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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL IN ST.

AUGUSTINE
Author(s): ROBERT J. O'CONNELL
Source: Traditio, Vol. 19 (1963), pp. 1-35
Published by: Cambridge University Press
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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL IN ST. AUGUSTINE*
By ROBERT j. O'CONNELL, S.j.

In a preceding article,1 we have tried to show that important features of


the relationship between St. Augustine and Plotinus still call for some in
vestigation: that, in fact, one of the latter's most telling treatises (Ennead
VI 4-5) had hitherto virtually escaped the notice of those interested in tracing
his influence on Augustine's thought. To one possible implication of that
study we alluded only briefly, but its importance for the history of Christian
spirituality impels our returning to it now. Augustine, we suggested, from
his earliest extant writings up to and including the Confessions, may well
have been thinking in terms of a Plotinian fall of the soul into the body.2
There may seem to be a certain temerity in this proposal, and yet it is not
entirely without precedent. Jens N?rregaard, in that sober, careful study
of Augustine's conversion3 which still ranks as one of the most commendable
efforts at understanding his early thought, found himself obliged to en
tertain just this hypothesis.4 And H. de Leusse, starting from a study of
Marius Victorinus' doctrine on the soul, notes that the Plotinian teaching
uncovered in that author finds echoes scattered through the writings of the
young Augustine.5
The list of Plotinian treatises which N?rregaard claimed Augustine read
has, in the meantime, been called into question,6 and indeed, the debate on
the topic of Augustine's Neo-Platonism has advanced considerably since

* For convenient reference we abbreviate the following works as indicated: Augustinus


Magister (3 vols.), Acts of the Augustinian Congress,! Paris, 1954, = AM, I, II, III depend
ing on the volume. Real-Encyklopaedie der Klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, Pauly-Wis
sowa-Kroll-Witt er, Stuttgart, 1894ff., = RE. Biblioth?que Augustinienne series of uvres
de Saint Augustin, Paris, 1933ff., = BA plus series-number of the volume (e.g. A 6). An
cient Christian Writers series, Westminster, Md., 1946ff. = ACW plus the volume-number
(e.g. ACW 22). In citing from Augustine's works we regularly omit the chapter numbers,
except where indispensable (as in the De civitate Dei), citing only book and section: so,
e.g., Confessions 5.10.19 shortens to Conf. 5.19.
1 'Ennead VI 4-5 in the Works of Saint Augustine/ in Revue des ?tudes Augustiniennes,
9 (1963) 1-39.
2 See the conclusion of the above article, 39.
3 Augustins Bekehrung (T?bingen 1923). Henceforth cited as Bekehrung.
4 Ibid. 238. He immediately appends that Augustine subsequently interprets this theory
in the light of Genesis. The question is, to what extent does Augustine interpret Genesis
in the light of this theory?
5 H. de Leusse, 'Le Probl?me de la pr?existence des ?mes chez Marius Victorinus Afer,'
Recherches de science religieuse 29 (1939) 197-239, esp. 198 and 236ff.
6 By Fr. Paul Henry, Plotin et l'Occident (Louvain 1934) 66-7., henceforth: Plotin.

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2 traditio

the publication of his work.7 No one, on the other hand


Augustine read any of Marius Victorinus' work aside from so
of the Enneads, so that de Leusse's indications can hardly
met with an enthusiastic reception.
But if the door is open to a more extensive Plotinian influen
thought than has generally been held tenable in recent years,
the "pattern-method" we advocated in our former article is
uncovering such influence, then the discussion may enter a
the question whether Augustine really held the fall of th
authors found in his writings calls for serious reconsiderati

Gilson's Rejection of the 'Fall'

The presence of such a doctrine in Augustine's writings


rejected by no less a scholar than Etienne Gilson in his n
Introduction ? ?tude de saint-Augustin.8 If we examine t
position here, our objective is far from shining at his expen
question, surely. The position he articulates is by no means h
ceived; it is well thought out, ably argued, and lucid enough
key issues. Gilson starts from Augustine's categorical refu
body and the entire sensible universe in terms which he und
igen's: as a place of punishment for souls which once pre-ex
sinned, and were plunged into the body as the result of tha
Il y a dans cette conception de l'homme un pessimisme
pugne profond?ment ? la pens?e d'Augustin. Certes, il a
sur la transcendence hi?rarchique absolue de l'?me par ra
mais il n'a jamais admis, et il a m?me repouss? avec horre
d'une humanit? dont les corps ne seraient qu'autant de p
le con?oit Orig?ne, l'univers sensible en g?n?ral et le c
particulier ont ?t? cr??s comme des lieux et des instrume
pour Augustin, tout ce que Dieu a fait est bon; le corps a
pour sa bont? intrins?que et non comme une cons?quence
du p?ch?; l'?me, enfin, ne saurait y ?tre pr?cipit?e comm
son, mais selon la description que nous venons d'en do
? lui par amour, comme une force ordonnatrice et co
l'anime et le meut du dedans.9

7 For a recent summary on this question?though perhaps slanted in s


a Porphyrian hypothesis?see J.J. O'Meara,'Augustine and Neo-Plat
Augustiniennes I (Paris 1958) 91-111.
8 (2d ed. Paris 1943) 67ff. Henceforth: Introduction. We cite from th
from its recent American translation, The Christian Philosophy of
York 1960) since this latter is doubtless less accessible than the former
without significant change. 9 Ibid.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 3

Gilson goes on to support his view by appeal to two major texts on th


question. The first occurs in Book XI of the De ciuitate Dei where Augustine
expresses his astonishment that a man as versed as Origen in the littera
ecclesiasticae could put forth the theory he there describes.10 The secon
occurs in Letter 166, written to Jerome, and there astonishment has becom
the horror to which Gilson alludes.11
Now the first factor of uncertainty in all this is the relative lateness of the
texts: they both date from the year 415, some twenty-nine years after Au
gustine's conversion.12 And the period between 386 and 415 was a critic
one in Occidental Christianity, precisely in regard to the theory which con
cerns us here. For during these years there broke forth the first anti-Origeni
crisis in the West.13

The Anti-Origenist Controversy: Chronology

It must be remembered in this connection that Origen's glory shone with


out eclipse practically up to the end of the fourth century; that Jerome hi
self, so soon to become the standard-bearer of the opposition to his idea
could rank him in 381 as the most eminent of the church's teachers after t
Apostles themselves, and as late as 392 enthusiastically enshrine him in h
De viris Mus tribus. Ambrose, who has been called the Bishop of the We
of his time, exploited his exegetical works with neither stint nor scruple,14
and there is good reason to think that up until 399?perhaps after the term
ination of the Confessions?Augustine remained ignorant of the details o
Origen's error.15 If, therefore, we admit Augustine's own professed ignoranc
of the litterae ecclesiasticae during several years after his conversion,16 his

10 De civ. Dei 11.23. 1-2. 11 Ep. 166.9. 27.


12 See G. Bardy, La cit? de Dieu, A 35 (Paris 1959) 10, . 1; and Goldbacher's d
of chronology in the Vienna edition of Augustine's letters, GSEL 58.44.
13 For the details on this controversy see P. de Labriolle, in L'histoire de l'?g
Martin) III, De la Mort de Th?odose ? l'?lection de Gr?goire le Grand (Paris 194
II 31-46; and his principal source, F. Cavallera, Saint J?r?me (2 vols., Louvain
I, 193-286. Henceforth: J?r?me.
14 See F. H. Dudden, The Life and Times of St. Ambrose (2 vols, [pagination con
Oxford 1935) 2,457, Henceforth: Ambrose-.
15 See Ep. 67 to Jerome, which is clearly a request for information. Cavaller
II 48 (see the text which corrects the approximation given in the table on the
prefers 399 as the date of this letter.
16 See especially his plea to Valerius for time to study, Ep. 21.3 (date: 391). Mor
touching our question, De libero arbitrio 3.59. F.J. Thonnard, A 6, (2d ed. 1
dates this book in the neighborhood of 395, nine years after his conversion. S
Bardy's remarks, ibid. 495-9 and in Les r?visions, A 12 (1950) 567. This latter
precious mine of information, particularly on the chronology of the Saint's wor

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4 traditio

confidence in Ambrose's orthodoxy, and the general reputat


enjoyed up to the turn of the century, it must be left open
sibility that Augustine could once, in perfectly good faith,
igenist doctrine which he later repudiated.

Augustine: Pre-existenge and the four Hypotheses

But the question only sharpens if we juxtapose two co


has made in the course of his study. The first allows that in
Augustine appears to have held the pre-existence of the
admits that of the four hypotheses presented in the thir
libero arbitrio concerning the origin of the soul, Augustine
to the exclusion of the others, since *la foi n'en condamne a
n'est impos?e comme certaine par la raison.'18 The book
to date from 395,19 in which case the possibilities as August
that advanced date are the following:
There are these four opinions about the soul: that it co
tion, that it is newly created when each person is born, t
pre-exist elsewhere are sent by God into the bodies of tho
or that they come down (labantur) of their own will. We s
accept any of these opinions. Either this question has not yet
and decided by Catholic commentators on Scripture, b
scurity and difficulty, or if this has been done, these wo
come into my hands. At all events, our faith must keep u
anything about the substance of the Creator which is fa
of Him.20

Notice in passing that it would be difficult to find a more appropriate term


for the Plotinian expression of the fall ? a e ?a e ? than the labantur
which expresses Augustine's fourth hypothesis.21 His avowal of ignorance
respecting any litterae ecclesiasticae which might settle the question, is also
interesting.22 But coupled with his tendency to think of the soul as pre-exist
ing, it is clear that Augustine's personal choice must lie between the last
two hypotheses: which raises the question, what does the fourth hypothesis
mean?

