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Philosophy of Religion » St Anselm’s Ontological Argument

Tags: anselm, religion, god, philosophy on 2008-05-07 -All Annotations (0) -About

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Responses to religion - LearningSpace - OpenLearn - The Open University

Tags: enlightenment, history, religion on 2008-02-07 -All Annotations (0) -About

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Natural religion was a form of religious belief founded on the observation of nature rather than on revelation or scriptural authority.
deism, a particular religious belief which holds that God designed and created the world, but so effectively that there would be no further need for his intervention.
Deist views were expressed by those who questioned conventional Christianity and who believed in a universal rather than a sectarian God.
‘argument from design’
Voltaire
others were keen to embrace a belief in God apparently grounded in empiricism.
empiricism
to challenge forms of belief based on an unthinking acceptance of tradition and authority.
Enlightened rational scrutiny could assist in religious reform without destroying faith.
one of the major developments of the Enlightenment was an increasingly secular approach to morality

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Philosophy of Religion

Tags: philosophy, religion on 2007-12-15 -All Annotations (0) -About

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natural theology, according to which we can use reason to argue for the existence of God;
revealed theology, which holds that statements about God are revealed to us in religious experiences or scriptures.
none of the potential justifications of belief in God are taken (or intended) to be proof; instead, religious beliefs are a complex interaction of ideas and to suppose that a single argument could ground them all is not only unreasonable but contrary to the way in which we decide questions in everyday life.
There are three main suggestions as to why it might be better to think otherwise:
- The rationality of belief
- Belief and faith
- The meaning of "God"
Some philosophers, particularly Wittgenstein, have proposed that rationality depends on what we use as criteria for making decisions about ideas and arguments, noting that these can differ from person to person
the framework we approach a religious concept from can have an important influence.
f we could show that the existence of God were certain or rationally justified, there would be no room left for faith
but instead as a boundary condition or principle through which we interpret life and our experiences
It is also suggested that God would not make it unreasonable for us to believe in Him, so there must be some value in the proofs of His existence, whether or not we find them convincing.
evidentialism,
evidentialism seems to be self-refuting.
we believe things every day without evidence
reformed epistemology
warrant.
He identified four conditions that a warranted belief had to satisfy; namely, it would have to be:
- Produced by cognitive faculties (like memory and perception) that are working properly;
- Produced by these same faculties working in the proper environment;
- Produced by aiming at true beliefs; and
- Successfully reaching their target, or at least with a high probability of having been successful.
The basic form of belief is theism, the belief in God as traditionally understood in the monotheistic (that is, single-God) religions of Christianity, Islam and Judaism.
Pantheism takes a different perspective in that God is identified with the universe, so that they are identical.
Polytheism holds that there are many gods,
Deism takes there to have been a God who created the universe and, as it were, "set it to running", but who otherwise plays no further part in it
process theology, which comes from the work of A.N. Whitehead and Charles Hartshorne
postmodern theology, which is obviously related to the issues we considered in our thirteenth discussion. It tries to take theology beyond the metaphysical and other assumptions we looked at there, which some so-called postmodernists find untenable.
Liberation theology is both an approach to theology and a social movement—primarily within Latin America but also elsewhere throughout the world—that attempts to understand and expand on the implications of Christianity for personal and public life.
Feminist theology tries to seek out any biases in religious stories and texts, trying to understand if their relevance is to all people or in fact at the cost of women
Often these two meanings are called strong and weak atheism
trong or positive atheism makes the claim that God does not exist and hence offers reasons as to why we should reject Him.
Whether the atheist can maintain that the burden of proof is on the theist in the face of the challenge of reformed epistemology is the subject of much discussion.
The term itself literally means "without knowledge" and was coined in the 1880s by T.H. Huxley.
It is perhaps better, then, as well as more accurate, to understand agnosticism as an epistemological position rather than something distinct from belief or non-belief.
the idea being to note that the universe cannot account for its own existence—so it is claimed—and thus a cause is sought outside of it to explain the brute fact of existence.
Leibniz reformulated the cosmological argument in terms of the principle of sufficient reason. According to this principle, every fact or truth must have a sufficient reason to explain it
nother form is called the Kalam cosmological argument after the school of Islamic philosophy of the same name. In its basic form it claims that since the universe came to exist at some time, it follows that it must have a cause for its existence
This argument points to the existence of purpose and order in the universe and supposes that if we see signs of design then there must have been a designer
These tend to have different forms, but there is enough common ground to list a few of them that have been distilled as a result of work by people like William James and David Hay:
- The experience is hard (if not impossible) to describe.
- It is a feeling of oneness with God.
- It can also be a sense of being dependent on God.
- It may sometimes call attention to a painful separation from God.
- It can be experienced anywhere, in everyday situations.
- It can provide insight into otherwise inaccessible truths.
- The experience tends to be transient.
The religious experience argument, again, does not seek to prove that God exists but instead that it is reasonable to believe that He does because of the direct experience of Him.
Indeed, we could say the argument is an inference to the best explanation:

P1: People have religious experiences;

P2: The existence of God explains these experiences;

C: Therefore, God exists.
that is, God provides the basis of moral order.

