magic as a boundary- the case of iamblichus' de mysteriis

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Magic as a Boundary : the Case of IamblichusDe Mysteriis

Olivier Dufault, D epartm ent o f History,

McGill University, Montreal July 2004

A thesis subm itted to M cGill U niversity in partial fullfilm ent o f the requirem ents o f the degree o f M aster o fA rts

O livier D ufault, 2004


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Magic as a Boundary

Abstracts

Par ce memoire, je tenle de demontrer que, dans IAntiquite tardive, la religion ne ponvait etre definie sans son oppose, la magie. Assumant que la definition de la magie par rapport a la religion est le symptome de chocs culturels, je considere le D e Mysteriis de Jamblique (240-325 apres J.-C.) comme une tentative de reorganisation politico-religieuse de / empire Komain.

La premiere partie presente une analyse des croyances religieuses de Porphyre (232305 apres J.-C.). Son approche minimise les differences enlre la magie et la religion. Par cette analyse, je demontre que Jamblique rectijie Iapproche philosophique de Porphyre.

Dans la deuxieme partie, je pre sente la reponse de Jamblique comme etant une reorganisation des fails religieux en un nouveau systeme holistique, appele

Abbreviations

ANRW H. TEMPORINI. (cdl),Aufstieg undNiedergang der romischen W elt: Geschichte und Kuitur Korns im Spiegel der neueren Torschung, De Gruyter, 1972-2004.

(DlELS-KRANZ) = Die Tragmente der Vbrsokratiker, edited and translated by W. IvRANZ & H. DlELS, W eidm ann, 1951-52.

DM = IAMBLICHUS, On the Mysteries, translated by E C. Clarke, ]. Dillon and H. J.Blumenthal, Society o f Biblical Literature, 2003, (Writings from the Greco-Rom an world; 4).

PGM = The Greek Magical Papyri in Translation, Including the Demotic Spells, vol. 1 texts, edited by H .D . BETZ, University o f C h icago Press, 1986.

P E = EUSEBIUS, Preparatio TLvangelica, ed ited an d tran sla ted by J . SlRINELLI, E . DES P l a c e s , G. Sc h r o e d e r & O. Z in k , C erf, 9 vol., 1979-1991,(Sources Chretiennes\ 206, 228, 262, 266, 215, 292, 307, 338, 369).

PL = Patrologia Tatina, ed ited byJ.-P . M lGNE, M igne, 1844-64.

(SMITH) = PORPHYRY, Porphyriiphilosophi jragmenta, edited by A. SMITH, Teubner,1993.

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Table o f Contents

Magic as a boundary P-5

Magic and NeoplatonismGoeteia and magic P-12Plotinus and magic P-14

Dichotomous and non-dichofomous approaches to religion p. 19l.a: Porphyry's Letter to Anebo: Platonicpiety meets traditional piety

l.a.lPorphyrys Letter to Anebo: the fragments

Eusebius p.24Augustine p. 2 5lamblichus p.26

l.a.2Paganism and the religious evidence of god-coercing rituals P-28

l.b: Neoplatonists priests? pReligious evidence as philosophical evidence P-36Porphyrys non-dichotomous stance P-39

Porphyrys neoplatohicpiety: a tradiMonal revolution? p.44

The place of evil in social systems

p.462.a: Arguments for a political recuperation of the De MysteriisMagic and religion in the De Mysteriis P-48

2.b.lThe appropriation of the Empires theological battleground P-62

For evil is more opposed to the good than to that which is not good p.64

2.b.2Theurgists as demiruges: the political implications of theurgy P-67

PoMcdpmrtues and' the assimilation with the divine p.68Theurgy as demiurgy p.71

p.74

p.81

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Rubbish is value denied, Jl is rendered universally meaningless, but since this is impossible, its meaning returns in an inverted or repressed form to haunt us in disguise, in the form of daydreams, faint odours,

noxious pollution. Ben W atson on the music o f Frank Zappa

Magic as a boundary

Suppose that we do as Plotinus liked to, playing at first before we set out to be serious, 1

and consider the notion o f identity7 be it political, religious, cultural or simply ontological

as needing a radical opposition o f terms in order to be conceived. M oreover, lets say that

this opposition not only entails the polarization o f two entities, but that it also aligns on the

same front two parallel series o f oppositions: a cultural opposition (sam e/different), and

m ore importantly for the topic, an ethical opposition (good/evil). This is the premise o f this

study: that thinking the world as a sum o f entities is the result o f an ethical way o f thinking.

