From hanging out here for a few years it seems like:

(a) Catholics aren't too interested in understanding many philosophers after, say, Aquinas.
(b) Evangelicals and Protestants aren't too interested in anyone before, say, Luther, or much of anything after, say, Calvin.

1. If these are unfair generalizations, tell me why.
2. If you're a Christian, do you feel it's important at all to understand the heavy hitters of philosophy, morality, and religion? (Spinoza, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Nietzsche, and so forth). Do you ever challenge your own beliefs about the nature of faith, or nature of God, or hermeneutics by reading philosophers that have different views from what you've been taught?

Frok said:

---

I do think that is a generalization. I would say most people don't study the ancient philosophers anymore than the average christian.

---

Agreed.

I also want to point out that there's rarely any philosophical differences between Catholics/Protestants when they are relatively educated on it.

There are certainly theological differences that exist, but I can't really think of an instance where the disagreement is philosophical.

Frok said:

---

I do think that is a generalization. I would say most people don't study the ancient philosophers anymore than the average christian.

---

Do you think Christians should know more than the average American dullard about philosophies that are related to their own beliefs?

Like, do you think any Christian needs to be aware of, say, Hume and Kant's arguments about rational proofs for the existence of God? Or even 20th century philosophers?

Part of the reason I ask is that you see the same arguments about god and faith and whatnot playing out on this very message board almost as if 2000 years of philosophy didn't exist.

I guess for me personally it is inconceivable to not have to wrestle deeply with the big questions of god and faith and how would you do that wrestling without at least considering the ideas of the smartest people who ever lived? How do you decide for yourself what kind of hermeneutics you use? It's not like it's all metaphysics, i mean reading and interpreting the Bible is something a Christian must do all of the time. Many extremely smart people have vastly different ideas about that.

Frok said:

---

Quote:

---

Part of the reason I ask is that you see the same arguments about god and faith and whatnot playing out on this very message board almost as if 2000 years of philosophy didn't exist.

---

Are the arguments for sure 100% refuted or do you just not agree with their side?

---

I'm not trying to make any kind of positive statement about any of that. I'm just asking what's up with the fact that people keep rehashing the same arguments as if we lived in a historical and philosophical vacuum.

As a crappy armchair spare-time philosopher I say this as much to myself as anyone else.


I guess maybe my general observation is that for a forum titled "Religion and Philosophy" there is precious little actual philosophy in here. It seems like 80% doctrinal squabbles, 10% evangelicals complaining about gays and abortion, and 10% cool science news. It seems weird to me and I'm wondering what's up with that. Is it that the Christians who dominate the discourse on this board just aren't interested?

TampaBayAg said:

---

Paul quoted Epimenides, Menander, and Aratu.

---

That's great. But Paul been super dead for a good while now. What about you?

Working my through the History of Philosophy with Any Gaps on my commutes. Starts with the pre-Socratics and I'm up to the aftermath of Avasenna after finishing up philosophy in Andalusia.

I'd say you're not getting much epistemology or metaphysics here, as those topics are pretty pretty cut and dried for devout believers. There's plenty of rhetoric, logic, theology, natural philosophy and apologetics though.

I took one course in PHIL 101 during my undergrad.

One nugget I took away was the "Golden Mean."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_mean_(philosophy)

Upon digging further down into ancient Greek philosophy, come to find out, the word logic originally meant "the word" or "what is spoken." Now tell me I haven't read that somewhere in the book of John.

dds08 said:

---

I took one course in PHIL 101 during my undergrad.

One nugget I took away was the "Golden Mean."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_mean_(philosophy)

Upon digging further down into ancient Greek philosophy, come to find out, the word logic originally meant "the word" or "what is spoken." Now tell me I haven't read that somewhere in the book of John.

---

Holy sh*t u must be some kind of genius

Save the flattery. It's not that big of a jump considering that it's Greek philosophy.

1 course is hardly enough to get one's feet wet!

