Being in Numenius and Plotinus Some Points of Comparison

Abstract

In his Vita Plotini (17,1-6), Porphyry tells us that when the people from Greece began to say that Plotinus was appropriating the ideas of Numenius, and Trypho the Stoic and Platonist told Amelius, the latter wrote a book to which we gave the title 'On the Difference between the Doctrines of Plotinus and Numenius' (trans. Armstrong). Whilst this evidence cautions us against making rapprochements between Plotinus and Numenius which overlook the differences between their respective doctrines, it also encourages us to compare these doctrines, and research has in fact brought to light Numenian material in the Enneads of Plotinus. Without going into a discussion of the results of this research1, this article will propose further possible points of comparison, with respect in particular to certain accounts of true Being in Plotinus and Numenius, and suggest that these might provide additional indications of Numenian influence in Plotinus' thought. The accouilt of Being given by Plotinus in Enneads VI 4, ch. 2 and VI 5, ch. 3 will first be examined, in relation in particular to the use made in these texts of Plato's Parmenides. A comparison will then be proposed between an aspect of the Plotinian account and Being as described by Numenius, this leading to a brief discussion of the possibility that Numenius may not only have influenced the account of Being given in Enneads VI 4 and 5, but may also have provided a precedent to Plotinus' use of the Parmenides in these works.