Leaving these considerations aside, I will principally argue in this paper that, in Late

Antiquity, the definition o f an anti-religion was inherent to the definition o f religion. Greco-

Rom an writers called this anti-religion magic (magia, mageia, goeteia) and used it as a

boundary-m aking concept which discriminated between good and bad religious behaviors.

Conversely, it seems that paganism fitted the Christians own magical anti-religion.2 As

Augustine heard while talking with apprentice theologians o f H ippo, the rites o f old no

longer existed; Paganism (i.e. the culture o f the peasant), was no longer the religion o f the

Em pire, what superstitious Romans were doing now was magic, or, in the words o f

Augustines friends, those things done in the night.

1 Ennead 3.8.1. O n P lotinus thoughts experim ents f . SI1AW (1999), p. 121, citing RAPPK, M etaphor in P lotinus E nneads v 8.9 , Ancient Philosophy 15 (1995), p. 164-169; and RAPPK, Self-knowledge and subjectivity in the Ennead/', in L.P. GF.RSON (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Plotinus, Cam bridge U niversity Press, 1996, p. 259-262.

2 Pagans like Julian the A postate ra ther called paganism H ellenism , and traditional R om ans, H ellenes. Since bo th w ords basically m ean the same thing albeit denoting from w hich side o f the fence the w riter is they will be used interchangeably in this paper.

AUGUSTINE, On the Divination of Daemons, 5. Magic has a long history o f association w ith night, literally and figuratively: cf. BENKO (1984), p. 125-127.

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The study o f magic as a boundary-making concept could be com pared to what

Foucault called a history o f limits.4 In Histoire de la fo/ie a I'age classique, Foucault retraced the

m anner in which madness was slowly medicalized during the Enlightenment. Fie argued that

during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the European conception o f mental illness

was the rag-bag o f the Enlightenm ents misfits. Madness was taken care of, but their

problem s were no t medicalized as with 21st century bio-medicine. Such institutions as La

Salpetriere and TH opital general, while caring for the sick and the poor, also served as

prisons for those disillusioned by the positivist new world order. Accordingly, among

real madmen, sorcerers, alchemists and astrologers found their way into Paris prison-

hospitals.5 For Foucault, the medicalization o f impiety in general represented a precise

m om ent in the evolution o f social paradigms; a m om ent where magic gradually lost its

credibility, stopped being blasphem ous and started being a mental illness: 1'ous ces signes

[I.e. signs o f magic] qui allaient devenir, a partir de la psychiatric du XI Xc siecle, les

symptomes non equivoques de la maladie, sont restes, pendant pres de deux siecles, partages

entre limpiete et lextravagance, a m i-chemin du profanatoire et du pathologique la ou la

deraison prend ses dimensions propres.6

Thus, like magic in Late Antiquity, magic in eighteenth-century France was

extravagant {i.e. false and delusive), as well as impious. For both periods, however, impiety

and magic were shape-changing categories.7 This, I argue, is the function o f such categories.

By being ill-defined, bu t nonetheless evil, magic could be m anipulated by individuals to fit

certain targets, like rivals, theories, or incom prehensible events. Magic was a protean

category' which incorporated incomprehensible but nonetheless evilthings in the

accusers social space. In fact, magic rationalized the irrational by connoting the unknown

with evil. Christians, for example, did not know m ore about pagan practices after they called

them magic, bu t at least they could say that they were evil and not incomprehensible. Similarly,

4 FOUCAULT (1973), cited by F. B r a u d e l , Grammaire des Civilisations, F lam m arion, 1993, p. 63-64.5 F o u c a u l t (1973), p. 130-134.6 FOUCAULT (1973), p. 133-134. T he concept o f magic now does no t seem to have evolved beyond w hat

Foucault described for the 18th century. Magic is no longer bad to practice because it is im pious, it is bad because it is deceptive: degagee de ses pouvoirs sacres, elle ne po rte plus que des intentions malefiques: une illusion de l'esprit au service des desordres du coeur. O n ne la juge plus selon ses prestiges de profanation , mais d 'apres ce qu'elle revele de deraison. (p. 132). Exam ples o f this m odern attitude in regards to magic can be found in D e LIBERA (2003) and PAPAIS (2003).