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Toward a Theological Understanding of Postmodernism, by Daniel J. Adams

Tags: postmodernism, religion, theology on 2007-12-13 -All Annotations (0) -About

more fromwww.crosscurrents.org

Theologian Tyron Inbody compares it to
"intellectual Velcro dragged across culture" which "can be used to
characterize almost anything one approves or disapproves."(1)
Umberto Eco, himself classified as a postmodern writer
due in large part to his novel The Name of the Rose, has written of postmodernism,
"I have the impression that it is applied today to anything the users of the term
happen to like."(2)
We might say that postmodernity is
the condition in which late twentieth-century culture finds itself; postmodernism is a
reflection upon that condition and a response to it.
The postmodern is,
therefore, a movement which has arisen in reaction to the modernism of Western
civilization.
the
process of modernization continues to bring capitalism, urbanization, technology,
telecommunications, and Western popular culture to virtually every corner of
the globe.
the postmodern should not be considered surprising, for the
postmodern is a way of recognizing that the world is in a period of transition. It is a
world "that has not yet discovered how to define itself in terms of what is,
but only in terms of what it has just-now-ceased to be."(6)
"unsecularization of the world."
In the words of
one observer, people "have seen these. . . . false gods fail. So now
we have the old gods coming back."(9)
as a re-enchantment
of the world that modernity tried to dis-enchant."(10)
postmodernity
is restoring the sacred.
religion lies at the very heart of the postmodern condition.
The postmodern era can best be understood in terms of four major characteristics: the
decline of the West, the legitimation crisis, the intellectual marketplace, and the
process of deconstruction.(12)
Today there is an attempt to recover the
fragmented remains of these cultures as well as make certain that Western cultural
hegemony comes to an end.
The first of these characteristics of postmodernity is the decline of the West.
he second characteristic of postmodernity is what has come to be known as the
legitimation crisis.
In the postmodern era it is no longer taken for granted that development is
unlimited or even that certain kinds of development are necessarily good.(15)
When
previously held metanarratives are deprived of their authority, what follows is a
plurality of values.
In Western culture this has resulted in a fragmentation of
society into special interest groups based on ethnicity, religion, and economic issues.
this same fragmentation is taking place in the
mainline denominations and in contemporary theology.(17)
With postmodernity, however, comes a momentous change; no longer can cultural and
religious knowledge and value be effectively controlled by the intellectual and political
elite. Satellite television networks, computers, and fax machines have made both
censorship and control obsolete.
A fourth characteristic of postmodernity is what has come to be known as the process of
deconstruction. Deconstruction is exactly what the meaning of the word implies; it is the
taking apart of texts somewhat like the process of peeling away the layers of an onion.
Deconstruction seeks to examine a text from all possible perspectives so that
individual bits of information are extracted and separated from each other.
Thus "deconstruction
categorically asserts the absolute impossibility of attributing to any text one single
ultimate meaning."(21)
This means that sacred texts, such as the Bible, do not have a single ultimate meaning nor
are such texts necessarily authoritative.
that postmodernity is a socio-cultural state of being.
Things which are plural in the postmodern world cannot be arranged in an
evolutionary sequence, or be seen as each other's inferior or superior stages; neither can
they be classified as "right" or "wrong" solutions to common problems.
No knowledge can be assessed outside the context of the culture, tradition, language game,
etc. which makes it possible and endows it with meaning.
pluralism is perhaps the most obvious result of the
postmodern condition, and deconstruction eschews all forms of ultimate meaning. It can be
said, however, that "postmodernism arises out of the disillusionment with the modern
ideals felt by European intellectuals after World War II."(28)
a rejection of classical metaphysical thought.
In theology this rejection of classical metaphysics has taken the form of a
shift from deductive theology to inductive theology.
the second major theme which is a rejection of
human autonomy.
heology does not "fall from the skies" but is constructed within a
complex socio-cultural matrix.(31)
nonfoundationalism,(32) which seeks to
disassociate theology from objective foundations such as Scripture, creeds and
confessions, and ecclesiastical tradition.
A third theme in postmodernism is praxis, that is, serious concern for the practical
ethical aspects of human life.
The fourth major theme is a strong anti-Enlightenment stance.
"Theologians are the last universalists"
Nonfoundationalism in theology would seek to
minimize the importance of Scripture, creeds and confessions, and church tradition.
We must purify our minds of the
restrictive Christendom-centered theologies that have blurred the universality of Jesus
Christ. . .
It may be that the time has come for theology to move a bit toward
universalism in an attempt to recover that delicate but ever so important balance.

