Plato and Virtue

LeBuick,

The Greek word for virtue is arête and denotes moral excellence but the word its self is linked by its root (arrhen male) that identifies it first and foremost with the character of the man. This indicates that virtue is strictly a human quality for instance in Matthew 19:4 the original man Adam, was said to be arrhen or linked with human virtue. Also Jesus in Revelation 12:5 and 13 is arrhen in his human form he was linked with human virtue.

Perhaps this is a great leap of faith for me to link virtue with the male and then to humanity in general but I put great stock in word studies and their roots and usages.

The passage you mentioned “for perceive that virtue has gone out of me” the word used for virtue is dunamis (miraculous power or force) the woman by faith had tapped into the incredible power of Christ to heal and to change. Mrk 5:30, Lk 6:19, Lk 8:46

As for the Old Testament verses you quoted, the Hebrew word is unclear, but does not seem to be morally based but equality based as in a mans world and a look at the context of each usage would validate that opinion. Theological Word Book of the Old Testament says “When the term (Hebrew word chayil) is used of a women it is translated virtuous, but it may well be that a woman of this caliber had all the attributes of her male counterpart.” If this be the case it would verify arête and its root arrhen which links it to males. Therefore the virtuous woman is a woman who can conduct herself with respect in the Jewish male world. Which certainly there have been those women who have excelled over the years in that respect such as Ruth, Abigail and Lydia etc?

In our world we would say that a woman who is efficient, diligent and biblically principled is a virtuous woman and I see no difference between our understanding of the word virtuous and the bible definition.

Thjplgvp

 

Filmproducer, thanks for the inquiry. It is coming well I was amazed at how long it took to prepare an introduction to the series. Here are some final conclusions I have arrived at during the preliminary study.

Old Testament righteousness is in essence the same as New Testament virtue.

That early writers began to insert man made philosophies of right and wrong that was acquired by faulty reason.

At the founding of the first church and the writing of the canon by the apostles virtue, moral excellence, was reintroduced to a civilization where religious righteousness had been established outside the Holy Scriptures. (Unless your righteousness exceeded the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees). Many compared themselves to the Jewish norm and announced they were righteous i.e. the Pharisee and the publican.

At the reintroduction of righteous, holy, or virtuous conduct the local churches re-established the norm for Christian behavior not based on the world but on Christian principles.

These principles pretty much stood firm until the debate on virtues came about during the beginning of the 700's where once again virtue was identified not as solely biblical but also of human ingenuity. Hence virtue was broken into two categories the natural virtues and the theocratic virtues (faith, hope and love).

Many things happened during the middle ages and I'll not go into all of them but toward the end of the middle ages Humanism was introduced by Pretarch and the ancient classics of Plato, Socrates, etc. were brought back into focus where it was suggested that Civil law, Government and education should be reacquainted with them. At approximately the same time many land owners within the feudal system in Europe developed personal military organizations known variously as Knights. These men were primarily nobles who swore to a strict code of conduct that became known as codes of chivalry.

At that time the Catholic Church also used warrior monks to enforce Catholic protocol and thee Knights were initially known as the Knights of Templar.

At the close of the middle ages and more by mutual consent than debate Chivalry was the accepted norm for virtue the problem was that because of the influx of humanistic reasoning there was no reference to biblical virtue nor of the bible being the final authority of virtue.

Arete and arhenn (moral excellence centered in the male species) was now no longer a consideration instead morality (mores) were centered on the elite (socialites of the day). By the close of the middle ages virtue was not a biblical word it was a courtly word.

More followed but the short of it was that by the 1800's virtue was assigned the feminine sexual quality of chaste. To semi quote Frank Wells "a woman who was a liar, or a fraud could no longer be said to be lacking virtue she could only lose her virtue through losing her virginity."

Today the world in general defines virtue and it is no longer a function of believers we have lost 2,000 years of headway and have become no better than the Pharisees old for we look at the morality of the world and keep our selves (in our own mind) more righteous than they and we then pronounce ourselves as virtuous.

We truly need a revival of local church virtue where our moral excellence is based on the bible and not the world.

Thjplgvp