Plotinus

According to Plotinus philosophical beliefs, beauty communicates the order of things both visually and intellectually. That through art you can connect the two realms together. It is through the goodness of one’s soul to bring the intellectual principle of form into something visually beautiful to help the human soul connect to the one (God). One such example of this is the baptistery of San Giovanni in Florence, Italy. The structure was rebuilt on top of Roman Ruins in the Tuscan Romanesque…

Just as it was turning into the medieval period, Augustine lived in the “late antiquity” days. He is a fascinating figure who brings together almost four centuries of debate and consolidation concerning Christian doctrine, while stemming from teachings of Plato, making himself a pivotal philosopher. He had a yearn for happiness and introspection, which is evidence to how powerful his mind truly is. With contribution entirely to the grace of God, Augustine created the mold that other great…

During week 13 we started a brief outline on The Confessions of Augustine of Hippo. We had been discussing the writing in class for almost two weeks now, and started to compose and outline and understand the main topics covered in the reading. Our reading covered book twelve of The Confessions. Book twelve focuses on the explanation of Genesis, with special attention to the word Christ and also meaning of the Heavens. The Book of Genesis focuses on the stpry of creation. It’s important to note…

But good fortune came his way when Symmachus, prefect of the city, chose Augustine for a post in Milan as professor of rhetoric. Augustine moved to Milan and took up study of the Neoplatonists, especially Plotinus, who had taught that one is awakened to a sense of divine destiny through purification from carnal appetites. The basic Christian principles his mother had taught him remained intact. He became increasingly disillusioned with Manichaean materialism…

Metaphysics and Epistemology deal with theories of reality and knowledge. Those two domains of philosophy exhibit a close relationship since our understanding of reality affects our perception of knowledge. Philosophy explores an unlimited array of ideas, including religion. In the field of religion, the nature and existence of a higher power (God) are explored as well as the immortality of the soul, miracles, and the comprehensibility of religious language as factual statements (Alexander, 2010…

Aesthetic value can be defined as the sensation or feeling of enjoying beauty. For example, when we see a good piece of art in an exhibition, we feel like appreciating that particular art and artist as we find that art a beautiful one. That feeling specifically can be referred to as aesthetic value. Every human will have the value of aesthetics or aesthetic sense that one get to enjoy whatever he/she sees in her daily life. The joy of enjoying beauty gives some kind of pleasure. “Beauty depends…

To get a better understanding of the concept of the soul, one should know its meaning from different religious perspective.In Judaism, the soul is the referred to as nephesh and ruah, which means breath and wind or spirit respectively. Two essential concept of the soul in this religion is that every living thing has a soul,which is referred to as the life-force and that emotions and the fundamental core of the human beings are stored in the soul.“All the while my breath is in me, and the spirit…

Taoism is a religion most commonly seen in China. Taoism does share some similarities with two religions we have discussed previously, including Buddhism and Confucianism. This religion started with a man named Lao Tzu. Lao Tzu was born around 604 B.C and was known in the Taoism religion as “the Old Boy.” People were not very certain about Lao Tzu because there were different conspiracies about different parts of his life. Some legends about Lao Tzu included people believing he was in his…

For centuries in the Middle Ages there have been little changes to the scientific knowledge, and the Catholic Church had adopted a system of beliefs that is based on the teachings of the Romans which it had successfully incorporated into their religious doctrine. During this period of time only few scientific inquiries and experimentations were conducted. However, the Renaissance shaped the western societies’ doctrinal passivity entirely. In the early modern period, there was a fundamental…

Ralph (otherwise known as Waldo) Emerson was an American, poet, author, and transcendentalist. Born on the 25th of May, 1803 in Boston, Massachusetts. He was known as the “Sage of Concord” in literary circles, he became the chief spokesman for transcendentalism; American philosophic and literary movement. Emerson studied at Harvard and taught for a brief time before being appointed to minister (1826) and ordained to the Unitarian Church (1829). The same year as his ordainment, Emerson married…