Aeneas of Gaza

5th and 6th-century Neo-Platonic and Christian philosopher

Aeneas of Gaza

Died| c. 518

Gaza, Palaestina Prima, Byzantine Empire

Philosophical work
Era| Ancient philosophy
Region| Ancient Greek philosophy
School| Neo-Platonism
Institutions| Rhetorical School of Gaza
Notable students| Procopius of Gaza
Language| Ancient Greek
Main interests| Theology

Aeneas of Gaza (Ancient Greek: Αἰνείας ὁ Γαζαῖος; d. c. 518)[1] was a Neo-Platonic philosopher and a convert to Christianity who flourished towards the end of the fifth century. He is considered part of the Rhetorical School of Gaza, which flourished in Byzantine Palaestina in the fifth and sixth centuries.[2][3][4]

## Life

[edit]

Not much is known about his life. Aeneas was probably born around 450 in Gaza.[5] In his major work entitled Theophrastus, he alludes to Hierocles of Alexandria as his teacher, and in some of his letters he mentions as his contemporaries writers from the end of the fifth century and the beginning of the sixth, such as Procopius of Gaza.[6] Aeneas has been also suggested as the unnamed uncle of Marcianus of Gaza who is described as the bishop of Gaza prior to Marcianus and as a famous sophist.[7]

Like many others from his literary circle, Aeneas had close relations with the monastic communities that surrounded Gaza. Aeneas for instance frequently consulted Abba Isaiah, a nearby famous ascetic and monastic monk, in regard to the writings of the philosophical writings of Plato, Aristotle and Plontius.[8]

## Thought

[edit]

Like all the Christian Neo-Platonists, Aeneas held Plato in higher esteem than Aristotle. Like Synesius, Nemesius, and others, he found in Neo-Platonism the philosophical system which best accorded with Christian revelation. But, unlike Synesius and Nemesius, he rejected some of the most characteristic doctrines of the Neo-Platonists as being inconsistent with Christian dogma. For instance, he rejected the doctrine of pre-existence (according to which the soul of man existed before its union with body), arguing that the soul before its union with the body would have been "idle", incapable of exercising any of its faculties.[9]: 947  Similarly, he rejected the doctrine of the eternal duration of the world, on the ground that the world is corporeal, and, although the best possible "mechanism", contains in itself the elements of dissolution[9]: 958 sqq  Again, he taught that "man's body is composed of matter and form", and that while the matter perishes the "form" of the body retains the power of resuscitating the "matter" on the last day.[9]: 982

Twenty-five letters of Aeneas of Gaza survived to today and form one of late antiquity’s smallest and most idiosyncratic epistolary collections.[10] The collection was likely much larger and survived as a microcollection whose fragments were likely coincidentally preserved by an eighth- or ninth-century anthologist.[11]

## See also

[edit]

* The Gaza Triad
* Neoplatonism and Christianity
* The Rhetorical School of Gaza

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Champion, Michael W. (2022). Dorotheus of Gaza and Ascetic Education. Oxford University Press. pp. 16, 103. ISBN 9780198869269. Retrieved 25 November 2023.
2. ^ Webb, Ruth. "Gaza, schools and rhetoric at." In The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity. Oxford University Press, 2018.
3. ^ Cribiore, Raffaella. "education and schools, Greek." In The Oxford Dictionary of Late Antiquity. Oxford University Press, 2018.
4. ^ Vikan, Gary, Alexander Kazhdan, and Zvi 'Uri Ma῾oz. "Gaza." In The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium. Oxford University Press, 1991.
5. ^ Storin, Sogno & Watts 2019, p. 385.
6. ^ Christie, Albany James (1867), "Aeneas Gazeus", in Smith, William (ed.), Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology, vol. 1, Boston, p. 32, archived from the original on 2011-05-14, retrieved 2007-10-23`{{citation}}`: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
7. ^ Ashkenazi, Yakov (2004). "Sophists and Priests in Late Antique Gaza". In Bitton-Ashkelony, Brouria; Kofsky, Aryeh (eds.). Christian Gaza in Late Antiquity. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill. pp. 200–201\. ISBN 90-04-13868-4.
8. ^ Bitton-Ashkelony, Brouria; Kofsky, Aryeh (February 2006). The Monastic School of Gaza. Brill. pp. 22, 32. ISBN 9789047408444. Retrieved 12 November 2023.
9. ^ a b c Migne, Patrologia Graeca, LXXXV
10. ^ Storin, Sogno & Watts 2019, p. 384.
11. ^ Storin, Sogno & Watts 2019, p. 9.

## Sources

[edit]

* Aeneas of Gaza, Theophrastus, transl. by John Dillon and Donald Russell. With Zacharias of Mytilene, Ammonius, transl. by Sebastian Gertz, coll. Ancient commentators on Aristotle, London, Bristol Classical Press, 2012.
* Michael W. Champion, Explaining the cosmos : creation and cultural interaction in late-antique Gaza, coll. Oxford studies in late antiquity, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014.
* Manfred Wacht, Aeneas von Gaza als Apologet : seine Kosmologie im Verhältnis zum Platonismus, coll. Theophaneia, Bonn, Hanstein, 1969.
* Storin, Bradley K.; Sogno, Cristiana; Watts, Edward J. (November 2019). Late Antique Letter Collections A Critical Introduction and Reference Guide. University of California Press. ISBN 9780520308411. Retrieved 24 April 2025.
*  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Turner, William (1907). "Æneas of Gaza". In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 1\. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
*  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Smith, William, ed. (1870). "Aeneas Gazeus". Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology.

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*[c.]: circa