Boston Collaborative Encyclopedia of Western Theology: Sallie McFague

Tags: language, religion, theology on 2007-12-13 -All Annotations (0) -About

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Theology Today - Vol 40, No. 4 - January 1984 - BOOK REVIEW - Metaphorical Theology: Models of God in Religious Language

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CrossCurrents magazine: the best thought and writing on religion and the world.

Tags: ecumenicalism, pluralism, religion on 2007-12-13 and saved by2 people -All Annotations (0) -About

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THEOLOGY BRIEF: Content / Inter-faith Related & Religous Pluralism / Christianity in a Multifaith World

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Wabash Center

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SpringerLink Home - Main

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Bible Translations That Do Not Teach Eternal Torment

Tags: bible, religion, universalism on 2007-12-09 -All Annotations (3) -About

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marvelling that these Jewish scholars were not ashamed to tell
the world they were not perfect and therefore could not produce an inerrant
translation
Abraham, Moses, David, and
all the rest of the peoples of the Old Testament only knew one place where
all people went, good or bad . . . Sheol, the grave, the place of the departed.
How could the Creator be so thoughtless, and
>

not warn millions of people of a fate they did not even know awaited them?
>
Add Sticky Note
- This is s agood point. Proponents of the doctrine of hell would appeal to 1 Peter 3: 18-20 here. They would say that this problem was resolved after Christ died and went to shoel and preached to those who were held there because of their disobedience.
  posted by stech1 on 2007-12-09 18:49:18
- This is s agood point. Proponents of the doctrine of hell would appeal to 1 Peter 3: 18-20 here. They would say that this problem was resolved after Christ died and went to sheol and preached to those who were held there because of their disobedience.
  posted by stech1 on 2007-12-09 18:49:59
Our minds have been doctrinally contaminated
by traditions much more than perhaps we are willing to admit.
It would seem that if, according
to Christendom's doctrines, 90% or more of mankind will end up in eternal
torment that the gates of hell will prevail, and mightily!
If the Creator
loved us and created such a horrible place for most of mankind, he would
surely have plastered the warning everywhere.
No, Sheol is the grave. Very simple and
very plain.
Please note if Jonah was
in "hell," as the KJV has it, then Jonah escaped from a place where,
according to modern theologians, there is no escape.
"Hell" cannot even be found in the Old Testament in dozens of English translations,
many of which are accepted by mainstream conservative churches.
We believe as we get closer to the original languages of the Bible,
that that awful word "hell" will totally disappear from the pages of Scripture.
In the New Testament, three words were translated
into "hell" by the King James translators:
Hades
Gehenna
Tartarus
The concept of evil men going to a place of
torment after death first appeared in Jewish apocryphal writings of 3 to
1 B.C.
Most translations that mention
it at all, mention it only 12 to 14 times, the King James being the King
of Hell mentioning only it 22 times in the New Testament, not even once
per book!
Paul, the apostle to the nations, never used the word "hell"
once?
n 1851 the American Bible
Society compared six different editions of the King James Bible and discovered
over 24,000 variations between the editions of the same Bible translation!
King James
Bible because of political reasons, not because of a love of the Creator.
Over 350 English translations of the New Testament
have been marketed to date.
Pastors
will push those translations which work for them the most.
The fear of eternal punishment in the afterlife
has been a doctrine pagan religions used for centuries before Christianity
came on the scene.
The doctrines of fear
and demons entered the church in full force when Constantine made Christianity
the religion of the Roman Empire. When the political system of Rome merged
with the heirarchial structure of the church, the death knoll sounded. The
church became full of unconverted pagans who brought their pagan ideas with
them. The church absorbed them and it died. Dark ages. . millions of people
killed in the name of Christ. Fear and the doctrines of fear and of demons
again controlled the world. The pagan doctrine of eternal torment was added
to the Latin Vulgate.