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Peter Brown used Mary Douglas definition o f magic to analyze the charge o f magic in Late

Antiquity.8 For Brown, magic accusations occurred when a group with no socially-approved

pow er (inarticulate) clashed with another established group, holding articulate power. He

convincingly argued that the two social groups fought in demi-mondes (like the circus, the

E m perors court, or the church), where people o f different cultural backgrounds m et in a

shared social space. These demi-mondes were social buffer-zones between rigid systems o f

articulate pow er, where the norm s o f society' (and nature) were suspended.9 Peter Brown

explained Late Antique magic accusations as the result o f a malaise in the structure o f the

governing classes o f the Roman Em pire. 10: Sorcery beliefs in the Later Empire, therefore,

may be used like radio-active traces in a x-ray: where these assemble, we have a hint o f

pockets o f uncertainty and com petition in a society increasingly com m itted to a vested

hierarchy in church and state. 11

For the largest part o f Late Antique society7, which lived from the land, magic

probably looked like what Jeanne Favret-Saada described for the late 1970s Bocage, a rural

region o f N orthern France. Ldencrouillage (Bocages slang for bewitching) was a secret

practice which drew on hatred and evil to explain and resolve unfortunate events. In the

Bocage, magic explained crop failures, the illnesses o f cattle, or the im potence o f a family

m an.12 In the E m perors entourage, magic could be used to explain the incom prehensible

(and undesirable) rise o f a rival.1 As we will see in this paper, in theology, magic fixed the

boundary7 between orthodox and unorthodox cults by grouping together undesirable

religious evidence which confronted ones cosmology. By religious evidence, I

7 G o rd o n (1999, p.163) appropriately called his article Im agining G reek and R om an Magic : T he no tion o f magic, at any rate in w hat I shall call a strong sense, was form ed in the ancient w orld discontinuous!}7 and, as it were, w ith everybody talking at once.BROWN (1970), p. 25-26. f . M. DOUGLAS, De la souillure : essai sur les notions de pollution et de tabou, translation o f Purity and Danger by A nne G uerin, E ditions La D ecouverte, 1992, p .119-120 : La sorcellerie serait la m anifestation d 'un pouvoir psychique antisocial em anant de personnes qui se situent dans les regions relativem ent non structurees de la societe. D ans les cas ou celle-ci peu t difficilem ent exercer un contro le sur ces individus, elle les accuse de sorcellerie, ce qui est une m aniere de les controler. Ce serait done dans la non-structure que reside la sorcellerie. Les sorciers seraient l'equivalent social des coleopteres e t des araignees que lon trouve dans les interstices m uraux et les boiseries. Ils inspirent les m em es craintes et la m em e antipathie que les ambiguites et contradictions que Ton trouve dans d 'autres structures de pensee; et les pouvoirs qu 'on leur attribuent sym bolisent leur statut am bigu et inarticule.

9 B ro w n (1970), p. 21-22.10 B r o w n (1970), p. 20." B r o w n (1970), p. 25.12 F a v r e t - S a a d a (1977), p. 16-24.

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understand the experiences o f the divine which were taken for granted in Antiquity. For

example, oracular sayings were meaningful data for m ost Romans, even if they sometimes

could not understand what they meant. Likewise, people now take Fiinsteins theory o f

relativity for granted, even if they generally cannot explain why they think it is true. In a

similar way, sacrifices and prayers were religious evidence as well because they were seen as

holding truth o r special powers on the world. Being the source o f all knowledge and all

power, Late Antique intellectuals and politicians vied for the control o f religious evidence

i.e. to impose a cultural system on society which included good evidence, and excluded

bad evidence.

By being an ethical category, it will also appear that magic was a political category.

The validity o f this statement, however, depends on what one defines as being politics and

culture. In this study, I understand politics as being the protection and the advertisement

o f ones ideal culture. M oreover, I understand culture as the shifting extension o f ones

identity, which stops where one arbitrarily considers that something alien begins. Thus, if, as

for m ost inhabitants o f the Roman Empire, religion was a crucial aspect o f culture, an

attem pt to distinguish the good and the bad in religion became a highly political gesture.

The political aspect o f magic accusation will be explored in a case study involving

two Neoplatonists o f the late third and early fourth century AD, Porphyry o f Tyre and

lam blichus o f Chalcis. Drawing on the thesis that magic definition and accusation was not

only theological bu t also political, I will argue that lam blichus De Mysteriis was a tool for the

restructuring o f the Roman Empire. Originally called Malchos, the first N eoplatonist studied

here was nicknamed Porphyry by his fellow philosophers.14 He was a prom inent student

o f Plotinus, the founder o f N eoplatonism .15 Probably after having m et an Egyptian priest

called Anebo, Porphyry sent him a letter on religious issues, now entitled The Letter to Anebo.

