Book Review: Socrates' Children Vol. II by Peter Kreeft

Socrates' Children Volume II Medieval Philosophers by Peter Kreeft

See my review of volume I here.

After the regular introduction to philosophy in general and justification for this series in particular, Kreeft covers numbers 34 to 54 of his 100 most important philosophers in the Western tradition. He starts off surprisingly with Saint John the Evangelist, who wrote the fourth gospel in the New Testament. John was a harbinger of things to come, not just theologically, but philosophically. To be more precise, he began the serious union of theology and philosophy that would dominate the Medieval period. 

Most of the philosophers in this period were Christians; most of them were theologians who used philosophy to help understand the Christian faith. The texts of Aristotle (except for his works on logic) were lost at the beginning of this period, leading to a dominance of the Platonic tradition. Resolving Platonic and Neo-Platonic theories with Christian teaching proved difficult, though St. Augustine did a masterful job reconciling the two in the late 300s and early 400s. In the 1100s, the texts of Aristotle came back to Europe by way of the Muslims (who had them in translation), creating a new need for a synthesis between the popular philosophy and Christian understanding. Thomas Aquinas stands as the best at uniting the two, taking the good things out of Aristotle to help explain and understand the Christian faith. Some theologians put more emphasis on Aristotle, leading to various dubious ideas like the "two truths" theory where what is known from philosophy sometimes contradicts what is known from Christian faith. To resolve the problem, thinkers posited that both were accurate in their own way, a not very satisfactory solution. The Medieval period wound down with William of Ockham's theory that there are no universals and that everything has its being in God. Moral goodness only comes from the divine fiat, not from the nature of reality, because there is no nature. All things are individuals, generalizations like "cat," "dog," or "human" do not exist in reality, but only Fifi and Fido and Frank. Ockham set up a lot of ideas that would get champions later on (probably in the next volume?).

The book is entertainingly written, with a nice blend of clarity and humor. Kreeft does a good job reviewing various people even when he disagrees with them (he even calls Ockham a villain!). Augustine and Aquinas, the two big thinkers from this period, get much longer descriptions. The others are reviewed in three to five pages. It is easy to ready for amateurs and a great review for those who have already studied philosophy.

Highly recommended.