S///R///W/B Mythless Patterns

[Paul Mackin]

My wording with regard to the place and use of Greek philosophy in the
West was inprecise. Should have said something like: Christianity
incorporated the thought of Plato and Aristotle into its theology. Later,
the habit and skills derived from thinking in these highly developed
ways could be separated from religious belief and serve in the development
of Western science. My point was that this was one way in which the
development of Christianity was intimately involved with the development
of Western Civilization--for good and ill. 
 
			P.


On Wed, 27 Sep 2000, Robert Pirani wrote:

> At 06:37 PM 9/27/00 +0000, Paul Mackin wrote:
> >Seems to me Christianity had a lot going for it in its day. ...
> >Another thing, it kept alive a lot of the best thought of the ancient
> >world. Plato, Aristotle, etc--the deciplines which later could be split
> >off from belief and made to work in the development of modern science
> >and such. 
> 
> I don't think you can credit Christianity with keeping Plato alive. Far
> more of Plato's thought on the nature of human existence became part of
> Gnostic beliefs that were ruthlessly supressed by Christianity. Not that he
> didn't influence Christianity at all, he did. But compared to his role in
> Islamic philosophy and Gnostic religions I would Christianity did more to
> eliminate that preserve Plato. It's true that Aquinas relied heavily
> Augustine so this is really a qualification not a dispute.
> 
> 
> Regards,
> Robert
>