Forum Philosophicum

Volume 28, Issue 1, Spring 2023

Christian Philosophy and Its Challenges

Greek Philosophy as a Religious Quest for the Divine

Philosophy has always been parasitic on other bodies of knowledge, especially religious thought. Greek philosophy in Italy emerged as a purification of Orphic religious traditions. Orphic votaries adopted various disciplines in the attempt to become divine, which led Pythagoras and Empedocles to define philosophy as a path to divinity. According to Plato and Aristotle, the goal of philosophy is to become “as much like a god as is humanly possible.” Classical Greek philosophy is not the study of the divine but the project of becoming divine, a!project which it shares with Christianity. Greek philosophy and Christianity have different paths to the divine, but they share a common aspiration.