Marsilio Ficino

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Marsilio Ficino
Marsilio Ficino from a fresco painted by Domenico Ghirlandaio in the Tornabuoni Chapel, Santa Maria Novella, Florence
Born	19 October 1433 Figline Valdarno, Republic of Florence
Died	1 October 1499(1499-10-01) (aged 65) Careggi, Republic of Florence
Notable work	1474  De Christiana Religione 1482  Theologia Platonica de immortalitate animae 1484  De amore 1489  De vita libri tres
Relatives	Diotifeci d'Agnolo Alessandra di Nanoccio (parents)
Era	Renaissance philosophy
School	Christian humanism Neohermeticism Neoplatonism Augustinianism Thomism
Main interests	Immortality of the Soul Theology of Love and Eros Translation of Platonists Commentary on the dialogues of Plato Natural, medical use of Astrology and Theurgy Catholic interfaith polemics
Notable ideas	Platonic love First in a genus Prisca theologia[1]

Part of a series on
Neoplatonism
Reconstructed bust believed to represent Plotinus
Concepts Theory of forms Form of the Good Hypostasis Arche Nous Demiurge Logos Anima mundi Henosis Theurgy Okhema Microcosm and macrocosm
Works Enneads De Mysteriis Aegyptiorum Liber de Causis The City of God The Consolation of Philosophy De Coelesti Hierarchia De divisione naturae Chaldean Oracles
People Plotinus (students) Porphyry Iamblichus Julian the Apostate Hypatia Macrobius Augustine of Hippo Proclus Pseudo-Dionysius Simplicius of Cilicia Boethius David the Invincible Maximus the Confessor Johannes Scotus Eriugena Al-Farabi Brethren of Purity Solomon ibn Gabirol Isaac the Blind Michael Psellos Thierry of Chartres Gemistus Pletho Marsilio Ficino Giovanni Pico della Mirandola Giordano Bruno Cambridge Platonists Thomas Taylor Roman Ingarden
Related topics Platonism (in the Renaissance) Platonic Academy Middle Platonism Kabbalah Spirituality Isma'ilism Druze Allegorical interpretations of Plato Plato's unwritten doctrines Neoplatonism and Christianity / Gnosticism
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Marsilio Ficino (Italian:

Early life

Ficino was born at

When Cosimo decided to

Among his many students were Niccolo Valori^[7][8] and Francesco Cattani da Diacceto. The latter was considered by Ficino to be his successor as the head of the Florentine Platonic Academy.^[9] Diacceto's student, Giovanni di Bardo Corsi, produced a short biography of Ficino in 1506.^[10]

Theology, astrology, and the soul

Part of a series on
Hermeticism
Hermes Trismegistus
Hermetic writings Liber Hermetis (astrological) Definitions of Hermes Trismegistus Corpus Hermeticum Poimandres Asclepius Discourse on the Eighth and Ninth Prayer of Thanksgiving Korē kosmou Cyranides The Book of the Secrets of the Stars The Secret of Creation Emerald Tablet Kitāb al-Isṭamākhīs Liber Hermetis de alchemia
Historical figures Ancient and medieval Zosimos of Panopolis Jābir ibn Ḥayyān (may be legendary) Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi Ibn Umayl Maslama al-Qurṭubī Aḥmad al-Būnī Early modern Marsilio Ficino Lodovico Lazzarelli Giovanni da Correggio Pico della Mirandola Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa Paracelsus John Dee Giordano Bruno Jakob Böhme Robert Fludd Christian Rosenkreuz (legendary, see Rosicrucianism)
Modern offshoots As above, so below Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn Hermetic Qabalah Rosicrucianism The Kybalion Hermetism and other religions
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Though trained as a physician, Ficino became a priest in 1473.

"This century, like a

liberal arts, which were almost extinct: grammar, poetry, rhetoric, painting, sculpture, architecture, music ... this century appears to have perfected astrology."^{[This quote needs a citation}

]

There will be some men or other, superstitious and blind, who see life plain in even the lowest animals and the meanest plants, but do not see life in the heavens or the world ... Now if those little men grant life to the smallest particles of the world, what folly! what envy! neither to know that the Whole, in which 'we live and move and have our being,' is itself alive, nor to wish this to be so.[16]

One metaphor for this integrated "aliveness" is Ficino's astrology. In the Book of Life, he details the interlinks between behavior and consequence. It talks about a list of things that hold sway over a man's destiny.

