Plotinus’ Enneads
- Instructor: Rasoul Rahbari-Ghazani
- 8-Week Online Intensive
- Format: Live online sessions + guided readings + Exclusive WhatsApp
- Level: Open to all motivated learners; no prior background required
- Start: Early January 2026
- Early Registration: 50% OFF for December registrations
Course Overview. This eight-week program offers a clear, structured, and intellectually rich journey into Plotinus’ Enneads—the foundational text of ancient Neoplatonism and one of the most influential works in the history of philosophy, mysticism, and late antique thought. This online course brings together close reading, conceptual analysis, and guided discussion to illuminate Plotinus’ profound vision of reality, the self, beauty, and the philosophical life. Across eight modules, participants will explore Plotinus’ understanding of the One, Intellect, Soul, knowledge, self-awareness, ethical transformation, and the ascent toward the Good in the context of the prominent secondary sources.
Course Structure
- Week 1. Plotinus in Context: Historical background, the Neoplatonic tradition, and Hadot’s vision of philosophy as spiritual exercise.
- Week 2. The One and the Structure of Reality: The three hypostases, emanation, metaphysical hierarchy, and the nature of the First Principle.
- Week 3. Intellect and the Realm of Being: Intellect as living thought, the Forms, and Plotinus’ account of intelligible reality.
- Week 4. The Soul: Unity and multiplicity of souls, embodiment, descent, and spiritual orientation.
- Week 5. Knowledge, Consciousness: Self-knowledge, intellectual vision, the conscious centre, and the metaphysics of awareness.
- Week 6. Self, Presence, Ascent, and Mysticism: Different levels of the self, presence, the contemplative path, and the contemplative path.
- Week 7. Beauty, Virtue, and Ethical Transformation: Aesthetics of beauty, the role of virtues, happiness, and the purification of the soul.
- Week 8. Philosophy as a Way of Life: Dialectic, interior sight, the ascent to the Good, and Plotinus’ vision of the sage.
Who Is This Course For?
This course is designed for:
- Students and researchers of philosophy, classics, theology, and mysticism
- Anyone interested in Neoplatonism, metaphysics, or the history of ideas
- Readers of Augustine, Ibn ʿArabī, Mulla Ṣadrā, Rūmī, or other traditions influenced by Plotinus
- Individuals seeking a structured philosophical program that integrates intellectual rigor with spiritual depth
No formal academic background is required—only commitment, curiosity, and willingness to read closely.
What You Will Receive
- 8 live seminars with lecture + discussion
- Guided reading selections from primary and secondary texts
- All sources provided as PDF
- Access to recorded sessions
This course aims not only to introduce the Enneads but to cultivate the kind of reflective, interior attention that Plotinus saw as essential to the philosophical life. Participants will gain both a scholarly understanding of his system and an experiential appreciation of how Neoplatonic thought continues to shape metaphysics, mysticism, ethics, and the philosophy of selfhood.