Speaker 1: This episode is brought to you by Middle Born Arms alone.
Speaker 1: Welcome to Mythic Mind, where we pursue wisdom in the
Speaker 1: past between primary and secondary worlds. I'm your host, Andrew Schnyder,
Speaker 1: and I heartily welcome your company. Today we're going to
Speaker 1: continue this off season, at least for the public feed
Speaker 1: by doing some philosophy, as I give you a side
Speaker 1: lesson for my life, death and Meaning with Beowulf and
Speaker 1: Boethia's course that traces some major points in the development
Speaker 1: of Neoplatonic thought from the pre Socratics ancient Greece, through Plato, Aristotle, Platinus,
Speaker 1: and then its baptism into Christian thought by the likes
Speaker 1: of Saint Augustine and Boethius. And then we'll close with
Speaker 1: a recommendation. Neoplatonism or new Platonism, which reaches height around
Speaker 1: the third fifth centuries or so, is largely an attempt
Speaker 1: of paganism to put forward a system that can stand
Speaker 1: against Christianity, but it actually ended up providing some tools
Speaker 1: that Christians like Augustine found to be effective for communicating
Speaker 1: Christian truth and recognizing that Augustine dominated medieval thought as
Speaker 1: well as reformational thought, and beyond. This makes it of
Speaker 1: lasting significance and definitely worth our time to consider. And
Speaker 1: so now let's go ahead and jump into it. Hello
Speaker 1: and welcome, as we discussed some of the major philosophical
Speaker 1: influences on Boethius as seen in the Constellation of Philosophy.
Speaker 1: This lesson was originally made for My Life, Death and
Speaker 1: Meaning with Bewolf and Boethius course, but I'm also going
Speaker 1: to make this one publicly available. If you'd like access
Speaker 1: to all of the material from this course, including on
Speaker 1: Boethius and Beowulf, and the side lessons which go into
Speaker 1: some element of myth or scholarship or philosophy, then you
Speaker 1: could head over to Andrew Snyder dot Patia dot com
Speaker 1: and you can likely find out link wherever you're watching this.
Speaker 1: All materials are you usually keeping once you enroll, and
Speaker 1: so you can go through it asynchronously at whatever time
Speaker 1: man pays works for you. Now, if you've read any
Speaker 1: of the consolation at this point, you know that Boethius
Speaker 1: is pretty fast and loose with his references to classical
Speaker 1: pagan philosophy and poetry, which some find odd for a
Speaker 1: Christian theologian who has been stripped of nearly all earthly fortunes,
Speaker 1: and very well may be facing death, and history tells
Speaker 1: us that he absolutely was facing death as you would
Speaker 1: be executed. However, you have to keep in mind his position.
Speaker 1: This is a Roman Catholic Trinitarian Christian under the heretical
Speaker 1: Aryan Ostrogothic king Theodoric, who took control of Italy after
Speaker 1: killing Odieser, who deposed the last Roman emperor, and so
Speaker 1: as a Catholic Trinitarian affirming Roman Christian, Boethius is very
Speaker 1: much an other relative to the Aryan Germanic king above him,
Speaker 1: and this difference was surely magnified when Boethius was stripped
Speaker 1: of his rank and goods through no apparent fault of
Speaker 1: his own. And this gulf that he faced between his
Speaker 1: ultimate accuser that the king and his current position very
Speaker 1: likely caused him to appreciate vestiges of his rich pagan
Speaker 1: heritage alongside his theological convictions and intellectual framework. He was
Speaker 1: a Roman and a Christian, and both of those formed
Speaker 1: an important part of his identity in the discarded image. C. S.
Speaker 1: Lewis says, like this quote, Catholic Christendom and that high
Speaker 1: pagan pass to which he felt so deep a loyalty,
Speaker 1: were united in his outlook by their common contrast to
Speaker 1: Theodoric and his huge, fair skinned beer drinking boasting things
Speaker 1: was there's no time for stressing whatever divided him from Virgil,
Speaker 1: Seneca Plato in the Old Republican Heroes end quote. And
Speaker 1: so with that in mind, looking to some of the
Speaker 1: pagan traditions and philosophies that Boethius found particularly palatable will
Speaker 1: help us to get a better handle on what exactly
Speaker 1: he is doing in the consolation. In this lesson, we're
Speaker 1: going to be taking a high level look at the
Speaker 1: emergence of Neoplatonism from the pre Socratics up to its
Speaker 1: baptism into early medieval Christian thought with the likes of Augustine. Neoplatonism,
Speaker 1: selfish to say, was an active force from about the
Speaker 1: third to six centuries or so, and of course it
Speaker 1: had significant influence beyond that time, even up to the
Speaker 1: present day. According to Augustine, the Platonist by which he
Speaker 1: most directly meant, the group of thinkers we today would
Speaker 1: call the Neoplatonists provide the pagan school that comes closest
Speaker 1: to Christian thought, and it is actually most beneficial in
Speaker 1: helping Christians to systematically formulate what they believe about the
Speaker 1: nature and working of the cosmos. Not so much that
Speaker 1: neoplatonism gives us new substance, but it does give us
Speaker 1: an intellectual framework for arranging the substance that we have
Speaker 1: through scripture and through at this point early Church tradition.
Speaker 1: And so Augustine and others thought that the Neoplatonists really
Speaker 1: helped them to formulate their understanding of the nature and
Speaker 1: the working of the cosmos. And Augustine, of course, was
Speaker 1: of monumental importance for setting many courses that would continue
Speaker 1: through the Middle Ages and beyond. And Boethius, who was
Speaker 1: a couple generations after Augustine, definitely operates within this trajectory.
Speaker 1: And so I think that we're going to better see
Speaker 1: some of what's happening in the constellation if we have
Speaker 1: a better handle on this system of thought. Now. As
Speaker 1: a warning, especially if anyone is watching this who is
Speaker 1: already versed in this topic, this presentation is very much
Speaker 1: intended to be a summary of some of the major
Speaker 1: elements at play here in the emergence of neoplatonism. This
Speaker 1: is nothing like an exhaustive study of Neoplatonism, or any
Speaker 1: of these connected ideas for some degree of scale. But
Speaker 1: I'm about to cover in about fifteen sl generally takes
Speaker 1: about three weeks at the beginning of my on campus
Speaker 1: medieval philosophy course, and it could easily make for an
Speaker 1: entire course in itself and beyond. And so with that
Speaker 1: being said, you can consider this to be a fairly
Speaker 1: hefty introduction rather than a comprehensive study. And so note
Speaker 1: that we're not covering any of our sources exhaustibly, and
Speaker 1: we're also not including all the sources that could be
Speaker 1: brought into this. All right, with that in mind, let
Speaker 1: us go ahead and get started with the pre Socratics. Now,
Speaker 1: the history of Western philosophy typically begins with a group
Speaker 1: of philosophers in ancient Greece referred to as the pre Socratics,
Speaker 1: because well, they came before Socrates. Now one hand, it's
Speaker 1: a little bit arbitrary to ever pick a beginning point
Speaker 1: of philosophy, because the truth is, to be human is
Speaker 1: to be a philosopher. To be human is to think
Speaker 1: about the way that the world is in our role
Speaker 1: within it, and how to move every closer to the
Speaker 1: path of wisdom. The path of achieving the goals of
Speaker 1: human nature, and so that's been happening for as long
Speaker 1: as we've had consciousness. However, it is helpful to come
Speaker 1: up with a starting point, and going back to the
Speaker 1: Presocratics and specifically the Presocratic philosopher theies kind of makes
Speaker 1: sense because these are some of the early sources that
Speaker 1: we have that can go to through written records, where
Speaker 1: we see people intentionally asking questions through reason, like why
Speaker 1: is there a basic harmony in nature? What accounts for this?
