Knowledge of God

Bonaventure’s ways of seeing

• eye of the flesh: using senses (empiricism)

  • knowledge of physical world

• eye of reason: rationalism

  • knowledge of mathematics and philosophical truth

• eye of contemplation

  • using faith to gain knowledge of god

Polkinghorne - binocular vision

1. eye of science to learn about physical processes in world

2. eye about spiritual truths of God and purposefulness of world

need both eyes

NT - seen in order of creation

• paley’s design arg - loving God

• St Paul Romans: ‘his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made’

• Calvin: analogy of world as mirror

  • “skilful ordering of the universe is for us a sort of mirror in which we can contemplate God” The institutes of the C religion

  • God manifests himself thru creation that works best thru human minds (humans finite)

  • we see =/= essence = appearance of God

  • ‘sparks of glory’

  • principle of accommodation

• god =/= in nature, nature reflects God’s beauty and orderliness

  • can understand God’s power and eternity, care for humanity, justice and mercy

  • thru senses and reasoning

• Swinburne: world displays order, design, purpose

  • “best of all possible worlds”

NT - innate human sense of divine

• humans imago dei - inbuilt capacity and desire to know god

  • opennes to beauty and goodness of God

  • intellectual ability to reflect on and recognise God’s existence

• CofCat Church

  • “desire for God is written in the human heart”

  • “openness to truth and beauty”

• Calvin: “sensus divinitatis” = sense of divinity

  • universal (even “ignorant” ppl)

• conscience = God-given faculty which allos sense of moral judgement

  • John Henry Newman: when feel “responsibility”, “ashamed”, “frightened”

• NL, Aqui - all have innate sense of fairness and justice

• innate sense of morality: Butler, Newman, CS Lewis

  • guilt/ “inner voice”

• Cicero

  • all cultures and times in history have had sense of infinite being

  • unaware of each other but similar

🙂 NT

• everyone has access

• long tradition

• reasonable given sheer no. of ppl with some sort of faith

• appreciation of awe and wonder take us beyond physical

  • diff level to material things

  • God can be known from earthly things

• Aquinas

  • God revelas truths to us thru reason, reason can be used to access God

  • but gave up philosophising about God at end of life

    • writing ‘ike straw’

      • God basically unknowable

☹ NT

• desire? Freud

• not specific to one faith

• is religion universal? (s.d.)

• human supposed god-given characteristics not necessarily universal

• not enough to gain personal knowldge

• God’s nature beyond unaided human understanding

• humans = fallible and sinful

  • fall

• can’t know everything thu reason and NT

  • e.g. trinity, prodigal son → unlimited love of God

  • special importance of jesus lost

  • need faith

• need guidance of church to understand god

• order and purpose can be explained by other factors

• awe from beauty =/= from God

RT

• unveiling/ uncovering

• knowledge God has chosen to show ppl

• immediate revelation

  • direct

  • e.g. gave exact words to prophets to speak to their listeners

  • e.g. A&E with God before Fall (walked with them in Garden of E)

• mediate revelation

  • < direct

  • e.g. reading about someone’s RE/ hearing religious ideas in sermon in church

• bible = either

• barth: God can only be revealed thru RT

• result of God’s grace and accepted thru faith

RT - God’s grace

• shown thru e.g. gift of wisdom, w of scripture, gift of faith, bringing ppl to salvation

• leap to faith deepened thru life with church e.g. worship

• Calvin: ‘firm and certain knowledge of God’s omnibenevolence to us’

• Aquinas

  • empirical and logical knowledge - ‘scientia’

  • faith = voluntary choice

  • knowledge about diff things

  • faith =/= opinion = solid and certain

    • emotional level of redemption won by Jesus

• faith = virtue

  • Cat church: need knowledge (reason) to access faith

• John: diff between know and believe

• can only have full knowledge when God chooses

• HS = work of God in today’s world

  • give prophets of OT right words to say at right time

  • guide writes of scripture → w of God

  • give ppl wisdom to understand what is revealed

  • Calvin: ‘till the spirit has become our instructor, all that we know is folly and ignorance’

Acts 17 Luke

• apostle Paul speaking in marketplace to ppl of Athens

• ‘to an unknown God’

