Online Lecture on «Hermeticism in Islam: from the Sabians of Harran to al-Suhrawardi» by Marinos Sariyannis
With the kind support of the A. S. Onassis Foundation (2023 grant), the research project “Between Athens & Alexandria. Platonism, 3rd-7th c. CE” (2022-2024), in collaboration with the Alexandria Center for Hellenistic Studies of the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, organise a lecture series on late antique Neoplatonism. The meetings take place on Zoom at 7.00 pm (Athens time). The Spring 2024 lectures focus on Neoplatonic commentaries on Plato’s dialogues, which, together with Aristotelian hypomnemata, form the main way of philosophising in Late Antiquity, and beyond.
All welcome!
Οn Wednesday Apr. 3, at 19:00 (Athens time) Research Director Marinos Sariyannis (IMS-FORTH) will give a lecture on «Hermeticism in Islam: from the Sabians of Harran to al-Suhrawardi».
Abstract
Hermeticism can be described as the idea that vast amounts of wisdom, especially related to the correspondences between the microcosm and the macrocosm (“as above, so below”), had been revealed to Hermes Trismegistus and then transmitted in the form of occult knowledge to the elect. This Hellenistic tradition, which as we know found new life in the Renaissance, was preserved and enriched throughout the medieval Islamicate world. The lecture will follow the metamorphoses of the Hermes legend and of the corpus Hermeticum through the Middle Ages and the early modern era, with special emphasis on the Ottoman reception and on the relationship of al-Suhrawardi’s Illuminationism with Neoplatonic philosophy (emanations, world of images) and with Hermeticism. Thus, we will seek to describe a wider array of Neoplatonic ideas, as they were adopted and adapted in late medieval and early modern Islamicate cultures.
You can register in advance to our seminar meetings using the following LINK.