Speaker 1: And so they're asking these broad level philosophical questions. They're
Speaker 1: delving into the fundamental nature of reality, and we have
Speaker 1: a written pathway to at least approach understanding of what
Speaker 1: they were doing. And so this is not a bad
Speaker 1: place to begin the history of Western philosophy, which is
Speaker 1: why it usually begins there. And so at this point
Speaker 1: with the Presocratics, we're mostly relying on fragments of writing
Speaker 1: and quotes provided by later philosophers, and so because we
Speaker 1: don't have a lot from these early thinkers directly, they
Speaker 1: usually just get luved together into this group of the
Speaker 1: pre Socratics. Now, as I just mentioned, the first member
Speaker 1: of this group that the we usually go for the
Speaker 1: beginning of history of philosophy courses is a guy named
Speaker 1: Thales who recognized that there is harmony and order in
Speaker 1: the natural world, and so he wanted to get to
Speaker 1: the bottom of its cause. Well, he supposed that this
Speaker 1: harmony is owed to the fact that there must be
Speaker 1: some element that underlies everything. You break everything down into
Speaker 1: its most basic level, and you get one thing, and
Speaker 1: this he theorized, was water. Now that might sound a
Speaker 1: little bit silly to us today, but it makes some
Speaker 1: sense that his stage of things, for example, plant and
Speaker 1: animal life requires water. Water is all around us, especially
Speaker 1: Phi Lippy in Greece. Water is generally moving, which accounts
Speaker 1: for change, and water can present itself in three states
Speaker 1: solid liquid, gas, and so it's not a bad early contender. Well,
Speaker 1: Thales was followed by others who proposed other elements you know,
Speaker 1: such as earth, air, fire. But early philosophical critiques made
Speaker 1: it evident that no one physical element could account for
Speaker 1: everything because the elements supposed each other. Fire could not
Speaker 1: be water, air could not be earth, and so forth.
Speaker 1: And so Heraclitis takes the conversation in a new direction.
Speaker 1: Instead of looking to a physical element to describe all
Speaker 1: of reality. He said that everything is change or everything
Speaker 1: is changing, everything is moving, everything is in a process
Speaker 1: of flux. Now, he did say that the cosmos is
Speaker 1: made of fire, but this was really just a poetic
Speaker 1: way of emphasizing the idea that, like fire, the elements
Speaker 1: are ever moving in and against each other, flaring up
Speaker 1: and diminishing from moment to moment. But he most famously
Speaker 1: said that you cannot step into the same river twice.
Speaker 1: As we get quoted from Plato, Heraclitis says somewhere that
Speaker 1: all things give way and nothing remains, and likening existing
Speaker 1: things to the flow of a river, he says that
Speaker 1: you cannot step twice into the same river. And this
Speaker 1: is because you step into the river, you step into
Speaker 1: the water, you step out, you step back in, and
Speaker 1: now you're in new water. And he said, this is
Speaker 1: what all reality is like. It's ever moving, it's never
Speaker 1: the same, it's always in a state of process, it's
Speaker 1: always becoming, it is never being. Now, if this is
Speaker 1: all that he believed, then it would present some pretty
Speaker 1: serious problems. For example, if everything is moving, then our
Speaker 1: knowledge is never accurate because the picture of the river
Speaker 1: that we have in our minds. It never corresponds to
Speaker 1: the way the river actually is in any given moment.
Speaker 1: It's always out of date. And so our minds are
Speaker 1: always separated from the state of things around us, because
Speaker 1: there is no state, there is only process. Also, this
Speaker 1: would create a crisis of identity, because it would mean
Speaker 1: that there is no me that endures across time. On
Speaker 1: a physical level, we know that our cells are constantly
Speaker 1: being replaced, and maybe I might find recourse to an
Speaker 1: idea of the soul, but it's not even that continually
Speaker 1: undergoing change, adopting and pushing away desires, and just continually
Speaker 1: taking new forms as I undergo experience and as I
Speaker 1: direct the orientation of my soul. And so even the
Speaker 1: soul is constantly in a state of change. And so
Speaker 1: who is the me that I suppose endoors across time. Well,
Speaker 1: if literally everything is moving, then there is no me.
Speaker 1: There's only a succession of becomings. Well, fortunately, heraclitis does
Speaker 1: give us some direction toward constancy, towards stability, somewhere where
Speaker 1: we might be able to find some rest. So, everything,
Speaker 1: or at least nearly everything, may be changing, but it
Speaker 1: always changes in a consistent and orderly manner. The river
Speaker 1: may always be moving, but through reason I can reliably
Speaker 1: predict how and where it will move, and so change
Speaker 1: itself is constant. Now why is this well? Heraclite has
Speaker 1: found his answer in the lagos or the word, which
Speaker 1: is an idea that will become very important in the
Speaker 1: history of philosophy. And we even see some of this
Speaker 1: in the New Testament. While some biblical scholars may argue
Speaker 1: that Greek wisdom is not being referenced here, I've not
Speaker 1: been completely convinced that it's not at play. When John
Speaker 1: begins his Gospel with NRK handhold logos in the beginning
Speaker 1: was the word, and then he proceeds to explain how
Speaker 1: the world was made through this word. For Heraclitis, the
Speaker 1: word is the one staple reality that holds together what
Speaker 1: would otherwise be the chaotic and the formless and the void.
Speaker 1: And me just think about what the word word means.
Speaker 1: And imagine you have a bag of scrabble tiles and
Speaker 1: you pour them out, and odds are they're not going
Speaker 1: to go into the form of a word, just going
Speaker 1: to have a random cacophony of sounds represented by the
Speaker 1: letters that are formless and void of meaning. Well, the
Speaker 1: word is the form that it then imposes itself on
Speaker 1: the letters, arranging them in an orderly way, where now
Speaker 1: they contain and they express meaning. And so a word
Speaker 1: is what brings order and meaning out of what would
Speaker 1: otherwise be chaotic and void. That's what a word does,
Speaker 1: and that is what the word does on a cosmic scale.
Speaker 1: As the apostle Paul says in Colossians, in him all
Speaker 1: things hold together because he is the word. He is
Speaker 1: the lagos. And for Heraclitis, this lagos does not only
Speaker 1: explain what we see in the natural world. Or better yet,
Speaker 1: he maintains that we are part of the natural world.
Speaker 1: Maybe that's a better way of saying that, and said,
Speaker 1: the lagos gives direction for how we live our lives.
Speaker 1: In following the Lagos, the various competing elements of the
Speaker 1: human psyche and of human desire can find order and
Speaker 1: move in a unified direction. However, at least based on
Speaker 1: what we have, Heraclitis is only beginning to develop this
Speaker 1: logos doctrine, and so he is principally known as the
Speaker 1: philosopher of becoming or of change. On the other side
Speaker 1: of the spectrum of being becoming, we have Parmenides, the
Speaker 1: philosopher of being, who argues that movement is rationally impossible.
Speaker 1: As he says in his poem on Nature, being is
Speaker 1: uncreated and imperishable, whole, unique, unwavering, and complete, meaning it
Speaker 1: has no potential. There's nowhere that it can go. The
Speaker 1: easiest way to understand his argument is to consider paradoxes
Speaker 1: that are provided by his student Zeno. Zeno has this.
