Plotinus’ Account of Demiurgic Causation and its Philosophical Background

Plotinus’ account of the sensible world is based on two assumptions: 1. The sensible cosmos is rationally ordered, and its order depends on the activity of a prior cause. 2. This order does not reflect any rational design on the part of the cause, since the cause has no reasoning or calculation in it. Plotinus therefore rejects intelligent design theology, while at the same time maintaining that our world has an ordered structure, which is the effect of a superior cause. Here I aim to set this theory against its background. I will argue that the debate between Platonic and Aristotelian philosophers during the second century ce played a prominent role in the genesis of Plotinus’ account. A crucial passage to assess Plotinus’ view of demiurgic causation is the opening chapter of Enneads vi.7 (treatise 38). It contains an exegetical section on the Timaeus, where Plotinus considers Plato’s account of the making of the cosmos and the fashioning of the human body