Stolen Legacy

Page 119



Page 119

N.B.

Incidentally, but no less important, it might be mentioned here that in this story of the created Gods by Atum the Sun God into a family of nine, i.e., the Ennead, we have the original source of two important scientific hypotheses of modern times:--

(1) There are nine major planets and (2) The Sun is the parent of the other planets (This latter being supported by the Nebular Hypothesis). Let us remember also that

(a) the worship of the planets began in Egypt and

(b) the Egyptian temples were the first observatories of history.

(c) In attempting to prove the existence of God or a First Cause by reference to actuality and potentiality, Aristotle simply followed the traditional custom of the Ancients, who used the principle of Opposites in order to explain the functions of nature.

(d) Plato used it, through the theory of Ideas, to explain the real and unreal in the phenomena of nature.

(e) Socrates used it in order to establish the fact of immortality by showing that the death of one form of life of existing things, is but the beginning of another form of life of these things. In other words life is perpetual, it only changes its form in its course of progress.

Democritus applied the principle of opposites in their interpretation of a particular phase of reality. We cannot therefore consider Aristotle's use of the terms, actuality and potentiality in the problem of the existence of God as a new method of interpretation.

Furthermore, Aristotle's review of the doctrines of all previous philosophers including Plato, together with his exposure of their errors, and inconsistencies, shows that he had become confident not only of the fact that he was in possession of a new and correct knowledge one that had not before been made available to the Greeks, but also that he could then speak with