intro

faith: voluntary commitment to a belief without the need for complete evidence to support it

empiricism: a way of knowing that depends on the five senses

natural theology: drawing conclusions about the nature n activity of God by using reason n observing the world

Protestantism: a form of Christianity which rejects the authority of the Catholic Church and places greater emphasis on the Bible and on personal faith

revelation: ‘uncovering’ in theological terms; this is when God chooses to let himself be known

immediate revelation: where someone is given direct knowledge of God

mediate revelation: where someone gains knowledge of God in a secondary non-direct way

grace of God: God’s unconditional n undeserved gifts

wisdom literature: a genre of writing from the ancient world, teaching about wisdom and virtue. in the Bible, books such as Proverbs n Job are classified as wisdom literature

how do we gain knowledge?

• innate knowledge

• reason alone: a priori, logic n reasoning

• plato: theory of forms - true knowledge is gained by the soul in a permanent eternal world

• authority: have to have a degree of faith

• personal experience

• through experience alone: a posteriori

• through a priori and a posteriori knowledge

• aristotle: empiricism: from our experience we can understand the truth of the world

• plato:

  • true knowledge comes from an eternal, permanent ideal world beyond this one

  • we are innately endued w knowledge from this world when we’re born

  • when we think we’re gaining knowledge, we’re actually recognising what we already knew from this other world

• aristotle:

  • we can only learn anything meaningful empirically through science

  • we gain knowledge by looking at the physical world around us n conduct repeatable experiments

  • some ppl conclude that the physical world contains all that is worth knowing about and even all that can be known

how do we gain knowledge?

• some say through reason n logic

• also from authority eg parents, teahers, books n experts » faith is required that what they are telling us is true

• some will argue that the only kind of knowledge worth exploring comes from the senses/reasoning

• religious ppl say these are too limited, these don’t offer knowledge of:

  • the spiritual world

  • supernatural truths

  • ethical truths about how we ought to live

  • what we should strive to become

for Christians, how do humans gain knowledge of God?

• reason: a priori, logic n reasoning

• innate knowledge

• through efforts of contemplation n meditation

• personal experience

• empiricism: observation of the natural world

• revelation - the efforts of man is limited and truths about God need to be revealed to them

• through experience: a posteriori

• authority: have to have a degree of truth