Emanationism

Media:Example.oggEmanationism is a component in the cosmology or cosmogony of certain religious or philosophical systems that argue a sentient, self-aware Supreme Being did not create the physical universe, but instead an insentient The Absolute emanated lower and lower spiritual modalities and lastly matter as the resultant efflux of the Absolute. Other perspectives argue that this emanation originated in The Absolute, unmanifested "Root of Existence", through the action of the Supreme Being ('The One') at the dawn of manifestation. The only lasting place where the totality of emanationism is still observed is by Neoplatonists and some Advaita Vedantists.

Specifically, that complex things are created in nature is not in question either by Creationists (Abrahamic religions, etc.), Emanationists, or nihilists and atheists; the two matters that are in question are the locus for creation and whether a sentient, self-aware Absolute (‘God’) is a necessity for creation. Emanationists such as Pythagoras, Plato, Plotinus, Gotama, and others argued that complex patterns in nature were a natural consequence of procession from the One (Hen, Absolute).

Plotinus (a key expositor of Emanationism) in particular argued that there is no knowledge or sentience in the Absolute, and that all things noetic and corporeal were as well a logos or proportional phenomena of the emanation of and by the One. In Plotinian Emanationism, there are lesser and lesser potencies of will as procession occurs beginning from the One, through the noetic, or the soul, finally ending in base matter, which is generally seen as utter privation.

According to Emanationism, the Absolute, its nature and its activity must be inseparably one thing only, namely will, such that the nature and activity of the Absolute is both one and the same (again, will) and by its very nature is also its activity ‘to will’ and wills things to be or occur, thereby maintaining the center of the logical system of Emanationism. In addition, agnosis, or the lack of Subjective gnosis, is a primordial privation which must be corrected before a metaphysical "Oneing" (Plotinus) can occur. Through this process, the transcendent yet immanent will of individuals is made self-reflexive by recollecting back further and further. Eventually it will reach that nature, the Noetic (and real) self, which is antecedent to the phenomenal, corporeal self. The corporeal self is seen as being one's unactualized nature, and this nature will remain unactualized until contemplation is brought to fruition, thereby bringing into actuality what had been merely potential.

According to this paradigm, creation proceeds as an effulgence from the First Principle (the Absolute or Godhead). The Supreme Light or Consciousness descends through a series of stages, gradations, worlds or hypostases, becoming progressively more material and embodied. In time it will turn around to return to the One (epistrophe), retracing its steps through spiritual knowledge and contemplation. ^{[citation needed]}

The primary classical exponent of Emanationism was Plotinus, wherein his work, the Enneads, all things phenomenal and otherwise were an emanation from the One (Hen). In Ennead 5.1.6, Emanationism is compared to a diffusion from the One, of which there are three primary hypostases, the One (hen), the Intellect/will (nous), and the Soul (psyche tou pantos). For Plotinus, emanation, or the "soul's descent", is a result of the Indefinite Dyad, or tolma, the primordial agnosis inherent to and within the Absolute, the Godhead.

Emanationism is opposed to both Creationism (wherein the universe is created by a sentient God who knowingly creates it) and nihilism (which posits no underlying subjective and/or ontological nature behind phenomena). Creation itself is merely a logos (Republic 509d-511) of the Absolute which "pours forth" as lesser and lesser potencies of the One, proceeding from the One, to the Nous, then to the Soul, and lastly as utter privation, matter (hyle), or, as Plotinus called matter, "an image of an image" (cf. Plato's Allegory of the cave). The emanationist paradigm for the cosmos can be seen as the model that most logically corrects the inconsistencies, paradoxes and philosophical incongruities that are found in Creationism and nihilism. ^{[citation needed]}

Other models of Emanationism than that found in Neoplatonism are that of Advaita Vedanta and presecular Buddhism, both of which posit agnosis/nescience as the principle whereby emanation (proodos) occurs, by means of contemplative and assimilative techniques, the Soul is able to assimilate (epistrophe) itself in union with the One, its nature. ^{[citation needed]}

Emanationist views are found in:

• Platonism and Neoplatonism
• Gnosticism
• Mandaeanism
• Manicheanism
• Catharism
• Kabbalah
• Surat Shabda Yoga
• Rosicrucianism
• Esoteric Christianity

And arguably some variants of Hinduism and Buddhism and the ancient Egyptian religion.

Emanations are sometimes featured in fiction as well, especially in fantasy fiction. Some examples include:

• J. R. R. Tolkien's Ainur of the world of Middle-earth.
• Clive Barker's Imajica
• Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials
• The Elder Scrolls series by Bethesda Softworks, in which Order and Chaos and the unity thereof are used to create a type dual Emanationism.

External links

• Emanation and Ascent in Hermetic Kabbalah 1.4 Mbyte PDF - Colin Low 2004. Presentation and notes on emanation and the roots of Hermetic Kabbalah
• Emanationism

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