Monday, June 23, 2008

Platonism for the Commoners

Is Christian theology simply a way to demystify Greek philosophy in order for the masses to understand it? While there is not a mathematical proof about this theory, there exists evidence which seems to support it.
To begin, a direct reference to the bible: St. John has the following sentence in his gospels: “In the beginning there was word and with word there was god.” That is an undeniable platonic reference. is a direct translation from the Greek which also means reason. Thus, St. John, whoever he was in order to write the gospels, must have known the other meaning of logos in order to associate it with god. Otherwise, it does not seem as something very enlightening to relate god with word.
Platonic ontology is driven by the need to find the absolute “One” which can only be reached by the reason which comes from innate ideas. In a parallel with Christianity, the “One” would be god, and the way to reach him seems to be the same, except Christianity emphasizes a different kind of reason than that to which Platonic epistemology refers to. Christianity is interested in a rather spiritual reason. However, both types of reasons are related to each other in the sense that we as human beings are born with the knowledge that, according to Platonism, there are forms and, according to Christianity, that there is a god. The highest form is the Form of the Good and is the basis for the rest. God is the basis for everything there is in Christian theology.
If Plato was the one who presented the realm of forms to humanity, then Jesus would be his equivalent since according to the gospels he came to this material world in order to teach humanity his father’s doctrine.
Plato’s Republic is one of, if not the most, influential philosophical works. In said book, Plato presents the ideal community, the ultimate rulers and the different models to rule. In the same way, the bible seems to present humanity with the idea of the perfect world through merely trying to teach how to go about building it, but refraining from showing what the finished work would look like. The Republic is a more direct guideline towards building the perfect inhabitable place. The perfect rulers are the philosophers in Plato’s word which directly relate to the priests as god’s instruments for ruling Earth.
Plato presents the metaphor of the sun. Said metaphor presents the sun as the source of “light” which in this case represents knowledge as well as the Form of the Good. This idea is sometimes interpreted to be Plato’s concept of god. The metaphor is about what the reality crucially means and how one attains the understanding of it. Likewise, god represents the essential source of light in Christianity. God is the Supreme Being the same way the Form of Good is the Supreme Form. Early Christian thought understood the forms of which Plato talks about as the thoughts of god which shows another connection.
The Allegory of the Cave is a well known passage in Plato’s Republic in which a man walks out into the sun and after experiencing light he is not longer able to live inside the cave, yet those who remained in the cave do not understand what he means when he speaks of the light. In this sense, this man has reached the light, reason, which he must share with the rest of the people with whom he was on the cave in order for those who remained to also become possessors of light. Otherwise, the one man who has found the light would become a bizarre creature to his past companions. In the same way, god’s word should be spread, the gospels claim. If one becomes acquainted with Christian thought, one must share it with the world in order for god’s teachings to help humanity as opposed to selfishly keep them to oneself. The problem here becomes that one is involuntarily forced to share god’s teachings that could be found in the bible which for all we know was only written by men in the same way Plato’s Republic was.
Christianity and Platonism are not, of course, all the available options in this department. But I am sure that other religions also have similar relations with Platonism. What do you practice then, the real thing otherwise known as Platonism or a spin off whatever it might be called?

xoxo,
Poison Drops

©Copyrighted 2008

1 comment:

karla said...

check your e-mail for my review on this one! :)