BECOME MY PATRON! www.patreon.com/angelapuca ONE-OFF DONATIONS paypal.me/angelasymposium JOIN MEMBERSHIPS kzread.info/dron/PSbip_LX2AxbGeAQfLp-Ig.htmljoin FOLLOW ME: Facebook (Angela's Symposium), Instagram (angela_symposium), Twitter (@angelapuca11), TikTok (Angela's Symposium).

@krispalermo8133

Жыл бұрын

Hope you had a Merry Christmas, & a Happy New Year !

This was just superb Dr Puca. It's an honour and pleasure to creating content about the weirdest and wildest subjects alongside you and this great group of religious studies educators. Long live the weird and the wonderful.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thank you so much, Zevi! And thank you for bringing us together for this collab!

@FraterRC

Жыл бұрын

You guys continue to rock 🤘

@Bildgesmythe

Жыл бұрын

Awesome collaboration

@belteshazzarbenyakovleib4009

Жыл бұрын

Wonderful collaboration .

@aminrodriguez4707

9 ай бұрын

Long live!!!! May the wonder and excitement of being a part of a magical universe allways be with you all.

Fantastic work as always! Very important to point out the internal diversity even in the greek Neoplatonists themelves.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad you liked it, Filip!

I literally started to read Iamblichus's works two days ago, and I find this video to be a great starting point for researching his core beliefs. Cheers to Iamblichus and cheers to you!

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad it was helpful!

Very well documented and serious review of the old Greek sources for this important subject and the theory of emanation, shared by the qabalists and other eastern esoteric traditions.

Dr. Puca, thank you sincerely for this joint campaign on neoplatonism. This was an absolute joy to watch with all of you.

I suggest looking into the works of Edward P. Butler (also a PhD, in Philosophy), who is one of the few people approaching the non-Christian neoplatonists (Plotinus, Iamblichus, and so on) from their own perspective instead of the uses that the Christian neoplatonists put them to. His works on what Plato and the non-Christian neoplatonists meant by "The One" are particularly interesting.

Here via Vervaeke, and I am very excited to see some witchiness in this corner of the Internet! 🦉And learn some Neoplatonism, of course. 😁

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Welcome aboard!

another absolutely amazing video. This one is a subject very close to my heart. I spend more times with Plotinus and Iamblichus than I care to admit.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing!

It helped me to set the playback at .75 speed. Wonderful thanks for posting.

@drangelapuca

6 ай бұрын

Excellent!

ive been on a mean Proclus kick lately. Reading everything I can find.

I highkey appreciate this channel, I've learned a lot about magic on this channel.

This was a fantastic overview. Well done, Dr Puca 👏 Thanks for doing right by my boi, Iammy. Now I feel like reading some Chaldean Oracles and animating some statues... Excuse me

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Hope you enjoy it!

I just ordered a book on theurgy and the tarot on Amazon. This will be here tomorrow. This is a miracle. Imagine if I told you that I could do this feat back in 1988, you would think I was crazy. Or a “manifestation” hippy at best. But it is a trivial action now, although it took my own will to do the deed. So what I’m saying is, all of our effective action in today’s world is miraculous. The more actions you take the more miraculous life gets. That is all. Amazing video ❤❤❤

@tylerdavis520

Ай бұрын

What makes an action effective?

Excellent: clear and to the point. Thank you.

Thank you for the illuminating discussion! I am curious if Iamblichus had an explanation for why Plotinus did not need magic to ascend? It would be ironic if the idea was that Plotinus had a heroic soul and was unaware. I.e., when Plotinus wrote from personal experience, he was wrong to think that what he thought worked for him would work for others. I imagine the frustration of a prophet-type saying, "do what I do," and everyone saying, we cannot b/c we are not prophet-types. Like, Superman trying to teach us how to fly as he does. But then someone comes along and reverse engineers how he does it but with technology so we all can. Much love!

@drewprice8468

7 ай бұрын

I’ve wondered the same. Wasn’t it mentioned somewhere that Plotinus was ashamed to be in the body? This sounds like self-realization via self-inquiry. Any thoughts?

Thank you for your consistently high quality and courageous content.

Enjoyed this very much!

one of my favorite videos so far. This is so cool.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Yay! Thank you!

Great work defining these topics with intellectual kindness.

Great video Dr. Puca. Thank you so much.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad you liked it!

I just found this collaboration !!! What fun!!!

Live and love the Plotinus .World of applause to the doctor.you are awesome and very well experienced on entrancing with magick video. Blessings

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thank you so much 😀

great video. thank you so much

Very insightful video.

