  The issue of human freedom becomes more complex in view of Plutarch's conception of god and his theory of divine providence. This is an important aspect of Plutarch's philosophy. Plutarch distinguishes sharply between God or the divine (theos, to theion) and gods, and the question is how the plurality of gods is to be understood vis-à-vis the first God. This is not entirely clear (Ziegler 1951, 940). Plutarch appears to maintain that the first God can take different names, yet he is to be distinguished from the deities of the Greek pantheon (such as Asclepius in Amatorius 758A-B), who are to be identified with the lesser gods. In the On the E at Delphi Apollo is presented as the supreme God (393D-394A), while elsewhere it is Zeus who is described as the supreme God, creator of the universe (De facie 927B). According to Plutarch the first God constitutes a unity of utter simplicity, a unity including all divine beings in it (De Iside 377F), and is identified with the Good and with Being (De E 393B–D; see Opsomer 2009, 158–160). Apparently Plutarch identifies the highest principle with the Form of the Good of the Republic and with the demiurge of the Timaeus (see Ferrari 2005, Brenk 2005), a tendency that Numenius and Plotinus will resist later. God rules over the world and provides for it, but being supreme (anôtatô; Plat. Quest. 1000E), father of gods and men alike, he remains transcendent. This becomes clear in Ammonius' speech in On the E in Delphi, where God is said to be “beyond everything” (epekeina tou pantos; 393B), but also in the On the Obsolescence of Oracles, where Lamprias defends the possibility of God being provident over many worlds, provided that these are of a finite number (426E). This means that God is not immanent in the world, and yet he is its creator. God's transcendence is maintained by delegating to the world soul some mediatory demiurgic performance (see above, sect. 4.1; cf. Opsomer 2005, 94–5). This resonates with Plutarch's more general view (inspired by Plato), according to which the soul has a mediating role between the intellect and the body or sensible reality (see below, sect. 5).