[138] The Royal Society, chartered in 1662, advanced Epicurean atomism. [119] The Roman orator Cicero (106 – 43 BC), who deplored Epicurean ethics, lamented, "the Epicureans have taken Italy by storm. [120], However, in the first and second centuries AD, Epicureanism gradually began to decline as it failed to compete with Stoicism, which had an ethical system more in line with traditional Roman values. God is all knowing. Please forgive my typos. The beauty in nature itself. Would you like to be a robot, or loved by a robot? "[131] While the ideas of Plato and Aristotle could easily be adapted to suit a Christian worldview, the ideas of Epicurus were not nearly as easily amenable. It can be used or rejected by man. But he has given man the will to choose. Go to # 18. "[26], According to Diskin Clay, Epicurus himself established a custom of celebrating his birthday annually with common meals, befitting his stature as heros ktistes ("founding hero") of the Garden. If God use omniscience to eliminate natural causes of evil–disease, tsunamis–then humans would not reap the consequences of the 1st rebellion in Eden, as well as subsequent ones. (John 17:3) For more information visit http://www.jw.org. [79] After one's desires have been satisfied (e.g. "[64] He also wrote that a single good piece of cheese could be equally pleasing as an entire feast. [66] Nonetheless, the vast majority of everything he wrote has now been lost[118][116][62] and most of what is known about Epicurus's teachings come from the writings of his later followers, particularly the Roman poet Lucretius. [119] By the first century BC, it had established a strong foothold in Italy. Go to 19 [96] As a result of this belief that the universe and the number of atoms in it are infinite, Epicurus and the Epicureans believed that there must also be infinitely many worlds within the universe. To deny the existence of God is itself a dark place with little light to follow. Go to # 17 I am not even an adept of some denomination Epicurus paradox is a paradox for antique deity, not monotheistic God [116] Epicurus's extant writings demonstrate that he did believe in the existence of deities. 54 in Smith's edition). [138] They came to exert profound influence on later writings about Epicurus. Should God stop all evil now in this present system of things? 20. Lying afar some fellow's lifeless corse, Though popular, Epicurean teachings were controversial from the beginning. Epicurus was born in the Athenian settlement on the Aegean island of Samos in February 341 BC. God has proven again and again that he is patient, long suffering and desirous of man’s turning to him. [102] Lucretius describes it, saying, "It is this slight deviation of primal bodies, at indeterminate times and places, which keeps the mind as such from experiencing an inner compulsion in doing everything it does and from being forced to endure and suffer like a captive in chains. Most knowledge of his teachings comes from later authors, particularly the biographer Diogenes Laërtius, the Epicurean Roman poet Lucretius and the Epicurean philosopher Philodemus, and with hostile but largely accurate accounts by the Pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus, and the Academic Skeptic and statesman Cicero. Go to 16. Yes. [20], Epicurus's Letter to Menoeceus, possibly an early work of his, is written in an eloquent style similar to that of the Athenian rhetorician Isocrates (436–338 BC),[19] but, for his later works, he seems to have adopted the bald, intellectual style of the mathematician Euclid. Your email address will not be published. Do you like to continue? [113][114] The later Pyrrhonist philosopher Sextus Empiricus (c. 160 – c. 210 AD) rejected the teachings of the Epicureans specifically because he regarded them as theological "Dogmaticists".[115]. For prove thou mayst he perished not by steel, And it often comes down to choices made by man. [132] Both Epicureanism and Christianity placed strong emphasis on the importance of love and forgiveness[133] and early Christian portrayals of Jesus are often similar to Epicurean portrayals of Epicurus. Through the centuries there is no evidence of the intervention of God in human affairs. [138] These works, together with Charleton's Epicurus's Morals (1658), provided the English public with readily available descriptions of Epicurus's philosophy and assured orthodox Christians that Epicureanism was no threat to their beliefs. God’s name was derived from an ancient Hebrew word that means ‘he causes to become’. He advocated that people were best able to pursue philosophy by living a self-sufficient life surrounded by friends. An issue of right to rule (sovereignty) was raised. He claimed that if God cannot stop evil then he is not all-powerful (omnipotent). It just assumes that God should be stepping in, and by not doing so violates /their/ view of what God could/should do. Hope more are enlightened. Go to # 27. [138] Gassendi modified Epicurus's teachings to make them palatable for a Christian audience. 2. For ancient Israel he gave more than 600 laws. Go to 2. Pingback: THE ORIGIN OF SIN AND WHO SATAN IS (PART III) – Priest ITM White. But in philosophy, delight keeps pace with knowledge. [116] However, the vast majority of Epicurus's writings have been lost and it is possible that some form of this argument may have been found in his lost treatise On the Gods, which Diogenes Laërtius describes as one of his greatest works. Lactantius attributes this trilemma to Epicurus in De Ira Dei: God, he says, either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or He is able, and Then he is not omnipotent. [54] Nonetheless, anything contrary to a person's experience can be ruled out as false. Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher. [64][122] He remained the most simultaneously admired and despised philosopher in the Mediterranean for the next nearly five centuries. [108], Epicurus rejected the conventional Greek view of the gods as anthropomorphic beings who walked the earth like ordinary people, fathered illegitimate offspring with mortals, and pursued personal feuds. [55] Epicureans often used analogies to everyday experience to support their argument of so-called "imperceptibles", which included anything that a human being cannot perceive, such as the motion of atoms. And he is not the owner of an oil well or a coal plant, complete with vested interests. You just have to choose. [138], Epicurus's teachings were made respectable in England by the natural philosopher Walter Charleton (1619–1707), whose first Epicurean work, The Darkness of Atheism Dispelled by the Light of Nature (1652), advanced Epicureanism as a "new" atomism. We have an American President who doesn’t ”believe” in global climate change, despite overwhelming evidence and almost daily experience of it. [131] Of all the Greek philosophical schools, Epicureanism was the one most at odds with the new Christian teachings, since Epicureans believed that the soul was mortal, denied the existence of an afterlife, denied that the divine had any active role in human life, and advocated pleasure as the foremost goal of human existence. Go to 14. There is no evidence that God caused the first evil. (Isaiah 41:3; 44:7,8) Would it have been better if he used this power to prevent evil? Then he is malevolent. No. [129] On the twentieth day of every month, admirers of his teachings would perform a solemn ritual to honor his memory. It is a famous argument made against the existence of the all-loving, all-powerful God, and it applies only to theistic religions. [19] Epicurus shared this view with his contemporary, the comic playwright Menander. The recent pandemic called COVID 19 has brought about wide destruction to the society globally. 14. 3. Go to 15 26. Diogenes Laertius, Book IX, Chapter 11, Section 64. Go to # 6. He openly allowed women to join the school as a matter of policy. by Robert Drew Hicks", Epicurus | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "Epicurus page on Information Philosopher; cf. 15. Will be the true: lo, if thou shouldst espy [46][47] Epicurus held that the purpose of all knowledge is to aid humans in attaining ataraxia. No. [121] Nonetheless, Epicurus was not universally admired and, within his own lifetime, he was vilified as an ignorant buffoon and egoistic sybarite. 13. [22][22], Epicurus's teachings caused strife in Mytilene and he was forced to leave. Throughout the Middle Ages Epicurus was popularly, though inaccurately, remembered as a patron of drunkards, whoremongers, and gluttons. (Joshua 24:15; Deuteronomy 30:19). No. [110] He further warned that believing that the gods control natural phenomena would only mislead people into believing the superstitious view that the gods punish humans for wrongdoing, which only instills fear and prevents people from attaining ataraxia. [91] For Epicurus and his followers, the existence of atoms was a matter of empirical observation;[92] Epicurus's devoted follower, the Roman poet Lucretius, cites the gradual wearing down of rings from being worn, statues from being kissed, stones from being dripped on by water, and roads from being walked on in On the Nature of Things as evidence for the existence of atoms as tiny, imperceptible particles. [131] Nonetheless, "Epicureanism" remained a pejorative, synonymous with extreme egoistic pleasure-seeking, rather than a name of a philosophical school. So essentially, under the Christian belief, God satisfies the expectations Epicurus has of God, as He has the power to stop evil and will stop evil when the time is right. [15] During Epicurus's formative years, Greek knowledge about the rest of the world was rapidly expanding due to the Hellenization of the Near East and the rise of Hellenistic kingdoms. Epicurus taught that although the gods exist, they have no involvement in human affairs. Justice, Epicurus said, is an agreement neither to harm nor be harmed, and we need to have such a contract in order to enjoy fully the benefits of living together in a well-ordered society. Go to 27. [117], Epicurus was an extremely prolific writer. [89] Similarly, he also writes that nothing ever passes away into nothingness, because, "if an object that passes from our view were completely annihilated, everything in the world would have perished, since that into which things were dissipated would be nonexistent. [19] Epicurus's epistemology also bears an unacknowledged debt to the later writings of Aristotle (384–322 BC), who rejected the Platonic idea of hypostatic Reason and instead relied on nature and empirical evidence for knowledge about the universe. (Galacian 6:7,8; 2Chronicles 12:2,7,8) 190), Tertullian (c. 155–c. Sending Jesus Christ is his ultimate intervention and this provided a lasting solution. Yes. Life itself is our gift. No. His teachings are surprisingly modern; therefore Asclepiades is considered to be a pioneer physician in psychotherapy, physical therapy and molecular medicine. [140], Around the same time, the Epicurean injunction to "live in obscurity" was beginning to gain popularity as well. [79][80] "Moving" pleasures occur when one is in the process of satisfying a desire and involve an active titillation of the senses. Yet somewhat of this sort hath come to him But this would mean that he is not the God of the Bible since the God of the Bible does whatever he desires to do ( Eph. Plutarch elaborated on this theme in his essay Is the Saying "Live in Obscurity" Right? Go to # 23 Epicurus deviated from Democritus by proposing the idea of atomic "swerve", which holds that atoms may deviate from their expected course, thus permitting humans to possess free will in an otherwise deterministic universe. [58], Epicurus