Compare And Contrast Aristotle's God And The Creation Of The Universe Essay

573 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Greek influences Western philosophy

God and the Creation of the Universe Aristotle lived before the writings of the New Testament and the birth of Jesus of Nazareth born in Bethlehem of Judaea. Aristotle was a theoretical philosopher confident that his endeavors to understand the world would succeed. Aristotle agreed with is teacher (Plato) about many things; the existence of God, the presence of oppose in the world, and the creation of the universe, (the connection between virtue and happiness). According to Mason on God and Nature (161) Aristotle (and Plato), played a major part in making belief in a single supreme God more wide spread, the idea of a creator God was not widespread among all the Greek philosophers and thinkers. Aristotle (c. 384–322 BC), often posited first cause arguments, that had certain notable cause, and saw ex nihilo nihil as proof for God and the Creation of the Universe (Mason 3, 28, 161 and Waterman Lecture Notes). According to Waterman, Aristotle was not familiar with the Hebrew Scriptures and the creation accounts in the Book of Genesis, “In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth” and there is no concept of providence in Aristotle’s god where this god looks after and cares for human beings. According to Waterman, his god also did not create the universe and only causes its motion. Thus, …show more content…

According to his theses, immaterial unmoved movers are eternal unchangeable beings that constantly think about thinking, but being immaterial; they're incapable of interacting with the

Show More
Related

  • Use of Ethos, Pathos, and Logos in Rhetoric

    1156 Words  | 3 Pages

    Aristotle lived in ancient Greece from 284 BC to 322 BC, but his teachings hav...

    Read More

  • The Views of Aristotle’s Idea of the Prime Mover Vs. the Judaeo Christian's Idea of God

    747 Words  | 2 Pages

    The Views of Aristotle’s Idea of the Prime Mover Vs. the Judaeo Christian's Idea of God

    Read More

  • The Opposing Views of Great Minds

    1050 Words  | 3 Pages

    Plato lived between 427 and 347 BC. Aristotle lived between 384 and322 BC. He grew from being Plato's pupil to being an independent thinker and rival. Plato was an inside/out philosopher as opposed to Aristotle’s outside/in thinking. This simply means that Plato developed his ideas from within and applied them to the outside world. Conversely, Aristotle took the views from the world around him and applied them within. These different approaches to metaphysics lead to the issue of Aristotle’s imminent reality versus Plato’s dualistic, transient reality. Aristotle’s beliefs lead to him seeing only one level of reality. He felt there was only one imminent world and that forms existed within particular things. Aristotle held that form had no separate existence and existed i...

    Read More

  • Aristotle And Plato's Criticism Of Plato And Aristotle

    1429 Words  | 3 Pages

    How can this be seen as a criticism of Plato and Aristotle? In your opinion, is the criticism correct?

    Read More

  • The Nature Of Aristotle: The Final Cause Of Nature

    1306 Words  | 3 Pages

    At some point in everyone’s life, they have probably wondered what their purpose is, what they’re meant to do or accomplish during their time on Earth. In his writing, Physics, Aristotle gives four causes that are responsible for that which is by nature, with the final cause, the purpose of a thing, being the considered the chief cause. With this principle in mind, Aristotle ponders what the final causes are for both man and for the state in the Nicomachean Ethics. Aristotle applies the doctrine of final causality to his teachings by claiming that the final cause for man is happiness, attainable through virtue, and the telos of the state is to produce and foster virtuous citizens.

    Read More

  • The Importance Of Dante's Inferno

    1651 Words  | 4 Pages

    According to John Lord, “Aristotle penetrated into the whole mass, into every department of the universe of things, and subjected to the comprehension its scattered wealth; and the greater number of the philosophical sciences owe to him their separation and commencement… He is also the father of the history of philosophy, since he gives an historical review of the way in which the subject has been hitherto treated by the earlier philosophers…. Says

    Read More

  • Physics of Aristotle

    1385 Words  | 3 Pages

    The great Greek thinker Aristotle was born in 384 B.C. in Stagirus, a city in ancient Macedonia in northern Greece. At the age of eighteen Aristotle went to Athens to begin his studies at Plato's Academy. He stayed and studied at the Academy for nineteen years and in that time became both a teacher and an independent researcher. After Plato's death in 347 B.C. Aristotle spent twelve years traveling and living in various places around the Aegean Sea. It was during this time that Aristotle was asked by Philip of Macedon to be a private tutor to his son, Alexander. Aristotle privately taught Alexander for three years before he returned to Athens after Philip gained control of the Greek capital. During this period back in Athens Aristotle founded his own school, the Lyceum, where he taught for twelve years. In 323 B.C. Alexander the Great died and the Macedonians lost control of Athens. Aristotle was forced to leave and he died one year later in Chalcis, north of Athens, at the age of 62.

