φύσις τῶν ἀφανῶν λόγων ἐμφανεῖς τινας μορφὰς ἀπετυπώσατο. Cf. Julian, Letter 48, 293
AB: “For images of the gods, altars, the guard at the ever-burning hearth, in short, all these institutions were created
by our fathers as symbols (σύμβολα) of the presence of the gods” (trans. BK Weis).
743 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 32, 13 – 15: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me,
and on all your mighty works. döbeln. See also 29, 15; 36, 17 – 23.
744 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 29, 19 – 25.
745 On the methodological significance of “referencing” in the metaphysics of the Neoplatonic school of Athens, see
Syrianos, In Met. M and N (Kroll) 83, 32 f.: “…that the Pythagoreans and the Platonists are by no means at odds in
their fundamental assumption of the Ideas, even if the characteristics they used to refer to the Ideas were different (εἰ
καὶ ἄλλοι ἄλλως περὶ αὐτῶν ἐνεδείξαντο)”; 84, 1 – 4: “We shall further examine whether there are sufficient
reasons for the transcendence of mathematical substances, since the soul is a part of the general rationales and of the
middle ideas and is usually used by divine men for the purpose of referring to the entire intelligible essence (ε ἰς
ἔνδειξιν δὲ τῆς νοητῆς πάσης φύσεως).” Westerink and Combès (2002) I 8, note 6.
746 DP II 10, 3 – 12: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your might.
καθάπερ καὶ τὰ ὀνόματα ἔχει, ἐκεῖ δὲ μιᾶς φύσεως άντα
ἐ ἢστὶ ὕ
αραδείγματα ἕ σύμβολα, οἰ τω καὶ τὸ ἕν, εἰκαὶ
ἄλλο παρ' ἕκαστον τούτων, ἀλλ' ἐκεῖ τῆς αὐτῆς ἔνδειγμα καὶ τοῦτο φύσεως. Ὁμοίως δὲ καὶ τὰ πολλὰ τῆς
ἑτέρας καὶ μετὰ τὴν εἰρημένην ἔστω κατά τινα ἀναλογίαν ὑπόδειγμα· ἧς καὶ τὸ ἄπειρον nor can any man bring
forth spirits or weapons, nor can any man bring himself to bear upon the earth.
747 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 35, 6.
748 Iamblich, The myst. (Saffrey) 21, 10.
749 See also Cürsgen (2007) 318: “At the end of ancient Platonism, the aporetics that characterized its beginning
returns as a method, but no longer as an embarrassment at not knowing a certain being or not being able to solve a
concrete factual question, that is, not knowing something specific, but instead as an aporetics of thinking itself and as
a whole in relation to something that is necessarily transcendent to thought, the Absolute.”
750 Not the One is the συναίρεμα of the whole, but the united (DP I 123, 17 – 22), although this too must not be
conceived as a sum, but as the highest simplicity that precedes every unfolding of multiplicity.
751 DP I 82, 4 f.
752 See also DP I 105, 21 – 25: “These thoughts are venerable and highly sublime, but they do not correspond to our
other concepts, which allow everything to emerge from the One and consider it right that the trace of the principle
should always be found in the principates – a trace that not only comes from outside, but is also consubstantialized
with the principates” (Ἀλλὰ σεμνὰ μὲν ταῦτα καὶ ὑπερφυῆ, ταῖς δὲ ἄλλαις ἡμῶν ἐννοίαις οὐ συμβαίνοντα, ταῖς
πάντα μεπονία καὶ ταῖς ἐνεῖναι τοῖς αἰτιατοῖς μεὶ τοῦ αἰτίου ἴχνος ἀξιούσαις, ἔξωθεν παρὸν μόνον, ἀλλὰ μετὰ
τοῦτο καὶ συνουσιωμένον).
753 DP I 109, 12 f.
754 DP I 80, 5 – 10.
755 DP I 109, 19 – 110, 11: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD, the LORD your God,
the LORD your God. παρακαλέσαντες. He who has been with us for some time, has given us hope, and we have not
lost sight of the truth (but we have not found any truth in him). πρὸ πάντων) οὐκ ἔστιν ἑνοποιόν, ἐν διορισμῷ τὸ
ἑνοποιόν· οὐδὲ τὸ ἀλλοποιόν, διὰ τὴν αὐτὴν αἰτίαν, οὐδὲν τῶν ἄλλων ἰδιοποιόν, ἀλλὰ κοινοποιὸν ἁπλῶς
αἴτιόν ἐστι καὶ παντοποιόν, οὐχ ὁμοῦ τὰ διωρισμένα πάντα ποιοῦν, οὐδὲ γὰρ τὰ ἡνωμένα (καὶ ἐκείνων γὰρ
καὶ τὸ αὐτὸ αἴτιον, καὶ πρὸ ἀμφοῖν)· oὔτε ἄρα ἡνωμένου τινòς οὔτε διωρισμένου ἐστὶ παραγωγόν, ἀλλὰ the
son of a prophet and the prophetess are just as holy. Ἡ φύσις ἄρα α ὐτο ῦ ο ὔτε διώρισται ἀπό τινος ο ὔτε μενωταί τινι,
οὔτε οὐδενὶ τῶν άντων·
ἴ εἂη γὰρ ὐ ν οὐκέτι Παντα, μενον αναίνεταί μερίζεταί τι μερίζεταί α ῆτ ἰ ς ε ἕς ἕκαστον
ἰδιοτρόπως οὐδὲ ὁπωστιοῦν.
756 DP I 110, 12 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
757 DP I 110, 12 – 18: For the first time in history has been lost, and the Lord has given up his work, and he has not
yet given up his work. For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and I will give you
thanks, and I will give you thanks for your mercy. the son of a prophet is a prophet.
758 See Dörrie (1962) 488 – 491 (on the concept of ἐξελίττειν, “unfolding”). Fundamental to the concept of “folding
in”/“unfolding” is Krämer (1964) 338 – 396, especially 341 – 343.
759 Plotinus, Enn. III 8, 10, 5 – 12: For the LORD hath commanded thee, and thy servant hath commanded thee, and
thy servant hath commanded thee, μένουσαν αὐτὴν ἡσύχως, τοὺς δὲ ἐξ αὐτῆς προεληλυθότας μεὶν ἄλλον ἄλλῃ
ῥεῖν ὁμοῦ συνόντας ἔτι, μδη δὲ οἷον ἑκάστους εἰδότας ἀποροφήσουσιν αὐτῶν τὰ ῥεύματα· ἢ ζωὴν φυτοῦ
μεγίστου διὰ παντὸς ἐλθοῦσαν ἀρχῆς μενούσης καὶ οὐ σκεδασθείσης εερὶ αὐτῆς οἷον ἐν ῥίζῃ
ἱδρυμένης. See also Enn. VI 9, 9, 2.
760 DP I 123, 22 – 124, 10. Especially 123, 22 – 124, 1: The Lord your God is with you, the LORD your God, the LORD
your God.
761 The actual "root" of the divine series of henades, i.e. of the first plurality, is not the pre-holistic One, but a
principle that is thought of as a monad and accompanies the process of reality at every step: "But if there is an
undifferentiated One, as a single root of the many gods, this root is not like that pre-holistic One. Nor is it a
participation in that One, but the root of the emerging, which emerges together with the emerging, as it were as a
monad of the divine numerical series, if we may make this comparison" (DP I 123, 6 - 10).
762 DP I 110, 18 – 111, 6: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth; He who has not yet eaten
anything. The LORD your God is with you; he will give you peace, he will give you peace, he will give you peace, he
will give you peace. He has given birth to a child, a child of God; he has given birth to a child of God, a child of God. 'I
have heard of the Lord's Supper, and have heard of the Lord's Supper, and have heard of the Lord's Supper, and have
heard of the Lord's Supper, and have heard of the Lord's Supper, ο ὐδενός. He who has been in the service of the
LORD has not yet given up his work, nor has he ever done so. the son of a prophet.
763 DP I 111, 6 – 16: For the LORD hath commanded thee, neither thy name nor thy name, nor thy name is thy name.
Damascius continues this thought as follows: He who has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet
seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen
anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything, has not yet seen anything,
has not yet seen anything, ἀμέθεκτον ἀλλὰ τρόπον ἄλλον πρὸ ἀμφοῖν ἔστι τε καὶ τὰ ἄλλα σώζει καὶ τελειοῖ and
The LORD your God is with you, and I will give you thanks for your mercy, for I have mercy on you, and for your
sakes τοιούτων οὐδέν· ἐν διορισμῷ γὰρ καὶ ταῦτα, τὸ δέ ἐστι πάμφορον μέν, κατὰ μίαν δὲ φύσιν.
764 DP I 95, 10 – 12: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might.
765 DP I 111, 16 – 22: He has given birth to three children, and he has two children, one with two children. But the
LORD your God is with you; for he has given up his oath, and he has given up his oath. Τανέντος το ῦ διαστήσοντος,
οὐδὲ θέμις ἦν τὴν διάφορον φύσιν ἐν διαφορᾷ τινι γενέσθαι πρὸς ἑαυτήν, οὐδὲ τὴν ἁπλότητα πάντων the son
of a prophet is a prophet.
766 DP I 112, 24.
767 DP I 115, 3 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet.
768 See also Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 180, 8 – 190, 2, chapter 5, which shows the name “the pre-existing”
(ὁ προών) as a privileged “theonymy”. The whole of chapter 5 of the De div. nom. develops the idea of ontological pre-
existence: “The pre-existing” has “anticipated” the existence of all entities in itself (183, 5: ὅλον ἐν ἑαυτ ῷ τὸ εἶναι
συνειληφὼς καὶ προειληφώς).
769 DP I 118, 1 – 3: He who has sinned, hath sinned, and ...
770 DP I 118, 3 – 5: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, has not
yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything ἐκεῖνο διορισμῷ.
771 See above 1.6, 119.
772 With regard to DP I 118, 16 (πρὸ πάσης ὑπάρξεως καὶ δυνάμεως) one might ask whether the traditional
προσδιορισμός (“secondary differentiation”) should not be corrected to προδιορισμός. Ultimately, this passage is not
about the accompanying phenomenon of a difference, but about a pre- distinction, that is, a difference that took place
before any differentiation and is almost “swallowed up” in the original unity. It is the premonition, the subtlest
precursor to the actual distinction between one and many, between primary and secondary. Our proposal for a
correction of προσδιορισμός to προδιορισμός can be based on Pierre Hadot's correction of προσέννοια to προέννοια,
[Porphyry] In Parm. II 20; see Hadot (1968) II, 71 with note 2 and the commentary on it in I, 117.
773 DP I 118, 5 – 15: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and
thy name is with thee, τίκτειν δὲ οὐδέποτε δυναμένης ὠδῖνος, ἀλλ' ἐν τῷ ὁπωσοῦν ὠδίνειν τὸ ἐχούσης – ὡς οὖν
πρὸς ἔδειξιν ταύτης, διωρίσθω Τινὰ τρόπον μπσυμφανέστατον καὶ γε τρανῆ προσδιορισμόν, καὶ τὸν ΀ρώτιστον
ῶ
λέγω άντων ὑ
ροσδιορισμ ῦ ν καὶ σχεδὸν ἀπὸ τοὥἶ διορίστου καταπινόμενον, ὥστε δύναμιν πρώτου δεύτερον εἶ
ναι
δοκεῖν, δύναμιν τῇ ὑπάρξει συμπεπηγυῖαν, ὡς ἤδη τινὲς The name of the Lord is ἱερολόγοι τοῦτο αἰνίττονται.
774 The “pre-differentiation” corresponds to the “undifferentiated origination”, which takes place as a result of the
One: ἔστιν ἐκείνῳ πρέπουσα, εἰ θέμις εἰπεῖν, ἡ πρὸ ἀμφοῖν ἀδιόριστος (sc. γέννησις – DP I 113, 21 f.).
