Freethought & Rationalism Archive

PhilosopherJay · 06-11-2010, 12:56 PM

Hi aa5874,

On this fact, that Justin believe in one "true" god, we are in agreement.
It is on what Justin believed about the Greek and Roman Gods that we are trying to unravel.

That he believed that they are rebellious angels and demons, we get explicitly from the second apology, chapter 5:

Quote:

But if this idea take possession of some one, that if we acknowledge God as our helper, we should not, as we say, be oppressed and persecuted by the wicked; this, too, I will solve. God, when He had made the whole world, and subjected things earthly to man, and arranged the heavenly elements for the increase of fruits and rotation of the seasons, and appointed this divine law— for these things also He evidently made for man— committed the care of men and of all things under heaven to angels whom He appointed over them. But the angels transgressed this appointment, and were captivated by love of women, and begot children who are those that are called demons; and besides, they afterwards subdued the human race to themselves, partly by magical writings, and partly by fears and the punishments they occasioned, and partly by teaching them to offer sacrifices, and incense, and libations, of which things they stood in need after they were enslaved by lustful passions; and among men they sowed murders, wars, adulteries, intemperate deeds, and all wickedness. Whence also the poets and mythologists, not knowing that it was the angels and those demons who had been begotten by them that did these things to men, and women, and cities, and nations, which they related, ascribed them to god himself, and to those who were accounted to be his very offspring, and to the offspring of those who were called his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, and to the children again of these their offspring. For whatever name each of the angels had given to himself and his children, by that name they called them.

and implicitly from numerous passages in his other works, for example Trypho (73):

Quote:

the Crucified One, who (as the Holy Spirit testifies in the same Psalm) was freed from death by His resurrection, and thus showed that He is not like gods of the Gentiles, for they are but the idols of demons.

So far, I have found early Christian writers arguing that the Greek and Roman Gods were originally men, taking the view of Euhemerus of the Third Century B.C.E. and I have found Christians arguing the idea that they are fallen angles or demons. I am trying to find if any Christian actually denied their existence.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

The issue is not whether the Greek Gods existed, but what Justin believed abouit them.

But, I have ALREADY shown you that Justin BELIEVED there was ONLY ONE GOD and that MULTIPLE GODS were LIES of the Devil.

"Hortatory Address to the Greeks" XXI

Quote:

This first false fancy, therefore, concerning gods, had its origin with the father of lies.

God, therefore, knowing that the false opinion about the plurality of gods was burdening the soul of man like some disease, and wishing to remove and eradicate it, appeared first to Moses, and said to him, "I am He who is."....

So based on Justin Martyr:

1. The plurality of God had its origin with the father of lies.

2. The Plurality of Gods was a FALSE opinion.

3. The plurality of Gods was burdening the soul of man like a disease.

4. The false opinion of the plurality of Gods is to be removed and eradicated.

5. There was ONLY one GOD. "I am HE who is".

GakuseiDon · 06-11-2010, 03:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

So far, I have found early Christian writers arguing that the Greek and Roman Gods were originally men, taking the view of Euhemerus of the Third Century B.C.E. and I have found Christians arguing the idea that they are fallen angles or demons. I am trying to find if any Christian actually denied their existence.

I'm not aware of any, either. I think the real problem is aa's inability or refusal to comprehend what Justin was saying.

aa5874 · 06-11-2010, 07:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi aa5874,

On this fact, that Justin believe in one "true" god, we are in agreement.
It is on what Justin believed about the Greek and Roman Gods that we are trying to unravel.

That he believed that they are rebellious angels and demons, we get explicitly from the second apology, chapter 5......

But, I would have thought that you would have acknowledged that your arguments for what Justin believed about the Greek Gods have VAPORISED into Allegory.

You have in fact been arguing that the Greek Gods were NON-EXISTENT.

Please examine an excerpt from one of your post.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

....Plato (and remember Justin is a Platonist) felt that the Gods were real but allegorical....

Nothing is real and allegoric, including Greek Gods.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

.....For example
Trypho (73):

Quote:

....the Crucified One, who (as the Holy Spirit testifies in the same Psalm) was freed from death by His resurrection, and thus showed that He is not like gods of the Gentiles, for they are but the idols of demons....

But you are just "quote-mining. And the VERY quote from "Trypho" 73 destroys your own argument.

You must see that the Greek gods are the IDOLS of Demons.

You must remember Justin wrote that the Greek Gods were SOULLESS and DEAD.

You must understand Justin now!

