Platonic Theology (Ficino)

The Platonic Theology (Latin: Theologia platonica) is a theological work consisting of eighteen books by Marsilio Ficino. Ficino wrote it between 1469 and 1474 and it was published in 1482.^[1] It has been described as Ficino's philosophical masterpiece.^[2]

Content

While covering a number of topics related to God, the main concern of the work is to argue for the existence of an immortal human soul. Ficino employs a number of arguments to do so, including recasting those made by Plato for example in the Phaedo. Ficino ascribes to the human soul a middle position in a five-part division of things: between God and angelic beings on the one side, and qualities and bodies on the other.^[3]

Ficino's work was also meant to compete with the ancient Platonic Theology of Proclus. Proclus was at the time only newly available again to Western readers. While Proclus' work was considered interesting, and philosophized in a way similar to Christian theology, it was in the end anti-Christian. Ficino wanted to offer a similar style of Platonist philosophy which nonetheless affirmed Christian belief.^[4]

Audience and influence

Ficino directed the Platonic Theology toward his fellow Renaissance ingeniosi, or intellectuals, in the Republic of Florence, including the political elites.^[5] In agreement with Plato, in the work Ficino argued for the immortality of the soul, and the Fifth Council of the Lateran was probably influenced by this in its decree Apostolici regiminis against Christian mortalism.^[6]

Notes

1. Celenza, §2.1.
2. Allen and Hankins, p. vii.
3. Lauster, p. 48. See Ficino, Book III, chapter 2, paragraph 1.
4. Celenza, §2.1.
5. Allen and Hankins, p. ix.
6. Allen and Hankins, p. viii.

Bibliography

• Allen, Michael J. B., "Introduction" in Marsilio Ficino: The Philebus Commentary (University of California Press, 1979).
• Allen, Michael J. B. and Hankins, James, "Introduction" in Platonic Theology, Volume 1, Books I–IV (Harvard University Press, 2001).
• Celenza, Christopher S., "Marsilio Ficino" in Zalta, Edward N. (ed.), The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Spring 2012 Edition) .
• Ficino, Marsilio, Platonic Theology. In six volumes edited by James Hankins with an English translation by Michael J. B. Allen (Harvard University Press, 2001).
• Lauster, Jörg, "Marsilio Ficino as Christian thinker: The theological aspects of his Platonism" in Allen, Rees, and Davies (eds.), Marsilio Ficino: His Theology, His Philosophy, His Legacy (Brill Publishers, 2002), pp. 45–70.

External links

• Google Books - Theologia platonica, edited by Gilles Gourbin, Paris, 1559 (Latin, full text).