17 Introduction, 94-5. 18 Ibid. 68.


19 See note 16 supra.
20 De lib. arb. 3.59, translation: Dom Mark Pontifex, AGW 22, (Westminster 1955).
21 It contains both the senses of 'deviate' and 'fall' conveyed by the Greek term.
the occurrence of the latter in a locus which there is good reason to think Augustine r
(cf. our article, cited supra n. 1), see Ennead YI 5.12.16.
22 The terms (a divinorum librorum catholicis tractoribus) are different, but the subst
recalls his complaints against Origen, De civ. Dei 11.23.1-2.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 5

To arrive at any clarity on this issue, it would be indispensable to illuminate


the entire context, thereby reviving a controversy whose flames still slumber.23
For that context bristles with difficulties, not to say with confusion: and
we would suggest that Augustine is not entirely exempt from responsibility
on the latter score. What seems beyond question is the fact that Augustine
is here discussing two troubling aspects of human existence, our ignorance,
and our difficulty in doing good.24 He begins by assuring his readers that
these two aspects of our life are surely a punishment, and, since God is just,
punishment for some sin.25 The purpose which brings him to examine the
four hypotheses is, accordingly, that of proving that however the soul is con
ceived as having arrived in this vale of tears, God's justice is beyond reproach.26
Now this is how he reasons respecting the fourth hypothesis:
But if souls existing elsewhere are not sent by the Lord God, but come
of their own accord to dwell in bodies, we can easily see that whatever
ignorance and difficulty result from the action of their own will, the
Creator is in no way to blame. Even if He had sent them Himself, since
He did not deprive them ... of their freedom to beg and seek and strive ...
He would therefore be utterly without blame.27

God's justice, therefore, is put beyond man's complaint. But the hypothesis
is none other than that of a voluntary fall of the soul into the body, into ig
norance and difficulty, into a place of punishment. The divine Justice is
uncompromised precisely because the soul has chosen freely and consequently
deserves everything that follows from that free choice. One can only infer
that this choice is itself the sin for which the soul is punished, the sin preced
ing birth in this life on account of which it is embodied in a sensible universe:
the essence of what Augustine much later found to be Origen's position.
Consider now the difference between the third and fourth hypothesis:
either God has sent the soul without fault on its part, or the soul has sinned.
Starting from his pre-existence position, which of these two must Augustine
choose? His way of appending a hasty quandoquidem etiamsi eas ipse misisset28

23 The controversy dates from the publication of an article by Fr. Y. de Montcheuil


Recherches de science religieuse 23 (1933), (reprinted in his M?langes th?ologiques (Paris 1946)
93-111, in answer to Fr. Charles Boyer's 'Dieu pouvait-il cr?er l'homme dans l'?tat d'ignoran
ce et de difficult?/ Gregorianum 11 (1930) 32-57. In 1954 it still showed no signs of abat
ing: see the contributions of Trap?, Boyer, Le Bouriier, De Lubac to Augustinus Magister,
and the discussion, AM III 247-61.
24 De lib. arb. 3.53. Compare the question as put by Evodius, ibid. 1.23.
25 Ibid. 3.51, 52, 54.
26 See Ibid. 3.53: ut quiescant, et adversus Deum murmurare d?sistant; also his treamtent
of each of the hypotheses, ibid. 54-8 and the summary-conclusion, 59: we should not think
(sentire) aliud de ilio [seil, creatore] quam est.
27 Ibid. 3.58 . 28 Ibid.

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6 traditio

'even if He had sent them Himself ? to his treatment


hypothesis, is at least suggestive: the misisset seems to put u
back into the framework of the third hypothesis, which
thoroughly treated: why go back to it?
Now it may just be that Augustine is not back-tracking at
tion between these two hypotheses may in his mind not be a
all; he may not feel either obliged or entitled to choose one
of the other. The good Plotinian, in fact, cannot choose b
falling and being sent; for one of the peculiarities of Plotinus'
in holding firmly to both ends of that chain and trying to
the apparent opposition is, in the final analysis, illusory.
And yet, the objection comes, that opposition is quite r
cannot but agree. That agreement leads us to examine ano
Gilson's text, cited above. 'Pour Augustin,' he assures us,
a fait est bon; le corps a donc ?t? cr?? pour sa bont? intrins?q
une cons?quence ou un ch?timent du p?ch?. ' We have underl
which show a passage of the author's thought from the pr
plane to the level of inference: an inference which shows th
instinct which is at work, for these two views are, in fact, h
Can it be that Augustine's thought at this point suffers f
herence ?
The possibility must be left open, at least for the moment. The justification
of chess, it has been said, lies in the fact that even grand masters make mistakes;
one might suggest by a distant analogy that it must sometimes be the business
of the historian of philosophy to transcribe faithfully the inner contradictions
which his philosophic instinct ? and admiration ? would tempt him to
suppress. If Augustine's thought is not entirely coherent on the situation
of the embodied soul, he was not the first to suffer under that stigma....

The Incoherence of Plotinian Doctrine on the Soul

For it is precisely that doctrine of the soul, fallen, yet at the same time
sent, into a world which is simultaneously bad and beautiful, which led Br?hier
to speak of an 'undeniable contradiction' in Plotinus' thought.29 It arose
from his desire to remain a faithful exponent of the Platonic tradition in
its entirety. In his basic work on the subject, Ennead IV 8, on The Soul's
Descent into the Body he begins with a careful summary of the two conflict

29 La philosophie de Plotin (Paris 1928) 68. The entire chapter, pp. 47-69, is valuable
for an understanding of the diverse tensions in Plotinus' theory of the soul.
30 Sixth in the chronological order, this treatise is relatively early.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 7

ing sides of Plato's thought on the soul's immersion in the sensible universe,31
before proceeding to his own effort of reconciliation. The pessimistic accent
found in the Phaedo and the Phaedrus, whereby some ' fault ' of its own has
plunged the soul into matter, is balanced by the more optimistic view of the
Timaeus, where the demiurge, out of goodness, 'sends" the soul down into
the sensible universe to impart beauty to it, by conferring on it the intelligible
perfection of the Ideas.
Plotinus is, therefore, conscious of the ambivalence in the master's thought,
and that from the very beginning of his philosophical activity.32 He refuses
the privilege of taking a one-sided view of the matter33 ? at least on the
plane of reflective thought; but reflection and affectivity do not always har
monize. Thus there is a possibility that the ' shift of accent ' wrhich is generally
admitted in Plotinus' thought only complicates that original ambivalence,
allowing the pessimistic accent to dominate toward the beginning, and gradu
ally to give way to the more Stoic optimism which characterizes his riper
work.34 The turning point in this development Harder has placed at the
moment when Plotinus realized that his earlier views gave entirely too much
encouragement to the Gnostics who for a considerable time became the target
of his fiercest opposition.35 Thus, in his later works, he points much more
to the beauty of the sensible world, which so reflects the goodness of God
and the perfection of the Ideas that it must rightly be called God's 'youngest
child,' indeed, the 'manifest god.'36 The soul, consequently, is 'sent' to
confer beauty on this world: does it follow that it has not sinned and 'fallen'
into that world? Not in the least; the two theses remain true and still require
reconciliation, or, in Br?hier's term, perpetuate the undeniable contradiction.
And Plotinus must constantly renew his effort to show that fault is integrated
into the necessary operation of the immutable laws of the universe, that the

31 Ibid. 1, entire. 32 See note 30, supra.


33 As many of his predecessors seem to have done, opting for either the pessimistic
optimistic position. See A.J. Festugi?re, La r?v?lation d'Herm?s Trism?giste 2 (Pari
63-96. This attempt at reconciliation is already a first hallmark of the Plotinian th
34 See H. Schwyzer, RE s.v. ' Plotinos' 547-8; but see also H.C. Puech, 'Plotin et les
tiques,' Sources de Plotin, Entretiens sur l'Antiquit? Classique, Fondation Hardt, V;
forth, Sources (Vand uvres-G?n?ve 1960) 159-174; also the subsequent discusi?n, 17
esp. 183. Compare ibid. E. R. Dodds' study, 'Numenius and Ammonius' 1-32 (discus
33-61). The resulting picture is one of more decided development than Schwyzer was p
to admit when writing his article for RE. Its direction generally is away from a
Gnostic dualism toward a more Stoic optimism. Unaware of this development, and
his Plotinus without regard for chronology, Augustine shows the tensions even more c
perhaps, than the Plotinus of any given treatise.
35 Sources 185.
36 Enn. V 8.12.9. This treatise dates from Plotinus' anti-Gnostic period, see loc. cit.
. 35.

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8 traditio

soul's liberty and cosmic necessity are really one and the sam
that we are fallen because we desired to fall, but that mu
desire is itself put in us by the Logos which irresistibly rule
our returns.37
The very lucidity of Gilson's estimate of the situation, then
reason for examining his position. His analysis suggests th
coherence in Augustine's thought, that incoherence is the
troubled Plotinus, giving his doctrine a characteristic set of
which may serve to make it all the more identifiable if we f
in Augustine.

Comparison of Plotinus and Augustine: Method and

The fact that Plotinus' doctrine on this point is so charac


us to what some might consider a methodological shortcut. In
proving, treatise by treatise, that Augustine read the Ennead
to invoke as points of comparison between his and Plotin
mean to expose the two doctrines, highlighting their par
complexity and inner tension, and leaving the reade
his own conclusions on the question of direct dependence
intend to facilitate that conclusion somewhat by presenting
from a limited number of Plotinian treatises, placing them i
Augustinian texts whose direct dependence on the the P
appears highly probable, at times almost transparent. Th
diiect dependence, however, we prefer to treat as a confirma
ary conclusion: that Augustine's doctrine of the soul and its
body is, whatever its direct source, faithfully Plotinian.
There should be no difficulty against our invoking Enn
2-3 and IV 3: Augustine refers explicitly to them in the
and the grounds are excellent for thinking that he read them
ings at Cassiciacum.38 G. Verbeke has presented strong evide
the De immortalitate animae with Ennead IV 7, on the Im
Soul,Z9 and additional evidence could be adduced to corrob

37 77 \7 ? ; + ? Dlntinnc rohirnc + +V.io nnHl?nrt ?^nKlow, ^ 77??, O 19 OC?tt


JZjli?L. iV O. O "XiLii". J. IU Ulllu? l^luill? Ulli] llVkLllllg pl UUlVlll Ali J_rfil.it.. XXX . lU.?^
and IV 3.12-13. Note that the latter two treatises are expressly referred to in De civ. D
see Henry, Plotin, 122-3.
38 See our article, cited above, n. 1, especially nn. 14 and 15.
39 'Spiritualit? et immortalit? de l'?me chez saint Augustin' AM I 329-34.
40 A number of additional arguments (besides those listed by Verbeke) occur in suggesti
parallel in both treatises: note particularly the curious argument concerning sleep in Erin
IV 7. 85 and De imm. animae 23. The question deserves a special study, which would

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the plotinian fall of the soul 9

Treatise I, 4, on Happiness, also lays claim on our attention.41 We have,


finally, called attention in a preceding article42 to the importance of Ennead
VI 4-5, the twin-treatise on omnipresence.
We would suggest that in addition to the above, Augustine shows convin
ing signs of having read and assimilated Enneads III 7 (On Eternity and Time),
IV 8 (On the Soul9s Descent into the Body), and V 8, (On Intellectual Beauty).
We propose, however, to use them as additional (though at times pivota
points of comparison, without insisting here on the mass of evidence which
could be brought forward for direct dependence.43

