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1. Medieval
Philosophy
RamChandra
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2. BIG QUESTION in MEDIEVAL
EPOCH….
WHAT IS FAITH?
WHAT IS RELIGION?
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Faith is personal: INTERNAL, Within the power
of the “I”. It is both the cognitive and the
emotive. It is within the context of it and NOT
bound with QUANDARY.
BASIS
Religion: EXTERNAL: bound with the choice we
made. It can be change. It is structural and
functional.
PRACTICE

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5. Medieval Philosophy
• Medieval philosophy is the
philosophy in the era now
known as medieval or the
Middle Ages, the period
roughly extending from the fall
of the Western Roma Empire
in the fifth century AD to the
Renaissance in the sixteenth
century
• Essentially “monotheistic”
• From a state of polytheism to a
belief in a one and only God.
• God here is the center of
man’s life Medieval philosophy is not to be
separated from theology
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6. Medieval Philosophy and the
Problem of Evil
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7. The Dark Ages
•
period emphasizing the
The "Dark Ages" is a historical
cultural
and economic deterioration that
occurred in Europe following the
decline of the Roma Empire.
• The label employs traditional
“light-versus darkness” imagery to
contrast
period
the "darkness" of
with earlier and
the
later
periods of "light“ (Middle Age).
The period is characterized by a
relative scarcity of historical and
other written records at least for
some areas of Europe, rendering it
obscure to historians.
•
Petrarch conceived the idea of a European "Dark Age".
From Cycle of Famous Men and Women, c. 1450
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8. Challenged Church Authority
• In the 16th century,
various humanists
had begun to ask
dangerous questions.
• The Enlightenment
allowed people to
believe in progress,
to “think outside the
box,” and it led to
the rise of
individualism
individualism
The Ninety-Five Theses, (1517) written by Martin
Luther, described his hopes and wants for reform in the
Catholic Church. This effectively challenged the pope'e
authority and the infallibility of the general council, and
eventually led to Luther being excommunicated from
the church and declared a public enemy by the
state.The 95 Theses were translated into German and
RL
Pu
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r's ideas were circulated throughout the empire.

9. Medieval Philosophy
• The term medieval refers to the Middle Ages, the time in
European history between classical antiquity and the Italian
Renaissance, from about 500 A.D. to about 1350 ( 13th)
Medieval philosophy is theocentric in its character.
•
• During the
philosophers
decline of Greco-Roman civilization,
turned their attention from the
Western
scientific
investigation of nature and the search for happiness in this
world, to the problem of salvation and life in another, better
world
The torch of civilization in Western Europe was carried
mainly by the Christian Church, where thought were
conducted under the context of Christian doctrines
•
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10. • By the 3rd century AD, Christianity
had spread throughout the Roman
Empire.
• The religious teachings
Gospels were combined
of the
by the
Fathers of the Church with many of
the philosophical concepts of the
Greeks and Roma
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11. FOCUS: ON RELIGION and FAITH
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12. St. Augustine
“You are great, O Lord, and man desires to praise you. You so excite him that
to praise you is his joy. For you have made us for yourself and our hearts
are restless until they rest in You.”
St. Augustine (354–430 C.E) : Uses aspects of
Neoplatonism to understand, explain Christianity.
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13. Conversion
• He regret that once he believed in
Manichaeismmeans taught an
elaborate dualistic
cosmology describing the struggle
between a good, spiritual world of
light, and an evil , material world of
darkness.
• Began to study under Saint Ambrose.
• Became fascinated by intellectual
nature of faith.
• Was not baptized, at first, because he
didn’t want to give up life of sin.

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His Philosophical Beliefs
• The man with his strength does not exceed
this vicious cycle of not being able to not want
what cannot get
• Only the grace of Christ save us
• History is called original sin
Jesus says that the Holy Spirit "will convince the world
concerning sin" (Jn 16:8). As I tried to penetrate these words,
I was led back to the opening pages of the Book of Genesis, to
the event known as "original sin."

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• described the nature of this sin as
follows: amor sui usque ad contemptum Dei
—self-love to the point of contempt for God.
• It was amor sui which drove our first parents
toward that initial rebellion and then gave rise
to the spread of sin throughout human
history.

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• The Book of Genesis speaks of this: "you will
be like God, knowing good and evil" (Gn 3:5),
in other words, you yourselves will
decide what is good and what is
evil.
• Man is not, in general, self-sufficient: marked
by original sin, is called to communion with
God, in Christ.
• This non-self-sufficiency is also seen in the
field of knowledge. It's Christ truth (as
interior Teacher , through the illumination).

