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Agnostos Theos: Relacja między nieskończonością a niepoznawalnością Boga w doktrynach medioplatoników

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Mrugalski D.

Roczniki Filozoficzne

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2019

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vol. 67

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issue 3

25-51

PL

W czasach poprzedzających powstanie neoplatonizmu (I-III wiek przed Chr.) filozofowie zwani dziś medioplatonikami snuli rozbudowaną refleksję na temat możliwości poznania Boga oraz dróg prowadzących do zdobycia wiedzy o tym, co transcendentne. Zgodnie ze słowami Platona: „Znaleźć Twórcę i Ojca tego wszechświata jest rzeczą trudną, lecz znalazłszy Go, jest niemożliwe opowiadać o Nim wszystkim” (PLATO, Timaeus 28c) medioplatonicy uważali, że Bóg, którego utożsamiali niekiedy z platońskim Jednem i Dobrem, jest poznawalny, lecz niewyrażalny. Choć poznaniu Boga towarzyszy trud związany z procesem intelektualnego i etycznego doskonalenia się, a to, co poznane w tym procesie, jest niemożliwe do wypowiedzenia w ludzkim języku, to jednak wiedza o Bogu i upodobnienie się do Niego jest celem wszelkiej filozofii platońskiej. Do podobnych wniosków dochodzili myśliciele żydowscy i chrześcijańscy tworzący w tym samym czasie, tacy jak Filon z Aleksandrii, Klemens z Aleksandrii czy Orygenes, zaliczani niekiedy również do grona filozofów medioplatońskich. W odróżnieniu od swych pogańskich kolegów, uważali oni jednak, że proces poznawania Boga przez człowieka będzie trwał w nieskończoność, a skończony ludzki umysł nigdy nie będzie w stanie objąć w zupełności tego, co nieskończone. Za nieskończoną bowiem uznawali istotę i moc Boga. Celem niniejszego artykułu jest ukazanie związku między nieskończonością a niepoznawalnością Boga, a zarazem wskazanie na różnice w tezach stawianych w tej kwestii przez medioplatoników pogańskich i tych, którzy przyjmowali Objawienie judeo-chrześcijańskie.

EN

In the times preceding the emergence of Neo-Platonism (1st–3rd century BC), the philosophers now known as Middle Platonists elaborated an extensive reflection on the possibility of knowing God, and the ways that could lead to acquiring knowledge about the transcendent. According to Plato, “To discover the Maker and Father of this Universe were a task indeed; and having discovered Him, to declare Him unto all men were a thing impossible” (PLATO, Timaeus 28c). The Middle Platonists believed that God, whom they sometimes identified with the Platonic One and Good, is possible to know but not possible to express. Even though the knowledge of God is accompanied by all the difficulties associated with the process of intellectual and ethical improvement, and although what one comes to know in this process is ultimately impossible to express in human language, gaining knowledge of God and becoming like Him is nevertheless the goal of all Platonic philosophy. Jewish and Christian thinkers working at this time came to similar conclusions. These include Philo of Alexandria, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen, who are themselves sometimes deemed Middle-Platonic philosophers. Unlike their pagan colleagues, they believed that man’s process of coming to know God would go on forever. They thought that the finite human mind would never be able to contain the infinite, and they held that the essence and power of God are indeed infinite. The goal of this article is to expose the relationship between the infinity and the unknowability of God, and at the same time to point out the differences in the theses put forward on this question by pagan Middle Platonists and those who accepted Judeo-Christian revelation.

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Stwarzanie wieczne i poza czasem. Filozoficzne źródła koncepcji "generatio aeterna" Orygenesa

75%

Mrugalski D.

Verbum Vitae

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2019

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vol. 35

373-418

EN

Timaeus, a dialogue of Plato regarded by scholars as “the Platonists’ Bible”, was interpreted allegorically even in the time of the Old Academy (4th century BCE). In the Hellenistic period (1st-3rd centuries CE), especially among the philosophers known as Middle Platonists, there was great debate over the theses that appear in it. The main question was whether the world was created in time or ab aeterno, and most of the Middle Platonic philosophers believed that the world must be eternal. By the first century CE, this discussion had also been joined by Jewish and Christian Platonists such as Philo of Alexandria, Clement of Alexandria and Origen. In their opinion, God, because he is unchanging but at the same time good, must not have started to operate only at the moment of the creation of the world, but before. Yet the Scriptures state that the world began to exist at a particular point in time. Therefore, Christian Platonists postulated the eternal generation or production of the world of ideas (kosmos noetos), which, since it is the world of God’s thoughts, exists ab aeterno in the Divine Logos. The concept of generatio aeterna (that is, the eternal generation of the Son by the Father), which we find in Origen’s works, is related to this ongoing discussion about the eternal nature of the world. This article aims to present the facets of this ancient debate while emphasizing the links between the arguments advanced by the Middle Platonists and those found in the various hypotheses of Origen.