Medical works

Probably due to early influences from his father, Diotifeci, who was a doctor to Cosimo de' Medici, Ficino published Latin and Italian treatises on medical subjects such as Consiglio contro la pestilenza (Recommendations for the treatment of the plague) and De vita libri tres (Three books on life). His medical works exerted considerable influence on Renaissance physicians such as Paracelsus, with whom he shared the perception on the unity of the microcosmos and macrocosmos, and their interactions, through somatic and psychological manifestations, with the aim to investigate their signatures to cure diseases. Those works, which were very popular at the time, dealt with astrological and alchemical concepts. Thus Ficino came under the suspicion of heresy; especially after the publication of the third book in 1489, which contained specific instructions on healthful living in a world of demons and other spirits.^[17]

Platonic love

Notably, Ficino coined the term Platonic love, which first appeared in his letter to Alamanno Donati in 1476. In 1492, Ficino published Epistulae (Epistles), which contained Platonic love letters, written in Latin, to his academic colleague and life-long friend, Giovanni Cavalcanti, concerning the nature of Platonic love. Because of this, some have alleged Ficino was a homosexual, but this finds little basis in his letters.^[18] In his commentary on the Republic, too, he specifically denies to his readers that the homosexual references made in Plato's dialogue were anything more than jokes "spoken merely to relieve the feeling of heaviness".^[19] Regardless, Ficino's letters to Cavalcanti resulted in the popularization of the term Platonic love in Western Europe.^{[citation needed]}

Death

Ficino died on 1 October 1499 at

• Theologia Platonica de immortalitate animae (Platonic Theology). Harvard U. P., Latin with English translation.
  • vol. 1, 2001,
    ISBN 0-674-00345-4
  • vol. 2, 2002,
    ISBN 0-674-00764-6
  • vol. 3, 2003,
    ISBN 0-674-01065-5
  • vol. 4, 2004,
    ISBN 0-674-01482-0
  • vol. 5, 2005,
    ISBN 0-674-01719-6
  • vol. 6 with index, 2006,
    ISBN 0-674-01986-5
• The Letters of Marsilio Ficino, transl. by the Language Department of the School of Economic Science (Shepheard-Walwyn, 1975–2013). (With extensive endnotes.)

• • vol. I, 1975,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-010-5
  • vol. II, 1978,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-036-5
  • vol. III, 1981,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-045-7
  • vol. IV, 1988,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-070-9
  • vol. V, 1994,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-129-4
  • vol. VI, 1999,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-167-6
  • vol. VII, 2003,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-192-8
  • vol. VIII, 2010,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-242-0
  • vol. IX, 2013,
    ISBN 978-0-85683-289-5

• Gardens of Philosophy: Ficino on Plato, ed. and transl. by Arthur Farndell (Shepheard-Walwyn, 2006).
  ISBN 978-0-85683-240-6
  This, the first volume in a five-volume series, provides the first English translation of the 25 short commentaries on the dialogues and the 12 letters traditionally ascribed to Plato. The volume Contains the following:
  • Ficino's Preface to his Commentaries on Plato [addressed to Lorenzo de' Medici].
  • Hipparchus: The Desire for Gain
  • Philosophy or The Lover
  • Theages: Wisdom
  • Meno: Virtue
  • Alcibiades I
    : Nature of Man
  • Alcibiades II
    : Prayer
  • Minos: Law
  • Euthyphro: Holiness
  • Hippias: The Beautiful and Noble
  • Lysis: Friendship
  • Theatetus: Knowledge
  • Ion: Poetic Inspiration
  • Statesman: Kingship
  • Protagoras: Virtue
  • Euthydemus: The Views of the Sophists
  • Lesser Hippias: Truthfulness
  • Charmides: Temperance
  • Laches: Courage
  • Cratylus: Names
  • Gorgias: Rhetoric
  • Apology: Socrates' Defense
  • Crito: Socrates' Way of Life
  • Phaedo: Nature of the Soul
  • Menexenus: Love for One's Country
  • Critias: Story of Atlantis
  • Discussions of Plato's twelve letters
  • Two of Ficino's other prefaces to the dialogues and their commentaries
• Evermore Shall Be So: Ficino on Plato's Parmenides, ed. and transl. by Arthur Farndell (Shepheard Walwyn, 2008). (Does not include Latin text.)
  ISBN 978-0-85683-256-7
• When Philosophers Rule: Ficino on Plato's Republic, Laws, and Epinomis, ed. and transl. by Arthur Farndell (Shepheard-Walwyn, 2009).
  ISBN 978-0-85683-257-4
  (Unabridged except for the commentary on Republic, bk. 8; see Nuptial Arithmetic, below.)
• All Things Natural: Ficino on Plato's Timaeus, ed. and transl. by Arthur Farndell (Shepheard-Walwyn, 2010).
  ISBN 978-0-85683-258-1
• On the Nature of Love: Ficino on Plato's Symposium, ed. and transl. by Arthur Farndell (Shepheard-Walwyn, 2016).
  ISBN 978-0-85683-509-4