17. INFLUENTIAL BOOK
Confessions (Latin: Confessiones)
•is the name of an autobiographical wok, consisting of 13
books
•The work outlines Augustine's sinful youth and his
conversion to Christianity
•Sinful Youth: fleshly desires for women
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18. The City of God
• Answers profound questions of theology
such as the suffering of the righteous, the existence
of evil, the conflict between free will and divine
omniscience, and the doctrine of original sin.
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19. His legacy
• He believed humans
cannot experience true
happiness until they
find God.
• His work centred
around the notion that
everything in the world
is basically good.
He wrote many works
over his lifetime.
He attempted to dispel
•
•
and
heresy
blasphemous
ideologies.

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21. St. Thomas Aquinas

22. Overview
• An Italian-born monk who taught at the
University of Paris
• Born: January 28th, 1225 in Roccasecca, Sicily
• Died: March 7th, 1274 in Fossanova, Sicily
• Taught that faith came first
expanded the scope of reason
• Major figure in scholasticism
and greatly

23. The Nature of God
• Aquinas developed a list of the (5)
five divine qualities:
1. God is simple, without
composition of parts, such
as body and soul, or matter
and form.
lacking
2. God is
nothing.
perfect,
That is, God is
distinguished from other
beings on account of God's
complete actuality. Thomas
defined God as the ‘Ipse
Actus Essendi subsistens,’
subsisting act of being.

24. 3. God is infinite. That is, God is not finite in the ways that
created beings are physically, intellectually, and emotionally
limited. This infinity is to be distinguished from infinity of size
and infinity of number.
4.God is immutable, incapable of change on the levels of
God's essence and character.
5.God is one, without diversification within God's self. The
unity of God is such that God's essence is the same as God's
existence. In Thomas's words, "in itself the proposition 'God
exists' is necessarily true, for in it subject and predicate are
the same.”
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25. Reason
• Aquinas retained the basic belief
while studying reason
He believed that:
•
1. Humans could – through reason
alone – know much of the natural
order, moral law, and the nature
of God
2. All essential knowledge could be
organized coherently
• Wrote a series of Summas
(highest works) that employed
careful logic to counter any
possible objections to truth as
revealed by reason and faith

26. Summas
• Summa Theologica: Most well-known
and best work of Aquinas
• Intended as a sort of introduction to
theology and the main theological
points of Church doctrine
• Three parts:
– Part One: God’s existence, the creation
of the world, angels, and the nature of
man
– Part Two: Morality (general and specific)
– Part Three: Christ, the Sacraments, and
the end of the world

27. Ethics
• Four Cardinal Virtues:
1.Prudence
2.Temperance
3. Justice
4.Fortitude
• Three Theological Virtues: .
1.Faith
2.Hope
3.Charity

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Four types of Law:
1. Eternal: direct word of God, governs all Creation
2. Natural: human adherence to eternal law,
discovered by reason
3. Human: positive law (natural law applied to
human government and society)
4. Divine: the law as defined in the scriptures

29. The Existence of God can be
proved in five ways.
1. Argument from Motion
2. Argument from Efficient Causes
3. Argument from Possibility and Necessity
(Reduction argument)
4. Argument from Gradation of Being
5. Argument from Design
-----VIDEO CLIP-----
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***EXPLANATION FROM 1st
CAUSE
The Argument From Motion
St. Thomas Aquinas:
•studying the works of the Greek philosopher Aristotle
concluded from common observation:
that an object that is in motion (e.g. the planets, a rolling
stone) is put in motion by some other object or force.
From
ultimately
this,
there
Aquinas believes that
must have been an
UNMOVED MOVER (GOD) who first put
things in motion.

31. ST. ANSELM
• Anselm's motto is “faith seeking
understanding” (fides quaerens intellectum)
• St. Anselm of Canterbury (1033–1109 CE) was
a Christian philosopher.
• He was Archbishop of Canterbury from the age
of 60 until his death

32. The Ontological Argument
• Anselm is perhaps most famous for
developing the ontological argument for the
existence of God.
1.God is that than which nothing greater can be
conceived.
2.It is greater to exist than to not exist.
3.Therefore, God exists.
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To one who has faith, no
explanation is necessary. To one
without faith, no explanation is
possible.
---Thomas Aquinas

34. MERCY and COMPASSION
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