Platonism and early Christianity

In his 2010 Divine Complexity: The Rise of Creedal Christianity , Paul Hinlicky presents a nuanced summary of both the commonalities and the differences between Middle Platonism and early Christian thought. Citing C.J. De Vogel, he lists several shared assumptions: visible things don’t exist in and through themselves; the imperfections of visible things point to a perfect, primary reality; this invisible reality is of infinitely greater significance than sensible reality; the fact of the supremacy of the invisible reality should rule our conduct; this implies the infinite value of the soul (161).

Both Platonism and the gospel, in short, represent a “critique” of visible things, but the basis of the critique is different. Platonism “thinks . . . of the dubiousness of the visible within the static framework of an eternal cosmos,” while the gospel “renders the present establishment of things dubious by expectation of a new creation through the gospel of the resurrection of the Crucified.” In the long run, the effect of the gospel was to “critique and revise” Platonism” even while its claims were being expounded in Platonic terms.

That’s seems an accurate as historical description, but the difference Hinlicky mentions (static framework v. eschatology) affects the way several of the “shared assumptions” are understood. Platonists and Christians would not, for example, think of the imperfections of visible things (which are good ) in the same way a Platonist would. And while Christians indeed affirm that God is of infinitely greater significance than His creation, that truth is transformed by the confession that the infinite God took flesh to dwell among us and sent His Spirit into our hearts.