Speaker 1: Imagine a race between the Greek hero Achilles and a tortoise. Now,
Speaker 1: obviously Achilles has the advantage, and so the tortoise gets ahead.
Speaker 1: Start to keep the math easy, let's say the tortoise
Speaker 1: begins one hundred yards in front of the starting line
Speaker 1: where the Achilles begins. The race goes off, and then
Speaker 1: Achilles takes off. Now, before he can get to where
Speaker 1: the tortoise began at one hundred yards, he first has
Speaker 1: to cross half that distance. He has to go fifty yards.
Speaker 1: Well before he goes fifty yards, he has to go
Speaker 1: twenty five. Well before he goes twenty five, he has
Speaker 1: to go twelve and a half, and so forth, and
Speaker 1: so forth, and so forth, and so rationally speaking, mathematically speaking,
Speaker 1: it turns out that there is an infinite amount of
Speaker 1: distance between any two points. Well, how long does it
Speaker 1: take to cross an infinite distance? Well, it takes an
Speaker 1: infinite amount of time, which is another way of saying
Speaker 1: that movement is rationally impossible. Now, you may be tempted
Speaker 1: to say that this is absurd, because we experience an
Speaker 1: observed motion all the time. However, Parmenides believe that there's
Speaker 1: a conflict between our sense, experience and reason, and so
Speaker 1: we ought to choose reason right, because if we're not
Speaker 1: going to prioritize reason, then what business do we have
Speaker 1: do in philosophy to begin with? With this move he
Speaker 1: really serves as an early modern, as Descartes, going to
Speaker 1: do the same thing right, He's going to isolate reason
Speaker 1: over again sense experience, and that's going to set the
Speaker 1: tone for a lot of what happens in modern and
Speaker 1: postmodern philosophy. And I would consider that modern turn, which
Speaker 1: very much is I believe in keeping with Parmenides, I
Speaker 1: think that it leads to disastrous ends. But in any case,
Speaker 1: here we have our philosopher, a being who believes that
Speaker 1: reason leads us to a completely stable reality, the world
Speaker 1: of being. Well, in Plato, being and becoming will both
Speaker 1: find their place. Promenides and Heraclitis will be brought together.
Speaker 1: And I believe that the best introduction to Plato's thought
Speaker 1: is the one that is usually chosen for this purpose,
Speaker 1: and that is Plato's allegory the cave, which is found
Speaker 1: in the Republic. In this section of the Republic, Soco
Speaker 1: has us imagine a cave. In this cave are prisoners
Speaker 1: who are shackled, and they've been in that position for
Speaker 1: their entire lives. All they can do is stare at
Speaker 1: the wall in front of them, and on this wall
Speaker 1: they see shadows of objects and animals and whatnot pass by.
Speaker 1: These shadows are the only reality they have ever known,
Speaker 1: the only thing they've ever perceived. Eventually, one of the
Speaker 1: prisoners is set free. And how this happens we're not told,
Speaker 1: but it doesn't really matter for the allegory. And so
Speaker 1: he's set free. He turns around and he sees the
Speaker 1: fire that had been producing the cave's light, and he's
Speaker 1: initially pained greatly by looking at light directly for the
Speaker 1: first time, he sees these cutouts that have been passing
Speaker 1: back and forth in front of the fire to project
Speaker 1: the shadows and between the pain of his eyes and
Speaker 1: the confusion regarding what he's looking at, he's inclined to
Speaker 1: go back to watching the shadows because they seemed more
Speaker 1: real to him. At this time. However, he is, apparently
Speaker 1: through no real design of his own, kind of almost
Speaker 1: dragged out. He's compelled out of the cave and up
Speaker 1: to the surface world, and now he's blinded by the
Speaker 1: light of the sun. But his eyes eventually adjust and
Speaker 1: he experiences the real things that were previously imaged on
Speaker 1: the cutouts, which he previously only saw through the images
Speaker 1: of the shadows, and so now he is in genuine reality,
Speaker 1: illuminated by the genuine light of the sun. He eventually
Speaker 1: remembers the prisoners who are still in the cave, and
Speaker 1: he feels pity on them, and so he goes back
Speaker 1: to share this new revelation that he's had. Now at
Speaker 1: this point, he's a difficult time seeing in the darkness
Speaker 1: because he's used to the light, but he eventually finds
Speaker 1: his way down and he tells the prisoners of this
Speaker 1: glorious reality that he has experienced. Well, they don't take
Speaker 1: too kindly to this, as they've developed a value system
Speaker 1: a hierarchy based on who is best at figuring out
Speaker 1: the shadow pattern and detecting what would come next. This
Speaker 1: new revelation shattered their shadow society, and so they initially
Speaker 1: thought him to be mad, and eventually they got ahold
Speaker 1: of him, and they actually killed him. And of course,
Speaker 1: when Plato is telling us this story, he very much
Speaker 1: has in mind his teacher Socrates, who was executed by
Speaker 1: the city of Athens for practicing his philosophy. In addition
Speaker 1: to providing a general introduction of philosophy, this allegory gives
Speaker 1: us some images that are particularly helpful in understanding Plato's
Speaker 1: system of thought. The shadow world or the shadowlands, which
Speaker 1: is a term that C. S. Lewis adopts, is the
Speaker 1: one that we all have access to by nature, kind
Speaker 1: of like by default. That's probably even a better word
Speaker 1: than saying by nature. That's more of a loaded term.
Speaker 1: And so by default, as material beings in a material world,
Speaker 1: we all have access to this shadowland, and this is
Speaker 1: the corruptible world of partial truths or of obscure truths.
Speaker 1: Perhaps we can expect to see obscure particular images of justice,
Speaker 1: but we will never see the ideal pure justice in
Speaker 1: any particular historical instantiation. So too with love, and with
Speaker 1: the ideal of humanity, with loyalty, or even the ideal
Speaker 1: of a horse or whatever else. All of these ideas,
Speaker 1: the full actualizations of what things are, imperfectly in potential,
Speaker 1: reside above the material world, in what Plato would call
Speaker 1: the world of the forms. And so by default we
Speaker 1: live in the shadowy world of becoming, but we can
Speaker 1: aspire to the illuminated world of being. After all, if
Speaker 1: you are to have a shadow, there must be a
Speaker 1: solid object in order to cast the shadow. Well, the
Speaker 1: solid objects that cast the shadows are the forms, such
Speaker 1: as the form of justice and whatnot. These are things
Speaker 1: that we can know through our minds, but it actually
Speaker 1: takes more than that. To no justice, for example, is
Speaker 1: not just to be able to provide a definition, although
Speaker 1: such propositional knowledge is important, But to really no justice
Speaker 1: is to be just, to love justice and to instantiate
Speaker 1: justice in your life. Remember that philosophy in its truest
Speaker 1: sense is the love of wisdom, not just the knowledge
Speaker 1: of wisdom, but the love of wisdom. And so the
Speaker 1: forms of the highest level of reality that we can
Speaker 1: consciously we know, and as we better know such reality,
Speaker 1: we gain stability in this world of change. Even when
Speaker 1: we experience in justice, we ourselves can still be rooted
Speaker 1: in the unending, eternal reality of justice itself. Well, remember
Speaker 1: that I said that the world of forms is an
Speaker 1: illuminated reality. Well, if it is illuminated, then it must
Speaker 1: be illuminated by something. And this something in the allegory
Speaker 1: is the Sun, which for Plato is the form of
Speaker 1: the good, or we would not even be far off
Speaker 1: to call this God, as Plato seems to do in
Speaker 1: the timaeis Now. Admittedly, this is a place of some
Speaker 1: contention within Platonic scholarship, but for our purposes I don't
Speaker 1: believe that this complation is unfounded. And so God is
Speaker 1: the light that illuminates the world of the forms, which
Speaker 1: is the solid substance that cast shadows in the world
Speaker 1: of becoming. And just as you do not stare at
Speaker 1: the sun directly to understand its light, but you must
Speaker 1: instead look to what it illumines, you must look to
Speaker 1: the effects in order to understand the cause, so too
Speaker 1: we own only understand God by understanding the forms. You
Speaker 1: look at the sun directly and you go blind. And
Speaker 1: this makes sense if we say that reason is good,
Speaker 1: then we mean that goodness is a higher reality than reason.