strongly favored naturalistic explanations over theological ones. The Greek philosopher Epicurus (342-271 BCE) claimed that the existence of God proved there is no God. That’s the source of Faith to build on. No. Are there any other reason/s why God would allow evil to exist for the time being? Jesus Christ whom God sent ressurected the dead, cured diseases, and even stopped a stormy sea. [56] In line with this principle of non-contradiction, the Epicureans believed that events in the natural world may have multiple causes that are all equally possible and probable. [22][23] Over half of the forty Principal Doctrines of Epicureanism are flat contradictions of Platonism. [14], Epicurus's teachings were heavily influenced by those of earlier philosophers, particularly Democritus. [133] DeWitt argues that Epicureanism, in many ways, helped pave the way for the spread of Christianity by "helping to bridge the gap between Greek intellectualism and a religious way of life" and "shunt[ing] the emphasis from the political to the social virtues and offer[ing] what may be called a religion of humanity. That’s illogical. Evil causes harm and suffering. Epicurus’ argument focuses on the problem of evil and how it might present a problem for a classical concept of God generally embraced by theists; Epicurus presents the following set of questions and propositions, “Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Yes. Go to #10. Since creation, the devil has been trying to defeat God by offering mankind choices that are more comfortable. [145], The only fragment in Greek about this central notion is from the Oenoanda inscription (fr. Is he able, but not willing? God made laws that if followed would have prevented evil. Read Romans 15:4; Psalm 65:2; 119:2,93, 105; 1Peter 5:6,7 Why blame God when things do not go our way? In Dialogues concerning Natural Religion (1779), David Hume also attributes the argument to Epicurus: Epicurus’s old questions are yet unanswered. Epicurianism was developed around 370 BC by Epicurus, this is the theoretical paradox of God: "God either wants to eliminate bad things and cannot, or can but does not want to, or neither wishes to nor can, or both wants to and can. Go to # 4. [138] In 1647, Gassendi published his book De vita et moribus Epicuri (The Life and Morals of Epicurus), a passionate defense of Epicureanism. [96] He states that the javelin must either go past the edge of the universe, in which case it is not really a boundary, or it must be blocked by something and prevented from continuing its path, but, if that happens, then the object blocking it must be outside the confines of the universe. [7] Plato had died seven years before Epicurus was born and Epicurus was seven years old when Alexander the Great crossed the Hellespont into Persia. Of which 'tis not enough one only cause [45], Epicurus maintained that the senses never deceive humans, but that the senses can be misinterpreted. [131] Valla made no mention of Lucretius or his poem. Influenced by Democritus, Aristippus, Pyrrho,[3] and possibly the Cynics, he turned against the Platonism of his day and established his own school, known as "the Garden", in Athens. 165 AD), Athenagoras of Athens (c. 133–c. Go to 3. [101] Epicurus's reason for introducing this doctrine was because he wanted to preserve the concepts of free will and ethical responsibility while still maintaining the deterministic physical model of atomism. One of his earliest laws could have prevented death, the 1st evil. This quotation does indeed bring “comfort and joy.”. Epicureanism and similar humanistic philosophies are what we have left to us. THE ORIGIN OF SIN AND WHO SATAN IS (PART III) – Priest ITM White, Epicureanism after Epicurus – The influence of Epicurus on Western thought, Epicurus and Politics: why I think he was wrong, Things You Should Never Post Online but Probably Do, Ways to Check If You’re Visiting a Safe Website, What Teens Shouldn’t Put in Their Social Media Profiles, International Soc. Evil is eventually defeated, everywhere. [120] At the same time, opponents of his teachings denounced him with vehemence and persistence. Lactantius attributes this trilemma to Epicurus in De Ira Dei: God, he says, either wishes to take away evils, and is unable; or He is able, and is unwilling; or He is neither willing nor able, or He is both willing and able. Whether or not God exists is probably the most important question of all human philosophy. If you don’t recognise this then you Re making the same mistake as many did in the 1930s, to their horrific cost. "[140] Meanwhile, John Locke (1632–1704) adapted Gassendi's modified version of Epicurus's epistemology, which became highly influential on English empiricism. 16. One of the quotes from Epicurus recorded in the Vatican Sayings declares, "In other pursuits, the hard-won fruit comes at the end. Yes. A clue is given above by the commentator who pointed out God is not a baby sitter nor is he Santa Claus, for that matter. [98] He held that there are two kinds of motion: the motion of atoms and the motion of visible objects. Yes. As a former Christian Fundamentalist I do rightly understand Epicurus. Like Aristotle, Epicurus was an empiricist, meaning he believed that the senses are the only reliable source of knowledge about the world. Only three letters written by him—the letters to Menoeceus, Pythocles, and Herodotus—and two collections of quotes—the Principal Doctrines and the Vatican Sayings—have survived intact, along with a few fragments of his other writings. Would you like to use your freedom to choose/ free will to love God by obeying his laws (1John 5:3) ? It almost leaves me to wonder, why bother believing things to stay stable, when it only take a whiff of wind to topple our “peace”. A more permanent cure is coming.

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