Thank you Angela. Happy New Year. 💜💜💜

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Happy new year!

Informative as always.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thanks again!

THANK YOU for this video as well as the related video Neoplatonism in Magic Esotericism Witchcraft Occult. It is interesting to have this developmental and contextualizing perspective on certain notions that I (age 75) first heard at my "western occultist" mother's knee--notions that, some time later, became influentially axiomatic in popular metaphysical literature. It is also interesting to compare these European ideas with monist streams of philosophy developed in India--which have similar theurgic and magical applications. Cf. Tantra.

Great video, Dr. Puca.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad you liked it!

Oh, this little white lamb and the brown little bear beside it in the background are soooooo cuuuuuute. I have a deep love for our stuffed animal friends and I was very happy seeing those two dear and lovely friends of you in the background. Certainly they hang on your lips, listening and contemplating every single word you were uttering and certainly they wondered talking to each other in Italian, what for a strang language that is, that you are speaking. On the other hand, our stuffed friends empathically understand everything we say, so they are learning from you,..... and learning-......and learning. Please give them a little kiss from me.

thank you so much! i was wrestling with this exact topic last year, but i could never quite get it resolved. it seemed like so many conflicting opinions/ideas, but you totally explain it here! thank you again for all your time and research!

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Great to hear!

I saw you on the Esoterica livestream and finally got around to checking out your channel. Really looking forward to watching all of your videos!

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Welcome aboard!

Awesome. Enjoyed thoroughly. I find both thinkers compelling.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad to hear it!

Hello Dr. Puca. I am Team Iamblichus, however, as is usual, it seems too always be more complex. Great Video, I will need to look at the transcript to outline better my thoughts for you. One of the better reasons to be a Patreon supporter. :) Being able to chat with you and ask questions when they pop up are the BEST reasons. Thank you so much for your work. Now I have a bunch of other videos to catch up on with this collaboration. hank

Great work, really nice to see accurate summaries and references to other academics as well. My only regret is that I've only found you today.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad it was helpful!

great video, thanks for sharing your findings.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thanks for watching!

Thank you, That was Fun (team Platonius go!)

Fascinating. Plotinus Neoplatonist view seems a Western version of Vedanta as taught by Sri Ramakrishna. I spent years studying Vedanta, and what I learned in the Vedanta Temple continues to shape my world view. Team Plotinus, it is!

Doctora Puca, altho I do have to make an effort to look beyond the makeup and black nails, superb work on the strange relationship between neoplatonic philosophy and the magical orb. You, Zvi and Dr Sledge have become mainstays in my religious and philosophical studies and for it I am eternally grateful.

Thanks!

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Welcome!

youve got my attention

great analysis

This video was wonderfully made driving home the most important points of Neoplatonism 💥💥😊

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad you liked it

Informative. 😃

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Glad it was helpful!

Wonderful ❤

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Thank you 😄

Thanks for posting such a clear analysis of the difference (divide?) between theurgic and contemplative Late Classical Platonism. Since you asked, I am on Team Plotinus. It has taken me a long time to comprehend clearly the distinction you so deftly presented in this video, but over time I found myself more and more uncomfortable with the Theurgic view. Part of the feeling of discomfort is that the Theurgic Platonists tend to complicate the Platonic system; I see this especially in Proclus. And these additional hypostases and realms of manifestation do not seem to me to be necessary or illuminating. But that might be due to a lack of familiarity with a Theurgic approach. On the other hand, it strikes me that the Theurgic Platonists seem to place barriers to a 'return to the One', making access to the One more difficult (not that such access is easy in Plotinus, but, rather, it seems that the Theurgists, by adding more complexity to the system, and by separating the human soul from the One, have undermined Plotinus's most original insights as well as the possibility of union with the Divine. Again, this might be due to my own limited understanding; but that's how I see it at this time. // Thanks again for taking the time to present these alternative views on spirituality within the Platonic tradition. (And Happy New Year!)

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Happy New Year

@canisronis2753

Жыл бұрын

I agree with your view. It seems the human mind in general has an intrinsic arrogance where it "feels" like it knows stuff and therefore justified to add complexity...think Hegal vs Shopenhauer.

@BrelynnHeart

7 ай бұрын

Are you, or have you ever been, a magical practitioner of theury or are coming from just a philosophical approach only? PS I'm not trying to argue about anything just genuinely curious of your experience

Thanks Angela

Interesting. I can see a few parallels between the Great Chain of Being and Ain Soph Aur.

happy new year

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Happy new year

Platonists look at reality and say "Sorry, I just don't buy it. It's just not *REAL* enough".

