St. Thomas’s Third Way to prove the existence of God, “Of Possibility and Necessity” (ST 1, q.2, art. 3, response) is one of the most controverted passages in the entire Thomistic corpus. The central point of dispute is that if there were only possible beings, each at some time would cease to exist and, therefore, at some point in time nothing would exist, and because something cannot come from nothing, in such an eventuality, nothing would exist now—a reductio ad absurdum conclusion. Therefore, at least one necessary being must exist. Generations of critics and defenders have contended over St. Thomas’s proof. This article argues that the principle of pros hen analogy is implicit in the Third Way and that once identified explains the ontological dependency of possible beings, as secondary analogates, on the first necessary being, as primary analogate. Thus, without the necessary being as primary analogate, possible beings simply could not exist. The fact that they do exist is evidence for the existence of the necessary being. St. Thomas makes synthesizes the principle of pros hen analogy, as found in Aristotle’s Metaphysics, with the Neoplatonic principle of participation. Aristotle develops pros hen analogy in contradistinction to univocal and equivocal predication as well as to genus in Metaphysics 4.2, 11.3, 12.3-5. Since Scotus and re-enforced by modern analytic logic, philosophers have almost universally regarded any kind of analogical predication as a sub-category of equivocal predication and, thus, implicitly occlude the possibility of considering pros hen analogy in their readings of the Third Way. Distinction of per se and per accidens infinite regress and of radical and natural contingency are also central to understanding the Third Way. While resolving apparent problems in the Third Way, the article also seeks to rehabilitate the doctrine of pros hen analogy as a basic principle in Thomistic and, indeed, Aristotelian metaphysics.

This article focuses on the work of Czech Jesuit Cardinal Tomáš Špidlík (1919-2010), continued in his pupils, both in Rome, where he taught for most of his life, and in the Czech Republic. It explores in particular how studies of hesychasm marked their understanding of deification. It asks in which sense their work can be seen as a Western attempt to rehabilitate the doctrine of deification in its experiential and theological complexity, where they contribute to the renewal of the communication between the Christian East and the Christian West, and what are the complications present in their attempt expressed against the background of uniatism.

Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) was one of the greatest artists of all time, but also one of the harshest critics of the contemporary art. In the conclusion of his controversial book, What is Art?, Tolstoy claimed: “The purpose of art in our time consists in transferring from the realm of reason to the realm of feeling the truth that people’s well-being lies in being united among themselves and in establishing, in place of the violence that now reins, that Kingdom of God – that is, of love – which we all regard as the highest aim of human nature.” In my paper I want to examine what Tolstoy means by that, and also how his understating of the purpose of art applies to his own works of art, as well as how it applies to some other contemporary works of art.

In this article, following the introductory chapters of the Platonic dialogue Charmides (153a1-154b7), we attempt to investigate the terms of transition from a simple dialogue to dialectics. Interpreting the expressive means used, we attempt to explain how Plato goes from historicity to systematicity, in order to create the appropriate conditions to build a definition about a fundamental virtue as well as to set the criteria to be followed in a philosophical debate. Our study is divided in two sections, each of which is also divided in two subsections. In the first section, we investigate the historical context of the dialogue and the terms of transition from a single dialogue to dialectics. In the second section, we attempt to define according to Socrates’ judgments the mental and moral quality of the young men as well as the terms and conditions of the right interlocutor. At the end of each section, we present a table of concepts to bring to light the conceptual structures that Plato builds, which reveal the philosophical development in this dialogue.

Martin Buber in his famous critique of modern philosophy and psychology, described the philosophical hour through which the world is now passing as a spiritual eclipse—a historical obscuring of “the light of heaven.” This essay explores process thought as first formulated by the mathematician/philosopher Alfred North Whitehead, and then expounded by Charles Hartshorne, John Cobb, and other theologians as paradigmatic of Buber’s concern. Accordingly, it proposes, that when consciousness shifts in such a way that God becomes recognizable as immediately present, as the aura in which the person of faith lives, the eclipse is over.

The ‘bread’ in Lord’s Prayer is today usually understood as ‘daily bread,’ as we can see in contemporary translations. However, in Orthodox Christian understanding ‘bread’ in Lord’s Prayer has a different meaning, spiritual or Eucharistic, and it is emphasized by Orthodox theologians and Orthodox interpreters of the Bible. A different understanding of Biblical text is not something new in Christian history: it is something that is present in Christianity since the times of early Church, and it is well attested through contributions of ancient Christian schools of Biblical exegesis, for instance Alexandrine and Antiochene school. A different understanding is the fruit of different contexts, different traditions and different readings of Biblical text. In this paper we will show the origins of Orthodox Christian reading of ‘bread petition’ in the Lord’s Prayer, and how Orthodox Christian understanding is influenced by ancient Christian reading of Biblical text.

