Defining "God" | The Evolution of a Word

Contribute to the East West Lecture Series fundraiser: theeastwestseries.com In this week's episode, Dr. Jacobs looks at how the term "God" has evolved throughout Western intellectual history, from ancient Platonism through medieval scholasticism to contemporary religious pluralism. He walks through the development of divine simplicity and perfect being theology in Latin Christianity, showing how Augustine's engagement with Neoplatonism and the scholastic tradition that followed shaped the assumptions we still carry today about divine nature. The episode considers how this theological inheritance continues to influence debates about religious pluralism, rational religion, and the question of whether different faith traditions are actually referring to the same being when they use the word "God."All the links: Substack: https://nathanajacobs.substack.com/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thenathanjacobspodcastWebsite: https://www.nathanajacobs.com/X: https://x.com/NathanJacobsPodSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0hSskUtCwDT40uFbqTk3QSApple Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-nathan-jacobs-podcastFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/nathanandrewjacobsAcademia: https://vanderbilt.academia.edu/NathanAJacobs00:00:00 Intro00:04:27 Augustine and God 00:15:46 Divine simplicity & perfect being theology 00:36:19 The rise of rational religion 00:53:55 Religious pluralism & the transcendent God