"First Apology"

Quote:

And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods; since we see that these are soulless and dead, and have not the form of God (for we do not consider that God has such a form as some say that they imitate to His honour), but have the names and forms of those wicked demons which have appeared.

1. The Greek DEITIES were the IDOLS of Demons.

2. The Greek DEITIES were FORMED by men.

3. The Greek DEITIES were SOULLESS and DEAD.

4. The Greek DEITIES were in the FORM of DEMONS.

Now you say the Greek DEITIES were REAL but ALLEGORIC.

You must mean the Greek DEITIES were REAL (IDOLS of Demons), soulless and dead, but their history was MYTH, MADNESS and LIES ( ALLEGORIC).

And that is what Justin Martyr believed EXACTLY.

PhilosopherJay · 06-12-2010, 04:40 PM

Hi aa5874,

In the first quote from Justin's "Apology," Justin is clearly talking about statues.

Quote:

And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods; since we see that these are soulless and dead, and have not the form of God (for we do not consider that God has such a form as some say that they imitate to His honour), but have the names and forms of those wicked demons which have appeared. For why need we tell you who already know, into what forms the craftsmen, carving and cutting, casting and hammering, fashion the materials? And often out of vessels of dishonour, by merely changing the form, and making an image of the requisite shape, they make what they call a god; which we consider not only senseless, but to be even insulting to God, who, having ineffable glory and form, thus gets His name attached to things that are corruptible, and require constant service. And that the artificers of these are both intemperate, and, not to enter into particulars, are practiced in every vice, you very well know; even their own girls who work along with them they corrupt. What infatuation! that dissolute men should be said to fashion and make gods for your worship, and that you should appoint such men the guardians of the temples where they are enshrined; not recognizing that it is unlawful even to think or say that men are the guardians of gods.

He says about these statues:

1. Men set them in shrines and call them Gods
2. They are soulless and dead and have not the form of God
3. They have the name and forms of wicked demons that have appeared.
4. They are sometimes made out of dishonorable vessels
5. This is senseless and insulting to God because God gets his name attached to disreputable things.
6. The statue workers corrupt the girls they work with.
7. The men who make them are shamefully appointed to be guardians of the statues in temples.
8. It is wrong to call men guardians of Gods.

The Greeks and Romans in each major city had thousands of statues. They knew very well that they were not Gods, but representations of the Gods. In the same way the Greeks and Romans knew that a statue of Alexander the Great was not Alexander the Great, but a representation of him. Justin, in this passage, makes the same point he always makes, that these Greek and Roman Gods have the name and form of evil demons and not gods.

He makes this equation explicit in Apology 41, "For all the gods of the nations are idols of devils;"

The Greeks and Romans call these things that they put in shrines and temples Gods because they represent Gods. Justin is saying that that they do not represent Gods, but demons.

I think that you imagine that Justin is saying that the demons are the statues, but he is saying that the statues are "of devils," representations of beings he calls devils. They are not Gods because Justin believes in the Platonic-Pythagorean concept of a single God which Jews such as Philo had adopted before.

When we go to Trypho (55), the message is the same:

Quote:

a Lord of lords,' adding frequently, 'the great and strong and terrible[God].' For such expressions are used, not as if they really were gods, but because the Scripture is teaching us that the true God, who made all things, is Lord alone of those who are reputed gods and lords. And in order that the Holy Spirit may convince of this,

Like the Greeks and Romans, Justin has two meanings for the term Gods. They are 1. the supernatural beings purportedly living on Mount Olympus and 2. the statues that represent these beings on Mount Olympus.

The Christians used the cross as a representation of Jesus in that same way that the Greeks and Romans used statues to represent their Gods. It would be absurd to propose that the Christians thought of Jesus as merely a cross, two rectangles of gold or wood, one longer and one shorter and perpendicular to each other. In the same way, it is absurd to think that the Greeks imagined the Gods to be merely the statues that the Greeks and Romans made. When Justin does this, it is merely as a rhetorical device. In the same way non-Christians today laugh at Christians over their adoration of the cross symbol. if I tell someone that they are ridiculous for believing that wearing a cross will bring them good luck or save their soul, I am not expressing the idea that Jesus did not exist. That is a quite separate issue.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi aa5874,

On this fact, that Justin believe in one "true" god, we are in agreement.
It is on what Justin believed about the Greek and Roman Gods that we are trying to unravel.

That he believed that they are rebellious angels and demons, we get explicitly from the second apology, chapter 5......