Augustine and the Doctrine of Ennead IV 8

The Dialogues of Cassiciacum are richly sown with enigmatic reflections


on the soul's condition in the body; difficult to understand outside of a doctrin
of the fall of the soul into the body, they often become easy and obvious in
the light of Plotinian teaching. The various terms which describe the sou
in its fallen condition, for example, ? oblita, demersa, implicata, progress
among them44 ? echo the little Neo-Platonic lexicon of the soul's fallen con
dition which Plotinus presents in his opening section of Ennead IV 8.45 More
significant, perhaps, is the division among souls whereby some seem 'less
fallen' than others; like Plotinus, Augustine holds for a diversified fall which
explains why certain souls can mount to the ' vision ' more easily than others.4

very revealing on Augustine's working methods and perhaps also on his philosophic forma
tion. Plotinus, for example, combats the entelechy and harmony theories of the soul with
parallel arguments (ibid. 84 and 85); this seems to have led Augustine to assume (ibid. 17
that they were one and the same theory).
41 See Henry, Plotin, 138. Taking as a hypothesis that Augustine read this treatise be
fore Gassiciacum would, we suggest, illuminate some obscurities in those writings.
42 Art. cit. . 1, supra.
43 Or, if preferred, our method could be construed after the hypothetical fashion suggested
in n. 41. The fact that these treatises help explain obscurities in Augustine's text and in
the movement of his thought (without, however, deforming it) would itself constitute ev
dence of their relevance, to be confirmed, if possible, by further data of a more philologica
nature. See the methodological remarks in our former article, pp. 4-5 and nn. 21, 26, an
31.
44 Such expressions abound at Gassiciacum, see for example De ord. 1. 29 and 2. 30-1;
De b. vita 1-5; and J.J. O'Meara's edition of Against the Academics, AGW 12, notes 8 and 9
to Book 1, with references.
45 Enn. IV 8.1.
46 Cf. Enn. IV 8.5.17-29 and De b. vita 3-5 (three classes of souls) and Sol. 1. 23-25 (two
classes). Note especially Sol. 1.23, those in the higher class nec doctore indigent, sed sola
f?rtasse admonitione. His credere, sperare, amare satis est. But the notions of faith, hope
and charity (ibid. 12-14) bear careful examination.

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10 TRADITIO

For both authors, this ascent must start with the exercise of that Platon
reminiscence which revives the soul's former contact with the higher world,4
and Augustine's early emphasis on the purifying value of the disciplinae
liberales almost certainly stems from a Plotinian understanding of the intel
lectualist nature of this 'return of the soul.'48
Our reference treatise for the doctrine just exposed has been Ennead IV 8.
And the key term which Plotinus there uses to describe the soul's ideal statio
is a , drawn from Plato's Timaeus,^ and a classic expression in Ne
Platonism. Theiler has ably shown the importance of that notion in Augustine
works, at the same time endeavoring to demonstrate that Augustine foun
it, not in Plotinus, but in Porphyry.50 His uncompromising repudiation of
Plotinus as in any measure a direct source for Augustine's doctrine has met
with almost universal rejection, even on the part of those sympathetic towar
the hypothesis that Augustine was exposed to Porphyrian readings in additio
to those he admittedly made in Plotinus.51 However, the evidence for these
readings, as occurring before the De consensu evang?list?mra, remains entirely
indirect,52 whereas the circle of Plotinian treatises scholars have seen fit to
add to Augustine's early reading-list is once again expanding. Had Augustine
drawn the notion of a from Plotinus, then, where would he have
found it?
Oddly enough, in only two loci. The first of them is in Ennead III 2-3,
on Providence, which we know he read, but where the notion is found without
extended development.53 Its only other occurrence is in Ennead IV 8,54 where

47 Enn. IV 8.4.29-30. Cf. Sol. 2 entire, but especially 34-5.


48 This is particularly clear in Sol. 2, where the reminiscence theory is in close connection
with the ascent through the disciplinae, 34-5. It explains much of the De ordine's concentra
tion on the ordo studiorum, 2.14-17 and especially 30-31 where its connection with the re
gressus animae is stressed.
49 Enn. IV 8.7.1-11, esp. line 5.
50 Porphyrios und Augustin (Halle 1933)17ff. Henceforth: Porphyrios.
51 See for example, O'Meara in ACW 12. 22-3 and notes; P. Courcelle, Les Lettres Grec
ques en Occident (2d ed. Paris 1948) 159ff.
52 Consisting of inferring Porphyrian influence for themes in Augustine's early works
which the aging bishop later associates with Porphyry. See our article (cited note 1, above)
especially note 39, and also O'Meara, ACW 12, note 110 of the Introduction and the cita
tions given there. Note how importantly O'Meara features the fuga a corpore theme in this
regard.
53 See Enn. Ill 2.9.20, where Plotinus is concerned to show that the universality of Pro
vidence does not deprive man of responsibility for his actions.
54 Enn. IV 8.7.5. Here its connection is different from the above, as we shall shortly
see. We are indebted to Mr. G. Pollet for this information on the occurrence of the
a notion in Plotinus, information he was enabled to furnish thanks to his researches
toward a Plotinian Lexicon.

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the plotinian fall of the soul 11

Plotinus describes the soul's position in reality as an intermediate one, be


tween the pure intelligibles and the sensible realm, such that it pertains to
her very nature to govern and order the sensible world, communicating to
it the perfection she draws from her contemplation of the ideas. This function,
he is careful to note, she can fulfill while remaining entirely recollected in
contemplation, enfolded in the unity of the universal soul, with which she
is fundamentally at one. Her government of the sensible world does not
necessitate her entering 'into,' engaging in intimate contact with it. Like
the entourage of a king who never leaves his palace, she can govern that world
'from afar.'

The 'De genesi contra manichaeos' and the soul's 'medietas'

As revealing on Augustine's anthropology as Ennead IV 8 is on Plotinus',


is that little-studied, perhaps because highly disconcerting work, the De
Genesi contra Manichaeos. Here, Augustine's 'spiritual exegesis' permits him
to take extraordinary liberties with what is often the most obvious meaning
of the scriptural text, something of which he seems at times uncomfortably
aware. He justifies his resort to the transferred sense with a number of reasons,
laying particular stress on the need to explain Genesis in a manner 'worthy
of God,'55 and therefore calculated to retort the 'sacrilegious' expos? of the
same work proposed by the Manichees.56 His sincerity in all this, his 'Catholic
spirit,' is beyond question, for his model in exegetical method is most prob
ably Ambrose, whose 'subjective, capricous, arbitrary' interpretation suc
ceeded, as Dudden puts it, in making virtually 'anything mean anything.'57
The point, however, is this: for such an arbitrary application of spiritual
exegesis the literal and obvious sense of Genesis can hardly be said to be norma
tive. And yet, some normative outlook must be sought to explain the mean
ing Augustine manages to 'put into' the terms of the sacred text.
That normative outlook, we would suggest, is identifiably Plotinian: beneath
the verba of the sacred author, Augustine succeeds in unearthing the res of
the Enneads. And it is the doctrine of Ennead IV 8 which persuades him
to reduce the scriptural author's very substantial Eve to a mere exemplum
a kind of symbolic figure standing for the inferior, sensible, 'animal part,,'

55 See especially De Genesi contra Manichaeos 2.3. (henceforth: De Genesi.)


56 Ibid, and 2.19, where his spiritual exegesis has purged Genesis of the ' sacrilegious '
Manichaean interpretation whereby it was God who encouraged carnal intercourse in para
dise; cf. his ingenious theory of copulatio spiritalis, ibid. 1.30.
57 See Dudden, Ambrose, Vol. 2, 459. See also ibid. 458 for the principle o? digna Deo; and
cf. P. Roller?, ' La Expositio evangelii secundum Lucani di Ambroggio come fonte della
essegesi', Agostiniana (Turin 1958) esp. 14-17; 129-132; 137-40.

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12 TRADITIO

subject to the 'virile' ratio; she is accomodata ad obtemperandum, while the


governing ratio must itself remain in constant contemplative contact w
and submission to subsistent Wisdom.58 This hierarchic position of the soul
Augustine describes in the pregnant term medietas animi, taking his startin
point from the happy coincidence that Genesis speaks of the two trees situat
in medio paradisi:
Ennead IV 8. De Genesi c
7. 1-17 : e a - 12: Product
, , ?? a , ne illud lign
a e Lvov e e e a , gaudium spir
a a e e a a - terram, et n
e a a ?a e a renarum cup
e , a a a a a Lignum aute
a , e a a e e , dio paradisi
... ... a e cat, qua opo
e a a , e a e in meditullio
a a , e e a e dinatam, ut
a , a habeat omn
a e a e supra se tarn
a a , a a ?a e e a Dei: et nequ
a a , e e a sibi arrogan
a a a a - sinistram p
, a e e nendo quod e
e i e plantatum i
e a a e ' , a e a Ligno autem
a a a e a a a , - ipsa item m
a e a a e e e integrit?s si
a I a e a? lignum in m
al a , a a est; et ideo l
e e e e a , a et mali dic
a a e e - d?bet in ea
a I a e tendere, id
? ? e ?v a . - posteriora s
a e a e a ? a id est, corp
a e a sam, desert
a a e e a, e e - sua potentia
a e a a . voluerit, int

58 De Genesi 1. 30; cf. 1.27


To what extent is the an
The Platonic passage fr
bids us be cautious; and t
that Augustine may not be
to us. How settle the ques
ambiguous phrase a meanin
that the functional relatio
Platonic.

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THE PLOT I NI AN FALL OF THE SOUL 13

initium omnis peccati. Et cum hoc


ejus peccatum poena fuerit consecuta,
experiendo discit quid intersit inter bo
num quod deseruit, et malum in quod
cecidit. Et hoc ei erit gustasse de
fructu arboris dignoscentiae boni et
mali. . . .

