Forms, Souls, and Embryos by Wilberding James;

Author:Wilberding, James; [James Wilberding]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781317355236
Publisher: Routledge

Pseudo-Iamblichus’ Theology of Arithmetic

The Theology of Arithmetic, traditionally attributed to Iamblichus but now generally regarded as dubious, has much to say on the topic of embryology and displays a significant familiarity with ancient medical texts, especially those belonging to the Hippocratic corpus and Diocles.71 As with the three texts examined above, the eclectic character of this treatise72 raises some doubts about the project of reconstructing a coherent embryology from the scattered remarks contained in it, but unlike the above texts, the Theology of Arithmetic clearly advances the core theory’s one-seed thesis and conceives of the seed as consisting of a unified plurality of form-principles in potentiality.73 Yet the rest of its embryology, while rich in detail on issues relating to the time of formation and animation (predictably influenced by numerological considerations), does not reveal any significant Neoplatonic influence. Conception is said to take place within seven hours of emission (61,6–7), and the formation proceeds in seven-day stages: after seven days it resembles a ‘membranaceous, water-bearing kind of thing’ (τινί ύμενὡδει ύδροδόχῳ), then spots of blood appear on the outside, in the third week they appear in its interior, in the fourth the moisture coagulates and becomes something in between blood and flesh, and by the end of the fifth week (35 days) the embryo (τό βρέφος) is formed in the middle, being at this stage only the size of a bee but nevertheless having the head, neck, trunk, and limbs roughly made out.74 At some undetermined point the embryo acquires the life-status of a plant, which it retains until roughly seven hours prior to birth, during which time it is neither a plant nor an animal. It is not a plant because it is no longer able to maintain itself with nourishment from the umbilical cord, which is now severed, nor is it yet an animal, since it is not detached and has not reached its completion, which is achieved by breathing in external air.75 This claim about the importance of breathing in external air is significant for evaluating the author’s commitment to Neoplatonism. As we saw above, Porphyry also appeals to the fact that embryo-fetuses do not breathe through their noses as long as they are in the womb, to support his own view that they are not yet animals, but the claim here appears to be different, as the account of birth makes clearer still:

Just as embryo-fetuses [τὰ βρέφη] were sown and ordered in the womb by the hebdomad, so also after birth in seven hours they reach the crisis of whether or not they will live. For all those which are born complete and not dead come out of the womb breathing [ἐμπνέοντα], but as regards the acceptance of the air which is being breathed and by which the form of the soul acquires tension [τήν τοῦ άναπνεομένου άέρος παραδοχήν, ύφ' οὗ τονοῦται τò τῆδ φυχῆς εἶδος], they are confirmed at the critical seventh hour one way or the other – either towards life or towards death.

([Iamblichus]

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