IamblichusIamblichus (aɪˈæmblɪkəs ; Iámblichos; Yamlīḵū; 245-325) was a Syrian neoplatonic philosopher of Arabic origin. He determined a direction later taken by neoplatonism. Iamblichus was also the biographer of the Greek mystic, philosopher, and mathematician Pythagoras. In addition to his philosophical contributions, his Protrepticus is important for the study of the sophists because it preserved about ten pages of an otherwise-unknown sophist known as the Anonymus Iamblichi.
Porphyry (philosopher)Porphyry of Tyre (ˈpɔrfɪri; Πορφύριος, Porphýrios; فُرْفُورِيُوس, Furfūriyūs; 234 – 305 AD) was a Neoplatonic philosopher born in Tyre, Roman Phoenicia during Roman rule. He edited and published The Enneads, the only collection of the work of Plotinus, his teacher. He wrote original works in the Greek language on a wide variety of topics, ranging from music theory to Homer to vegetarianism. His Isagoge or Introduction, an introduction to logic and philosophy, was the standard textbook on logic throughout the Middle Ages in its Latin and Arabic translations.
Atticus (philosopher)Atticus (fl. c. 175 AD) was an ancient Platonic philosopher who lived in the second century of the Christian era, under the emperor Marcus Aurelius. His lifetime fell into the epoch of Middle Platonism, of which he was one of the most notable representatives. Atticus was vehemently anti-Peripatetic. From the writings of Atticus, which have only been handed down in fragmentary form, it can be seen that he was conservative and wanted to purge what he saw as the original teachings of Plato from the intrusion of elements of Aristotelianism.
Monad (philosophy)The term monad () is used in some cosmic philosophy and cosmogony to refer to a most basic or original substance. As originally conceived by the Pythagoreans, the Monad is the Supreme Being, divinity or the totality of all things. According to some philosophers of the early modern period, most notably Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, there are infinite monads, which are the basic and immaterial elementary particles, or simplest units, that make up the universe.
PhiloPhilo of Alexandria (ˈfaɪloʊ; Phílōn; Yəḏīḏyāh (Jedediah); 20 BCE- 50 CE), also called Philo Judaeus, was a Hellenistic Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, in the Roman province of Egypt. The only event in Philo's life that can be decisively dated is his participation in the embassy to Rome in 40 CE; whereby he represented the Alexandrian Jews in a delegation to the Roman Emperor Caligula following civil strife between the Alexandrian Jewish and Greek communities.
TranscendentalismTranscendentalism is a philosophical, spiritual, and literary movement that developed in the late 1820s and 1830s in the New England region of the United States. A core belief is in the inherent goodness of people and nature, and while society and its institutions have corrupted the purity of the individual, people are at their best when truly "self-reliant" and independent. Transcendentalists saw divine experience inherent in the everyday, rather than believing in a distant heaven.
HypatiaHypatia (born 350–370; died 415 AD) was a neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer, and mathematician who lived in Alexandria, Egypt, then part of the Eastern Roman Empire. She was a prominent thinker in Alexandria where she taught philosophy and astronomy. Although preceded by Pandrosion, another Alexandrine female mathematician, she is the first female mathematician whose life is reasonably well recorded. Hypatia was renowned in her own lifetime as a great teacher and a wise counselor.
BasilidesBasilides (Greek: Βασιλείδης) was an early Christian Gnostic religious teacher in Alexandria, Egypt who taught from 117 to 138 AD, and claimed to have inherited his teachings from the apostle Saint Matthias. He was a pupil of either the Simonian teacher Menander, or a supposed disciple of Peter named Glaucias. The Acts of the Disputation with Manes state that for a time he taught among the Persians. According to Agapius of Hierapolis he appeared in the 15th year of Trajan reign (113 AD).
LogosLogos (UKˈloʊɡɒs,_ˈlɒɡɒs, USˈloʊɡoʊs; lógos) is a term used in Western philosophy, psychology and rhetoric; it connotes an appeal to rational discourse that relies on inductive and deductive reasoning. Aristotle first systemised the usage of the word, making it one of the three principles of rhetoric. This specific use identifies the word closely to the structure and content of text itself. This specific usage has then been developed through the history of western philosophy and rhetoric.
Jewish philosophyJewish philosophy (פילוסופיה יהודית) includes all philosophy carried out by Jews, or in relation to the religion of Judaism. Until modern Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment) and Jewish emancipation, Jewish philosophy was preoccupied with attempts to reconcile coherent new ideas into the tradition of Rabbinic Judaism, thus organizing emergent ideas that are not necessarily Jewish into a uniquely Jewish scholastic framework and world-view.