Speaker 1: Reason participates in the goodness that makes all good things good.
Speaker 1: And so what this means is that we can never,
Speaker 1: really never fully apprehend God directly by reason, because the good,
Speaker 1: the good that makes reason good, stands above reason. And
Speaker 1: so we see this idea in the Medievals as well,
Speaker 1: that as we approach the heights that reason can assail,
Speaker 1: we have to engage at that point in a kind
Speaker 1: of mysticism that doesn't work against reason. Right, we're still
Speaker 1: making use of reason. We're not saying anything goes, but
Speaker 1: there is a kind of mysticism that we need to
Speaker 1: use to close the gap between reason and God. This
Speaker 1: gap must be traversed in love and in faith, in
Speaker 1: a realm that goes beyond what reason can assail. And
Speaker 1: we see this idea in Scripture as well, as we're
Speaker 1: told that God's presence is engulfed in unassailable light or
Speaker 1: impenetrable darkness, which are two ways of saying the same thing.
Speaker 1: This is not a place in which we can see
Speaker 1: by ordinary means. So for Plato we have got at
Speaker 1: the top. Then we have forms in the knowable world
Speaker 1: of being, and then the shadows or particulars are in
Speaker 1: the world of becoming. And let's flush us out a
Speaker 1: little bit more with his dialogue that gives us his
Speaker 1: creation account. That is, the tomaeis the Tomayos is a fascinating,
Speaker 1: albeit fairly difficult, platonic dialogue that became very influential in
Speaker 1: the history of pre modern thought. At a side note,
Speaker 1: this is also where we learn about Atlantis, and so
Speaker 1: that may be a hook for some of you to
Speaker 1: pick it up. But for now we're going to talk cosmology,
Speaker 1: and so let's take a look at this. I'm going
Speaker 1: to read this fairly long passage and then we'll talk
Speaker 1: about it a little bit. In my opinion, we must
Speaker 1: certainly make this distinction. First, what is that which is
Speaker 1: always and has no becoming? And what is that which
Speaker 1: is becoming but never is? And so again we're dealing
Speaker 1: with being and becoming. Now the former being, ever, the
Speaker 1: same is comprehended by the activity of news along with
Speaker 1: an account, the latter, by opinion, along with sense perception
Speaker 1: to void of an account, it comes into being and
Speaker 1: passes away and never actually is. Again, all that comes
Speaker 1: into being must come into being from some cause, for
Speaker 1: it is impossible for anything to be generated without any cause. Now,
Speaker 1: whenever a craftsman looks always to the unchanging, referring to
Speaker 1: something like this as his model, he will produce its
Speaker 1: form and character, and all that he fashions in this
Speaker 1: way will necessarily be beautiful. But if he looks to
Speaker 1: something that has come to be and uses a generated model,
Speaker 1: the product will not be beautiful. And so in this passage
Speaker 1: Plato says that we initially have three things. We have
Speaker 1: the craftsman, who we can shorthand ask God. He's going
Speaker 1: to refer to as the God. And so we have God.
Speaker 1: We have the forms, and we have undifferentiated becoming. We
Speaker 1: could even borrow the language of Genesis one two and
Speaker 1: call this last piece the formless and the void. In fact,
Speaker 1: calling it a formless is very much in tune with Plato,
Speaker 1: because you removed form, and all you have is the chaotic.
Speaker 1: You have the formless and the void, something very much
Speaker 1: like nothingness. Well, the material world as we know it
Speaker 1: is the formless void, which has become something ordered and substantial,
Speaker 1: which for Plato is the same thing as saying that
Speaker 1: it has come to be. It has been made into
Speaker 1: something real, something knowable. Well, something is not made to
Speaker 1: be without something that makes it to be. In other words,
Speaker 1: a crafted work requires a craftsman who himself must not
Speaker 1: come to be. He cannot be part of the world
Speaker 1: of change, and therefore he must be entirely stable. He
Speaker 1: must be eternal rather than temporal, and he must be
Speaker 1: the cause of all ordered temporal reality. Now, the design
Speaker 1: that the craftsmen used to order the otherwise formless and
Speaker 1: chaotic world of becoming is found in the eternal, unmoving
Speaker 1: world of the forms which are apprehended by noose or mind.
Speaker 1: He goes on to say that it is surely obvious
Speaker 1: to everyone that the model was everlasting, since the universe
Speaker 1: is the most beautiful of created things, and the craftsmen
Speaker 1: is the most excellent of causes. So having come into
Speaker 1: being in this way, it has been made to resemble
Speaker 1: that which is comprehended by reason and intelligence, and remains
Speaker 1: the same. And so, in other words, this intellectual blueprint
Speaker 1: that the craftsmen that God used in order to order
Speaker 1: the otherwise formless and void cost moose, is itself eternal,
Speaker 1: It is unmoving, It is in the world, It is
Speaker 1: in the realm of being, and don't worry. In just
Speaker 1: a moment, a couple of slides, I'm going to give
Speaker 1: you a visual aid for mapping this out. But first
Speaker 1: let's look at one more passage in the Timaeus, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to go ahead and read this, and then
Speaker 1: again we'll talk about it. Well, let us state the
Speaker 1: reason why becoming and the universe were constructed by the artificer.
Speaker 1: He was good, and in the good, no envy ever
Speaker 1: arises about anything, and being devoid of envy, he desired
Speaker 1: that all things be as much like himself as possible.
Speaker 1: We would then be absolutely right to accept from men
Speaker 1: of understanding that this is the supreme source of becoming
Speaker 1: and of the cosmos. For the God desired that all
Speaker 1: be good, and as far as possible, nothing be imperfect.
Speaker 1: He therefore toook everything that was visible, which was not
Speaker 1: at rest but moving discordantly and randomly, and he led
Speaker 1: it from disorder to order, regarding orders entirely superior to disorder.
Speaker 1: But it was not then, nor is it now lawful,
Speaker 1: for the supreme good to enact anything except the supremely beautiful.
