Plotinus

(c 205-270) Neo-Platonist ; all things have emanated from God. Wrote Enneads. Reality is the One from which all existence emanates and to which all strives to return. It is of the nature of the One to emanate. Emanation begins with the ideas that structure existence and link Being (the One) to Non-being. Ideas emanate souls, which in turn emanate bodies or matter. Matter exhausts emanation in a plurality of physical beings that have a kind of negative existence but are essentially Non-being or absence of Being. Souls are individual and animate bodies. Souls participate in the world mind. Souls find their ultimate destiny in escape from matter (Non-being) and return to the One (Being).