A Place in the Cosmos: Reflections of Christianity and Philosophy on the World in the 2nd and 3rd Centuries
Abstract
This paper is a historical study of the Christian and philosophical perspectives about the world and their implications in the second and third centuries. Some Christian thinkers believed the world was created by God, especially for men. Nevertheless, this idea was extended by the conviction that cosmos was made mainly for and to Christians. It meant Christians had an important function in the divine plans and in God’s purposes to save humanity, they were God’s favorites ones. In contrast, the intellectuals –above all Stoics, Platonics and Neoplatonics–thought the world like an organic whole which remains for the collective, not for some part, not even men. Some philosophers defended that humans were not exceptional, but animals showed similar or superior characteristics and skills than humans. These positions and their arguments ultimately reflected two different visions about the world, the nature, God and man that faced each other in the cultural environment of the Roman Empire in the second and third centuries.
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