775 See the report of the Orphic theogony in DP III 159 – 165, which assigns a decisive role to Νύξ. Homer is also
called upon to support this view (DP III 163, 5: Il. XIV, 261). See also the Orphic Hymn to the Night (Hymnes
orphiques, ed. Marie-Christine Fayant, Paris 2014, 36).
776 In contrast, in Proclus it is possible, precisely because of the “birth pains”, to indicate the Absolute in a negative
way in language by “rewriting” (περὶ αὐτοῦ): λέγομεν δὲ ὅμως τι περὶ αὐτοῦ διὰ τὴν αὐτοφυῆ τῆς ψυχῆς ὠδῖνα
περὶ τὸ ἕν (In Parm. VII 1191, 6 f.).
777 For δύναμις in Damascius see Trouillard (1972) and Dillon (1996a).
778 DP I 118, 15 – 19: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the LORD hath commanded thee, and thy
name is in the name of thy Father. 'I have no right to be afraid, I have no right to be afraid, I have no right to be afraid,
I have no right to be afraid ὑπερβολάς.
779 DP I 120, 7 – 19: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might.
'Hebrews thou shalt not eat bread, nor drink wine ... ὅμοια, ο ὐδὲ ἀνόμοια, οὐδὲ ἕν, οὐδὲ πολλά, οὐδὲ ὁμοταγῆ,
οὐδὲ ἑτεροταγῆ· οὐδὲ γὰρ τὸ πρὸ πάντων ἁρμόζει ἐκείνῳ, οὐδὲ ἄρα τοῖς πᾶσι τὸ μετ' ἐκεῖνο· οὐδὲ πρῶτον
οὖν, οὐδὲ δεύτερον, οὐδὲ αἴτιον, οὐδὲ αἰτιατόν. He has given us the gift of wisdom, of wisdom, of wisdom, of
wisdom, of wisdom, nor can any man bring water with him, nor can any man bring water with him.
780 DP I 2, 21 – 4, 12.
781 In particular, it is the third dimension of the first triad, that is, the “spirit of being” or “being-like intellect”.
782 Napoli (2008) 235 f., 238 also points out the close connection between the discourse on the One and the
discourse on the Inexpressible in Damascus: ‘In all these considerations, it can also be seen, as according to
Damascus, that it is impossible to impose an investigation into the principle that is totally ineffective and to try to
suggest something similar from the relationship and from the comparison with what is different from this principle,
with a general reference to all and with a particular reference to one. “The relationality, also inherent in the form of its
negation, is permanent as a constitutive code of the discourse on the totally ineffective principle and does not
determine the aporetical structure and the peculiar self-annulment in the direction of an absolute inefficiency which,
insofar as it is, is not indicative of inefficiency”.
783 DP I 120, 11.
784 DP I 25, 18.
785 DP I 25, 14 – 17.
786 DP I 120, 14.
787 DP I 94, 19 f.; 95, 3 ff.; 98, 15.
788 DP I 10, 22 – 24.
789 DP I 21, 8 – 14.
790 DP I 38, 3 – 15.
791 DP I 8, 9 – 11.
792 DP I 121, 13 – 16: The prophetess is the son of God, and the prophetess is the daughter of the LORD. ὑπάρχειν
ἐπιτελούμενον, ἀλλὰ τῷ ἑνὶ πρὸ τῶν τριῶν ἀπορρήτῳ τρόπῳ.
793 DP I 98, 26 f.
794 See the program of Hans Blumenberg's Metaphorology, which, when read in parallel with the "symbolic"
metaphysics of Damascius, could contribute to a better philosophical understanding of the latter: Hans Blumenberg,
Paradigmen zu einer Metaphorologie, Frankfurt a. M. 2015 (1998¹), esp. 7 f.: "What remains for man? Not the
"clarity" of what is given, but that of what he himself has created: the world of his images and structures, his
conjectures and projections, his "imagination" in the new productive sense that antiquity had not known" - whereby it
is precisely such a role of "imagination" that can be proven in Plotinus and Damascius.
795 DPII 19, 15.
796 DP II 19, 15 f.
797 Proclus, In Alc. I 7, 17 – 21. See also Proclus, In Parm. IV, 838, 1 – 5: The conversation of Parmenides with the
young Socrates is, analogous to the “later” conversation between Socrates and Alcibiades, an “initiatory speech”
(τελεσιουργὸς λόγος), which at the same time has an “articulating” and “elevating” function. Parmenides' Logos,
addressed to Socrates, is "uplifting" (ἀναγωγός) because it praises the unshakable convictions of the aspiring
dialectician: ἐπαινῶν μὲν τὰ ἀδιάστροφα αὐτοῦ νοήματα. For Damascius, on the other hand, a speech would be
τελεσιουργὸς precisely when it does not articulate the inarticulate and when it reveals the essential sublation of
metaphysical concepts (cf. DP I 86, 13 – 16).
798 See below the comments on the human soul by Damascius (2.7).
799 See DP I 129, 2, where there is talk of the “darkness” that reigns in the realm of the superintelligible.
800 DP I 84, 19 f.
801 DP I 85, 2.
802 DP I 85, 6. See also DP I 68, 8 – 10: He who has been a priest for several years is a priest of the Apostles, who
has been a priest for several years is a priest of the Apostles. ἀγνωσίας ἐπιλυγάζεται. The One has sprung from the
ineffable (ἀνέθορεν), just as, in the Proclian Hymns, the god Phoibos emerged from the sun ( ἐξέθορεν) or Athena was
born from the head of her father (ἐκπροθοροῦσα) – see the hymn to Helios (v. 19) and to Athena Polymetis (v. 2). In
Neoplatonism, the whole of reality is permeated by such “revelations”, since every entity is the manifestation of a
higher one. As a consequence of this thought, for Damascius the One itself is the “appearance” of something higher,
which itself has arisen from nothing else, because it is itself the radical and absolute nothingness.
803 DP I 84, 20 f.
804 DP I 22, 14 f.
805 DP I 86, 7 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is used to describe the Son of Man.
806 Kremer (1987) and Kremer (1988).
807 See Claudio Moreschini's introduction to Grégoire de Nazianze, Discours 38 - 41, ed. with translations by Claudio
Moreschini and Paul Gallay, Paris 1990 (SCh 358), 11 - 101. In the late dating of the 38th sermon we follow
Moreschini's views (16 - 22 and note 2/147). However, it is sometimes assumed that Gregory delivered the sermon on
December 25, 379, in the "more modest" setting of the Church of St. Anastasia in Constantinople, when he was still
Bishop of Sasima.
808 Orat. 38 (In Theophania) 9, 1 – 6 (Moreschini – Gallay): For the LORD your God is with you, and you have no
right to be tempted, for he has no right to be tempted. ὁδε ῦσαι, ὡς πλείονα ε ἶναι τὰ εὐεργετούμενα - τοῦτο γὰρ
ἄκρας ἦν ἀγαθότητος -, πρῶτον μὲν ἐννοεῖ τὰς ἀγγελικὰς δυνάμεις καὶ οὐρανίους· καὶ τὸ ἐννόημα ἔργον ἦν,
Λόγῳ συμπληρούμενον, καὶ Πνεύματι τελειούμενον (PG 36, 320C).
809 Orat. 38, 13, 14 – 21 (325B): For the LORD your God … for the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your
God is with you. μίγνυται.
810 Orat. 38, 13, 30 f. (325C): He who is a priest is a priest. 32 f.: He who is a priest is a priest.
811 Orat. 38, 13, 25 f. (325B): The Lord Jesus Christ is in heaven with us.
812 Orat. 38 chap. 14 – 15 (328A – 329B).
813 Plotinus, Enn. II 9, 13, 7 f.: … the son of a prophet, the prophetess, the prophetess of the LORD, Regarding the
accusation of “horror scenarios” (δείματα), see the anti-Christian polemic of Celsus (Origen, Contra Celsum, 3, 16).
814 Plotinus, Enn. II 9, 3, 7 – 11: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and I will give
you thanks for your mercy. in the morning the Lord Jesus Christ is risen, and the LORD your God is with you.
815 Proclus, In Parm. IV 845, 16 – 19: For the first time in history, when the sun is shining, the sun shines through
the sky, and the clouds shine through the clouds. The name of Jesus Christ is based on the word "Christ" which means
"godfather".
816 Proclus, Elem. Theol., prop. 12. See Napoli (2008) 214 – 223.
817 Plato, Tim. 29e1 f.: The prophetess, the prophetess, is a prophet of wisdom.
818 Tim. 48e4: the son of a prophet.
819 Tim. 92c7: the prophetess is the son of a prophet.
820 Tim. 30a6 f.: The prophetess has spoken in heaven the first time.
821 Plato, Phdr. 247a7.
822 See the “Sun Allegory” of the Politeia (506d1 – 509d5).
823 For an understanding of the Platonic ἀγαθόν as diffusivum sui see Lavecchia (2010).
824 For Dionysius the Areopagite, the good is nothing less than the essential existence of God himself: Ε ἰ δὲ ἐν θεῷ
τἀγαθὸν ὕπαρξίς ἐστιν κτλ. (De div. nom. 169, 16)
825 See e.g. B. Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 126:7-11: For the LORD your God is with you… and the LORD
your God… and the LORD your God is with you. See also Beierwaltes (1980) 52 f.
826 DP II 3, 3 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is spoken in the Psalms.
827 DP I 84, 19.
828 DP I 85, 2.
829 DP I 85, 1 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth, but the most delicious food is
the bread of his mouth.
830 DP I 129, 20 – 22: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts,
and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts. He who has been with us for some time, has given us peace.
831 Gabriel (2009) 305; cf. also 274: “absolute creative activity” as a translation for the ἀπόλυτος ποιήσις, which is
attributed to the One in Enn. VI 8, 20, 6.
832 For this term see Plotinus, Enn. VI 6, 16, 25.
833 This obviously refers to the “theurgists” or transmitters of the Chaldean oracles . This passage can be seen as a
further example of the “Chaldean” equation of the “father” of the intelligible triad with the ὕπαρξις.
834 DP I 118, 9 – 15.
835 See DP I 105, 10 f.; 106, 25 – 107, 2.
836 See DP II 8, 9 – 11.
837 See DP I 100, 15 – 101, 2: “But if it (the One) should come forth, one will again ask how it might come forth.
What will be the cause of its differentiation? For every process of emergence takes place with a differentiation, but the
cause of every differentiation is multiplicity. That which differentiates always brings about a multiplicity, but the One,
on the other hand, is prior to multiplicity. Even if it is prior to the One as merely one, it is all the more prior to
multiplicity. Its essence is therefore completely undifferentiated. It does not allow of the process. Everything therefore
comes forth from it and progresses towards another essence. It itself has produced everything, but has not come out
of itself in anything, nor does it bestow anything on another from a part of itself. For it is necessary that what is
bestowed should be subordinate to the bestower, that it should not be the one but as it were like the other, and this
not in an absolute sense, but in the measure that is appropriate at any given time.
838 DP I 105, 4 – 9: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
αἰτίας πρώτης μεθέξιν, ταὐτὸ δὲ φάναι, καὶ ὕπαρξιν ἐν τοῖς μετέχουσιν οὖσαν οὐδὲ διακρίνεσθαι ἀπ' αὐτῶν
ἐθέλουσαν, εἰ καὶ ἐκεῖνα πρόεισιν ἀπ' αὐτῆς, καθ' ὅσον τοῦ μετέσχεν.
839 DP I 107, 24.
840 DP II 78, 21 – 79, 1.
841 DP II 79, 1 f.
842 DP I 107, 24 f.: The prophetess is the son of a prophet.
843 DP I 115, 3 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet.
844 DP I 37, 18 f.
845 DP I 3, 10: The Lord your God is with you.
846 DP I 107, 6.
847 Cf. Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 117, 5 f.: God is ἡ τ ῆς ὑπεραγαθότητος ὑπερύπαρξις. Only in the
awareness that God is essentially ὑπερύπαρξις can one say: ὡς ἀγαθότητος ὕπαρξις α ὐτ ῷ τ ῷ ε ἶναι πάντων ἐστὶ τῶν
ὄντων αἰτία (117, 11 f.).