The N eoplatonist lamblichus, under the guise o f an Egyptian high priest named Abam m on,

13 O n the accusation o f magic leveled against A thanasius, cf. AjMMJANUS MARCELLINUS, 15.7.7, cited by BROWN (1970), p. 26. O n the exam ple o f Libanius, cf. BROWN (1970), p. 24, n. 32.

14 Porphyry (232305 AD) gave up his Syrian nam e o f M alchos (king in Syriac), while lam blichus (240-325 AD) only transliterated his (Syriac o r Aram aic yamliku : may he rule , o r he is king: Cl .ARKK [2003], p. xix). It is tem pting to relate these tw o different attitudes to lam blichus and Porphyrys dissention on the sem antics o f holy w ords, f . iAMBi.IO IES, De Mysteriis, 8.4-5. (hereafter DM ).

15 N eoplaton ism is a m odern category. It is w orth noting, how ever, that the change in G reek philosophy that scholars w itnessed w ith P lotinus (205-270 AD) was also observed by Proclus (412485 AD), w ho, in contrast w ith m odern scholars, did no t see N eoplaton ism as som ething new but as the re turn to the true philosophy o f Plato {Platonic Theology, 1.1).

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subsequently answered this letter. Drawing on his Egyptian lore, A bam m on resolved the

problem s presented in Porphyrys letter to Anebo, in a letter now called the De Mysteriis. Both

lam blichus and Porphyry came from native Syrian families, and although lam blichus studied

under Porphyry, they were roughly about the same age. 16 Unfortunately, the epistolary

exchange is impossible to date accurately.17 Both letters, however, addressed issues o f

divination and theology which were relevant to the late third century AD; a period where

m ore and m ore Christian statesmen and intellectuals began to criticize the religious

procedures o f the Empire.

In the Letter to Anebo, Porphyry confronted cultic practices with logical or

philosophical beliefs. W hat appears from Porphyrys fragmentary and sometimes

contradictory works is that he did not put faith in material rites but preferred an intellectual

religion.18 lam blichus position in the De Mysteriis, however, turned Porphyrys position

16 DlLLON (1974), p. 866. cf. p. 863-875 for the best biography o f lam blichus.17 B lum enthal, Clark and D illon give the D M a com position date betw een 280 and 350 AD (CLARKK 2003, p.

xxvii); Saffrey, 300 AD (1971, p. 231-233). D illon, how ever, suggested an early com postion (1973, p. 13 and 18), bu t later no ted that he now disagreed w ith his tentative chronology' (1974, p. 875). W e cannot assum e tha t the D M was w ritten during Porphyrys lifetim e because it was a response to Porphyrys letter. Many published texts in A ntiquity took the form o f a letter, o r a note, bu t that does no t m ean that the audience was restricted to the addressee. In philosophy, ethical treatises w ere often w ritten in that genre. A risto tles Ethics to Nichomachus and E picurus letters are early examples. T he Eetter to Marcella and the De Abstinentia, tw o o f Porphyrys m ost polem ical w orks, were letters as well. A ugustines City of God was also presented as a letter, and is probably the best example o f a w ork com bim ng religious, ethical and political issues. I f a study o f the genre canno t date the exchange, neither is the con ten t o f the D M o f any help. Carine Van Liefferinge (with Larsen: VAN LlEFFF.RINGE [1999], p. 33, n. 86) is inclined to date it tow ard the end o f lam blichus career on the basis that it could show an evolution from an earlier and m ore intellectual conception o f divinization found in his protreptik-on to Pythagorean philosophy. As the refu tation o f Joseph B idez chronology' o f Porphyrys w orks will shortly dem onstrate, we cannot date N eoplatonic treatises based o n their religious character. W e cannot assume that Porphyrys o r lam blichus shifted from a religious and irrational philosophy to a m ore rational one; n o r can we consider the reverse process a m ore convincing alternative.

