①
もちろん、以下はアウグスティヌス『神の国』第13巻第18章の日本語訳の要約です。原文の哲学的・神学的な深みを保ちつつ、読みやすく整理しました：（copilot）
🌌 第18章：天に存在できないとされる地上の身体について
哲学者たちはこう主張します：
「地上の身体は自然の重さによって地に引き戻されるため、天に存在することはできない。」
これに対してアウグスティヌスは反論します：
✝️ キリストの昇天と復活の身体
🛠️ 人間の技術 vs 神の力
🧠 魂と身体の関係
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直訳： それでも魂は、自らの肉体の四肢を、病弱で痩せているときよりも、健康でたくましいときの方が軽々と運ぶ。 そして他人が運ぶ場合には、健康で頑丈な人の身体の方が、痩せて病んだ人の身体よりも重く感じられるが、本人自身にとっては、病気や飢えで力がほとんどないときよりも、健康で肉付きが良いときの方が、自らの身体を動かし運ぶのに機敏である。 つまり、地上の身体を持つにあたっては、それがまだ腐敗し得るものであり、死すべきものであるとしても、重要なのは量的な重さではなく、調和のあり方である。 そして、今私たちが「健康」と呼ぶ状態と、将来の「不死」との間に、どれほどの違いがあるかを、誰が言葉で説明できるだろうか？ したがって、身体の重さについて語る哲学者たちは、私たちの信仰を論駁することはできない。 私は、なぜ彼らが地上の身体が天に存在し得ると信じないのかを問いただすつもりはない。なぜなら、地球全体が虚無の中に浮かんでいるのだから。 この一節は、身体の「重さ」が物理的な質量だけでなく、魂との関係性や健康状態によって変容することを示し、復活後の身体がいかにして天に存在し得るかを論じる重要な箇所です。 |
👼 天使と聖人の力
🌍 地球の位置と重力
🔚 結論
神は人間の肉体から腐敗を取り除き、形や性質を保ちつつ、重さによる制限を取り払うことができる。
復活と不死の身体については、神が望めばこの著作の最後でさらに詳しく論じる、とアウグスティヌスは述べています。
②
もちろんです。以下はアウグスティヌス『神の国』第22巻第5章の日本語による要約です：
✝️ 第5章：世界が信じたにもかかわらず、なお信じない者たちについて──肉体の復活
アウグスティヌスは、キリストの肉体の復活と昇天がかつては信じがたいことであったにもかかわらず、今や世界中で信じられている事実を強調します。そして、これに関連する三つの「信じがたいこと」がすでに実現していると述べます：
1. キリストが肉体をもって復活し、天に昇ったこと
2. 世界がそのような信じがたいことを信じたこと
3. 卑しい身分で無学な少数の人々が、それを世界中に説得できたこと
これら三つのうち、最初のものを信じない者がいるが、第二のもの（世界が信じたこと）は否定できず、第三のもの（誰が説得したか）を否定すれば、第二のものの説明がつかないと論じます。
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直訳： キリストの肉体が天に昇ったこと──すなわち肉体の復活と天上の座への昇天──は、今や学ある者も無学な者も信じており、驚きつつも信じない者はごくわずかしか残っていない。 もしそれが「信じるに値すること」であったなら、信じない者たちはどれほど愚かであるかを知るべきである。 もしそれが「信じがたいこと」であったなら、それが信じられているという事実そのものがまた信じがたい。 つまり、「信じがたいことが信じられた」ということ自体が、もう一つの驚くべき事実なのだ。 このように、二つの信じがたいこと──すなわち「私たちの身体が永遠に復活すること」と「世界がそのような信じがたいことを信じるようになること」──は、神によって、どちらも起こると予告されていた。 そのうちの一つはすでに実現している。すなわち、かつては信じがたかったことを世界が信じた。 ならば、なぜもう一つが絶望視されるのか？ 世界がすでに信じたことが、かつては信じがたいことであったのだから、残る一つも実現するはずではないか？ この二つの信じがたいこと──そのうちの一つはすでに目にしており、もう一つは信じている──は、世界が信じるに至ったその聖なる書物において、どちらも予告されていたのである。 |
さらに、使徒たちが行った奇跡──異言を話す、病人を癒す、死者を蘇らせる──が信仰の説得力となったことを挙げ、これらの奇跡が実際に起こったと認めるならば、肉体の復活と昇天を信じる根拠は十分であると主張します。
そして最後に、もし奇跡がなかったとしても、世界がそれを信じたという事実そのものが、神の力による最大の奇跡であると締めくくります。
4世紀末にはキリスト教徒が帝国内の多数派となり、5世紀初頭には人口（約5,000万〜5,500万人と見積もられています。）の過半数以上がキリスト教徒だったと考えられます。
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Friday, September 5, 2025
Perhaps it is a failure of diplomacy on my side, but my approach to most contemporary political controversies could be summed up in the statement, "You're nuts!