I consider myself to be a Stoic to the extend of self control, meekness etc... I find a lot of these values intertwine with the Christian faith and monasticism.

BusterAg said:

---

So, I'm not trying to be trite here, but, bring it. Seriously.

I would love nothing more than for people to start quoting and or referring to specific arguments that specific philosophers have made over time. Seeing this done in the past lead me to hundreds to of pages of study on Kierkegaard, and Im working through Nietzche and Dosyoyevsky now.

Only halfway sarcastically, I implore you to bring the enlightenment to us religious luddites, if you please.

---

I would never presume to know enough to lecture anyone else. This thread is not in bad faith; I am genuinely interested in the extent to which different kinds of Christians engage -- or not -- with philosophy on even a cursory level. We learn dialectically through conversations about dense, complicated arguments, counter-arguments and ideas. I just know that for me, as someone who currently self-identifies as something like "provisionally agnostic but hopefully theist" struggling with believe, it is just inconceivable to wrestle with questions of "how can I believe" or "what is the proper role of evidence and capital-r Reason in cultivating belief in the divine" without surveying the biggest and best philosophical writing addressing those questions.

In other words, many years ago I realized my faith was philosophically, intellectually bankrupt and empty. I feel compelled to challenge oneself in this way and cannot relate to people who don't experience that. People who are so socially and mentally embedded in one faith tradition that they never bother to seriously look around at what the smartest people who ever lived had to say about such things.

So for me, it's not just a simple matter of curiosity. I like the definition of philosophy as the study of how to live (or even better, how to prepare to die). These questions are of existential importance. This is why I have no time for formal logic, for example. If it doesn't ultimately connect to the question of "how should I live and what should I believe", I'm not going to make time for it.

Maybe I will take you up on your suggestion and "be the change" or whatever and start some threads. Maybe one way to go about it would be to propose an ongoing series of threads where people who are interested read a text and then discuss it in here.

R&P philosophy book club! I'm down

Thanks for the clarification. I don't find all philosophy as useful, but do think struggling with the foundational questions makes sense.

My base assumptions include that there is a physical universe, that this is not all some kind of dream, and humans are capable of rational decisions. That is because this is the way I experience the world, so, even if those models are incorrect or incomplete, they are useful. Anything postulating to the opposite isn't of much interest to me.

Most of the other philosophical questions have to do with the meaning of life, and living a life of meaning. It is interesting to get a secular view of this, but I obviously find them lacking.

I consider many theologians to be philosophers, and political writers and economists too. C. S. Lewis, Kierkegaard, Barth, etc. I devoured a lot of Sowell, read a decent amount of Marx, Mises, Hayek, etc.

So, there is room for Philosophy, just don't expect me to opine on whether or not Texags really exists, or if it is a manifestation of my intellect. I don't really care.

Most people on here balk at a post with more than 150 characters. You can't have a philosophical discussion without some words.

Christianity in the East very emphatically stated that Christianity was the only true philosophy, and others grasped at what a Christian person who has been illumines has direct access to. Any philosophy not rooted in the experimental and liturgical life of Christianity is - or perhaps I would say should be - suspect. This doesn't prevent Christians from being exposed to or even utilizing other philosophy. But this is a baptizing of terminology to express what we have as truth. We've been doing this continuously since the beginning. You can see St Paul, as someone pointed out; or St John's use of Logos to describe Christ, or the later Christianization of neo-Platonist language and concepts.

Quote:

---

Do you think Christians should know more than the average American dullard about philosophies that are related to their own beliefs?

---

Why?

If a Christian is convinced that Jesus historically rose from the dead and that the Bible is true, what benefit would there in reading the opinions of man? Do these opinion help me love my wife better, give to the poor better, value others as being created in the image of God better?

