On the Generation of Matter in the Enneads. A Reply

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Kevin Corrigan, Emory University
• Language: English
• Date: 1988-12
• Publisher: Dalhousie University
• Publication Version: Final Published Version
• Copyright Statement: Dalhousie University
• License: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): https://ojs.library.dal.ca/dionysius/article/view/6161/5474
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: Dionysius
• Volume: 12
• Start Page: 17
• End Page: 24
• Keywords: analyses; Plotinus; Aristotle; Enneads
• Research Categories: Philosophy

Abstract

In a recent article in Dionysius Jean-Marc Narbonne has taken me to task for my 1986 Phronesis article, "Is there more than one generation of matter in the Enneads?", in which I tried to show that certain difficult passages in the Enneads may well constrain us to accept that Plotinus views the generation of matter in several, rather different ways, and consequently that a rigid two-tier theory of matter, Intelligible and Sensible matter, is not entirely adequate to the subtlety and richness of all Plotinus' analyses. M. Narbonne, it seems, strongly disagrees with just about everything in my article, and what I want to do here is to answer his criticism point by point, and this for two reasons: firstly, because I do not recognize my own article in his criticism, in which I find my "position" misrepresented, and secondly, because M. Narbonne is altogether wrong in his assessment of the major passages in question.