RL: SYMBOLISM & RAMSEY

Question 1

In what way is language symbolic?

Answer 1

In the sense that we use words to stand for other things.

Question 2

When do religious people often use language symbolically?

Answer 2

When they are talking about their relationship with God. For example, ‘God listened to my prayers.’

Question 3

What does religious language being symbolic mean?

Answer 3

It cannot be subject to tests in order to assess its meaningfulness.

Question 4

What does Tillich state about metaphors and symbols as a way of helping us?

Answer 4

“open up levels of reality which were otherwise closed to us.”

Question 5

What does a symbol do according to Tillich?

Answer 5

‘Unlocks dimensions and elements of our soul.’

Question 6

How is God defined in symbols?

Answer 6

Visual images, rituals, saints and stories.

Question 7

How should religious language be perceived according to Tillich?

Answer 7

More like poetry than like prose.

Question 8

What do we use religious symbolic language as according to Tillich?

Answer 8

A means of coming to terms with the meaning of human existence.

Question 9

What does Tillich argue religious language is used to communicate?

Answer 9

All of our most important ideas, concerns, feelings and experiences.

Question 10

How does Tillich link with Aquinas?

Answer 10

In asserting that ordinary human language is inadequate to convey ultimate truth.

Question 11

What does Tillich argue about using literal language of God?

Answer 11

It’s unhelpful and conveys a false impression of the nature of God.

Question 12

What does describing God using the omni qualities mean for Tillich?

Answer 12

Suggests that God is ‘a being’.

Question 13

What does thinking of God as an existent being mean according to Tillich?

Answer 13

Instead of realising that such thinking is symbolic, God does not give us an adequate answer to existential doubt.

Question 14

What two terms did Ramsey use?

Answer 14

‘Models’ and ‘Qualifiers’.

Question 15

When can we use ‘models’?

Answer 15

When we speak of God using words such as, ‘righteous’ - these are words we understand as we have a reference point.

Question 16

When can we use ‘qualifiers’?

Answer 16

To not limit God, as qualifiers are adjectives and adverbs such as ‘everlasting’.

Question 17

What can we show through Ramsey’s models and qualifiers?

Answer 17

That God is different from us proportionally by using the qualifier to point us in the right direction.

Question 18

What does Ricoeur argue? (symbolism)

Answer 18

That ‘the function of language is to articulate our experience of the world, to give form to this experience.’

Question 19

What does Ricoeur state about metaphors?

Answer 19

Rather than suspending reality for Ricoeur, a metaphor creates a new way of ‘seeing’ or constructing reality.

Question 20

What is the main issue with symbolism as a way of communicating religion?

Answer 20

May only be properly understood by those within a restricted community.

Question 21

What did Tillich argue about using metaphors and symbols to help us?

Answer 21

They ‘open up levels of reality which were otherwise closed to us.’

Question 22

Where can symbols become an issue?

Answer 22

If they contradict each other or that are misconstructed, misinterpreted and hard to gain comprehension from.