Dodds’s Influence on Neoplatonic Studies

This chapter explores E.R. Dodds’s work on Neoplatonism, which has been fundamental to the development of Neoplatonic studies over the last one hundred years. The challenge in understanding the Neoplatonists is to understand the remarkable way in which the mystical and the analytical are combined in their thought. In his scholarly work on Neoplatonism, Dodds applied the rigorous methods of traditional classical scholarship to the elucidation of Neoplatonic texts, and in his treatment of Plotinian mysticism, he stressed that for Plotinus, as for Plato, any kind of spiritual experience of a transcendent world comes only after a great deal of study of mathematics and dialectic. Ultimately, the significance of Dodds’s work on Neoplatonism lies not only in his publications on Plotinus, Proclus, and other late antique thinkers but also in his network of contacts with European scholars in the field and in his influence on individuals who went on to work on Neoplatonism themselves.