Theology

The term theology is derived from the Latin theologia ("study [or understanding] of God [or the gods]"), which itself is derived from the Greek theos ("God") and logos ("reason"). Theology originated with the pre-Socratic philosophers (the philosophers of ancient Greece who flourished before the time of Socrates [c. 470-399 bce]). Inspired by the cosmogonic notions of earlier poets such as Hesiod and Homer, the pre-Socratics were preoccupied with questions about the origin and ultimate nature of the universe. The first great theologian, however, was Socrates' student Plato, who appears also to have been the first to use the term theology. For Plato, theology was the study of eternal realities, the realm of what he called forms, or ideas. For his pupil Aristotle (384-322 bce), theology was the study of the highest form of reality, the "first substance," which he seems to have regarded at different times as the "unmoved mover" and as "being qua being." Aristotle spoke of three theoretical, or speculative, ways of knowing: the mathematical, the physical, and the theological, with theology being the "most honourable."