But, I would have thought that you would have acknowledged that your arguments for what Justin believed about the Greek Gods have VAPORISED into Allegory.

You have in fact been arguing that the Greek Gods were NON-EXISTENT.

Please examine an excerpt from one of your post.

Nothing is real and allegoric, including Greek Gods.

But you are just "quote-mining. And the VERY quote from "Trypho" 73 destroys your own argument.

You must see that the Greek gods are the IDOLS of Demons.

You must remember Justin wrote that the Greek Gods were SOULLESS and DEAD.

You must understand Justin now!

"First Apology"

Quote:

And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods; since we see that these are soulless and dead, and have not the form of God (for we do not consider that God has such a form as some say that they imitate to His honour), but have the names and forms of those wicked demons which have appeared.

1. The Greek DEITIES were the IDOLS of Demons.

2. The Greek DEITIES were FORMED by men.

3. The Greek DEITIES were SOULLESS and DEAD.

4. The Greek DEITIES were in the FORM of DEMONS.

Now you say the Greek DEITIES were REAL but ALLEGORIC.

You must mean the Greek DEITIES were REAL (IDOLS of Demons), soulless and dead, but their history was MYTH, MADNESS and LIES ( ALLEGORIC).

And that is what Justin Martyr believed EXACTLY.

aa5874 · 06-12-2010, 06:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi aa5874,

In the first quote from Justin's "Apology," Justin is clearly talking about statues.

That is not so at all. The very FIRST line of the quote CLEARLY shows that Justin had established that he was talking about DEITIES.

The very FIRST line shows that Justin did NOT honour soulless and dead deities.

Quote:

And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods....

It should be obvious to you that without the IDOLS the Greeks would have no GODS to worship.

And this happened when the Greek Gods were eradicated under Constantine.

As soon as you remove and eradicate the IDOLS you eradicated the Gods of the Greeks.

Now, the God of Justin was NOT an IDOL. Justin's God was of an INVISIBLE image and his TEMPLE was Justin's heart.

Quote:

And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods; since we see that these are soulless and dead, and have not the form of God (for we do not consider that God has such a form as some say that they imitate to His honour), but have the names and forms of those wicked demons which have appeared. For why need we tell you who already know, into what forms the craftsmen, carving and cutting, casting and hammering, fashion the materials? And often out of vessels of dishonour, by merely changing the form, and making an image of the requisite shape, they make what they call a god; which we consider not only senseless, but to be even insulting to God, who, having ineffable glory and form, thus gets His name attached to things that are corruptible, and require constant service. And that the artificers of these are both intemperate, and, not to enter into particulars, are practiced in every vice, you very well know; even their own girls who work along with them they corrupt. What infatuation! that dissolute men should be said to fashion and make gods for your worship, and that you should appoint such men the guardians of the temples where they are enshrined; not recognizing that it is unlawful even to think or say that men are the guardians of gods.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

He says about these statues...

NO. Justin was NOT writing about how statues were made.

Justin wrote specifically about the composition of the Greek Gods.

Justin specifically gave some details about the construction of Greek GODS.

In the very passage you supplied Justin mentioned the words "dieties", "God" and "gods" NINE TIMES.

Not a single time did he use the word "statue". The word "statue" CANNOT be found in the passage.

Justin CLEARLY stated that "men are the guardians of gods."

And up to now, you have still not admitted that your claim that the Greek Gods were REAL but ALLEGORIC is completely contradictory and is the same as claiming that the Greek Gods were REALLY UNREAL.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

....Plato (and remember Justin is a Platonist) felt that the Gods were real but allegorical....

There is no such thing as a REAL ALLEGORIC anything. No such thing as a REAL ALLEGORIC Greek God. No such thing as an existing non-existing Greek God.

According to Justin, there is ONLY ONE GOD, the Greek Gods are IDOLS of Demons, Soulless and Dead and were made by the POETS.

PhilosopherJay · 06-13-2010, 09:13 AM

Hi aa5874,

It is clear to me that the deities that Justin is talking about in the line, "And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods;" are statues.

from metmuseum

Quote:

In the classical world, large-scale, freestanding statues were among the most highly valued and thoughtfully positioned works of art. Sculpted in the round, and commonly made of bronze or stone, statues embodied human, divine, and mythological beings, as well as animals...

Among the earliest Greek statues were images of divinities housed in temples, settings well suited to communicate their religious potency. The Greeks situated these standing or seated figures, which often wore real clothing and held objects associated with their unique powers, on axis with temple entrances for maximum visual impact...

