Necessarily Dissimilar

Unsaying God ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 73-128
Author(s):  
Aydogan Kars
Keyword(s):  
Philosophical Hermeneutics ◽  
Negative Theology ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
Discursive Thought ◽  
First Cause

In the centuries following al-Kindī, Muslim philosophers developed a coherent family of apophatic theological positions on the divine essence and its accessibility. The recurring aspects of this philosophical apophaticism were (1) a negative theology of divine attributes that reads them as negations, (2) the unknowability of the divine essence, closely connected with an Aristotelian version of the Neoplatonic distinction between discursive thought [dianoia] and non-discursive intellection [noēsis], (3) the necessary dissimilarity of God as the first cause of everything else, and (4) a philosophical hermeneutics that protects divine oneness and dissimilarity. Most of these aspects were established in conversation with the Muʿtazilites. As early as al-Kindī, Muslim philosophers adopted such a philosophical apophaticism of the divine nature, which later would take diverse forms, while preserving strategic resemblances.

Introduction

Unsaying God ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Aydogan Kars
Keyword(s):  
Negative Theology ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
Conceptual Problems ◽  
Technical Terms

This chapter introduces the framework and the content of the book and discusses the basic conceptual problems revolving around “negative theology.” It argues that we should not only move from “negative theology” to “negative theologies” in order to approach Islamic intellectual landscapes, but we should also qualify the particular question of theology we are examining. Discussions of negative theology as such tend to confuse divine attributes and the divine essence and reduce apophaticism into a hunt for negative particles and statements. The chapter narrows down the scope of the book to the negative theologies of the divine essence. It also presents justifications for its boundaries and its linguistic preferences, and it defines some technical terms that appear throughout the book. It provides a conceptual introduction to negative theology and a compass to the subsequent chapters of the book.

The dispute about the nature of divine attributes in Jewish medieval philosophy

2015 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-101
Author(s):  
Andrija Soc
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Negative Theology ◽  
Medieval Philosophy ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
The Third ◽  
Ecclesiastical Authority ◽  
The Status ◽  
Religious Dogma ◽  
Alternative Solutions

In this paper I discuss a dispute between Jewish medieval philosophers about the status of divine attributes. The paper consists of three parts. In the first part, I outline Philo?s and Saadia?s reasons as to why God must be thought as perfect and simple. Using the aristotelian distinction ?substance/accidence?, I explain why it is problematic to ascribe to God, as seen within Judaic tradition, properties such as omniscience, power, goodness, and others. In the second part, I examine Maimonides? negative theology. Maimonides holds that one must not predicate anything to God. Because God and human beings are incommensurable, any such ascription would be equivocal. Under the influence of Saadia, Maimonides maintains that one cannot say anything about God except that He exists. To prove his thesis, Maimonides was prepared to interpret the content of Jewish Holy writs as being highly metaphorical and it?s most profound meaning as beyond the grasp of the majority of those practicing the principles of Judaism. Even though Maimonides? influence was felt on many subsequent Jewish thinkers, many of them didn?t always agree with him. In the third part of the paper, I sketch Gersonides?, Crescas? and Albo?s alternative solutions to the problem of ascribing attributes to God. Aside from discussing a question of the status of Divine attributes, in this paper I also try to put forward a thesis that goes beyond the framework of the mentioned dispute. Namely, Jewish philosophers, Maimonides being the paradigmatic example, didn?t simply adopt the official interpretations of religious dogma, nor did they compromise with it when it comes to proving their theses. In that regard, they came very close to early modern philosophers, who discussed philosophical and theological problems in light of principles of rational examination, rather than accepting the claims of ecclesiastical authority.

scholarly journals El punto ciego que permite ver: de las teofanías más allá de las imágenes (Ibn ʿArabī) a la visión en la extinción (Kiarostami)

1970 ◽  
Author(s):  
Antoni Gonzalo Carbó
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Negative Theology ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
Knowledge Of God ◽  
Blank Screen ◽  
Meister Eckhart ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Ordinary Consciousness ◽  
The Invisible ◽  
Robert Bresson

