Wise Men Still Seek Him
Epiphany as Conversion in The Language of Plotinus, Augustine, and Balthasar
In a moment of intense humility, the esteemed Magi prostrate themselves before an infant in worship and present the child with expensive gifts as an offering: this oblation is the first to be given to Christ Incarnate. Mary Magdalene will follow in the Magi’s footsteps later when she anoints Christ’s feet, an act that Jesus says is preparation for his burial. Within the week, after the anointing, Christ will enter Jerusalem and be hailed as the King of Israel. But the Magi call Christ the one born the King of the Jews and the sign that will be nailed to the Cross above the thorn-crowned and wounded Sacred Head of Christ will also proclaim Him thusly.
The Magi’s encounter with Christ can be seen as a moment of conversion but indeed, it is also the pinnacle to their salvific journey. In exploring this journey of and for salvation, this paper will use the language of the philosopher Plotinus, the theologian Augustine, and the priest Hans Urs von Balthasar. The paper will begin with the descent into sin before turning to the eye of the soul lifted toward the heavens, and will culminate in the encounter with Christ, thus bringing the paper full circle.
Plotinus, Augustine and Balthasar are agreed that the state of the soul is one of ugly disarray, entombed in darkness, trapped in wickedness. Both the philosophy of Plotinus and the theology of Augustine and Balthasar make use of the imagery of a fall from former glory to describe the now natural state that each human finds himself in — what we might call human nature or the human condition. Plotinus uses the phrase “descent of the soul” and indeed one of his Enneads bears that title. In Christian terms, Augustine and Balthasar speak of The Fall as depicted in Adam’s sin in the Garden of Eden (Genesis 3). Augustine’s words are particularly poignant as they are voiced in reflection on the depravity of his youthful days. Nevertheless, before recalling his youthful evil, Augustine affirms that such recollection is done out of love for Christ.
I do it for love of Thy love, passing again in the bitterness of remembrance over my most evil ways that Thou mayest thereby grow ever lovelier to me, O Lovelines that dost not deceive, Loveliness happy and abiding: and I collect my self out of that broken state in which my very being was torn asunder because I was turned away from Thee, the One, and wasted myself upon the many (Confessions, pg. 25).
The language of a soul being torn asunder runs parallel to Plotinus’ own writings. In describing the fallen ugly soul, Plotinus writes: “It is dissolute, unjust, teeming with lusts, torn by inner discord, beset by craven fears and petty envies” (Beauty, chapter 5). The soul, being in a state of disunity is also “severed from the whole” (The Descent of The Soul, chapter 4) which in Christian terms designates broken relation between the Divine and the mortal. Plotinus adds:
“When a soul remains for long in this withdrawal and estrangement from the whole, with never a glance toward the intelligible, it becomes a thing fragmented, isolated, and weak” (The Descent of The Soul, chapter 4).
Thus, Augustine says that in his sinful state he had turned away from the One and Plotinus says that turning away results in a severance from the One. Augustine speaks of his evil ways and Plotinus reminds us that such evil is the result of a discordant soul teeming with lusts. Plotinus writes what could very well have been written by Augustine: “For the life it leads is dark and evil, sunk in manifold death. It sees no longer what the soul should see. It can no longer rest within itself but is forever being dragged towards the external, the lower, the dark” (Beauty, chapter 5) Though if it were Augustine writing, he would not speak of the soul resting in itself but rather the restless soul finding its rest in God (Confessions, pg. 1).
If the descent of the soul were the only narrative with which to explore our human condition, despairing withdrawal or animalistic hedonism — and neither satisfying or able to offer rest to the restless soul — would be the only available choices. But in commenting on Plotinus’ philosophy, the 20th century theologian and Catholic priest Hans Urs von Balthasar writes: “If we wish to talk of a ‘descent’ or ‘fall’, we must always set over against this the reverse side of the descent which is the drive upwards of what is lower in the scale of being” (Balthasar, pg. 286).
It is fitting, then, that the Magi raised their eyes to the Heavens and gazed at the Star which heralded the Incarnation and which guided the wisemen on their journey of faith to Christ Jesus, the King. Balthasar provides us with a language for understanding the Magi’s faith journey when he writes:
All intellectual activity in Heaven and earth circles around this generative mystery [Christ, eternally generated, not made], all longing love struggles upwards toward it, all the beauty of the world is only a sign coming from it and pointing to it so that as he contemplates and seeks to understand the things of the world the philosopher is compelled at a deeper level to run away, to let go, to turn again to the uniqueness of absolute unity (Balthasar, pg. 282).
Thus it is that the Magi, their hearts filled with the Eros that pulls them upward, turn from their own native land to embark on a journey. It would perhaps be appropriate to describe the Star that the Magi followed as a manifestation of God’s beauty in the beauty of the world and to say that this beautiful Star was a sign coming from Christ, Incarnate Beauty, and pointing to Him. The Star bid the Magi to “run away” from and “to let go” of what would hinder them in their quest to see God.
