Aristotle East and West: Metaphysics and the Division of Christendom (Repost)

This book traces the development of thought about God and the relationship between God's being and activity from Aristotle, through the pagan Neoplatonists, to thinkers such as Augustine, Boethius, and Aquinas (in the West) and Dionysius the Areopagite, Maximus the Confessor, and Gregory Palamas (in the East).

Historians of philosophy have tended to limit the study of Christian philosophy during the Middle Ages to the medieval West. This book presents the thought of the Greek Fathers as a significant and substantial alternative. Focusing on the central issue of the nature of God and the relationship between God’s being and activity, David Bradshaw traces the history of energeia and related concepts from their starting-point in Aristotle, through the pagan Neoplatonists, to thinkers such as Augustine, Boethius, and Aquinas (in the West) and Dionysius the Areopagite, Maximus the Confessor, and Gregory Palamas (in the East). The result is a powerful comparative history of philosophical thought in the two halves of Christendom, providing a philosophical backdrop to the schism between the eastern and western churches. It will be of wide interest to readers in philosophy, theology, and medieval history.