Speaker 1: So on reflection, he discovered that from whatever is visible
Speaker 1: by nature nothing that is made without noos is on
Speaker 1: the whole ever better than something which possesses nous, and furthermore,
Speaker 1: that news cannot be present in anything in the absence
Speaker 1: of soul. Based on this reflection, having placed noos in soul,
Speaker 1: in soul in body, he constructed the universe so that,
Speaker 1: once completed, it would naturally be as beautiful and excellent
Speaker 1: a piece of work as was possible. Accordingly, based upon
Speaker 1: the likely account, we must state that this cosmos is
Speaker 1: a living creature with soul and news that has, in
Speaker 1: truth come into being through the providence of God. So
Speaker 1: we see at the beginning of this passage that God
Speaker 1: is good, and that he constructed the world to imitate
Speaker 1: his own goodness to the extent that contingent and moving
Speaker 1: things can approximate independent and eternal goodness. Now, in order
Speaker 1: for there to be rational order, there has to be
Speaker 1: nous or mind. But minds do not exist by themselves,
Speaker 1: but are placed within souls, and so the eternal and
Speaker 1: unmoving realities are God and the forms. They both operate
Speaker 1: in this realm of being. But in order for the
Speaker 1: forms to be instantiated in the moving cosmos, they must
Speaker 1: be apprehended by nous by mind. But in order for
Speaker 1: a nows to be instantiated, it must be placed in
Speaker 1: a soul, and so, according to Plato, the cosmos itself
Speaker 1: has a soul, a world soul that also contains news,
Speaker 1: which is directed towards the forms, which are something like
Speaker 1: the wisdom of God. A little bit later on in
Speaker 1: the history of thought this can turn into the mind
Speaker 1: of God, but for now the exact relationship between the
Speaker 1: forms and God is not clearly worked out. It's kind
Speaker 1: of ambiguous in Plato. But as with the cosmos, each
Speaker 1: individual operates the kind of microcosm. As we have material
Speaker 1: bodies that are embedded in the changing material world, which
Speaker 1: is by nature given order to corruption and formlessness. But
Speaker 1: we also have souls which are capable of movement, and
Speaker 1: we have minds, which, rightly oriented by soul, can aim
Speaker 1: upward toward higher, unmoving reality. And ultimately, in doing so,
Speaker 1: we're moving in the direction of the God that we
Speaker 1: cannot apprehend by mind. And so we use mind to
Speaker 1: move toward God, recognizing that God himself exists beyond the
Speaker 1: reaches of news, beyond the reaches of mind. I know
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, Mind singularly, because for Plato, it's not
Speaker 1: just that we have minds analogous to the divine mind.
Speaker 1: Our minds are actually kind of sharing. In the divine mind,
Speaker 1: there is news, not so much newses. And so in
Speaker 1: using mind appropriately, we're not just reaching toward God. We
Speaker 1: are very much relying on God. We're following the divine
Speaker 1: light that comes directly from God, the divine light that
Speaker 1: we see when we are reasoning appropriately, that the goodness
Speaker 1: of God pervades all existent realities. And so in the
Speaker 1: upward path, you turn inward. You don't turn outward toward
Speaker 1: material things perceived by the senses. We turn inward toward
Speaker 1: the soul. You turn inward toward the mind. And as
Speaker 1: you turn inward, you are also moving upward. You're going
Speaker 1: further up and further in. The Realms of fairy are
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Speaker 1: Here we are with my very sophisticated diagram, moving in
Speaker 1: order of priority, moving from substance to nothingness. We have
Speaker 1: God who uses the forms, which are something like the
Speaker 1: wisdom or mind of God, although again Plato himself is
Speaker 1: a little bit hazy about this exact connection, but in
Speaker 1: any case, God uses the eternal forms as blueprints for
Speaker 1: ordering of the material world, which is by nature formless
Speaker 1: and void. But the forms need to be apprehended by News,
Speaker 1: which needs to be placed within the soul, which mediates
Speaker 1: between the news and the body. And on the other
Speaker 1: side of the ordered body or matter, we have nothingness,
Speaker 1: which can also be understood as evil because it is
Speaker 1: a movement away from the goodness of God. It's movement
Speaker 1: away from the good order that God imposes on the
Speaker 1: otherwise chaotic, and we on the path of wisdom, will
Speaker 1: use the agency of our souls to prioritize the life
Speaker 1: of the mind, which reaches to the forms and ultimately
Speaker 1: in the direction of God. Alternatively, we also have the
Speaker 1: option of prioritizing material things and living as beasts, seeking
Speaker 1: nothing more than the fulfillment of carnal desires, and in
Speaker 1: so doing we become deformed. We move in the direction
Speaker 1: of nothingness, we become as ghosts or shades. It's also
Speaker 1: worth noting that in this dialogue Plato indicates that the
Speaker 1: planets or wanderers, which is what that word means, are
Speaker 1: associated with the gods, and they move in ordered, interlocking
Speaker 1: spherical motion. In fact, I should say that the Tomayis
Speaker 1: seems to indicate that these heavenly gods are actually the
Speaker 1: true gods, as Plato demotes the Greek pantheon to the
Speaker 1: rank of damons, a secondary class of divine helpers, and
Speaker 1: so Plato himself is basically monotheistic. In fact, I would
Speaker 1: say he is monotheistic. Now, these spherical movements of the
Speaker 1: planets are derivative of the spherical movement of the entire cosmos,
Speaker 1: because perfectly consistent spherical movement is as close as moving
Speaker 1: reality can get to imitating the perfect stability of God.
Speaker 1: In this understanding of the heavens is the beginning, or
Speaker 1: at least a significant leap in near the beginning, of
Speaker 1: an important cosmological development that will reach its height in
Speaker 1: the Middle Ages. And now we are going to jump
Speaker 1: over to Aristotle, Plato's student. Aristotle deviates from his teacher
Speaker 1: in some rather important ways, but he also maintains some
Speaker 1: important points of continuity in his metaphysics. Aristotle gives us
Speaker 1: his famous cosmological argument for the existence of a prime
Speaker 1: mover or an uncaused cause. This is an important argument
Speaker 1: in the history of philosophy and was readily adopted by
Speaker 1: the likes of Thomas Aquinas as proof for the existence
Speaker 1: of God. In this argument, Aristotle makes an argument regarding motion.
Speaker 1: To summarize, anything that begins to move is moved by
Speaker 1: something else. Follow the sequence of dominoes back far enough,
Speaker 1: and eventually you have to arrive at a starting place,
Speaker 1: or else you have an infinite regress. And without a
Speaker 1: real beginning, motion would be impossible. So the argument goes, well,
Speaker 1: motion is possible. Obviously things move, and so there must
Speaker 1: be a real beginning. There must be something that sets
Speaker 1: the dominoes in motion. There must be something that moves
Speaker 1: but is not itself moved. This something is the prime mover,
Speaker 1: which Aristotle also refers to as God. This God is
Speaker 1: eternal and fully actualized, meaning it has no potential. There's
Speaker 1: nothing that it can do, because it's already the best
Speaker 1: it could possibly be. It is eternal and unchanging goodness,
Speaker 1: eternally contemplating its own goodness, because well, what else is
Speaker 1: there for fully actualized goodness to do? If God is
Speaker 1: fully good, Aristotle proposes, then God will be eternally focused
Speaker 1: on that which is most good, which is himself. And
Speaker 1: so this God does not intentionally do anything to set
Speaker 1: the cosmos in motion. It instead moves the cosmos as
Speaker 1: a beloved does its lover by producing desire. This begins
Speaker 1: with the outermost edge of the cosmos, fe of the
Speaker 1: primum mobile or the first movable sphere. This outermost level
Speaker 1: of the cosmos moves in a perfect spherical dance and
Speaker 1: imitation of its beloved, the perfectly stable, unmoving God, who
Speaker 1: is fully actualized goodness. This great cosmic dance then moves
Speaker 1: through the firmament or the stellatom, the realm of the
Speaker 1: fixed stars, then to the planetary spheres of Saturn, Jupiter, Mars,
Speaker 1: the Sun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon, and finally the Earth,
Speaker 1: which is stable, almost as a kind of mockery of
Speaker 1: the stability of God. And we see this idea really
Speaker 1: play out in Dante, where you go to the center
Speaker 1: of the Earth and that's where you find Hell. Go
Speaker 1: to the center of Hell and you find that it
Speaker 1: is frozen over. And so Satan is perfectly stable, just
Speaker 1: as God is perfectly stable. But for very different reason.
