Around 244 he went to Rome at a time when Christian churches competed with Oriental religions.

Plotinus, under the influence of these events, developed his own philosophic ideas.

He believed that man should reject material things and should purify his soul and to lift it up to a communion with a higher spirit.

Plotinus became the founder of the Neo-platonic school of philosophy, which became the most formidable rival of Christianity in the ancient world.

Neoplatonism