13989710
Description
Flashcards by yasmin kongsfelt, updated more than 1 year ago
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Created by yasmin kongsfelt
almost 6 years ago
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| Question | Answer |
| Via Negativa (apophatic way) | Content: Moses MAIMONIDES Pseudo-DIONYSIUS Strengths and Weaknesses |
| Maimonides | “we cannot say that God is good when we do not know what it means to say that ‘God is good’" God is beyond our ability to describe. through negation, we can learn something about God without the risk of anthropomorphising him |
| Ship example | The ship is not a mineral, not a plant, not a natural body etc. by the 10th statement, we will have some knowledge of a ship Critic - Brain DAVIES |
| Evaluating Ship example | DAVIES - “he could equally be thinking of a wardrobe" “if one can only say what he is not, one cannot understand him at all” We cannot say what God is not because we need to have some idea of what God is. |
| Pseudo-Dionysius support | God is "beyond assertions and beyond denial" influenced by PLATO and was aware of the limit of our sense as well as our language. Positive language risk anthropomorphizing him hence only negative terms can preserve the mystery and 'otherness' of God |
| Weaknesses - AQUINAS | "when we say 'God is alive' we mean more than just 'God is not dead'" Reduces God in the opposite way - it does not fully capture the essence of God |
| Weaknesses - scripture | it is not a true reflection of how religious believers speak or thing of God Scripture speaks of God positively |
| Weaknesses - Can we learn anything? | We cannot learn about God by process of elimination, since he is beyond our experience |
| Weaknesses - Falsification response | Anthony FLEW - the idea of a God who is not visible, is intangible, etc., seems to bear very lottle differences to there being no God at all. |
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