1 D ue to Porphyrys som ew hat inconsistent way o f writing, this is still debatable. As Shaw (1995; p. 10-16), F innam ore (1999; p. 87), and B erchm an (1989; p. 147) realized, the issue o f w hether rites are useful o r no t for the souls unification w ith the O ne depends on the ph ilosophers psychology. I f they conceived soul com pletely descended in to m atter, then external and material rites w ere necessary for its salvation. B ut, if as P lotinus thought, the soul was undescended, the soul could short-circuit the material w orld in its re tu rn to the O ne. T his revolutionary' psychology, which, I argue was also Porphyrys, claim ed that salvation was achieved by a w ithdrawal o f the self to the highest part o f the soul, w hich was still in contac t w ith the divine. Conversely, since the low er spiritual part o f the soul (which is descended) could only perceive the material w orld, m aterial rites could n o t bring salvation. It is still debated w hether Porphyry considered the soul undescended o r not. Citing the exact same passage, Sm ith (1974; p. 40-45) argued that Porphyry' held P lotinus theory' o f the undescended soul, while B erchm an (1989; p. 147, n. 297-301; citing STEEL [1978], p. 38, n. 1), w rote that Porphy'ry7 sadly dismissed P lotinus surprising theory'. B erchm an in terpre ted Porphvry's statem ent that w ho has deviated from Intellect is in the very' place w here he turned aside (De Abstinentia 1.39.2.115.9// : Nou de ho parkbas ekei estin hopou kaiparexelthen), as meaning that part o f the soul does no t enjoy perpetual intellection and passivity. T hat the soul is no t perpetually united w ith Intellect o r the O ne is a fact fo r P lo tinus (Enneads, 4.8.7.1-15), and did n o t stopped him thinking that the soul was undescended.

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upside-down by arguing that the intellect alone could not bring ones soul united with the

divine the famous assimilation with the divine which will be considered shortly,

lamblichus rationalized cultic practices by rallying all good religious evidence under one

system, which he called theurgy. 19 In short, the religious debate between these two

em inent philosophers revolved around a political question: what should, and what should

not be considered religious evidence.

Part 1 will explore Porphyrys position on cult practices. I argue that P o r p h y r y s

Plotinian stance, notably upheld in the Philosophy from Oracles, forced him to downplay the

differences between civic cults and magic. Since it theoretically negated differences between

magic and religion, I call this approach non-dichotom ous.201 will argue furtherm ore that

lam blichus De Mysteriis can be seen as a reaction to the absence o f dichotomy in Porphyrys

considerations on religious practice.

In part 2, I dem onstrate how lam blichus sought to control religious evidence and

reacted to Porphyrys non-dichotom ous stance by thoroughly eradicating statements

bringing rituals too close to magic. By separating religious evidence from anti-religious

evidence, i.e. magic, lam blichus enterprise m ust be understood as an attem pt to define and

appropriate the theological battleground on which a growing Christian counter-culture

opposed the Greco-Rom an establishment. By vying for the control o f religious evidence, the

political and religious aspects o f the De Mysteriis cannot be separated. Indeed, if politics is the

protection and the advertisement o f ones ideal community, and if religious evidence is a

C ontrary to w hat B erchm an concluded from his quote o f De Abstientia, Porphyrys preceding sentence (T he Intellect is w ith itself, even w hen we are n o t w ith it : Nous men gar estipros hautoi, kan estin hemeis me omen pros autoi) ra ther implies that we can be w ith the Intellect n o t tha t we are shut o ff from it. As Gillian Clark rem arked in her translation o f De Abstinentia (2000; n. 138), this last statem ent probably points to the theory o f the undescended soul (Enneads, 4.8.8). U ndescended vs. descended is probably no t a good way to contrast the two positions because b o th lam blichus and Plotinus thought that the soul was the m ediator betw een the divine and the non-divine (Enneads, 4.8.7.6-7; D M 4.2-3.184.1-13; D M 6.5.246.16- 6.6.247.5). I t m ight be encouraging to po in t ou t tha t scholars in Antiquity also had difficulties with Porphyrys works. Augustine and E usebius w ere n o t the only one w ho rem arked P orphyrys ambiguity, lam blichus did too. In De Anim a, he w rote that Porphyry seem ed to be in d oub t about P lotinus and N um enius conception o f the soul, bu t that he som etim es follow[ed] it com pletely as having been handed dow n from on high. [in STOBAKUS, Anthology, 1. p. 365.7-21.) T hroughou t this paper, I argue that Porphyry was reluctant to differentiate magic from civic rituals because he thought that the souls retu rn to the O ne could no t be effected through m atter.

