Joseph asked:

Is there a difference between the Neoplatonists who viewed humans as falling from the ideal through
ignorance, and the Christians thought of humans as sinners who willfully reject God's commands?

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Neoplatonism was developed by Plotinus. In essence, it combined elements of Aristotelianism,
Pythagoreans, and Stoicism and developed into a religious philosophy. Reality was essentially
spiritual in nature for Plotinus. Plotinus developed three different forms of reality which he designated
as Soul, Intelligence, and The One. In answer to your question we need to look at Intelligence first.
For Plotinus, Intelligence corresponded to the realm of Forms or Ideas as put forth by Plato. These
Ideas are God's Ideas, and these thoughts don't exist outside the Intelligence.

The Soul is a central part of Plotinus's philosophy; it is here that we delineate the status and potential
of the individual within reality as a whole. The One is the ultimate reality within the system. It is the
One that embraces all Intelligible forms and is thought. The One is above the Soul and it
contemplates the Intellectual. One needs to remember that for Plotinus, the Soul is responsible for
sensation, perception, and knowledge.

The individual most develop a harmony that allows the Souls to guide the body. When the Soul
achieves harmony, a state of union with reality in totality becomes possible. It is through this harmony
and union that the individual goes beyond good and evil. Plotinus felt it was possible to achieve
perfection, as for the less perfect to achieve perfection according to his nature. If the individual
wanted to reach this Ideal state it was through contemplation and intellectual understanding of reality.

In Greek, the word "hamartia" was used to signify sin. It means "missing the mark". This was equated
with ignorance. In effect, an individual would not sin if he understood what he was doing. It may be
true that some sins are due to ignorance, but it does not follow the Christian concept of deliberate sin.

According to Christine Doctrine, sin is turning away from God. Adam sinned by disobeying God. In
doing this, Adam diminished his intellect with ignorance. This sin was transmitted so all men after
Adam had a defective nature. Although man had Free Will, the ability not to sin was not an option.
Only by God's grace can man be saved and no longer sin. Sin comes about by the way people
choose and act.

In Neoplatonism the true self consists of thoughts. It can realize itself by turning to thought, and
through this contemplative nature, to God. This is the Ideal and is possible only on rare occasion. In
Christian thought, when Adam disobeyed God, he lost his divine gifts. It then became impossible for
man not to sin. Man went into sin free and came out unfree. In Neoplatonism it is an act of
contemplation that frees man. In Christian thought one can't achieve grace by free will, but only by
grace — grace from God.

John Eberts