Speaker 1: And so the closer you get to absolute evil, and
Speaker 1: notice I said, the closest you get. And so in
Speaker 1: this kind of model we're working with, there is no
Speaker 1: such thing really as absolute evil, because so the evil
Speaker 1: would be nothingness. And so even Satan is at least
Speaker 1: as close to nothingness as you can get. And so
Speaker 1: as he is on this other side of being, the
Speaker 1: other side of the spectrum from God, who fully is,
Speaker 1: Satan also is stable, but very different reality. He is
Speaker 1: frozen over. Satan is stable because he lacks actuality, whereas
Speaker 1: God is stable because he lacks potential. And so is
Speaker 1: a kind of inversion, a kind of mockery of the good.
Speaker 1: So too, Earth, which is the furthest away from the
Speaker 1: reality of the prime mover is, it is stable for
Speaker 1: somewhat similar reasons. And so the heavens move in perfect order.
Speaker 1: But then once you get below the moon, once you
Speaker 1: get to Earth, we are now at the furthest point
Speaker 1: away from the initiation of the great dance. We've lost
Speaker 1: the same sense of desire that we see in the heavens.
Speaker 1: And so the perfectly ordered movement starts to move into chaos,
Speaker 1: that starts to move into corruption. Once we get down
Speaker 1: to earth, this is where things are the most chaotic. Well,
Speaker 1: now let's jump ahead to Platinus, who is likely the
Speaker 1: most important foundational figure for the Platonic tradition that would
Speaker 1: become known as Neoplatonism, which will be essentially Platonic, but
Speaker 1: with borrowed elements from Aristotle, the Stoics, and others, as
Speaker 1: well as some innovations, aim to counteract the emerging critiques
Speaker 1: of Christianity. Of course, the irony is that, at least
Speaker 1: according to Augustine and those who would sympathize with him,
Speaker 1: that the Neoplatonists attempted to respond to Christianity, but in
Speaker 1: so doing they actually have created some useful tools for
Speaker 1: communicating Christian truth. In any case, let's take a look
Speaker 1: at a couple of quotes from Platinus concerning good and evil. So,
Speaker 1: for the good, he says that the good is that
Speaker 1: on which all else depends, toward which all existences aspire
Speaker 1: as to their source and their need, while itself is
Speaker 1: without need, sufficient to itself, aspiring to no other, the
Speaker 1: measure and term of all, giving out from itself the
Speaker 1: intellec actual principle and existence and soul in life and
Speaker 1: all intellective act, and then of evil. If the solution
Speaker 1: is that the one act of knowing covers contraries, and
Speaker 1: that as evil is the contrary to good, the one
Speaker 1: act would grasp good and evil together, then to no
Speaker 1: evil there must be first a clear perception and understanding
Speaker 1: of good. Since the nobler existences precede the baser in
Speaker 1: our ideal forms, while the less good hold no such standing,
Speaker 1: are near to non being. Okay, so I know that
Speaker 1: for many of you you probably didn't follow that, and
Speaker 1: that's honestly to be expected at this point. But Platinus
Speaker 1: affirms with Plato that the good is the ultimate and
Speaker 1: independent reality on which everything else depends. Because this ultimate
Speaker 1: good is the one place of absolute order, of absolute unity,
Speaker 1: Platinus and the new Platonists will often refer to him
Speaker 1: to this Good or this God as the one. This
Speaker 1: is the place of absolute order, where there is no differentiation,
Speaker 1: there's no distinction. As with Aristotle's primever, this God is
Speaker 1: eternally focused on its own goodness, and so it's not
Speaker 1: intentionally related to any external realities beyond itself. However, as
Speaker 1: it eternally turns in on itself, it also eternally emanates
Speaker 1: out contingent reality. Think of this like ripples in a pond,
Speaker 1: or perhaps as a tiered fountain in which water gushes
Speaker 1: up from the top tier and then trickles down to
Speaker 1: the other tiers. Or maybe better yet, think of the
Speaker 1: one as the Sun, which cast out as rays, not
Speaker 1: because it chooses to, but because that is its nature,
Speaker 1: is simply what it does. And objects closer to the
Speaker 1: Sun will receive its light and its heat more fully,
Speaker 1: but the slightness heat will diminish the further away you move.
Speaker 1: And so emanations closest to the one closest to God
Speaker 1: are good in proportion to said nearness, and more distant
Speaker 1: emanations are less good, until finally we drop off from
Speaker 1: existence altogether, just as the rays of the Sun eventually
Speaker 1: dwindle into nothingness. This nothingness, or rather this presence of lack,
Speaker 1: if we want to put it that way, is what
Speaker 1: evil is. It is lack. It is a privation of being.
Speaker 1: It is a movement into formlessness. Now, these quotes here
Speaker 1: are fairly abstract, and you can spend some time bowling
Speaker 1: over them if you so desire, But I don't want
Speaker 1: to get overly bogged down in Platinus at the moment.
Speaker 1: If this were a course in ancient or early medieval philosophy,
Speaker 1: we would spend some more time here. But for our
Speaker 1: current purposes it is sufficient to say that the Good
Speaker 1: or a God or the One is the only fully
Speaker 1: actualized reality, and that we are good in as much
Speaker 1: as we approximate this ultimate reality, and that we are evil,
Speaker 1: and as much as we turn from this God toward
Speaker 1: lesser things, because turning to lesser things, such as through
Speaker 1: our carnal desires for material goods, orients us in the
Speaker 1: direction of the formless and the void, which is evil.
Speaker 1: Now Here we have our cosmological model that looks similar
Speaker 1: to the diagram that I gave you for Plato. At
Speaker 1: the top we have the One or God. The first
Speaker 1: emanation from God is platos Nus. Although at this point
Speaker 1: we have some clarification regarding the location of the forms,
Speaker 1: they exist within the News, which is now explicitly identified
Speaker 1: as the mind of God, and so the forms the
Speaker 1: ordering principles for creation. This intellectual blueprint is found within
Speaker 1: the mind of God. Now note that this mind is
Speaker 1: an emanation, yet it is very closely associated with God himself,
Speaker 1: and so this almost sounds Aryan, which saw the Lagoss
Speaker 1: as the best of God's creation and of similar substance
Speaker 1: to God, that Greek word being homoeusius, but not exactly God,
Speaker 1: of similar substance but not exactly the same. Oh and
Speaker 1: by the way, in this presentation I did not include
Speaker 1: Philo of Alexandria, who is a Jewish Platonist in the
Speaker 1: first centuries b c. And AD, and he belonged to
Speaker 1: a period of Platonic thought that we now call Middle Platonism,
Speaker 1: which stands between Platonism proper and Neoplatonism. Well, Filo referred
Speaker 1: to the mind of God as the Logoss, which he
Speaker 1: also refers to as God's Son, And isn't that interesting? Well,
Speaker 1: in any case, we have God, and then we have
Speaker 1: the mind of God, which is the first emanation and
Speaker 1: sometimes difficult to fully differentiate from God, but is nonetheless different.
