Numenio de Apamea

Numenio de Apamea

Numenius of Apamea was a Greek philosopher who lived in Apamea in Syria and worked in the second half of the second century. It was Pythagorean and forerunner of Neoplatonism. It seems that Pythagoras took as his greater authority, while at the same time is mainly to Plato. He calls the latter a "atenizante Moses", which compares Plato a Greek Moses. His main deviation from Plato is the distinction between "first god" and "demiurge". This is probably due to the influence of Jewish philosophers of Alexandria (especially Philo of Alexandria and his theory of the Logos). According to Proclus (Commentary on the Timaeus, 93), Numenius maintained that he had a kind of trinity of gods, whose members are designated as 'father', 'doer' and 'what is done', ie the world. The first is the supreme deity or pure intelligence; the second would be the creator of the world; the third world. His works were held in high esteem by the Neoplatonists and Amelio (which was critical of Gnosticism) seems almost wrote two books of commentaries on Numenius.