Midterm Exam Study Guide - Faith and Doubt | REL 2001, Study notes of World Religions

Download Midterm Exam Study Guide - Faith and Doubt | REL 2001 and more Study notes World Religions in PDF only on Docsity! The exam will consist of 10-13 short essay questions. Most questions should be answered within 3-7 sentences and include 3-5 important details or specific points. Examples of questions: These were 7 of the questions: 1. restate Clifford's thesis; 2. how does James respond to Clifford; 3. explain Paine's view of true revelation; 4. restate Harris' thesis; 5. explain Tillich's conception of the Protestant Principle; 6. how does Tillich defend the use of symbol and myth in religion; 7. how does Kierkegaard distinguish between faith and resignation. History of the Bible  Traditionally, Moses wrote the first 5 books of the bible, they are the only books that are supposedly the word of God, written around 950-430 bce, if Moses was a living person he would have been alive around 1200 bce  There was a lot of establishment around 950 bce, cities start to settle down and people begin to keep record, the 1st temple of Jerusalem is built, the documentary hypothesis  The first man to question Moses and the writing of the books was exiled in the 1600s from Amsterdam to live alone  The gospels were written 30-90 years after Christ died  325 bce Council of Nicaea- books to be used in the bible are decided, especially the books of the new testament True Religion  Natural universe (observation)  One god  Morality= this world  Science  Experience  Objectivity  Independence False Religion  Bible  Mystery, prophecy, miracles (petty and reduce God)  Opinions  Providence View of Jesus  Moral vs. Pecuniary Justice (exchange or transaction)- a person dying for your sins i.e. not moral The Age of Reason How does Christian faith reduce God?  The use of an equally powerful devil  Using God as an excuse to do terrible, morally wrong things  Giving God a gender, human characteristics  Using miracles and having to search for them  “Whenever resource is had to show, for the purpose of procuring that belief, it implies a lameness or weakness in the doctrine that is preached”  God cannot be compassionate, sign of weakness, human characteristic  Revolted that humans are redeemed by the death of the Son of God Biblical God  Wrathful and loving  Judgment  Jealous  Forgiving  Merciful  Contradiction  Accepting Classical Theism  Omnipotence  Goodness  Loving  Omniscient  Omnipresent  Unchangeable/eternal  Impassivity  Independence Why study religion?  Morality  Everybody has reason, if we tap into reason and become the best we can be than we are morally just Clifford- The Ethics of Belief  Morally wrong to believe in something without evidence  Greatest danger to society is that people become credulous and simple minded  Beliefs always lead to some behavior so no belief is truly private or insignificant  Cases in which we are all able to investigate but fail to do so and make false accusations  You have a right and responsibility to earn your belief  Religion has no empirical evidence  It is wrong everywhere and in all times to believe things without any evidence  Ultimate concern is that we lose the power to judge Sam Harris  Religion relies on dogma and therefore should stay out of public policy  Protestant principle: not just about Catholicism. The entire community has the responsibility to keep itself under the cross. The possibility of being wrong. And open to. Actively affirm that we are finite and if not you are in danger of committing idolatry. Chapter II:  What faith is NOT… o Distortions of faith: not a belief-  Lack of knowledge. Not just being a preliminary thought that we can test but its something that we can trust. o Not will  If something is an ultimate concern then we cannot decide it. Cannot control it.  You don’t obey and then have faith. Faith is something more basic and prior  Faith is something infinite and we cannot create it  Responding to the argument that Pascal made—  Cannot will ourselves to faith o Not feeling/emotion  “Feeling” — implies “that faith is merely a matter of subjective emotions, without a content to be known and a demand to be obeyed.”  Emotion is the source of faith  There were many distortions of the meaning of faith. The Biblical writers considered faith as matter of intellect and Thomas Aquinas, as a matter of will. These two ideas led Schleiermacher to interpret faith as emotion. The word ‘feeling’ has introduced many people to believe that faith is a matter of merely subjective emotions.  But faith as the state of ultimate concern claims the whole man and cannot be restricted to the subjectivity of mere feeling. More so the ultimate concern is expressed through symbols. Chapter 3 and 4 Symbols of Faith  6 characteristics of symbol o Points to something beyond itself.  