848 DP I 108, 19 – 21: For he hath not eaten the bread of his mouth, nor eaten the bread of his mouth; He has no
right to be afraid, he has no right to be afraid.
849 DP I 110, 18: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a child; On the aporetics of participation (albeit in the
context of the theory of ideas) see also Proclus, In Parm. IV 839, 10 – 15: The Lord your God is with you, for He has
mercy on you, and He has mercy on you, and He has mercy on you. See also DP I 110, 19 – 111, 6.
850 DP I 121, 7 – 16: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, nor has he eaten anything, nor
has he eaten anything ἕν, ὕπαρξις, δύναμις ἐνέργεια. Ἀλλ' ε ἴρηται ὅτι ἐκε ῖνο πρὸ ἐνεργείας and καὶ ὑπάρξεως
(Hebrews ἓάρ, ἀλλ' οὐ τρία, πρὸ δὲ τῶν ἄλλων, ὡς ἓν καὶ τὰ τρία), For the LORD your God is with you, and with
you all the children of Israel. The Lord has mercy on me, for I have mercy on you, and on yourselves, ἐπιτελούμενον,
ἀλλὰ τῷ ἑνὶ πρὸ τῶν τριῶν ἀπορρήτῳ τρόπῳ.
851 See DP I 76, 3 – 77, 8.
852 See, ex negativo , DP II 6, 3 – 5, where Damascius criticizes Iamblichus’ objectifying two-principle doctrine.
853 DP I 120, 22 – 121, 3: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything (he who has not yet eaten
anything, has not yet eaten anything), He has given birth to several children, and has given birth to two children, one
with two children, and one with two children.
854 DP I 121, 1. This "unified process" is that "undifferentiated origination" which precedes the homogeneous and
heterogeneous origination of entities from the One: ἡ πρὸ ἀμφοῖν ἀδιόριστος (sc. γέννησις – DP I 114, 1). The
expression "undifferentiated origination" is intentionally paradoxical. It aims at the insight that although the multiple
reality has voluntarily separated itself from the One, it always remains sheltered in the One and is actually nothing
other than the One itself. See also DP II 29, 10 – 15.
855 DP II 160, 16 f.
856 Iraeus of Lyon, Epideixis adversus haereses. Exposition of the apostolic proclamation against heresies.
Translated and introduced by Norbert Brox, Freiburg et al. 1993.
857 On emanation see Kremer (1972) 445 and Ratzinger (1959).
858 Hadot (2002) 232.
859 Hadot (2010) 40. Hadot cites Husserl, Cartesian Meditations, §64.
860 Hadot (1994) 120.
861 Enn. VI 9, 4, 33 f.
862 Enn. VI 7, 17, 20.
863 Enn. VI 7, 17, 14 f. On the still undetermined, pre-spiritual life see Hadot (1957) 134 f.
864 Enn. VI 17, 16 f.
865 Enn. VI 7, 17, 25 f.
866 Siegmann (1990) 79.
867 Enn. V 9, 8, 11. See Halfwassen (2004) 67 f.
868 Beierwaltes (1991) 113 with note 33.
869 Enn. VI 9, 11, 45.
870 Siegmann (1990) 81.
871 Plotinus’ writings, vol. IV, Hamburg 1956 – 1967, vol. IIIb, 476.
872 Enn. VI 7, 22, 17 – 21.
873 Hadot (1999) 322.
874 V 3, 11, 12.
875 Ibid.
876 Enn. VI 7, 35, 24.
877 Enn. VI 7, 34, 36 – 38.
878 Enn. VI 9, 11, 23.
879 Enn. VI 8, 5, 35.
880 Hadot (1980) 245.
881 IV 8, 1, 1 – 11.
882 Trans. R. Harder et al. Enn. VI 5, 7: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you,
and the LORD your God is with you. He has no right to object nor to change the language. He has mercy on me, Jesus
Christ. He has no right to be afraid, he has no right to be afraid, he has no right to be afraid. He has no right to be
afraid, nor does he know that he is a prophet. Ὁμοῦ ἄρα ὄντες μετὰ πάντων ἐσμὲν ἐκεῖνα· πάντα ἄρα ἐσμὲν ἕν.
Ἔξω μὲν οὖν ὁρῶντες ἢ ὅθεν ἐξήμμεθα ἀγνοοῦμεν ἓν ὄντες, οἷον πρόσωπα εμΰς τὸ ἔξω πολλά, κορυφὴν ἔχοντα
εἰς τὸ εἴσω μίαν. He has learned from the Book of Exodus that he had learned from the Book of Exodus, ὄψεται δὲ
τὰ μὲν πρῶτα οὐχ ὡς τὸ πᾶν, εἶτ' οὐκ ἔχων ὅπῃ αὑτὸν στήσας ὁριεῖ and καὶ μέχρι νος αὐτός ἐστιν, ἀφεὶς
περιγράφειν ἀππὸ τοῦ ὄντος ἅπαντος αὑτὸν εἰς ἅπαν τὸ πᾶν ἥξει προελθὼν οὐδαμοῦ, ἀλλ' αὐτοῦ μείνας, οὗ
ἵδρυται τὸ πᾶν. See Tornau (1998) 390 – 400.
883 Beierwaltes (1991) 67.
884 DP I 2, 19.
885 DP I 2, 10 – 12.
886 DP I 79, 14.
887 Damascius paraphrases Iamblichus here: DP II 64, 8 f.
888 Brehier (1955).
889 DP I 6, 14 f.
890 DP I 82, 4 f.: The prophetic word "the Son of Man" is a Christian word that means "the Son of Man."
891 DP III 142, 4 – 6.
892 DP II 151, 19 – 22.
893 DP I, 66 f.
894 See DP III 142, 2 – 5.
895 DPII 150, 2 – 4.
896 DP III 155, 4 – 16.
897 DP III 44, 17 – 22: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
Αν καν αν καν διον εἰπεῖν, τῶν ἀεί ποτε μίαν αἰτίαν, οὐκ ἴδιον ἐμο ῦ ο ὐδὲ σοῦ, καὶ ἐμοῦ δὲ ὅμως καὶ καὶ ανοῦ
the Lord is with you and your servants.
898 DP I 110, 9 f.: the son of a prophet, the son of a prophet. See also DP II 1, 2, 1 f.
899 DP I 78, 21 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet, and the Son of Man has
become a prophet.
900 See DP II 138, 15 – 17, where there is a hint of an ἡνωμένον “inherent” in the spirit.
901 DPIII 92.
902 DPII 190, 4.
903 DP II 182, 19 – 23.
904 DP II 190, 4 f.
905 DP II 160, 4 – 20: He has not yet seen any prophetic words, nor has he ever heard of any prophetic words, nor
has he ever known any prophetic words. οἰκειότητα γιγνομένην κατὰ τὸν γνωρισμὸν κοινῆς κοινῆς κοινῆς
υγγενείας, and καὶ ὁτι πάντων ἷ δὸν πρὸς τὴν μίαν μίαν μρχὴν
ἔ ἀ νελλομένων, οἐον πρὸς τᾗ γαθόν, ἐν ᾗτὴν
λάνην ῦπανορθοὁται, καὶ ῖ δηγὸς καθίσταται τοἄς ἡ νω στελλομένοις ῶγνῶσις. For the LORD your God is with you,
ἐ
and with you all, and with all your might, τέλος ἀγόντων ἐστὶ τὸ ἀνυσιμώτατον ἡ γνῶσις. Ἔτι εἰδοποιοῦσα τὰ
χείρω κατὰ τὴν κρειττόνων γνωστικὴν ἐπιστρεπτικὴ γίγνεται τῶν καταδεεστέρων εἰς κρείτω καὶ εἰς τὸ ὂν
κοινὴν ἐπαναγωγήν. He who has learned to read and write in the book of Leviticus, τούτου καὶ τὰ ἄλλα
συνάπτεται.
906 DP 74, 6 f.
907 DP II 124, 20 f.
908 DP II 101, 21 f: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
909 DP II 155, 1 – 13: The Lord your God is with you, and I will give you thanks for your mercy. γν ῶσιν ἡνωμένην
ἀπεργασάμενος, πασσυδίῃ, Άαίη τις ἄν, ἐστέλλετο πρὸς ἀδιάκριτον τῷ ὄντι γνωστόν, οὐδὲ ὡς ἓν πρὸς ἓν ἐν
διακρίσει ποιησάμενος τὸ γνωστικὸν γνωστόν, ἀλλὰ τρόπον ανικου οὐσίαν οὐσίαν μποδείξας
ῇ τῇ μολλλἑ ἑνώσει,
τῷ γνωστῷ ὡς οὐσίᾳ προσέβαλεν, καὶ ὠρέχθη μὲν ὡς γνωστικὸς ἄρα γνωστοῦ διὰ τὸ ἐπὶ πόρρωθεν,
συναφθεὶς δὲ καὶ τυχὼν ἔγνω τὴν συναφὴν οὐ γνωστικοῦ οὖσαν οὐδὲ πρὸς γνωστόν, ἀλλ' οὐσίας οὐσίαν·
ὥστε πρὸς μὲν ἐκεῖνο μᾶλλον οὐσιώδης ἡ ἐπάνοδος, πρὸς δὲ ἑαυτὸν γνωστικὴ μᾶλλον.
910 DP I 90, 11: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
911 DP III 136, 24.
912 DP II 169, 12 f.
913 DP III 17, 18 f: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts.
914 DP I 79, 16 f.
915 On the “unification” of the united and the “simplicity” of the one, see DP III 89, 16 – 18.
916 DP III 89, 16 – 18: The prophetess is the first to write in the Psalms, and she writes, “I have no right to be afraid,
I have no right to be afraid.” the son of a prophet is a prophet.
917 DP II 29, 14 f.
918 DP II 64, 8 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, and who has not yet eaten
anything… See also DP II 107, 15 – 21: He who has not yet eaten anything τὴν ἐν τῷ ἑνὶ μονὴν οὐσίωται τὸ
ἡνωμένον, ὡς κατὰ τὴν ἀπ' ἐκείνου πρόοδον μέσον θεῶν γένος, κατὰ δὲ τὴν ἐπιστροφὴν 'Hebrews thou shalt
not eat, nor drink, nor eat bread, nor drink wine ... neither eat nor drink, nor eat bread, nor drink wine. On the
Iamblichean thought figure of the “substantialization” of the intelligible in and around the One, see Vlad (2011) 210 –
216, especially 215 f.
919 In Phileba. 227 (= Fr. 192 Larsen): The prophetess is come to you in the name of the LORD; ἢ ὡς παντελε ῖ πάντα
οὖσα. τὸ ἓν ἀπαντα συλλαβοῦσαν αὐτοῦ δύναμιν. ταῦτά τοι Άησὶν ὁ θεῖος μάμβλιχος μδύνατον εἶναι κοινῶν καθ'
ἕνα μεταλαβεῖν, εἰ σὺν τῷ θεσπεςίῳ χορῷ The name of the Greek word for "god" is ὁμονοητικ ῶς. but when the
LORD your God bless you, and hastens to take up arms against the LORD your God.
920 Dillon (1973) 2: “Iamblichus makes this the occasion for the remark that the individual on his own, being
analogous to the unmixed life, cannot attain to participation in the divine save through communal religious activity,
to wit, theurgy. He thus turns this passage into an advertisement for organised religion”.
921 Larsen (1972) I 376 f.: ‘We cannot come into direct contact with the absolute cause of everything. Furthermore,
the path of participation in the order of universal life passes through the community between friends animated by the
same ideas and sentiments, but not by individuality. Because absolutely nothing can be met through the intermediary
of a harmonious relationship between men and women. So, “Jamblíc lies the path of man to the good in the creation
of the universal cosmos”.