19 lam blichus letter was originally called Repp o f the Master Abamon to the Eetter of Porphyry to Anebo, and the Solutions to the Questions it Contains. Fortunately, scholars now call this w ork De Mysteriis, if. SAI-T'RHY (1993), p. 144-145. F o r a com plete assessm ent o f the De Mysteriis textual history, p. SlCH ERI, (1957).

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crucial aspect o f this community, choosing w hat will and what will not be religious evidence

is highly political. Thus, by using magic as a category to separate true and false religious

evidence, lamblichus not only vigorously debated over theology, but he also advertised his

own ideal culture. Trustworthy religious evidence was crucial for the Late Antique emperors

and warlords who wanted to rule as friends o f the divine comes dei. Since religious

evidence had a political weight in Late Antiquity, the De Mysteriis was political because it

created a coherent system in which certain evidence was discredited (magic), while other was

authenticated (religion) w hether Christians were, or were not related to this debate.

For all o f Antiquitys philosophical systems, the greatest goal was to reach homoiosis

theiou the assimilation to the divine, or divinization o f the soul.21 For philosophers, whom

we tend to regard as apathetic professional scholars, the assimilation with the divine was not

only something to think about, it was m ore importantly something to live for. Despite its

emphasis on metaphysics, neoplatonism was no t an exception to this ideal. As we will see,

this feature o f Late Antique philosophy brought the De Mysteriis in the realm o f politics. For

lamblichus, theurgy (his w ord for homoiosis theiou, or, in layman terms, religion)22

assimilated the soul to the demiurge. Then, as a demiurge, the theurgists soul was filled with

the principles o f creation and was thus no t only capable, but compelled to engage in political

activity.

Since magic plays an im portant role throughout the thesis, it is im portant first to

address some interpretative problem s, and secondly, to demonstrate how Neoplatonists

understood magic first as a mechanical, sympathetic procedure, and secondly as a delusive

and impious belief.

20 This position, how ever, was never explicitly stated by either P lotinus and Porphyry, w ho also used magic to discredit o ther religions cf- P lo tinus Ennead 2.9 against the G nostics, and Porphyry Against the Christians, in Jerom e (P L t. 26, col. 1066d).

21 O M e a r a (2003), p. 31-39. T his concep t was expressed in m any different ways dunng Antiquity. T hroughout the paper, the following expressions will be used w ith the same meaning: assimilation w ith the divine (homoiosis theiou)', divinization o f the soul/self; unification w ith the O n e (endsis); retu rn o f the soul; theurgy; road to happiness.

22 O M k a ra (2003), p. 128-131; V a n I.;i i i i rinc .s : (1999), p. 25-38. cf. D M 10.

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Magic and Neoplatonism

Goeteia and magic

The Greek terms goeteia and magia, translated as magic, seems to have been used to accuse

somebody else, the sorcerer (goes, magos) o f practicing a mysterious and impious art.2

Being a goes, then, was not like being a carpenter or a consul, two businesses that were

socially marked by strict characteristics. We should thus be cautious o f the actual words used

in sources to describe activities that we think are magic. Calling the Greek Magical Papyri

magic (even if its content alm ost never refers to itself as such) is a bit like calling Michel

Foucault or Eric D oddss works demagogy, and not what they claim to be. The difference

between demagogues and historians is no t how they accomplish their work; for historians and

(good) demagogues both use logical argumentation. Likewise, holy men and sorcerers in

Antiquity also shared similar techniques and thus cannot be differentiated by the way they

accomplished their miracles. In the early 20th century, Frazer considered magic different

from religion because it was mechanical and aimed toward material interests; it was not

religion but sciences bastard sister.24 Many critiques have shown, however, that Frazers

characteristics (sympathy, god-coercion and material interests) could not establish an absolute

definition o f magic because they were often present in official religion too.25 W hat can be

m ore easily done, however, is a relative definition o f magic. In fact, by its secretive nature,

magic forces us to look at it from contradicting points o f view.

In his study o f the Greek Magical Papyri (PGM),26 Hans D ieter Betz realized that the

writers o f the so-called magical papyri referred to themselves with the vocabulary o f the

2j PLATO, Earn, 10.909b; P l a t o , Meno, 80b; GORGIAS, E/oge d Helene, frag. B11.10 (D IH L/.-K ran/.); G o r g ia s , frag. A3 ( D ie ls -K ra n z ) = D io g e n e s L a e r t i u s , 8.56; On the sacred disease, 1.10-12; P lo t i n u s , Enneads, 2.9.14; AUGUSTINE, City o f God, 10.9, etc. cf BRAARVIG (1999), p. 31-51 and GRAF (1994), p. 35- 37.

