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To: Stone Mountain

At the risk of stirring up a hornet's nest, Natural Law, which is basically what we're talking about, has it's routes in Greek philosopy, and more closely, the Roman flavour of Stoicism that followed it. Jewish theologians (such as Philo of Alexandria) were heavily influenced by this tradition, and judging by the style of the New Testament, Paul was also. This goes to show that despite the fact that Stoics were theists, their concept of natural law was independent of a need to believe in God (Seneca himself states this). The early church fathers largely lifted this philosophy in its entirety, and simply change the 'objective' from the happiness/contentment of the Stoics to the salvation objective of Christians.

To put it simply, the moral traditions of Christianity (and non-Orthodox Jewry) is largely based on pagan philosophy.


314 posted on 08/02/2006 10:32:07 AM PDT by Incitatus
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To: Incitatus

'Routes'? I mean 'roots' of course...


319 posted on 08/02/2006 11:18:55 AM PDT by Incitatus
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