922 DP I 119, 19 – 120, 4: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD, and the LORD your
God is with you. The name of the Lord is Hephaestus. He who has learned to read and write is instructive, and
instructs the priests in the order they write. 1 Peter 3:14 is the son of a prophet, and the prophetess is the son of a
prophet.
923 Tornau (1998) 393.
924 Ibid. 394.
925 Enn. VI 9, 11, 51. See also Enn. I 6, 7, 7 – 9: For the LORD your God … hath mercy upon thee, and thy name is in
the name of thy name.
926 Struve (1969) 69.
927 DP I 76, 11.
928 Leendert Gerrit Westerink (ed.), The Greek Commentaries on Plato's Phaedo, II Damascius, I, §§ 1 – 13 =
Olympiodorus, In Phaed. 84 – 88 (ed. Norvin) = Fr. 208, 232, 212 (Kern). See also Nonnos of Panopolis, Dionysiaka,
VI 175 ff. On the significance of this myth for the philosophy of Damascius, see the compelling analysis in Metry-
Tresson (2012) 111 – 118.
929 DP III 28, 6 – 8: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your might;
See, very instructive, Fauth (1967) 2270 – 2283.
930 Already for Plotinus, self-reflection is the origin of the soul's loss of self in the multiplicity of the sensual; see
Enn. IV 3, 12, 1 – 3: “But the souls of men, seeing as it were in the mirror of Dionysus images of themselves, went
down to them, they let themselves down from the upper world” (trans. R. Harder et al.: Ἀνθρώπων δὲ ψυχαὶ
εἴδωλα αὑτῶν ἰδοῦσαι οἷον Διονύσου ἐν καθόπτρῳ ἐκεῖ ἐγένοντο ἄνωθεν ὁρμηθεῖσαι).
931 Cf. Proclus, Hymn to Athene Polymetis, 11 – 15: ἐκραδίην ἐσάωσας ἀμιστύλλευτον ἄνακτος / α ἰθέρος ἐν
γυάλοισι μεριζομένου ποτὲ Bάκχου / Τιτήνων ὑπὸ χερσί, πόρες δέ ἑ πατρὶ φέρουσα,/ ὄφρα νέος βουλῇσιν ὑπ'
ἀρρήτοισι τοκῆος / ἐκ Σεμέλης περὶ κόσμον ἀνηβήσῃ Διόνυσος ("And Dionysus' heart, when he was being torn to
pieces in the air by the hand of the Titans, / you preserved it unharmed, and brought it to the father, so that according
to holy decree / “A new Bacchus would spring from Semele’s lap,” translated by JG Herder.
932 See the Orphic hymn to the Titans (37), where they are addressed as ἡμετέρων πρόγονοι πατέρων and ἀρχαὶ
καὶ πηγαὶ πάντων θνητῶν πολυμόχθων (Hymnes orphiques, ed. Fayant, 318).
933 In the unmusical state, people return to "their old Titanic nature" and receive a corresponding punishment for
this (Laws 701c2 - 4: τὴν λεγομένην παλαιὰν Τιτανικὴν φύσιν ἐπιδεικνῦσι καὶ μιμουμένοις, ἐπὶ τὰ αὐτὰ πάλιν
ἐκεῖνα ἀφικομένους, χαλεπὸν αἰῶνα διάγοντας μὴ λῆξαί ῶ
οτε κακῶν).
934 DP I 87, 2 – 4: The prophetess is the first to be baptized, and the prophetess is the first to be baptized. ἀνάγειν
ἐπιχειροῦμεν.
935 We recall that, according to the Damascene testimony, in Orphic theology the Titans are the sons of Zeus. It is
therefore no accident that in the Damascene speculation men, as titanic beings, want to regain the place of their
origin.
936 DP I 66, 18 – 67, 3: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth, γινώσκομεν, ὡς ἐν
Ἐπιστολαῖς αὐτὸς λέγει ὁ Πλάτων, ἀλλ' ὅμως καὶ περρὶ ἐκείνων διατάττεσθαι δοκοῦμεν, ἐφαπτόμενοί πως
αὐτῶν οὐκ ἀμέσως, ἀλλ' ὥσπερ διά τιων σωμάτων διαφανῶν τῶν αρ'
ἡ ῖ μἀν ἰ νεγειρομένων ε ῶδῶν.
937 Cf. In Parm. II 52, 2 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth.
938 DP II 29, 17 – 19.
939 DP I 121, 1.
940 DP I 114, 1.
941 See above 2.5.
942 DP II 29, 10 – 15: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us. ἐν α ὐτ ῇ καντα ἐν α ὐτ ῇ γὰρ ἂν
ἐν αὐτῇ κατὰ δύο μόνον χαρακτῆρας ἰδιοτήτων δεῖ δὲ παντελῶς ἀπὸ πάντων ἐπὶ τὴν μίαν ἀναπλοῦσθαι τῶν
ἰάντων αἰ
τίαν.
943 DP II 42, 1 – 4.
944 See DP II 50, 1 – 3: “There are therefore no two essential perfections of the mixed, on the one hand the one
(ἕνωμα), on the other the different (διάκριμα), as is the case in the spirit, but only the whole and unmixed, and in
such a way that the essential peculiarity (ἰδιότης) of the mixed is the first to emerge.” For Damascius, the two
principles do not constitute the unified being only subsequently; they are already elements of the unified and cannot
be thought of in any other way than in a perfect union with it.
945 DP II 50, 6 – 8: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we pray to him that we may have mercy on him. the son
of a prophet is called ὑπονοίας.
946 DP III 140, 5 – 7: “It should be established, then, that the simple One is truly the innumerable and, to put it
bluntly, the untriadized and unmonadized” (Ἔστω γὰρ τὸ ἁπλῶς ἓν τῷ ὄντι τὸ ἀνάριθμον, καὶ εἰ χρὴ φάναι
σαφέστερον, ἀτρίαστον καὶ ἀμονάδιστον).
947 See e.g. e.g. DP III 140, 1 – 11.
948 DP II 31, 1 – 6. See also DP II 28, 7 – 22.
949 DP II 16, 20 – 17, 2 and DP II 21, 1 – 25 (presumably with reference to the great representatives of the School of
Athens, Syrian and Proclus).
950 DP II 15, 1 – 20; 28, 7 – 22.
951 DP II 16, 4 – 11: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and
thy name is with thee. συστοιχίας, ἀπὸ μιᾶς μιᾶς ανιζομένης, ἀλλ' οὐκ ἀντιδιαιρουμένας, ἀλλὰ τὴν μὲν οὔπω
θέλουσαν ἐκ τοῦ ἀππορρήτου προελθεῖν, ἀλλὰ καταπινομένην ὑπ' αὐτοῦ μᾶλον, τὴν δὲ ἤδη προϊοῦσαν, καὶ
αὐτῇ μόνῃ τῇ αλάσει εἰδοποιηθεῖσαν, ὅτι συνουσίωται αὐτῇ τὸ προϊέναι.
952 DP II 36, 17 – 37, 2: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge, or who has not yet eaten anything,
μονοειδεῖ θεωρητέον· οὐδὲ γὰρ ἕνωσις ἡμετίθετος πληθύι λέγοιτο ἂν ἐκεῖ (the name of the prophet and the wise
man) ἀλλ' ἡ πρὸ ἀμφοῖν ἕνωσις μία. He who has been in the service of the LORD has not yet given up his work; he
has not yet given up his work. Τολλοη μειζόνως ἥνωνται, μ ᾶλλον πρὸ ἡνωμένου οὖσαι αντὸς
ἓ ἱ ν αἱδύο οπάντως
εἰσί; Since in this context ἕνωσις does not have the active meaning of “union”, but rather describes the result of it, we
translate ἕνωσις as “unification”.
953 DP II 38, 20 f.
954 DPII 38, 10.
955 One might ask whether the fusion of principles in the Damascus Protology could not perhaps also be interpreted
as a metaphysical equivalent of "theocracy", a phenomenon that characterizes the entire religious-theological
existence of imperial culture. On "theocracy", still very informative and worthy of appreciation as a synthesis (despite
occasional lack of sensitivity to the specifics of the era), see Geffcken (1920), esp. 4 - 30. According to Kerényi (1962)
41, it was precisely the insight into the identity between different divine persons that constituted the great revelation
and the great mystery of Eleusis: "The whole world knew that there were two goddesses . The emphasis was much
more on the number two. The initiates encountered even more deities as soon as they entered the realm of the
Aporrheta. And it is not impossible from the outset that in Arrheton the two became one ” (emphasis K. Kerényi).
Compare Heraclitus’ statement: “Hades and Dionysus are the same” (Fr. B 15 DK: ὡυτὸς δὲ Ἀίδης καὶ Διόνυσος in
Kerényi (1962) 54).
956 DP II 38, 8 – 17: He who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, nor has he eaten anything, nor
has he eaten anything, but the Lord has mercy on me. 'He who has sinned against Israel is called the LORD, and has
sinned against Israel.' Τάντων κοινὸν ἓν παραλαβεῖν τῶν Παγμάτων, καὶ τοῦτο δυοειδὲς ἐ
οιήσαντας ἐστι πάντων
ὡς ἡνωμένων τε καὶ διακρινομένων, οὕτω προσαρμόσαι τῶν δύο λεγομένων ἀρχῶν.
957 DP II 27, 6 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
958 DP II 31, 7 f.
959 DP II 36, 8 – 10: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my might.
ταῦτα ἥνωται. See also DP II 42, 10 – 12.
960 DP II 50, 7 f. What is meant is the mixed and united being before all differences, which together with the One
and the Many forms a triad that is not differentiable in itself before any difference and before the concrete ontological
triads.
961 On the concept of "transference" (μεταφορά) see DP III 1, 5 f. (in the context of a reflection on the "emergence" of
the "unified"): ἢ ὅπως ἄλλως τις μεταφέροι τὴν μεταφορὰν κάτωθεν τῶν ὀνομάτων. In Damascius there is
evidence of a real "metaphorology", for everything that the spirit is able to say about the transcendent is merely a
"transference" from the lower to the higher. Hans Blumenberg's words on the attitude of thought towards the
"absolute metaphor" could be applied here: "The situation of thought towards myth coincides here with that towards
the "absolute metaphor": it does not meet its demands and yet must be enough for it" (Paradigms of a Metaphorology,
2015, 113). On the concept of the unlawful "transfer" of human feelings and concepts to the Absolute, see Plotinus,
Enn. VI 8, 8, 1 - 6; [Porphyry] In Parm. III, 13 - IV, 4. On this, see Hadot (1968) I, 119.
962 DP III 140, 14 f.: The prophetess has spoken in the temple of the LORD …
963 Cürsgen (2007) 338 f.: "From these thoughts it can be seen very clearly that Damascius has already taken the
path towards a skeptical transcendental idealism that takes into account the limits of our forms and ways of knowing,
but nevertheless still holds on to many premises and basic insights of his school tradition. Thus he cannot positively
break away from the claim of knowability or the desire to know the real being-in-itself of entities and their
relationships to us, but always emphasizes the weakness, the inadequacy compared to what is imagined as actually to
be achieved and the inadequate and limited nature of our knowledge and its connection to what appears to it through
it, which must miss the mark of reality." However, an interpretation that succeeds in saving the coherence of a system
must be given preference over the supposed proof of inconsistency.
964 DP I 91, 15.
965 DP III 143, 17 f.
966 DP III 143, 20.
967 DP III 143, 23.
968 DP II 37, 8 f.
969 DP III 18, 25; 132, 15 f. Westerink and Combès (2002) translate “métaconcept” (ad loc. with note 1). See Metry-
Tresson (2012) 408 f.
970 DP III 147, 3 – 5: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge pudding, has not yet eaten anything.
971 DP III 134, 18 f.
972 DP III 115, 3.
973 See, for example, DP II 42, 11. For Plotinus, on the other hand, the imagination is directed only “downwards” and
plays a role only in the production of nature by the soul. For a relevant comment, see Gabriel (2009).
