Platonism and Ascension

Following his proposal that 'religion' entails the belief that there exists an "unseen" power that can influence human experience, James only briefly entertains one potentially illuminating application of that characterization.  He goes on to note that Christ meant something different to contemporaries, for whom he was a visible presence, than to the devotees for whom he posthumously became an object of worship.  The distinction is thus a reminder of the centrality to Christianity of the death and resurrection of Christ.  That centrality explains why Platonism is significant to Augustine in a way that it is not to Philo--its dualism, which entails the existence of an incorporeal realm, provides a setting for Christ's 'Ascension'.