God and Existence

The religious-minded, for time immemorial, have been faced with - and arguably failed in - the responsibility of proving God’s existence. This is a fair enough charge for those theo-enthusiasts who say that there is in fact a super-being out there called God who created the Heavens and the Earth, but what about those theo-enthusiasts who think this question is moot? In other words, I’m not disputing the need for those who say God exists to give reasons for their belief/knowledge, but rather I’m disputing the need, in general, to ascribe existence to God as if existence was somehow necessary to make God - or religion - worthwhile…

To get straight to the point, why is existence the most necessary and/or important qualifier of God? Why is it that existence must be shown before religious texts can be taken (by the secular-minded) with any degree of seriousness? Why is the Bible - a non historico-scientific text - always judged as if it was first and foremost a document of history/science? Why are the events depicted in religious stories credited or discredited by the archeological evidence available, as if they need to be shown to have happened somewhere along the historical timeline in order to be of value to us now?

In the morning news (thestar.com/news/world/article/557645) there was an article about a German Muslim scholar who said that he believes Mohammed and Jesus and other religious figures are mythical and not historical in nature. In this article - the main point of interest for me at least - was a passage from a Muslim council representative who said that if this was true, if these figures are indeed mythical and not historical, then “this would mean we would have to abolish the religion altogether”.

How is this the case? Why does it matter if Adam and Eve truly walked in some garden called Eden for their story to have meaning for us? Why is history/ontology at all relevant to religion, as if the first thing theo-enthusiasts must do to be considered rational is demonstrate God’s existence? Why must we show there was indeed a flood and an ark and a man called Noah in order for this event - indeed a mythical event - to have meaning?

This question applies equally to the theists (those who say God exists) as it does to the atheists (those who charge all religious-minded folks with the need of proving God’s existence).

I want to disentangle God from Existence while upholding the value of religious texts as if I was the most ardent believer. And so I ask all of you why this can’t be done. Why - if God does not exist or the religious events depicted in Scripture are not historical - must we “abolish religion altogether”?

Well, I agree, and I see the importance of the question. But if we acknowledge that the only two reasonable positions on the existence of God are agnostic-deism and agnostic-atheism, then the big hole in the ground we are left with is doubt. Many people can’t live with it. What they don’t realize is that fulfillment is still possible, maybe even more so, knowing that your flying solo.

There are many kinds of religion. For many people in ILP, religion means monotheism and mostly Christianity (somehow …).

Unfortunately for Christians, 3 sister religions of Jewish origin are scripture based (more or less).
They try to authenticate themselves relying on the value of scriptures, rather than PURE belief/conviction/faith.

When someone has solid faith in something, s/he doesn’t need any other support in her/his faith. He would/may doubt her/his faith with all his reason, and s/he would conclude “I may be insane but I cannot deny what/how I believe.”

But people without real faith can’t be sure of themselves solely by the conviction.
And they try to supplement their faith by (fake) logic, (fake) authorities.

Many religious people love to debate about this and that because they can feel better, more certain about their faith by doing so if they can convince themselves that their (fake) logic is sound.

In case of scripture based religions, they often use both (fake) authority and (fake) logic to boost their poor grade faith.
And they try to use both in entangled manner that when one fails, other seems to go down together, and their religion it’s really (just their not so convincing faith) crumbles.

In short, if you have very solid faith in anything, you need nothing more.
You don’t need scripture, logic, myth, tradition, preachers, church, even god.
It’s crazy, but you are CERTAIN about your faith.
So, at least, your desire for the absolute certainty is satisfied, which is rare among human being.

I think the need for proving (god, scripture, whatever religious) is proving the lack of one’s faith. :slight_smile:

I would opt for another position. We believe in the way of life God - or any religious figure - shows us in Scripture. I think we need to show the sense of following God’s law. If we find it is indeed a reasonable position (to live according to this law) then, well, we have what I think you’re talking about when you say:

What you’re saying here, I think, is that we can still find meaning in our lives on our own, i.e., the meaning we give our lives. I agree. I think the point of God is to believe enough in God’s law to make it our own. To find fulfillment by living like God… Even if we’re flying solo when we do so…

It isn’t my intention to override the multiplicity of religious experience with the Christian variety. When I talk here, I’m trying to speak of religion itself even if my examples are Judeo-Christian. I would love to discuss the essence of religion if you’d like since it is indeed critical to this thread. I think religion is about conscience. It’s about how to live life, the good life. My main point here is that historical correspondence of religious stories is no reason to accept or reject their teachings… I think this transcends my Christian bias… But you are right, I certainly am biased.