Resumen: La capacidad visionaria que se traduce en valoración consciente de la Imagen como tal, es discernible en toda la obra de Ibn ʿArabī. Según el gran maestro andalusí, el conocimiento más elevado de la desnudez absoluta de la Esencia divina está más allá de toda imagen (la Entbildung del Maestro Eckhart o el Bildlosigkeit de Enrique Suso). Si en contexto de la mística renana del siglo XIII el Maestro Eckhart habla de la «imagen sin imagen» (bîld âne bîld) de Dios, un siglo antes el gran místico persa Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār se refiere a la Realidad divina en similares términos a las teofanías akbaríes más allá de las formas o de las imágenes: no-imagen (per. naqš-bi-naqš, bi-ṣūra, bi-nišān; cf. el Bildlosigkeit de Enrique Suso), i.e., la imagen original del mundo Invisible. Según Ibn ʿArabī, Él está más allá de cualquier representación, pero también más allá incluso de la ausencia de representación. Las teofanías más allá de las imágenes, que revelan la esencia divina en su completa desnudez, exigen la aniquilación del sujeto, la abolición provisional del yo, que, en el fondo de la experiencia, ignora incluso que está viendo a Dios. Solo puede aprehender ese portentoso hecho una vez que retorna a su conciencia ordinaria: «Si Me encuentras no Me verás, mas Me verás si Me pierdes»; «El que me ve y sabe que me ve, no me ve». El conocimiento supremo de Dios coincide con la ignorancia absoluta del propio yo, estando reservado para quien, sumido en la noche de su nada original, ha olvidado incluso su propio ser. La poesía de Mallarmé y de Rilke nos sirven para introducir, en el contexto de la espiritualidad islámica que nos ocupa, dos temas relacionados con la teología negativa: en primer lugar, el sentido simbólico que en el sufismo la blancura tiene como expresión del mundo invisible, y en segundo lugar, y estrechamente afín con el anterior, la trascendencia, abstracción e ignorancia que, en la mística de Ibn ʿArabī, van vinculadas a las teofanías más allá de las imágenes en el marco de la visión suprema del Increado. Su traslación al arte lo encontramos en los recursos a la pantalla vacía de imágenes en el cine de Robert Bresson o en la extinción de la imagen en el de Abbas Kiarostami.Abstract: The visionary ability that translates into a conscious appraisal of the Image as such, can be discerned in all of the works of Ibn ʿArabī. According to this great Andalusian master, the highest knowledge of the absolute nakedness of the divine essence lies beyond all images (e.g., in the Entbildung of Meister Eckhart or the Bildlosigkeit of Henry Suso). If in the context of the Rhineland mysticism of the thirteenth century, Meister Eckhart speaks of the «image without image» (bîld âne bîld) of God, a century earlier the great Persian mystic Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār refers to the divine Reality in terms similar to the akbarian theophanies beyond form and image: the non-image (in Persian, naqš-bi-naqš, bi-ṣūra, bi-nišān; cf. the Bildlosigkeit of Henry Suso), i.e., the original image of the invisible world. According to Ibn ʿArabī, He is beyond all representation, but also beyond even the absence of representation. Theophanies beyond images, which reveal the divine essence in its complete nakedness, demand the annihilation of the subject, the provisional abolition of the self, which, in the depths of experience, does not know even that it looks upon God. One only apprehends this prodigious fact on returning to ordinary consciousness: «If you find Me you will not see Me, but you will see Me if you lose Me»; «He who sees me and knows that he sees me, does not see me». The supreme knowledge of God coincides with absolute ignorance of the self. It is reserved for those who, immersed in the night of their original nothingness, have forgotten even their own being. In the context of Islamic spirituality as it concerns us here, the poetry of Mallarmé and Rilke serves to introduce two subjects related to negative theology: the first is the symbolic meaning that whiteness takes on in Sufism as an expression of the invisible world; and the second, which is closely connected to the first, is that transcendence, abstraction and ignorance, in the mysticism of Ibn ʿArabī, are linked to the theophanies beyond images in the framework of a supreme vision of the Uncreated. This vision is translated into art through the use of the blank screen, emptied of images, in the cinema of Robert Bresson and also through the extinction of the image in the cinema of Abbas Kiarostami.

