Thomas Aquinas, Immanuel Kant, And Francis Schaeffer

World History and Philosophy: Final Paper INTRODUCTION In the beginning, man had thoughts. He had a view of the world and he had God to walk alongside him and shape his ideas. However, there would come a time where God would no longer come down to speak directly to man and his heart. Looking through history, one can see that men began to have new and different ideas. Man began to try to make sense of the world, of his feelings, and of God. Philosophy was born. Some men strove for the same God-centered worldview, while others rejected God altogether and tried to explain the world from a godless perspective. To this day, philosophy is still very much alive. It is constantly moving, changing, morphing, conforming, and impacting the lives and …show more content…
However, the great philosophers and their influence society have also played a role in shaping my worldview and the way I think. There are five philosophers in particular who have affected me the most. These are Thomas Aquinas, Martin Luther, John Locke, Immanuel Kant, and Francis Schaeffer. Thomas Aquinas, a thirteenth century philosopher and theologian, provides the most important part of my philosophy – that God is real, alive, and can be proven. He does this in his Five Ways, which are five formal proofs he wrote for God's existence. Martin Luther contributes much to my theology. Although a monk for sixteen years, one night, he read Romans 1:17, “...the just shall live by faith”. He understood it like he never had before. It was then he realized his works could not save him. Rather, only his faith in Christ and Christ’s work on the cross could purchase his salvation. John Locke has greatly influenced my view on the government and its role. Locke formulated the idea of the liberalism. Liberalism is a social-political theory that stresses freedom from undue governmental interference, the state as the guarantor of the basic liberties, and the rights of the individual. According to Locke, the government should serve its people. This was different from European governments before Locke in which the people served the government. The American founding fathers felt that Locke's ideas were right and followed his guidelines. …show more content…
There have been many famous philosophers who have single-handedly changed the course of history, both for the better and the worse. The philosophy that I respect the most, and that I believe if adopted by everyone, would influence the world for the most good, is Immanuel Kant's philosophy of the Categorical Imperative. According to Vicki and Micah Tillman in their book World History and Philosophy: A Christian Worldview Study, “The Categorical Imperative states that you should act in such a way that you would be comfortable if everyone was required by law to imitate your behavior” (Tillman). Also in their book, they give a brief history of Immanuel Kant's life. In order to understand a philosophy, it is important to understand the philosopher that created it. Kant came from a Pietist family, a Russian version of Puritans. They were very strict and kept to all the observances of their sect. Unfortunately, because of his harsh upbringing, he developed a distaste for traditional church services. Although he gave up regular church-going, he remained firm in his faith and devoted much of his life to the defense of Christianity. He taught as a professor at the University of Konigsberg and began putting his philosophy to paper at the age of fifty-seven. These writings were so deep and complicated that a friend of his once returned a manuscript to him only