Now the most significant similarity between these texts is one of doctrinal
pattern: Plotinus' key term, a , is translated by the term medietas
animi, which Augustine paraphrases with the explanation that the soul is
'ordered' in meditullio quodam rerum (cf. a e ...).
The paragraph from the De Genesi then presents a finely compressed statement
of the doctrine presented in Ennead IV 8: the soul must supereminere, retain
her natural relation of governor of the sensible world, without letting it de
generate into an involvi, obrui, an implicatio (cf. e e ) earthly
pleasures. Her gaudium should remain spiritale, and Augustine has already
explained this as referring to the delights of intellectual contemplation,59
exactly in accordance with Plotinus' mind on the matter. So firmly has he
grasped the doctrine concerned, he can re-express it in terms reminiscent
of various other treatises, reminding us that the things in this spiritual world
really exist, those in the sensible universe not 'existing' in the true sense
of that term so that the dextera-sinistra couple furnishes a semi-biblical
hook for a perfectly Plotinian insight.60 The spiritual is, for both thinkers
what is prior, ante, while the corporeal is posterior, post,61 in a realm which
the soul should school herself to forget in order to revive that other kind of
memory, the Platonic reminiscence of the intelligible: again, good Plotinian
doctrine.62 The notion of an aversio whereby the soul has 'deserted' God,

59 De Genesi 1.30: the spiritual marriage of 'man' and 'woman,' symbolizing the rational
and sensible parts of human nature, was to bring forth spirituelles foetus immortalium gaudio
rum. It must be remembered that Augustine has already made the soul part of that "spir
itual creation" which is symbolized by the viridi agri (2.4) which is irrigated by the intel
ligible light of the Verbum (2.6).
60 Cf. Conf. 7.16-17, where Augustine's first step in his reflections on the libri platonieomm
is in terms of this classic Platonic distinction.
61 See, for example, Augustine's allusion to the hierarchy of beings in Conf. 3.9, the priora
opera Dei being the spiritalia, while the corporeal universe implicitly receives the denomi
nation of posteriora. The same distinction can be found frequently in Plotinus, but especially
relevant to Augustine's paradise image is its use in Enn. V 8.12-13, where the notions of
inferiority and (natural, not temporal) posteriority are linked.
62 As contained in Enn. IV 3.25ff., which Augustine read, and which K. Winkler finds
active at Cassiciacum: see 'La Th?orie augustinienne de la m?moire ? son point de d?part/
AM I. 511-19.

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14 traditio

shows Augustine already beginning to read this treatise in the


VI 4-5, a practice which climaxes in the Confessions.63
The doctrinal pattern, then, is identical in both texts: was th
on the other? An indication making this probable is found
Augustine's exegesis of the verse in question. Why should A
that peculiar assurance, one that seems to have nothing to do
ical task at the moment, concerning the profit the soul can d
fallen existence? The spiritual meaning of 'tasting the frui
of good and evil' provides a starting point, but one whose
be slightly adjusted by the interpretation he gives it. The fall
side: the soul can gain an experiential and comparative kno
good she has deserted. We shall see that this parallelism of ass
to an identity of problematic in both authors;64 but it is, at t
bizarre enough, arbitrary enough in the context which is Aug
Its explanation becomes easy, however, once we admit it w
the same reminder occurring in the same context in Plotinus'

Ennead IV 3 and the Properties of the 'Fallen' S

For Augustine, the initium of the fault lies in superbia; w


us that for Plotinus as well, the fault which can disturb this
is a desire whereby the soul tires of being with the intellig
wishes to be ' on her own ' ? ad seipsam, as Augustine puts
of this desire, Plotinus explains in the same treatise, is that t
into herself, leaves the whole-soul to become isolated and part
capable of surveying and dealing only with fragments: notably
of the corporeal universe which she chooses to be her own bod
plunges into the very heart of the sensible universe, becomes
enters into contact with a part which becomes her own, and ent
her. This preoccupation, immersion, intimate contact ? in Aug
this involvi, obrui, implicatio as distinct from her former su

63 See our previous article, cited in note 1, above. As might be expected, th


and therefore works of Augustine in which one or other treatise of Plotinus
his attention.
64 We shall see shortly that Augustine shares the problematic which ex
rence of this anomalous passage in a deeper sense than mere textual rapp
ever do it; at the same time, however, that problematic is never clearer th
text which here served to remind Augustine of the need to 'justify' the
\ 65 See Enn. IV 8.4.11-28: we have merely summarized it here.
66 Ibid.; and cf. the text cited above . 12, in parallel with Enn. IV

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 15

is what weakens the soul, draws her attention away from the vision of intelli
gible truth, and constitutes her fallen state.67
To the mechanism of that fall we shall return shortly; but for the moment
it must be remarked that one term in various forms suffices to describe man's
fallen state which Augustine sees as ensuing post peccatimi, in contrast with
the soul's existence ante peccatum.68 It is a vita mortalis, mors vit?lis; it is
hujus vitae mortalit?s, or, in more condensed form, it is, when compared with
the alia vita, simply mors.10 Augustine may well have found Plotinian en
couragement for selecting this term to capsule the properties of our fallen
situation;71 what is more manifest is that Plotinus, rather than Genesis, war
ranted his treating as consequences of our fall a number of elements which

67 Plotinus, therefore, would reject the thought of the soul's 'pure' spirituality; the soul
preserves a natural relation with the body and the sensible universe, but one which makes
it ideally present 'to' (not 'in') that universe, present in an absent sort of way.
68 Note the distinction: whereas the anima is the subject of peccatum (De Genesi 2.5:
antequam anima peccaret), the term homo seems more appropriate to our fallen condition:
only after that fall was there a homo labor?ns in terra, (ibid). Though obliged by the sacred
text to admit man as created from the clay of the earth, Augustine seems to reduce the
force of that admission with the immediate reminder that this was before he was transported
into paradise, ut a Verbo Dei consummaretur (ibid. 2.10.) This seems to mean that man's
creation was itself completed by that consummation, so that the normative divine idea
of man is that of a spiritual creature. Hence Augustine can say that the basic flaw of the
Manichaean anthropology arises from its starting point: multum errent qui post peccatum
consid?rent hominem, cum in hujus vitae mortalitatem damnatus est-, (ibid. 1.29). Add that
we look forward to a renovatio, a liberatio which Augustine terms a commutatio in angelicam
form?m (ibid. 1.29; 2.32), in virtue of which, by following the spiritual Adam, Christ, we
become once more the spiritual creation, the viride agri, having been restored to the paradise
which we lost by sin (2.10). Cf. De quant, animae 78, where the soul is naturally par angelo,
and inferior only in consequence of sin.
69 Conf. 1.7. Note the context: Augustine admits: nescio unde venerim hue; cf. ibid. 9:
die mihi, utrum alicui iam aetati meae mortuae successerit infantia mea ... fuine alicubi aut
aliquisl Thus, in a doubt which may be resolved as the Confessions proceeds, he leaves
the question open: Ibid. 10, he praises God de primordiis ET infantia mea, quae non memini.
70 Cf. De Genesi 1.29; (for other variations, ibid. 1.19. 26; 2.15, 38, 40). Compare De
lib. arb. 2.53, the culminating definition of sin, and De Genesi 2.15 where a similar com
pression is achieved, the term mors now standing for the entire complex of fallen-condition
properties.
71 Cf. Enn. IV 7.11 and ibid. 9, line 23, where the term is applied to wood and stone in
contrast with the soul. Augustine's distinction De imm. animae 16, between anima
animata-exanime, with the latter then termed mortuum, seems an echo of this terminology.
See also the coincidental but striking grouping of the same terms (wood, stone, death) in
the Plotinian original of Augustine's death-bed quotation, Enn. I 4.7.20-26: 'One that
sets great store by wood and stones, or, Zeus ! by mortality among mortals, cannot yet
be the proficient, whose estimate of death, we hold, must be that it is better than life in the
body. ' Such verbal correspondences mean very little to us; there is much evidence to suggest
that they meant a great deal to Augustine.

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16 TRADITIO

the Hebrew author unquestionably thought proper to man as God created


him: thus, labor,72 carnal procreation,73 the need to resort to sense knowledge,
language, symbolic communication of all sorts,74 the opacity of a body which
makes concealment and simulation possible,75 none of these, in Augustine's
view, were proper to man (or, more exactly the soul) as originally intended;
all such things came upon us quia post peccatum mortales facti sumus. Again,
a comparison with Ennead IV 3, which we know Augustine read, makes the
structured correspondence of teaching almost transparent:
Ennead IV 3.
^ De Genesi
18. 1-4 : e a ?? ! 30: Hoc ip
a e e a a a e - vita quisque
e a ; * e a a - veniendi ver
e e a e a toli corpore.
a - punctiones to
a Et quoniam
a ? e . . . oculos et per
admonemur,
phantasmat
plexitate, cu
manducet p
9-22 : e e a?e 5: Ante pecc
? e e e [Deus creatur
a ?a e e ae -
V e a a e a -
teriore, loque
non extrinse
a a e , a e e a e - fonte suo, h
a a e a a , e e a manante veri
a e e a . e
a , I a , a 6. Et ideo la
e e - cessariam hab
a , al a a nis verbis_N
a a ' a e nus noster ..
a . " a e a ... infudit... u
ee aa' a
a e
? -
- pluviam_Ho
id est, in pec
a a, e e a e ? tu? [intellig
a e e a e a a a humanis ver
a a ' a e a e tanquam de
1 a ? e e ,
e 'a a
a a 9 a e

72 De Genesi 2.15.
78 Ibid. 1.30.
74 Ibid. 2.5, 6; cited belo
75 Ibid. 2.32, cited below
7? See note 68, supra.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 17

e . 9 E e I a e a a 32: ?eque enim


a a coelestibus sic la
e ? ? ' a * dendum est, quem
e e e a a a poribus latent: s
a a a tus anirnorum ap
a a e e xime in oculis, s
? e a - ac simplicitate
, a a e e omnes omnino m
a I e e e . arbitror. Itaque
tationem illam
angelicam form
tiuntur.

The adjustments Augustine has worked here are all in function of his
exegetical task and of the modification of problematic imposed by his Christian
preoccupations. None of them, however, can hide the fact that the inner
logic of Plotinus' position has been grasped with admirable acuity. Thus,
the use of reasoning is due to difficulties, perplexities, which are symbolized
by the 'thorns and thistles' of 'this life': e a a. This 'labor' Augustine
assures us, is what the author of Genesis must mean by Adam's punishment.
In the higher sphere of existence, (e e , e ), all our knowledge
was poured into us by that fons spoken of in Genesis, one that interiorly ir
rigated the viride agri which symbolizes the spiritual creation77 ? and at
this point the Augustinian manans reproduces Ficinus' translation of the
Plotinian . Having lost contact with this interior font, the soul
must turn outwards in its pursuit of truth:78 human words, all the work of
communication, symbol, advice and consultation (and this for Augustine
includes the entire regime of scriptural, prophetic and apostolic authority),
all these are consequences of the peccatum animae, the fall from paradise.
Remarkable is the fact that both authors entertain the idea of a body in the
paradisiac state, though a body of a transparency (perspicuitas, simplicitas,
cf. a a a a)79 such that everyone's inner thoughts are immediate
ly known to his companions there, no concealment or simulation being
possible.80 And it is significant that both describe this reciprocal awareness

77 De Genesi 2.10.
78 We have tried to show (art. cit. note 1, above, pp. 28-37) that in the Confessions Augustine
most often uses the Plotinian image of the 'Head' (Enn, VI 5.7.1-14)as the imaginative
backdrop of this intus-foras distinction. At this point in his career, however, and dealing
with the analogous but not identical concept of the intima, the corresponding image is drawn
rather from Enn. Ill 7, as we shall shortly see. Gf. note 68, above.
79 Gf. also the a of Plotinus' description of the fall in Enn. VI 4.14.25. Mackenna
renders the term suggestively with the phrase: 'We have lost that first simplicity, we are
become the dual thing.' (Italics ours).
80 De Genesi 2.23 develops this link between the "tunics of mortality" and the resulting
possibility of dissimulation and hypocrisy.