The Christians that I know who are the most versed in these philosophies of man are engaged in the world of apologetics. They are using this knowledge for a purpose. It's my opinion that Hume and Kant are not the leading anti-God philosophers Christians should be aware of, it's the ones who disguise philosophies as science.

k2aggie07 said:

---

Most people on here balk at a post with more than 150 characters. You can't have a philosophical discussion without some words.

---

This doesn't seem to be the case on R&P.

Edit: accidentally clicked on an emoji (the correct word for this is emoticon but my wife uses the word emoji and it has become endearing to me) apparently.

Marco Esquandolas said:

---

Frok said:

---

I do think that is a generalization. I would say most people don't study the ancient philosophers anymore than the average christian.

---

Do you think Christians should know more than the average American dullard about philosophies that are related to their own beliefs?

Like, do you think any Christian needs to be aware of, say, Hume and Kant's arguments about rational proofs for the existence of God? Or even 20th century philosophers?

Part of the reason I ask is that you see the same arguments about god and faith and whatnot playing out on this very message board almost as if 2000 years of philosophy didn't exist.

I guess for me personally it is inconceivable to not have to wrestle deeply with the big questions of god and faith and how would you do that wrestling without at least considering the ideas of the smartest people who ever lived? How do you decide for yourself what kind of hermeneutics you use? It's not like it's all metaphysics, i mean reading and interpreting the Bible is something a Christian must do all of the time. Many extremely smart people have vastly different ideas about that.

---

i think it's a pretty big assumption to think that most Christians "wrestle" with the big questions of god and faith. they are happy with the 1+1=3 situation as long as they get to go to heaven.

And yet another generalization.

I found that to remove my doubt, which I greatly struggled with, demanded a venture into philosophy. This was sparked by talking with highly educated people who disagreed with me.

I consider these friends and, in most cases, strangers (online message board types) to be some of the most valuable people in my life.

They challenged me, made me find surety.

What was funny was, though, once I found sure philosophical footing, I then realized what, I think K2 is pointing out, is that, in many ways, it seems meaningless in the face of the truth of the resurrection of Christ.

I know that sounds weird, but that is where it led.

Now my surety comes from the fact and mystery of the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth.

That is not to discount in any way the work of the philosophers. I still enjoy my crappy attempts at learning and communicating what philosophy illuminates.

Truth is found through many avenues, and they all work toward His purpose:

The senses
Reason
Experimentation and observation
Testimony
etc...

They all lead to Truth.

So I'm a stereotypical engineer who's never cracked a book about philosophy. But I like to learn, read nonfiction, and challenge myself once or twice a year to tough, long reads of classic books. How would I start in philosophy? It's a pretty intimidating challenge. Is there some go-to book that's going to give me a high level, that I can then go to something specific that interests me?

I am generally curious how a Sola Scriptura following Christian incorporates philosophy into his/her belief system.

I am specifically curious how a Sola Scriptura following Christian considers Natural Law...

@quad: Will Durant's Story of Philosophy or Anthony Kenny's A New History of Western Philosophy are both good.

Quad Dog said:

---

So I'm a stereotypical engineer who's never cracked a book about philosophy. But I like to learn, read nonfiction, and challenge myself once or twice a year to tough, long reads of classic books. How would I start in philosophy? It's a pretty intimidating challenge. Is there some go-to book that's going to give me a high level, that I can then go to something specific that interests me?

---

You might check out some of the Great Courses on philosophy: https://www.thegreatcourses.com/search/?q=philosophy

They're pretty expensive but a few are on sale. I'm planning to get into those pretty soon myself.

You could read St John of Damascus, the first section of "The Fountain of Knowledge" is a pretty solid philosophical review.

k2aggie07 said:

---

You could read St John of Damascus, the first section of "The Fountain of Knowledge" is a pretty solid philosophical review.

---

Seems like the big drawback of this -- i.e., something so incredibly old -- for someone looking for a philosophical overview is that you automatically omit like most of the philosophy that has ever existed, no?

He said start and introduction. That book is a text to do exactly that - give a basis of logic and philosophy.