What if I have a certain faith that all children under five should be exterminated? Or that women should be disallowed from public? Blind reckless faith isn’t enough. I’m sorry, but you need something more than “nothing” to believe… Otherwise all is permitted.

I don’t think you understood what I said.
What I said was about the degree of conviction, not about the simplicity/complexity of it.

When your faith is stronger than reason, opinion of any other person, or anything, you need nothing more than it - your faith. You don’t need to prove it to yourself nor to others.

Actually, people with strong faith would doubt their own faith.
Rather than trying to boost it, they would challenge their own faith.

PS.

Personally, I don’t think I have any faith. :slight_smile:

The way I see it, the more historical “evidence” you can acquire about certain events in religious texts, the more certain you can feel about the authenticity of the religion itself. This is important for me, looking at it from a nonbeliever’s perception, because all this talk about how religion is to promote the good life and a sort of humanism is absolute crap, in the sense that it really doesn’t depict the true basis for religion. The point of religion is the afterlife, in its truest form, nothing else should really matter. Jesus said, “My kingdom is not of this world,” and in this sense I’ve always admired the writings of St. Augustine.
If you speak about religious contexts as merely mythological “stories,” then you have to sort of question if heaven itself is part of the mythological illusion. In the Qur’an, a sort of detailed analysis is continually given about heaven, the way it will feel and what it will look like. If Muhammad was merely a mythological allegory, then what merit does the text itself have? In Islam, Muslims believe that Muhammad himself was given the revelations of the Qur’an, if now Muhammad was merely a mythological allegory, then who acquired the revelations from god? A person, prone to storytelling?
As a very confused nonbeliever, I myself hope that there is some concrete evidence that can authenticate religious context, for then I would feel it more logical to believe.

When it comes to why do people find it necessary to believe in god in such modern times of science, I think Slavoj Zizek (Google him, he’s amazing) put it best in his book The Puppet and the Dwarf, “The standard answer is: rational philosophy or science is esoteric, confined to a small circle; it cannot replace religion in its function of capturing the imagination of the masses, and thus serving the purpose of moral and political order.”

The following is only applicable to those that concern themselves with these issues; “they” refers to any group of people that do the previous.
Pro is for the notion, while Ob is against the notion.

Pro: Because they would not believe if they viewed their respective providence as false according to reality; they would not follow if the providence is not real in their mind.
A similar comparison to the idea of people being “moral” only because the religious laws tell them what not to do and what to do, rather than the person wishing to do these things on their own.

Ob: Because they see this the same as the Pro’s, but have simply found no evidence to prove the existence to themselves to cause them to believe in a given providence.

Pro: Because of the above; this causality creates a need for the existence, or the collection becomes just a “pack of lies”.

Ob: Because the text is often (in this demand of existence) being presented as evidence of something, by which, can only resemble value if the construct of the assumption of a providence is a reality and not fiction. It is not a case, often, that a religious text is highlighted for moral concepts as thought and nothing more.

Pro: (following from the line of existence needed) Any religious text showing construct of creation through the text and held as truth by extension of the providence being true, then would be more true, by this same logic (so it is held), than any other form of discovery regarding history. This is held because the text came from an infallible, and presumably, perfectly honest providence.
(In the case of Christianity, it is even a simpler answer: Because the Bible WAS held for ages as the most accurate text on history, and used to determine what is and is not true about reality and science.)

Ob: Because of the above presentation of Pro’s, it is then contested constantly by the Ob’s as a necessary affect of the Pro’s assertion.

Pro: Because of all of the above.

Ob: Because of all of the above.

Without regard to either Pro or Ob: Because if there are constructs of historical reality that do line up with a given religious text’s content’s, then it is an insight into the comparison of reality as we can find it anthropologically and how that same set of people chose to write about that which we find.

Rather, it is an insight of perspective to read a poem from you about Aprognopolis and the 18 lines of Triven, but if I find evidence of Aprognopolis and some physical evidence of some of the lines of Triven, then I can know how they lived to some degree, and compare that against your poem that describes the 5th line of Triven as the Line of the Lion and find that in the 5th line there are among their homes many more higher classes of pottery as well as higher qualities of metal found; coin, and more mirrors.
This means that Lion was meaning wealthy; whereas I could have found swords, shields, barracks, and more spartan classes of evidence of living which would have meant Lion was meaning fierce and warrior class; respected for being the protectors of the Triven.