During the early Roman Republic, the principal types of statue display were divinities enshrined in temples and other images of gods taken as spoils of war from the neighboring communities that Rome fought in battle. The latter were exhibited in public spaces alongside commemorative portraits...

By the late Republic, statues adorned basilicas, sanctuaries and shrines, temples, theaters, and baths. As individuals became increasingly enriched through the process of conquest and empire, statues also became an important means of conveying wealth and sophistication in the private sphere: sculptural displays filled the gardens and porticoes of urban houses and country villas (09.39; 1992.11.71). The fantastical vistas depicted in luxurious domestic wall paintings included images of statues as well (03.14.13).

Incidentally, While the temples and statues were destroyed by Christians in the Fourth Century, it wasn't their destruction that ended the worship of Greek and Roman Gods. It was the brutal, long term, legalized murder and torture of millions of pagans that ended the worship of Greek and Roman Gods. Illegal worship of Greco-Roman Gods and Goddesses continued underground until the 9th Century, 500 years after the "idols" and "temples" had been destroyed. See here for a brief account of this holocaust.

It is correct to say that while the pagans sacrificed millions of animals to their gods, it was the Christians who sacrificed millions of people (pagans) to their one God Jesus.

As far as Plato's attitude towards the Gods, they are complex. I did point you towards Did Socrates "Teach New Deities"? Or: Homer's Gods, Plato's Gods* A Public Talk by Dr. Jan Garrett in which he says:

Quote:

To return, finally, to the charge that Socrates taught new divinities. In hindsight, we have to say that in some senses he did, and in some senses he did not. He was, apparently, quite willing to pay his respects to the traditional gods, Zeus, Athena, etc.; all evidence points to him being a polytheist. He agreed with Homer and Hesiod that these gods had bodies and would never die.

But his image of these gods was far more exalted than the image of the gods which one gets from listening to a recitation of Homer and his tribe of god-talkers (theologoi) and storytellers (muthologoi). The gods of the Greek philosophers are perfect, wise, alien to any moral wrongdoing, and the source of good but not of evil among mortals. They are not jealous, they don't get angry, they don't send false dreams, and especially they don't rape women. Good persons recognize the gods as their masters or superiors and carry out their orders, which are, essentially, to act justly and promote human virtue.

So Plato actually offers a more divine picture of the gods than the poets. In a sense, he is more conservative than the conservative priests of the Gods, crazier than the crazy priests of the gods; he imagines himself as priest of the priests, the better defender of the Gods.

Another article you might consult is "Plato and the Gods" by Gustav E. Mueller in The Philosophical Review, Vol. 45, No. 5 (Sep., 1936), pp. 457-472.
He writes:

Quote:

Polytheism. Greek Polytheism pervades Plato's realms like an invisible and omnipresent atmosphere. It is never doubted. But a reform is wanted. This reform is directed against the poets and artists, against the confusion of human, anthromomorphic stories and pictures with the deities themselves. Plato here stands in line with the Presocratic criticism of Herakleitos and the Eleatics; but it seems to me that his criticism is less radical, because he loves the gods and their festivals and does not attempt to replace them by reason or by a naturalistic being-in-general. But compared with the liberal and profuse mythic-poetic imagination of Greek religion, his attempt at reform is still radical enough. The poets and artists and the poetic-artistic imagination of his people had produced a rank and luxurious vegetation of innumerable local and national legends and shapes, against which the protest seems very weak, inefficient and inadequate. Nevertheless if we look for an intelligible account or justification of this same artistic-imaginative polytheism, we find enough hints in Plato to find it plausible, where- as the stories of Hesiod and Homer have for us no plausibility beyond their poetic beauty. Plato brings some order into this world of divine powers.17

There are the gods of mother earth (Nom. 740), the netherworld of chaos and vegetation, of death and life, of blood and family- tradition. Their cultic place is outside the city-limits, where the dead are buried. Their feast is in December, the last month, devoted to the remembrance of the dead, to the ancestors that have returned back to mother earth; their ritual is a ritual of piety and of a patriotic thanksgiving. They have a close relation to women, Demeter and Kore (Persephone) being besides Pluto their main representatives.

The Olympian, Homeric Gods are conceived as the Gods of the polis. Plato accepts the twelve main Gods and distributes their festivals over the twelve months.'8 The Olympians, originally the wanton and brutal reflections of conquering warrior-tribes, are spiritualized. They are the Gods of civilization, but at the same time immortal, cosmic principles, in which the polis is anchored...