Different from signs. Signs can be replaced. Doesn’t have its own meaning. Small meaning o Symbols however participate in that to which it points. o It opens up levels of reality. o “Unlocks dimensions and elements of our soul which correspond to the dimensions of reality” o It cannot be produced intentionally  Can’t just point to something and decide that it’s a symbol.  In any kind of activity symbols have to emerge out of something that has happened. It takes on a life of its own.  Grows out of a collective unconsciousness. o Cannot be invented.  Cross was not a symbol until later because it to be used as a torture devise and they didn’t want to glorify criminals. They also wanted to show Jesus as a king.  The language of faith has to be symbolically expressed o Because humans and finite and we need symbols o Symbols can travel from the finite to the infinite and back again. o God is the symbol for god Symbols can be well explained with six characteristics: (I) It points beyond itself, (ii) It participates in that to which it points, (iii) It opens up levels of reality, (iv) It unlocks dimensions and elements of reality, (v) It is not produced intentionally and (vi) It is not invented. Here, our particular concern is on the religious symbols.  The fundamental symbol of our ultimate concern is God. God is the basic symbol of faith. All the qualities we attribute to him are taken from finite experiences and applied symbolically to God. Another group of symbols of faith are sacred things, events, persons,  Demythologization p. 57-60 o Myth: something that is not true. Just like a symbol a myth is something that communicates something that is far more. A lot more than the words that are just being said. o Know when a myth is a myth and a symbol is a symbol. o Myth is another word for a symbol. A symbol in a form of a story  Reason and Faith o The connection between— Draw up a list of different forms of different tendencies from a few religions.  Sacrament: a ritual that brings you closer to god.  Criticizes fundamentalism: literal reading of scripture. According to Tillich there’s a problem in fundamentalism—they believe in one final answer, they don’t adapt in doing that they miss the ultimacy of the ultimate. Treating and object like it was the ultimate.  Romanticism: a movement in art and literature, kind of religion and philosophy.  Whey does faith require courage? Types of Faith Faith can be divided into two types: ontological type of faith and moral types of faith. Ontological type of faith is nothing but faith here and now. It encounters us in a thing, in a person, in an event. They traditionally are called as sacramental. Moral type of faith is characterized by the idea of the law. God has given the law as a gift and as a command. He can be approached only by those who obey the law. Truth of Faith Right from the beginning of theological speculation, there is constant fight between faith and reason. Paul Tillich opines that if faith is the opposite of reason, it would tend to dehumanize man. A faith, which destroys reason, destroys itself and the humanity of man. Reason is the presupposition of faith and faith is the fulfillment of reason. There is no conflict between faith and reason, they are within each other. Man is finite, but he is aware of his potential infinity and this awareness appears as his ultimate concern as faith. So also, the truth of faith cannot be cannot be confirmed by the latest physical or biological or psychological discoveries. And faith cannot be shaken by historical researches, because they are based on probabilities. Neither scientific nor historical truth can affirm or negate the truth of faith and vice versa. The popular opinion says that philosophy is the enemy and destroyer of faith. Philosophical truths consist in true concepts concerning the ultimate. The truth of faith consists in true symbols concerning the ultimate. Fear and Trembling  Infinite resignation vs. faith o Thinks this is what people mean when they say they have faith, or he’s a man of faith, complete resolved acceptance, resign yourself to a fact, accept things as they are o Abraham was great in faith because he was justified in it, he trusted it, trusting in god- believed in absurd things (having Isaac and killing him but believing another outcome) o We can explain resignation by Abrahams acceptance o Faith is movement that happens on the absurd after infinite resignation, not just obedience to God, it is Abraham holding knife over Isaac and still believing god wont demand him  Absurd o Faith will always look absurd to others because its your own relation with God  Paradox o What faith is because it cant be explained to other people  Religion and Ethics o Religion supersedes ethics and almost contradicts them, there is mediation in ethics ex. Killing your child to better the nation o Ethics- individuals relationship to all other people, finite relationship o Religion- absolute relationship that subordinates all others o Uses Luke 14:26 as an example pg. 99  Telos  Tragic hero vs. Knight of faith o The individual in a religious relationship is then very isolated o Tragic hero- you can understand them because their actions require strength