Religious Language Flashcards
Linguist Roman Jakobson noted six functions of language…
1) referential
2) expressive
3) conative
4) poetic
5) phatic
6) metalingual
Referential
Describing situations or things (‘the leaves are falling’)
Expressive
Describing feelings or emotions (‘Wow! Look at that!’)
Conative
A command or request (‘Come here’)
Poetic
A poem or saying/slogan (‘Easy come, easy go’)
Phatic
Greetings or casual conversations (‘Hi. Nice weather we’re having’)
Metalingual
Talking about yourself (‘I feel fine’)
What does realism, or realist language deal with?
Statements that can be proved to be either true or false
An example of an empirically provable sentence
‘The sky is blue’
An example of a phrase that has meaning for some people, such as religious believers…
‘God exists’
What is an anti-realist statement?
Those that should not be taken literally, but are understood in other ways.
Who came up with the Verification Principle
AJ Ayer
Criticisms of the Verification Principle
- Statements that express opinions or emotions have meaning.
- Ethical and moral statements are not empirically verifiable, but certainly have meaning.
- The verification principle cannot itself be verified
- Historical statements are meaningful even when there is no one alive who could claim to have experienced the events.
What is the falsification principle?
Almost the reverse of the verification principle, it asks what would be needed to prove a religious language statement to be false.
Criticisms of the falsification principle
- When believers use religious language, they are using it in a special way.
- Religious language can be meaningful because it expresses an intention to follow a certain code of conduct.
What is the Via Negativa?
It is the view that the truth about God can be discovered by speaking negatively about Him - the way to find out what God is like is first to discover what He is not like.
Criticisms of the Via Negativa
- It doesn’t allow God to be described in factual terms
- To say that God can only be spoken of in negatives means denying the existence of God altogether.
- Believers always want to speak positively about God
Univocal language
Using words and phrases in their everyday sense, EG - ‘God’s love’ and ‘John’s love’ to mean the same thing.
Equivocal language
Using the same words but in a totally way.
Analogical language
Using human words such as ‘love’ and applying them in a similar but not identical way to God.
Analogy of proportionality
All good qualities belong infinitely to God and, in proportion, to humans.
Analogy of attribution
God is the cause of all good things in humans and therefore God’s attributes are at a higher level than our own. Human love is a pale reflection of God’s love.
What is a myth?
A myth is a story that uses symbols to express a truth when it is not known for certain what actually happened.
Examples of Bible stories that carry a symbolic meaning but aren’t literally true…
1) The virgin birth - reflects purity
2) Noah’s Ark - probably a myth highlighting the sinful nature of humanity and the love of God.
3) The nativity story - probably a myth depicting the birth of Jesus as a significant religious event.
Criticisms of Symbolism and myth…
- It is difficult to know exactly what the symbols mean
- Symbolic objects may become the focus of worship
- Symbols and myths become outdated
Strength
- Believers can learn the rules of religious language
Weaknesses
- Religious language is only for those inside the game
- The rules of the games cannot be change to allow outsiders in.
