The Johannine concept of eternal life differs from the synoptic view. Hell is the correlating opposite. If one concludes thus then he/she must still conclude aion can mean endless time from the Hellenistic Age onwards and is associated with life, fate, and a completed whole. For this expression (name) has been divinely uttered by the ancients; for the completeness which embraces the time of the life of each, outside which there is nothing, according to nature, is called the aion of each. We need a foundation upon which to build. Augustine was influenced by Porphyry’s (c. 234 - c. 305 AD) threefold conception of man, namely that man is composed of body, imagination, and mind. But none of them is eternal! It all comes down to how one interprets passages. There's a definition, and there's a pattern to its meaning; there is no disputing that. We have proposed that eternity has different faces, and one face need not be preferred over the other. Top Answer. The Hebrews tended to think of the world (and time) as more dynamic, more on a spectrum of activity, and as experiential. In the New Testament. Even without fully accepting Boman’s conclusions, this difference between worldviews is key. Some authors clearly use it to mean infinite time or time going boundlessly into the future or past. This is certain, that the word is distinctly used by Plato, Aristotle, and Philo (and, according to the dictionaries, by Lycurgus, whom I have not the means of consulting) as "eternal," in contrast with what is of time having beginning or ending, as its definite and proper meaning. Such a paradox is open to interpretation. This is yet another dualism. It seems that aion is the subjective side, while aidios the objective. Nothing has been said about the various theories of time, either scientific theories and questions about whether time even exists or philosophical theories like McTaggart’s about A and B series, etc. God transcends and encompasses all, and Life with/through Him is the ultimate goal for humankind. These dualisms are a product, largely, of Greek philosophy, especially Platonic, Aristotelian, and NeoPlatonic philosophy. This would be a vast undertaking. Only Heaven was eternal to these fathers. Is that all? The Prime Mover himself is eternal, but he is also the ultimate end. This distinction could hearken back to Greek philosophy’s general pattern to use aidios for divine and aionic for the universe, but, as we mentioned, Plato and Aristotle do not seem to keep this dichotomy with perfect consistency. This is how Greek philosophers usually treat the words. “Time” is experienced by creation and can be broadened to mean “subjective experience” (aion/olam). Other Early Christians use it in the more “boundless” sense, like the writers of the Didache. Aionic life appears elsewhere, notably John 17:3, John 3:36, etc. Aidios is the unmeasurable divine source of things in which it "fits”. For example, a person’s “aion” might be 80 years, whereas a Mayfly’s would be a day. 2009-11-15 23:18:20 2009-11-15 23:18:20. There is no end to the list. In 43.1.6.3 he says, “One group (of natural philosophers and historians), which takes the position that the universe (kosmos) is unbegotten and undecaying, has declared that also the race (genos) of men exists from aion, their generation (genesis) never having got a beginning.” Clearly, Diodorus is saying that some philosophers and historians think that there was no beginning to the universe, implying that it is eternal, with an infinite past. Traditionalists rightly point out that most linguistic scholars for around 1500 (or 2000) years accept the definition of "eternity, everlasting, forever, etc." There is also the word קֶ֔דֶם in Deuteronomy 33:27 … For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all. It initially meant “life”, or “one’s allotment”, but it came to be used more abstractly to refer to an age, then endless ages. In 10 he goes on to shew that that beginning to be (genesthai) involves the not existing always, which I refer to as shewing what he means by aion. However, the word apeiron might literally mean something like “untested, unanswered, or unmeasurable”, and perhaps this just further complicates the question of the gap. Sometimes the discussion about time, eternity, and aions misses the point that there are different perspectives about all three. These are the only ways that we can conceive of Heavenly eternity, being ourselves within the context of time-it as an “immovable now”. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word `olam is used for "eternity," sometimes in the sense of unlimited duration, sometimes in the sense of a cycle or an age, and sometimes, in later Hebrew, in the signification of world. The central question to keep in mind is whether aion can or must mean eternity, and to remember that the word’s meaning has evolved over the centuries. But eis ton aiona never means "to the age" in any case. That is no business of mine; but it shews what he means by eternity (aion). Though there is a formal similarity in denotation, there is a difference in connotation. If one can imagine eternity as boundless time, then the question is solved. The textbook definition of eternity for aion stands, but it must have some qualifications. My object is not to argue the point, but to consider the words here; but I must say that, if anything could lower and degrade the hope and present joy of the Christian, it is this miserable notion that "eternal" does not mean eternal. This process had no start and no end, but it is still a contained whole in the sense that it is reality. Oops! Plato applies aion to the universe, as a living being in Timaeus 37d, meaning eternity. But its meaning is eternity, and eternal. into the æon), in Gen. 6:4 ap aiõnos (lit. ETERNITY. For that pattern exists for all eternity (panta aiona estin on), but on the other hand, that which is perpetual (dia telous) throughout all time has had a beginning, and is, and will be." Coming to a consistent, biblical and etymological proof rather than a likely and logical opinion is elusive. Both positions are defensible. 4 colloq. Wave particle duality is at the center of modern-day physics; they seem to contradict each other, but it is more proper to say that the two “natures” of reality, particle and wave, are mutually complementary.