Zodinsanga T - Role of Energeia in the Knowledge of God: A Philosophical Discourse

Toimoi ZODINSANGA*

Federated Faculty for Research in Religion and Culture, Kerala, India

Abstract:

There has been a debate over the valid source of knowledge. Rationalists claim that innate idea or reason provides knowledge while empiricists argue for senseexperience as the valid means of knowledge. Idealists (Plato, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, George Berkeley, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Immanuel Kant) affirm that reality of a thing lies in its essential nature. Plato, the idealist, declares that reality of a thing resides in its forms [1] (Panthanmackel 1999, 3-6; See also, Gracia 2003, 23). Immanuel Kant, another idealist philosopher holds different view that the essence or noumenon (“thing-in-itself”) of a thing cannot be known, what can be known is phenomenon (thing-itappears). The realist philosophers on the other hand observe that the ultimate reality of a thing lies at the world of physical object which is existed independently from mental processes. Aristotle, in response to the absolute claim of Plato in the knowledge of reality (forms/ideas/essence) asserts that the essential nature of a thing is expressed in its movement (Ferrarin 2001, 380). In the knowledge of God, many theologians have agreed that the energeia of God is the only and the best element to know God as the ousia of God is beyond comprehension. The Cappadocian Fathers (Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory of Nazianzus) are one group of theologians who advocate the revelation of God’s attributes through his activities. In this paper, attempt is made to discuss the role of energeia in the knowledge of God with special reference to the Cappadocian Fathers, which will be considered in the light of Neoplatonic philosophy. In this paper, attempt is made to discuss the role of energeia in the knowledge of God with special reference to the Cappadocian Fathers, which will be considered in the light of Neoplatonic philosophy.

Keywords:

energeia, knowledge, God, philosophy, Cappadocian Fathers

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