Speaker 1: The next emanation is soul, in keeping with Plato, and
Speaker 1: then the material world, and then nothingness on the other
Speaker 1: side of things. Now, by default we are born into
Speaker 1: the material world, the world of shadows, but we are
Speaker 1: capable of transcending to soul and the mind in the
Speaker 1: direction of God. Now in order to go further up
Speaker 1: in this cosmic hierarchy, you must go within again, not
Speaker 1: because you are anything special in yourself, but because the
Speaker 1: immaterial aspects of human existence, namely the soul and the mind,
Speaker 1: participate in the world soul and the divine mind, and
Speaker 1: ultimately in God himself or itself. In each soul we
Speaker 1: have access to the utmost foundation of reality, because everything
Speaker 1: that exists is an overflow of God. And so in
Speaker 1: each one of us we can find the divine light
Speaker 1: of God that illuminates all reality for those who have
Speaker 1: the eyes to see. And so when we contemplate inwardly
Speaker 1: in this fashion, we are not really seeing ourselves at all,
Speaker 1: but we are seeing the light of God, which draws
Speaker 1: us further up and further in. If you'll remember those
Speaker 1: words from C. S. Lewis's The Last Battle, well you
Speaker 1: may now have a better image as to what he
Speaker 1: is talking about, that reality goes further up and further in.
Speaker 1: And of course Lewis did not hide his appreciation for
Speaker 1: the Platonic tradition. The further up we go, the further
Speaker 1: in we go, and the further in we go, the
Speaker 1: further up we go. This is how you have worlds
Speaker 1: nested within worlds, and at his root we ultimately find
Speaker 1: the world of God. Now let's take a look at Augustine,
Speaker 1: who is likely the most important figure in baptizing the
Speaker 1: Neoplatonic model, as he took what he saw as God's
Speaker 1: truth held unjustly by the Neoplatonists and brought it back
Speaker 1: into its proper context, while leaving out what he saw
Speaker 1: as irredeemable error. Now, Augustine, like Lewis, also did not
Speaker 1: hide his appreciation for the Platonists, as he says in
Speaker 1: the City of God. If then Plato defined the wise
Speaker 1: man as the one who imitates, knows, loves this God,
Speaker 1: and who is rendered blessed through fellowship with him in
Speaker 1: his own blessedness, why discuss with the other philosophers. It
Speaker 1: is evident that none come nearer to us than the Platonists.
Speaker 1: So pretty clear claim there. And we see this thought
Speaker 1: carried out further in this passage of the Confessions, as
Speaker 1: Augustine says, what I found in reading the Platonists, not
Speaker 1: precisely in these words, but saying the same thing in
Speaker 1: varied in very convincing ways, was this At the origin
Speaker 1: was the word, and the word was in God's presence,
Speaker 1: and the Word was God. This was at the origin
Speaker 1: with God, and all things were made through it, and
Speaker 1: nothing was made without it. In it life was made,
Speaker 1: and a life was men's light. And the light shone
Speaker 1: in the darkness, and the darkness cannot control it. Further
Speaker 1: that the human soul, however it may bear testimony to
Speaker 1: the light, is not itself the light. God's Word is
Speaker 1: the true light that gives light to every man who
Speaker 1: arrives in this world. Further that he was in this world,
Speaker 1: and the world was made by him, and the world
Speaker 1: did not recognize him. But this I did not read.
Speaker 1: There he came among his own, and his own did
Speaker 1: not accept him. But to all who accepted him, who
Speaker 1: believed in his title, he gave the right to become
Speaker 1: God's sons. And so, as far as a system of
Speaker 1: philosophy goes as a structure for understanding what reality is,
Speaker 1: he believes that the Platonists do a remarkable job of
Speaker 1: providing a structure that is well suited for articulating Christian truths. However,
Speaker 1: what he does not find in the Platonists is a
Speaker 1: real redemption. He does not see the Gospel in the Platonists.
Speaker 1: He sees a God who supplies the cosmos and man
Speaker 1: with existence, but not much else regarding redemption, regarding participation
Speaker 1: in wisdom, there's no personal connection here. The platonic God
Speaker 1: never looks on man with grace, never has any initiative
Speaker 1: toward man. There's no rescue mission, and in fact, a
Speaker 1: rescue mission such as we have in Christ would be
Speaker 1: unthinkable because it would be philosophical sacrilege to suggest that
Speaker 1: the immaterial, eternal, immutable God would take on a material body,
Speaker 1: for matter was seen as intrinsically evil, approaching nothingness on
Speaker 1: the grand hierarchy. And so a Platonist regarding John's Gospel
Speaker 1: would likely be on board with John's teaching on creation
Speaker 1: that God made all things through his logoss until they
Speaker 1: get to the logos becoming flesh. And so to be
Speaker 1: very clear about this, because sometimes some charges are brought
Speaker 1: against Augustine that he was overly Platonic. Augustine is not
Speaker 1: a wholehearted Platonist. He believes that the Platonists are of
Speaker 1: great value, but that even the best that Paganism has
Speaker 1: to offer lacks the Gospel. Augustine is first and foremost
Speaker 1: a Christian and that is how he approaches the Platonic tradition.
Speaker 1: And I should also specify that when Augustine refers to
Speaker 1: the Platonist he is more likely or at least more
Speaker 1: often and more directly referring to the group that we
Speaker 1: now call Neoplatonists, he referring to the Platonic tradition in general. Now,
Speaker 1: in this same section of the Confessions, Augustine mentioned some
Speaker 1: of what the Platonists did for him. He says that
Speaker 1: the books of the Platonists did provoke in me and
Speaker 1: returned into myself, you guiding me, I entered my own recesses,
Speaker 1: though you helping me made that possible. Entered there I
Speaker 1: could see, so far as I could see anything with
Speaker 1: my poor soul's vision, something beyond my soul's vision and
Speaker 1: beyond my mind, in always unfailing light, not the light
Speaker 1: common to all our physical vision, nor simply like that,
Speaker 1: but on a grand scale, as if it had just
Speaker 1: got brighter and brighter till nothing else could be seen.
Speaker 1: Nothing of that sort was it, No of some other,
Speaker 1: some far different sort. It was not a thing layered
Speaker 1: above my mind, as oil floats above water, or heaven
Speaker 1: above earth, but something higher than I am, because it
Speaker 1: made me who am lower, because made by it. To
Speaker 1: know truth is to know this light, and to know
Speaker 1: this light is to know eternity. It is the light
Speaker 1: Love knows. And so there we have it. Augustine looked
Speaker 1: within and he saw the light of God. And this
Speaker 1: is very common Augustinian language, which definitely mirrors the Neoplatonic
Speaker 1: image of seeing the light of God within your soul.
Speaker 1: If you read the Confessions, you'll find that Augustine regularly
Speaker 1: talks about how he foolishly sought God or satisfaction beyond
Speaker 1: himself in the things that are seen, rather than within.
Speaker 1: This is the kind of thing that can be very
Speaker 1: easily misunderstood due to the influence of pantheistic New Ageism
Speaker 1: and whatnot today. But when Augustine talks about searching within,
Speaker 1: he is looking for God's divine light, the true light
Speaker 1: that enlightens all rational souls, as the Apostle John tells us.
Speaker 1: And he's not looking for himself as God or anything
Speaker 1: like that. And so this light which is above him,
Speaker 1: this light that created him, allows him to see reality
Speaker 1: within the right context. To know truth is to know
Speaker 1: this light, and to know this light is to know eternity.
Speaker 1: It is the light love knows, and this concept and
Speaker 1: this kind of light imagery leads us right up to Boethius,
Speaker 1: so sinks the mind in deep despair, and sight grows dim.