The Divine Simplicity in St Thomas

1989 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 271-293 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert M. Burns
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Natural Theology ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Divine Simplicity ◽  
Summa Theologiae ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
Insufficient Attention ◽  
The Trinity

In the Summa Theologiae ‘simplicity’ is treated as pre–eminent among the terms which may properly be used to describe the divine nature. The Question in which Thomas demonstrates that God must be ‘totally and in every way simple’ (1.3.7) immediately follows the five proofs of God's existence, preceding the treatment of His other perfections, and being frequently used as the basis for proving them. Then in Question 13 ‘univocal predication' is held to be ‘impossible between God and creatures’ so that at best ‘some things are said of God and creatures analogically’ because of the necessity of using ‘various and multiplied conceptions’ derived from our knowledge of created beings to refer to what in God is simple for ‘the perfections flowing from God to creatures… pre–exist in God unitedly and simply, whereas in creatures they are received divided and multiplied’ (1.13.5). In line with this, in the De Potentia Dei the treatment of analogical predication is integrated into that of ‘the Simplicity of the Divine Essence’ (Q 7). Moreover, it lies at the root of Thomas's rejection of any possibility of a Trinitarian natural theology such as, for instance, St Anselm or Richard of St Victor had attempted to develop, on the grounds that ‘it is impossible to attain to the knowledge of the Trinity by natural reason’ since ‘we can know what belongs to the unity of the essence, but not what belongs to the distinction of the persons’ (1.32.1). Even modern minds sympathetic to Thomas have clearly found it difficult to understand his concern for the divine simplicity: in his Aquinas Lecture Plantinga speaks for many in stating that it is ‘a mysterious doctrine’ which is ‘exceedingly hard to grasp or construe’ and ‘it is difficult to see why anyone should be inclined to accept it’. Not surprisingly, therefore, some of the most widely read twentieth–century commentators on Aquinas have paid little attention to it. Increased interest has recently been shown in it, but a number of discussions pay insufficient attention to the historical context out of which Thomas's interest in the doctrine emerged, and consequently tend to misconstrue its nature.

scholarly journals Hervaeus Natalis and his polemics with the early scotists about formalities and formal distinction in God

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 409-418
Author(s):  
Galina V. Vdovina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Subject Matter ◽  
The Other ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
Biographical Information ◽  
Rational Expression ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Absolute ◽  
The One ◽  
Formal Distinction

The article is devoted to Hervaeus Natalis, also known as Hervaeus drom Nedellec, who was an outstanding theologian at the end of 13th — beginning of 14th centuries (c. 1260–1323). Brief biographical information about Hervaeus is provided and his importance for medieval thought is emphasized. The subject matter of the article is the consideration of a formal difference, or formal distinction in God. The introduction of this concept is usually associated with the name of Duns Scotus, and there is every reason for this: although Duns was not the inventor of formal distinction as such, it was he who put it at the heart of his trinitarian theology. The concept of formal difference is inextricably linked to the concept of formalities, which in this context mean those ontological subunits in a concrete single essence between which there is a formal difference. The basic impetus to the introduction of both concepts was the necessity for rational expression of distinction between common divine nature and those relations by which Persons are constituted (relations of fatherhood, sonship, etc.), and also between different divine attributes. The task was, on the one hand, not to destroy the absolute real unity in God, and, on the other hand to explain certain differences that exist in him before any act of intellect, even divine intellect. Therefore, the notion of formality as a correlate “from the nature of the thing”, which corresponds to any attribute or relation, is conceivable in a separate concept.