The paper concentrates on two main theoretical problems connected with the idea of ‘person’, namely, ‘freedom’ and the ‘reality of evil’. Will be considered both Russian and Italian thinkers. After a presentation of Berdyaev’s philosophy of person and its critics (Vasilii Zenkovsky), alternative theological approaches to personality (Bulgakov, Lossky) will be considered. The last part of the paper deals with the heritage of Dostoevsky and Berdyaev in Italy, focusing on the ‘ontology of freedom’ proposed by Luigi Pareyson. The final remarks try highlight communion as the necessary horizon for freedom and personality.

The laws of logic and two of the broader theories of truth are fundamental components that are responsible for ensuring such an ontology and meaningfulness. In this respect they have persisted as conventional attitudes or modes of thought which most, if not all, of analytic philosophy uses to philosophize. However, despite the conceptual productivity of these components they are unable to account for matters that are beyond them. These matters would include certain theological beliefs, for instance, that transcend the purview of analytic ontology and the meaningfulness it ensues. Any attempt in making rational sense of such beliefs that are insusceptible to these methodological components would conventionally prohibit (restrict) us from rationally believing in them. This is because we would be unable to make sense of such beliefs with the aid of these methodological components. As a result of this, religious beliefs of this particular nature would be deemed irrational. I shall demonstrate this point by applying both of these components to an ab­solutely ineffable God of Islam. This would entail, attempting to make sense of an absolutely ineffable God of Islam in virtue of the laws of logic and two broad categories of truth theories, namely, substantive and insubstantive theories. I hope to establish that applying both of these methodological components in attempting to make sense of an absolutely ineffable God of Islam would not be conceptually viable. It would result in a contradictory notion which I shall allude to as the paradox of ineffability.

The fundamental insight that N. Berdyaev obtains in his historiosophical reflections is that history is antinomic and the historical process is catastrophic since it has to end, because “the world cannot exist eternally”. In its global, empirical (objective) dimension, history resembles an absurd comedy “in which nothing ever succeeds”. The idea of history as a long duration (long duree) and permanent progress misses its essence. According to Berdyaev, such history is meaningless, and it has to end. Its true meaning is revealed only in “its end” and “before the face of eternity”. Terrestrial history does not have its epilogue and the final solution in historical time but in celestial history when the boundaries between the immanent and the transcendent world disappear. History is the path to another and different, sublime and spiritual (noumenal) world that lies beyond the boundaries of everything historical. The destiny of man, which lies at the heart of history, assumes a meta-historical goal and a trans-historical solution to the destiny of history in a different, eternal time. To summarize, history has an eschatological meaning. Although there is an unsolvable tragic conflict between the individual human destiny and the destiny of humanity as a whole within the framework of history, Berdyaev, following the entire tradition of Russian religious philosophy, is convinced that the overcoming of that contradiction on the historical level is possible with love as the salvation and the main driving force of the soul and the source of all the spiritual creation of man.

This paper develops the meaning of a doctor in the wing of the Christian tradition, by starting the thesis from the best and first known physician in the New Testament: St. Luke. Then the premise he was even in a doctor is questioned. However, the whole paper continues to follow the symbolism St. Luke indubitably has not only as one of the Evangelists, but parallelly as a physician, so it then questions what such an expertise would mean when one of the establishing figures is attached to a particular profession. Medical effort is then connected to the notion of Christus medicus as a primary healer. From that point on, a question of the miraculous healing and its effect on human approach to God emerges. This problem occurs when freedom as a central to the acceptance of God’s deeds is installed. In this case, I discuss it on the grounds of a passage from The Grand Inquisitior. Finally, the problem of freedom in the multifaceted context of healing is to be circled in the discussion about the problematic positions both doctors and patients encounter, and ultimately medicine itself.

The paper deals with the Amb. 21 of St Maximus the Confessor in which he attempts to resolve the ambiguity posed by St Gregory the Theologian calling John the Evangelist ‘the forerunner of the Word’. Maximus’ solution is analysed in detail as it provides significant insights into not only his understanding of the iconic nature of the Gospel as it relates to the world to come, but also into the way he develops his theological reasoning, as well as his understanding of the authority of the patristic authors.