Plotinus on the Contemplation of the Intelligible World

In this study Mateusz Stró?y?ski offers an experiential and practical way of understanding Plotinus' thought and philosophy through a focus on the act of contemplation. He argues that contemplation or direct seeing of the principles of reality is not merely a part of Plotinus' thought but rather a significant dimension of it. Moreover he argues that Plotinus understands metaphysics as a conceptual and propositional description of reality from a third-person perspective as well as an expression of an experience of that reality from a first-person perspective. Stró?y?ski focuses on the first phase of the journey to the Good namely on the contemplation of the intelligible world: Nature Soul and Intellect. He describes the fall of the soul and her return through the lens of the so-called “Great Kinds”: Being Movement Rest Difference and Identity. Stró?y?ski also shows how this concept derived from Plato's Sophist is creatively used by Plotinus to explain both the loss and the restoration of our ability to contemplate through philosophical practice.