Nancy van Deusen

Ensouled bodies: the continuity of the theme of 'the body as instrument'.

Abstract This paper deals squarely with the concept of instrument, specifically, a music instrument, as a unifying agent. The topic occupied writers from Plato, through Plotinus (3rd century, CE), writers within the period known as the European Latin-based Middle Ages, and, as we will see, beyond. Seen from a historical perspective as it recurs, the topic of “body as instrument” is evidence that mind–body interactive reciprocity is not by any means solely a recent multifaceted biochemical, neurological, psychological, and cognitive, subject of inquiry; but, rather, constituted a carefully-articulated topic of discussion in the past – and, that the results of this encounter of various points of view are indeed useful for us today. Further, that alternative modes of knowledge transmission exist, for example, the allegorical mode.