Religious Language - Analogical Attributes Flashcards
What were the 3 ways that Aquinas said language can be used?
Hints: U,E & E
Univocal - language with one meaning
for eg: ‘humans made of bones and flesh’
bones and flesh always mean the same thing
Equivocal - language with no objective meaning
e.g. ‘I am cold’ it could mean temperature or demeanour (unsuitable for religious language since we could never know what was being said of God).
Analogical – language based on experience of the world, but compared to God, e.g. ‘God is good’ is meaningful, because goodness in the world is caused by God.
All religious language is
analogical.
What two ways did Aquinas argue for analogy?
Attribution & Proportion
What is Analogy of Attribution?
Humans gain attributes from God but on a simpler level
Worldly things that’s compared with God because He is their efficient cause, e.g. ‘God is good’. We know goodness in the world because God caused it. Food is described as healthy as it causes health in a person.
God has whatever it take it to make human goodness.
What is Analogy of Proportion?
worldly things are compared with God,
but must be understood according to scale and suggesting there is a proportional relationship ; e.g. God’s goodness
is in proportion with His greatness, whilst our goodness is lesser
in proportion with us
Give an example of A of P through the use of my sibling who is a drummer in comparison to a professional drummer?
So if my younger sister is a good drummer, that means she is good for her age, however, a professional drummer played at her standard then that would be disappointing.
