Background
He was born in 175 in Alexandria, Egypt. According to Porphyry, the parents of Ammonius were Christians, but upon learning Greek philosophy.
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Ammonius Saccas
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Not much is known about the life of Ammonius Saccas.
Ammonius was a porter in his youth.
Most details of his life come from the fragments left from Porphyry's writings.
The most famous pupil of Ammonius Saccas was Plotinus who studied under Ammonius for eleven years. According to Porphyry, in 232, at the age of 28, Plotinus went to Alexandria to study philosophy:
Ammonius had two pupils called Origen: Origen the Christian, and Origen the Pagan.
It is quite possible that Ammonius Saccas taught both Origens. And since there were two Origens who were accepted as contemporaries it was easy for later Christians to accept that there were two individuals named Ammonius, one a Christian and one a Pagan. Among Ammonius' other pupils there were Herennius and Cassius Longinus.
Two of Ammonius's students - Origen the Pagan, and Longinus - seem to have held philosophical positions which were closer to Middle Platonism than Neoplatonism, which perhaps suggests that Ammonius's doctrines were also closer to those of Middle Platonism than the Neoplatonism developed by Plotinus (see the Enneads), but Plotinus does not seem to have thought that he was departing in any significant way from that of his master.
His death is variously given between a. d. 240 and 245.
Achievements
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Ammonius Saccas was a Greek philosopher from Alexandria who was often referred to as one of the founders of Neoplatonism. He is mainly known as the teacher of Plotinus, whom he taught for eleven years from 232 to 243. He was undoubtedly the biggest influence on Plotinus in his development of Neoplatonism, although little is known about his own philosophical views. Later Christian writers stated that Ammonius was a Christian, but it is now generally assumed that there was a different Ammonius of Alexandria who wrote biblical texts.
Religion
Ammonius rejected his parents' religion for paganism.
According to Nemesius, a bishop and Neoplatonist c. 400, Ammonius held that the soul was immaterial.
Personality
Quotes from others about the person
Hierocles, writing in the 5th century, states that Ammonius' fundamental doctrine was that Plato and Aristotle were in full agreement with each other:
"He was the first who had a godly zeal for the truth in philosophy and despised the views of the majority, which were a disgrace to philosophy. He apprehended well the views of each of the two philosophers [Plato and Aristotle] and brought them under one and the same nous and transmitted philosophy without conflicts to all of his disciples, and especially to the best of those acquainted with him, Plotinus, Origen, and their successors. "
Porphyry seems to suggest that Ammonius was instrumental in helping Plotinus think about philosophy in new ways:
"But he [Plotinus] did not just speak straight out of these books but took a distinctive personal line in his consideration, and brought the mind of Ammonius' to bear on the investigation in hand".
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