Categorie archief: Geen categorie

Philosophy in medieval times also covered thinking about the ideal city. What is remarkable about thinking about the ideal city, is that the main focus seems to arise from religious thinking again. The Bible forms a great source for political philosophy, as it kind of contains a description of an ideal society. The Ten CommandmentsMeer lezen over “Lecture 11: the ideal city”

Thomas Aquinas is a philosopher that can be placed in the later medieval tradition. He attended the Benedictine Abbey of Monte Cassino, where he was educated religiously. In the late medieval philosophy, a seven-piece liberal arts program formed the main course of the philosophical education. The trivium was mainly about grammar and dialectics, while theMeer lezen over “Lecture 10: Aquinas”

Maimomides was a jewish rabbi and philosopher who tried to bring judaism and philosophy closer together, resulting in him changing both. He tried to make knowledge more accessible to the public and taught to advanced students. In his earlier years, he went to the Andalusian school of Aristotelian studies, where Maimomides was inspired to applyMeer lezen over “Lecture 9: Maimomides”

Saadia is a philosopher who stands in the jewish tradition of philosophy. Saadia originally came from Egypt and was the first to practice systematic philosophy in judaism. His main interests were physics, metaphysics, logic, ethics and politics. Under Saadia, Hebrew became more important as a philosophical language. Religion was important for him, but Saadia managedMeer lezen over “Lecture 8: Saadia”

It has been a weird time lately, but luckily these times allow us to keep following education. Al-Ghazali seems to be the last Arab philosopher we discuss in this course. He was a polymath, which seems to have become a very common way of philosophizing in the Middle Ages. Al-Ghazali’s work The doctrines of theMeer lezen over “Lecture 7: Al-Ghazali”

This week we talked about the arabic philosopher Al-Farabi. Al-Farabi is being seen as the father of the islamic neoplatonism and as the second master (the first one was Aristotle). He was polymathic, a concept that is hardly seen nowadays because of our focus on specialization and the earlier focus on becoming a better personMeer lezen over “Week 5: Al-Farabi”

This week was about medieval logic. In medieval times, logic was seen as an art, which is nowadays hard to believe. Whereas logic in ancient times was more of a discipline, it now became a way of telling truth and getting attention. One way of doing that was, for instance, criticizing ancient philosophers like Aristotle.Meer lezen over “Week 4: Medieval Logic”

Boethius was born in 475 around Rome. He was almost obsessed with the Alexandrian philosophy and was keen to preserve the Greek philosophy as well. Unlike many other philosophers, who wrote their philosophy in Greek, Boethius’ philosophy was written in common Latin. He also translated Aristotle to littery Latin, so that more people could readMeer lezen over “Week 3: Boethius”

This week the lecture was about Augustine. Augustine was born in 354 in Algeria . He converted to the Manichean tradition, became an auditor and focussed his works on religious philosophy. Later, Augistine mastered himself in rhetoric. Augustine was an important philosopher and up until the 19th century he was seen as the greatest antiqueMeer lezen over “Week 2: Augustine”

This week, the course ‘An introduction to Medieval Philosophy’ has started. What could I expect? To be very honest, I had not really thought about it. And I did not in the least expect that I would be starting a blog today. However, here I am, more excited to write about todays lecture that IMeer lezen over “Week 1: Queen Religion”