    Read More

  • Chapter 6 Of Aristotle's View Of God

    1188 Words  | 3 Pages

    I find Aristotle’s arguments to lack the evidence necessary to actually persuade me into seeing the world through his lens. Aristotle, criticizes Plato for having no concrete evidence to back up his theories yet he has no concrete evidence that the material world is the source of knowledge. Isn’t it possible that things don’t exist for a reason, some things happen by chance? If the Prime Mover cannot interact with the world, then it is very different from the Judeao-Christian understanding of God that I have grown up being taught to understand. Therefore I am quite biased in the sense that my morals lean toward the Christian view more so than that of Aristotle, his ideas are second nature right now and therefore not as appealing to my mind. I would want Aristotle to believe that God has the ability to know that evil is

    Read More

  • The Theory of Origin in Aristotle's Metaphysics

    394 Words  | 1 Pages

    Aristotle believes that before the concept of time there were three kinds of substances, two of them being physical and one being the unmovable. The three substances can be described as one being the “sensible eternal”, the second being the “sensible perishable” and the third substance being the immovable. To further this theory the sensible perishable can be seen as matter, the sensible eternal as potential, and the immovable can be seen as that which is Metaphysical and belongs to another science. According to Aristotle, the immovable is God. It is the immovable that sets the sensible perishable into motion and therefore turns the potential into the actual.

    Read More

  • Compare And Contrast Aristotle And Jesus

    850 Words  | 2 Pages

    When comparing Aristotle and Jesus, we should look at the different beliefs the two have about life, and virtue by asking questions such as; what are we all pursing in this life? Or, what exactly is virtue, and how does Aristotle’s and Jesus’s view compare to each other? Another question that presents its self when reading about these two is, what exactly makes somebody character truly virtuous or moral? Although there is no one for sure answer to these question, both Aristotle and Jesus devoted there life’s to study and teach about what they believed were the answers and it brings two very different but very interesting points of views on how Greek and Christian view the world.

    Read More

  • Literary Analysis: Dante's Inferno

    822 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...s sin? Medieval theologians used to describe theology using Aristotelian principles. Dante had access to these teachings and uses them to relate to the reader in a more straightforward way of why there is delineation. In this function Aristotle is not the agent of knowing, but rather a way to relay the reasoning and rationale behind God’s judgment in this way God is not limited by Aristotle.

    Read More

  • The Unmoved Mover: God in Aristotle’s Metaphysics

    1471 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...e ultimate cause of everything? While its minor problems are resolved quite easily, Aristotle’s argument for the unmoved mover is predicated on a premise of unknown stability: philosophy. At the heart of the issue is the very nature of philosophy itself and its ability to tackle questions of any magnitude. If everything is knowable, and philosophy is the path to knowledge, then everything must be knowable through philosophy, yet the ad infinitum paradox Aristotle faces is one that shows that the weakest part of his argument is the fact it relies on the abovementioned characteristics of philosophy. If any one of those is wrong, his proof crumbles and the timeless God in which he believes goes along with it, but if they are all right, then there is one God, immovable and actuality, for as Aristotle says, “The rule of many is not good; let there be one ruler” (1076a).

    Read More

  • Existence Of God Essay

    1187 Words  | 3 Pages

    The existence of God is a very fundamental topic on which many philosophers have argued and till date there is no physical proof of His existence. At some point or the other of our life, we all ask the question, does God exist? The answer to this changes our way of living, our thinking and how we understand or interpret the world. If one answers a yes then they live for a purpose and hope for eternity, while others create their purpose on planet earth and understand death as their final end.

    Read More

  • Essay On Human Nature And Free Will

    905 Words  | 2 Pages

    Aristotle’s discussions on free will came from his theory of the prime mover. In his book Physics, Aristotle theorized that everything is always in a constant state of change, or movement. When a pen falls of a table, it is changed because it is in a different location than it was previously and also possibly scuffed up from falling to the floor. If something is moved, or changed in its composition, there has to be an ultimate higher power, or mover, responsible. This is what Aristotle called the Prime Mover, referring to God. Aristotle believed the Prime Mover to be unchanging and infinite. He exists because in order for something to be changed, there must also be a master, unchangeable thing. There needs to be a start to the chain of events that is caused by the primary, unmoved mover, or God. Therefore, God is necessary for ...

    Read More

  • Essay On Aristotle's View On The Self

    1099 Words  | 3 Pages

    384 B.C.E., Aristotle was born in Stagira, Greece. At the age of fourteen, Aristotle went to Athens to study Philosophy with Plato. Although he studied with Plato, he did not always agree with some of his teachings. When Plato died, Aristotle left Athens and traveled to Macedonia. While in Macedonia, Aristotle tutored Alexander the Great. Later on in his life, Aristotle returned to Athens and created a school of him own, Lyceum. When Alexander the Great died in 323 B.C.E., Aristotle fled to Euboea to avoid charges and execution. He died shortly after in 322 B.C.E. (Aristotle Biography, 2015). Aristotle is seen as much more than just a great philosopher of his time. He practiced in ethics, biology, science, and much more (Chaffee, 2013, p. 250).

    Read More

More about Compare And Contrast Aristotle's God And The Creation Of The Universe Essay

Open Document