24J.G . F r a z e r , (1981), p.14.25 B ra arvig (1999), p. 21-31.26 T he Papyri Graecae Magicae, w ere first collected, edited and translated by K arl Preisendanz in 1928. In the

1986 edition, H ans D ie ter Betz added new G reek material (PG M 82-130) as well as bilingual (D em otic/G reek) papyri n o t included by Preisendanz. T he PG M are hardly datable and range from the first century to the seventh century A D . Still, if they w ere read as sheet m usic fo r religious perform ances, we can assum e that, in essence, their form at did no t change a lot over the ages. T hus, even if they were w ritten dow n under the R om an E m pire, they probably reflect o lder traditions, cf Br aSIIHAR (1996) for a good history o f the transm ission and editions o f the PG M .

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mysteries and not o f magic.27 Accordingly, Betz judged that the authors o f the PGM rituals

considered their work to be religion , and not magic.28 M oreover, Betz noted that the

PG M never refers to practitioners as goes, and only rarely as magos.29 O n the contrary, the

practitioner was an initiate ;30 Pnouthis, a famous Egyptian sorcerer, was a holy

scribe. 1 Nevertheless, Betz tended to magicaltze the texts. For example, he called the

rituals authors mystagogue-magicians and rendered ousia (a very vague term denoting the

materials used in the rites) as magical material. 2 Although Preizandanz edition o f the

eighty-odd magical papyri probably contains some secret rituals which were commonly

considered to be magic by Greek speakers, many o f the PG M s holy scribes, however,

would probably have been insulted if someone had called their rituals magic. The PGM

are a m odem collection, which includes many descriptions o f ritual under the modern label o f

magic.4 Accordingly, the definition o f these papyri is probably worth reconsidering.

Magic is no t an easy category, and it is clear that, as with other social taboos like

adultery, people rarely described themselves as practicing it. Given the mostly public

character o f the texts copied down from Antiquity until now, it is no t surprising that few

would have seriously defined themselves as socially deviant individuals. W hen the term

magic is used, then, it invariably occurs in negative, second-party accounts. In the face o f

such a context, two options are conceivable: 1-Studying the social processes surrounding the

accusation o f magic i.e. w ho accused, and how which is very different from: 2-Studying

sources describing the practice o f w hat other people called magic. This study deals with the

first kind o f methodology. For some, the definition o f magic is a futile endeavor.35 This

m ight be tm e if one only considers the second type o f magic study, i.e. the classification o f

27 A ccording to Betz (1991; p. 248), in the PG M , Holy magic (hiera mageia) is a positive term. [...] T here are, how ever, d ifferent levels o f cultural sophistication in the papyri, and it is in sections representing a higher cultural level that we find descriptive term s such as mageia (magic), magikos (magical), and magos (magician). O ne could w onder w hat Betz m eans by a higher cultural level (which probably m eans a Greek cultural milieu). N evertheless, mageia and its cognate term s could be understood in G reco-R om an literature as m eaning the purest religion as well as its diam etrical opposite, goeteia. p. PLATO, Alcibiades, 1.121e, and A puleius (Apology, 25-26), w ho cites P latos passage to his own profit.

28 B u t /. (1991), p. 254.29 B e t z (1991), p. 248.30 mustes: P G M 1.127; 4.474, 744.31 hierogrammateds : P G M 1.42.32 PG M , p. 336.33 Some o f the rituals found in the PG M either involves the coerc ion /persuasion o f divinities o r the

restraining o f hum ans, cf. PG M 4.555-582; 7.394-404, 417-22, 429-58, etc.34 p. B e t z (1996), p. xli-xliv.

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sources (like the PGM) or literary descriptions o f magical procedures. For this study,

however, defining magic is essential because philosophers and bishops repeatedly

appropriated its meaning to fit their own cosmology and their political visions.

