Knowledge Of God’s Existence Flashcards
Natural theology
Considers that God can be known through reason and observation of the natural world
- an innate human sense of the divine: through openness to beauty and recognise his existence through creation
Revealed theology
Considers that God can only be known when he reveals himself eg through prophet, scripture, prayer
- humans have finite minds, natural knowledge is not sufficient to gain full knowledge
General revelation
Available to all people, at all times and in all places eg the beauty of creation or conscience
Special revelation
God reveals himself to particular persons at definite times and places
Regeneration
The process of renewal, restoration and recreation - this is enabled by knowing God fully and having a complete relationship with him
Trinity
Christian doctrine that God is one but reveals himself as father, son and holy spirit
Fideism
The belief that revelation is essential for the human mind to know anything about God’s existence or nature
Humans can know nothing about God expect what he chooses to reveal
Imago Dei
In the image of God
Principle of accommodation
The principle that God shows himself through creation in ways that finite human minds can understand
Sensus divinitatis
A ‘sense of God’ or a ‘sense of the divine’
Point of contact
God’s revelation in the world which provides humans with a first step towards knowing God as redeemer
Immanent
God is involved with and participates in the world
Faith
Voluntary commitment to a belief without complete evidence to support it
How can you know God
- knowing about God - reason, observation of the natural world (natural theology)
- Knowing God - a personal relationship, through the self-disclosure of God and through Jesus Christ (revealed theology)
Natural theology reason - Bonaventura
- suggested that the human mind had three ways of knwoing using a metaphor of the eye seeing to illustrate
- eye of the flesh - sense perception, empiricism, gain knwoledge about the physical world
- eye of reason - work out mathematical and philosophical truths using logic
- eye of contemplation - go beyond the senses and reason to come to knowledge of God through faith
Natural theology reason - Aquinas
- aimed to show that Christian faith was reasonable
- reason were important signposts to God
- although he also thought the revealed truths about God were needed
- things are directed towards a purpose so showing God
Calvin - sensus divinitas
General awareness of God
- suggests that huamsn have an inbuilt and innate sense of God
- Argues that even those least likely to believe in God have religious beliefs (supports belief in God being universal)
- For Calvin everyone has potential to become religious and the seeds of religion are everywhere
Calvin on natural theology
- creation is God’s mirror - reflects something of the creator
- natural theology allow the infinite God to be revealed to finite human minds through principle of accommodation
- these are sparks of glory
- the world is the theatre of God’s action. God is known through his actions, through the things that he does
- nature is a point of contact
Problems with natural theology
- Calvin, imagery of the world as a therater in which we are actors and God is the unseen director
- the kind of knowledge gained is more like ‘knowing about’ God rather a personl relationship of faith
- it is using ‘normal’ reasons to justify God’s existence
- can can falled huamns with a cirrupt nature begin to understand God through natural theology
Natural theology - strengths
- normal for human to use their reason to work out knowledge about God
- large numbers of people who have faith in God - there is a link
- a loving God who created huamns would want to have contact with us
- ## Appreciation of awe and wonder take us beyond physical and feelings are on a different levels
Natural theology weaknesses
- difficult to understand how an inifinite being can be revealed or understood by finite minds
- Augustine - huamns are innately sinful and and revelation would also be tainted
- it is more like ‘knowing about’ rather than ‘knowing’ God
- using ‘normal’ reason to justify God
Revealed knowledge - faith
- Hebrews 11:1 ‘faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see’
- a voluntary commitment to belief without complete evidence to support it
Revealed knwoledge - grace
- faith becomes initmate where God’s grace is involved
- Grace is needed first to reciev the knowledge of God
- Calvin - the holy spirit helpd to create faith becuase it repairs the damage caused by orignal sin
Revealed knowledge - Jesus Christ
- Calvin - christ the complete and most imporatnt revelation of God
- christ is mirror and mediator
- mediator - means bu which sinful huamns are reconciled ot God and brough to full knowledge
- Catholicism - adds that the role of faith is to re-think teh revelation of Christ in every generation
Revealed knowledge - bible
- the word of God
- traditional - God is the author - ‘speech of God’
- Fundamentalists - literal word of God
- others - inspired by God
- catholicism - it is the ‘eternal word of the living God’
- Calvin - must be read in the context of the revelation of Jesus the Mediator
- Natural theologians - important socurce of knowledge
Revealed Knowledge - calvin
- fall means that corrupt humanity cannot use sensus divinitaus to come into the relationship with God
- grace, Christ the mediator allows us to overcome this
Revealved knowledge of God - Catholicism
- humans were not cut off from knowing God as the fall but it distracts us
- natural is usefuly but we need divine revelation
Kierkegaard
- leading defender of the idea of faith
- ‘fear and trembling’ - reflection on the biblical story of Abraham and Isaac
- writes positively about Abraham’s obedience which began ‘early the next morning’ - right ti ibey God against reason
- faith is belief in God, it isn’t just a matter of what but how we believe
- (accused of fideism)
Problems with fideism
- which faith do i leap for
- how can there be contact to enable teh believer to discuss with the non-beliver
- self defeating - offering justification they are no longer a fideist
Revealed theology strengths
- only God could be able to revela himself - he is indescribable
- importance of faith in the believer
- importance of God’s gracae showing how much greated God is than humans
- importance of revelation of Jesus Christ
- available through the bible
Revealed theology weaknesses
- no use to non-belivers
- revelations which are contradictory - what is correct
