Aristotle's Thoughts on Religion

Aristotle was further than Plato in subscribing to conventional religious views, though he gives theology the highest place in the rank of possible studies. Aristotle speaks of theology as "the most divine knowledge" and the "most worthy of honor." If we think of religion as a relationship between humans and the divine with implications for human behavior, what we have of Aristotle's philosophy is virtually devoid of any traces of religion. His "God" is the Unmoved Mover, a metaphysical principle, the casual source of our world, not personally related to it and caring nothing for us or for our worship.

Since there is eternal motion in our world, there must be an eternal cause of motion, which is "an unmoved mover, being eternal, primary, and in act," rather than having any unactualized potentiality. Such as Aristotle's eternal figure, the Unmoved Mover, which causes change in other things without itself undergoing change. Unmoved motion must originate in desire or intellect, the former aiming at "what appears good" and latter at "what is good." But Plato suggests, "an end is desired because it seems good; it does not seem good because it is desired. So the starting-point is the activity of knowing." The Unmoved Mover, then, is a divine mind. But it must think about something, and what does it think about? "Either itself or something else. If something else, either always the same thing or different things." But the only object worthy of divine thought is that which is divine, eternal, and unchanging. And this is only to be found in the divine nature itself.