Aseity

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Walter Matthews Grant
Keyword(s):  
Strong Support ◽  
Greek Philosophy ◽  
Church Fathers ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Causal Dependence ◽  
Turn On ◽  
Divine Attribute ◽  
First Cause ◽  
Classical Greek Philosophy ◽  
The Church

‘Aseity’ (short for ‘God’s aseity’) is the traditional divine attribute whereby God is said to exist of or from himself. Although the Latin phrase ‘a se’ (from which the Latin ‘aseitas’ and English ‘aseity’ derive) might suggest that God is from himself as an effect from a cause, only a minority of theists have held that God literally causes himself. In affirming aseity, most theists intend rather to claim that God is a self-sufficient or self-existent being who, in some significant sense, lacks dependence on other things. God’s lack of dependence on anything besides himself distinguishes him radically from creatures, every one of which depends on God, and therefore on at least one thing besides itself. The claim that God is an independent or self-sufficient being has strong support within the Western tradition. Foreshadowed in classical Greek philosophy and taught at least implicitly in Jewish and Christian scripture, the claim is explicitly affirmed by the Church Fathers, the medieval philosopher-theologians, and the most prominent theistic philosophers of the classical modern period. Aseity has been thought by many simply to follow from other claims central to theism. Theists claim God to be the First Cause and the most perfect being possible. Since the First Cause cannot itself be caused, God will at least lack causal dependence on another. Moreover, if lack of dependence is a perfection, then God will lack dependence to the extent consistent with his other perfections. While certain contemporary theists reject some of the traditional divine attributes, it is difficult to find any who reject the idea that God enjoys a special independence from other things. There are, however, various ways in which aseity might be defined, based on precisely what sort of dependence God is said to lack. Definitions of aseity will turn on, and vary in strength in accordance with, the broader metaphysical and theological commitments of different theists.

Trinity

2007 ◽  
pp. 45-104
Author(s):  
Daniel J. Lasker
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
Christian Doctrine ◽  
Triune God ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Trinity ◽  
Father And Son

This chapter discusses Jewish philosophical arguments against the Christian doctrine of Trinity. Though not all Christians with whom the Jews were familiar agreed on all the detail of the Trinitarian doctrine, most followed the formulation of the Quicumque (Athanasian) Creed. A number of concepts are presented in this formulation of faith. First, there is only one God, who is one substance or divine nature. Second, this one God has three Persons: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Third, the Father was not begotten, the Son was generated from the Father, and the Spirit proceeded from the Father and Son. Fourth, all three Persons are coequal and coeternal. The Jewish polemicists disagreed with the division of God into three Persons and with the assumption that the three Persons were apparently causally connected. The Jews rejected this Christian concept of a triune God as being incompatible with the principles of God's unity, which even the Christians claimed they maintained. The chapter then details the four major categories of Jewish philosophical arguments against the Trinity: (1) Trinity implies matter; (2) the divine attributes are not Persons; (3) generation disproves unity; (4) syllogistic logic refutes the Trinity. It also considers (5) images of the Trinity.

On the orthodoxy of Jonathan Edwards

2014 ◽  
Vol 67 (3) ◽  
pp. 304-322
Author(s):  
Oliver Crisp
Keyword(s):  
Jonathan Edwards ◽  
Divine Simplicity ◽  
Possible World ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
Scholarly Community ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
The World ◽  
Causal Action ◽  
Best Possible World ◽  
As If

AbstractJonathan Edwards had some strange ideas. He was an idealist like Berkeley. He denied that the world persists through time, claiming that it is continuously created out of nothing by God moment-by-moment. He also denied creaturely causal action in his doctrine of occasionalism. Moreover, he thought that the world is the necessary output of the essential creativity of the deity, embracing the idea that this is the best possible world. Often these views are not reported in popular accounts of his work, though they are widely known in the scholarly community. But is his position theologically orthodox? This article argues that he is faced with anEdwardsian Dilemma:Either he must admit that his theology proper implies that God is not metaphysically simple, or he must embrace pantheism. Neither horn seems particularly attractive. Of the two, the second seems less appealing than the first. Nevertheless, it looks as if the logic of his position presses in this direction. His idealism and Neoplatonic conception of God's necessary emanation of the world imply panentheism. When coupled with his doctrine of divine simplicity, it looks as if his position could be pressed in a pantheist direction. However, if he opts for the first horn, he must deny the doctrine of divine simplicity, which he endorses in a range of works. If God is simple, then it looks as if all his ideas imply one another and the divine essence. Yet the world is an emanation of divine ideas, which Edwards believes God constantly ‘communicates’. Suppose with Edwards that the world is an ordered series of divine ideas. Then it looks as if they must imply each other and the divine nature as well, given divine simplicity. Clearly this is intolerable, as far as orthodoxy goes. One option is for the Edwardsian to revise divine simplicity, so that God is merely a metaphysical simple like a soul. Then he may have distinct states and properties. However, in addition to this revision one would need to amend Edwards’ occasionalism because it provides an apparently insuperable problem of evil for his metaphysics. Thus, revising the first horn involves more than a little tinkering with the deep structures of Edwards’ thought. However, I argue that this is what the Edwardsian must do if she wants to hold onto a broadly orthodox Edwardsian view on these matters.

