ABSTRACT
The philosophical bridge between late antiquity and the Middle Ages is Neoplatonism. This return to Platonic thought and themes was conducted through commentaries on the Platonic dialogues. The interpretations in these commentaries laid stress on the cosmogony of the Timaeus, treating this dialogue not just as cosmology but also as an explication of ontology, an ontology that focused on the detailed elaboration of the order of beings. Discussion of time by Neoplatonists centered on interpretation and criticism of its nature and its place in that order. The best known of the early Neoplatonists is Plotinus (205-270 C.E.). We know his thoughts through The Enneads, six books, each of nine chapters or tractates, arranged by Plotinus’ student Porphyry.1 The discussion of time appears in the Third Ennead, Seventh Tractate, “Time and Eternity.” In this section Plotinus rejects the views of his predecessors, distinguishes between temporal and timeless senses of terms like “always,” explains the nature of eternity, and produces what he presents as a critically modified version of the Platonic view of time. This view of time, however, also contains emphases distinctive to Neoplatonism.
