2nd century

The Apologists: The "Monarchy" of God, Transcendence and the Name "He Who Is"

According to Hall, ancient philosophy (Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics) could lead thinkers to some form of monotheism even before Christ, and Philo combined Plato's idea of the beautiful with the God of the patriarchs: God is absolutely transcendent, and the Logos provides the link with the world. Against polytheism and the doctrine of the coeternity of matter, the apologists asserted the transcendence of God and strict monotheism – the "monarchy." Aristides, in the oldest surviving apology, speaks of God in negative terms: without name, without beginning, without end, uncompounded. The apologists pointed to the kinship of Greek thought with Scripture. Exodus 3:14, "I am He Who Is," was understood ontologically – Pelikan speaks of a "metaphysics of Exodus."