Timaeus

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The Timaeus (27d-38c, 47e-53c)

The Timaeus is Plato’s attempt to describe how the world came into being. Plato states that it is only a “likely story” (29d); nonetheless, it is an excellent summary of Platonic metaphysics and was extremely influential later in antiquity.
Plato first argues that since the sensible world “is always becoming and is never real,” it must have come to be, and therefore must have a cause (27d-28a). This cause he calls “the maker and father of the universe” (28c). Later he calls it Mind (47e) and God (53b). Modern scholars refer to Plato’s God as the Demiurge (“maker” [29a], or literally “craftsman”).
Since the Demiurge was good, he desired “that all things should be good and, so far as might be, nothing imperfect” (30a). Plato calls this “the supremely valid principle of becoming and of the order of the world.” From it he derives the necessary qualities of the cosmos:
- Since to have intelligence and soul is better than to lack them, the sensible world must have intelligence and soul, and therefore must be a living creature (30b).
- Hence its model must be the single Living Creature that contains all the “intelligible living creatures” (30c-d). These are the Forms (cf. 39e).
- Because there is one model there must be only one universe (31a).
- In order to be visible and tangible the sensible world must contain fire and earth (31b-c).
- In order to be three-dimensional it must also contain two mean terms between fire and earth: air and water (32a-b).
- Since the elements are arranged as geometric means, the cosmos is united internally by concord and amity (32c).
- Since there is nothing outside the cosmos, it is free from external assault (33a).
- Its shape is that of a sphere, the “most perfect and uniform” shape (33b).
- Its only movement is that which “above all belongs to reason and intelligence,” namely, uniform rotation (34a).
- Since the Living Creature is eternal, and the cosmos must be as much like the Living Creature as possible, the Demiurge created time, a “moving image of eternity” (37d).
- The sun, moon, and planets were made to “distinguish and preserve the numbers of time” (38d).
This chain of deductions fulfills the goal originally set forth in the Phaedo: to explain the nature of the physical world in terms of how it is for the best. Note, incidentally, that the result is a more favorable view of the physical world than that of the Phaedo. The world created by the Demiurge is alive, intelligent, eternal, and good, and therefore it is a “blessed god” (34b).
The Demiurge’s goal was that “so far as might be” there might be “nothing imperfect” in the world (30a). It turns out that besides the influence of Mind (the Demiurge) there was another factor at work, one that limits the perfection of the world. This is what Plato calls Necessity or the “variable cause” (47e-48a).
The source of this element of necessity is the “Receptacle of Becoming.” The Receptacle is “the natural recipient of all impressions, and is stirred and informed by them,” yet she “never departs at all from her own nature and never . . . assumes a form like that of any of the things which enter into her” (50b-c). She is the “receiving principle” and may therefore be likened to the mother of the cosmos, whereas the Demiurge is the father (50d).
The best way to understand the role of the Receptacle is by remembering that the sensible world is an image of the Living Creature. Any image must be “in” another (52c)--as, for example, a reflection is “in” a mirror. Hence, besides the Living Creature and its image, there had to be something in which the image was created. This was the Receptacle of Becoming.
The Receptacle is, in fact, simply space (52b). When we perceive a physical object what we really perceive is a part of the Receptacle in which a given Form is being imaged. Fire is “that part of her nature which from time to time is inflamed, and water that which is moistened,” and so on (51b). Hence each physical object is strictly speaking not a “this” (i.e., a permanent thing that can take on different qualities), but a “such.” The real “this” is the Receptacle. (49d-50a)
In summary, Plato reaffirms that there must be Forms, because Mind or Reason (nous) and true belief are different and must have different objects (51d-52a). This is the familiar argument of Republic V. He then gives his final catalog of what exists:
1. The Forms, which are “always the same, uncreated and indestructible,” and are perceived by mind alone.
2. Sensible objects, which are images of the Forms and are “created, always in motion, becoming in place and again vanishing out of place, . . . apprehended by opinion (doxa) jointly with sense” (52a).
3. The Receptacle, which “is space and is eternal, and admits not of destruction and provides a home for all created things”; since it has no nature of its own, however, it is apprehended “by a kind of spurious reason, and is hardly real” (52b).