Is Plato or Aristotle the coat-hanger of your thoughts and lifestyle?

Koot van Wyk (DLitt et Phil; ThD) Visiting Professor, Department of Liberal Education, Kyungpook National University, Sangju Campus, South Korea, Conjoint lecturer of Avondale College, Australia

Aristotle was the student of Plato but he was diametrically opposed to the views of his teacher. One can see the differences between these two philosophers as the great polarity that exists today in the world between religion and secularism. The best illustration of this polarity of views is a painting done by Raphael in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican in 1511, called "School of Athens". In the painting one can see Plato on the left and Aristotle on the right with Plato pointing his finger exactly where he thinks true ultimate reality is to be found: heaven and Artistotle his finger downwards to say that the earth holds the most important place in this life. Neo-Platonism and neo-Aristotelianism is just attempts to ride both extremes and saying "we never denied the importance of the other" but in the final analysis, the most important is still the extreme polarity position. Plato is in essence pointing for Christians to religion and God as the ultimate success in this life whereas Aristotle is holding out a secularistic humanistic approach to this life. All the philosophies of the world is either on the one side or the other. Meet anyone in your family or friend circle or anywhere and start talking. Are they using language giving prominence to God? If not and their talk is full of gain, enjoyment, sports, fun seeking, computer game excitement, you pretty much look at someone who is directed by the Aristotelian camp. Knowingly or unknowingly the person is living Aristotelian realities. Plato is sometimes called the dreamer and Aristotle the pragmatist but the difference is just that Plato thinks that ultimate reality is not on this earth but elsewhere and Aristotle on the other hand insists that reality is on this earth and not elsewhere. "Let us eat and drink and be happy, for tomorrow we die" (will be Aristotle the hedonist). Plato is more concerned about the epistemology whereas Aristotle make ontology the focus of life. This was the paradigm shift between Modernism and Post-modernism that Modernism focussed on the epistemology, the dogma, or not, the systems of thinking or denunciation thereof. Post-modernism shifted gears and the central piece for it is ontology, the way you experience, feel, enjoy, what you think about things subjectively rather than any outside doctrine or revelation like that given in the Bible. Pastors preach the doctrines of the church in sermons on Sabbath, for example, and the generation younger than 30 start taking out their cellphones to play with. Why is that? The paradigm shift in society is that ontology is more important than epistemology. Psychology, experience, self-stories, feelings, imaginations are more important than pioneers doctrinal discoveries, biblical positions of this or that or prophecies of Daniel and Revelation. So what does the preacher do in this case? Become an Aristotelian by focusing on enjoyment, self-happiness, games, feelings, psychology and gain-dreams, stories? The Bible says no. In Micah 6 we have the Rib-oracles which is the word for "Investigative Judgment". That judgment started in 1844 and is thus for our time. A number of prophets talked about it like Hosea, Isaiah, Amos, and Jeremiah. Sorry millennials with your focus on ontology. But that is what this post-modern writer is telling you now. I was actually born two years before the death of Modernism in 1960. Micah tells us that one of the major problems with secularistic settings, whether socialistic, Marxistic, democratic or any fusion socialism like the African ones, if the scales of measurements are skew it leads to "corrupt-self-enrichment" (Micah 6:10b). Problematic scales for weights in sales or deals, or deals by tricks and illegal cronyism leads to corrupt self-enrichment (Micah 6:11a). Bags of deceitful weights adds to corrupt enrichment practices (Micah 6:11b). Violence on every level leads to self-assertion practices (Micah 6:12). If one nation built a building but another comes to rename the building to their own heroes, you have an example of legacy stealing. It is better to build anew adjacent to that building and name the new building or site by the new name. In the days of Tikulti-Ninurta of Assyria, it was his error that he invaded Babylon and brushed aside its culture and religion and ways of living and the result was a silent rejection and a build-up of a revolt that many years later led to his murder and death by a Babylonian who took revenge. Lying leads to self-rationalization (Micah 6:12b). Tongues full of guile leads to self-directed verbalizations (Micah 6:12c). All these events happen by people who favor Aristotle's ontological philosophy of gain, individually or cooperatively socialistically or "forced cooperative socialism" as some forms are found in the Orient with people severely suffering from hunger, partition, blocking of opportunities, blocking from social media and blocking from the outside world or the outside world access to them so that they cannot tell their sad stories of their status quo. It is all the result of Aristotle who basically designed "ethics" for secularists and those who want to have a good time on earth. Aristotle's point is also that there is no heaven above, that heaven is right here and you have to make it heaven or have nothing ever. That is why Futurists and Preterists ideas of building a heaven on earth, called by some churches as the "Kingdom of God on earth" to improve as time goes on until earth is heaven, is not possible. In 2 Timothy Paul said that in the last days there will be distressing times. He did not say it will get better. Jesus description in Matthew 24 of the last days is all but improved situations. The papacy called on prime-ministers to meet at the Vatican to enforce better social laws for industries, the same for all churches and on the 6th of June he calls all Judges over the world to come for a jurisdiction tutorial of the same. He lives with the opposite view of creating a "heaven on earth". He want them to build in their laws the concept of a Sunday rest for humanity since it will help that goal of social justice in the industries better. We know that Sunday observance is recognized in the Constitution of the United States Article 1, Sec. 7, Paragraph 2 as a "a day of rest for the President and implied for the people". Elder Collier said in the early 1960's in a pamphlet that Ichabod, meaning "glory of the Lord has departed" will happen when "Protestantism reaches her hand across the gulf and clasps the hand of Roman Catholicism by inducing the United States government to enforce a National Sunday Law" (E. Collier, "The Three-Fold Union - Protestantism" page 44).

The preacher must preach what is current to appeal to people but Micah 3 warns that money orientated priests and prophets teach and preach for money and for a price (Micah 3:11). They are trying to please those who pay them by adapting the preaching to the source of the money. The Jewish Middle Age Rabbi Redak said of this: "They interpret the Torah to suit those who pay them a price". This is Ichabod.

Dear Lord

Our era wish to honor and operate on all levels with Aristotle and to try to create heaven on earth contrary to Your word. We do not want to have any part in it. To the Scripture and Scripture alone we ask for the Word of God, not from gut feelings or ideas from the hip. Amen.