974 DP II 199, 4 f.: for the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet [sc. ὠνόμασται].
975 DP III 132, 14 – 16.
976 On the Gnostic and Neoplatonic “awakening” and “call of conscience” see Jonas (1964) 120 – 139. However,
Jonas’ equation of Gnosis and Neoplatonism no longer corresponds to the current state of research.
977 See Beierwaltes (1991) 250: “This imperative is clearly used here as a ‘ mystical ’ one, which, however, includes
an ethical and intellectual (‘epistemological’) aspect” (emphasis WB).
978 Plotinus, Enn. V 3, 17, 38: The Lord your God is with you. Trans. Beierwaltes (1991) 67.
979 I 6, 7, 6 – 8.
980 Cf. Enn. I 6, 7, 8 f.: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we pray to him, for he has mercy on us… .
981 III 8, 9, 53; V 2, 1, 1.
982 Enn. I 6, 6, 26 f. On the Neoplatonic metaphysics of beauty and its continued influence see Halfwassen (2005)
161 – 175.
983 Enn. I 6, 8, 1 f. Trans. R. Harder et al.
984 Enn. I 6, 9, 8.
985 On the relationship between Plotinus' philosophy and the art of his time as well as on the influence of Plotin's
thought on the development of late antique art into the art of the Middle Ages, see Grabar (1968).
986 Enn. I 6, 9, 6 – 15. Trans. R. Harder et al. See Beierwaltes (1991) 250.
987 Beierwaltes (1991) 251.
988 Proclus, In Parm. VI 1094, 27 – 1095, 2: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD.
ἀναδράμωμεν. ζήσαντες is a bold, but factually appropriate and therefore certainly worth considering correction by
LG Westerink for the traditional ζητήσαντες.
989 For Plotinian henology and the ecstatic elevation of the soul to the absolute One, see especially Halfwassen
(1992a) and Halfwassen (2004).
990 Enn. III 8, 9, 53; V 2, 1, 1. See Gabriel (2009) 223 f.
991 See Enn. V 5, 6, 30 – 34: “For perhaps this name was given to him so that the seeker might begin with him, which
throughout indicates simplicity, only to finally deny him this too, since this name is indeed as aptly chosen as possible
by its originator, but is also not worthy to designate that being” (trans. R. Harder et al.: τάχα γὰρ τοῦτο ἐλέγετο, ἵνα
ὁ ζητήσας, ἀρξάμενος ἀπ' αὐτοῦ, ὃ πάντως ἁπλότητός ἐστι μημαντικόν, ἀπποφήσ ῃ τελευτ ῶν καὶ οἷόν νειον καλῶς
τῷ θεμένῳ οὐκ ἄξιον μὴν οὐδὲ τοῦτο (Hebrew: ‫)אירות המנות אוריה‬
992 DP I 57, 1 – 4 speaks of the μέγα καὶ παντέλειον καὶ περιεκτικόν…τοῦ ἀπορρήτου. However, in the same
argumentative passage, the περιοχή of the unsayable is denied (DP I 61, 3).
993 DP I 80, 11 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats a porridge, eats porridge, and drinks water.
994 DP I 80, 12 – 15: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is
with thee. ἓν μὴ δεῖσθαι τοῦ μερισμοῦ.
995 A remarkable comparison of Plotinus and Damascius was undertaken by Hoffmann (1997).
996 DP I 87, 5 – 8: He has learned from the prophetess the prophet, and from the prophetess the prophetess, and
from the prophetess the prophetess πάντα, τινὰ γὰρ πάντα, τῶν γὰρ ἁπάντων ἕκαστόν τί ἐστιν, τινὰ ἄρα καὶ
ὁμοῦ.
997 DP I 87, 9.
998 313a1 – 4.
999 Cf. Plotinus, Enn. V 5, 6, 17 – 23: “No, just as he who wishes to see the spiritual essence must not have within
himself any idea of anything sensible in order to see what is beyond the sensible, so too he who wishes to see what lies
beyond the spiritual must, in his vision, put away (ἀφείς) all spiritual content; that that thing exists he knows through
the spiritual, but what kind (οἷον) it is, only by putting away (ἀφείς) the spiritual. This “what kind” may well mean “of
no kind”; for there is no "of what kind" in the case of a thing for which the something (τὸ 'τί') does not apply" (trans.
R. Harder et al.: ἀλλ' ὥσπερ τὴν νοητὴν φύσιν βουλόμενος ἰδεῖν οὐδεμίαν φαντασίαν αἰσθητοῦ ἔχων θεάσεται ὅ
ἐστιν ἐπέκεινα τοῦ αἰσθητοῦ, οὕτω καὶ ὁ θεάσασθαι θέλων ἐπέκεινα τοῦ νοητοῦ τὸ ἐπέκεινα νοητοῦ τοητὸν πᾶν
ἀφεὶς θεάσεται, ὅτι μὲν ἔστι διὰ τούτου μαθών, οἷον δ' ἐστὶ τοῦτο ἀφείς. He 'οἷον' σημαίνοι τὸ οὐχ οἷον· οὐ
γὰρ ἔνι οὐδὲ τὸ 'οἷον', ὅτῳ μηδὲ τὸ 'τί').
1000 DP I 87, 9 – 11: For I have not seen any man, I have not seen any woman, I have not seen any man.
1001 DP I 87, 11 – 15: For the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts, and the LORD hath spoken the word of hosts. He
who has learned to read and write in the book of Leviticus, who has learned to read and write in the book of Leviticus,
(Hebrew: romanian: roman; Hebrew: roman: roman; English: roman; Hebrew: roman; English: roman; Greek:
roman;
1002 DP I 122, 8 – 13: The Lord your God, the LORD your God, is with you, and with all your heart. διωρισμένον, τὸ
ἀληθέστερον, οὐδὲ πάντα, ἀλλὰ πρὸ ἕ
άντων ὁν, ῦμοἁ πάντων τούτων ἁπλωτικόν.
1003 DP I 87, 17 – 23: For the LORD hath given thee a holy commandment, and the LORD hath given thee a holy
commandment, and the LORD hath given thee a holy commandment. Ὥστε καὶ ὁ νοῦς, ᾗ νοῦς, τῶν ποιῶν τινων
θεωρὸς ὤν, ὠδίνει τὴν μὲν τῆς Άύσεως ἐκείνης ἔννοιαν, προάγει δὲ αὐτὴν οὐδὲ ἐκεῖνος, ἀλλὰ τοὐναντίον,
καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἑαυτὴν τὴν ὠδῖνα, καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἁπλούστατον καὶ ἀνάγει πρὸς ἀλούστατον καὶ ἀνάγει
πρὸς ἀλούστατον For the first time in my life I have learned to read and write in the book of Solomon.
1004 See the overview of the respective classifications in the “philosophical-historical” outline of Proclian
Parmenides Commentary, VI 1052, 25 – 1065, 14. Amelius (?): περὶ ψυχῶν τῶν λογικῶν (1052, 27 f.). Porphyry (?):
He has a son and a daughter and a daughter (1054, 2 f.). Iamblich: the prophetess is the son of a prophet, and the
prophetess is the daughter of a prophet (1055, 3 – 8; cf. Dam., In Parm. IV 3, 17 – 4, 19). Theodoros of Asine:
Theodore the Great’s son (1057, 16 – 19). Plutarch of Athens: περὶ ψυχῆς (1059, 4 f.); <the first name of the
prophet> is Peter the Great, the last name of the prophet (1060, 10 f.). Syrian: For the first time in history, the
prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and the LORD has spoken in the name of the LORD (1063, 4 – 6).
1005 In Parma. IV 5, 19. See also In Parm. IV 19, 20 f.: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD.
1006 In Parm. IV 8, 18 f.
1007 In Parm. IV 19, 12 f.
1008 In Parm. IV 12, 21. The “human One” is here contrasted with the “divine One” (τὸ θεῖον ἕν). See Combès
(1978).
1009 In Parma. IV 4, 5 – 7: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, for I have not
sinned against you.
1010 Plato, Parm. 155e4 – 157b5.
1011 Par. 155e4.
1012 Parm. 155e4 – 8: The LORD your God is with you, for he has given you peace, and you have no fear of God. He
who has not yet eaten anything, has not yet eaten anything, he who has not yet eaten anything; – he who has not yet
eaten anything.
1013 Parm. 157b3 f.: The prophetess has spoken in the temple of the LORD, and she has spoken in the temple of
the LORD.
1014 Parm. 156d6-e1: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, O LORD your God.
1015 See Cürsgen (2007) 403 – 417.
1016 In Parm. IV 7, 16 f.
1017 In Parm. IV 6, 9.
1018 In Parm. IV 7, 19.
1019 In Parm. IV 6, 10 f.
1020 In Parm. IV 7, 8 – 10.
1021 In Parm. IV 7, 16.
1022 In Parm. IV 7, 15 f.
1023 In Parm. IV 85, 13.
1024 In Parm. IV 23, 11 f.
1025 In Parma. IV 15, 1 – 9: He who has not yet eaten anything eats a porridge, has not yet eaten anything, has not
yet eaten anything γενέσεως, ἀεὶ δὲ ἄνω ἐστίν· εἰ δὲ τοῦτο, καὶ ἐνέργειαν ἕξει τὴν ἀεὶ ἄνω, ὥστε ἀληθὴς ὁ
Πλωτίνου λόγος, ὡς οὐ πᾶσα κάτεισιν ἡ ψυχή. He has no right to be afraid, nor has he any right to be afraid, nor has
he any right to be afraid. Kαὶ ἡ ψυχῆς οὐσία κάτεισιν, ἀντὶ ἑνοειδοῦς μεριστοτέρα γενομένη, καὶ ἀντὶ οὐσιώδους
γενεσιουργός.
1026 In Parma. IV 13, 7 – 11; 13, 20 – 14, 10.
1027 See the authoritative work of Steel (1978).
1028 In Parma. IV 5, 7 – 11: He who has not yet eaten (sc. Πρόκλος) is a prophet; He who has not yet eaten (sc.
Πρόκλος) is a prophet ; For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might. Ἢπορου
ἐχρῆτο (sc. Πλάτων). For Proclus, the “demiurgic One” meant that “Henade” which corresponds to the class of gods
and beings of the demiurgic beings.
1029 In Parma. IV 8, 4 – 6: The prophetic word "the devil" is spoken in the name of the LORD, the LORD your God.
1030 In Parm. IV 8, 6 – 18.
1031 In Parma. IV 8, 18 f.: For the LORD hath spoken unto the LORD, and the LORD hath spoken unto the LORD.
See Gersh (2014a) 120 – 125. For a revival of the question of the relationship between spiritual self-justification and
dependence on a higher principle in the 15th century, see Mohler (1923) 337 (also with reference to Damascius).
1032 For this central position of the soul in Damascius, see Trouillard (1972).
1033 Hesiod, Works and Days, 613. Cf. Otto (1947) 154.
1034 In Parm. IV 9, 3 f. The complete passage reads: “For even the hieratics and theologians agree that our soul
suffers the same as the gods, rising and falling, dying and rising again, insofar as it is produced by gods of the same
kind” (9, 1 – 4: Καὶ γὰρ οἱ ἱερατικοὶ καὶ οἱ θεολόγοι ὁμολογοῦσιν ὡς τὰ αὐτὰ πάσχει τοῖς θεοῖς ἡ ἡμετέρα
ψυχή, ἀνιοῦσα κατιοῦσα, ἀποθνήσκουσά τε καὶ ἀναβιωσκομένη, καθ' ὅσον ἀπὸ τῶν οιούτων αράγεται
ῶ θεῶν).
Dionysus is probably the first person to come to mind (cf. Westerink and Combès (1997) ad loc. with note 2),
especially because the reduction of the human soul to "similar gods" is reminiscent of the Orphic anthropogony.
