scholarly journals Αρετολογία και μεταφυσική

2000 ◽  
Author(s):  
Μπόρις Μπράγιοβιτς
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Moral Perfection ◽  
Middle Way ◽  
Byzantine Church ◽  
Self Rule ◽  
Evagrius Ponticus

The topic of this Dissertation concerns the relation of Metaphysics (especially Christian Metaphysics) to Virtue Ethics in the ascetical writings of the Byzantine Church Fathers from the 4rth to the 6th century. In particular, the writings of Evagrius Ponticus, Neilus of Ankyra, Diadochus of Photice and Ioannis Climacus are analyzed, discussed and related to the Virtue Ethics and Metaphysics of Ancient Greek Philosophy and especially Plato’s, Aristotle’s, the Stoics’ and the Neoplatonists’.Evagrius Ponticus writes that virtues reflect the spiritual health of man and that man cannot be virtuous by the reflecting and willing the evil. Utilizing the Platonic and Aristotelian conceptions of Virtue, he also emphasizes that virtues are the middle way and so the medium or a necessary condition for approaching and uniting mystically with God. According to Neilus of Ankyra, virtue ethics must not be conceived in an anthropocentric way, but in a theocentric one, and so virtue does not depend only on the ethical achievements of man, but on divine grace and on the personal relation of man to God. In the virtue ethics of Diadochus Photice, the notion of self-rule (αυτεξούσιον) is of paramount importance for the creative progress in one’s moral perfection. With the proper use of self-rule man can escape sin and turn himself to love. In addition, Diadochus also uses the notion of apatheia (απάθεια) to indicate the way for a successful cleansing (κάθαρση) of the soul, so that with this cleansing man can grasp the logoi (λόγοι) of beings. For Ioannis Climacus, virtues are akin to the human soul. Even after the Fall many “natural virtues” are preserved in human nature. But the perfection of the soul can be achieved only through the cultivation of all the virtues, and especially progressing from the partial to the more general ones with the purpose of achieving the perfect virtue and most general of all, that of Love (Αγάπη). Early ascetic thought as found in the writings of the above mentioned Byzantine Ascetic Fathers has integrated much of the framework of pre-Christian Ancient Greek philosophical thought and placed it in the Christian metaphysical context. Consequently, the Platonic, Aristotelian, Stoic and Neo-platonic concepts of Virtue became the object of further elaboration and were the context within which the ascetic Christian conception of virtue evolved. The ancient Greek concept of Virtue, which included courage, temperance, prudence and justice, was now complemented by the metaphysical virtues of love, hope and faith, which are a focal point for the proper interpretation of Christian Virtue Theory.

Aristotle on the Sources of the Ethical Life

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvia Berryman
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Common Belief ◽  
Ethical Life ◽  
Metaphysical Grounding ◽  
Middle Way ◽  
The Common

This work challenges the common belief that Aristotle’s virtue ethics is founded on an appeal to human nature, an appeal that is thought to be intended to provide both substantive ethical advice and justification for the demands of ethics. It is argued that it is not Aristotle’s intent, but the view is resisted that Aristotle was blind to questions of the source or justification of his ethical views. Aristotle’s views are interpreted as a ‘middle way’ between the metaphysical grounding offered by Platonists and the scepticism or subjectivist alternatives articulated by others. The commitments implicit in the nature of action figure prominently in this account: Aristotle reinterprets Socrates’ famous paradox that no one does evil willingly, taking it to mean that a commitment to pursuing the good is implicit in the very nature of action. This approach is compared to constructivism in contemporary ethics.

scholarly journals Eastern Church Fathers on Being Human—Dichotomy in Essence and Wholeness in Deification

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 575
Author(s):  
Olga Chistyakova
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Philosophical Tradition ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Gregory Of Nyssa ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Christian Anthropology ◽  
Church Father ◽  
Byzantine Church ◽  
God's Image ◽  
Maximus The Confessor

