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TOPIC 4

WESTERN EUROPEAN MEDIEVAL

PHILOSOPHY

Lecture 8. Western European Medieval philosophy and

Renaissance

1. Teocentrism. Beginning of Christianity.
2. Scholasticism and patristics.

Western European medieval philosophy existed mainly as
teocentrical world-view, the theoretical issues formed around the notion
of God’s mythpologem and were based on church dogmas. Question
about the origin of the world is solved in terms of the spirit of

creationism - Bible claims that everything is created out of nothing with
only one will of God. Christianity emerged in 200-100 BC. Due to its
interethnic nature it becomes religion and even philosophy of an abstract

creature.
Students should select several stages of Christian philosophy and
emphasize the systematisation role of philosophical teachings of the

period which had lasted from the 8th to 15th century. Patristics claimed
incompatibility of philosophy and religious consciousness (Tertulian).
Aurelius Augustine's position was an effort to put God in the centre of

philosophical thinking and to make Christian and ancient doctrines
closer. Scholastic (academic philosophy) was to address the relationship
of faith and knowledge, religion and reason. In its turn scholastics were
divided into nominalists and realists.

A. Augustine (354 – 430) – is the representative of natristics,
whose works reflected the tendencies concerning the intimacy of
Christianity and antiquity. Studying the works of Augustine, we should

pay our attention to the fact that the so called “father of the church”
started to speak about the theory of self – knowledge, based on the truth,
which was created by God that is apriorno. The study of moral
problems, created by Augustine is grounded upon the claim of

absoluteness of divine`s good and relevance of evil, which comes from
the sinful nature of a human being. As well as Greek philosophers he
explains the sense and happiness of human life in recognizing the God.

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