So anthropology wants to find stuff because religious texts offer them clues to finding out more about people of the past.

Religious anthropologists want to find this stuff because it validates the religious texts for them.

Anti-Religious anthologists (not so many of these that I’m aware of) want to find this stuff to invalidate the religious text.

Fair enough; this is indeed the common way of seeing it… But this position presumes that the point of religion is to document history… The only way “the authenticity of the religion itself” can be corroborated by history is if religion itself is an account of history… But religion is not an account of history… You still haven’t shown that it is… In fact you go on to say:

Which certainly doesn’t lend credence to the fact that religion rises or falls based upon its historical accuracy… This aside, I disagree with the claim itself as well. The point of religion is to tell us how to live, not to tell us what happens after we die. The point of the Gospels, for example, is to show us how Jesus lived so that we can follow suit, which is why 90+ percent of it is devoted to his life and maybe 10 percent (if you’re lucky) is devoted to his death or events after his death…

Fair enough; Jesus indeed said something like this. But Jesus also tells us not to seek the Kingdom, i.e., not to say “look, there it is!” or “here it is!”, but that the Kingdom is already in our midst…

In the Gospels there are two contrasting “states”: the Kingdom and the World. Indeed, the Kingdom is not of the World. The Kingdom is a place of unconditional gifts while in the world nothing is free…

From the text we can see how Muhammad lived, just as in the Gospels we see how Jesus lived and in the Iliad we see how Achilles lived. We can decide whether or not the life these religious characters live is worth living (and aren’t we all faced with the problem of how to live our lives?). So the merit of the text itself is in the life it reveals to us. Who cares if Muhammad was real or not? Does it matter if Achilles was real for us to learn from his character and to decide whether or not it makes sense to live accordingly?

Of course. The Qur’an was written by a person, perhaps Muhammad, perhaps someone else. It certainly didn’t come to us through divine revelation (that’s just absurd). As should be clear from the foregoing, God is just a character in a story to me, which is to say an entity which can “reveal truths” only to those who study the text we have. The text itself wasn’t revealed to an author by God, but rather an author reveals God to us through the text (just as Shakespeare reveals Hamlet to us through that text)…

No; historical correspondence is not what makes or breaks a religious text. What makes or breaks a religious text is whether or not the way of life it describes makes sense given the facts of our life. In Ancient Greece, did it make sense to be an heroic character? Strong and fast and honorable and brave? Sure… Just as today, during economic and environmental crisis, it makes sense to be prudent and sparing and innovative…

However what really makes a religious texts is how universal its way of life is. i.e., the Greek way of life is no longer relevant just as it’s no longer relevant to live like a Medieval monk. The religion that addresses the “facts of life” of all lives, throughout all history, is the religion that never breaks. But is there a way of life that suits all circumstances? I happen to think there is, and I happen to think our major religious traditions have captured it quite nicely…

Is this Zizek’s answer or the “standard answer”? Either way it seems to dumb down the depths of religious literature. I agree that religion tries to make itself available to everyone, and its message, although deep, is also simple. But I don’t think it simply fills the role of philosophy or science for those who are incapable of understanding the latter. That’s just intellectual elitism. Religion goes deeper than philosophy and science since philosophy and science are, IMO at least, both religions. The atheist scientist is no less religious (living like the man of science versus the man of God) tha the Christian. Look to Socrates through whom we see the “man of philosophy”, who tries to live the examined life… These are all religions. Zizek mistakes the importance of religion. Or perhaps he calls religion ethics or something, which is fair enough since my sense of religion is pretty close, in form at least, to Aristotle’s ethics…

Anyways, thanks for the response! However I fail to see why history is at all relevent for religion, even if religion has the point you say it does (i.e., the afterlife).

Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith. (Habakkuk 2:4)

For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:17)

But that no man is justified by the law in the sight of God, it is evident: for, The just shall live by faith. (Galatians 3:11)

Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. (Hebrews 10:38)

I think there are many people who go to various churches, temples, or whatnot, who don’t really care wether or not God exists. They don’t really care. They care about the teachings and practices of their institution. The only thing is they have no reason to say so. In fact, they might not have the ability to say so. If you ask them, “is there a God?” You might get some answer like, “I feel God,” or “I think grandma’s in heaven.” In short, they don’t really answer the question, even to themselves.

But if the personal/interactive God offers no reasonable basis for belief, how can “His” scripture? I know of no revealed God or word of God that isn’t much more likely to be the idea and word of men.