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18 traditio

in identical analogies, namely, the expressiveness of the h


a ) and of the human eye ( a ).
Now the parallel just cited proves at least that Augusti
of these properties of human existence faithfully echoes Plo
that we know from other evidence that he did read this t
tight pattern whereby he reproduces the same interconn
consequences, make it highly probable that he had this p
mind (if not before his eyes) when writing his Genesis comm
We are not, therefore, in the world of 'pure spirits': the
angelicam formam means that the soul will once again don
it once had. We are entitled to think of this corpus codest
yet in a sense quite different from our ordinary use of the
hardly be just, therefore, to speak of paradisiac man as t
certainly, the robust author of Genesis would hardly hav
Adam he wrote about.

The Soul never 'entirely' fallen

The soul, therefore, retains even in paradise her natural relation to the
sensible: it is a radical degeneration of that relation which constitutes its
fallen state. And yet (and here Plotinus admits he is advancing a personal
opinion) the soul is never entirely fallen. His final suggestion in Ennead
IV 8 would have it that the soul's highest portion remains in unbroken contact
with the intelligible order, still engaged in contemplation.82 Of this highest
activity, our everyday consciousness would seem to bear not the slightest
trace. The objection from experience, therefore, is a normal one, and Plo
tinus must contend with it. In Ennead V 8 (on Intellectual Beauty) one of
his hearers poses the question squarely: how can the soul be in [the realm
of intellectual] beauty, and yet fail to see it?83
That question, allowing for modifications of problematic,84 is entirely anal
ogous to the difficulty which faces Augustine in the De musica. For both

81 This seems the force of Plotinus' a a where Henry-Schwyzer (accepting Vitringa's


reading) place it. Gf. Erin. V. 8.3. 21ff. for Plotinus' acceptance of corporeality in heaven;
here he seems to warn that that body will not be the kind familiar to our ordinary experience.
Mackenna probably ( ' though they may occupy bodies in the heavenly region ') and Br?hier cer
tainly ('tant qu'elles ont leur corps dans le ciel') work from a different positioning of a a .
82 Enn. IV 8.8.1-9: Plotinus offers the suggestion with the admission that it 'clashes
with the general view. ' This is, in fact, one of the most characteristic and personal of Plo
tinus' views on the soul and her fallen condition, making all the more significant the traces
of the same theory in Augustine. 83 Enn. V 8.11. 19-20.
84 In De musica 6.7-8, Augustine is trying to show how much of the illusory there is in
our everyday impression that the body can act upon the soul in its fallen state: such a ca

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 19

authors admit that sense experiences would at times vividly persuade us


that we are naturally 'embodied.' The reply in both cases tacitly supposes
the Plotinian doctrine that true health, which correlates with our exercise
of the higher and therefore most proper activity, is invariably accompanied
by a 'diminution,' at least of such corporeal consciousness.
Ennead V 8. De musica 6.
11. 24-31 : e e a e e e - 9-10: Gorporalia ergo quaecum
a , e a huic corpori ingeruntur aut ob
a a e ? ? tur ... in ipso corpore aliquid fae
e e , e quod operi ejus [seil, animae] a
a e e - versetur aut congruat. Ideoqu
a ? ? a - renititur adversanti et mat?ri?m
e , e a e ficulter impingit, fit attentior ex
e a a a cultate ... et hoc vocatur dolor a
? e a * e bor. Morbidam quoque perturbat
... ? a e o I e a - corporis attente agit ... (10:) Se
a ' ' e a - sensus ... instrumentum est... sim
a I o i e , s?milibus ut adjungat, repellatqu
a a a noxium est... Agit haec anima
a e e - quiete, si ea quae insunt in untia
a e ?v . T? e a letudinis, quasi familiari quadam
e a a ? . . . sensione cesserunt_Gum autem
nonnulla, ut ita dicam, alteri tate
pus afficiunt, exserit atientior
tiones_ Quibus actionibus con
l?benter associ?t, et moleste obsis
congruis.
33-38 : a e 9 e a a
e a a , a e e ...
a a e ,
e a e * , e a
a e , ' ?v a e e e
e a .

Here an identity of doctrine is expressed in the same basic analogy, and


vested in a constellation of corresponding terms: Ficinus' translation repro
duces Augustine's sanitas, morbus, quietior, familiare, tranquilla, changing

pacity on its part5 he advises his disciple, would be real cause for wonder. He then goes
on (ibid. 9-10) to elaborate (with help from Plotinus, we may think: see Enn. IV 4.22ff.
which Augustine seems to have interpreted in the light of additional suggestions in Enn.
I 4.10 where the present problematic is remarkably paralleled) his celebrated theory of
sensation as an active 'attention of the soul to the passio corporis.' That attention becomes
sharpest when the soul encounters some difficultas in its normal animating activity, one
which produces the distraction from the higher activity of contemplation which is traced
to its cause in De musica 6.37ff. The cause is, as one might guess, the fall of the soul.

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20 TRADITIO

his consensione to the cognate consensu. Vivid sense impressions leave ' shocks
rather than clear knowledge; they go with a state of sickness ? alien, unnatur
al, incongruous ? rather than with the more natural, ' familiar, ' congruous
state of health; their evidence, accordingly, is more deceptive on our re
ontological condition than informative. Their clamorous claim on our atten
tion both authors associate with disturbance, tension, ' otherness ' ? an
Augustine feels obliged to add an apologetic ut ita dicam to the alteritas which
he may well have found translating Plotinus' a ? a disrupted stat
contrasting with the companionate, tranquil 'unification' proper to health:
a tranquillity whose upper extreme is, in both authors, the soul's ability to
abstract entirely from bodily concerns.85 Thus Augustine's reminder in De
quantitate animae 79 that only those activities obtrude upon our attentio
which we exercise with greater difficulty. The truth of the matter may be
? potest esse ? that the soul is constantly engaged in all seven levels, eve
in the highest contemplative activity ? its noblest portion never, in Plotinus
term, having ' come down. ' For this reason, too, he has previously observed
that the souls' re-ascent resembles nothing more than a cessatio, less a kind
of knowing than a lack of it ? a e e ? a 'diminution of co
sciousness. '86 From this standpoint it becomes plain why Augustine has fel
obliged repeatedly to return to the subject of the soul's 'immobility' in, his
early works87 ? a corollary of the Plotinian teaching whereby the pinnacle
of the soul remains entirely at peace, tranquil and changeless in the empyrean
Potest esse: Augustine abstains from affirmation, and the uncertainty does
him credit. For Plotinus' doctrine ultimately implies the rejection of an
need of 'being saved.' Salvation is already an accomplished fact, and th
only thing the soul need do is grasp that fact by an effort of intellectual ascen
whose function is to bring consciousness into line with what her true onto
logical status unalterably is. But such was Augustine's enthusiasm for th
Neo-Platonic illumination of Milan, ? after which (Conf. 7.17) he could
more easily doubt his own existence ( ' a avr?v e e e e a ) tha
the reality of that Supernal Truth these books had told him of ? that i
took him some time to grasp the dangers of this implication of the master'

85 Compare De musica 6.49 and E . I 4.10, where (see note 84) absorption in intellectu
activity is shown to take our minds completely off any routine lower activity we may be
engaged in at the same time.
86 De quant, animae 55. On whether, in Plotinus' system, all elevation corresponds t
'diminution de conscience' (Br?hier, Enn?ades V 149, note 1?? propos of the exact
passage from Ennead V 8.11 cited above, p. 19), see H.R. Schwyzer's careful "'Bewuss
und 'unbewusst' bei Plotin" in Sources, 341-378. Augustine maybe excused for holding
as regards corporeal consciousness, essentially the same view as Br?hier.
87 See De imm. animae 3-4 (comparing with Enn. IV 7.9); De ord. 2. 3-7, 18-21.

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the plot in i an fall of the soul 21

personal, characteristic, and therefore eminently recognizeable teaching on


the soul.

The Mechanism of the 'Fall'

(a): Fault and cosmic order are identical


To return now to the mechanism of the fall itself: is it so evident that the
problematic in both authors is parallel on the fundamental identity of 'fault'
and ' being sent ? ' Again we are faced with an example of Augustinian spiritual
exegesis which at first sight appears utterly inexplicable. Why does he take
such pains to draw our attention to the expression in Genesis whereby God
'dismisses' the sinful soul, rather than 'excluding' it from paradise? Close
examination of Augustine's writings from Cassiciacum onwards shows him
preoccupied with understanding the articulation which exists between the
sinner's action and the action of the sinless God:88 an articulation rendered
all the more delicate in a participation scheme wherein the action of the ' sec
ondaries ' always reduces to the action of the ' First. ' To this nettling issue
he comes back in the De libero arbitrio,89 answering it in terms which strongly
recall the definition of iniquitas which lies at the core of the Confessions'
account of his Neo-Platonic readings.90 In all these instances, the background

88 This is one of the background implications in De ord. 2.11-13 and 18-21; the overt
question is whether the actions of the stultus (translate: 'sinner') are performed in ordine;
the real question is whether Deus omnia agit as the universality of Providence seems to
imply; cf. ibid. 1, 1, aut certe mala omnia Dei vol?ntate committi. Plotinus' formulation of
the problem is the same, cf. 'On Providence,' Enn. Ill 2.7, and 10, and 12; III 3.3, and
4, where he is unable to hide his acute embarassment before this question. In the De ord.
sections referred to (as well as in De ord. 2. 22-3), the only solution offered is that the actions
of the stultus do not elude God's logically subsequent ordering activity. What drives Augus
tine in both instances to point out the need of an ordo studiorum before being fit to gain
insight into such question is his own awareness that this is an escape from rather than a
solution of the questions which he has posed entirely too squarely to get out of it that easily.
He is looking for a scheme such that the sinner can commit sin, and God not commit
it, while at the same time the dualistic solution of the Manichees is foiled, and the exigencies
of participation theory are conscientiously observed.
89 See De lib. arb. 1.4: the statement of the question is beguiling if one takes voluntas
hi a chosiste manner. Augustine really wants to know how God can give us a free will whose
very free act is reducibly His, without making Him the auctor of the sins we commit.
90 De lib. arb. 2. 53; cf. Conf. 7.22 and De quant, animae 78. The structure of both thought
and image in all these texts is the same: our fall plunges us from the Summa, God, our 'com
mon' object of (contemplative) beatitude, into the ima of corporeal creation; and its root
is a 'turning away' from God through the proud desire to have something proprium. Why
this structure appeals to Augustine as his way out of the difficulty mentioned in notes 88
and 89, above, we shall see presently in connection with the pondus motif.