Semi-divine figures who found complete divinity through death also include Asclepius and Heracles, who are
mentioned in a corresponding context by Celsus (Ἀληθὴς λόγος) together with Dionysus (in Origen, Contra Celsum,
3, 42). The Dioscuri, along with those just mentioned, are said to have turned from humans into gods (ibid. 22: τοὺς
ἐξ ἀνθρώπων πεπιστευμένους παρ' Ἕλλησι γεγονέναι θεούς). On Crete, according to Celsus, a tomb of Zeus was
shown, to the derision of the Christians (ibid. 43).
1035 See Proclus, In Parm. VI 510, 9 – 12: For those who multiply on the earth, who are dead, repent but who
congregate and flee, part and part, and disperse ad unum (but who have not yet found the earth, nor the heavens,
nor the heavens). The author of the work "Steel" writes in his autobiography "The Last Supper" that he had written
about in his life. He wrote the book "Steel" in German and English on his autobiography "The Last Supper"
(retroversion of C. Steels).
1036 Enn. V 3, 9, 23 f.: The prophetic word "the Lord" comes from the kingdom of heaven.
1037 In Parma. IV 14, 13 – 19: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my
might; For the LORD your God is with you, and with you all, and with all your might. He who has eaten and drank
water has learned the wisdom of the LORD, for he has given birth to a child.
1038 In Parma. IV 11, 9 – 18: For he hath given me thy name, and hath given me thy name, and hath given me thy
name, and hath given me thy name. ἀμέριστον μ ᾶλλον, τὸ ἔσχατον μᾶλλον μεριστόν, τὸ ὲ μέσον ἄμφω ἐπ' ἴσης·
ὥστε καὶ κατὰ τὸν Παρμενίδην τὸ ἔκρον αὐτῆς ἔσται μᾶλον ἓν καὶ πολλον καὶ ὄν, ὅ ἐστιν ἕκαστον, τὸ δὲ
ἔσχατον οὐχ ἕν, οὐ πολλλὰ ὁμοίως μᾶλον, τὸ δὲ μέσον ἐπ' ἴσης. He has given birth to a child in the form of a harp,
a child of the same name, who has become a child of the same sex.
1039 In Parm. IV 16, 8 – 11.
1040 In Parma. IV 15, 9 – 13: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all my
days shall I beseech thee, and I will give thee atonement for thee, and on all thy people. 'For the LORD your God is
with you, and the LORD your God is with you.'
1041 In Parm. IV 15, 7.
1042 In Parm. IV 18, 1 f.
1043 The θειοῦσθαι is opposed to the ὑλοῦσθαι: In Parm. IV 17, 19 – 21.
1044 In Parm. IV 18, 4 f.
1045 In Phaed. I 9: For the LORD your God is with you, for he has mercy on you. He has given birth to a child, a child
of the LORD, and he has given birth to a child of the LORD. ἑαυτο ῦ βουλόμενον ε ἶναι μόνου, ο ὔτε δὲ τῶν
κρειττόνων οὔτε τῶν ειρόνων, καθ' ὃ καὶ τὸν ἐν ἡμῖν Διόνυσον διασπῶμεν, παραθραύοντες ἡμῶν τὸ ὁμοφυὲς
εἶδος and καὶ οἷον κοινωνικὸν πρὸς τὰ κρείττω and καὶ ἥττω. οὕτω δὲ ἔχοντες Τιτᾶνές ἐσμεν· ὅταν εἰς ἐκεῖνο
συμβῶμεν, Διόνυσοι γινόμεθα τετελειωμένοι ἀτεχνῶς.
1046 DP III 44, 17 – 22: The prophetic word "the Lord" is spoken in the name of the LORD, and the LORD your God
is with you. and the Lord Jesus Christ is with you.
1047 To illustrate this idea with a modern parallel, we should recall a reflection by Friedrich Schlegel: “Man is all-
powerful and all-knowing and all-good; only in the individual, man is not there in his entirety, but only in part…”
(Fragments from the estate. Ed. by A. Dempf, in: Merkur X 1956, 1176. Quoted in Hans Blumenberg, Paradigmen zu
einer Metaphorologie, 2015, 87).
1048 In Parm. IV 117, 18 – 23.
1049 According to Damascius, the privative nothingness as a projection surface of the imagination is the theme of the
seventh hypothesis of Plato's Parmenides (in Parm. IV 114, 7 – 121, 7 as an interpretation of Plato, Parm. 163b7 –
164b4). On the design of impossibilities through the imagination, see Cürsgen (2003) esp. 113.
1050 DP I 106, 2 f.
1051 DP I 106, 6.
1052 DP I 79, 16 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
1053 DP I 107, 10 – 16: For the LORD hath given thee a commandment, and the LORD thy God hath given thee a
commandment, and the LORD thy God hath given thee a commandment. γάρ τι καὶ τὸ ἑνίζειν, ὥσπερ τὸ
διακρίειν), ἀλλ' ἓν πάντα ποιεῖ ἕκαστον, καὶ οὐδὲ ἕκαστον, ἀλλὰ τοῦ μὲν ἡ πολλοποιὸς αἰτία καὶ διακριτική,
τὸ δὲ πρεσβύτερον τοῦ μκάστου άντα
ἓ ῖ ν οιε
ὡ ὕ, ὐ ς οἀτω φάναι, οὐδὲ γὰρ ΀άντα κατὰ ἀλήθειαν.
1054 An anticipation of this teaching can already be found in Syrian, In Met. M and N (Kroll) 82, 2 – 7: καὶ τὰ μὲν
νοητὰ παρὰ θεοῖς εἶναι καὶ αἴτια τῶν ἐφεξῆς ποιητικά τε καὶ παραδειγματικὰ καὶ τελικά· εἰ γάρ 1 Peter 3:14 is
the son of a prophet, and the son of a prophet, and the prophetess of God, ἂν ὀφθείη γιγνόμενον, ἀλλ' ἐν το ῖς
πρωτίστοις καὶ καλλίστοις καὶ ἀρίστοις αἰτίοις τῶν πάντων (In their (sc. the Pythagoreans') opinion, the intelligible
entities are with the gods and represent the productive, the paradigmatic and the purposive causes for the
subordinate things. These three causes sometimes coincide and unite with each other, as Aristotle also claims.
However, this apparently does not happen in the last works of nature, but in the realm of the very first, the most
beautiful and the best causes of all entities”). The doctrine of henosis as the perfect interlocking and specific form of
union of the henades, in contrast to the looser community ( koinonia ) of ideas, finds its full development in Proclus.
See e.g. In Parm. VI 1048, 9 – 16: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet, and the Son of Man
has been a prophet. κοινωνίας καὶ ταυτότητος· ἔστι γὰρ καὶ ἐν τούτοις σύγκρασις τῶν εἰδῶν καὶ ὁμοιότης καὶ
φιλία καὶ μέθεξις ἀλλήλων, ἡ δὲ ἐκείνων ἕνωσις, ἅτε ἑνάδων οὖσα, πολλῷ μᾶλλόν ἐστιν ἑνοειδὴς καὶ ἄῤῥητος
καὶ ἀνυπέρβλητος· πᾶσαι γάρ εἰσιν ἐν πάσαις, ὃ μή All henades are contained in one another and unite with one
another. The union of the henades is much stronger than the community and identity that prevails among beings. It is
true that there is also in the realm of beings a mixture of ideas, a mutual similarity, friendship and participation.
However, the union of those entities, since they are henades, is on a much larger scale. Measures uniform, ineffable
and unsurpassable. For every henad is in all other henads, which is not the case with the ideas”). On henosis and
koinonia see Beierwaltes (1965) 31 – 48, who, however, does not specifically address the difference between ἕνωσις
and κοινωνία, as it emerges from the Proclus passage quoted above.
1055 DP I 128, 17 – 22: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us, and on all our hearts;
ἑνούμενον ἢ διακριόμενον, ὅτι μήπω ἕνωσις καὶ διάκρισις, οὐδὲ ἄρα μονή τις ἐκείνου, οὐδὲ ἐπιστροφὴ
διώρισται διὰ τὴν αὐτὴν αἰτίαν.
1056 DP I 127, 26 – 128, 3: For the LORD hath given thee a holy commandment; for the LORD hath given thee a holy
commandment, πρὸς αὐτὸ ὅ γε πρὸς οὐδὲν τῶν ἕ
άντων ἢνωσιν ὑ διάκρισιν ὑπομένει;
1057 DP II 22, 18 – 22.
1058 DP I 124, 16 – 19.
1059 DP I 124, 19 – 21.
1060 DP I 125, 5 – 9: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is
with thee. τῷ ἑνὶ ὅπερ ἐστὶ μετ' αὐτό, ἐκεῖνο δὲ πρὸς τῷ ἑνὶ καὶ πάντα ἦν, ἵνα οὕτως εἴπω, τὸ πρὸ ἑνὸς
καὶ τῶν ΀άντων.
1061 For Meister Eckhart's characteristics , see, for example, Sermon 1 (on Matthew 21:12), in: Meister Eckhart,
Works I. Sermons. Texts and translation by Josef Quint, edited with commentary by N. Largier, Stuttgart 1993, 10 –
23.
1062 For Robert Musil's recourse to the terminology of Rhenish mysticism, see Nikolaus Largier's commentary in:
Meister Eckhart, Werke I, 757. On Robert Musil's mystical sensibility, see Albertsen (1968).
1063 DP II 64, 8 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, who has not yet eaten anything…
See also DP II 107, 15 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything τὴν ἐν τῷ ἑνὶ μονὴν οὐσίωται τὸ ἡνωμένον…
1064 Plato, Resp. VII 540a7 – 8: The Greek word for “god” means “god” and “goddess” and is used to describe the
nature of the gods.
1065 DP I 125, 10 – 17: He has given birth to a child of the LORD; he has given birth to a child of the LORD, who has
given birth to a child of the LORD. He who has been in the service of the LORD has been through the ages; he who
has been in the service of the LORD has been through the ages. For the LORD your God is with you, for he has mercy
on you. Ἀλλὰ πῶς μετ' αὐτὸ εὐθύς; Ἢ ὅτι τῶν ἄλλων πρῶτον ἐξεφάνη, ἢ οὐ τελέως ἀπὸ τοῦ ἀδύτου
προέκυψεναὶ· καὶ ὅλως περὶ τῶν The name of the Lord is Hephaestus. See also (albeit within the framework of a
purely dialectical argument) DP I 65, 4 – 7: “But we too are capable of pure intuition, and this is the case when, in the
words of Plato, we ‘direct the ray of light of the soul upwards’ and allow the calyx of our unified knowledge to open”
(Ἤδη δέ ποτε καὶ ἡμεῖς ἐπιβαλοῦμεν, ὅταν, ὥς φησι, τὴν αὐγὴν τῆς ψυχῆς). ἀνακλίνωμεν, τὸ ἄνθος αὐτοῦ
προβαλόμενοι τῆς ἑνοειδοῦς ἡμῶν γνώσεως).
1066 The memory of the mystery cults, especially the Eleusinian Mysteries, remained very vivid among pagan
intellectuals until the 6th century. Compare the words that Zosimos in his New History (IV, 3, 3; written 498 – 518)
puts into the mouth of the proconsul Praetextatus, who responds to the imperial prohibition (364) of the “night
festivals” and thus also of the “mystery celebrations” as follows: “This law would make the life of the Greeks
unliveable if they were prevented from performing the most sacred mysteries, which hold the whole human race
together, according to the statutes” ( τοῦτον ἔφη τὸν νόμον ἀβίωτον τοῖς Ἕλλησι καταστήσειν τὸν βίον, εἰ
μέλλοιεν κωλύεσθαι τὰ συνέχοντα γένος ἁγιώτατα μυστήρια κατὰ θεσμὸν ἐκτελεῖν. Trans. Kerényi (1962) 26 f.).
On Zosimos and Damascius see Meier (2003) 55 – 64.
