Commentary on Plato's Timaeus

That the essence of the female appears, such that women? do not differ? from men by their very nature original: "πρὸς ἀνδρῶν διαφέρειν". Proclus is arguing for the essential equality of the souls of men and women in the guardian class, a key Platonic tenet., because he fashioned them immediately and in a similar fashion. And in this same way, it is maintained as far as the sun; and he affirms in response that all things concerning generation and the sea? are learned. Thus we should also meet the women called guardians?. And in the spiritual pneumatic original: "πνευματικῷ" (pneumatikō). This refers to the "pneuma" or spirit-vehicle that serves as a bridge between the immaterial soul and the physical body. realm, such are the spiritual things. And for a long time, this wandering? has caused a wondrous thought regarding the whole. For not all are distinguished, as if each were used individually. But the wonder is that the whole male is similarly as a slave beneath the fact that these things clearly coincide with one another.

And thus that which is beginning to be helped comes from one and then from others. As we said, perhaps in his own power, and this also is the sort of thing that applies to the female, because among those who are slaves, the woman is by herself. In every response, the female is compared to the male; and it is not merely that the man begins in this way, but the female is also an equal part. And as the desolate places have been constructed because of the opposing living things in some way; for this reason, he made the beginning from previous? arguments. For we say that the common element is understood and that he renders to the female her own parts with one another, so as not to persist in making the same things his own. But he holds the ancient way; and we behold these things as the ruin and the persistence of the passions, making them to be one; they are recorded as having become not self-sufficient, and the substrate hypokeimenon original: "ὑποκείμενον". The underlying material or subject matter that receives form. because the male and the female run together.

Since, then, it is the same—that from which a man becomes a man in every respect—whether other things are governed without turning back, but more greatly since they and all these things are able to do so. And there is also the proper name of all other things; the whole is God from themselves because the essence original: "οὐσία" (ousia). The fundamental being or "substance" of a thing. is one according to itself. But because of the act of dividing, the contemplation of all things has been established by the sight of power. For this is the first of things; because the whole powers do not require as many divisions as they seem to have. From that point again, the soul psychē has contemplated the soulish original: "ψυχικὰ". Matters pertaining to the functions and levels of the soul. natures. We have the spiritual pneumatic part first for them; it comes from him with reason; for according to what is subordinate, it is possible to know. But each is a certain cosmic sensation? aisthēsis; they hold each to be similarly true.

For this reason, they are not able to be among the gods of the whole, if each of those powers is under a blessing. It raises the first thing; all things similarly from the whole of God, while it seems that there is a fitting together harmonization? regarding the female. Furthermore, it is most possible for the common virtues of the unseen and the common things to differ. And as for this power to be with one another, the change that is within; it happens that they are separate, because of which they themselves are not of the essence. The others are separate. It is still so; so that from both comes generation and the difference that is peculiar to all. And also the natural lineages?. And these things are the same for all, though they belong to each common thing. To have them is their property. Therefore, nature again fights according to what is being accomplished; and they are thought to trust in the whole life and essence.

...toward the productive power of education paideutikē The art or method of training and educating the soul, which Proclus views as a process of "recollection" or returning to divine origins.. And this seems to have been said immediately toward the act of intellection noein The highest form of rational thought or "intuitive seeing" in Neoplatonism.. One must remember one thing, and the words must be remembered; that for those who are exercised in other forms, it is equal. We happened to say that what remains fights against the imagination phantasia The faculty that produces mental images; Proclus often sees this as an intermediary between sense perception and pure thought. and that the education of the types appears there, since even in other ways they do not act, but there they become others, following easily. It is likely that education raises us toward those same exceptional moments of the private life.

And so it is that we are of the mortals; she who meditates on being carried along together while at the same time being separated, is continuous from what is separate. And the whole stands together by itself. For it is not for one who is tested to be a friend. For we know that they hold things that are impossible by nature. But the contemplative theōrētika matters come after this according to the arrangement of the whole; for to hold much, one has much. These things belong to them because of the union itself, for by this they are compared. Therefore, according to the same ideas, they are corrected; and the whole meets the whole that is by itself, after the gods, similarly to these in the first part. In this way, having been accepted, it is possible to think and to see, just as we said they have been separated; which is nature; as much as these same things come to be. It is by power. But the whole has the idea because it is also in the same blessing.

And instead, that which produces is peculiar. Thus also the common things of images differ. For the good order within ourselves is according to itself; for it agrees with itself. It is fitting also to know the intensity of the things that rule over the substrate hypokeimenon. Since even in this way, for those who meditate on something by itself, it comes toward the gods, because there are the same causes.

How then is there a correction of man and according to their natures? For this reason, he adds that the nature in man, regarding its own things, should be seen also in that form which they conceive there. So that these things are also in themselves; not as something foreign that has been established. You might take not only much of what is filled with activities; not as if to fashion that which is by power, from which one has to say that education is thus for her. For we know that it is corrected for us in the physical and logical proofs; as there is a difference and not an excess in them. And he may provide a reason for these things appearing in a multitude; and they differ from the images for the sake of being able to see the indivisible. By nature, the female itself is known by the male; and in everything, in the same idea, whether they are the things according to the whole. They receive into themselves the men; they know that from which, whether as an extended power, the peculiar virtues are in the whole itself.

He says that through these things it appears not to be a command to share in the same things; it seems to be possible for all. If the passion is something for the intellection, and another is the necessity of images to come to be, because a certain idea shares original: "κοινωνεῖ" (koinōnei). To participate in or have a share of something common.. For the whole arrangement is assumed to be sympathetic. And God seems to have revealed all things, not according to communion. The power is as if from a release. They will respond and judge this. Such a living being is unchangeable for each, following behind them, since even the distances differ.

...the power of the gods themselves comes to be in him, they have their natures; as much as...