Passibilità divina

This study focuses on the doctrine of the soul in Clement of Alexandria. The analysis pays special attention to Clement's sources as well as to the cultural Alexandrian background in the II century AD. I have first analyzed the structure of the soul as a part of the human being. When Clement refers directly to psychological themes, his idea of "soul" is tripartite. On the contrary, Clement thinks of a bipartite soul in texts where psychology is secondary. I then examined how Clement draws on at least three of the four traditional aspects related to the classical (i.e. medio-platonic) psychology: protology, ethics and embriology. Afterwards, I took into consideration Clement's escatology, which I investigated in the framework of his doctrine on the first principles. The last part of the monograph illustrates theological consequences of such psychological assumptions. An original idea of πνεῦμα occurs, which keeps the platonic concept of "individuation" together with the Aristotelian notions of δύναμις and ἐνέργεια. This involves Clement's personal idea of God, on which he has opinions much closer to those of his gnostic opponents – the Valentinians in particular). He basicly confirms that God, the Father – corresponding to the platonic first principle – ”suffered“. God underwent the passion of love: love for man, the creature He saved.