Speaker 1: When the storms of life inflate the weight of earthly care,
Speaker 1: the mind forgets its inward light and turns in trust
Speaker 1: to the dark without again. When Boethius talks about the
Speaker 1: inward light, he means the same thing as Augustine, who
Speaker 1: himself is using a modified version of the neoplatonic structure
Speaker 1: of reality. When we set our gaze on material things,
Speaker 1: we are looking to external things, things that are not
Speaker 1: by nature part of us, and are nearly nothing. As
Speaker 1: Boethia says in the Constellation, you can never make what
Speaker 1: is by nature external to you and internal good. That's
Speaker 1: not the way that it works. We need to look
Speaker 1: toward that which we are, and in looking toward that
Speaker 1: which we are, we find the God who is. Why
Speaker 1: would you put your hope in the volatile world of
Speaker 1: becoming that teeters on the edge of the formless and
Speaker 1: the void when you have recourse within to access the
Speaker 1: stable light of divinity that illuminates the rightly ordered and
Speaker 1: rational soul. This obsession, and I don't mean that negatively,
Speaker 1: this obsession with light, would permeate these so called dark ages,
Speaker 1: as the great Medievals saw all of reality, which is
Speaker 1: necessarily upheld by God, as bursting forth the light associated
Speaker 1: with God's presence. And this is such an ennobling, encouraging,
Speaker 1: and beautiful way of looking at the world. It does
Speaker 1: not matter how fortune spends her wheel, It does not
Speaker 1: matter how changing circumstance may appear at any given moment.
Speaker 1: The changing world will do what it always does, it
Speaker 1: will change. And so if you set your gaze in
Speaker 1: this direction, you will become lost in the maelstrom as
Speaker 1: you approach nothingness. If, however, you cling to the light
Speaker 1: of God that is present in all of existent reality,
Speaker 1: as seen through the light of Reason that is embedded
Speaker 1: in your soul, that you will find stability in the
Speaker 1: God who is. As you strive to think in accordance
Speaker 1: with the mind of God and to love in accordance
Speaker 1: with the goodness of God, you move within the great
Speaker 1: and cosmic dance that moves in response to the goodness
Speaker 1: of God. And now I will conclude today with the
Speaker 1: words of the apostle Paul as he speaks to the
Speaker 1: Athenian philosophers of Mars Hill, the God who made the
Speaker 1: world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth,
Speaker 1: does not live in temples made by man, nor is
Speaker 1: he served by human hands, as though he needed anything,
Speaker 1: since He himself gives to all mankind life and breath
Speaker 1: in everything, and he made from one man every nation
Speaker 1: of mankind to live on all the face of the earth,
Speaker 1: having determined allotted periods in the boundaries of their dwelling place,
Speaker 1: that they should seek God and perhaps feel their way
Speaker 1: toward him and find him. Yet He is not actually
Speaker 1: far from each of us, for in him we live
Speaker 1: and move and have our being, as even some of
Speaker 1: your own poets have said, for we are indeed His offspring.
Speaker 1: With this we see that even Paul himself engages in
Speaker 1: such baptism of pagan wisdom, as the Greek poet says,
Speaker 1: in him we live and move and have our being
Speaker 1: until next time, God's being. I hope that you enjoyed that,
Speaker 1: as I know that I enjoyed putting it together. It's
Speaker 1: also available on YouTube, by the way, and I'll provide
Speaker 1: that link in the show notes. It's been a little
Speaker 1: while since I made fresh content about philosophy proper, but
Speaker 1: I'd like to get back to my roots in that regard,
Speaker 1: and so we'll see what happens once I finished the
Speaker 1: current Patron exclusive series on the poetic dam maybe we'll
Speaker 1: go through some Plato or maybe Augustine, but I haven't
Speaker 1: quite decided yet. But for now, I would like to
Speaker 1: recommend to you tolstoy short story, The Death of the
Speaker 1: yvon Iliach. It's possible that I've already recommended it at
Speaker 1: some point, but it's worth the double recommendation if so.
Speaker 1: This short story is a haunting tale of a man's
Speaker 1: confrontation with his mortality, and by extension, every man's confrontation
Speaker 1: with mortality, as we're all mortals doomed to die. Yet
Speaker 1: despite this somber tone that tends to typify Russian literature,
Speaker 1: there is great hope and there's some important sign posts
Speaker 1: pointing us toward what it means to live and to
Speaker 1: die well. And I intend to do a video on
Speaker 1: evon Iliott soon and you can subscribe to my YouTube
Speaker 1: channel to make sure that you don't miss it. And now,
Speaker 1: before we go, I want to thank all of my
Speaker 1: patrons for supporting the various things that I do. If
Speaker 1: you like this show and my other content and you
Speaker 1: would like to you would like to help me to
Speaker 1: be able to increase both quantity and quality of content.
Speaker 1: I humbly welcome your support through Patreon, and any tier
Speaker 1: of support is welcome, but of course higher tiers come
Speaker 1: with greater perks. For example, the twenty five dollars month tier,
Speaker 1: it gives you access to both of the Mythic Mind
Speaker 1: podcasts ad free early whenever possible. It gives you access
Speaker 1: to my recordings of my readings of my subseci series
Speaker 1: on Tolkien's Letters whenever I'm able to produce those, and
Speaker 1: also on a weekly basis, it gives you access to
Speaker 1: my course materials, and so right now on a weekly basis,
Speaker 1: I'm posting the videos as well as the audio for
Speaker 1: the podcast feed for my fiction and Philosophy of C. S.
Speaker 1: Lewis course, and so that's currently playing out through Patreon
Speaker 1: at the twenty five dollars month tier. But again any
Speaker 1: level of support is welcome, and thank you again if
Speaker 1: you already support me, and I want to think by
Speaker 1: name all of my Tier two patrons and higher, and
Speaker 1: so thank you. Mark cliff Eric, Paul William, Aaron, Andrew
Speaker 1: Brandon and Christopher, Ian, Emmy, Jeremiah, Joshua Landon, Matthew and Steel.
Speaker 1: And of course thank you to all of my Tier
Speaker 1: one patrons as well, whether you support me financially or not,
Speaker 1: please do me a favor and leave me a five
Speaker 1: star review on Apple podcast and where brolls. You can
Speaker 1: do that, and a nice comment would be helpful as well,
Speaker 1: And of course you can share the show around and
Speaker 1: subscribe to my YouTube channel, which I'll be using a
Speaker 1: little bit more moving forward. But that's it for now,
Speaker 1: and as a reminder, well, I will be dropping some
Speaker 1: things into the public feed here and there. I am
Speaker 1: officially on a Patreon exclusive season right now. I would
Speaker 1: love to get to a point where I can simultaneously
Speaker 1: run a public and Patron season, but I'm just not
Speaker 1: there quite yet. But that's it for now and until
Speaker 1: next time, godspeed. You may have noticed that there were
Speaker 1: no annoying auto populated ads the beginning or throwing into
Speaker 1: the middle of the show, and that's thanks to our
Speaker 1: current sponsor, middle Born Arms. I previously relied on those
Speaker 1: autopopulated ads, but to be honest, I know that they're
Speaker 1: basically soulless. I much prefer supporting real people through arrangements
Speaker 1: that work for both of us. If you have something
Speaker 1: to advertise, whether a product, a service, or a platform,
Speaker 1: send me a messagee we can work out some kind
Speaker 1: of partnership. You can DM me on Twitter at andrew
Speaker 1: in Snyder or email me at Mythicmindpodcast at gmail dot
Speaker 1: com