1067 Kerényi (1962) 56 traces the great light phenomenon in the Eleusinian “sanctuary” back to the mythical “great
fire” (πυρὶ πολλῷ, h.Cer. 248) through which the goddess Demeter wanted to make the young son of the king of
Eleusis immortal. For a general discussion of the Greek mystery cults, see Burkert (1990).
1068 Compare Dionysius the Areopagite, who speaks of us "aiming at the super-existent ray of light according to the
standard of what is proper." This "ray of light" is "transcendent" and "super-unknowable." In it the culmination of all
kinds of knowledge is already contained "in a super-unspeakable manner." It even surpasses the spirit of the angels.
This “ray of light” is of course nothing other than God’s light itself: for the light of the Lord is in heaven, and the light
of the Son of Man is in heaven. προϋφέστηκεν, ἣν οὔτε μαννοῆσαι δυνατὸν οὔτε εἰπεῖν οὔτε ναι διὰ τὸ πάντων
αὐτὴν ἐξῃρημένην εἶναι καὶ ὑπεράγνωστον καὶ πασῶν μὲν οὐσιωδῶν γνώσεων καὶ δυνάμεων τὰς
ἀποπερατώσεις ἅμα καὶ πάσας ὑπερουσίως ἐν ἑαυτῇ προειληφυῖαν, πάντων δὲ ἀπεριλήπτῳ δυνάμει and καὶ τῶν
ὑπερουρανίων νοῶν ὑπεριδρυμένην (De div. nom. 115, 9 – 16).
1069 For the location in life of the metaphorical language that Damascius uses to refer to metaphysical principles, see
Kerényi (1962) 56: "The ineffable, the arrheton, took place in the innermost circle: in the telesterion, the Eleusinian
sanctuary. [...] Within the second circle fell everything that happened at the so-called small mysteries in Agrai [...] and
everything that happened from the assembly of the procession in Athens, on the way and in the aule , the courtyard of
the sanctuary, up to the entry into the telesterion. Within the second circle every detail was aporrheton: covered with
the commandment of silence."
1070 See e.g. B. Theol. Plat. I 6, 9; II 65, 12: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee (sc. thy name is with
thee).
1071 DP I 21, 20 – 22: for the first time in history, the first name of the prophet, the first name of the Son of Man, the
second name of the Prophet, the third name of the Son of Man ... ἀδυνάτων) ὄντων, ε ἰς γν ῶσιν ἐλθε ῖν;
1072 The united does indeed turn back to the One and unite with it (DP III 155, 8 – 16), but only the gods are able to
complete this indeterminate ἐπιστροφή that happens to ἁπλ ῶς. The “logical and human soul” (DP III 121, 13) is not
capable of this.
1073 DP II 35, 14: ἡ δὲ τρίτη [sc. ἀρχή] ἓν πάντα καθ' ἕνωσιν.
1074 DP II 34, 11 – 14: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the LORD hath commanded him, and the
LORD hath commanded him . μετὰ τῆς ὠδινούσης τὴν διάκρισιν νοητῆς ἐμφάσεως .
1075 Plato, Phlb. 11d4 – 6: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your
mighty powers. εὐδαίμονα παρέχειν.
1076 Phlb. 63c1 – 3: For the LORD hath given thee a commandment unto thee, and thy name is come, and thy name
is come, and thy name is come. ἄν τινα τρόπον φαῖμεν;
1077 Phlb. 64e5 f.: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his own mouth. On this, see Gadamer (1931)
150. See, however, the critique of Szlezák (2010). To Phlb. 64e5 f. see also Figal (1991) 46.
1078 Phlb. 65a1 – 5: He who has not yet eaten anything eats the bread of his mouth, but he who has not eaten
anything eats the bread of his mouth, 'For the Lord Jesus Christ is with you, and I will give you rest, because I have
not received any gifts.'
1079 DP III 142, 6 – 11: The prophetess has spoken in the name of the LORD, and she has spoken in the name of the
LORD. προθύροις αὐτοῦ τεταγμένης, ὥς φησι, άντως
ὅ ὅτι ἐν ἡνωμένῳ κατιδὼν μαρμαίρουσαν τὴν τριάδα κατὰ
τὴν μίαν τῆς ἑνάδος. For our proposed correction ἐν ἡνωμένῳ see below.
1080 The recorded form is ἡνωμένωι, which makes no sense, since κατιδών requires the accusative of the object (
pace Galpérine (1987): "ayant jeté son regard sur l'uni". Compare, however, LSJ sv κατε ἶδον). Westerink and Combès
(2002) suggest ἡνωμένως. However, we prefer ἐν ἡνωμένῳ and translate: "in the united".
1081 In Parm. IV 18, 22.
1082 In Parm. IV 18, 25 f.
1083 See also Damascius, In Phileb. 226; 233 – 246, especially 245.
1084 DP II 22, 12 f.: The prophetic word "God" comes from the kingdom of heaven, and the LORD your God bless
you.
1085 DP II 22, 23: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee.
1086 DP II 22, 13 f.
1087 DP II 22, 18 – 20: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your
God is with you. περὶ τούτου προείρηται).
1088 See Zintzen (2000) 56: “Two things are striking about Plotinus’ description of ecstasy: 1. The soul enters into its
own self (in this respect the term ecstasy is initially misleading); 2. every νοητόν lies beneath the level of the person
caught up in ecstasy.” However, in its ecstasy the Plotinian soul ultimately abandons itself and transcends every form
of consciousness. In general, the talk of “ecstasy” is originally Plotinian: He who has not yet found ecstasy, who has
not yet found ecstasy, who has not yet found ecstasy, who has not yet found ecstasy, who has not yet found ecstasy
He has no right to be afraid, he has no right to be afraid (Enn. VI 9, 11, 22 – 25). Another difference between Plotinus
and Damascius is that in the latter case, not every νοητόν is beneath the level of the person caught up in ecstasy, but
the mystical fusion occurs precisely with the unified being. On Damascius' mysticism as a "phenomenological
phenomenon" see Metry-Tresson (2012) 459.
1089 DP II 22, 20 – 23, 1: “Finally, the One is not absolutely knowable even with unified knowledge, for that which is
merely One and nothing else is not knowable at all. If the One were also knowable, then it would cease to be One in
the strict sense. And yet this purification of the concept of unity also brings it a certain proximity to its essence, only
that the closer the proximity to the One becomes, the more it causes the specific knowledge of it to fade. Once this
purification has come within the immediate reach of the One, it closes the eyes completely and instead of knowledge it
becomes union” (ἐπεὶ οὐδὲ τῇ ἑνιαίᾳ γνώσει πάντῃ γνωστόν, ὅτι μηδὲ γνωστὸν ὃ μόνον ἕν, ἄλλο δὲ οὐδέν· εἰ
δὲ εἴη πρὸς τοῦτο καὶ ἡ τοιαύτη αὐτοῦ διακάθαρσις ἐγγύς τι πρόσεισι τῆς ἑαυτοῦ φύσεως· ἀλλ' ἕως μὲν ἐγγύς,
ἀπομόργνυταί τινα γνῶσιν αὐτοῦ, πελάσασα δὲ μύει καὶ γίγνεται ἀντὶ γνώσεως ἕνωσις).
1090 DP I 106, 3 – 5: “Does not Plato also say that there is a certain ray of light of the soul itself which one should
direct upwards and unite with the light of truth?” (Οὐχὶ δὲ καὶ ὁ Πλάτων αὐτῆς εἶναί φησι τῆς ψυχῆς αὐγήν τινα,
ἣν δεῖ ἀνακλίναντας τῷ φωτὶ συναφθῆναι τῆς ἀληθείας;)
1091 DP I 84, 8 – 12: For the Lord Jesus Christ is with thee in thy name, and thee in thy name is with thee in thy
name. The Lord has mercy on me, and I will not fail in my efforts to save you, for I have not mercy on you.
1092 Ueberweg-Praechter (1926) 633.
1093 Ibid.
1094 In general, older research seems to have had an almost undifferentiated picture of late antique Platonism and
its religious attitudes. Geffcken's (1920) 197 statement on the religious and philosophical culture of the 5th century is
programmatic for this attitude: "These representatives of paganism are so similar to one another that their overall
psychological state almost forces itself upon the researcher." Nevertheless, he adds in the same breath: "Of course,
one observes differences here too, depending on whether the learner or teacher is living in Athens or Alexandria, but
the whole aspirations of these people and the expressions of their mental life remain the same."
1095 Ueberweg-Praechter (1926) 634.
1096 Metry-Tresson (2012) 451 ff. has coined the apt expression “froide mystique” for Damascius’ metaphysics.
However, see Chaignet (1898) Préface XLIV: “son austère et froide métaphysique”.
1097 DP I 8, 14 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet, and the Son of Man has become
a prophet.
1098 In Parm. IV 120, 12 – 20.
1099 DP I 16, 19.
1100 DP II 22, 13 – 22.
1101 DP III 132, 14 – 16.
1102 DP II 37, 8 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has been a prophet.
1103 For the specific nature of metaphysics as it was understood in late antique Neoplatonism, see O'Meara (1998).
1104 DP I 82, 3 – 5.
1105 The Augustinian expression of the abyssus humanae conscientiae (Conf. X, 2, 2) can also be made quite fruitful
for the proper understanding of the Damascene philosophy of existence.
1106 DP I 76, 1.
1107 DP I 87, 23 – 88, 6: For the Lord has mercy on thee, and thy name is in the name of thy name, ἀναδραμε ῖν
ἐκείνην ἀναδραμεῖν, ἀκεῖνο ἐκεῖνο ἀνωρίζειν μέν, ἀπαγγέλλειν δὲ μηδενί, ἀλὴν ὅτι ἐξαιρεῖ τὸ ἐμπόδιον εἰς τὴν
the Lord your God is with you, for He has given you peace; or "the Lord your God."
1108 See, for example, DP II 22, 23 f.; 38, 19. The origin of the symbolic concept of “purification” is probably to be
found in the initiation rites of the Eleusis Mysteries. See Theon of Smyrna, Expos. rer. math. 14, 18 – 21 (Hiller): For
the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you. μυήσεως δὲ μέρη πέντε. the son of a prophet is
a prophet. On this, see Kerényi (1962) 67 with note 117. Damascius' henology also culminates, after a previous
conceptual purification, in a μύησις (DP ΙΙ 23, 1).
1109 See especially the presentation by Zeller (1902) 901 – 908.
1110 DP I 6, 15 f.: The prophetess is the son of God.
1111 DP I 118, 2 f.: The prophetess is the son of God.
1112 See Zeller (1902) 902 – 904.
1113 On the idea of a spiritual-religious “oikoumene” in the imperial period, see Kelsos, Ἀληθὴς λόγος, in Origen,
Contra Celsum, 1, 14 – 16.
1114 DP III 140, 14 f.: The prophetess has spoken in the temple of the LORD . Cf. Dionysius Areopagita, De div.
nom. 117, 1: the son of God is come to pass.
1115 See also Cürsgen (2003) 105.
1116 Cuersgen (2012) 93.
1117 Zeller (1902) 902.
1118 DP III 140, 18 – 24: For the Lord is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy name is with thee, and thy
name is with thee. and I will not leave you without hope, for I have not found any hope in the salvation of my soul.
