Dipped into Neoplatonism today for some novel research. (Felt sad about the murder of Hypatia all over again, as one does.*)
But in general, it always strikes me how much 19th-C categories fudged our sense of history. "Neoplatonism" is an early Victorian term used to organize late-Hellenic philosophies pre- & post- Plotinus. But it's *much* more fruitful to study the progression of "one-ness" from older Egyptian & Indian philosophies, through 3rd C BC Plato & beyond.
Periodization is a trap!
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i agree. tracing the way ideas get developed and expressed in different cultures and periods is much more fruitful.
@holon42
I understand why strict periodization happens - especially in eras when so much was lost and destroyed, so you don't have a fuller sense of the conversation. But just because one person is the only voice to have survived doesn't mean one needs to configure them as *the* turning point... especially when their own texts very plainly reference a community of peers, and a long line of preceding thinkers.
The myth of individual genius leaves every generation with so much unlearning to do.