I think plato connects the seemingly opposing views with insight into the divided line. they are speaking about the same thing from 2 different point of views. incredible how you learn this without being your original language.

The idea of Plotinus that the human soul is only partially contained in the human body, and that a portion of it is in the higher world, is very interesting. I had never heard that he had thought that, but I came to the same conclusion regarding the soul myself. It seems likely the soul would have a structure like this since it is possible to reincarnate and yet have practioners of magic summon and converse with your soul from your past life as part of necromatic practices. I've suspected that you may be able to influence living people using the souls of their past lives if you can determine who they were in the past.

A few people sent me this video and asked me why both can't be correct and why should we have to choose. Rather than assume they didn't watch your fabulous video of course I think it's interesting to consider the dividing line between Plotinus' and Iamblichus' views on magic (theurgy, in this case.) Both were practicing the same hermetic techniques if Hanegraaff's new work is correct (though Im only part way through it) and I think it's easy to forget that ancient practitioners had the same kinds of disagreements even within ancient schools of spirituality as we find within single groups today. Now, if i had to guess, I would say you lean more team Iamblichus...am I right? I'll rewatch a few more times and see if I change my mind :D Happy New Year from Canada!

I'm a modern day theurgist. Team Iamblichus all the way!

Thank you

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

You're welcome

Now I know how to pronounce Iamblichus and I shall graduate to Gurdjieff next!

So what I see here is an attempt to rationalize the mystical in a form that is harmonious with a variety of other thinkings. I should point out that use of magic (or not) plays a two part role in mysticism. Its first role is to aid the mystic to achieve its desired state, but it can also be a focal point of the state. For reciting the Jesus Prayer in Hesychasm is a form of magic, and the outcome of that prayer is the idea that one is battling wicked demons. The discussion involves certain existential perceptions. What is a universe? What are we in the universe? What is the divine? What is are relationship to the divine? What is our place in the world and can we change it? In this framework the principles are arguing about a 'whole' they percieve through self discovery, basically an attempt to discover the nature of 'the source' or 'the one'. Again their perceptions are shackled by a limited knowledge of the universe and the nature of celestiality. While it may be seen as an advancement it is essentially a personification of divinity in the older notions of dinger An - lord of the sky. These notions separate our physicality with a separate divine nature of the heavenly plane. We know now there is no special state of existence (unless you want to dive into dark matter and energy). As we see, even today, new phenomenological understandings often warrant theorization about new, if not natural, formulations on how things come to be. A good example of this thinking is Lawrence Krauss's 'How something can come from nothing' videos. These ideas, reformulations, within mysticism seek to find a higher meaning. In as much theology's long history is littered with whimsical godheads that engage in games of oneupmanship until finally we have omnigod who trip all over themself with contradictory powers. Ultimately believers are trying to force a divine role into what they want their favorite god to be, keeping the faith in hopes that this will happen. The philosophical position is to step above the process while still ensuring that 'the [favored] one' still manages to be the modulator of 'the whole'. And of course us lowly corporeal beings need to find some special path 'fullness of being' within that 'whole'. So the essential critique of this philosophy stems from the association of natural entity with divine power. 1. Celestial objects are in inertia reference frames, they do not need a special divine magic to maintain their position in the heavens, moreover they are just floating dust covered rocks and fusion machines. 2. There is no special connection with 'divine' inner being and say a constellation. I can recognize the El Elyon is the taurus constellation, therefore divine in a mesopotamian sense, but should that perspective have any meaning outside of Canaan and mesopotamia? Authority of presupposed divine beings is both situational and not necessarily translational. People of Baccka valley believed things about El Elyon because the King of Mari imported his religion upon conquest. A second line of critique is the attempt to personify as a unified nature in the inner divine. 3. If we percieve a certain wholeness or oneness of being as part of a mystical experience it is really important to note that this is a perception. 4. We have to ask the question what drives the perception? Is the driving force the desire to percieve a whole whose parameters are out of reach (I cannot grab at say Aquarius and formulate its realness by touch or myopic inspection)? Is the perception of oneness simply a reflection of the mind, have reached a road block in understanding, trying to fabricate an understanding beyond what can be known? We do this today, we cant see beyond the CMBR or quantum gravity, so we fabricate a harmonization where we can see both. 5. This is my opinion and its a repetition of what I have said in the past. Assuming that this widely sought inner divine exists (I do) what more can we learn about it than through the self. So if we are honest, our best unbiased attempt to discover the divine is no more than our inner perception and attempt to interpret a self-divine perception. There might be a whole out their, but we can do no better than discover it through the self, never more than a tiny piece in a much larger puzzle. This methodology is predicted to result in contradictory points of views, and surprise!, it does. Such mistakes that are made are attempts to link a physicality or observational to the 'wholeness' that one fabricates. We should note that both philosophers have highly embedded circular logic to the point of being overt sophistry. This is a warning sign of an attempt to bury a cognitive dissonance. Rational attempts to explain the physical whole, coming from one who has been a scientist for 40 years, come in tiny incremental steps in understanding with lots of going forward and backwards notions. As we move on through the process it becomes easier to confess our ignorance. So mysticism has a certain power, but most of its power is a deception. The deception comes about when we try to force our inner self to find patterns in which it is ill-trained to do. Critical to harnassing the stance is to realize any knowledge we have of the divine is a local-immediate perception. Its not universal. Putting a bunch of mystics in a room and forcing them to formulate a divine (e.g. prelude to Kabbalism) is no more effective either. If such insights cannot be gained then whats the benefit? Let the benefit reveal itself, it does not need to be forced.

