The Mystical Hymns of Orpheus - Platonic Philosophy
The Mystical Hymns of Orpheus - Platonic Philosophy
The Mystical Hymns of Orpheus - Platonic Philosophy
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166 ADDITIONAL NOTES.<br />
been partakers <strong>of</strong> a certain energy above human nature,<br />
have again fallen into the sea <strong>of</strong> dissimilitude1, and for<br />
honour among men have embraced error towards the Gods,<br />
-<strong>of</strong> these Jupiter is said to be the father.<br />
<strong>The</strong> paternal cause originates supernally from the intelligible<br />
and occult Gods ; for there the first fathers <strong>of</strong> wholes<br />
subsist; but it proceeds through all the intellectual Gods<br />
into the demiurgic order. For Timzus celebrates this<br />
order as at the same time fabricatice and paternal ; since he<br />
calls Jupiter the demiurgus and father. <strong>The</strong> fathers, however,<br />
who are superior to the one fabrication are called<br />
Gods <strong>of</strong> Gods, but the demiurgus is the father <strong>of</strong> Gods and<br />
men. Farther still, Jupiter is said to be peculiarly the<br />
father <strong>of</strong> some, as <strong>of</strong> Hercules, who immutably preserve a<br />
Jovian and ruling life during their converse with the<br />
realms <strong>of</strong> generation. Jupiter, therefore, is triply father,<br />
<strong>of</strong> gods, partial souls, and <strong>of</strong> souls that embrace an intellectual<br />
and Jovian life. <strong>The</strong> intellectua'l order <strong>of</strong> the gods,<br />
therefore, is supernally bounded by the king2 <strong>of</strong> the total<br />
divine genera, and who has a paternal transcendency with<br />
respect to all the intellectual Gods. This king, according<br />
to <strong>Orpheus</strong>, is called by the blessed immortals that dwell<br />
on l<strong>of</strong>ty Olympus, Phanes Protogonus. But this order<br />
proceeds through the three Nights, and the celestial orders,<br />
into the Titanic or Saturnian series, where it first separates<br />
itself from the fathers, and changes the kingdom <strong>of</strong> the<br />
Synoches for a distributive government <strong>of</strong> wholes, and<br />
unfolds every demiurgic genus <strong>of</strong> the Gods from all the<br />
abovementioned ruling and royal causes, but proximately<br />
from Saturn, the leader <strong>of</strong> the Titannic orders. Prior,<br />
however, to other fabricators (b~ptovpyor) it unfolds Jupiter,<br />
who is allotted the unical strength <strong>of</strong> the whole demiurgic<br />
1 Plato, in the Politicus, thus calls the realms <strong>of</strong> generation, i. e. the<br />
whole <strong>of</strong> a visible nature.<br />
2 That is, intelligible intellect, the extremity <strong>of</strong> the intelligibIe order.<br />
3 That is, the divinities who compoae the middle <strong>of</strong> that order <strong>of</strong> Gods<br />
which is denominated intelligible and at the same time intellectual.