• Commentaries on Plato. I Tatti Renaissance Library. Bilingual, annotated English/Latin editions of Ficino's commentaries on the works of Plato.
  • vol. 1, 2008,
    ISBN 0-674-03119-9
  • vol. 2, 2012,
    ISBN 0-674-06471-2
  • vol. 3, 2012, Parmenides, pt. 2, transl. by Maude Vanhaelen,
    ISBN 0-674-06472-0
• Commentary on Plato's Symposium on Love, transl. with an introduction and notes by Sears Jayne (Woodstock, CT: Spring Publications, 1985), 2nd edn., 2000,
  ISBN 0-88214-601-7

Other works

• Nuptial Arithmetic: Marsilio Ficino's Commentary on the Fatal Number in Book VIII of Plato's Republic, ed. and transl. by Michael J. B. Allen (U. of California P., 1994).
• Icastes. Marsilio Ficino's Interpretation of Plato's Sophist, ed. and tranl. by Michael J. B. Allen (Berkeley: U. of California P., 1989).
• The Book of Life, transl. with an introduction by Charles Boer, Dallas: Spring Publications, 1980. ISBN 0-88214-212-7
• ISBN 0-86698-041-5
  • "De triplici vita". World Digital Library (in Latin). 16 September 1489. Retrieved 1 March 2014.
• De religione Christiana et fidei pietate (1475–6), dedicated to Lorenzo de' Medici. (English translation below.)
• On the Christian Religion, ed. and transl. by Dan Attrell, Brett Bartlett, and David Porreca (U. of Toronto P., 2022). (With extensive notes, indexes, etc.)
• In Epistolas Pauli commentaria, Marsilii Ficini Epistolae (Venice, 1491; Florence, 1497).
• Meditations on the Soul: Selected letters of Marsilio Ficino, transl. by the Language Department of the School of Economic Science, London. Rochester, Vermont: Inner Traditions International, 1996.
  ISBN 0-89281-658-9
  .
• Collected works: Opera (Florence,1491, Venice, 1516, Basel, 1561).

See also

• Allegorical interpretations of Plato
• Contemporary Italian Renaissance philosophers:
  • Lodovico Lazzarelli
  • Giovanni Mercurio da Correggio
  • Giovanni Pico della Mirandola
• Greek love
• Hermetica (philosophical writings attributed to Hermes Trismegistus)
• Hermeticism
• Platonic Academy (Florence)
• Platonic love
• Renaissance humanism
• Renaissance philosophy
• Renaissance magic
• Translations (historical)