Im thinking Dr Puca ,you are tending more towards Iamblichus. Personally I don't get Plotinus given his upbringing in a culture that was so heavily invested in ritualistic magic. His, the one,soul,intellect seams to be directly from early Gnostic beliefs Monad etc but his version being devoid of any narrative. His division of soul- higher/lower is confusing and seems a stretch for me. Iamblichus seams to be more influenced by Zoroastrianism/Chaldean Oracles. As such I can find even less to latch on too. I would fall back on Pythagoras and Pliny the elder . Maybe I haven't contemplated either enough but they both ,to me are overcomplicating a common thread 'there is a divine' and "we can manifest our own reality". i do wish your talks were longer

This was a fascinating video! 🔥 While the contrasting views of the human soul and gods was illustrative, I kept reflecting on my own personal experiences. Maybe I’m oversimplifying, but the natural question that arises for me is: why can’t both of these concepts be true simultaneously? 🤔

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Great question!

@LaneMaxfield

Жыл бұрын

I have the same question, honestly. They both raise interesting points and there are aspects of each perspective that resonate with my experience.

I love the connections made in these videos. You had my interest with Plotinus obviously, but then phronesis... - Hint: JV is wrong, it is not equivalent to Sati - The Sanskrit equiv is anumana, and is even explained in the Devi Mahatmya as example. I am in the Gnostic/mystic sphere - but 'Jung and the I Ching' - 'Siddhi and Tantra in CittaMatra'... Thank you for your research and sharing.

Interesting

Angela, i love your vídeos. Do you pratice any kind of Magic?

A curated copy of the transcript for this video is at www.innersymposium.study/?p=1947

Oh yes, and being asked for my team - I am team Proclus, partly also Porphyrios. But I love all platonists deeply and ardently.

Do they mention actual techniques & practices for achieving these results? Which books? Thanks for your wonderful work.

A human becomes warm by sitting next to a fire. You could say that the attributes of fire are communicated to the human just by being in the proximity of it. My summoning a god and being irradiated by it's particular light you could say the human is similarly transformed. I am not sur theurgy is actually raising oneself up to the gods but rather summoning them down to our level and being transformed in their presences. Alchmey is similar in that you are what you eat and consuming the philosopher's stone causes transmutation of the human. Transfiguration and transmutation are two topics interesting to study and compare, transfiguration being the goal of theurgy whilst transmutation is the goal of alchmey

@PanSzawu

Жыл бұрын

not a bad metaphor

Great info. Iamblichus' works led me into witchcraft.

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

Wonderful!

BEAUTY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you Angela ! But I think there may be a better translation for Theurgia. In the view of Iamblichus, Theurgia is opposed to Goeteia, which is translated to magic or sorcery in modern language, according to the chaldean oracle published by brill. So I suggest the theurgia may translate to liturgia ,when we compare it to theory.

@epicmercury333

Жыл бұрын

Hhhmmm…🤔

Brutal.

I dont think either are correct I think various philosophies are very interesting without being true Im a strict materialist , realist and empiricist , they may not be "deep" philosophies but they do only deal with what can be verified to be true Very interesting video , came here from LTR , have been a long time subscriber of his , and I plan to watch every video from the collaboration !

