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Fall
2010 God and Philosophy Fall 2010 R. E. Innis TuTh 10:00-11:15 The maker and father of this universe it
is a hard task to find, and having found him it would be impossible to
declare him to all mankind….If then, Socrates, in many respects
concerning many things—the gods and the generation of the
universe—we prove unable to render an account at all points
entirely consistent with itself and exact, you must not be surprised.
If we can furnish accounts no less likely than any other, we must be
content, remembering that I who speak and you my judges are only human,
and consequently it is fitting that we should in these matters accept
the likely story and look for nothing further. Plato,
Timaeus Ein begriffener Gott ist kein Gott. ‘A God comprehended is no God.’ (Tersteegen) Required texts: Karen Armstrong, A History of God. Random House Charles Hartshorne, Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes. SUNY Press John Hick, Disputed Questions
in Theology and the Philosophy of Religion. Donald Crosby, Living with Ambiguity. SUNY Press This course will examine the status of the concept of God from an historically informed philosophical point of view. It will focus on the many contexts and dimensions of the ‘God problem’ as it has appeared in history. All the language we use to speak about ‘God,’ including the God concept itself, has a history and has been used in many different ways. Taking account of the multiplicity of religious visions, it will ask what philosophical issues are raised by, and are needed to deal with, questions such as the following. What do we mean, if anything, when we talk about God? What are the different principal conceptions of God? What ‘conceptual’ and ‘linguistic’ problems does the problem of God raise? Why would one ever think—or need to think--that there is such a thing as a god, gods, or God? How can God be known, if at all? Can the existence of God be ‘proved’? Does it need to be? Can God be experienced? What role or function does God play in human life? What existential issues is the reality of God meant to resolve? Is the reality of God in any traditional sense of the term central to a religious way of being in the world? If such a God does not exist, why (and how) should one be religious? The attempts to answer these questions will lead to an examination of alternative traditions of formulating the nature of ultimate reality. We will first study, relying on Karen Armstrong’s A History of God, images and models of the divine in three major monotheistic traditions religious traditions: the Jewish, the Christian, and the Islamic. We will focus on core philosophical concepts and the language in which they are embodied. Secondly, we will study the attempted reformulation or reconstruction of the classical concept of God by Charles Hartshorne in his Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes. Thirdly, we will examine, in light of John Hick’s Disputed Questions, how monotheistic frames of experience and analysis, with their insistence on the personal nature of ultimate reality, stand to non-personal approaches. Finally, we will engage Donald Crosby’s Living with Ambiguity, in which, eschewing the notion of God altogether, he proposes that we take nature itself, understood as a web of process and pattern and source of values, not to be divine but still as religiously and metaphysically ultimate. We will accordingly in the course of the semester constantly engage the issue of the personal or non-personal nature of ultimate reality and the requisite religious attitudes and whether creativity or nature in its different conceptions can ‘ground’ or be the ‘ultimate’ object of religious concern instead of God. Course requirements: a minimum of three blocks of written assignments principally in the form of take-home examination papers and self-directed critical and analytical essays, totalling between 15 and 20 pages in all. Actual dates to be determined. The course format assumes that students are keeping up with the readings in a timely fashion, as indicated. Students are expected to attend the classes and to be prepared to participate in the discussions. Class participation will be taken into consideration when the final grades are calculated. Excessive absences will entail forfeiture of comments on papers and the right to consultation during office hours. The class periods are the primary work space of the course and you should avail yourself of this time. All students must hand me an index card when they have been absent and all students MUST activate and use the university student email server, which will be @student.uml.edu. Office: Olney 102c Office hours: Tu and Th 2:00-3:00, and by appointment Tel: 2532 email: Robert_Innis@uml.edu . Supplementary readings Bonaventura,
ITINERARIUM
Mentis ad Deum Jerome Stone on
Religious Naturalism |
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