Middle Platonism

Middle Platonism is the modern name given to a stage in the development of Platonic philosophy, lasting from about 90 BC – when Antiochus of Ascalon rejected the scepticism of the New Academy – until the development of Neoplatonism under Plotinus in the 3rd century. Middle Platonism absorbed many doctrines from the rival Peripatetic and Stoic schools. The pre-eminent philosopher in this period, Plutarch (c. 45-120), defended the freedom of the will and the immortality of the soul. He sought to show that God, in creating the world, had transformed matter, as the receptacle of evil, into the of the world, where it continued to operate as the source of all evil. God is a transcendent being, which operates through divine intermediaries, which are the gods and daemons of popular religion. Numenius of Apamea (c. 160) combined Platonism with Neopythagoreanism and other eastern philosophies, in a move which would prefigure the development of Neoplatonism.

Antiochus of Ascalon (c. 125-68 BC), was the pupil of Philo of Larissa, and the teacher of Cicero. Through his influence, Platonism made the transition from New Academy Scepticism to Eclecticism. Whereas Philo had still adhered to the doctrine that there is nothing absolutely certain, Antiochus returned to a pronounced dogmatism. Among other objections to Scepticism, was the consideration that without firm convictions no rational content of life is possible. He pointed out that it is a contradiction to assert that nothing can be asserted or to prove that nothing can be proved; that we cannot speak of false ideas and at the same time deny the distinction between false and true. He expounded the Academic, Peripatetic, and Stoic systems in such a way as to show that these three schools deviate from one another only in minor points. He himself was chiefly interested in ethics, in which he tried to find a middle way between Zeno, Aristotle and Plato. For instance, he said that virtue suffices for happiness, but for the highest grade of happiness bodily and external goods are necessary as well.

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