I'm delighted you enjoyed the episode. To your first question, I would point you to a pair of posts (originally a talk for the American Academy of Religion) on whether Christianity has metaphysical commitments. Links below:
I make the case that the answer is yes, Christianity has metaphysical commitments, and those commitments very much include realism. One cannot profess the Nicene faith or Chalcedonian Christology without professing realism.
Now, I would not want to say that professing Christian realism means professing Platonism. I do believe there are notable differences between Christian realism and Platonism. For a systematic assessment of pro-Nicene realism, see my article, "The Metaphysical Idealism of the Eastern Church Fathers." Link below:
So, what does this mean for Christians who diverge from realism? They have, indeed, diverged from the Christianity handed down by Christ, the Apostles, and the fathers, which was codified in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed and in the Seven Ecumenical Councils of the first millennium.
I think such divergence is endemic in Modernity, appearing in empiricists, like John Locke, and even rationalists with Platonic tendencies, like Leibniz (who strives to mirror historical Christianity but does so with wildly idiosyncratic metaphysics). And yes, that would include existentialist Lutherans, like Kierkegaard. This does not mean that everything they say is false, but it means whatever may be true is wrapped in a packaging that heterodox at best. (As for Nikolai Berdyaev, I find his views far too influenced by German idealists, like F. W. J. Schelling, to be embraced as properly Orthodox.)
Now, as for figures such as Florovsky and Lossky, again, I think it's important to distinguish realism more broadly from Platonism proper. Platonism proper has a number of things that are anathema to the fathers. Plato believes in reincarnation; matter is an eternal second principle alongside God that he did not create; matter is inherently unstable, making corruption an inevitable byproduct of material copies; the Forms are second world (on the traditional Aristotelian reading), not Ideas in the mind of God; the Forms include only pure generics, like circle, and not particular subjects, like you and me (something corrected by the logoi doctrine of the fathers).
The point is this. Sometimes the fathers or Orthodox scholars will critique Platonism, and a reader may presume they are rejecting realism. But this is a non sequitur. Gregory of Nyssa, who is universally recognized to be a realist, mocks NeoPlatonic emanationism, for example. The fact that he rejects this aspect of NeoPlatonism as absurd does not change the fact that he agrees with the NeoPlatonist that the world is modeled after archetypal ideas. The term "Platonism" is often thrown around to signify any number of things from, yes, realism to contempt for matter or the body or for substance dualism, etc.
One final note. The Eastern fathers, though realists, did not identify as Platonists. They identified as Christians. This highlights a difference between ancient ways of thinking and contemporary ways of thinking. Scholars today tend to indigenize ideas: This is a Hebrew idea, that's a Greek idea, etc. But the ancient world thought of ideas as true or false. If Plato is right that God has archetypal Ideas after which the world is modeled, then this is not Plato's concept anymore than calculus is Leibniz's concept. And this is another reason why the fathers do not identify as Platonists while still embracing Christian realism. Realism is not Platonic; it is true. And it is part of Christian philosophy.
Dear Uoeofye,
I'm delighted you enjoyed the episode. To your first question, I would point you to a pair of posts (originally a talk for the American Academy of Religion) on whether Christianity has metaphysical commitments. Links below:
https://nathanajacobs.substack.com/p/does-christianity-have-metaphysical
https://nathanajacobs.substack.com/p/does-christianity-have-metaphysical-a1d
I make the case that the answer is yes, Christianity has metaphysical commitments, and those commitments very much include realism. One cannot profess the Nicene faith or Chalcedonian Christology without professing realism.
Now, I would not want to say that professing Christian realism means professing Platonism. I do believe there are notable differences between Christian realism and Platonism. For a systematic assessment of pro-Nicene realism, see my article, "The Metaphysical Idealism of the Eastern Church Fathers." Link below:
https://www.academia.edu/41586437/The_Metaphysical_Idealism_of_the_Eastern_Church_Fathers
So, what does this mean for Christians who diverge from realism? They have, indeed, diverged from the Christianity handed down by Christ, the Apostles, and the fathers, which was codified in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed and in the Seven Ecumenical Councils of the first millennium.
I think such divergence is endemic in Modernity, appearing in empiricists, like John Locke, and even rationalists with Platonic tendencies, like Leibniz (who strives to mirror historical Christianity but does so with wildly idiosyncratic metaphysics). And yes, that would include existentialist Lutherans, like Kierkegaard. This does not mean that everything they say is false, but it means whatever may be true is wrapped in a packaging that heterodox at best. (As for Nikolai Berdyaev, I find his views far too influenced by German idealists, like F. W. J. Schelling, to be embraced as properly Orthodox.)
Now, as for figures such as Florovsky and Lossky, again, I think it's important to distinguish realism more broadly from Platonism proper. Platonism proper has a number of things that are anathema to the fathers. Plato believes in reincarnation; matter is an eternal second principle alongside God that he did not create; matter is inherently unstable, making corruption an inevitable byproduct of material copies; the Forms are second world (on the traditional Aristotelian reading), not Ideas in the mind of God; the Forms include only pure generics, like circle, and not particular subjects, like you and me (something corrected by the logoi doctrine of the fathers).
The point is this. Sometimes the fathers or Orthodox scholars will critique Platonism, and a reader may presume they are rejecting realism. But this is a non sequitur. Gregory of Nyssa, who is universally recognized to be a realist, mocks NeoPlatonic emanationism, for example. The fact that he rejects this aspect of NeoPlatonism as absurd does not change the fact that he agrees with the NeoPlatonist that the world is modeled after archetypal ideas. The term "Platonism" is often thrown around to signify any number of things from, yes, realism to contempt for matter or the body or for substance dualism, etc.
One final note. The Eastern fathers, though realists, did not identify as Platonists. They identified as Christians. This highlights a difference between ancient ways of thinking and contemporary ways of thinking. Scholars today tend to indigenize ideas: This is a Hebrew idea, that's a Greek idea, etc. But the ancient world thought of ideas as true or false. If Plato is right that God has archetypal Ideas after which the world is modeled, then this is not Plato's concept anymore than calculus is Leibniz's concept. And this is another reason why the fathers do not identify as Platonists while still embracing Christian realism. Realism is not Platonic; it is true. And it is part of Christian philosophy.
I hope that helps!