How does Christianity impact philosophy if they have nothing to do with eachother?
So I was told Christianity has helped mold philosophy but I cant understand how that is when they are 2 totally different things. Didnt philosophy occur waaaaay before Chiristianity, or is it the other way around? But really how does Christianity or “religion” tie into philosophy?
I’m not agreeing or disagreeing with anything. I’m not trying to form an opinion; I’m simply just asking for understanding.
Oops, you slipped. Christianity is not a religion. It is a way of life. And so is philosophy. So, whoever told you that Christianity and philosophy have nothing to do with each other, is incorrect.
ps. your profile name is interesting…
philosophy was around WAY before Christianity.I’d say the latter was only one very small part of Philosophy.
Better to look at Philosophy of religion in general & see what you agree & disagree with.
Also,you can be a great Philosopher & have no religious beliefs at all!
The purported goal of both is to seek truth. Personally I think Christianity doesn’t seek truth so much as declare what it thinks it is, but that’s beside the point. Prior to the 19th century most philosophies rooted all truths in natural truth, i.e. God. The ideas that loving your neighbor is good, greed is bad, sexual promiscuity is bad, etc. have no objective truth, they are simply declared to be basic truths by Christianity. Philosophies were molded around these ideas for centuries. It wasn’t really until the existentialists that we started to break free of the template and start to come up with other bases for basic truths, or lack of basic truths.
Religions are influenced by philosophy more than they influence philosophy.
Philosophy is the mother of religion.
Christianity is connected to philosophy in the sense that it draws metaphysical distinctions and asserts that they are true above all others where as philosophy is the body of work that it draws from.
Plato is perhaps the most noted philosopher to have postulated the christian world view in terms of metaphysics, he predates christainiy by several hundred years.
But religions are also concerned with morality and subscribe to divine command theories of ethics.
Where by a person accepts on faith that holy commandments are what a particular god expects of humans concern morals.
To understand how religion ties into philosophy you have to understand two main branches of philosophy.
Morality/ethics- Seeking to answer how one should live, or what does it mean to live a good life.
Metaphysics- Seeking to answer what is reality, what is really real.
Where most religions are negligent is in the branch called epistemology- How can humans have knowledge of truth and reality, as most religions take it on “faith” that certain things must simply be believed even when there is not good reason to believe those things.
You were given incorrect information, philosophy especially the work of Plato, is the foundation of the christian religion not the reverse.
Though it is true that many prestigious philosophers were christian, there work is a continuation of the pre-christianity philosophers that came before them.