Commenting on the Magi narrative, Pope Francis sees the devil’s attempts to thwart the Magi by obscuring their sight. The Magi, operating on human reasoning which would suggest a King would be found in a palace, allow themselves to be called away to Jerusalem. “There,” says Pope Francis, “they lost sight of the star and met with a temptation, placed there by the devil: it was the deception of Herod” (Catholic News Agency, January 6, 2015). In His mercy, God warns the Magi in a dream not to return to Herod and restores to them the sight of the joyous Star. Here we see the protection of God for those of us who desire Him but who are nevertheless vulnerable to Satan’s efforts to sift us as wheat.
More than just a comforting word, this understanding of God’s sovereign protection and effectual goodwill towards those who desire Him is crucial for understanding the hope of our salvific ascent. For while Balthasar does speak of struggle, contemplation, and turning to — all verbiage in which we are the subject of the sentence and can thus be seen as working out our salvation — he first emphasizes that this activity of the soul is dependent on and revolves around the Incarnate Christ, the “generative mystery” who is the object to which we lift our eyes and the object of our sight.
Crucially, it is not the Star that saves the Magi nor is contemplation of the Star the path of salvation, nor is it the Magi’s journey itself that saves them. The Star points to God, the contemplation coupled with obedience leads to God, the journey is toward God. It is only in the encounter with Christ that the Magi attain the blessedness that is the very sight of Christ.
If Christianity was built on the thinking of the Neo-Platonist, the wisemen would have journeyed closer and closer to the star (in the heavens) till in some wonderful turn of events, they died thereby escaping Plato’s cave, freed from the tomb of the body, their souls no longer individual but rather assimilated back into the one Soul. Imagine the Neo-Platonist’s surprise, therefore, when the Star guides the Magi to an earthly encounter with the Divine in bodily form. Imagine the surprise of the Neo-Platonist when instead of an escape from the dust of earth, The Word (Plotinus might have called him The Intelligence) is made flesh and makes His dwelling among us (John 1:14.) Plotinus talks about seeing with the eye of the soul but the Magi see Jesus with their bodily eyes as well as their eye of the soul.
And so the Star comes to rest over the house where Jesus is and this word of rest is appropriate. Recalling the words of Augustine who wrote of the restless soul finding rest in God, the souls of the Magi which have hitherto been restless as they journeyed are now invited into a posture of worshipful rest.
Plotinus, though not writing on the Magi, nevertheless captures the elation which the Magi must have experienced as they looked on their Savior when he writes: “And, seeing thus, one undergoes a joy, a wonder, and a distress more deep than any other because here one touches truth” (Beauty, chapter 4). Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI echoes this language of joy saying that it is: “the joy of one whose heart has received a ray of God’s light and who can now see that his hope has been realized — the joy of one who has found what he sought, and has himself been found” (Jesus of Nazareth, pg. 106).
This is a joy that only an encounter with true Beauty could induce. To use the language of Plotinus, it is “an astonishment, a delicious wonderment, a longing, a love, a trembling that is all delight” (Beauty, book 4). For this is “the best of visions” and “to attain is blessedness” (Beauty, book 7). The one who, like Herod, does not attain to it is, in the words of Plotinus, “the true unfortunate” (Book 7). So great is this vision, says Plotinus, that “it were well to cast kingdoms aside and the domination of the entire earth and sea and sky if, by this spurning, one might attain this vision” (Book 7).
And so the Magi — the wise men who lifted up their eyes and followed the Star — are in the presence of the Savior and experience a joy more deep and intense than any other joy. What then is their natural reaction, what might this joyful sight call forth from their souls? It is fitting that the Magi respond in worship and in offering. In bowing before the Savior, they humbly acknowledge His magnificent glory and in giving gifts they respond to this unsurpassable gift of Love with an oblation, the first fruits of their faith.
This, then is salvation — for us and for the Magi — to be invited to come with joy and in triumph to behold Him who is King: God of God, light of light, begotten, not created, the Word who took on flesh and dwelt among us. This, then, is salvation, to sing His praise as citizens of Heavens and to come and adore Him, Christ the Lord.
Works Cited
Confessions. Trans. F.J. Sheed. 2nd ed. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Pub., 2006. pag. 1, 25 Print.
Plotinus, and Elmer J. O’Brien. The Essential Plotinus: Representative Treatises from the Enneads: Selected and Newly Translated with Introdcution and Commentary. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett, 1980. Print.
Balthasar, Hans Urs Von, and John Riches. “Volume 4: The Realm of Metaphysics In Antiquity.” The
Glory of the Lord. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1989. N. pag. Print.
Benedict, and Philip Whitmore. Jesus of Nazareth. New York: Image, 2012. Print.
Harris, Elise. “True Models of Conversion: Wise Men Believed in Love, Not Worldly Power.”
Catholic News Agency. N.p., 6 Jan. 2015. Web. 20 Oct. 2015.
