I seem to recall the Chrysostom uses it in the sense of eternal or everlasting elsewhere. Maybe I can find it…
Concerning Plato, I still would be interested what your opinion on my interpretation is, ironically it is Origen who is said to have been a Platonist, yet he used aionios in a limited sense, which he would not have done, if with aionios Plato meant endless.
Concerning Chrysostom, if I remember right he used not aionios but a form of the noun aion, I was not able to find the proper Greek passage.
You’ll find Greek sources of him there:
documentacatholicaomnia.eu/2 … nctus.html
This might be the writing, but is quite large:
One can find the quote in English on the following site—fifth paragraph down.
newadvent.org/fathers/230104.htm
It seems the translators have rendered “αιωνιος” as “of this age.” I could not find the quote in Greek and so I was unable to verify that the adjective “αιωνιος” (lasting) was used, and not the noun “αιων” (age).
I once checked it in Greek, but its years ago and I think it was aioni, which is a form of the noun?
Hi all, interesting topic. I hope you see this as this topic hasn’t been active for a while but I have a few questions.
“For Plato, forms, such as beauty, are more real than any objects that imitate them. Though the forms are timeless and unchanging, physical things are in a constant change of existence. Where forms are unqualified perfection, physical things are qualified and conditioned.[13]”
Does this mean physical things cannot be timeless?
It’s aionios, an adjective, Strongs # 166, the same word used at Mt.25:46:
“For that his kingdom is of this age,(αἰώνιος) i.e., will cease with the present age(αιώνι) …” (Homily 4 on Ephesians, Chapter II. Verses 1-3).
newadvent.org/fathers/230104.htm
Where aionios is clearly of finite duration.
See page 137, line 21 of the Greek text here:
For other ancient examples of aionios as a finite duration:
Whoa… what did Plato believe?? That was a trippy description of creation and not as… unbiblical as I expected. Reminds me of how I felt when I read Josephus, as if he were writing commonly known truths at that time that I’d never heard of before but seemed as if they were well known by the ancients of that time. Very cool, I’ll have to read further into this.
“αιωνι” (or “aioni” as you transliterated it) is simply the dative case of the noun. In phrases such as “in the age to come” the dative form must be used to go with the preposition “in.”
Does anyone know of any scholars who believe Plato meant everlasting time by his use of aionios? I thought I read that someone but can’t remember where.
Where does Plato call time and heaven aionios?
This should be the relevant passage, also have a look a few posts above.
When the father creator saw the creature which he had made moving and living, the created image of the eternal gods, he rejoiced, and in his joy determined to make the copy still more like the original; and as this was eternal, he sought to make the universe eternal, so far as might be. Now the nature of the ideal being was everlasting, but to bestow this attribute in its fulness upon a creature was impossible. Wherefore he resolved to have a moving image of eternity, and when he set in order the heaven, he made this image eternal but moving according to number, while eternity itself rests in unity; and this image we call time. For there were no days and nights and months and years before the heaven was created, but when he constructed the heaven he created them also. They are all parts of time, and the past and future are created species of time, which we unconsciously but wrongly transfer to the eternal essence; for we say that he “was,” he “is,” he “will be,” but the truth is that “is” alone is properly attributed to him, and that “was” and “will be” only to be spoken of becoming in time, for they are motions, but that which is immovably the same cannot become older or younger by time, nor ever did or has become, or hereafter will be, older or younger, nor is subject at all to any of those states which affect moving and sensible things and of which generation is the cause. These are the forms of time, which imitates eternity and revolves according to a law of number. Moreover, when we say that what has become is become and what becomes is becoming, and that what will become is about to become and that the non-existent is non-existent-all these are inaccurate modes of expression. But perhaps this whole subject will be more suitably discussed on some other occasion.
Time, then, and the heaven came into being at the same instant in order that, having been created together, if ever there was to be a dissolution of them, they might be dissolved together. It was framed after the pattern of the eternal nature, that it might resemble this as far as was possible; for the pattern exists from eternity, and the created heaven has been, and is, and will be, in all time. Such was the mind and thought of God in the creation of time. The sun and moon and five other stars, which are called the planets, were created by him in order to distinguish and preserve the numbers of time; and when he had made-their several bodies, he placed them in the orbits in which the circle of the other was revolving-in seven orbits seven stars. First, there was the moon in the orbit nearest the earth, and next the sun, in the second orbit above the earth; then came the morning star and the star sacred to Hermes, moving in orbits which have an equal swiftness with the sun, but in an opposite direction; and this is the reason why the sun and Hermes and Lucifer overtake and are overtaken by each other. To enumerate the places which he assigned to the other stars, and to give all the reasons why he assigned them, although a secondary matter, would give more trouble than the primary. These things at some future time, when we are at leisure, may have the consideration which they deserve, but not at present.