a sentence about which it is appropriate to ask whether it is true or false
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Non-cognitive sentence
a sentence about which it is not appropriate to ask whetehr it is true or false. orders, prayers, stories, poems etc are non cognitive utterances
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discourse of faith
language as used within the religious aspect of life. its significance and meaning are internal to a given religion
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Via positiva (cataphatic way)
the claim that we are able to make certain positive statements about god.
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Via negativa (apophatic way)
an approach to religious language which claims that nothing can be said about god. we can state only what he is not. eg god is not mortal
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Pseudo-Dionysius
early 6th cent, made the distinction between negativa and positiva. stated that we must not talk about god because he is beyond our capability and intuitive reason, so trying to describe him with human language is almost offensive
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Maimonides and via negativa
adopted via negativa. warned of the dangers of anthropomorphising god (giving human characteristics). even though scriptures do so 'the mouth of god' 'gods right hand'. maimonides says not to interpretthese literally though.
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Criticisms of via negativa
critics have argued that this approach provides no deeper understanding into the nature of god. eg saying god is not a bike doesn't help.
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W.R. Inge- christian doubt of via negativa
Inge- to deny god of his descriptions was to lead to annihilation of god and humanity. to not describe god just because our descriptions are limited and based on finite human experience, risks us losing the essential link between god and the world.
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G.K. Chesterton + Pierre Teilhard de Chardin- christian
'divinisation of matter'. believed that finding god throught our material existence was all part of his divine plan of salvation. Teilhard- talking of gods relationship with material thing is positive but limited.
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Aquinas, Anselm, Augustine + others
it is possible to say something positive about god. it should be noticed that it does not follow that we are able to be precise in our language about god.. even though what we say is limited , it might be positively indicative
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reconciling via positiva and via negativa
the point made is that discussion of god is not the beginning of faith. we meet god and then try to express the encounter. whether we see our language as apophatically or cataphatically, it is always true that it's a mere human attempt to explain god
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Other cards in this set
Card 2
Front
Non-cognitive sentence
Back
a sentence about which it is not appropriate to ask whetehr it is true or false. orders, prayers, stories, poems etc are non cognitive utterances
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