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Full-Text Articles in Ancient Philosophy
Plato's Theologia Revisited, Gerard Naddaf
Plato's Theologia Revisited, Gerard Naddaf
The Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy Newsletter
The word theologia is attested for the first time in Plato’s Republic II, 379a4: Hoi tupoi peri theologias. According to Werner Jaeger (The Theology of the Early Greek Philosophers, Oxford 1947, 4-‐13), Plato coined the word to support the introduction of a new doctrine which resulted from a conflict between the mythical and the natural (rational) approach to the problem of God. For Jaeger, the word theologia designates what Aristotle was later to call theologikê or “first philosophy (hê protê philosophia) – whence his translation of hoi tupoi peri theologias by “outlines of theology.” Victor Goldschmidt, for his part, in …