Folia Theologica 19. (2008)
Perendy László: Judging Philosophers - Theophilus of Antioch on Hellenic inconsistency
JUDGING PHILOSOPHERS 209 Grant points out that - in his doctrine of God - Theophilus "made use of categories both Platonic and Stoic... He lists 'negative attributes' of God in Platonic fashion while he treats the logos, or Son of God, in a Stoic manner, differentiating the logos endiathetos within God from the logos prophorikos expressed by him. (...) Theophilus insists on the transcendence of God and points out that all of God's 'appellations' refer to his characteristics, attributes, or activities, not to his nature in itself. (...) All these terms are symbolic because they refer to the ineffable transcendent God who, unlike Marcion's God, is just as well as good. Similar teaching is to be found in Albinus and the Corpus Her- meticum (2.14). But like Justin, Theophilus is not an orthodox Platonist philosopher. His list of names and attributes ends on a biblical note. 'If I call him 'fire' I speak of his wrath.' The interlocutor asks, 'Will you tell me that God is angry?' Against the overwhelming majority of philosophers, not to mention the Marcionites, Theophilus replies, 'Certainly: he is angry with those who commit evil deeds but good and merciful toward those who love and fear him. For he is the instructor of the pious and father of the just, but judge and punisher of the impious.' Here he is on firm Stoic ground, at least: Plutarch notes that in the Stoic view 'God punishes evil and does much to punish wicked men.'"36 Their mistakes about the origin of the universe 'PCKXa Kai népi xrjç Koapoyovtaç aobpcpcova âÀAf|À,otç Kai (pati/Va è^eînov. IIpcoxov pèv oxi xtvèç àyévr|xov xôv KÓapov ànc- cpfjvavxo, Ka0coç Kai ëpnpooOev èSriXcûoapev, Kaï oi pèv àyévr|xov aùxôv Kaï (à)tôiav cpùotv cpaaKovxeç oùk àKÔ/Vot>0a eînov xoîç yevrixôv aùxôv Soypaxiaaotv. EÎKaopcp yàp xaùxa Kaï àv0pamivr| èwoia ècp0éyi;avxo, Kaï où Kaxà ddf|0eiav. "Moreover, they made inconsistent and evil statements about the origin of the world. In the first place, some of them declared that the world was uncreated, as we have already explained [n. 4]; and those who said that it was uncreated and that nature is eternal disagreed 36 R. M. Grant, Gods and the One God. Christian theology in the Graeco-Roman World, London, 1986, 87-88.
