Knowledge of God Flashcards
(11 cards)
Natural knowledge of God
Naturally have a sense of the divine and can know about God through our own reasoning and intelligence of reflecting on the order and beauty of the world
Innate sense of the divine (Calvin)
Sensus Divinitas
God has ensured all has a sense there must be a God. ‘That there exists in the human minds and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity… to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead.’
Calvin (natural) quote
‘there is no nation so barbarous, no race so british as not to be indued with the conviction that there is a God.’
Calvin (semen religionis)
Inbuilt knowledge of God is quite sparse, we have a seed of relgion, rather than know everything. We know we owe worship but beyond we don’t know much else. We cannot know Jesus to be the son as ordinary humans - need revealed knowledge rather than natural.
Catholic Church agree with natural sense of divine
‘The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself.’ (CCC)
Christians believe made imago dei. Meaning in a small way, we reflect the God in which we have come - long to be back where we truly belong in the presence of God.
Evidence to support natural revelation
Every culture on earth has religious aspect. May practice differently and have different beliefs. St Paul when in Athens, saw an alter which was inscribed ‘to an unknown God’. Athenians were convinced in their sense of the divine that they ensured all bases were covered by having an alter that covered all Gods (Acts 17:16-34)
Evidence Pt2
No experience is truly and utterly satisfying. People of faith say this sense of inadequacy is another symptom is our desire for God and what is truly fufilling.
Aquinas said our happiness in this world would always be limited - heaven with God would be perfect happiness (beatitudo).
Augustine argues that we are made imago dei so cannot find true happiness until with God. ‘You have made us for yourself and our hearts are restless until we find rest in you.’ (Battle with concupiscence)
Evidence pt2
We have inbuilt tendency to do good and avoid evil.
St Jerome called this seeming of the good, scintilla conscientiae - the spark of conscience. This moral sense of duty can also be seen as a sign of out inbuilt tendance to seek the good which is God.
Natural revelation in beauty
Natural openness to beauty.
‘The human person: with his openness to truth and beauty.’ (Catechism)
The believer thinks that our attraction to beatty is part of a desire to know God who is Beauty itself.
Augustine would agree as he argues that all beautiful things are signs of God’s existence - they’re clues to an ultimate source of beauty.
Do we have the intellectual ability to reflect upon and recognise God’s existence?
Church believes that faith and reason work together. Our reasoning powers are another natural path to knowledge of God.
Anslem - [if a person knew nothing about God and his creation of the world] I think he could at least convince himself of most these things by reason alone’
Church recognises that ‘there are many obstacles which prevent reason from being effective and fruitful use of this inborn faculty.’ (Catechism) such as mental health and emotions.
Natural Knowldge of God’s existence: The Apparent Design & Order of Nature
William Paley - takes the incredible order of nature to see tyat there has been something designed. Pocket watch - infer rationally there must be a designer.
Rudolf Otto - Part of order and apparent design is beauty. Otto says the root of religion lay in the feelings of awe and wonder when we see beautduk things in nature. Numinous experiences and said it began in awe and fascination - mysterium tremendum et fascinans. We can see behind this tremendous feeling they’re something attractive.
