| Great Theosophists--Ammonius Saccas (9 of 29)THEOSOPHY, Vol. 25, No. 2, December, 1936(Pages 53-59; Size: 19K)(Number 9 of a 29-part series)GREAT THEOSOPHISTSAMMONIUS SACCASTHE influence of the great Alexandrian Schools had not helped the earlyChristians in their work of propaganda. While the Church of Rome held upthe Jewish Bible as the sole authority upon every subject, the GnosticSchools of Alexandria and Ephesus had turned out thousands of studentswho recognized the absurdity of such a claim. The scattered communitiesof orthodox Christendom, echoing the church in Rome, were teaching thatthe Jewish Scriptures were the only revelation of God, and therefore notto be compared with the Scriptures of other nations. But three prominentJewish scholars had already proved the similarity between the Laws of Mosesand the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle and Pythagoras. Christians claimedthat Jesus was a unique character, while the entire pagan world knew thatthe legends surrounding Jesus' life were identical with those of the pagangods. Students of comparative religion recognized their similarity to thetraditions of great spiritual Teachers who had preceded Jesus.The Church now found herself in conflict not only with the religiousideas of her self-chosen adversaries, but with their scientificviews as well. The orthodox Church Fathers declared that God made the worldout of nothing. The Gnostic Fathers denied this unphilosophical assertionand held that the universe was the result of a gradual unfoldment fromwithin without. Christianity asserted that the earth was flat, and againstthis theory was pitted that of Aristarchos of Samos, who had been a memberof the Alexandrian School in 280 B.C., and had taught the sphericity ofthe earth as Pythagoras had taught it before him.In the fourth century, Science and orthodox Christianity came to a deadlock,the bone of contention being the idea of the sphericity of the earth. Criticizingthe ancient theory of the roundness of the earth, Lactantius, one of themost polished rhetoricians among the Christians, indignantly inquired:"Is it possible that men can be so absurd as to believe thatthe crops and trees on the other side of the earth hang downward, and thatmen have their feet higher than their heads? If you ask them how they defendthose monstrosities, how things do not fall away from the earth on thatside, they reply that the nature of things is such that heavy bodies tendtoward the center, like the spokes of a wheel, while light bodies tendfrom the center to the heavens on all sides. Now I am really at a losswhat to say of those, who, when they have once gone wrong, steadily perseverein their folly and defend one absurd opinion by another."But this statement, although written by a prominent member of their ownfaith, was objected to by the Christians themselves. When had they everclaimed that there were people on the other side of the earth? TheBible stated that the only persons who survived the Flood were the threesons of Noah, and their work was clearly described. Shem had re-populatedAsia, Ham had done the same thing for Africa, and Japhet was the ancestorof the European peoples. Therefore, to quote St. Augustine: "It is impossiblethat there should be inhabitants on the other side of the earth, sinceno such race is recorded in the Scriptures among the descendants of Adam."As if that were not enough of an argument to convince any thinking man,St. Augustine offered another which was certainly irrefutable! It wouldbe impossible, he said, for men to be on the other side of the earth, forin that case "in the Day of Judgement, men on the other side of the earthwould not be able to see the Lord descending through the air."By the sixth century, the flatness of the earth had been definitelyestablished by the Christian Church. In his great work, ChristianTopography, Cosmos Indicopleustes describes the earth as a quadrangularplane, extending four hundred day's journey east and west and exactly halfas much north and south. This quadrangular plane he said to be enclosedby mountains, upon which the sky rests. As the mountain on the north islarger than the others, it intercepts the sun's rays and produces night.The plane of the earth is not exactly horizontal, but inclines slightlyfrom the north. Therefore rivers like the Tigris and Euphrates,which run southward, have a rapid motion, while the Nile, which runs northward,naturally moves more slowly.In addition to the pagan and idolatrous religions of the "heathen" andtheir absurd scientific views concerning the sphericity of the earth, therewere the teachings of the great pagan philosophers which had to be refutedalso if the Christian Church were to become the ruling force of the day.The orthodox Fathers devoted all their time and energy to this task. Butin spite of their best efforts, the Pagans laughed quietly at Christianignorance. The Church was in a quandary. How could she continue to refutethe pagan doctrines unless she understood the theories she was trying tocombat?In self-defence, the Church decided to adopt new tactics. She wouldestablish a School of her own in Alexandria, the city of Schools. ThisSchool would serve two purposes: first, it would enable her to introduceChristianity into this hotbed of heresy; second, it would give the ChurchFathers an opportunity to study the pagan doctrines, and thus give a greaterappearance of authority to their Refutations. As the Reverend Father Stebbingpoints out, this School. . . aimed at using philosophy, especially the speculationsof Plato, to serve the cause of the Church, and to answer the objectionsof pagan philosophers on their own grounds, demonstrating that true philosophyled the way to Christianity and not to Paganism.Early in the second century, then, a Christian School was established inAlexandria. At first it was a school for children