If you don't like my recommendation, please feel free to offer a better one.

k2aggie07 said:

---

He said start and introduction. That book is a text to do exactly that - give a basis of logic and philosophy.

If you don't like my recommendation, please feel free to offer a better one.

---

Are you sure that book even qualifies as philosophy and not theology? Is it not mostly a religious text?

Anyway, I'm completely shocked your recommendation just so happens to be an Eastern Orthodox saint from the 1st century or whatever. I'd think any basic college intro to philosophy text has to be infinitely more useful.

Yes, quite sure. The first chapters are called the philosophical chapters, and go into great detail about basic philosophical concepts such as essence, form, logic and so forth. This is a basic understanding that he felt was needed to be able to follow along to the later chapters, which are theology (a list of heresies and an exposition of the Orthodox faith).

He was from the 8th century, actually.

Are you trying to learn philosophy or modern philosophy?

If you think there is a better text, then suggest it. I learned a lot about basic philosophical terms and how philosophical arguments are constructed by reading St John. Maybe if you read it, you would too.

Anyway, I picked that text because it is a basic text for teaching, and it covers a lot of ground.

More specific things to read would be Aristotle's Metaphysics or Rhetoric or Nicomachean Ethics, or Plato's Republic or Five Dialogues or Meno, or Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, or Seneca's On the Shortness of Life, or Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy, or Locke's Second Treatise, or Discourses Concerning Government by Sidney. All of these books are interesting reads on their own.

Marco Esquandolas said:

---

Frok said:

---

Quote:

---

Part of the reason I ask is that you see the same arguments about god and faith and whatnot playing out on this very message board almost as if 2000 years of philosophy didn't exist.

---

Are the arguments for sure 100% refuted or do you just not agree with their side?

---

I'm not trying to make any kind of positive statement about any of that. I'm just asking what's up with the fact that people keep rehashing the same arguments as if we lived in a historical and philosophical vacuum.

As a crappy armchair spare-time philosopher I say this as much to myself as anyone else.


I guess maybe my general observation is that for a forum titled "Religion and Philosophy" there is precious little actual philosophy in here. It seems like 80% doctrinal squabbles, 10% evangelicals complaining about gays and abortion, and 10% cool science news. It seems weird to me and I'm wondering what's up with that. Is it that the Christians who dominate the discourse on this board just aren't interested?

---

Welcome to the post-internet world. The job of cyberspace is to keep us out of the mall at Christmas, not to fill our existential void. On to humanity's next futile diversion...

k2aggie07 said:

---

Yes, quite sure. The first chapters are called the philosophical chapters, and go into great detail about basic philosophical concepts such as essence, form, logic and so forth. This is a basic understanding that he felt was needed to be able to follow along to the later chapters, which are theology (a list of heresies and an exposition of the Orthodox faith).

He was from the 8th century, actually.

Are you trying to learn philosophy or modern philosophy?

If you think there is a better text, then suggest it. I learned a lot about basic philosophical terms and how philosophical arguments are constructed by reading St John. Maybe if you read it, you would too.

Anyway, I picked that text because it is a basic text for teaching, and it covers a lot of ground.

More specific things to read would be Aristotle's Metaphysics or Rhetoric or Nicomachean Ethics, or Plato's Republic or Five Dialogues or Meno, or Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, or Seneca's On the Shortness of Life, or Descartes' Meditations on First Philosophy, or Locke's Second Treatise, or Discourses Concerning Government by Sidney. All of these books are interesting reads on their own.

---

Why would you draw a distinction between "philosophy" and "modern philosophy"? This seems bizarre and speaks to the generalizations I made in the OP. It's all philosophy regardless of how old it is. Yes of course read the Greeks but are you gonna then not deal with like Spinoza and Kant?

Anyway if someone wanted the Christian take I'd go with Tillich's A History of Christian Thought since it gets you all the way from Plato to existentialism.