Did the Stoics believe in God?
The Stoics often identified the universe and God with Zeus, as the ruler and upholder, and at the same time the law, of the universe. The Stoic God is not a transcendent omniscient being standing outside nature, but rather it is immanent—the divine element is immersed in nature itself.
Is stoicism a religion?
Stoicism may be called either a philosophy or a religion. While Stoicism was never a religion in the modern sense, with temples and altars, its spiritual nature evoked reverence and piety in the ancients and in many who practice it today.
Can only say what God is not?
Apophatic theology, also known as negative theology, is a form of theological thinking and religious practice which attempts to approach God, the Divine, by negation, to speak only in terms of what may not be said about the perfect goodness that is God.
What is apophatic mysticism?
Applied to God, apophatic mysticism maintains that the experience of God can be described only by saying what God is not. Pertaining to God, kataphatic mysticism says that God can be described by positive terms.
Does Stoicism align with Christianity?
Stoicism is not connected to Christianity. Although Stoicism refers to gods, it is a philosophical doctrine without religion. Q: What do Stoics believe? Stoicism holds that we can only rely on our responses to outside events, while the events themselves we cannot control.
What is Kataphatic prayer?
Cataphatic theology or kataphatic theology is theology that uses “positive” terminology to describe or refer to the divine – specifically, God – i.e. terminology that describes or refers to what the divine is believed to be, in contrast to the “negative” terminology used in apophatic theology to indicate what it is …
What is Spinoza’s Metaphysics of God?
Spinoza’s metaphysics of God is neatly summed up in a phrase that occurs in the Latin (but not the original Dutch) edition of the Ethics: “God, or Nature”, Deus, sive Natura: “That eternal and infinite being we call God, or Nature, acts from the same necessity from which he exists” (Part IV, Preface).
What did Einstein say about Spinoza?
Einstein used only about half his allotted number of words. It became the most famous version of an answer he gave often: “I believe in Spinoza’s God,” who reveals himself in the lawful harmony of all that exists, but not in a God who concerns himself with the fate and the doings of mankind.”
What is Spinoza’s philosophy of nature?
And nothing could be further from the spirit of Spinoza’s philosophy. Spinoza does not believe that worshipful awe or religious reverence is an appropriate attitude to take before God or Nature. There is nothing holy or sacred about Nature, and it is certainly not the object of a religious experience.
What is Spinoza’s view of miracles?
This is simply a consequence of Spinoza’s metaphysical doctrines. Miracles as traditionally conceived require a distinction between God and nature, something that Spinoza’s philosophy rules out in principle. Moreover, nature’s order is inviolable in so far as the sequence of events in nature is a necessary consequence of God’s attributes.