Divine Simplicity

1982 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 451-471 ◽  
Author(s):  
William E. Mann
Keyword(s):  
Divine Simplicity ◽  
Divine Attributes ◽  
Divine Nature ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Critical Attention ◽  
The City ◽  
Detailed Presentation

In The City of God, XI, 10, St Augustine claims that the divine nature is simple because ‘it is what it has’ (quod habet hoc est). We may take this as a slogan for the Doctrine of Divine Simplicity (DDS), a doctrine which finds its way into orthodox medieval Christian theological speculation. Like the doctrine of God's timeless eternality, the DDS has seemed obvious and pious to many, and incoherent, misguided, and repugnant to others. Unlike the doctrine of God's timeless eternality, the DDS has received very little critical attention. The DDS did not originate with Augustine, but I am not primarily concerned with its pedigree. Nor am I concerned to ask how the doctrine interacts with trinitarian speculation. I will have my hands full as it is. In Section I of this paper I shall provide a rough characterization of the DDS, indicate its complexity, and focus on a particular aspect of the doctrine which will exercise us in the remainder of the paper, namely, the thesis that the divine attributes are all identical with each other and with God. In section n I shall discuss Alvin Plantinga's recent objections to Aquinas' version of the DDS. I shall then offer a more detailed presentation of what I take to be Aquinas' version (section III), and recast it in terms of a theory of attributes which is significantly different from Plantinga's (section IV). Although the recasting of the doctrine will enable me to rebut Plantinga's objections (section v), it by no means solves all the problems of the DDS. In section vi I shall discuss the chief lingering problem facing a defender of the DDS.

scholarly journals Prolegomena to a Bahá’í Theology

1992 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-67
Author(s):  
J. A. McLean
Keyword(s):  
Interreligious Dialogue ◽  
Divine Revelation ◽  
Negative Theology ◽  
Community Attitudes ◽  
Divine Essence ◽  
Religious Truth ◽  
Main Substance ◽  
Hidden God ◽  
Holy Writ

Theology is intrinsic to the Bahá’í revelation. While community attitudes have tended to view the discipline of theology somewhat suspiciously, the term and field of “Bahá’í theology” remain valid and are indispensable. One can distinguish source theology or revelation theology, contained in holy writ, from derivative theology (commentary), which is more relative and subjective. The relativity of religious truth, while it plays a useful role in deabsolutizing dogmatism and in promoting interreligious dialogue, is itself relative and currently runs the risk of becoming another absolute. Bahá’í theology is both apophatic (negative) and cataphatic (affirmative). An abstruse, apophatic negative theology of a hidden God is explicit as background to Bahá’í theology. Apophasis rejects defining God and honors God by remaining silent about the divine essence. If apophasis does speak of God, it does so by via negativa, by describing God through a process of elimination of what God is not, rather than making affirmations about what God is. The main substance of Bahá’í theology, however, is manifestation theology or theophanology, that is, a theology calculated upon an understanding of the metaphysical reality and teachings of the divine Manifestation. This manifestation theology is cataphatic. Cataphasis dares to speak about God but recognizes that God transcends the human analogies used to describe divinity. Bahá’í theology is, moreover, based in faith rooted in the person of Bahá’u’lláh and his divine revelation, has a strong metaphysical bias, eschews dogmatism, and welcomes diversity.

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