On the other hand, Mueller notes how Plato also speaks the language of monotheism:

Quote:

Ethical religion does not necessarily have to cease to be polytheistic. But the unifying, ethical principle involved tends to use a monotheistic language alternatively with the polytheistic one. Zeus, as the principle of order, of command, of ethical balance of all principles, tends to become the God.

God alone is good. He creates nothing but what is good. These goods are approximations and similes of God. To become as much as possible like God is the absolute meaning of life. It is a goal beyond being and nature, the goal of striving, in which process the soul has its kind of immortality, justifying also the endlessness of regeneration. Since God is good he cannot change. If he changed it could only be for the worse, which is impossible. Therefore ethical religion must not tolerate legends about God's metamorphoses, his lying tricks, his greed, his envy and revenge. Suffering, fear of death and punishment, must either not be allowed to come from God, or they must not be conceived as evil. Popular mythology cannot be saved from such criticism by allegorical reinterpretation, contrary to the naive and patent meaning of the stories. If we need pictorial symbols of our ethical religion, let us tell new ones, adequate to the eternal and ultimate idea of a just and benevolent judge and father, instead of paradises where we are eternally drunk in the company of the gods, as we find them in the religion of Orpheus.28 Such new myths will pronounce to the picture-lovers the just distribution of eudaimonia, which means that each soul lives the life it deserves and suffers the degree of damnation which it has brought about by its own will.

So Plato conceives of the Gods as real, but the mythologies or stories of the poets do not match their real divinity but these stories degrade the divinities of the Gods and paints a false picture of them.

In relation to Justin, we can say that Justin rejects Plato's rejection of the mythologies of the Poets. He accepts the poets accounts of the gods as real (albeit he calls it "madness" to still think of these beings as Gods) and therefore sees the gods as demons. As the same time, Justin accepts the divine spiritual nature that Plato attributes to the Gods and the demiurge (Plato's one god creator of the gods) and attributes it to the Jewish God, which is similar to the solution that Philo found more than a century and a half before.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Quote:

Originally Posted by aa5874

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi aa5874,

In the first quote from Justin's "Apology," Justin is clearly talking about statues.

That is not so at all. The very FIRST line of the quote CLEARLY shows that Justin had established that he was talking about DEITIES.

The very FIRST line shows that Justin did NOT honour soulless and dead deities.

It should be obvious to you that without the IDOLS the Greeks would have no GODS to worship.

And this happened when the Greek Gods were eradicated under Constantine.

As soon as you remove and eradicate the IDOLS you eradicated the Gods of the Greeks.

Now, the God of Justin was NOT an IDOL. Justin's God was of an INVISIBLE image and his TEMPLE was Justin's heart.

NO. Justin was NOT writing about how statues were made.

Justin wrote specifically about the composition of the Greek Gods.

Justin specifically gave some details about the construction of Greek GODS.

In the very passage you supplied Justin mentioned the words "dieties", "God" and "gods" NINE TIMES.

Not a single time did he use the word "statue". The word "statue" CANNOT be found in the passage.

Justin CLEARLY stated that "men are the guardians of gods."

And up to now, you have still not admitted that your claim that the Greek Gods were REAL but ALLEGORIC is completely contradictory and is the same as claiming that the Greek Gods were REALLY UNREAL.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philosopher Jay

....Plato (and remember Justin is a Platonist) felt that the Gods were real but allegorical....

There is no such thing as a REAL ALLEGORIC anything. No such thing as a REAL ALLEGORIC Greek God. No such thing as an existing non-existing Greek God.

According to Justin, there is ONLY ONE GOD, the Greek Gods are IDOLS of Demons, Soulless and Dead and were made by the POETS.

aa5874 · 06-13-2010, 10:03 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi aa5874,

It is clear to me that the deities that Justin is talking about in the line, "And neither do we honour with many sacrifices and garlands of flowers such deities as men have formed and set in shrines and called gods;" are statues.

Well, that is it. It took you a long time.

The Greek Gods are STATUES.

Elijah · 06-13-2010, 11:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

As far as Plato's attitude towards the Gods, they are complex. I did point you towards Did Socrates "Teach New Deities"? Or: Homer's Gods, Plato's Gods* A Public Talk by Dr. Jan Garrett in which he says:
So Plato actually offers a more divine picture of the gods than the poets. In a sense, he is more conservative than the conservative priests of the Gods, crazier than the crazy priests of the gods; he imagines himself as priest of the priests, the better defender of the Gods.