- what about other religions of ideas about God that do not come through Christianity
- not always clear how humans should interpret what is revealed to them
- could be accused of bias
Brunner
Calvin accepted natural theology but recognised the need for revelation as well
- possible to know God through the aspects of the natural world
- fall corrupted huamn nature but not spiritually so that humans can know something of God on a spiritual level
- conscience is particullarly important for humans to become aware of their sinful state of God
- natural theology helps us be aware that there is a God but it is limited
- true knowledge can only come through God’s revelation of Christ, grace and faith
Barth
Calvin rejected natural theology completely
- God is so ‘radically other’ that there is no way finite minds can comprehend God
- huamn nature is too corrupt from teh fall there is no access to God through huamn nature
- no point of contact, our reason cannot be trusted
- we can never hope to understand God
- true knowledge only comes through revealed theology
Barth critisisms
- too influenced by his time - nazis and missue of reason explains why he viewed us as too corrupt
- view of supremacy of faith over reason leads to fideism - no way to test if it is true without reason
What was the Barth-Brunner debate
- about Calvin’s thought on natural theology of God
- Barth: Calvin rejected natural theology
- Brunner: Calvin accepted natural theology but recognised the need for revelation as well
The fall has completely removed all natural knowledge of God
- the effects of the fall utterly decimated human relationships with God
- Cicero’s universal consent argument can be rejects as even though many people have a sense of religion the fact that they interpret it differently proves that human reason is inadequate
- human nature is clearly flawed and it would be wrong to say that fallen humans should attempt a relationship with a perfect God
The fall has not completely removed all natural knowledge of God
- No christian denomination believes that natural theology on its own is sufficient, reasonable for there to be different ways of finding knowledge of God
- too much emphasis put on the idea of the fall,catholics downplay this and focus on the gap between us and God because of our very nature, it is possible to know something of God through reason
- God’s nature is never knowable in any way, it is not as a result of the fall as much as the otherness of God
What is Cicero’s universal consent argument
So many people believe in god’s of different sorts that it must be part of the natural make up of humans
Natural theology - Paley
- you can infer from looking at the purpose and regularity in the universe that there is a designer behind it all
- he uses natural theology to infer a designer
Natural knowledge is the same as revealed knowledge
- the two are simply different sides of the same coin, you cannot have natural knowledge without revealed knowledge first
- proving that God exists is simply recognising an already revealed truth
- all complex questions require several differnt approaches at once
- the distinction between the two approaches are artificial and ways to come to know could be spilt into different categories
Natural knowledge is not the same as revealed knowledge
- the two operate in different spheres: to ‘do’ natural theology you need to put revealed theology aside
- you cannot fairly prove God exists using logic if you already believe him to exist
- natural knowledge gives a different sort of knowledge to revelation
- no one can become a believer through natural theology alone
- natural knowledge must be different because it is impossible due to the Fall as the points of contact have been lost
Belief in God is sufficient to put ones trust in him
- belief in God requires a leap on faith, if you make that leap you must trust in God
- points of contact are correct then recognising these points should lead to faith because something true about God has been recognised
- all people believe in different way so it doesn’t matter who made humans worship God - belief in God in whatever form should lead to a commitment
Belief in God is not sufficient to put ones trust in him
- belief in God needs proper context and understanding - through an understanding of Jesus as mediator as taught by the church
- belief in God gain solely through natural theology is not the same as a personal relationship with God
- belief in God does not make living a christian life easy - there are may challenges to make someone doubt whether they should trust fully in God
Romans 1:18-21
- ‘the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven’
- ‘for since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities […] have clearly been seen, being understood from what has been made’
- you can understand God through natural theology
Psalm 19:1
‘The heavens declare the glory of God’
Observation of the natural world - Paley
- using the design, order and purpose in the natural world
Observation of natural world - Tennant
- aesthetic principle
- suggests the existence of a benevolent designer because of human appreciation of the arts
Observation of the natural world - catholic catechism
- the type of arguments from observation of the world, using reason, provide strong reasons to believe and are ‘converging and convincing’
Natural theology - conscience
- Calvin, considered this to been God-given
- ‘joint knowledge’ between humans and God
Aquinas - faith
- may be based upon rational arguments
- unformed faith - intellectual reasons are accepted by the person cannot believe it is true
- formed faith - it is a decision to accept what can be reasoned, it takes time, effort and requires the discipline of prayer and worship
god can be known through reason alone
- God gave us ways to discover him
- cicero - many different gods, it must be a part of nature
- faith alone cannot be meaningful - there must be a reason for it
god cannot be known through reason alone
- not everyone uses reason correctly
- god is ineffable, we can’t know him ourselves
- sinful, reason is tarnished by the fall
faith is sufficient reason for belief in god
- it is spiritual and emotional not academic
- can’t be understood without faith or grace
- relationship is personal not just a theory
faith is not sufficient for belief in god
- atheist - all acts of faith should be rejected - a want for more than meets the eye
- faith without reason leads to belief in anything
- god made us rational, we must use it
