On the Chaldean Oracles

Proclus, Commentary on the Timaeus 267^d. Damascius II 16,20. 57,26; for these things were spoken concerning the divine mind, not the human mind.¹) Wherefore Proclus says in Platonic Theology 172,39: original Greek: καὶ οὕτως ἅμα μὲν ἐξῄρηται τοῦ νοῦ τὸ νοητὸν αὐτὸ καθ' αὑτὸ ὑπάρχον, ἅμα δὲ οὐκ ἔξω τοῦ νοῦ τὸ νοητόν. "And thus, at once the intelligible is set apart from the mind, existing by itself, and yet at the same time the intelligible is not outside of the mind."

It is consistent that that which holds the sovereignty of intelligible things, being distinct from all other things that are known, is the supreme principle. If we look around to see what other fragments should be recalled to this point, the first that offers itself is that which Michael Psellus An 11th-century Byzantine scholar who preserved many fragments of the Chaldean Oracles. records in 1144 ^a:

original Greek: ὁ πατὴρ ἑαυτὸν ἥρπασεν... οὐδ' ἐν ἑῇ δυνάμει νοερᾷ κλείσας ἴδιον πῦρ. The author queries if the original spelling was ἥρπασσεν.

The Father snatches himself away and, retaining his own fire—by which his nature is contained—within himself, he does not hand it over even to his own mind. — To this, the anonymous Turin author A reference to a fragmentary Neoplatonic commentary found in a Turin manuscript. IX 1 seems to look: original Greek: οἱ δὲ ἁρπάσαι ἑαυτὸν ἐκ πάντων τῶν ἑαυτοῦ εἰπόντες... "But those who say that he snatched himself away from all his own things, grant him both power and mind to be united in his simplicity, and yet another mind again; and not removing him from the Trinity, they deem it right to do away with number, so as to say that they altogether decline to call him 'the One.' These things are said in a way that is both right and true, if indeed the gods, as those who handed these things down say, have proclaimed them." Here, therefore, he confesses that the discussion concerns the supreme God, a point which Proclus denies in Commentary on the Parmenides 1070,15 and the Vatican excerpts 194,29²). He, therefore, is named "Father," possesses the power of thinking, and his own fire. But before we proceed from these points to others, it is necessary that we pause.

The Oracle says that the Father is situated beyond mental power; but the Platonists separate these, introducing "Power" and "Mind" as distinct entities³). Why they have done this is not obscure. For they are accustomed to affirm that in each of the ranks of the Chaldean theology The "Chaldean Oracles," a 2nd-century mystical text used by Neoplatonists as a sacred scripture. there reigned—

¹) Cf. Plotinus V 5 ("That the intelligibles are not outside the mind, and concerning the Good") and 6,2: "For it is necessary for it to become mind in order to think, but being mind it must also have the intelligible, and as that which thinks primarily, it must have the intelligible within itself." 3,5: "Mind and the intelligible are therefore one in this way." Porphyry, Life of Plotinus 18.
²) original Greek: εἰ γὰρ ὁ πρῶτος πατὴρ... "For if the first Father (namely the intelligible one placed below the One) is said to snatch himself away from the mind and (!) the power, who is he who did not even need to snatch himself away in this manner?" Hence "to snatch oneself away" Greek: ἁρπάζειν ἑαυτόν is often employed: Platonic Theology 270,8; Commentary on the Cratylus 62,22; Commentary on the Parmenides 628,11. 1067,3.
³) Why the anonymous author speaks of two minds besides the power, we shall see immediately. That he wrote before Proclus can also be concluded from the fact that he follows a simpler interpretation of the oracles.