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

• bible: some writers claim this view e.g. Psalm 8 and romans 1

• 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