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22 TRADITIO

is heavily tinted by the treatise on omnipresence, Ennead VI 4-591, but the


innermost solution seems to have been suggested by Ennead IV 392 and par
ticularly by the two lengthy sections which Plotinus devotes93 to showi
that identity of fault and universal cosmic necessity to which he has fe
obliged to return time and time again.94 The De musica presents the remark
able parallel on the carmen universitatis which shows Augustine's mind adop
ting Plotinus' thought to a point that is downright disturbing:
Ennead IV 3. De mus
12, 12-26 : es0 a e , a 29: Non e
' a a e a a e bus ... nosq
a e a , a a ae e a nos sunt,
e ? e a e * a ita ... ordi
a a ae e ioribus de
a a a e a e - quasi pon
? e ergo ordi
a a e a a - superiora
a e e , a a ' e ma, incon
e a e e a ' terna man
e a ? a e a - est tempu
e e a a et unde te
a a e a a a a a. nantur ...
a e a - redit, et c?
a cai, diebu
e a et lustris,
a a , a a legibus ae
a e a a - dina tionis
a a a a - terrena su
a e a rum numer
, a a - universita
a a a ? a a
a a a e a 30: In qui
a - inordinata
a al a a ordini pro
e e a - nescientes
a . a dentia pul
a e a a
e a .

Starting with a r
of reality (just as P

91 See our article, pp


92 See Henry, Plotin,
citing in De. civ. Dei
93 E . IV 3. 12-13.
94 E . IV 8.5, Iff. an
he might be.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 23

to sketch the fall as one which 'binds' us to the order of temporal realities.
The accent is characteristic of the De musica which stresses the fall into time
as much if not more than the fall into the body; but it reflects Plotinus' re
minder that the souls ' by their descent ... have put themselves into contact,
and they stand henceforth in harmonious association with the cosmic circuit, '
tied to it (cf. context) with ' bonds ' which Zeus the father periodically dissolves.
Fall and return are both, therefore, the work of the cosmic order, of that
providence which rules the periods of history (a cyclic conception which Augus
tine was later firmly to reject, and in explicit connection with this same text)95
' leading the things of this realm to be of one voice and plan with the Supreme '
so that Out of this concordance rises as it were one musical utterance.'
But in the section following (IV 3.13) Plotinus goes to some pains to show
that the inalterable law does not draw its power 'from without' but that it
is interior to the beings which execute it: its action is also theirs. How does
it operate ? ' Each several entity is overruled to go, duly and in order, towards
that place and kind to which it characteristically tends, that is towards the
image of its primal choice ... to which its individual constitution inclines it;
there is therefore no need of a sender ... of its own motion it descends ... as
by a magician's power or by some mighty traction ... neither under compul
sion nor of free will ' but more by a kind of ' leap of the nature as moves men
to the instinctive desire of sexual union or, in the case of some, to fine conduct. '
And Plotinus ends with another image, one which illumines both Augustine's
Delectatio ... quasi pondus est animae, and his curious exegesis of Genesis'
dimisit ilium:

Ennead IV 3. De Genesi contra


13. 27-33 : ... a ?vorfj a 34: Et bene dict
, a e e a , e a non, exclusit; ut i
e a e a , rum pondere tan
e a a e e , a e e - congruum videret
a a a a e e titur plerumque m
a a a , ? a bonos vivere coep
e a a a e a commutare nolue
a a e e e e , e a congregatione, p
e e e a . consuetudinis pell
excludunt reluctan
l cupientem.

Amor meus pondus meum: the


so different from the De mus

95 In De civ. Dei 10.30.30 precisely


note 92 above.
96 Conf. 13.10. See the context.

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24 TRADITIO

each of his life's turnings he finds God has governed him by those stimuli
interni which are none other than his own profoundest inclinations, those
pondera in the deep heart of that mystery, man.97 For an understandin
of the Augustinian doctrine of freedom and grace, it would seem imperative
to ask how far he went in adopting the Plotinian problematic of freedom an
cosmic law which is suggested here.

(b): Pride, concupiscence, and 'curiosity*.

Law and fault are, therefore, one: another extremely characteristic tension
in Plotinus' teaching can be found in Augustine as well, and related persuasivel
to a precise text which we have every evidence Augustine read. But wha
of the fault itself? Here another set of tensions greets us, for Plotinus' doc
trine is not entirely easy here. The root fault Plotinus designates by th
term a; the likelihood that a Latin, especially one interested in erectin
a Plotinian intellectus of the Biblical fides, would translate this with the ter
superbia, has already been suggested by students of the question.98
But the identity of that primal fault is more complex: we have seen alread
that Augustine relates it to a superbia whereby the soul, sibi arrogando quod
non est, chooses at the same time sua potentia tamquam sine Deo fru?." And
yet, in that very paragraph, he speaks of an 'implication' in terrenae cupidi
tates, in corporeae voluptates: are we to understand that the fault of superbia
is identical with a species of cupiditas^
This tension too is found in Plotinus, whose a frequently contain
a note of ' excessive zeal ' for the ordering of the sensible universe, not entirel
unconnected with the kind of desire for sense-delights which the Orphic stra
in the Platonic tradition, complicated by Plotinus' own semi-Gnostic leanings,
finds uniformly reprehensible.100 Thus, in the early treatise on beauty which
so struck Augustine, he describes the soul's ugliness ? ' dissolute, unrighteous,
teeming with all the lusts ... thinking only of the perishable and the base ...

97 Con f. 7.12: stimiilis internis; 4. 22, pondera; 7.23, pondus. The idea without the term
occurs frequently, e.g. 5. 14 and 23.
98 See W.M. Green, ' Initium omnis peccati superbia. Augustine on pride as the first
sin,' U. of California Publications in Classical Philology 13 (1949) 407-31. W. Theiler,
Porphyrios, 28, tries to show that the concept which he finds so important in both Augustin
and Plotinus, must therefore have been in the Porphyry who (he would have it) transmitte
Neo-Platonic thought to Augustine.
99 De Genesi 2.12, cited above, p. 12.
100 See the description of the fall in Enn. IV 8.4.11-28 in addition to the texts cited below
notes 101, 103. Note that a certain 'interference' was likely in Augustine's reading of al
these texts, so that he found the coloration of one in the occasionally more neutral languag
of the others.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 25

the friend of unclean pleasures'101 ? in terms which only too faithfully echoed
both Augustine's experience and the Manichaean revulsion toward the sexual
reproduction which they held to be the chief of all sins; and it is interresting
that they traced that sin to the principle of concupiscence, ,102 just as
Plotinus traces it, both here and in his last word on the question, to the alien
principle, matter.103 It is not, therefore, surprising that Augustine's first
serious efforts to seek out a definition of sin start with the terms libido and
cupiditas,10* and that his later efforts to make this emphasis rime with the
more Christian superbia, found the ambiguity of Plotinus' a ready and
waiting to help him. Even more relevant to the text which concerns us here,
is Plotinus' insistence at a number of points that matter is the primal evil,105
that consequently the initiative for the fall of the soul comes from below,
from that sensible universe which like an undisciplined 'rabble of pleasure,
desires and fears,' sets up a howling for the soul's attentions.106 This may
explain Augustine's curious insistence, not once but twice in the De Genesi
contra Manichaeos,107 that the only path temptation can take to the virile
ratio is the lower, animal 'feminine' principle in each of us.
There is, however, actually a triad of sins which dominate Augustine's
moral thinking from the De Genesi onwards. Theiler has underlined the im
portant r?le played in the De vera religione by what at first sight appears
to be the 'triple concupiscence' of St. John's first Epistle, and he has labored
to show that it reproduces a Neo-Platonic moral triad that 'must have been'
in Porphyry.108 Concupiscentia, curiositas and superbia are, assuredly, terms
which would seem to derive from the Johannine concupiscentia carnis, con
cupiscentia oculorum, and ambitio saeculi to which Augustine later on explicitly
relates them.109
But the only difficulty here is explaining the explanation. Why in the
world should Augustine have chosen, as his constant set of moral categories,

101 Enn. I 6.5.22ff. But see the following section as well, I 6.6.
102 See H.G. Puech, Le Manich?isme, son fondateur, sa doctrine (Paris 1949) 68-71 and
76-8. Note the relation of with concupiscence. Augustine claims to Honoratus that
he has conserved all he found true in Manichaeism: De utilitate credendi 36: quod apud
eos verum didiceram, teneo. Any understanding of his hardy effort to erect an intellectus
fidei must bear in mind that such a (legitimate in itself) intention carries risks with it.
103 Enn. I 8 (chronologically = 51st of the 54 treatises) which, as Br?hier notes (Enn?ades
I, 51) embodies the same theory of evil as the treatise on Beauty I. 6.
104 De lib. arb. 1.8ff.
105 See note 103 above.
106 Enn. VI 4.15.
107 De Genesi 2.20 and 39.
108 Porphyrios, 36ff. Gf. I Jo. 2. 15-16.
109 De musica 6.44.

