Note 21 — Chapter XIII · PLATO

The soul is, acc. to the account in Tim., created in order that by animating and governing a body, it may complete the sum of creation: without the ζῷα the οὐρανός (the universe) would be ἀτελής, Tim. 41 B ff. Acc. to this teleological motivation of the being and the ἐνσωμάτωσις of the soul, this latter, the ἐνσωμάτωσις, would have belonged to the original plan of the δημιουργός and there would be no purpose in the creation of the souls (by the δημιουργός and the inferior gods) unless they were destined to the animation of the ζῷα and conjunction with σώματα. But it is obviously inconsistent with all this that the object of the soul’s endeavour should be to separate itself as soon as possible and as completely as possible from the body and everything material in order to get back again to immaterial life without any body—42 BD. This is a relic of the original theological view of the relation between body and soul. In Phd. (and usually in Plato) it displays itself unconcealed; but it was far too closely bound up with the whole of Plato’s ethic and metaphysics not to make its illicit appearance even when as in Tim. he wished to keep the physiological side to the fore.