The article traces the formation of Eastern Christian anthropology as a new religious and philosophical tradition within the Early Byzantine culture. The notion “Patristics” is reasoned as a corpus of ideas of the Church Fathers, both Eastern and Western. The term “Eastern Patristics” means the works by Greek-Byzantine Church Fathers, who in the theological disputes with the Western Church Fathers elaborated the Christian creed. Based on an analysis of the texts of Greek-Byzantine Church Fathers, the most important provisions of Eastern Patristics are deduced and discussed, which determined the specificity of Christian anthropology. In this context, different approaches of the Eastern Fathers to the explanation of the Old Testament thesis on the creation of man in God’s image and likeness and the justification of the duality of human essence are shown. Particular attention is paid to considering the idea of deification as overcoming the human dualism and the entire created universe, the doctrine of the Divine Logoi as God’s energies, and the potential elimination of the antinomianism of the earthly and Divine worlds. The article reflects the anthropological ideas of the pre-Nicene Church Father Irenaeus, the non-canonical early Christian work The Shepherd of Hermas, and the teachings on the man of the classical Eastern Patristics period by Athanasius of Alexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, and Maximus the Confessor.

THE CONCEPT OF CO-INHERENCE IN THE WORK OF CHARLES WILLIAMS

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 122-128
Author(s):  
O.B. Lukmanova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Time And Space ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Holy Trinity ◽  
Close Study ◽  
Unique Interpretation ◽  
Refusal To Participate ◽  
Charles Williams ◽  
The City

The article examines the concept of coinherence (or co-inherence) as one of the central and unifying concepts in the life and work of Charles Stansby Williams (1886 – 1945), English poet, writer, and literary critic, also known as “the third Inkling” in conjunction with C .S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Through a close study of the writer’s biography and letters as well as his poetry, novels, theological treatises and essays we trace the origin of the term “coinherence,” borrowed from the Church Fathers in the meaning of mutual indwelling of the Persons of the Holy Trinity, uncover the unique interpretation that Williams gave to the term, and look at various ways he used to integrate it into his writing. Understanding coinherence as a fundamental ontological principle of comprehensive mutual interdependence, exchanged life, and substitution as direct fulfillment of the Gospel commandment “to carry each other’s burdens,” Williams portrays it as a necessary condition of any truly human existence and expounds its universal nature on every level of life, from childbirth to money as a means of exchange, to mutual services of empathy, to intercessory prayer, and to self-sacrifice for another’s sake. In his thinking, people can carry each other’s burdens even through barriers of space and time, since they are simultaneously co-inherent to each other and to God who exists both outside of time and space and in all time and space. Thus, in his novels Williams often employs a version of Dante’s vertical chronotope of simultaneity, and one of the most important symbols that reflect the nature of coinherence is the City as a web of continuous mutual exchange and substitution, in its turn coinherent to the City of God. Williams portrays refusal to participate in the principle of co-inherence as “descent to hell” which is seen as a gradual unraveling of any personhood and ultimate annihilation.

Moderation in Greek and Islamic Traditions, and a Virtue Ethics of the Qur’an

2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-28
Author(s):  
M. Ashraf Adeel
Keyword(s):  
Virtue Ethics ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Contemporary View ◽  
Aristotelian Ethics ◽  
The Individual

This article looks at some of the salient analyses of the concept of wasaṭīyah (moderation) in the ancient Greek and the Islamic traditions and uses them to develop a contemporary view of the matter. Greek ethics played a huge role in shaping the ethical views of Muslim philosophers and theologians, and thus the article starts with an overview of the revival of contemporary western virtue ethics, in many ways an extension of Platonic-Aristotelian ethics, and then looks briefly at the place of moderation or temperance in Platonic-Aristotelian ethics. This sets the stage for an exposition of the position taken by Ibn Miskawayh and al-Ghazali, which is then used as a backdrop for suggesting a revival of the Qur’an’s virtue ethics. After outlining a basis for its virtue ethics, the Qur’anic view of the virtue of wasaṭīyah is discussed briefly and its position on this virtue’s nature in terms of the individual and the community is presented.

