"Philosophy of Religion" and "Theology": What's the Difference?

Greetings,

Your experience might differ, but I find that those with a passion for philosophy (including the philosophy of religion) tend not to share a passion for theology, and vice versa. This has sparked a question in my mind: what is the difference between "philosophy of religion" and "theology"? In this post, propose a theory that hopefully gives us a satisfactory answer. I propose that, in order to understand the difference between "philosophy of religion" and "theology", you ought to accept the following:

1. "Philosophy of Religion" and "Theology" both refer to logically consistent inquiries, which usually take the form of arguments.

2. The subject of the inquiries of both "Philosophy of Religion" and "Theology" is the same: divinity. This is, presumably, a subset of the supernatural.

3. As the subject of both inquiries is the same, the differentiating factor must lie in the form of the inquiry itself.

4. Inquiries can only prove the veracity of their conclusions if the negation of the conclusion yields a contradiction.

5. The only truths philosophy has available are those which are tautologically true-- that is, true by nature of their logical form. The proposition, (a) or [not (a)], is true by nature of its form. Yes, this seems to entail classical logic, although the truth is that it need not. Roll with me, here.

6. Theology has all philosophical truths available to it (that is, theology does not embrace contradictory claims).

7. The truthfulness of premises in a philosophical argument can only be evaluated in terms of their internal/external logical consistency.

8. Here's where the difference lies: Theological claims can also form inquiries where the truthfulness of a premise is not determined simply by logical consistency.

By now, you're saying... "Zach, this is too much. Break it down for me". To quote Dale Cooper... "Okay."

1. All arguments that are sound in the philosophy of religion are sound in theology.
2. Not all arguments that are sound in theology are sound in the philosophy of religion.

Example of a Philosophical Argument
1. Either God exists or he does not.
2. If God exists in possibility, he exists in necessity.
3. It's possible that God exists.
4. Thus, God exists necessarily.

This argument may not be sound, but it can be understood and evaluated in philosophical terms. An individual might critique the second or third premise, but his critique would be grounded in logic.

Example of a Theological Argument
1. Either humans are predestined or they are to be held responsible.
2. God holds humans responsible.
3. God does what he ought to do.
4. Thus, humans are not predestined.

Philosophically, this is not an interesting argument. Premises 2 and 3 are determined to be true or false depending on adherence to religious principles, not logical necessity. However, this argument can be converted into a philosophical argument...

Example of a Philosophical Argument
1, Either humans are predestined or they are to be held responsible
2. Thus, if [God exists] and [God holds humans responsible] and [God does what he ought to do], then humans are not predestined.

This is actually philosophically interesting-- it doesn't presuppose the existence of God, but is concerned with logical entailment if he does exist (and other premises follow).

In conclusion, all truths determined through the philosophy of religion are true according to theological inquiry as well, as theology has all the tools of philosophy of religion available. However, not all truths revealed by theological inquiries are true in accordance with the philosophy of religion. It may be possible to convert these to philosophical claims, but the inquiry loses some of its impact.

Thoughts/comments/suggestions/criticisms will be much appreciated!

Allah©

An unusual legal dispute has emerged in Malaysia recently about whether non-Muslims may use the word "Allah" to refer to God. The Malaysian government contends that the word is strictly Islamic and may only be used by Muslims, not by the minority religious communities of Christians, Buddhists, and Hindus in the country. The government argues that use of "Allah" in non-Muslim publications will confuse Muslims and presumably make them more likely to convert to other religions. A Catholic publication challenged this prohibition and the Malaysian High Court has ruled in favor of the publication. "Allah" is the English transliteration of the Arabic word for God, and both Christian and Jewish speakers of Arabic generally use it to refer to "their" God. The term entered into the Malay language with the arrival of Arab traders and one report I read claimed that there is no other recognized word in Malay for God. Some people contend that Jews, Christians, and Muslims all worship the same God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But that's not so clear. What are the identity conditions that can be used to determine that my God is the same as your God? For example, most Christians think that God consists of three persons and that one of the persons is the Son of God. Muslims generally consider these beliefs to be both polytheistic and unacceptably anthropomorphic. If there is such radical disagreement about the nature of God, would it not make more sense to say that Christian and Muslims worship two different beings? Neither being might exist for all we know! In any event, maybe it would make sense to reserve "Allah" for the Muslim God (except that Christian Arabs may protest that they were using the word first).

The Apostasy of Smerdyakov

Greetings,

Although my free–reading time has been severely limited due to the standard semester business, I’ve nevertheless found time to continue reading Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov. Aside from having the coolest name I’ve ever read (say it aloud a few times and bask in its greatness), Dostoevsky has a pretty interesting way of structuring his character development… I’m not convinced yet that the book deserves the accolades it has received, but it’s at least keeping me reading, which means I might be swayed, eventually.

In Book Three, Chapter VII (“The Controversy”), a character named Smerdyakov argues that, if one takes the Bible to be axiomatically true, it would not be a sin for an individual to renounce his faith if faced with torture or, perhaps, even death. Even though the character is largely trying to provoke others into anger with the argument, the argument itself is interesting, and I’d like to see how well you all think it works. I’m going to spell it out in as straightforward manner as possible. The edition I’m using the reference this is the 1976 Constance Garnett translation, revised and edited by Ralph E. Matlaw. I shall be referring to the tortured individual as “I” in this argument, because that is how Smerdyakov chose to argue.

