We'll continue with Patristic philosophy (named for the "fathers" of the church through Augustine) by looking at the person who most influenced the person who most influenced us. Plotinus (AD 204-269) was the greatest Platonic philosopher after Plato. Born in Lycopolis, Egypt, he studied philosophy in Alexandria for eleven years, then established his own school in Room in 243. In 269 he died of a painful illness, probably leprosy.

His final words summarize his thought: "the divine spirit within me is departing to be united with the universal divine spirit." After his death, his disciple Porphyry revised and published his works in six Enneads (series of nine writings each).

Plotinus wanted to bring the uncharted religious ideas of his age under one unified system. He saw God as the source of all being and existence, and believed that the universe emanates from him. Thought produces soul, which produces matter. The soul "fell" into its physical state when it turned from God toward the material. Somewhere Orpheus is cheering.

Only by mystically purging ourselves from all bodily sensations and contemplating the eternal can we know God. Then our souls transcend their own thought, lose themselves in the soul of God, and become one with God.

We've heard all this before. Now comes the new (and highly significant) part. Plotinus believed that evil has no independent status or identity. Evil is the result of wrong thoughts, and only comes into material reality when we think them. And so evil is nothing of itself, literally "non-being." For reasons which make no sense just yet, this is crucial. Trust me.