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NEOPYTHAGOREANISM
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NEOPYTHAGOREANISM , a Graeco-Alexandrian school of See also:philosophy, which became prominent in the 1st See also:century A.D. Very little is known about the members of this school, and there has been much discussion as to whether the See also:Pythagorean literature which was widely published at the See also:time in See also:Alexandria was the See also:original See also:work of 1st-century writers or merely reproductions of and commentaries on the older Pythagorean writings. The only well-known members of the school were See also:Apollonius of Tyana and Moderatus of Gades. In the previous century See also:Cicero's learned friend P. Nigidius See also:Figulus (d. 45 B.C.) had made an See also:attempt to revive Pythagorean doctrines, but he cannot be described as a member of the school. Further, it is necessary to distinguish from the Neopythagoreans a number of Eclectic Platonists, who, during the 1st century of our era, maintained views which had a similar tendency (e.g. See also:Apuleius of Madaura, See also:Plutarch of Chaeronea and, later, See also:Numenius of See also:Apamea). Neopythagoreanism was the first product of an See also:age in which abstract philosophy had begun to See also:pall. The See also:Stoics discovered that their " perfect See also:man " was not to be found in the luxurious, often morbid society of the Graeco-See also:Roman See also:world; that some-thing more than See also:dialectic See also:ethics was needed to reawaken a sense of responsibility. A degenerate society cared nothing for syllogisms grown threadbare by repetition. Neopythagoreanism was an attempt to introduce a religious See also:element into See also:pagan philosophy in See also:place of what had come to be regarded as an arid formalism. The founders of the school sought to invest their doctrines with the See also:halo of tradition by ascribing them to See also:Pythagoras and See also:Plato, and there is no See also:reason to accuse them of insincerity. They went back to the later See also:period of Plato's thought, the period when Plato endeavoured to combine his See also:doctrine of Ideas with the Pythagorean number-theory, and identified the See also:Good with the One, the source of the duality of the Infiniteand the Measured (ro &recpov and Irrpas) with the resultant See also:scale of realities from the One down to the See also:objects of the material world. They emphasized the fundamental distinction between the Soul and the See also:Body. See also:God must be worshipped spiritually by See also:prayer and the will to be good, not in outward See also:action. The soul must be freed from its material surrounding, the " muddy vesture of decay," by an ascetic See also:habit of See also:life. Bodily pleasures and all sensuous impulses must be abandoned as detrimental to the spiritual purity of the soul. God is the principle of good; See also:Matter (An) the groundwork of Evil. In this See also:system we distinguish not only the See also:asceticism of Pythagoras and the later See also:mysticism of Plato, but also the See also:influence of the Orphic mysteries and of See also:Oriental philosophy. The Ideas of Plato are no longer self-subsistent entities; they are the elements which constitute the content of spiritual activity. The Soul is no longer an See also:appanage of ovala, it is ou ria itself : the non-material universe is regarded as the See also:sphere of mind or spirit. Thus Neopythagoreanism is a See also:link in the See also:chain between the old and the new in pagan philosophy. It connects the teaching of Plato with the doctrines of See also:Neoplatonism and brings it into See also:line with the later Stoicism and with the ascetic system of the See also:Essenes. A comparison between the Essenes and the Neopythagoreans shows a parallel so striking as to See also:warrant the theory that the Essenes were profoundly influenced by Neopythagoreanism. Lastly Neopythagoreanism furnished Neoplatonism with the weapons with which pagan philosophy made its last stand against See also:Christianity. See PYTHAGORAS, NEOPLATONISM, ESSENES; and See also:Zeller's Philosophie d. Griechen. For members of the school see APOLLONIUS OF TYANA and MODERATOS OF GADES. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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