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26 TRADITIO

a triad of sins to which nothing in the ecclesiastical tradition seems to have


accorded a similar importance? What we wish to suggest as an explanation
is this: Theiler is correct in thinking that Augustine found the Johannin
triad in more or less reasonable accord with an appealing Neo-Platonic triad,
but the Neo-Platonist in question was, after all, most probably Plotinus.
The possible correlates for Augustine's superbia and concupiscentia we have
already suggested: the key facet of the question, consequently, is the origin
of the curiositas notion.110
Having supposed that this final category was taken bodily from Porphyry,
where it was presumably directed against the imagination and its works,
Theiler must suppose a constancy in Augustine's use of it, which precludes
the tentative work of adaptation which in point of fact characterizes his initial
introduction of the category into his writings. Theiler's mistake, if mistake
there be, is partly accounted for by the fact that he starts his investigation
of Augustine with the relatively systematized De vera religione, then some
what blandly assures his readers that the earlier works present ein ?hnliches
Bild.111 Partly, too, his confidence reposes on the use of the triad in the second
book of the De libero arbitrio, which he mistakenly assumes is prior to the
De Genesi contra Manichaeos,112 when it is, in fact, subsequent to it, and profits
accordingly from the initial effort of systematization which we are about
to observe.
The first occurrence of the triple concupiscence in Augustine's writings is
found, unless we are seriously mistaken, in De Genesi contra Manichaeos 1.40.113
But its very firmness there suggests that it may have been inserted after the
second book was completed, to lend the entire work a certain unity of design.
For its appearance in the course of the second book is nowhere near so firm.
In the course of his exegetical task Augustine is led to comment on the
punishment imposed on the serpent; the biblical text he is using presents a

110 Its presence in Porphyry Theiler must deduce from its presence in Plotinus; see note
98 above.
111 Ibid. 57. Theiler overlooks the adjustments Augustine must make in Plotinus in order
to achieve the provisional synthesis of the De vera religione. Some of the portions of his
work where that labor is most evident are, for that very reason, most illuminating on the
real sources he is remolding: hence the importance of the De Genesi contra Manichaeos,
which Theiler, like most scholars, accords only passing attention.
U2 See note 16. Bardy's arguments, be it observed, impose a later date for the second
book than for the first, but it remains quite possible that it was written shortly after the
De Genesi contra Manichaeos, De musica and De magistro, which show many analogies
with it.
113 Augustine is explaining the allegory of the seven days of creation, and is in the finale
of the first book. His formal exegetical task is over, and it is possible that this portion con
stitutes a conclusion added later.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 27

triadic structure which has been eliminated from our modern translations,
and he reads God's words as Pectore et ventre repes, et terram manducabis.lu
His taste for parallelism leads him to see in the condemnation of the serpent
a reference to the same sins as provoked the fall of the soul: the pectus means
pride, superbia; the venter refers to desiderium carnale. Alas, what is to be
made of the terram manducabisl Augustine hesitates: this, he suggests
at first, could refer once again to earthly ' cupidities. ' But the solution does
not satisfy: it involves duplicating the symbolic force of the venter. Only
then does the happy idea seem to occur to him that this third member arms
him with a neat sally against the materialism and sensism of his Manichaean
adversaries, and he proposes that
... vel certe genus tertium tentationis his verbis figuratur, quod est
curiositas. Terram enim qui manducat, profunda et tenebrosa p?n?tr?t,
et tarnen temporalia atque terrena. (2.27).
Examining its next occurrence, one is at first tempted to grant Theiler
that this notion might indeed have originally been directed against imagina
tion and imaged thinking, and that its Porphyrian pedigree might be showing.115
But in the case before us, as in so many instances, we must take into account
the exigencies of controversy: Augustine is hardly bashful in making adapta
tions when they serve the cause. Once arrived at the prophetica explanatio
of this same punishment, all his hesitation has left him; the triad is directed
squarely against what he conceives to be the major errors of the Manichees,
and it is this clearly polemic reference which has molded the triple concupis
cence into final shape:
Non enim decipit [diabolus] nisi aut superbos, qui sibi arrogantes quod
non sunt, cito credunt quod summi Dei et animae humanae una eademque
sit; aut desideriis carnalibus implicates, qui libenter audiunt quod quid
quid lascive faciunt, non ipsi faciunt sed gens tenebrarum; aut curiosos,
qui terrena sapiunt, et sp?ritalia terreno oculo inquirunt. (2.40)116
The likelihood is, therefore, that Augustine did not find this triad already
neatly packaged for him in Porphyry; but the question of the origin of curio

114 Gen. 2.14. The triad, in which the venter and pectus mentions are really a doublet,
seems to be one of those peculiarities of the translation Augustine is using; see De Genesi
2. 27.
115 If, that is, one admit with Theiler that Augustine's curiositas reflects a Porphyrian
polemic against the imagination, for which his major piece of evidence is the fact that it is
found in that connection in Augustine. We would suggest, on the contrary, that its terminal
function in Augustine is a result of sifting it through the anti-image analysis of Ennead VI
4-5, a process which had definitely anti-Manichaean point. See note 116, infra.
116 The main defect that Augustine finds in his former intellectual comportment is this
habit of inquiring into spiritalia terreno oculo; see Conf. 5.19 and our article (cited note 1
above) especially the texts cited in notes 13 and 33.

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28 TRADITIO

sitas still calls for resolution. We suggest that Augustine found it in the P
tinian treatise on Time and Eternity, Ennead III 7. And it is in the De musi
that Augustine briefly tips his hand and cues us in this direction.
Guitton has well characterized the preoccupation of the De musica wi
the title, 'Le Temps Po?tique,'117 for Augustineseems to have done little bu
transpose Plotinus' considerations on temporal measures, intervals, and the
relativity, into a series of metrical applications. All the soul's creative
tivity, in fact, he there links to an amor generalis actionis which urges her
create a 'mendacious' array of numbers in imitation of the immobile perfe
tion of the eternal world. In all this, the context of Ennead III 7 is faithfu
reflected;118 but as if to clear up any remaining doubts, Augustine gives a
etymological definition of curiositas wherein its Plotinian origin becom
manifest.
That definition, however, is rooted in a context which speaks of the fall of
the soul: what possible connection could there be here? Plotinus has described
the process of the fall in Ennead IV 8, without mentioning the term a.119
But, as Br?hier has alertly remarked,120 the description of the fall presented
in Ennead V 1.1 ? again, a treatise which we know Augustine read121 ? is
largely a r?sum? based on Ennead IV 8, in which the term a is explicitly
related to the description of the fall presented in the earlier treatise. But
there Plotinus adds another note as well: he mentions that the fall plunges
the soul into a sphere of 'genesis,' hence of time and becoming. On that
connection Augustine has seized, studied the description of the origin of time
in Ennead III 7, found there a potent image of the soul's fall, and, struck

117 See Le Temps et V?ternit? chez Plotin et saint Augustin (Paris 1933) 102-30. A cursory
examination of the eleventh book of the Confessions will suggest that the discussion of time
and eternity there follows quite faithfully the pattern of Plotinus' own treatise, III 7.
Notice, for instance, the picturesque observation in both authors (Enn. Ill 7.1 and Conf.
11.17) that 'time' seems a simple question until the question is actually put; Augustine's
definition of time, moreover, as a distentio animi (11.39) reproduces Plotinus' own a a
... , which occurs in Enn. Ill 7.11. 41, in the same section we are about to cite in parallel
with his description of the fall into time. The intermediate steps of the argument all follow
the pattern set by Plotinus, once it is seen how much Augustine manages to couch the ref
utation of contrary views in terms of the metrical observations which constitute his De
musica adaptation of this treatise.
118 Of which the last sentence of our text is simply a r?sum?; see Enn. Ill 7.11.
119 Enn. IV 8.41 Iff: the soul becomes 'partial and self-centered; in a weary desire of
standing apart they find their way, each to a place of its very own. ' Both underlined terms
(the translation is Mackenna's) stand for Plotinus' ea ; cf. Augustine's parallel insistence
on such terms as suum, proprium, ad seipsam in the texts (De Genesi 2.22 and 24) we are
about to examine.
120 Enn?ades, V 15 note 1 (referring to Enn. V 1.1).
121 Henry, Plotin, 127, confirmed by O'Meara, AGW 12, 161.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 29

by its resemblance to a Biblical image of superbia, he has evolved a descrip


tion of the fall from its contemplative paradise in terms of this entire array
of connected elements:

Ennead V 1. De Gene
I. 1-8 : T? e a a e e 22: Vide
a a a e perbiam
e a a , a a e e e ut sub D
a a e e a a potestate
a ea a a e e ; A invident
e a a a ut suam
a a e cum Deo
e a e e a per quam
? a e ea - pora su
e a . a -
e e e e a 24: Quis
a e a , Dei, nisi
e a a ' a e amare qu
a , e a a a a mendaciu
a e a a e ... Ab eae
a , a a ea a e aversus e
e e e a ' ... et non d
Deo sed
Ennead III, 7.exsultat..
II, 12-29 : ... " e , conversu
e e a a et displic
e e a , a e bat aliqu
a e a e , imela me
a 9 e e e a a a e. the corru
e e a -
al a e a 6: Quand
? al e a a - irrigabatu
jecerat i
al a
e e , e e a , perb iae
e e a a , a e e - quoniam
a ae a e a a , tumescen
a e e ' e e , timo, be
e a a e pheticis e
a e a e a - et cinis
e a. *E e ? jecit inti
a ,
' e e e ? e I De mu
e a e e a ? - 39-40: A
, e a a a templata
a e a e e * e ' por ibus o
e a e - Avertit
e a nis ... et
e , quibus in

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30 TRADITIO

e a , e , a a artis imi tallone gau


e , a i a ' rios?tas nascitur ips
e e a e a - Generalis vero amo
e a a e - bia proficiscitur, q
a e e ? - luit Deum imitari qu
e , a a a te itaque scriptum e
a a , Initium superbiae h
e e e e a Deo: et Initium om
e , a bia. Non potuit au
e e a e e a e a e strar i quid sit su
e e a .... quod ibi dictum e
terra et cinis, quo
projecit intima su

If we are willing to concede Augu


timid, unimaginative schoolboy
work of synthesis we are claiming
was, however, no mere schoolboy:
this point been engaged for about
a Plotinian intellectus which he
to the faith of the Church. His cl
correspondences played a frequent
sion a grammaticus and rhetor?h
to read one treatise in the light
even upon occasion fuse element
others. Thus the pivotal idea of th
with its subordination implications;
cf. a e ) which tempts the soul
nead V 1.1, where the connect
ring. This connection to Ennead V
tion in its own free movement' fo
verbally the a e ... e a a e a , e a a
a ... of V 1.1. Instead, however, of the flight theme, 'r
Augustine prefers to think in terms of the ' desertion ' and the ave
couple which we have endeavored elsewhere to show in their
nead VI 4-5.122 It was, moreover, that same treatise on omnip
furnished a partial stimulus for the comm une-propri um dia
here represented by the terms proprium, amare quod suurn est
gues.123 It is clear from the context that Augustine means this