PL

Dialog Platona Timajos, uznawany przez uczonych za „Biblię Platoników”, był interpretowany alegorycznie już w Starej Akademii (IV w. przed Chr.). W epoce hellenistycznej (I–III w. po Chr.) natomiast, w kręgach filozofów zwanych medioplatonikami, toczyła się poważna dyskusja na temat tez, które w nim się pojawiają. Zasadnicza kwestia dotyczyła tego, czy świat powstał w czasie, czy też istnieje ab aeterno. Większość filozofów medioplatońskich uważała, że świat musi być odwieczny. W dyskusji tej, począwszy od I w. po Chr., uczestniczyli również platonicy żydowscy i chrześcijańscy, tacy jak Filon Aleksandryjski, Klemens Aleksandryjski i Orygenes. W ich opinii Bóg, ponieważ jest niezmienny a zarazem dobry, nie zaczął działać dopiero w momencie stworzenia świata. Pismo Święte stwierdza jednak, że świat zaczął istnieć w czasie. W związku z tym, postulowani oni odwieczne rodzenie świata idei (kosmos noetos), który jako świat myśli Boga, istnieje ab aeterno w Boskim Logosie. Koncepcja generatio aeterna (czyli odwiecznego rodzenia Syna przez Ojca), którą znajdujemy w dziełach Orygenesa, jest związana z prowadzoną w tym czasie dyskusją na temat wieczności świata. Niniejszy artykuł ma na celu przedstawienie tej dyskusji i uwypuklenie zależności, jakie zachodzą między argumentami stawianymi przez medioplatoników, a tymi, które znajdujemy w różnych hipotezach Orygenesa.

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Nieskończoność Boga u Orygenesa: przyczyna wielkiego nieporozumienia

75%

Mrugalski D.

Vox Patrum

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2017

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vol. 67

437-475

EN

Many historians of ideas – philosophers and theologians – believe that the first thinker to introduce the concept of a positive understanding of the infiniteness of God was Plotinus. In Greek philosophy, however, something infinite was understood as “unfinished” and therefore “imperfect”. All the same, according to many scholars, Christianity took the concept of the infiniteness of God precisely from the founder of neo-Platonism. One of the reasons for which researchers of the doctrines of the ancient world persist in this thesis even today is the fact that, in the writings of Origen – who lived at the time of Plotinus – we find the expressions which might give readers the impression that God’s power is finite, since God brought into existence a finite number of created beings. This article argues that this widely-held interpretation is wrong. Philo and Clement, a Jewish and a Christian thinker, both of Alexandria – from whose doctrines Origen borrowed abundantly – wrote of an infinite God before Origen did. In the surviving works of Origen, moreover, he nowhere states explicitly that God’s power is finite, although it is true that, according to him, God created a finite number of creatures. The controversial thesis of a finite God is found only in fragments written by ancient critics of Origen’s teaching. A detailed analysis of Origen’s own original pronouncements on the nature, power and knowledge of God leads one to the conclusion that the fragments that have led many historians of ideas into confusion, either do not represent the views of Origen himself or present Origen’s teachings inaccurately. Moreover, in Origen’s surviving Greek writings, we find the term ¥peiron used in reference to God. This is precisely the term used by Greek philosophers to designate infinity. We may posit, then, that the concept of the infiniteness of God, positively understood, was born of the encounter of Greek philosophy with the Bible – that is, with the Jewish and Christian doctrines of the first centuries of the common era. Origen, who came slightly later, continued the thought of his predecessors and does not contradict them anywhere in his surviving works. What remains to be examined is the question of whether Plotinus himself made use of the work of Jewish and Christian thinkers in forming his doctrine of an infinite God, rather than those thinkers leaning on Plotinus, as is usually assumed.

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Potentia dei absoluta et potentia dei ordinata u Orygenesa? Nowa próba wyjaśnienia kontrowersyjnych fragmentów "De principiis"

75%

Mrugalski D.

Vox Patrum

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2018

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vol. 69

493-526

EN

The medieval dispute over the absolute and the ordered, power of God (potentia Dei absoluta et potentia Dei ordinata) began with a tract by Peter Damian entitled De divina omnipotentia. One of the questions posed in this work was whether God could indeed do everything, including those things that God did not in fact do. The same question, and a similar answer, appears in Origen’s work Contra Celsum: God can do everything except that which is evil. The impossibility of doing evil, however, does not diminish the omnipotence of God, because evil, is by its very nature, non-being. Beyond that, Origen, in numerous statements appearing in his exegetical works, distinguishes between the absolute power of God, which is infinite, and the power of God that creates the world and operates within it, which has a certain God-given limit – that is, this power is adapted to the abilities of the creatures who receive it. The purpose of this article is to show that, in the light of the distinction of the potentia Dei absoluta and the potentia Dei ordinata, fragments of De principiis (II 9.1 and IV 4.8), in which a finite world and finite power of God are posited, can be interpreted in a new way. Many contemporary scholars, on the basis of these fragments, conclude that Origen inherited from the Greek philosophers a negative understanding of infinity as something imperfect, but the analysis carried out in this article shows something different. In talking about a certain range of God’s power, which is available to creatures, or in which creatures participate only partially, Origen does not actually exclude the proposition that, in God himself, power – existing in an absolute way – can be infinite.

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Agnostos Theos: Relacja między nieskończonością a niepoznawalnością Boga w doktrynach medioplatoników

Stwarzanie wieczne i poza czasem. Filozoficzne źródła koncepcji "generatio aeterna" Orygenesa

Nieskończoność Boga u Orygenesa: przyczyna wielkiego nieporozumienia

Potentia dei absoluta et potentia dei ordinata u Orygenesa? Nowa próba wyjaśnienia kontrowersyjnych fragmentów "De principiis"