Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic

Question 1

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic - Use of religious language

Answer 1

>Make truth claims
>Evoke feelings of worship
>Express emotion
>Solemnise occasions
>To pray

Question 2

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic - Via negative (apophatic way)

Answer 2

> In order to say things literally true of God, it is important to only use negative terms
Positive terms make God seem too small
Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite - 6th century - influential in developing the via negativa - people need to go beyond the need for understanding
Moses Maimonides - 12th century - example of describing a ship by what it is not
Can create statements that are literally true rather than requiring interpretation
Meaningful across different times and cultures

Question 3

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic-Criticisms of the via negativa

Answer 3

> Is not of much help to those who know nothing of God
May not be very different from claiming that God is nothing at all
The Bible uses positive terms for God and so does Jesus in the Bible

Question 4

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic - Via positiva (cataphatic way) - analogy

Answer 4

A comparison made between one thing and another
>Analogical language contrasts with univocal and equivocal language
>Aquinas - whenever we speak of God we use analogy whether we mean to or not
>Aquinas - recognising that we’re using analogy helps to avoid the problem of making God too small
>Aquinas - split analogy into two types
>Ramsey 1957 - wrote about analogy using ‘models’ and ‘qualifiers’. We can take an idea from this limited physical world and use it as a model.

Question 5

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic - Via positiva (cataphatic way) - analogy - Aquinas two kinds of analogy

Answer 5

> Analogy of attribution - a casual relationship between the two things described. When we speak of God as ___ we should remember that he is the cause of ___
Analogy of proportionality - analogy relates two things that are different in proportion. When we speak of God we need to remember his attributes are on an infinitely greater scale

Question 6

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic - Via positiva (cataphatic way) - symbol

Answer 6

A word or other type of representation used to stand for something else and to shed light on its meaning
>All language is symbolic
>We use metaphor in many contexts to aid understanding
>Using symbolism can be a way of saying positive things about God without making him too small
>The Bible uses symbolic language of God ‘lord is my shepherd’ or God as a ‘father’
>Tillich - Protestant - 20th century - theology of correlation
>Tillich - All religious language is symbolic
>Tillich - symbols participate in the things to which they point
>Tillich - symbolism helps us to understand God as the ‘ground of all being’

Question 7

Religious language: negative, analogical or symbolic- Criticism of analogy and symbolism as ways of speaking about God

Answer 7

> Using ideas from the limited, imperfect physical world to express ideas about God might make him too small
Using positive terms might wrongly suggest that we can come to an understanding of God
If we use analogy and symbol knowing that they are just a shadow of what God is then we do not come any closer to an understanding
Analogies and symbols require interpretation and we do not always know if we are interpreting them correctly
Some symbols can change in meaning over time or between cultures