Hilston,
While I was majoring in Greek at UCLA, I had to study Plato. I realize, in spite of the boring tomes that Augustine wrote and the statements about how near the Platonists were to his beliefs, he is held in such high regard by many Christians. Why, I don’t know.
Augustine wrote, “It is evident that none come nearer to us than the Platonists. To them, therefore, let that fabulous theology give place which delights the minds of men with the crimes of the gods;” The City of God, page 248, Book VIII Section 5
“Let these two theologies, then, the fabulous and the civil, give place to the Platonic philosophers, who have recognized the true God as the author of all things, the source of the light of truth, and the bountiful bestower of all blessedness. And not these only, but to these great acknowledgers of so great a God, those philosophers” The City of God, page 249, Book VIII Section 5
“Therefore, although in many other important respects they differ from us, nevertheless with respect to this particular point of difference, which I have just stated, as it is one of great moment, and the question on hand concerns it, I will first ask them to what gods they think that sacred rites are to be performed – to the good or to the bad, or to both the good and the bad?. But we have the opinion of Plato affirming that all the gods are good, and that there is not one of the gods bad. It follows, therefore, that these are to be performed to the good, for then they are performed to gods; for if they are not good, neither are they gods. The City of God, page 258, Book VIII Section 13
Do you believe that the Platonists really “recognized the true God as the author of all things”.
I also do not see any evidence God “has foreknowledge of (ALL) future things”. There is too much scripture that rebuts that idea.
Plotinus III, Loeb Classical Library, trans. by A.H. Armstrong, Ennead III, Chap. 7, Sec. 3, p. 152)
Augustine seams to think that everyone believes that God knows all future events. p. 156 “Nevertheless, they are far more tolerable who assert the fatal influence of the stars than they who deny the foreknowledge of future events. For, to confess, that God exists, and at the same time to deny that He has foreknowledge of future things, is the most manifest folly.”
In Christ,
Bob Hill