The Giant and the Underdog

Philotheos ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 240-259
Author(s):  
Aleksandar Danilović ◽  
Keyword(s):  
General Education ◽  
Religious Education ◽  
Role Models ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Sports Events ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Hebrew Version ◽  
David And Goliath ◽  
The Church

The story of David and Goliath is one of the most famous biblical stories. It had an impact on many branches of contemporary art. It is also an inevitable part of religious education and general education in all schools. Knowing the fact that the Church Fathers have an essential part in the lives of many Christians today (in the Orthodox Church, they were role models from the very beginning), it is interesting to see how did they, these original theologians, read and interpret the story of David and Goliath. Was it for them, in the time when the Bible was the most sacred book for all, important as it is for us today? Did people during the sports events of that time talk on the markets about the underdog who struck the giant? Additionally, if one looks at the ancient Greek and Hebrew text, one will find out that the Hebrew version, which was used as the source for most modern translations, is 40% longer than the Greek one. Could the works of the Fathers help us to determine which version of the story is the Holy Scripture for Christians today?

The social context of literacy in Archaic Greece and Etruria

Antiquity ◽  
1988 ◽  
Vol 62 (237) ◽  
pp. 761-772 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Stoddart ◽  
James Whitley
Keyword(s):  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Technological Determinism ◽  
Key Factors ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Greek Culture ◽  
Greek Thought ◽  
The Social ◽  
Mediterranean World ◽  
Archaic Greece ◽  
Literate Society

In recent years much emphasis has been placed upon the effects of literacy in the transformation of the Mediterranean World between 800 and 400 BC. Alphabetic scripts have been seen by many, archaeologists and classicists alike, as one of the key factors that made many of the achievements of Mediterranean, particularly Greek, thought and culture possible. Alphabetic scripts encouraged widespread literacy, and widespread literacy was the necessary condition for what remains distinctive in Ancient Greek culture, namely the development of History, Philosophy and speculative Natural Science. Murray (1980: 96) is typical in his view that ‘Archaic Greece was a literate society in the modern sense.’ The work of Goody & Watt (1963) has done much to advance the view that many of the achievements of Mediterranean Society can be ascribed to, if not entirely explained by, this ‘technology of the intellect’. Their ‘autonomous model’ however, as Cartledge (1978: 37) has observed, comes dangerously close to technological determinism.

On Necessary Gratuitous Evils

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 117
Author(s):  
Michael James Almeida
Keyword(s):  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Possible World ◽  
States Of Affairs ◽  
Gratuitous Evil ◽  
Moral Perfection ◽  
Standard Position ◽  
State Of Affairs

The standard position on moral perfection and gratuitous evil makes the prevention of gratuitous evil a necessary condition on moral perfection. I argue that, on any analysis of gratuitous evil we choose, the standard position on moral perfection and gratuitous evil is false. It is metaphysically impossible to prevent every gratuitously evil state of affairs in every possible world. No matter what God does—no matter how many gratuitously evil states of affairs God prevents—it is necessarily true that God coexists with gratuitous evil in some world or other. Since gratuitous evil cannot be eliminated from metaphysical space, the existence of gratuitous evil presents no objection to essentially omnipotent, essentially omniscient, essentially morally perfect, and necessarily existing beings.

What Have We Learned about Presidential Term Limits?

2019 ◽  
pp. 607-622
Author(s):  
Alexander Baturo ◽  
Robert Elgie
Keyword(s):  
Political Behavior ◽  
Focal Point ◽  
Democratic Consolidation ◽  
Term Limits ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
Necessary Condition ◽  
Collective Leadership ◽  
Weak Institutions ◽  
Democratic Tradition

The authors reappraise what has been learnt about presidential term limits from comparative and country studies. The importance and role of presidential term limits are contingent on political regime. In consolidated democracies presidential term limits are not only an institution but also a norm of political behavior. Term limits can be reformed without imperiling democracy when such reforms do not go beyond what is accepted as “normal,” typically when a president seeks more than two terms. In many dictatorships, term limits are unenforceable, but they may still serve as a very important pillar of collective leadership preventing personalism and facilitating succession. In unconsolidated regimes without democratic tradition or weak institutions, presidential term limits are extremely important and serve as a focal point for coordination against the possibility of a dictatorial takeover. While not sufficient, they are however a necessary condition for democratic consolidation.

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