Lostguy:

Undoubtedly. Although I’m not sure I’d use the word “care” so much as I would say they haven’t thought things through. These people probably want answers as much as anyone else but they’re too preoccupied with their jobs, families, etc, to be proving such things as the existence of God to themselves.

True. They probably also love the sense of community they get in their church.

I guess my point is that the question “does God exist?” is pointless; we need not even ask it. It’s not God’s real life existence that matters but rather the existence God shows us through Scripture (which then becomes a matter of interpretation instead of proving the unprovable). The life of Jesus Christ provides us an example we can follow. Whether or not we follow this way of life, I agree with you: we need reason to say so. We need to show that God’s way of life is indeed suited to the circumstances of our life. Religion isn’t something to be taken on faith alone, i.e., without examination… Religion is taken because we feel in our hearts that it is right (which, given our attempts to “know” anything, is perhaps the best we can do)…

For certain, Scripture is the word of man, not God. Through Scripture God is revealed; God does not reveal Scripture to us…

How does Scripture offer a reasonable basis for belief? The same way any text does. Because it speaks to us and we feel it is true. We feel in our hearts that its message is a good one, and so we take up the life that it proscribes.

I’ve tried rearticulating Scripture as argument. It seems to, and correct me if I’m wrong, work from one basic presumption (which our experiences of the world, I think, support): Nothing stays the same. The major religious traditions (Judeo-Christian-Muslim-Buddhist at least) are rooted in this fact of life. They try to offer us something eternal or with lasting value in the face of inevitable destruction. These traditions tell us the best way to live when life itself is marked by continuous birth and death…

The basic argument is that the good life depends upon the circumstances of life (just as it was good 2000 years ago to be strong, brave, honourable). There is only one constant circumstance in life: Nothing stays the same. The good life, then, is one that faces up to this primordial fact… The Christian life offers us a way of doing precisely this…

I think this is because of the evolution science has been going through. Science has accomplished a lot, but this also has a downside. Our science is built on formal logic, and none of the results of science that we have now would be possible without formal logic. Because of this, these people that demand a proof of God will only believe in a proof if it is based on formulas.

If it is impossible to express God in formulas, then no formula-based proof can be given of the existence of God.

I think the answer to this question is pretty obvious, at least in the case of the “Big 3” of Western religion. At the heart of it all the laws & rules for living laid out in the Holy Books are appeals to authority- do this, don’t do that, because God said so. No other reason is set forth- it doesn’t say ‘avoid pork because of trichinosis’ for example. No attempt is made to lay out a reasonable case for following these laws beyond the naked appeal to authority. Ergo, if there’s not God, revealed religion doesn’t have a leg to stand on.

I beg to differ. The reason we are to follow God’s path is not God’s authority, but because of God’s promise that everything will be good if we do so. Whether or not this is in fact the case, i.e., whether God’s promise holds up, we can say for ourselves by examining the life God calls us to and the promise God makes. Does the one lead to the other? If God’s only law, love, is consistently applied would there be heaven on earth as articulated in Scripture? Reason is sufficient, I think, for this job (if reason is an authority you respect, that is).

The point is that that promise is still an appeal to authority as there is no other reason given than God said it.

That’s not reasoning; that’s just appealing to authority.

Parent’s tell a child that they can’t have ice cream because there’s better stuff later on that night.
This doesn’t mean that reason is given.

It means that the appeal to the authority of the Parents over the Child is made.

That was his point, and it is a valid point; as religion typically appeals to authority, and one could say that religion centers around the idea and depends on the concept of authority as it’s central construct; to be subservient to something more than oneself: to release control.

As TheStumps points out, any promise God is purported to have made becomes irrelevant if He doesn’t exist at all. It’s like getting a Circuit City gift card. :wink:

No… The promise follows from the consistent application of love. God makes the promise of heaven to those who follow God’s way (to those who love consistently), and sure, we could simply trust God’s authority if we wanted to be unthinking creatures. But we could also use our wonderful brains to see if the promise holds up. i.e., What you both (Stumps and Phaedrus) keep neglecting is that I’m not saying we simply take God’s word for it. I’m saying we use our own reason to see if the consistent application of love leads to what God says it does (i.e., to heaven).

God makes the promise in a story. It doesn’t matter if there is a real God who makes a real promise; what matters is if the promise holds. Does the consistent application of love lead to heaven? God’s real life existence is irrelevant…