GakuseiDon

Weird! We are both looking at the same thing, but have opposite views on this.

To me, the author seems to have a high regard for "the wisdom" of the ancient Greek philosophers. It is the heretics who are messing things up -- and those heretics are Christians who have adopted a mish-mash of beliefs, including a distortion of the ancient Greek philosophers.

But, it wasn't those Greek philosophers that he called "heretics" and "atheists", as you yourself go on to show:
My emphasis above. The "heretics" that are really atheists are the Christians, not the Greek philosophers. He refers to "the wisdom of the Greeks" on quite a few occasions.

It was so people could see how the heretics distorted Greek ideas, by mixing them with astrology, etc. He writes:

"...their doctrines have derived their origin from the wisdom of the Greeks, from the conclusions of those who have formed systems of philosophy, and from would-be mysteries, and the vagaries of astrologers,--it seems, then, advisable, in the first instance, by explaining the opinions advanced by the philosophers of the Greeks, to satisfy our readers that such are of greater antiquity than these (heresies), and more deserving of reverence in reference to their views respecting the divinity...

The truth has not taken its principles from the wisdom of the Greeks, nor borrowed its doctrines, as secret mysteries, from the tenets of the Egyptians, which, albeit silly, are regarded amongst them with religious veneration as worthy of reliance."

As you can see above, he refers to "the wisdom of the Greeks" a few times. He wants to explain how the Greek philosophers are more deserving of reverence than the heretical Christians. This seems to be a support of ancient Greek philosophy AFAICS.

Malachi151

I will admit that it is confusing, but I think that perhaps the word "wisdom" is throwing you off. You can't impart our modern view of the word widsom onto the view held here. "Wisdom" in this case simple means doctrines, beliefs, claims, etc.

A few paragraphs make this all clear:

The heresiarhs are unseemly because they have taken their views from the Greeks.

IN the section that I left out from books 10, because its too long, he shows all kinds of contradictions between the Greek philosophies, and thus concludes:

He then goes on to discuss the heretics and show how they views are rooted in the Greek philosophers.

Then he concludes:

The beliefs of these people who claim to be Christians are heretical because they similar doctrines to the Greeks.

Most importantly, his "doctrine of the truth" is completely at odds with the ideas of the Greeks that he discussed:

Compare:

It would be imposible to claim that Hippolytus is defending these views.

GakuseiDon

And when he refers to "the wise men among the Greeks", how would you intepret that?

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/050105.htm
What is the doctrine of the Sethians, and that, purloining their theories from the wise men among the Greeks, they have patched together their own system out of shreds of opinion taken from Musaeus, and Linus, and Orpheus.

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/050110.htm
Having, therefore, embraced (a consideration of) the tenets of all the wise men among the Greeks in four books, and the doctrines propounded by the heresiarchs in five...

How about those Greeks "more deserving of reverence" as I noted earlier above?

it seems, then, advisable, in the first instance, by explaining the opinions advanced by the philosophers of the Greeks, to satisfy our readers that such are of greater antiquity than these (heresies), and more deserving of reverence in reference to their views respecting the divinity

Why would he even bother with pointing out that the Greek philosophers were "of greater antiquity than the heresies" and "more deserving of reverence" if he wasn't trying to separate them out from the heresies?

No, it wasn't because they took their views among the Greeks, it was because they have combined Greek philosophy with mystery religions and astrology. He actually says so in Book 1:

their doctrines have derived their origin from the wisdom of the Greeks, from the conclusions of those who have formed systems of philosophy, and from would-be mysteries, and the vagaries of astrologers

It isn't surprising that Hippolytus regards Christianity as superior to Greek philosophy, but he is hardly putting it on a par with the heretics. His description of the positions of the Greek philosophers in Book 1 seems very even-handed, at least that I can see. There are certainly some positive statements as listed at the top of this post, even if you discount "wisdom of the Greeks" as a positive statement.

Malachi151

It was often said by Christains that the earlier Greek philosophers could be forgiven for their false beleifs because they had not been told the truth of Jesus Christ, but they held people in more disdain who continued to hold these same beliefs after they had ben told "the truth" about Jesus.

Hence, the reason that he says:

The problem, however, is that his closing completely undermines any possiblity that he is defending the views of the Greek philosophers.

The whole point of the book is that these "so-called" Chrsitians held beliefs rooted in the philosphy of the Greeks.

Roger Pearse

Well, why not answer this question yourself? This forum is, after all, supposedly about history and evidence!

How would you approach this question? E.g., Why is the Da Vinci code not just as good as the canonical gospels as evidence about the life of Jesus? Why is Robert Graves less 'real' than Tacitus?

Isn't this sort of question one that you should have a go at answering intelligently yourself?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Roger Pearse

I think people discussing this should bear in mind that 'philosophy' in antiquity covered a much wider range of subjects than it would today; not only, and not mainly science, or what we would call philosophy, but also pop-paganism.

It was fine, therefore, if some of the philosophers got close to the truth.

What was not fine, however, where the fathers were concerned, was if people who called themselves Christians (or whom others thought might be) were in fact deriving their teachings not from the apostles but from the pop-paganism of contemporary society, making up in effect their own religion and adding a dash of Christian noises for effect.

Unless we keep this distinction -- philosophy as a route to Christianity, versus philosophy as a source of contamination of Christianity by anti-Christian ideas -- clear in our minds, surely we will infallibly talk tosh on this subject?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Gamera

I don't know, but people in a better position to know, the various men who assembled the canon based on what people were using not too long after Jesus' death, threw out some works and often explained why they did. The Acts of Paul, for instance, was thrown out because the guy who forged it, a well-intentioned priest apparently, got caught and was punished for it.

That's pretty good evidence that it wasn't an authentic document.

Gamera

Well, everything is relative. This isn't that much more comical than the bad scientific theories of the time from classical pagan culture. Though, some Greeks did get a lot natural science right.


I don't think any Chrisitan is arguing that the conversion to Christianity in the 2nd century gave one insights to electromagnetism or the theory of plate tectonics.

fta

So the early Christians were completely deluded about the natural sciences but still had valuable "insight" into theories such as a virgin being impregnated by a ghost, fermented H20, resurrected corpses, etc?

Roger Pearse

This is not specifically about Christians, surely: could not the same sort of comment be made about anyone in any society other than our own?

At all events, ever since the renaissance learned people have taken the view that we *do* have things to learn from the ancients.

All the best,

Roger Pearse