Person · philosopher
Plato
Greek philosopher; the Timaeus’s maker differs from later religious conceptions of God.
![Modern comparison of explanatory principles, not three names for the same god. Plato’s ordering does not establish creation from nothing; Aristotle’s mover is not automatically the biblical God. [6][7][13]](/media/1354)
Metadata
These are descriptive fields, not conclusions.
- Edition
- 2
Text
Republic II makes goodness and perfection criteria for evaluating stories about gods, rejecting change for the worse and divine deception. The argument belongs to educating the city rather than declaring that all Greeks acknowledged one God in the biblical sense. [1]
The Timaeus explains cosmic order through a good maker looking to an intelligible model. This alone does not establish matter’s creation from nothing; religious use of the account need not accept every Platonic theory. The diagram compares explanatory tools rather than depicting the philosopher. [2]
References and notes
- Plato, Republic II, translated by Benjamin Jowett Book II, 380–383; goodness, perfection and rejection of divine transformation. Return to the text ↑
- Plato, Timaeus, translated by Benjamin Jowett 27d–30b; good maker, intelligible model and ordering disorder. Return to the text ↑
Research history
Substantive changes are retained here. Minor copy edits remain in the internal operational log.
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Cite this record
IL Archive, «Plato», Edition 2, https://ilarchive.com/en/people/plato