  • desire to worship God (no context)

  • asks them to look for 1 cause, not be superstitious about little gods

• God ‘does not live in temples built by human hands’

  • he is everywhere

  • God =/= idol made by humans

  • God makes us

• tells them reason → some attributes of almighty God

  • grace gives them everything

Bible

• both

• NT

  • beauty

  • historical events

  • natural laws and design

• RT

  • RE

  • scripture

  • person of Jesus

  • life of church

🙂 RT

• only God can properly reveal something as indescribable as himself

  • e.g. RE

• RT → special nature of Jesus, special importance emphaised

• understanding Bible as revelead texts - shows God has left revelation for all to access

• grace shows how humans need to appreciate God much > humans and require revelation

• Kierkagard: ‘leap to faith’

  • can’t know everything thru reason/ empiricism

☹ RT

• not useful to non-believers bc cannot interpret/ understand it

• suggests God who only reveals in certain circumstances - biased

• ppl who claimed God revealed himself might contradict with others

• assumes C = correct revelation

Karl Barth

• NT = idolatry = make up and worship false ideas

• RT = only means

• fallible human reason

• BUT witnessed rise of Nazism

• God ultimately revealed in christ

• no truth in other religions

• CA

  • too extreme

  • need human reason to judge true and false

    • contradictory ‘revealed truths’ in claiming God had disclosed truth to them

fall completely removed all natural human knowledge of God

• Augustine - fall and OS

• Karl Barth (protestant)

  • sinful nature

  • finite capacities

  • knowledge reached ourselves = distorted/ misleading

  • no need to work out God for ourselves as have already been given truth

fall HAS NOT removed all natural human knowledge of God

• Aquinas (catholic)

  • God gave us reason and senses for purpose

    • + RT so use BOTH

  • RT to guide reason and work out natural knowledge

  • e.g. 5 ways

• against barth

  • bible suggests humans can gain natural knowledge of God

  • if Bible revealed by God and that revelation suggests we can learn truths naturally

x faith

• Dawkins: “faith is the great cop-out”

• Hume: ‘a wise man… proportions his belief to the evidence’

  • don’t believe without evidence

Jesus Christ

• ultimate revelation of God to world

• Calvin: J = ultimate mediator to understand God

  • J’s redemption of world = lens to see everything

  • see OT knowing incarnation saves humanity later in NT

  • lens strengthened by HS

• Cat church

  • revelation gradual in OT

  • completed by J and no further revelation needed until end of time

• revelation understood by

  • incarnation, only way to account for A’s sin

  • life and ministry of J

    • teachings

  • salvation thru crucifixion, overcoming death in resurrection

• incarnation so that ppl could understand God at own level

  • bc God = infinite

• reveals extent of God’s love for humanity e.g. miracles

• J calming storms = God’s omnipotence over laws of nature

• J healing ppl from leprosy, bleeding, blindness, paralysis reveals God’s grace in restoring ppl

• raising of lazarus = god as giver of LAD

bible and church

• liberals

• fundmaentals

• conservatives

• Calvin: Bible = preparation for Christ (OT) + outworkings of Christ’s incarnation (NT)

• RCX: God = author, written by breath of HS

  • Church helps understand scripture

  • church leaders → access God’s grace e.g. 7 sacraments

• Calvin: Church = body of Christ

Martin Buber

• belief that God exists diff to belief in God

  • relationship

• so need BOTH

Emil Brunner

• 🙂 NT

  • conscience and sensus divinitas

  • can’t save ppl but → discussion that points to existence of God

  • awareness

  • Fall didn’t damage us on spiritual level, can still connect with God

• NB both Brunner and Barth from Calvinist Reformed tradition

RT and NT are same

Pope JP II: "Faith and reason are like two wings on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth."

Aquinas - they are complementary not separate

Bible - need faith

"And without faith, it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him”

Hebrew

belief in God’s existence sufficient to put trust in him

• aquinas

• Hebrews “and without faith it is impossible to please god”

belief in God’s existence insufficient to put trust in him

• augustine and calvin

• brummer

  • belief = intellectual

  • trust = relational

• barth

• david hume

• dawkins