Philosophy - Early Christian Philosophers

Early Christian Philosophers

Philo, Justin and Gnostics - no specific qualities should be predicated of God because they are all too delimiting.

Christian philosophers conceived of God as a spiritual personality, as an infinite Being bearing a personal relationship to Man, as a Being whose personality finds its image in Man.

Christians regarded persons and interpersonal relationships as the very essence of reality.

Plotinus (204-269 AD) student of Athmonius Saccas founder of the Alexandrian school of Neo-Platonism an eclectic mix of Plato, Aristotle, Neo-Pythagoras and Stoicism.

- fundamental principle the doctrine of the transcendence of God

- soul is liberated from the material world through asceticism and can be transported mystically to a state of rapturous ecstasy in contact with the divine.

Patristic philosophy was the body of philosophical doctrines accepted by the Fathers of the early Christian church [ante nicene and post-nicene: Council of Nice 325 AD].

- early Christian philosophers were called Apologists because they devoted most of their time to the philosophical defense of the Christian faith against the claims of secular philosophy and Gnosticism.

Ante-Nicene} Hellenic School: Justin Martyr (150 AD), Felix (200 AD), Aristides, Theophilus, Melito     ===> African School: Tertullian (165-220 AD), Arobius of Numidia (290) - renown for their anti-rationalism, sceptical attitude toward reason, in order to establish the supremacy of faith.

Alexandrian School: Clement (150-220), Origen (185-254)

Christian philosophy was dominated in the post-Nicene period by Augustine (353-430).

Augustine subordinated philosophy to Christian doctrine (laid foundation for medieval philosophy).

- the Scholastics (Middle Ages) sought to resolve the conflict between faith and reason.

Origen - founder of Christian philosophy set on the basis of the Bible and the Regula Fidei (rule of faith as taught by the church or church council)

- matter is changeable and perishable, but the unchangeable God is everlasting (eternal)

- the Logos is not the God who participates in creation; a personal copy of God.

Man’s fall is attributed to his misuse of his freedom of will.

Man aspires through use of his freewill to attain salvation with the assistance of the Logos.

Two fundamental criteria of truth underlie the entire philosophy of Augustine: (1) The authority of the church, (2) The certainty of conscience (knowledge which man actually funds in his inner experiences (memory, intellect and will)).

- incongruities sometimes become evident when church doctrines cannot logically be reconciled with the dictates of reason (inconsistency between his theology and philosophy).

Augustine’s arguments against Skepticism used the experience of uncertainty and doubt as a logical defence for the existence of certainty and absolute truth.

God’s personality: omnipotence, omniscience, absolute goodness.

God created ex nihilo, therefore all natural things are good.

- sin impairs the natural process, attributable not to God but to the will of Man.

Fall of Rome (476) to Charlemagne’s coronation (800) } The Dark Ages