Came from Esoterica. You're cute, I'll sub.. lol

Cool video! It seems like the neoplatonic views on personal daimons is a bit confusing. On the one hand they discuss them as things that exist, while rejecting the idea that they could be invoked for the purpose of seeking guidance or knowledge?

@epicmercury333

Жыл бұрын

Interesting Steve. Any reference you can quickly point me toward?

@slmille4

Жыл бұрын

@@epicmercury333 Plotinus talks about daimons in Ennead III

@epicmercury333

Жыл бұрын

@@slmille4 Got it! Thank you! I’ll track it down.

What is the title of the video about emination?

I think the difference between Plotinus/Porphyry and Iamblichus/Proclus is that of Alexandrian vs. Athenian Neoplatonism. You can tell from the other Neoplatonists in Alexandria that they are more Plotinian rather than Iamblichean, even up to the 400s.

The comment you made at about 9:30, doesn't that foreshadow the quantum entanglement for which the Nobel in physics was awarded this year?

@epicmercury333

Жыл бұрын

Can you elaborate, Vlad? I assume I can Google this as well?

@realpastorvlad

Жыл бұрын

@@epicmercury333 not an expert on matters of quantum physics, but the Nobel for physics announcement introduced me to the concept that particles that interact can continue to influence one another even over unimaginable distances. It's like they're still right next to one another. I suspect the more we explore quantum physics, the more we will understand certain concepts typically branded as magic, as well as certain practices of religion. It's an exciting time, and a nice thought for New Years Day.

@RegainingTheBalance

Жыл бұрын

Spot on, I was going to comment on the same thing before I saw yours.

I’m having some synchronicities , I read the universal one the other day and I just realized it some this up quite well. That probably should have been obvious but what can ya do 😅

Do we know of what the ancient Egyptians said on the higher self & theurgy? Maybe we can go to the source. "Ancient Egypt is the source of all science, all arts, the art of war, civilisation and politeness. These the Greeks adopted and passed on to the Romans in an already corrupted form. Terrasson was not the first to argue that classical customs and achievements were based on Egyptian ones. For example, Diodorus Siculus, Terrasson’s main source for Séthos, is a well-known proponent of this theory. Terrasson reuses several of Diodorus’ examples of Greek innovations of Egyptian origin, such as Solon’s laws and Archimedes’ hydraulic screw, as well as a notable example of a Greek adaptation of an Egyptian practice, the Orphic mysteries. Terrasson’s assertion that the Egyptian mysteries were appropriated and corrupted by Orpheus, whose account of them was appropriated and corrupted by Virgil"

If one were to delve into this topic, would you recommend they start with Plato and work their way through to late Platonism?

@drangelapuca

Ай бұрын

Yes. Or from the stoics

@Tom-sd9jb

Ай бұрын

Thanks!

@Tom-sd9jb

Ай бұрын

Thanks for the reply and sorry for asking another question but I trust your advice. Would you recommend I start with Plato or the Stoics? And what would you recommend is a good book to start with?

I always figured the Platonic/Neoplatonic idea of The One was an attempt to describe infinity, in which case Iamblichus was kinda wrong and Plotinus would be closer to the truth. Doesn't preclude magic tho.

This has to be the nerdiest video you’ve ever done.

@epicmercury333

Жыл бұрын

And certainly one of the most interesting! 😏

I think Iamblichus would have been into the higher forms of magic like the Egyptian heka, the science of the sun (Ra).

I want to party with Dr. Puca and a copy of the Chaldaean Oracles

Both and neither. Oneness is an illusion of perception. A perspective that had no familiar reference points and simplified to an interpretation of one thing.

Where's the link to ur previous neoplatonism video?

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

It should appear on the screen. Here's the link in case it doesn't kzread.info/dash/bejne/fK2kzsVvZ8_JcZM.html

@profbri.02

Жыл бұрын

@@drangelapuca thank uuuu!

Why is every channel I follow dropping Neoplatonism videos today?

@drangelapuca

Жыл бұрын

We did a Collab!

@Bildgesmythe

Жыл бұрын

It's a wonderful collaboration!

Iamblichus explicitly rejected the interpretation of theurgy as magic.

🌞🌞🌞🌞🌞🌞🌞

Transcendence and the resulting Union or Henosis was and is the the goal of all mysticism…transcendence is something you do with the soul not the body…Plotinus and Damascius were more accurate than Iamblichus.

🥰💋 so sweet .. hello lets chat ????

Thanks!

@drangelapuca

6 ай бұрын

Welcome!