Born in Loenen aan de Vecht, Griffioen studied at the Vrije Universiteit, where in 1971 he received his Master of Arts cum laude in Political economy, in 1975 another Master of Arts in Philosophy, and in 1976 his Doctor of Philosophy cum laude with a thesis entitled "De roos en het kruis: De waardering van de eindigheid in het latere denken van Hegel" (The Rose and the Cross: The valuation of the finiteness in the later thought of Hegel).
Griffioen had joined the Vrije Universiteit faculty in 1971. From to 1979 he was Senior Member at the Toronto Institute for Christian Studies. Back at the Vrije Universiteit in 1979 he was appointed lector and teach philosophy from 1979 to 2002.
From 1979 to 1991 he was also Professor for Calvinistic Philosophy at Leiden University.
At the Vrije Universiteit in 2002 he was appointed Professor for Intercultural Philosophy until his retirement in 2006. Among his doctorate students was Sytse Strijbos (Doctor of Philosophy in 1988).