only, locatedalmost at the doors of the Old Museum, from which the majority of Christians,owing to their ignorance of science, art, and philosophy, had hithertobeen debarred. Out of this grew the famous Catechitical School.Its first director was Pantænus, a converted Stoic, who was deposedand sent to India as a missionary in the year 191. He was followed by Clementof Alexandria, whose study of Greek and Egyptian philosophy had convincedhim that truth could be found even in the heathen systems. But Clement'seclecticism met with no enthusiasm from his superiors, and in the year203 he was deposed and replaced by his pupil Origen, who was only eighteenyears old at the time.Origen's work for Christianity commenced with a deep and profoundstudy of the Hebrew Scriptures. Dissatisfied with the translations whichwere then extant, Origen determined to make his own translation. He broughtout what is known as the Hexapala, or six-fold edition of the OldTestament, in which he set forth, in parallel columns, the various versionsof the Scriptures, including his own. In addition to this, he brought outthree Greek versions of the Psalms. Some notion of the magnitude of Origen'swork (which occupied twenty-eight years of his life) is gained by an examinationof some recently discovered manuscripts. One may be found in the AbrosianLibrary in Milan, and another in the collection of palimpsests discoveredin Cairo.Origen's knowledge of the Jewish Scriptures convinced him that the orthodoxChurch was making a fatal mistake by denying the authenticity of certaindocuments. He openly rebuked the Church for rejecting the Book of Enoch,which contained the history of the early races of mankind and completelydestroyed the Jewish chronology. He also called attention to the esotericdoctrines of Moses which the Church had failed to notice. He discoveredthat Moses, in addition to the teachings of the Covenant, had communicatedsome very important secrets to the seventy elders, enjoining them to disclosethese facts only to the worthy.Origen's fearless attitude toward the accepted Scriptures of the Christians,as well as his openly-professed interest in Neoplatonism, aroused the wrathof the Patriarch of Alexandria. Origen was banished from the city in theyear 232. But his thirty years of study had convinced him of thetruth of Neoplatonism, and in the School which he subsequently foundedin Caesarea, Origen openly taught the doctrines that he had learnedfrom Ammonius Saccas.Ammonius, who later became the teacher of both Clement and Origen, receivedhis early education in the children's school which preceded the CatechiticalSchool. He was born in Alexandria about the middle of the second century.His parents were very poor, and the boy was obliged to add his shareto the family earnings by working as a porter on the docks locatedin the Egyptian, or Rhakotis portion of the city. There he saw shipsfrom far-off lands, heard queer dialects and met many strange people. Perhapshe gained his first acquaintance with the philosophies of the East fromsome Hindu sailor. The Song of Krishna is always on the lips ofthe son of Hindustan.The parents of Ammonius were devout Christians, and Ammonius was sentto the Christian School, where he learned about the Christian Christ. Hemust have heard that Krishna, too, had been immaculately conceived, waspersecuted by a wicked King, and had finally died upon a cross. Why werethe stories of the two Christs so similar? Could it be possible that bothwere legends? If that was the case, there must be other legends of Christsin other lands. The priest told him there was only one Christ. Allthe others were impostors. The priest told him to believe, but hewanted to know. So he left the Christian School, and started outupon his journey of honest investigation.When he grew older he attended some of the lectures in the pagan schoolsand eventually became acquainted with the basic ideas underlyingall the great philosophies. He pondered over the profound statements thathe heard, and often in the night their meaning, it is said, was revealedto him in dreams and visions. In the course of time people beganto speak of him as theodidaktos, the "god-taught." But Ammoniuswas a modest man, and called himself merely a Philalethian,or lover of truth. He started the Neoplatonic School in Alexandria in theyear 193 A.D.The objects which Ammonius Saccas had in view were the same asthose of H. P. Blavatsky in founding the Theosophical Society in 1875.The first of these objects was to form the nucleus of a Universal Brotherhoodwithout distinctions of any kind. Ammonius knew that Brotherhood meansunity on every plane. He saw that without this idea of unity theentire manifested universe would be an expression of chaos. Withunity as a basis, it would appear as an expression of law and order.The second century of the Christian era was marked by tolerance,but not by unity. The ancient Wisdom-Religion, which is the onlytrue basis of unity, was now forgotten. The Schools of the Mysteries weregradually dying, and with them the knowledge of the Wisdom-Religion. Thevarious Schools of the Gnosis were presenting different aspectsof the Wisdom-Religion, but their underlying unity was still unperceived,in spite of Valentinus' efforts to disclose it. Ammonius recognized thatreligious tolerance was not enough. For even tolerance, without a philosophicalbasis, soon sinks into apathy. He saw that the only way to establish thebrotherhood of religions was to show the identical source from which allof them had sprung; and from that point to explain the diversities. Hebegan by postulating the existence of the ancient Wisdom-Religion, andshowed how all religions sprang from that, as the branches of a tree froma common trunk.Using that One Source as a basis of comparison, Ammonius proved theessential identity of all religions by making his students acquainted