Plato's Matchless Influence On Christian Theology

St. Thomas Aquinas’s first cosmological argument, the prime mover, defines things in the world as being either in a state of potentiality or in a state of actuality. Those things that are in potentiality are things that have the capability of being reduced to another form. Such as a boy is potentially a man, or tree is potentially a house. Things that are in a state of actuality are things that are currently reaching their potential; such as that boy becoming a man, or that tree becoming that house. Aquinas observed that all things in a state of actuality had to have been put into that state by something that was already in actuality. In thinking about this he concluded that there would have to be an infinite regress of actual things making potential things actual. He concluded that this would be impossible because given that, there would be no first mover. He instead, postulated that there must be a first mover. A being that never had potential but only has existed in a state of infinite actuality. That what we call God.

Plato claims in his text The Phaedrus that all souls are immortal. He states that “every soul is immortal, for that which is always changing is immortal” (1), and that “since it does not come into being, it also necessarily does not perish” (1). This perfectly illustrates Plato’s claim as he explains that a soul is at every moment changing itself from within and since it is capable of changing itself, it will never stop changing. Furthermore, because the soul is a source of change, it must also be an origin. This means that the soul cannot be created or come into being, and consequently cannot perish. As a result, the soul must be immortal, for it will never ceases to exist. On this subject, Lewis would completely agree with Plato’s claim. According to the text The Three Parts of Morality by C.S.

Aristotle and St. Augustine have both been influenced by Plato. Their philosophy on morality, politics, and the purpose of life has been platonically influenced. St. Augustine is the true heir of Plato because he has taken Plato’s ideal state, and revealed the implications of the lives that the citizens of the earthly city lead, in the City of God. Plato’s state is an ideal state, that would not function in reality. St. Augustine has taken Plato’s notions, and have furthered the implications of living a life that strives towards a common good. The consequences, whether negative or positive, cannot be seen in the earthly state, but can be seen in the City of God.

Plato is remembered as one of the worlds best known philosophers who along with his writings are widely studied. Plato was a student of the great Greek philosopher Socrates and later went on to be the teacher of Aristotle. Plato’s writings such as “The Republic”, “Apology” and “Symposium” reveal a great amount of insight on what was central to his worldview. He was a true philosopher as he was constantly searching for wisdom and believed questioning every aspect of life would lead him to the knowledge he sought. He was disgusted with the common occurrence of Greeks not thinking for themselves but simply accepting the popular opinion also known as doxa. Plato believed that we ought to search for and meditate on the ideal versions of beauty, justice, wisdom, and other concepts which he referred to as the forms. His hostility towards doxa, theory of the forms, and perspective on reality were the central ideas that shaped Plato’s worldview and led him to be the great philosopher who is still revered today.

Our country is built on a set of values derived from ancient civilizations, individuals, and city-states; both negative and positive attributes of these relics can be proven to have assisted in molding our government into a unique and prized entity. Never would one imagine that western civilization is actually inclined by theories of truth and the human beings perception of it. Few would have thought that a primitive concept could be linked to the setbacks of other societies and their forms of socialization, as well as to the success to ours. The basic concept of truth and our natural response to socialization developed an ideal image of our current day country, long before our country existed. In ancient Greece, a great philosopher named

By the time of the third century theologian, Origen, the concept of God as espoused by Greek philosophers’ prevailed in the then current Christian theology.

Does morality stem from God? Or does it exist independently of his presence, not subject to arbitrary decisions? The first discussion over these questions appeared in Plato's Euthyphro, in which Plato chronicles the proceedings of a highly repetitive argument between Socrates and Euthyphro, a prophet and holy man, over the nature of piety and holiness. The questions produced in this dialogue have been expanded to remain relevant even in a modern religious context. It has achieved so much fame that the core question presented in this dialogue is now known as the Euthyphro Dilemma. In the dialogue, Socrates presents Euthyphro with a choice, "Is what is holy loved by the gods because it is holy, or is it holy because it is

Since the Invention of the spoken language humans have told stories. Over hundreds of years, these stories were spread and changed. William Blake believed that all myths and religions started from the same place. That two completely unrelated sets of beliefs, like the Greeks and the Christians, could have many similarities. The two certainly have their differences but, also have a plethora of parallels.

In The Republic, Plato introduces a philosophy that transcends the exclusivity of the contemplative and the active lives. He defines the ultimate truth as “aletheia”, which literally translates to mean “unhidden” or “that which does not remain unnoticed”. Through his use of the term and his allegory of the cave, Plato makes the strong implication that philosophers must actively seek to discover the absolute truth, rather than relying on traditional methods of contemplation and the persuasive tone of rhetoric to prove its existence. To better explain his reasoning, Plato constructs a metaphor between the sun and the ultimate good. He argues that “the soul is like the eye” in that it requires an exterior force to establish clarity of

This view contends that everything that exists is inherently good and thus anything that is viewed as evil simply means that it’s inherent “goodness” is lacking and/or absent and/or corrupted. Another facet of this Platonic thought towards this “form of the good” is that Plato also asserts the claim that the less perfect that something is, or the less amount of goodness that a person/object contains, the less real that thing is in the physical world. In this case, evil is simply an illusion instead of some powerful force that is pitted against the good. Perhaps this is why Christians were so willing to accept it. If all evil is simply a result of a lack of goodness, then all things are able to be saved if we can find a way to restore the goodness of an individual or an object through the work of ministry. According to Rowlands, Plato’s thought of the forms also instilled a notion of the non-physical existence of a soul and Christians utilized Plato’s ideas of perfect forms to envision what heaven would be

Another similarity they both share is the position of life is really death. To them the afterlife is the heaven or paradise and earth is just preparing us to get there. Plato describes that life on earth is to prepare the soul for existence in the afterlife. Saint Augustine shares a similar view in that who knows where people and bodies came from. Did god create us or did we just magically show up. After people die they can leave their life on earth behind them and spend eternity with god. The free soul can go to heaven where his bodily desires will no longer impede his attempts at reaching the true joy of knowing God. Augustine’s views are enforced through Christ and Christianity. The time periods brought different perspectives Christianity was very powerful in the time of St. Augustine and was not around when Plato was alive. To Augustine, Christ was God in human form, and his death showed God’s infinite mercy, as it presented Christians with the fact that God is within reach.

What does it mean to be pious?  In Plato's Dialogues and the Book of Job, the search for the explanation can be attempted from the readings about Socrates and Job. The two are very different. One, searches for a definition and questions the meaning of piety, whereas the other, Job, one of the most pious men in biblical history, sets by example the meaning of piety by suffering many of God's punishments and yet he remains unwavering in his faith and God.

Socrates continues the conversation with Glaucon and now focuses on the obligation of the guardians and philosophers to serve the people as a result of their education.

explains his belief that the “soul exists before, and survives the body”. Plato 's beliefs of

The Final Cause causes movement and gives purpose to everything in the universe. It could be argued that the final cause given by the Prime Mover is for everything to simply change. However, Aristotle describes the prime mover as God, implying that it obtaining goodness is our purpose. Therefore, it is God that attracts everything to himself while remaining unaffected. Aristotle supposed God’s existence to be necessary, inferring that God does not depend on anything else for existence. He lacks the potential and therefore does not change, exists outside our temporal reality, making him eternal. Aristotle stated that eternal beings are essentially good; there can be no imperfection in something that existing necessarily. Evil originates from a lack of, something which should exist. This would have to be the mere absence of ‘actuality’ that Aristotle stated God