"To release another person from ignorance, despite their initial resistance, is a great and noble thing."
-Plato
Motives. The reason I quoted this statement by Plato is because I wanted to talk about motives. Surely in Plato's statement, one of his chief motives, if not the only motive, was enlightenment. We see this in his Allegory of the Cave. We also see what Plato believed about the Forms from PJ's comment to this post. So how can we view this statement from a Christian perspective?
The question isn't, "How does this statement related to Christianity?" but, "What is the motive for telling someone about salvation through Jesus Christ?" Why, as a Christian, would I want to, in a sense, "enlighten" someone by telling him or her that God's son, Jesus Christ, came down to earth and died for our sins?
The answer is love. If I truly believe, as a Christian, there is such a place as Heaven (an eternal place of peace and joy with God), and a Hell (a place void of peace, joy, and God), and that the only way to enter this Heaven is through belief in the personal work of Jesus Christ on the cross, wouldn't I then want to tell you, out of love, about Jesus, so that you could one day be in Heaven?
At first glance I may appear to be begging the question, but if we turn to scripture we find out sharing the good news is not just a "great and noble thing," but required of us as a Christians. In Matthew 28:19,20, Jesus' last command before He ascended into Heaven was "Therefore, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always to the very end of the age."
Out of love and obedience to Christ do I share the good news. There is simply no other reason. Not for money, not for power, nor any other reason. Show me any other motive and I question it's authenticity in terms of Chrisitianity.
Blessings,
Joe
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Hi Joe - this quote from Plato refers to the "Socratic method." Plato believed that, prior to their existence on earth, humans pre-existed with the Forms. So, for Plato, humans, in their pre-existing condition, beheld the Forms. Them, as a form opf punishment, human souls were palced in physical bodies. Socrates tries to "teach" people by a technique called "anamnesis," or "remembering." He tries, with his "Socratic method," to draw out a person's memory of the Forms. Such as, e.g., mathemaatical, logical, and ethical truths. Plato believed people already know such things. To get them to remember and "see" such eternal truth is to relase them from ignorance.
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