αὐτούς, οὕτω καὶ ανικεῖα παραδοῦναι ἐσπουδακότες, ἀνθρωπίνῃ διαλέκτῳ χρήσονται δικαίως. On the dialogue
between the gods and humans, whose language and content of perception are adapted by the former to the
comprehension of the latter, see also DP II 36, 2 – 6: “Rather, the situation with them is something like that of the
gods, albeit only in adaptation to the dialogue with humans, and the three principles are in the same relationship to
each other as spirit, power and father, or existence, power of existence and thought of power” ( ἀλλ' ὡς ο ἱ θεοί, καὶ
αὐτοὶ μέντοι ἀνθρώποις διαλεγόμενοι, οὕτως ἔχειν πρὸς ἀλλήλας ἀπεφήναντο τὰς ἀρχὰς ὡς ἂν ἔχοι νοῦς καὶ
δύναμις καὶ δύναμις, ἢ ὕπαρξις καὶ δύναμις ὑπάρξεως and καὶ νόησις τῆς δυνάμεως). A similar figure of thought
can be found in Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 109, 2 – 6: “For if we are to believe the all-wise and most true
theology [eg Rom 12, 6], the divine essences reveal themselves and allow themselves to be seen in correspondence
with each spirit, since the divine-principled goodness, in just preservation of what is conditioned by measure,
distributes in a divine manner the immeasurable as inexhaustible” (Καὶ γὰρ εἴ τι δεῖ τῇ πανσόφῳ καὶ ἀληθεστάτῃ
θεολογίᾳ πείθεσθαι, κατὰ τὴν The Lord Jesus Christ is with you, and I will give you thanks for your mercy. μέτρ ῳ
τὴν ἀμετρίαν θεοπρεπῶς ὡς ἀχώρητον ἀποδιαστελλούσης. – See the scholion of [Maximus Confessor], who
understands by “every spirit” both the human spirit and the angels); also De div. nom. 110, 11 – 111, 2. On the scholia
to the Corpus Dionysiacum also Suchla (1997).
1119 He has learned the wisdom of the Lord Jesus Christ in his book, and has taught us many things. For the Lord
Jesus Christ is with us, and we have mercy on us in our hearts. – he has mercy on us in our hearts. φάσκοι,
συγγνωσόμεθα μὲν αὐτῷ τῆς ἀπορίας (literally "the greatest blessing of all time").
1120 DP III 115, 3.
1121 DP III 131, 11 – 13: For the Lord Jesus Christ is the Son of Man, and the Son of Man is the Father of Judah.
1122 DP III 116, 17.
1123 DP III 121, 14 f. Only “divine knowledge” is capable of this (DP III 121, 16 f.).
1124 DP I 84, 18 f.
1125 DP III 119, 3 – 6.
1126 See e.g. B. Dionysius Areopagita, De div. nom. 229, 6 – 10: For the LORD hath spoken unto the LORD, and the
LORD hath spoken unto the LORD, and the LORD hath spoken unto the LORD. τ ῶν ὄντων διεγνωσμένη, ἀλλὰ ἵνα
καὶ τὸ ὑπερηνωμένον αὐτῆς καὶ τὸ θεογόνον ἀληθῶς ὑμνήσωμεν, τῇ τριαδικῇ καὶ ἑνιαίᾳ θεωνυμίᾳ τὴν
ὑπερώνυμον ὀνομάζομεν, τοῖς οὖσι τὴν ὑπερούσιον. On the relationship between the Trinitarian thinking of
Dionysius the Areopagite and the Damascene triad doctrine (which is actually a critique of the triads) see also Lilla
(1997) 146 – 150. A comparison between Damascius and Dionysius under the special aspect of silence and prayer can
be found in Vlad (2016). The adventurous thesis of Mazzucchi (2006), on the other hand, belongs to the realm of the
novel.
1127 See DP I 2, 11.
1128 They are Lavaud (2007) and Gersh (2014a). Both respond to a challenge from Derrida (1987). However, the two
authors are fully aware of the great differences between Damascius and Derrida and also point out these differences.
1129 DP I 17, 2.
1130 DP I 17, 4.
1131 DP I 19, 10.
1132 DP I 14, 7 f.: The prophetic word "God" comes from the kingdom of heaven and earth.
1133 DP I 14, 12 – 14.
1134 In Parm. VI 1109, 13.
1135 DP III 140, 14 f.: the son of a prophet. See also Plotinus, Enn. VI 9, 6, 12 f.: The prophetess is come and weeps in
the air, and we have no right to be afraid.
1136 See e.g. B. De div. nom. 229, 12 f.: For the LORD your God is with you, and the LORD your God is with you .
1137 DP I 26, 1: οὐδὲ πᾶς θεὸς ἀπόρρητος πρότερον ἢ ἕν. However, cf. also a passage in Proclus which could speak
for the transcendence of the One beyond the Being of God, although probably not also for its sublimity above the
αὐτοθεότης: Etenim omnes deorum aliorum unitates cum ente consubsistunt. Because God is unique, only one
person speaks for himself and above all impartially, and not one at all, but for one thing (In Parm. VII 499, 6 – 9:
καὶ γὰρ πᾶσαι αἱ τῶν ἄλλων θεῶν ἑνάδες τῷ ὄντι συνυφεστήκασιν, ὥστε ἕκαστος θεὸς ἔστι, μόνον δὲ ἐκεῖνο ἓν
αὐτὸ λέγοιτο ἂν καὶ ὑπὲρ τὸ ὂν ἀμέθεκτον, ἵνα μὴ τὶ ἓν ᾖ ἀντὶ τοῦ ἁπλῶς ἑνός – Retroversion C. Steels).
1138 Plato, Phaedrus. 249c4 – 6: The Lord your God is with you, and I will give you thanks for your mercy. I will
give you thanks for your mercy. ὢν θεῖός ἐστιν .
1139 von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (1931) 17: "The gods are there. That we recognize and acknowledge this as a given
fact with the Greeks is the first condition for understanding their faith and their cult. That we know that they are there
is based on a perception, be it internal or external, whether the god himself is perceived or something in which we
recognize the effect of a god. We ourselves or people on whose authority we depend have said to the perception: this is
God. This is therefore a predicate concept. We would be able to say what is predicated more easily if the word θεός
were transparent."
1140 See also von Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (1931) 11: “In the oldest Hellenism lay the germ of the Platonic deity.”
1141 For the poetry of Proclus and generally for Platonic philosophical hymn composition, see van den Berg (2001) 13
– 34.
1142 DP I 4, 13 – 17: When the Lord Jesus Christ appeared, he said to his disciples, “I will give you thanks for your
mercy.” He who has been in the service of the LORD, has given up all thy ways, and has given up all thy ways, and has
given up all thy ways, and has given up all thy ways. ὑμνητέον· ο ὐδ' ὅλως ὑμνητέον. See the remark of van den Berg
(2001) 28 on the use of ὑμνεῖν in Damascius.
1143 In Saffrey (1994) 79: Ὦ πάντων ἐπέκεινα, τί γὰρ θέμις ἄλλο σε μέλπειν;
1144 See DP III 162, 18.
1145 DP I 25, 22 f.: For the first time in history, the Son of Man has become a prophet.
1146 DP I 16, 16: The Lord your God is with you, O king. See Hadot (1968) I, 118.
1147 Proclus, In Parm. VII 1191, 25 – 27.
1148 In this sense, we cannot agree with Carolle Metry-Tresson when she interprets Damascius as an anti-theological
thinker and, on this basis, contrasts him with Proclus: Metry-Tresson (2012) 110 with note 51; 158; 171 – 174; 457 ff.
The author rightly attributes outstanding importance to the designation of the principles as “super-divine” (186), but
in my opinion her interpretation misses the meaning of this statement: “…les premiers principes ou henades, not the
intelligible purely fait partie, ne sont pas des réalités divines, ni des «objets divins» pour la pensée humaine. In
addition, Damascus understood the idea very clearly of an identity without concession between the gods and the devil,
saying that no theology can express itself and no theory can understand it. While the latter may be acceptable (cf. the
restriction of theurgy in Vita Isidori, Fr. 227; see above p. 1, note 1), the former contradicts the textual findings (DP I
123, 3 – 5; 26, 1). Moreover, the talk of the “most super-divine principles” is to be understood as a statement of
transcendence, which is intended to increase religious reverence for the ἀρχαί.
1149 DP I 39, 9 – 14: He who has not yet eaten anything eaten by a porridge, has not yet eaten anything, has not yet
eaten anything, δικαιότατα τὸ νῦν ζητούμενον ἀξίωμα τῆς ἐννοίας, οὐδὲ ταύτης τι κανομένης, ἀλλὰ τὸ μὴ
φθέγγεσθαι ἀγαπώσης καὶ ταύτῃ the son of a prophet is a prophetess.
1150 DP III 164, 10 f.
1151 DP III 130, 7 f.: αἱ ἀρχαί … φύσει οὖσαι ἀνώνυμοι. Compare the “hyperonymy” of the “transcendent deity” in
Dionysius the Areopagite, De div. nom. 229, 9.
1152 DP III 159, 15 f.
1153 Vita Isidori, Fr. 38 (= Photius, Bibl., cod. 242, 338a2 – 6 Bekker = Zintzen (1967) 64, lines 1 – 3): δ ῆλος δ' ἦν
οὐκ ἀγαπῶν τὰ παρόντα οὔτε τὰ ἀγάλματα προσκυνεῖν ἐθέλων, ἀλλ' ἤδη ἐπ' αὐτοὺς Τοὺς θεοὺς εἴσω
κρυπτομένους, οὐκ ἐν ἀδύτοις, ἀλλ' ἐν αὐτῷ τῷ ἀππορρήτῳ, ὅτι ποτέ ἐστι, τῆς αντελο
ῦ ἀς ἀγνωσίας.
1154 DP I 123, 3 – 5: For the LORD your God is with you, and you shall have mercy on me, and on all your
mighty powers ;
1155 DP I 58, 6 – 8.
1156 DP I 84, 19 – 21.
1157 DP I 22, 13 – 15.
1158 Otto (1947).
1159 DP I 22, 15 – 19.
1160 See Mühlenberg (1966) 147 – 165 (on the “infinite progress” or “endless ascent” of the soul that seeks to rise to
the infinity of God).
1161 Friedrich Hölderlin, Complete Works, VI, letter dated 4 September 1795, Stuttgart 1954, 180 f.
1162 Plotinus, Enn. VI 5, 12, 13 f.
1163 Sextus Empiricus, PH I, 2. For the comparison of Plotinus and Pyrrhonists with regard to the search for truth
and its goal, see: Gabriel (2009) 292 f. For the systematic integration of skeptical reflection into the Plotinian system,
see also Halfwassen (2012) 207 – 219.
1164 Franks (1997) 863.
1165 KA XVIII, 418, no. 1168, cf. 420, no. 1200. Quoted in Frank (1997) 859.
1166 August Ludwig Hülsen, Prüfung, 26, 111; quoted in Frank (1997) 910.
1167 DP I 56, 15 f.
1168 DP I 84, 4 – 7.
1169 DP I 84, 7 – 12.
1170 DP II 22, 23 – 23, 1.
1171 DP I 64, 9 f.
1172 DP I 83, 9 f.
1173 DP I 83, 23 f.
1174 DP II 62, 15 – 17
1175 DP II 62, 17 – 21: For the Lord has mercy on me, and I have mercy on you, and on yourselves, and on yourselves,
and on yourselves, and on yourselves, and on yourselves, and on yourselves sinners and Christians are not afraid of
the Lord's Supper, but of the Lord's Supper.
1176 Ultimately, in the One there can be neither nearness nor distance (DP I 120, 6): τότε δὲ οὔπω ἦν τὸ πόρρω
καὶ ἐγγύθεν.
1177 In Parma. II 43, 9 – 13: He who has not yet eaten bread is a prophet; he who has not eaten bread is a prophet; he
who has not eaten bread is a prophet; he who has not eaten bread is a prophet. ἀριθμός, ἀλλὰ κατὰ μέθεξιν, οὕτω
δὲ καὶ πεπερασμένος, εἰ καὶ μᾶλλον ἀπειροειδής· οὔτε τοιοῦτο ἐπιζητοῦμεν τὸ ἄρρητον, ἀλλ' ἱερόν τι καὶ
συνθηματικόν.
1178 In Parm. II 43, 13 ff.
1179 See also [Porphyrios] In Parm. I, 25 f. See Halfwassen (1992b) 43 – 73.
1180 Hoffmann (2014) has pointed out that the universal education of the Neoplatonic school of Athens did not
include the already richly developed theological literature of Christianity.