Gregory Riley The River Of God Summary

When Jesus Became God is written by Richard Rubenstein suggests that Jesus was divine, but they do not insist upon it. Hundreds of years after Jesus ' death, the Church councils made Jesus ' divinity a central tenet of belief among many of his followers. When Jesus Became God is a narrative of the history of the Christians ' early efforts to define Christianity by convening councils and writing creeds. Rubenstein is most interested in the battle between Arius, Presbyter of Alexandria, and Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria. Arius the leader of the Arians said that Christ did not share God 's nature but was the first creature God created.

In his 4th-century autobiography, Confessions, St. Augustine of Hippo describes his path from wickedness to righteousness. Knowledge of the self, he learned, facilitates one 's knowledge of God; comprehending the all-powerful demands self-assessment (Burt). How one may come to know oneself, and thus know God, preoccupied early American writers, who explored human transformation and perfectibility through a range of theologies and philosophies. Jonathan Edwards paved the way with "A Divine and Supernatural Light." With The Age of Reason, Thomas Paine abandoned Edwards 's mysticism in favor of rationalist principles, though Edwards 's belief in direct communication with the divine through subjective experience recrudesced in Ralph Waldo Emerson 's Nature.

The Cosmological argument is an argument that is put forward by the Christian Philosopher named St. Thomas Aquinas (who was around between the times of 1225-1274). This argument was made as an attempt in order to prove the existence of God. However, Aquinas had always had strong belief in God, this therefore meant that instead of trying to prove his existence, it was more as if he was trying to solidify his established faith that’s based on reason, through looking at the cause of the Universe. Due to this, Aquinas claims that this is the work of God. The word ‘cosmological’ practically explains what the argument is about.

His philosophical contributions are basically in the philosophy of religion and philosophy of science. He stirred so much discussion with his early work in the philosophy of religion, a series of books comprising of ‘The Coherence of Theism’, ‘The Existence of God’, and ‘Faith and Reason’. Richard Swinburne can be said to be theist because of his works which he talked about the belief of God. Meanwhile, theism can be said to be the belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe, without rejection of revelation (Dictionary, 1986). As a member of the Orthodox Church, he is recognised as one of the foremost Christian apologists, arguing in his various articles and books that faith in Christianity is rational and coherent in a rigorous philosophical sense While Swinburne

Augustine of Hippo was a Christian philosopher who played a big part and impacted Christianity greatly. Augustine helped Christianity by helping the Church by finding answers to questions that could have damaged the Church if they went unanswered. He explained to the Church original sin, the Trinity, and clarified the concept of predestination. Augustine was the bishop in the city of Hippo located in North Africa. He was the son of the famous Saint Monica, but despite his mother being a devout Christian his father believed in paganism.

In general, Christians believe in God the Father, Jesus Christ, Satan, and the idea of life after death in Heaven or Hell. According to the World Scriptures text, Christianity was a missionary religion that quickly spread throughout the Roman Empire. Around 500 B.C.E the Zoroastrian Persian Empire spread from the Arabian sea to Mediterranean sea, which overlapped with Christianity at the time (Van Voorst 265). Christianity was heavily surrounding the Mediterranean and with the importance of trade routes at the time there was bound to be influencing ideas between the two. One may argue that Christianity was the mission religion that influenced Zoroastrianism.

C.S. Lewis, a christian apologist writer wrote Mere Christianity in the nineteen-forties during world war two. Lewis wrote Mere Christianity in attempt to bring together a “common ground” of truths for the core of the Catholic Church’s beliefs. Mere Christianity shows readers logical ways of understanding the Catholic faith and he is presenting this central idea to help comprehend such ideas. The preface of Lewis’s Mere Christianity sets forth his ideas and arguments.

Either way, the Theogony helps us to understand the Christian truth by showing that creation had to have come from somewhere, but also that something to which all things come must have some type of nature and essence that explains how this process would be possible. Thus, Theogony could perhaps be seen as laying the foundation for the allegorical creation story written by the biblical authors, but also by allowing Christian philosophers to alter and perfect elements where the story left

The City of God, laid the fundamental foundations for subsequent centuries of Christian scholarship, philosophy, apologetics, and theology. It established a Christian view of history, and like all historical paradigms, it provided a vision for future Christian civilization. Since Augustine considered the Christian scriptures to constitute the criteria which philosophy and politics must be evaluated against, his worldview necessarily includes the Christian dogma of the Creation, the Fall of man, and the Redemption.

In Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Miller’s Tale” he uses symbolism as a literary element to create an underlying Christian theme that portrays the characters in the story as biblical figures. Each character of the story represents a different figure from the bible such as, Nicholas and Alisoun representing Adam and Eve, John the carpenter representing a Great Divine and Absolon representing The Devil. Throughout the story, there are many different aspects that highlight the Christian theme and allow the readers to truly see this interpretation. Throughout the story readers may recognize the alignment between Nicholas and Alisoun and Adam and Eve. This can be inferred because of the fact that these two characters recognize right from wrong in a situation,