Athens and Jerusalem\u00a0<\/span>offers a lively and accessible chronicle of the relationship between philosophy and theology and how we can think about both today.\u201d<\/p>\nIn this post we will give you a sample of some of the kinds of discussions philosophers prompted for theologians.\u00a0 Commenting on the difference between Protestant, Catholic, and Orthodox approaches to Greek philosophy,\u00a0 Bray is surely right that both Catholics and the Orthodox, have engaged, some would say drunk, more vigorously from the well of Greek philosophy than the Reformers, and many later Protestants. (p. 4).\u00a0 In general, he is right about this, particularly if we are talking about the pre-modern period.\u00a0 There is a reason, for instance that John Wesley insisted that the Bible should be the basis of all good theological thinking, not tradition, not reason, not philosophy, not experience. There is a reason why the early Methodists at Oxford were called Bible moths, or even Bible bigots.<\/p>\n
This is very different from what we find in Augustine or Aquinas or some of the Eastern Fathers, for example the Cappadocians.\u00a0 And famously, Protestants had trouble deciphering the differences between the Orthodox and the Catholics. One caricature was that the Orthodox are just Catholics with beards!\u00a0 But the Protestant allergic reaction to incorporating Greek philosophy into theology, or using Greek categories to talk about God (e.g. immutability, impassability, aseity etc.) had some good examples to follow from the early church, for example,\u00a0 Tertullian , or even Irenaeus in his critique of the Gnostic philosophy=heresy.\u00a0 \u00a0In the Gnostic world, salvation was based on what<\/em> you know, grasp, understand, of the deep truths about the Logos etc. Not\u00a0who<\/em> you place your faith and trust in.\u00a0 In short, it was salvation for eggheads.\u00a0 Ordinary folk need not apply (not only so, it was also salvation for men. Note the famous saying of Jesus at the end of the Gospel of Thomas, saying 114\u2014 \u201c\u201cSimon Peter said to them, \u201cMake<\/strong>\u00a0Mary<\/strong>\u00a0leave us, for females don\u2019t deserve life.\u201d Jesus said, \u201cLook, I will guide her to\u00a0make<\/strong>\u00a0her\u00a0male<\/strong>, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the domain of Heaven.\u201d<\/p>\nAs Bray shows, what is really astounding is that Thales who in the 6th century B.C. came up with the notion that everything was made up of earth, air, fire, and water was still being debated before modern science came on the scene.\u00a0 Ancient Greek philosophy had a much longer shelf life than one might have expected, especially the philosophy of the giants\u2014- Plato, Aristotle, and various forms of Neo-Platonism. (cf. Plotinus).\u00a0 \u00a0What this did when it was used to analyze theology, is what I would call boiling things down to abstract ideas.\u00a0 And this was a problem because in fact the Bible has a narrative thought world, out of which theologizing and ethicizing was done.\u00a0 There were always problems with the Council of Chalcedon (450) with its dictums that Christ had two natures,\u00a0 one human, and one divine, which was sometimes expanded to include the notion that he had two minds\u2013 a human and a divine one.\u00a0 \u00a0About this idea, the NT says exactly nothing, and there were various church fathers that called this sorts of thinking problematic if not just wrong.\u00a0 Jesus the person was both God and man, as one person\u2014 the God-man.\u00a0 \u00a0From my point of view, Phil. 2.5-11 gives us the clue as to how to view this matter\u2014 the pre-existent Son of God had every right to take advantage of the fact that he was \u2018being in very nature God\u2019 but he chose divine condescension\u2014 he chose to limit himself in order to also be fully human, with giving up his Godness.\u00a0 He accepted the human limitations of time, space, knowledge,power, and mortality\u2014 yes he really died on a cross.\u00a0 \u00a0Like the temptation in Luke 4 indicates, as the divine Son of God, he could have drawn on his omnipotence and turned stones into bread, but alas that would obliterated his true humanity, because humans can\u2019t do that.\u00a0 And furthermore, while he could have done miracles drawing on his divine nature, he chose instead to perform miracles by the power of the Holy Spirit, as his followers could also do.\u00a0 \u00a0As so often would be the case down through the centuries,\u00a0 getting Christology right was the key to getting the Gospel, salvation grace etc. right.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The summary of the substance of this book on Amazon says the following: \u201cIn Athens and Jerusalem, Gerald Bray shows how history has been shaped by a myriad of attempts to relate philosophy and theology. Bray\u2019s tour spans from the early church to the present, pointing out impacts on the church, academy, and society.\u00a0Athens and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":91,"featured_media":70024,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[15376,15373],"class_list":["post-70036","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-or-the-love-of-logic","tag-the-love-of-wisdom"],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/a><\/p>\n