Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'The Social Contract (tr Cress)' and 'Knowledge and the Philosophy of Number'

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4 ideas

29. Religion / B. Monotheistic Religion / 1. Monotheistic Religion
Stoics teach that God is a unity, variously known as Mind, or Fate, or Jupiter [Chrysippus, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: Stoics teach that God is unity, and that he is called Mind, and Fate, and Jupiter, and by many names besides.
     From: report of Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.Ze.68
29. Religion / B. Monotheistic Religion / 4. Christianity / a. Christianity
A tyrant exploits Christians because they don't value this life, and are made to be slaves [Rousseau]
     Full Idea: The Christian spirit is too favourable to tyranny for tyranny not to take advantage of it. True Christians are made to be slaves; they know it and hardly care; this short life has too little value in their eyes.
     From: Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract (tr Cress) [1762], IV.8)
     A reaction: This is strikingly close to Nietzsche's verdict on Christianity, that it is the essence of slave morality. It has certainly been my experience that Christians tend to be much more reluctant than other people to stand up to authority.
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 2. Immortality / b. Soul
Death can't separate soul from body, because incorporeal soul can't unite with body [Chrysippus]
     Full Idea: Death is a separation of soul from body. But nothing incorporeal can be separated from a body. For neither does anything incorporeal touch a body, and the soul touches and is separated from the body. Therefore the soul is not incorporeal.
     From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Tertullian - The Soul as an 'Astral Body' 5.3
     A reaction: This is the classic interaction difficulty for substance dualist theories of mind.
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 3. Problem of Evil / d. Natural Evil
There is a rationale in terrible disasters; they are useful to the whole, and make good possible [Chrysippus]
     Full Idea: The evil which occurs in terrible disasters has a rationale [logos] peculiar to itself: for in a sense it occurs in accordance with universal reason, and is not without usefulness in relation to the whole. For without it there could be no good.
     From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by A.A. Long - Hellenistic Philosophy 4.4.5
     A reaction: [a quotation from Chrysippus. Plutarch, Comm Not 1065b] A nice question about any terrible disaster is whether it is in some way 'useful', if we take a broader view of things. Almost everything has a good aspect, from that perspective.