Amelius

Amelius a Platonic philosopher of the 3d century, was born in Etruria. In the year 246 he went to Rome, where he attended for twenty-four years the lectures of the Neo-Platonist Plotinus, whose most famous pupil he became, as well as his apologist. Like all Neo-Platonists Amelius tried to save heathenism, which was already on the wane. He was not only a pious heathen, but also attacked Christianity, especially Gnosticism, on the one hand, while, on the other, he perused the beginning of the Gospel of St. John, especially the Johannean doctrine of the Logos, in defence of Platonic philosophy. His writings, with the exception of the fragment, in which he makes reference to the beginning of the Gospel of St. John, are all lost. He died at Apamea, in Syria. See Eusebius, Preparatio Evangel. 2, 19; Theodoret, Graec. Affict. lib. 2; Cyrillus Alexandrinus, In Julianum, lib. 8; Hefele, in Wetzer und Welters Kirchen-Lexikon. s.v.; Smith, Dict. of Class. Biog. s.v. (B. P.)