1. The instant I say to a potential tormentor, “No, I’m not a Christian, and I curse my true God”, I am immediately cursed and “cut off” from the Holy Church (116)
2. However, one need not speak their apostasy; when I think it, before I had actually said it, I am already “cut off”—“accursed”. (116)
3. At the moment I become accursed, I become exactly like a heathen, and my christening is taken off me. (117)
4. If I’ve ceased becoming a Christian, I have told no lie to the enemy when they asked whether or not I was a Christian, as I had already lost my salvation before speaking. (117)
5. If I’m no longer a Christian, then I can’t renounce Christ, for I have nothing to renounce that belongs to me. (117)
6. It is said in Scripture that, if you have faith, even as a mustard seed, and tell a mountain to move into the sea, it would instantly do so. (118)
7. If a torturer tells me to convert, and I tell a mountain to move and crush the tormentor, and it does not do so, my faith wasn’t even that of a mustard seed, and thus I wouldn’t have been able to get to heaven, anyways. (119)

The intended result? If an individual is told to either renounce their religion or be tortured, and they proclaim that they will not be tortured because of x [x could be any saving act, such as the moving of a mountain], x will happen if their faith is real. If their faith is not real, one thinks that they are not saved, and thus cannot renounce their faith, because they have nothing to renounce. Thus, it is not a sin to commit apostasy (to renounce one’s faith) under the threat of torture, because one has nothing to renounce.

Thoughts? Is his argument good, and does it prove what he thinks it proves? Is it simply a word game, or is there something there?

Are Christians Evil?

One of my favorite philosophers is David Lewis. Lewis, who died in 2001, was a professor at Princeton renowned for defending strange and unconventional positions in metaphysics such as his belief that our world is but one of many worlds, all of which are equally real. He exemplified the playful cleverness that I admire in philosophers.

So I was pleasantly surprised to see that the December 2007 issue of the magazine Harper's has an excerpt from an essay entitled "Divine Evil" based on an outline Lewis wrote shortly before his death. The essay has been published in the book Philosophers without Gods (Oxford University Press, 2007).

The excerpt presents an argument that tries to show that most, if not all, of us are evil. It seems to go something like this:

(1) Anyone who admires someone who is evil is evil.
(2) It is evil to torment people for insubordination.
(3) The greater the torment prescribed for insubordination, the greater is the evil of the one prescribing the torment.
(4) God prescribes infinite torment for insubordination.
(5) Therefore, God is the most evil being. (follows from 2, 3, and 4)
(6) Anyone who admires God is evil. (follows from 1 and 5)
(7) All Christians admire God.
(8) Therefore, all Christians are evil. (follows from 6 and 7)
(9) All who admire people who admire evil beings are themselves evil.
(10) Almost everyone admires some Christian.
(11) Almost everyone is evil. (follows from 9 and 10)

Lewis uses the example of Fritz, the nice Nazi who admires Hitler. Clearly, Hitler is evil, and presumably we would judge people who admire Hitler, even if they themselves do not torment anyone, to be evil as well. But Hitler never sent anyone to eternal damnation in hell, so God is even worse than Hitler and anyone who follows God is worse than Fritz.

This argument seems to fail on a number of grounds, but I'll present one possible response right now and leave the rest to you.

Leaving aside universalists (who believe that everyone is saved), most Christians do believe that at least some people are eternally damned. But does that necessarily make God evil? Lewis seems to assume that we should assess the morality of a being based on the quantity or quality of the pain and suffering they inflict or allow. But that ignores the fact that people like Hitler and Stalin are limited in their ability to inflict suffering not by moral considerations but by their practical inability to inflict all the suffering they want to inflict. The question we need to ask is how much would such evil men do if they had the power of God? Compared to them, God is probably amazingly merciful. Any human in God's role would probably be much more petty and vindictive. So perhaps what is admirable about God is that given His infinite power, His mercy is beyond anything that humans are capable of.

Thoughts on Evil

As Halloween approaches, a philosopher's thoughts turn to evil. The "problem of evil" is one of the most widely discussed philosophical problems. It was a particular obsession of the great German philosopher and mathematician Leibniz. Lately, I've been thinking about Leibniz's work on this problem. Leibniz famously argued that the world is the best of all possible worlds that God could have created, a view that was later ridiculed by Voltaire in his book Candide. But it seems that even in Leibniz's day, several philosophers denied that there is a best of all possible worlds. Instead, they claimed that possible worlds are like numbers, and just as there is no greatest number, so too there is no greatest world.

But in that case what is God to do? Would He just arbitrarily pick a world, say world number 287,184, even though He could have just as easily created world number 287,185, which is greater! This would seem arbitrary and unbecoming of the all-powerful and all-good God. Surely God does not play dice! (Here I am assuming that there are as many possible worlds as real numbers and that the higher-numbered world is better than the lower one. For the sake of simplicity I am assuming that no two worlds are equally good, though, of course, this need not be the case.)

It seems that certain Jesuit theologians in Leibniz's time argued for God's arbirtary choice of this world. This would explain why this world contains so much evil. God had to pick some world to create, and whichever world He chose would be such that there are an infinite number of better worlds.

But it seems to me that if there is an infinite number of worlds God could have created, then there are two other options open to God other than arbitarily choosing one world. He could have chosen not to create any. Of course, He didn't do that. Or He could have created an infinite series of worlds that meet a minimum standard of goodness. Perhaps God created all the worlds in the open interval from 0 to infinity, that is, all the worlds that correspond to the positive real numbers. The negative worlds contain too much evil to be worthy of creation. Our world may be, say, in the neighborhood of 300,000 for all we know. (Some evidence points to our world being irrational, perhaps. [A joke]) In any event, not so great, but containing enough goodness to be creation-worthy.

The upshot of all this is that the significant amount of evil in this world is compatible with the existence of an omnipotent and perfect Being who did create the best worlds that can be created.

Or so I think. What do you think?

[An excellent article on Leibniz that I used in preparing this entry is at http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/leibniz-evil/. ]