I just poked in but that article isn’t really hitting the point of what Plato and Socrates changed ideologically. I don’t know if I’ve read that paper before or the opinion is just common but it was much more than just trying to make the characters/gods in the poetry act/appear better; but about them not being as temporally understood which a story about gods would automatically lead one to think. Plato’s big contribution was merging the “everything is in motion” philosophy with the “everything is at rest” philosophy and then putting the gods and spiritual elements on the constant side making people rethink them if they can’t change.

Also, daemon early on with Plato I think was a general reference to the dominion between the divine and man but in the time of Justin they are similar to unclean spirits or fallen angels which was the product of the intellectual/spiritual side mixing with matter which a statue of a god could be seen as or producing and why they could be called demons.

PhilosopherJay · 06-14-2010, 12:37 PM

Hi Elijah,

Yes, I think that Plato does reinvision the Homeric Gods to resolve the Pamenidean-Heraclitean philosophical conflict of first principles. He essentially creates a Parmenidean single unchanging god and has him create the proto-Homeric Gods.

Like Philo before him, Justin associates Plato's Parmenidean God with the Jewish creator God and claims Plato stole the ideas from Moses, supposing that Plato went to Egypt and there read the text.

Justin never really follows any of the arguments of Plato. He simply quote mines Plato's text to show that where there are similarities between Christian and Platonic doctrines, Plato stole it from Moses.

I think we can say now that the Platonic ideas were quite independent of the Hebrew Scriptures. Rather, the Jews and Christians injected Platonic and Stoic ideas into their readings of the Hebrew scriptures.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elijah

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

As far as Plato's attitude towards the Gods, they are complex. I did point you towards Did Socrates "Teach New Deities"? Or: Homer's Gods, Plato's Gods* A Public Talk by Dr. Jan Garrett in which he says:
So Plato actually offers a more divine picture of the gods than the poets. In a sense, he is more conservative than the conservative priests of the Gods, crazier than the crazy priests of the gods; he imagines himself as priest of the priests, the better defender of the Gods.

I just poked in but that article isn’t really hitting the point of what Plato and Socrates changed ideologically. I don’t know if I’ve read that paper before or the opinion is just common but it was much more than just trying to make the characters/gods in the poetry act/appear better; but about them not being as temporally understood which a story about gods would automatically lead one to think. Plato’s big contribution was merging the “everything is in motion” philosophy with the “everything is at rest” philosophy and then putting the gods and spiritual elements on the constant side making people rethink them if they can’t change.

Also, daemon early on with Plato I think was a general reference to the dominion between the divine and man but in the time of Justin they are similar to unclean spirits or fallen angels which was the product of the intellectual/spiritual side mixing with matter which a statue of a god could be seen as or producing and why they could be called demons.

Elijah · 06-14-2010, 05:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilosopherJay

Hi Elijah,

Yes, I think that Plato does reinvision the Homeric Gods to resolve the Pamenidean-Heraclitean philosophical conflict of first principles. He essentially creates a Parmenidean single unchanging god and has him create the proto-Homeric Gods.

Like Philo before him, Justin associates Plato's Parmenidean God with the Jewish creator God and claims Plato stole the ideas from Moses, supposing that Plato went to Egypt and there read the text.

Justin never really follows any of the arguments of Plato. He simply quote mines Plato's text to show that where there are similarities between Christian and Platonic doctrines, Plato stole it from Moses.

I think we can say now that the Platonic ideas were quite independent of the Hebrew Scriptures. Rather, the Jews and Christians injected Platonic and Stoic ideas into their readings of the Hebrew scriptures.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

I don’t think that either Parmenides or Heraclitus thought there was a first principle, a fundamental principle sure, but I think both were thought of as having ever existing universes. One of the reasons Plato is popular with the Jews and early Christians is because he is the main philosopher that has a beginning like they do. But I could be wrong because you say both Justin and Philo are comparing their God to Parmenides’?

I’m not sure what you are saying about the unchanging god “creating proto-Homeric God”. Are you saying that Plato believed in the same understanding of the gods as was commonly understood from the poets, he just added another constant god onto that?

I think the compromise he went was he moved the ineffability of Heraclitus’ Logos to his understanding of God and made the Logos synonymous to the spiritual intellectual side more constant like how Parmenides understood the whole universe.

What do you mean he never really follows arguments of Plato if he was showing there were similarities between Christianity and Platonic doctrines?

I do agree that they were injecting/interpreting Hebrew scripture in the new Hellenistic light.

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