This expression implies there will be no point in continuing the discussion. After all, the opponent is unlikely to acknowledge that he is mentally ill – even when I have allowed that everyone, including myself, is rather titched these days.
It is in fact the condition of political debate currently. No matter what issue we start with, we soon find ourselves arguing everything that has ever been raised in politics; and of course, we are not well informed on everything that was ever raised.
Politics takes priority in our most specialized political discussions. Religion, for instance – whether Christian, Jewish, Islamic, or Other – has shrunk to an obscure corner of the controversial map.
Wealth and open materialism are displayed, but thanks to socialism they are politicized by both left and right.
Professional sports may rise briefly out of the obscurity, and I have witnessed moments when a joke is so widely understood, that everyone sentient is laughing. These are moments of relief from the condition to which we are enchained – even with the people we agree with.
I wonder if monastic life is much different, today, when I discover that almost every monk or nun can be reached by email.
Some, very disciplined, have apparently learnt the "art of shutting up," at least on matters that are none of their business; for in an extra-religious way they realize that almost nothing is anyone's business.
Verily, I think of an old Jewish friend, whom I couldn't be sure was a friend, even when playing chess with him. It was not that he was silent, though he was mostly so; but that he did not seem to have any demonstrative opinions. Street directions were the most one could get from him, and the occasional mysterious quotation from Maimonides, or the Mishnah, as he moved his Rook into place. Or perhaps it was Kafka.
My admiration for this "Eric the Blest" (as I called him in parody of his given name) was for his instinct of self-preservation, in the highest conceivable sense. Whether or not he was physically threatened (and Jews often are), he never strayed from what he believed to be unqualified truth.
This I inferred. Eric would not declare such a thing. I think he would assume that, as it were, all declarations are false.
Faith, too, I would say, is not a declaration. It comes prior to any verbal formula, although perhaps words have contributed to it. In this sense, faith is quite different from reason, which can usually be expressed; sometimes, even mathematically.
But to return neurotically to politics, an opinion can be based on reason, or rather employ it in some way, but without becoming reasonable itself. One must leap into the ether, for faith must also be consulted.
There are, as Christ shewed in words and action, no glib certainties here, where the sun is not always visibly shining. What we see, we see only for a moment, and then it is covered by night. What we describe can remain apparent only momentarily.
Yet the odd thing, to those who think it odd, is that truth can only be a function of freedom, and freedom only a function of the truth, in our twilight world. Every attempt to compel our views is a betrayal of truth and freedom, both. It is a small declaration of war against sanctity; or a large one.
It was for this reason, I think, that Eric restricted himself, at most, to droll observations; and to a drollery that was soft. For he was not trying to be witty, either. Instead, only to be polite when asked for a comment.
A world consisting exclusively of Erics might not be intelligible to most of the characters this world contains, and yet there is something recognizably "Ericsome" in all our better moments.
Curiously these happen when we are looking for truth, in a small or big way; though as I think Maimonides said, there is no such thing as a small truth. For all truth is linked, as reason and revelation are linked, and as Biblical teaching is linked to the philosophy of Aristotle.
What Eric's silence conveyed was not the commonplace humility in the presence of "the infinity of things." He was "compelled," by nature and its Lord, in the voluntary way of a free man, and his own courage.
We are not that smart, nor that independent, even when trying to act in our own political interests. We cannot perceive the inter-relations or "correspondences" that silent contemplation begins to reveal: the extraordinary detail of the world that is created in which every particle makes sense.
I say, "is created," rather than "was created," for the truth is that it is being created, in every infinitesimal moment, throughout.
The truth, like the world, and the possibility of freedom, has never disappeared and never will. This, too, is implicit throughout Creation and we may know it as we know ourselves to exist.
Eric, an American, had a close American friend, named Rob, who was Catholic and educated at Notre Dame (back when). I particularly enjoyed their company, alone or together; for while so much alike, they were marvelously distinct. Their company gave an entry into a strange society, in which truth would suddenly come out of hiding, and be freely encountered.
As Goethe said of that Zwinglian, Lavater, "Truth always strikes one as something brand new; and when one happens on a man so wholly truthful, one feels as though one were just landing in the world for the first time."
Truth is seldom to be greeted as a tangible embodiment, but as a spiritual immanence, inducing harmony.
Goethe again: "It is simple and without fuss, whereas error affords opportunity for dissipating time and energy."