122 See our art. cit. note 1 above, especially pp. 18-20.
123 Ibid. pp. 21-27 and also here, notes 119 and 90, above. Note once again t
reinforce the importance of the proprium concept, at the same time com
to amalgamate their meanings into one that answers to his own compl

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 31

to stand for the animal skins which symbolize the corruptible body conferred
on the soul after the fall: having lost the original transparency of the corpus
codeste, the soul is plunged into the realm of mendacium, and that for two
reasons: first, because the opacity of the corruptible body allows for simula
tion and concealment of private thoughts, and hence the deceptions of hypoc
risy; but secondly, and more fundamentally, because the entire corporeal
world is, for the Neo-Platonist, a 'lying image' of the superior, intelligible
world on which it is modelled.124 Among other things involved in the soul's
primal sin, however, is this desire to have a body, aliquid proprium, some
thing suum: and we are in the fourth hypothesis of the De libero arbitrio.
The play on interior versus exterior is common both to Plotinus and to
St. Paul, making it a choice item for the type of concordism to which Au
gustine is committed. We have attempted to show its meaning in terms of
Ennead VI 4-5125 with special reference to the Confessions; but its value here
is governed more by the relation to Ennead III 7 and notably to the image
of soul as a seed, desirous of ruling itself (se ipsi regerent: a e a
? ) and uncoiling its insides out to a 'weaker greatness,' an image
which Augustine has found evocative of that other, present in Ecclesiasticus,
whereby the proud man: projecit intima sua. Here, moreover, the process
is one of abandoning a spiritual unity in itself (a ' e e a ) to deploy
that unity in an outgoing search of the material non-self ( e a e
a a ), a close analogy of Plotinus' assurance in Ennead VI. 4-5,126 that the
' alien ' which cloaks us from without is really unconnected with our authentic
self, our true identity: the way of return to primal unity consists accord
ingly in abandoning that non-self which is non-being, the source of the eges tas
copiosa whose paradoxical structure recalls Plotinus' 'weaker greatness' here:
e a e e .127 The soul's sin, therefore, involves a loss of spirit
ual unity in both authors, a 'swelling outwards' into the spatialized world
of body, a distentio animi into the dispersion of time.128
Once again, the thought-movement of the text from Ennead III 7 is framed
by the notions of the soul's 'imitative' action, creative of an image of eter
nity: a reminder which brings us to the De musica text, where the same preoc
cupation is evident. In both authors, the fall from eternity to time is a fall

124 See Sol. 2.9ff where Augustine is working out this whole topic of veritas, falsitas and
mendacium in terms of image and reality.
125 Art. cit. note 1, above, pp. 29-37.
126 Showing a certain amount of interference from Enn. IV 3, the Plotinian theory of
language as arising from the fall into the opacity of the terrestrial body; see pp. pi. 18-19
above.
127 See Ennead VI 5.12 and art. cit., note 1 above.
128 por this distentio notion see note 118 above.

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32 traditio

from the superior occupation of immobile contemplation t


degraded sphere of action: the root of the fall Plotinus pla
desire to be on its own (? a e a a ), and, g
a e ea e a of Ennead V 1.1, Augustine is entitl
here the a which he found in a perfectly identical connection
the amor generalis actionis, the amor de corporibus agendi wh
tinus' concern in Ennead III 7, Augustine roots quite legitimat
But Plotinus' diagnosis goes further: the soul, he tells us, wa
nature. Or should that term be translated as 'curious?' a :
the term is, in fact, deliciously ambiguous, meaning both 'restless' (thus
Ficinus' translation: inquieta) and 'curious' (hence Br?hier: curieuse). It is
revealing that both poles of the ambiguity are preserved in Augustine's text:
the love of action on bodies makes the soul inquieta and at the same time
gives rise to curiositas, ab ipso curae nomine, and sends her out on the quest
for vana cognitio. And the text goes on to portray superbia by citation of the
very same text we have seen in De Genesi 2.6, the projecit intima sua of Ec
clesiasticus. There is, therefore, a connection between the De Genesi 2.6
text and De musica 6.40: the later text actually illuminates the genesis of
the former, by bringing together the two key images which collide there:
Plotinus' e a ... e a and the biblical projecit intima sua.
Finally, the origin of Augustine's curiositas is also laid bare: its counterpart
is none other than Plotinus' ambiguous a . Far from finding it
ready-made in Porphyry, Augustine has gone to considerable pains to elabo
rate that concept, and in his elaboration of it, numerous disparate elements
have entered: Plotinus, the Bible, and his anti-Manichaean polemic being
the chief among them.

Summary

We began with Gilson's perceptive reminder that if Augustine holds a


fall of the soul, his theory must be fraught with incoherence: the body must
simultaneously be a place of punishment, and, as a creature of God, beautiful
in its own right. The same tension we found characteristic of Plotinus' view
of the matter: a view which showed other important strains as well. The
a explanation allowing for a fall of the soul through its own fault,
immediately calls forth the reminder of the good which the soul can draw
from its fallen experience; and the same pattern is reproduced in Augustine.
The properties of the fallen state, the vita mortalis, are perfectly Plotinian
as well, including a third peculiarity of Plotinus' theory, to wit, the suggestion
that the highest portion of the soul never 'comes down,' remains immobile
in contemplative bliss. To an objection drawn from experience both authors

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the plotinian fall of the soul 33

reply in strikingly similar terms, and in function of the same


whereby consciousness diminishes as the soul re-ascends.
Why does Plotinus pass from his description of the soul's fault
of the good it can draw from the fallen experience? The rea
soul's spontaneous choice is ultimately identical with the op
Logos, the principle of cosmic order, and he is anxious to 'justif
as far as possible. The identity between choice and cosmic la
is something he strains to prove, eventually coming round to a
desire, 'weighing on' the soul, we suggested, is the counterpart
celebrated pondus.
Nor have we exhausted the list of tensions in Plotinus' the
a final one, regarding the fault which results in the fa
kind of a^ Or are the two the same thing? The ques
more acute in Augustine's case, where a Christian superbia r
easily with concupiscentia carnis. And the situation become
more confused if we take into account the third member of Aug
triad, curiositas. Tracing the genesis of this triad in his work,
Plotinus' ambiguous a , its ambiguity entirely prese
Saint's explanation of curiositas in a text where its origin becom
Plotinian, after all.
Do the parallels we have presented actually prove a direct Plot
for each of these items in Augustine? The question may rem
but it has its importance nonetheless. It seems beyond question t
drew these ideas from a faithful exponent of the Plotinian
its complexity; that Porphyry may have found some of the te
theory indigestible, and modified his master's teaching to e
of them, is a possibility to be envisaged. Moreover, the tend
scholarship to expand once more the circle of Plotinian trea
probably read, tilts the scales even further in Plotinus ' favor.
no effort to hide our own growing conviction that Augustin
the treatises we have used in this explanation of his teachin
but presentation of the evidence would, in each case, require as
as this article itself. To that task we hope shortly to return.

Epilogue: Some possible applications

In closing, we should like to point to several areas of obscurity


writings which still pose problems to researchers, indicating br
theory here presented might well cast some light on them. Th
troubling set of hypotheses in the De libero arbitrio: the confu
have suggested, may be due in some measure to Augustine's ow

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34 TRADITIO

In 395, he felt most comfortable with the doctrine of the soul's pre-existen
and fall into the body, hence he may well treat of the final hypothesis wi
a great deal more sureness than the other three. It was, after all, the Plotin
solution which he found invaluable in combatting the Manichaean exeg
of Genesis. His later discomfort with Origenism, howrever, may have
him to touch up these passages somewhat, thus introducing a certain h
erogeneity of conception which only complicates the original difficulti
The second area of difficulty deals with Augustine's doctrine of faith an
reason. Norregaard has pointed129 to the disturbing fact that the exigency
for authority does not seem universal enough to cover Plato and Plotinus,
mention but those two. One can go further and show that Augustine seems
admit the existence of a 'few' who need no teacher, only an initial admonit
since their mental vision is clear enough for them merely to 'turn and see.'1
In the Plotinian hypothesis, the reason for that distinction becomes clear:
not all souls are equally fallen, not all stand therefore in equal need of auth
ity to speed them on their return.
Scholars, finally, are still discussing the problem of the unity of the Co
fessions. Why, specifically, does Augustine append those final three bo
of exegesis of Genesis?131 Augustine's real reason seems to have been more
profound?and complex?than the desire to demonstrate the lights
exegesis which God has conferred upon him. We have seen that the De Gen
contra Manichaeos furnishes in more than one instance the key to Augustin
anthropology. This is perfectly consonant writh the tradition whereby th
Hexaemeron was considered a classic locus in ancient exegesis for explain
man's place in creation, and the entire scheme of human history. The Sa
himself tells us that what Moses had primarily in view in these first chapte
was not a description of God's order or manner of creation, but the proph
explanation of the entire history of humanity132 ? a history in which ' Adam
seems to stand for each one of us.133 Augustine, it has been frequently sa
sees human history through the lens of that conversion experience he
portrayed in the Confessions: we would suggest in turn that he saw that e
perience itself in terms of a Plotinian exegesis of Genesis. His fall is typic

129 Bekehrung, 142ff.


130 Sol. 1.23: note the fortasse, however. But cf. Conf. 6.8 and De utilitate credendi 20
which still leave this possibility open.
m por the latest discussion of this question and an abundant bibliography, see Fr. A
Solignac's Introduction to Les Confessions BA 13-14 (Paris 1962) I 19-26.
132 De Genesi 2.4.
133 See De Genesi 2.4 and ibid., 39: decipitur Adam, non Christus, sed Christianus;
ibid. 41: labor?t jam Adam in agro suo... . Ipse det mulieri escam etc. Cf. Conf. 4.29, whe
Adam has become Augustine or the reverse: Iusseras enim ...ut terra spinas et tribuios par
mihi et cum labore pervenerim ad panem meum.

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THE PLOTINIAN FALL OF THE SOUL 35

of the fall of 'man,' his return representative of Everyman's return, and


the key to that archetypal history he presents for the first time in the De
Genesi contra Manichaeos: he is, and we are, souls, fallen into the universe
of space and time and body, through the triple sin of pride, concupiscence
and curiosity. In the first nine books of the Confessions he has told the story
of his vita mortalis, mors vit?lis, and it culminates in a conversion whose
nucleus is an illumination, one that reveals to him the full dimensions of his
ontological status. In the tenth book, he examines his present state of soul
in terms of that same triple concupiscence. Only in the final three books
does he fully discover to his reader the implications of what has preceded,
presenting him with the key to his experience, the key to all huir?an experience,
? the fall and return of that man each one of us is, Adam.
Fordham University

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