withall the different systems of thought. In his School the Vedantic, Zoroastrianand Buddhist systems were studied side by side with the philosophies ofGreece. The doctrines of Plato and Pythagoras were compared with the philosophiesof the ancient East, the teachings of the Jewish Kabala with those of theancient Egyptians. This comparative study of the religions and philosophiesof all nations accomplished the second of Ammonius' objects, and gave tohis School the name of Eclectic.The third object that Ammonius had in view was to make the study ofphilosophy a living power in the lives of his students. In order to accomplishthis he consistently used the method of correspondence and analogy, demonstratingto his students that the myths and legends found in the different systemswere but symbolical representations of the experiences through which everysoul must pass. Therefore the members of his School were known as Analogeticists.The School of Ammonius Saccas was divided into two sections: exotericand esoteric. This was merely the continuation of an ancient custom, forall the religious and philosophical schools of the past were divided inthe same manner. The Mysteries of every nation consisted of the "lesser"and the "greater." The "lesser" mysteries were given to the public andconsisted mainly in ethical teachings. The "greater" mysteries were reservedfor the few. All of the great Adepts of olden times gave out theirsecret teachings only to those who had pledged themselves to silence.Even the Jews had their Mercavah, or outer vehicle, which concealedtheir highest knowledge. Northern Buddhism has its "greater" and "lesser"vehicle, known as the Mahayana, or esoteric, and Hinayana,or exoteric School. Pythagoras called his Gnosis "the knowledgeof things that are", and revealed it only to his pledged disciples. Jesusspoke to the multitudes in parables and kept his secret teachings for thefew. Therefore Ammonius, in dividing his own School into two sections,was following the lines of his predecessors.The Alexandrian Theosophists were divided into three classes: neophytes,initiates and masters. Their Rules were copied from those which had beenused in the ancient Mysteries of Orpheus, who, according to Herodotus,had brought them from India. These Rules had come down to the Neoplatonistsas their natural inheritance: "What Orpheus delivered in hidden allegories,Pythagoras learned when he was initiated into the Orphic Mysteries, andPlato next received a perfect knowledge of them from Orphic and Pythagoreanwritings." (Neoplatonism and Alchemy, Alexander Wilder.)The Rules of Orpheus have again descended as a natural inheritance tothe Theosophists of the present day. For Orpheus is no other than Arjuna,the disciple of Krishna who went around the world teaching the ancientWisdom-Religion and establishing the Mysteries. Every time the modern Theosophistreads the Bhagavad-Gita he is acquainting himself with the ancientOrphic discipline. The system of Orpheus is one of the strictest morality,and the Orphic concept of duty one of the noblest known to mankind. Thephilosophical ideas of Orpheus are known to every student of The SecretDoctrine. In the Orphic system, the divine Essence is inseparable fromwhatever is in the manifested universe, all forms being concealedfrom all eternity in it. At determined periods these forms are manifestedthrough the process known as Emanation. All things having proceeded fromthis divine Essence, all things must of necessity return to it. Innumerabletransmigrations or reincarnations and purifications are needed before thisfinal consummation can take place.The philosophical system of Orpheus was revived in Egypt by AmmoniusSaccas. The central idea of the Eclectic Theosophy was that of a singleSupreme Essence, Unknown and Unknowable. The system was characterized bythree distinct features: first, the theory of this Supreme Essence; second,the doctrine of the human soul, called an emanation of the Supreme Essenceand therefore considered to be of the same nature; third, Theurgy, theart of using the divine powers of man to rule the blind forces of nature.The aim and purpose of Ammonius was to reconcile all sects, peoplesand nations under one common faith -- a belief in one Supreme Eternal Unknownand Unnamed Power which governs the universe by immutable and eternal laws.His object was to prove a primitive system of Theosophy, which in the beginningwas known alike in all countries; to induce men to lay aside their quarrelsand strifes and unite in purpose and thought as the children of one commonmother; to purify the ancient religions, now corrupted and obscured, fromall dross of human element by expounding their philosophical principles.His chief object was to extract from the various religious teachings, asfrom a many-stringed instrument, one full and harmonious chord which wouldfind response in every truth-loving heart.Ammonius Saccas, like many other of the great sages, left nothing inwriting. The records of his teachings have come down to us through theworks of Plotinus, Porphyry and Iamblicus. In relation to the school foundedby Ammonius Saccas, Alexander Wilder writes:Their doctrines were adopted by pagans and Christians in Asiaand Europe, and for a season everything seemed favorable for a generalfusion of religious belief. The Emperors Alexander Severus and Julian embracedthem. Their predominating influence upon religious ideas excited the jealousyof the Christians in Alexandria. The School was removed to Athens, andfinally closed by the Emperor Justinian -- The Eclectic Philosophy. Next article:Great TheosophistsPlotinus Main Page | IntroductoryBrochure | Volume 1--> Setting theStageKarma and Reincarnation | Science | Education |Economics | RaceRelationsThe WISDOM WORLD | WorldProblems & Solutions | The People*s Voice | Misc. |
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