References

1. ISBN 978-1-4610-9382-4
2. OCLC 65407018.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link
   )
3. ^ ^{a b c d}  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Symonds, John Addington (1911). "Ficino, Marsilio". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 317–319.
4. ISBN 978-1442604858
   .
5. ISBN 9004091610
   .
6. ISBN 0-226-95007-7
7. ^ Nuovo Dizionario Istorico, Va = Uz, vol. 21, transl. from French, Remondini of Venice (1796); p. 51.
8. ^ Niccolo Valori (died 1527) wrote a biography of Lorenzo de' Medici the elder and published posthumously in 1568.
9. ^ Marsilio Ficino, entry by Christopher Celenza in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy
10. ^ Annotated English translation of Corsi's biography of Ficino Archived 15 October 2011 at the Wayback Machine
11. ^ Christiane L. Joost-Gaugier, Pythagoras and Renaissance Europe: Finding Heaven, Cambridge University Press, 2009.
12. ^ Oskar, Kristeller Paul. Studies in Renaissance thought and letters. IV. Roma: Edizioni di Storia e letteratura, 1996: 565.
13. ^ "Three Books on Life". World Digital Library. 26 February 2014. Retrieved 1 March 2014.
14. ISBN 9780511803048
    .
15. ISBN 0-271-02045-8
    .
16. ^ Marsilio Ficino, Three Books on Life, translated by Carol V. Kaske and John R. Clark, Tempe AZ: The Renaissance Society of America, 2002. From the Apologia, p. 399. (The internal quote is from Acts 17:28.)
17. ^ Marsilio Ficino. Biography and introduction to The Letters of Marsilio Ficino, Volume 1 Archived 22 July 2014 at the Wayback Machine 1975 Fellowship of the School of Economic Science, London. Retrieved 26 April 2014.
18. S2CID 164146779
    – via JSTOR. I find no evidence in his letters of the homosexuality of which some contemporaries and some scholars over the last fifty years have suspected him.
19. ^ Ficino, Marsilio, "The Commentary of Marsilio Ficino to Plato's Republic", in Arthur Farndell, ed. and transl., When Philosophers Rule: Ficino on Plato's Republic, Laws, and Epinomis (Shepheard-Walwyn, 2009), p. 24.

Further reading

• Allen, Michael J.B.; Rees, V.; Davies, Martin (2002). Marsilio Ficino: his theology, his philosophy, his legacy. BRILL.
  ISBN 9789004118553
  . Retrieved 26 May 2013.
• John Herman Randall, Jr.
  , The Renaissance Philosophy of Man. The University of Chicago Press (Chicago, 1948.) Marsilio Ficino, Five Questions Concerning the Mind, pp. 193–214.
• Clucas, Stephen; Forshaw, Peter J.; Rees, Valery (2011). Laus Platonici Philosophi: Marsilio Ficino and his Influence. BRILL.
  ISBN 9789004188976. Archived from the original
  on 5 October 2016. Retrieved 8 September 2014.
• Anthony Gottlieb, The Dream of Reason: A History of Western Philosophy from the Greeks to the Renaissance (Penguin, London, 2001)
  ISBN 0-14-025274-6
• James Heiser, Prisci Theologi and the Hermetic Reformation in the Fifteenth Century (Repristination Press, Malone, Texas, 2011)
  ISBN 978-1-4610-9382-4
• Paul Oskar Kristeller, Eight Philosophers of the Italian Renaissance. Stanford University Press (Stanford California, 1964) ch. 3, "Ficino," pp. 37–53.
• Raffini, Christine, "Marsilio Ficino, Pietro Bembo, Baldassare Castiglione: Philosophical, Aesthetic, and Political Approaches in Renaissance Platonism", Renaissance and Baroque Studies and Texts, v.21, Peter Lang Publishing, 1998.
  ISBN 0-8204-3023-4
• Robb, Nesca A., Neoplatonism of the Italian Renaissance, New York: Octagon Books, Inc., 1968.
• Reeser, Todd W. Setting Plato Straight: Translating Ancient Sexuality in the Renaissance. Chicago: UChicagoP, 2016.
• Field, Arthur, The Origins of the Platonic Academy of Florence, New Jersey: Princeton, 1988.
• Allen, Michael J.B., and Valery Rees, with Martin Davies, eds. Marsilio Ficino: His Theology, His Philosophy, His Legacy. Leiden: E.J.Brill, 2002. A wide range of new essays.
  ISBN 9004118551
• Voss, Angela, Marsilio Ficino, Western Esoteric Masters series. North Atlantic Books, 2006.
  ISBN 978-1-5564-35607

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to Marsilio Ficino.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Marsilio Ficino.

• Works by Marsilio Ficino at Open Library
• Platonis Opera Omnia (Latin)
• Celenza, Christopher S. "Marsilio Ficino". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
• Marsilio Ficino at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
• Marsilio Ficino entry by James G. Snyder in Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
• Short Biography of Ficino
• Catholic Encyclopedia entry
• The Influence of Marsilio Ficino
• www.ficino.it Website of the International Ficino Society
• Online Galleries, History of Science Collections, University of Oklahoma Libraries. High resolution images of works by and/or portraits of Marsilio Ficino in .jpg and .tiff format.