It has been commented that Plato’s receptacle is not that ‘out of which’ things are made, but rather that ‘in which’ qualities appear. It is therefore these qualities, not the receptacle as such, which constitute the sensible world.136 And in his Commentary on Timaeus, Proclus adds to Plato’s account as follows: “Perhaps it is better to say that the term ‘things that pass in and out’ is applied not only to the qualities, but also to the forms immersed in matter; for these, not the qualities, are likenesses of the intelligible things.”137 In other words, the invisible receptacle of becoming receives the imprints of the Forms and thereby produces the visible qualities that we observe in the cosmos.
The Platonic cosmology, in terms of which God creates the world through the imposition of order onto pre-cosmic disorder, appears to be at least partially compatible with the biblical cosmology. Before the commencement of God’s creative activity, “The Earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters” (Gen 1:2–3). As Alan Watts comments on this text, before He made anything else, God made matter (Latin, materia, which is cognate to mater, mother) as the maternal womb of the universe, for it is a general principle in mythology that matter is the feminine component and spirit the masculine, their respective symbols being water or earth and air or fire. Thus, “In the beginning the Spirit conceived, the waters gave birth, and the world which was born from their conjunction was the first material image of the Word, of God the Son, the Logos who was the ideal pattern after which the creation was modeled.”138
The biblical depiction of the Earth as being formless and void suggests the formless pre-matter out of which the world was to be created, or its ‘astonishing emptiness’ in the words of Philaret of Moscow. As further explained by his countryman Hilarion Alfeyev, this pre-matter is “a chaotic primary substance containing the pledge of future beauty and cosmic harmony.” The ‘darkness’ and ‘deep’ indicate the formlessness of matter, while ‘water’ suggests its plasticity. And the ‘hovering’ of the Spirit denotes its protection and animation of the material world, by breathing life into it.139 This view of primordial chaos evokes Plato’s description of the receptacle of becoming, while its animation by Spirit echoes the role of Intellect, which transforms pre-cosmic chaos into cosmic order.
Evidently, for Plato the sensible world is produced by the interaction between the principle of form and formless matter. As commented by Philip Sherrard, this does not entail an absolute duality, since the principle of form (the Demiurge) is not the absolute reality, but a determination of the transcendent Good (the One). Furthermore, in Plato’s understanding, formless matter (which he also calls space, chōra) is not the substance out of which things are made, but it precedes substance as the receptacle in which sensible things originate. Also, this formless matter (the receptacle) does not pre-exist the cosmos like Aristotle’s matter (hylē), but originates and participates (‘in a most obscure way,’ Plato admits) in the pre-formal Reality from which the principle of form derives (Tim, 50c–51b). Thus, both Form and formless matter originate in the supreme Reality of the One.140
Plato held further that Soul is the only source of motion and thereby of the cosmic order. Therefore, motion is not caused by one or more of the four primary elements, as some earlier philosophers had taught (Tim, 46d). Soul is not only the source of motion, Plato writes elsewhere (in the Laws), but it is more specifically the first cause of the birth and destruction of all physical things (891e), the main cause of their alterations and transformations (892a), and the cause of all change in things (896a). Moreover, the physical world obtains its orderly arrangement (which is the meaning of the Greek noun kosmos) through the activity of Soul, for it is Soul that ‘implants’ the reason-principles (logoi) into matter.
We could say that the reality of Soul affirms the reality of both being and becoming, while also preventing a dichotomy between the intelligible and sensible realms. Plato argued that the true philosopher will reject both notions, namely that everything is at rest (the being of Parmenides) or that reality changes in every way (the becoming of Heraclitus). Instead, “He has to be like a child begging for ‘both,’ and say that that which is—everything—is both the unchanging and that which changes” (Sophist, 249c–d). In view of this clear statement, we should again note the error of the oft-repeated charge that Plato espoused a static cosmology and a dualistic metaphysics.
In the Platonic understanding, the human being is a (temporary) composite of a mortal body and an immortal soul. It thus involves a duality of substances, which is not the same thing as to assert an anthropological dualism. The difference between duality and dualism has been lucidly explained by René Guénon: “Dualism (of which the Cartesian conception of ‘spirit’ and ‘matter’ is among the best known examples) properly consists in regarding a duality as irreducible and in taking account of nothing beyond it, thereby denying the common principle from which the two terms of the duality really proceed by polarisation.”141 This reasoning also applies to the composite of an immortal soul and a mortal body, since both of these substances comprising the human being are derived from a single Principle.
Aristotle
Building on the metaphysical concepts which he had learnt from Plato, while adding his own powerful analytical skills, Aristotle emphasizes that each existing substance consists of both form (eidos) and matter (hylē). While matter is the principle of concreteness and individuality, form expresses generality and determines the essence of a thing.142 This argument is illustrated by means of a bronze statue: the matter is the bronze, the form is the shape or pattern, and the concrete whole (i.e., substance) is the statue. However, the form is prior both to the matter and the compound (Met VII.1029a). This affirmation by Aristotle that the form of sensible composites has more being than the matter or the composite itself is harmonious with Plato’s notion that eternal substances have ‘more being’ (mallon onta) than sensible substances (Met VII.1028b).143 Aristotle thus continues the Platonic dictum that the formal precedes the material in the constitution of cosmic reality.
In the Aristotelian conception, real matter is formed matter possessing limited possibilities. Nonetheless, there is a positive side to material limitations, namely that a specific matter has a natural inclination to assume certain forms. For example, stone and wood naturally incline to become a house. This implies that there is a natural purposefulness inherent in matter, such as the body of a child to become an adult human. Furthermore, for Aristotle matter is a purely relative term, being relative to form. Accordingly, in nature the elements are matter relative to their simple compounds, namely tissues; the latter is matter relative to the organs; and the latter is matter relative to the living body.144 Ontologically speaking, as we have noted in an earlier chapter, matter represents the realm of relative being.
Furthermore, matter is associated with potency (or potentiality) and form with actuality, as Aristotle states: “Further, matter exists in a potential state, just because it may come to its form; and when it exists actually, then it is its form” (Met IX.1050a). Therefore, to actualize a possibility is the same as to give form to matter. A particular matter only contains certain possibilities, and therefore matter depends on form for its realization. The Aristotelian notion of the interaction between potency and actuality has been stated as follows: when a being has exceeded its state of potentiality and attained to its highest goal, namely pure actuality, it can be viewed as a fully realized being.145
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