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== Philosophical views ==

== Philosophical views ==

In philosophy, Leibniz disagreed with [[Descartes]]' "I think therefore I am" and he instead thought that neither form alone (the mind) or matter alone (the body) could explain the existence of an individual.  Instead, Leibniz created a philosophy known as "monadology", which holds that [[soul]]s are all there are in the [[universe]].  Even a table, according to Leibniz, is nothing other than a collection of "windowless monads" which cannot interact.   

In philosophy, Leibniz disagreed with [[Descartes]]' "I think therefore I am" and he instead thought that neither form alone (the mind) or matter alone (the body) could explain the existence of an individual.  Instead, Leibniz created a philosophy known as "monadology", which holds that [[soul]]s are all there are in the [[universe]].  Even a table, according to Leibniz, is nothing other than a collection of "windowless monads" which cannot interact. However, already in the third and fourth centuries [[A.D.]], the Monad(s) were part of Mediterian [[gnostic]] cultures that [[Christian]] scholars harshly opposed until the battle against gnosticism was won by 325, the date of [[Council of Nicea]]. From this perspective, Leibniz was doing nothing more than reformulating an old [[heretical]] etnotheology widespread during the era of [[Arianism]].<ref name="Christopaganism">{{cite book

Between 18 - 21 November 1676, Leibniz met personally with [[Benedict de Spinoza]] discussing various philosophical topics, including the ontological argument for the existence of God. <ref>http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz/</ref>

|quote=My third illustration of the way in which Christian should and should not make adjustments to culture goes back to the third and fourth centuries A.D. A Christianity spread around Mediterian, it encountered many cultures, many philosophies and many religions in which incarnations, saviors and god-men of various sorts were worshipped. …Be that as it may, the cultures of that day (except for the growing Christian culture) were generally friendly to the idea of incarnations and saviors and salvific rites and ceremonies. Saviors were conceived as emanations of the One, the Supreme, the Monad, the Unknowable. A characteristic feature of Gnosticism was that of the Primal Man, who existed before the world, a prophet who went through the world in various forms and finally revealed himself in Christ and other saviors.}}</ref>  

Between 18 - 21 November 1676, Leibniz met personally with [[Benedict de Spinoza]] discussing various philosophical topics, including the ontological argument for the existence of God.<ref>http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz/</ref>

== Denominational background ==

== Denominational background ==