Benedetto Neola explores how late antique Neoplatonists, from Iamblichus in the third-fourth century to Damascius in the fifth-sixth, reimagined what it meant to be a true philosopher. For them, the philosopher was not simply a thinker or tireless talker, but a divine soul sent by the gods to rescue humanity from the material world. Figures like Pythagoras, Socrates, and Plato are portrayed as untouched by the charms of the sensible realm. Always connected to the divine, they are ritual practitioners whose sacred mission is carried out not through temple rites, but through speech itself - understood as the highest offering to the gods. These divinely inspired words, spoken in a state of possession and revealing truths about the divine, are the noblest form of ritual: an act that unites the philosopher with the gods and brings salvation to others. Combining philosophy, theology, and ritual, the author uncovers a forgotten dimension of ancient thought in which words save souls.

Benedetto Neola, PhD, is Marie Sklodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Researcher at the University Leiden.