God is very much a part of our society today.  Even so, when the deity is examined closely, obvious flaws are discovered.  Therefore, a new perspective of the deity is needed to account for these lapses in understanding.  God has two different perspectives; the being of God, and the concept of God.  Unlike the concept of God, when the deity is understood as an object or Supreme Being, problems arise in the ability to comprehend such an object.  Ideals, on the other hand, are primarily based in philosophical thought.  For this reason, the concept or ideal of God proves to be far more effective at co-existing with our modern age of thought and reason than that of the Supreme Being God. Read the rest of this entry »

Saint Augustine was a man who grew up in changing times. He was born in the transitional period between the ancient age of thought and the middles ages. In fact, Christianity was a relatively new ideal that was spreading across Europe and Russia. With this spread, people from all across Europe began to travel to holy sites and question the old gods that had existed for centuries. Interestingly enough, Augustine was born to a catholic mother and a pagan father, which caused him to be very conflicted in his faith. In his book titled Confessions, Augustine questions his beliefs, his education, his life and understanding, and even questions God. The question of who or what God is has been around since the invention, or discovery, of God. The modern idea of God suggests that there is a supreme being that is all knowing, all powerful, all benevolent and all encompassing. This God is one who is feared and worshiped by the laity and can be prayed to when help is needed. He is watching our every move and knows the path that we will take in life, but there seems to be a problem with this. This idea of God seems to be far too “human” to be God. Meaning that this way of looking at the deity is very shallow and naïve. Instead, Augustine proposes that God is something far more complex and incomprehensible. God is a form based on perfections of different ideals such as morality, justice, love, wisdom, thought, desire, understanding and faith and when correct reason is applied to the pursuit of these forms or perfections, then the nature of God will become much clearer.

To fully grasp the Augustinian God, you must understand the mindset of the time that Augustine lived. Today, the goal of Christianity is to reach the mental and physical experience that could be described as the presence of God. In other words, the individual must achieve an epiphany or mystical occurrence in order to “know” God. Augustine on the other hand, had a very different understanding of being spiritual. The common belief at his time was that if one could understand or interpret the scriptures in a skillful way, then that person was a spiritual individual. Meaning that since Augustine, in his later years, had come to some degree of understanding of the scripture, he was a very spiritual Christian, even if he did not have any mystical understanding of the nature of God. His ability to read through the visible words of scripture allowed him to better understand the nature of God according to the common beliefs at his time. Read the rest of this entry »

In books three and four of Saint Augustine’s Confessions, he outlines his troubling path towards God’s truth and morality.  He explains the nature of suffering and how he embraced the vices in society in order to satisfy some need for fulfillment.  As Augustine explains these troubles in his life, he attempts to reach for some underlying truth that he states can only be found in God (Saint Augustine Confessions, Book 4: 24).

Unlike books one and two that mainly talked about his folly as a young man, books three and four express his basic philosophical views of the nature of goodness and truth.  He begins book three by discussing the ideal of suffering, or at least his definition of it.  Suffering is naturally a negative aspect of life, and he viewed the entire world and everything in it as some form of suffering (Confessions, 3: 3).  He goes as far as to say that even compassion is a form of suffering because it needs some sort of negative feeling to exist (Confessions, 3:4).  As he studied in Carthage, he began to explore the world of Philosophy.  In his studied he realized that there was some truth that needed to be discovered in order to obtain some special sense of fulfillment, but at this time, Augustine was still very vile in his mind and blind to what this truth was.  He compares this state of mind as eating in a dream:

“Food pictured in dreams is extremely like food received in the waking state; yet sleepers receive no nourishment, they are simply sleeping.” (Confessions, 3: 10)

Read the rest of this entry »

In Book VIII of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, he outlines the ideals of friendship and explains how it relates to the Greek view of eudiamonia. Aristotle’s ideal of friendship is based on the pursuit of excellence and his general thought in Book VIII is to explain how only people who are good and actively pursuing excellence can have a lasting friendship (N.E. 1156b7-13).

The first aspect that will be discussed is how Aristotle stresses the importance of friendship. Aristotle defines friendship as a type of excellence that is necessary for life (N.E. 1155a4-5). He continues to say that even the powerful need friends:

“For even the wealthy or those who rule over or dominate others are thought to need friends more than anything – since what use would such prosperity be if they were deprived of the possibility of beneficence, which occurs most, and is most to be praised, in the relation to friends?”

(N.E. 1155a6-10) Read the rest of this entry »

We live in a confusing world. This is a world seemingly void of purpose and understanding because as we embark on the journey through life, society tells us to look after yourself, reach for that “American Dream”, and get lots of money and power while doing so.Traditional values, or values all together, fade away as this mass culture proceeds forward. Meaning seems to slip through our fingers as we reach out for what society offers. When meaning begins to disappear, Nihilism begins to take root in people’s minds and can lead to what I would consider to be a very undesirable world. But is this abyss of Nihilism an evil state of existence? If one is Nihilistic about the world, does that make that individual evil? It is an interesting question, but my answer is undoubtedly no. Based on the readings of Thomas Hibbs, Nihilism is void of meaning and therefore, evil can not exist. In a Nihilistic world, a Nihilistic individual can not be considered evil because his worldview is based on a meaningless existence. To understand my position, I must define what nihilism is and how it relates to the concept of evil and goodness. Read the rest of this entry »

i am writing this as a test, only a test, and please don’t respond to this test, because it is just a test…duh.