I f we consider magic as the foil o f religion, defining what magic was for

Neoplatonists will be o f great help in understanding Neoplatonic religiosity. It appears that,

following Plotinus path, Porphyry did not consider relevant to separate religious practices

under magic and religion. Since Plotinus did not consider the use o f m atter applicable to

the divinization o f self, distinguishing between evil and profitable religious practices was not

even a problem for him. I argue that, following Plotinus, Porphyry also considered part o f

the soul as still undescended, meaning that the soul was still divine, and that the divinization

o f self consisted in realizing this. 6 For lamblichus, however, since the soul was descended,

external and material help was necessary for its return. Like lam blichus De Mysteriis,

Porphyrys Letter to Anebo was an attem pt to define true ritual activity. It seems that for

Porphyry and lamblichus, the identification o f this activity7 could not be accomplished

w ithout referring, even implicitly, to an antithetical activity. Put simply, if the N eoplatonists

goal was to find the one road to happiness for alP (i.e. an Empire-wide religious system), it

seems that it could only be found by positing a system in diametrical opposition with religion

and by discriminating it.37

Plotinus and magic

Neoplatonists had two different attitudes toward magic (goeteia, mageia), bo th o f which can be

traced back to Plato:

1. Magic was a group o f rituals, which claimed coercive pow er over divinities.

Neoplatonists understood such a claim to be impious, but explained its potential

truthfulness by a pervasive world-view (in philosophy as elsewhere), which saw the

world as an intricate web o f microcosms and macrocosms physically related by an

35 O g d e n (1999), p. 85-86 and G a g e r (1992), p. 12.36 cf. no te 18.37 Porphyry7 (302F [SMITH] = AUGUSTINE, City o f God, 10.32), said that he never found the road to happiness

for all, w hich implies that he was at least thinking about it. As will see further on, O M earas study o f N eoplatonic political theory7 makes evident that lam blichus tried w ith the De Mysteriis to find this road.

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invisible pow er called sympathy (sumpatheia). This theory explained invisible relations o f

attractions or repulsion, and seemingly incredible events.8

2. Magic was delusive. It was a m etaphor for the ensnarem ent o f the world over the soul,

i.e. the fact that souls forget their true divinity and fall prey to irrational impulses.39

Using what A rm strong called a philosophical commonplace, Plotinus rem arked that nobody

tried to understand the true and complex workings o f fire because everybody was used to it.

I f somebody did, however, people would be astonished by the detailed account o f this

ordinary thing.40 Plotinus discussion o f the influence o f stars, and ultimately, o f magic, is

part o f a great work subdivided in three treatises, On Difficulties about the Soul I, 11, and 111

(Enneads 4.3-5). In this context, Plotinus tried to solve the problem o f the relation between

the em bodied condition o f the individual soul, and paradoxically, o f our souls participation

in and no t subordination to the world-soul.41 The Ennead 4.4. starts in the middle o f a

discussion on memory, and shows that stars, gods and perfect entities cannot have memory

because they need nothing and learn nothing which was not part o f their knowledge

before.42 Knowing everything, and for ever, makes memory useless for the gods, w ho will

then, not even have designs and devices concerned with human affairs, by which they will

m anage our business and that o f the earth in general: the right order which comes from

them to the All, Plotinus said, is o f another kind. 4 Plotinus m eant that the gods

influence could not be understood in a historical and locative way, bu t in a spatially as well

as temporally unified way.

Probably drawing on Platos passage o f the Banquet on the powers o f Eros,44 Plotinus

subscribed to a naturalistic conception o f the universe in which all i.e. good and evil

activities could be explained according to the powers o f cosmic sympathy (sympatheia), a

38 T his principle was explained by Pl.OTlNUS, Enneads, 4.4.30-45. A similar view can be seen in the fragm ents o f Celsus True Discourse as found in ORIGEN, Against Celsus, 4.86. O rigen h im self seem to had a simliar conception o f magic (Against Celsus, 1.24-25). F o r the quantum physics spin on the same idea, cf. Caltech M edia Relation: Caltech physicists achieve first bona fide quantum teleportation @http: / / p r.ca ltech .edu /m ed ia /P ress_R eleases/P R l 1935.html.

39 f . PLOTINUS, Enneads, 2.9.14 15; 4.3.17; PORPHYRY, De Abstinentia, 1.28; 1.43; 2.41; D M 3.25.160.15.40 PLOTINUS, Enneads, 4.4.37.41 ARMSTRONG, Plotinus with an English Translation, vol.4, H arvard University Press, p. 27.42 PLOTINUS, Enneads, 4.4.6.43 PLOTINUS, Enneads, 4.4.6.44 PLATO, Banquet, 202e, w hich itself is a fu rther elaboration o f the old principle o f Love and Strife (philia

and neikos), m entioned by E m pedocles, frag. 17.19-20b (DiELS-KRANZ).

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magic as a boundary- the case of iamblichus' de mysteriis

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