Augustine claims that Plato was a noble savage and he would have accepted Jesus if he was born later. But there are several contradictions between Plato and Christianity
1. Reincarnation. Plato clearly believed in reincarnation which obviously contradicts heaven and hell.
2. Cosmology. According to Christianity, God and God alone created the universe. But according to Plato, the sensible cosmos was created by the demiurge who only imitates God, and the universe is moved by Soul which is again a lower emanation.
3. Women. Women are not allowed to preach in Christianity, but Plato believed that the souls of men and women were equal.
4. Faith. I don’t think Plato would accept “faith” at all because he only believed in pure reason. In fact, since Jesus was a historical person and Christianity is based on documents that exist in the sensible world, he probably would not accept divine revelation either, since he would not be able to verify it through his own reason and he believed in turning away from the sensible world. Plato claims to avoid doubting the Greek gods only out of reverence for his ancestors and the law and customs of the greek, but this was probably just an excuse so he didn’t get killed like Socrates.
5. Eschatology. Plato believed that the earth was eternal and would last forever with cycles of civilizations. Christianity’s apocalypse contradicts this. But I don’t think he would easily give up this point because it was essential to his cosmology that the universe be eternal and his pure reason told him it made no sense for the universe to be created at an arbitrary time let alone destroyed.
Did Augustine ignore all this or did he think Plato would change his views or did he only have surface level understanding of Plato? I feel like these are essential characteristics of Plato that he wouldn’t be willing to change, especially the emphasis on pure reason as opposed to divine revelation.
https://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2005/04/17/response-to-fr-kimel/
https://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2006/03/08/spit-spat/
https://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2006/03/10/the-bickersons/
https://energeticprocession.wordpress.com/2007/10/17/heres-a-dot/
Interesting
Augustine believed that Jesus would likely come back imminently and the world was likely going to end within his lifetime (Jesus himself believed that the world would end within his own lifetime), and was inherently a reactionary as a result. Hence the rejection of reincarnation and the anti-women stuff.
Had Plato lived believing the same imminence of the world's destruction, their views would have been more aligned. And. of course, Plato was far less influenced by the israelites.
>Augustine believed that Jesus would likely come back imminently
I agree the early christians did but Augustine was born 400 years later. I don’t remember him saying it would happen in his lifetime
>(Jesus himself believed that the world would end within his own lifetime
No. No he didn't.
He didn't in John, but he did in the other three.
Sorce
Doesn't he predict his own death in all the Gospels? How does it make sense that he thought the world would end before he died lol
he does also come back to life in the gospels and hangs around on earth for a while. This does seem like a dead giveaway that the world wasn't going to end in his lifetime.
>Women are not allowed to preach in Christianity, but Plato believed that the souls of men and women were equal.
I don't think Christians today see women as unequal to men. just that our roles are different
True but for Plato soul is intellectual which means the souls being equal allows women to practice philosophy and be philosophers, which would surely allow them to minister within a Christian framework.
Christian writings from the Epistles to the Scholastics have always been to reconcile israeli monotheism with Platonic and Aristotelian Philosophy. To make sense of the clear contradiction between the words in John and the words in Deuteronomy or Isaiah. Christian theology is just one big cope.
Can you point to specific pieces of theology that were changed to be consistent with Platonic or Aristotelian philosophy?
It is not that theology has changed, but Christian theology is built around Hellenistic philosophy. The orthodox conception of trinity was indeed created to reconcile Paul's middle platonic henotheism and the strict monotheism of the OT. Every concept of Christian theology is made through greek terms and conceptions alien to the Abrahamic tradition.
The souls of men and women are equal in Christianity dumbass
There's a tendency for many Christian theologians to simultaneously affirm that most of humanity will end up in hell (including those peoples who had never even heard about Christ, as Saint Augustine himself thought) and then conveniently make exceptions for whatever pagan authors they happened to be fans of. For example, St. Justin Martir believed that Plato was in heaven, while also believing in mass damnata. Likewise, Luther claimed that Cicero had been saved, even though his hyperdeterministic vision of salvation painted a very bleak picture for the wide majority of mankind. It's a very disingenous practice, but what can you expect from Christians.
>For example, St. Justin Martir believed that Plato was in heaven, while also believing in mass damnata.
What? Do you have a source of Justin Martyr believing in massa damnata? From my limited understanding, Justin Martyr's position on the exclusivity of salvation as pertaining only through participation in Christ (i.e. John 14:6 "No one comes to the Father except through me") is that Christ is Logos, and as such, all who participate in Logos, even without knowing Him, are saved.
>"No, for the majority of men will not [see God], saving such as shall live justly, purified by righteousness, and by every other virtue." Dialogue with Trypho
Thank you for the citation, but Justin is here recounting to Trypho his conversation from when he was a Platonist with an old man which lead to his conversion. I don't think the Platonists held to the notion of massa damnata, besides, it is clear that what Justin and the old man are speaking of when they say "see God" isn't Heaven, but experience of God necessary for philosophers to speak of Him, in the same sense that you wouldn't know of a certain species of animal that had been described to you, unless you have yourself seen it.
>It's a very disingenous practice, but what can you expect from Christians.
Shut the frick up.
>Augustine claims that Plato was a noble savage and he would have accepted Jesus if he was born later.
Yeah no shit if he was born in christian society. This is about as obvious as saying Bach would make electronic pop music if born today.
Not really obvious at all, Augustine himself wasn't a Christian until later in his life
All I know is that Plato was a moron.
I would pay very good money to see a cage fight of this anon vs Plato.