Ship of Fools: What can we say about God?

Thread: What can we say about God? Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Frankenstein (# 16198) on :

Has anyone else read 'The Case for God' by Karen Armstrong?
As I understand her, she says that however we attempt to describe God, whatever we say, is flawed because all language restricts, and God cannot be restricted in any way.
The people of the Old Testament have a robust relationship with God.
He is open to persuasion, can be appelled to, is open to debate, can change His mind, can be irascible, loose His cool, in fact very similar to human beings!
(A side issue: Have we made God in our own likeness?)
What can we say about God?

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

Errm.

Posted by Frankenstein (# 16198) on :

"Errm" is probably as good an answer as any.

Posted by Jammy Dodger (# 17872) on :

I haven't read the book but whilst I see the point that ultimately God is God and we can't expect to understand everything about him (Quetzalcoatl and I ended up there on another thread) I'm not convinced by the language argument, simply, because if you push that too far then no meaningful conversation about anything is possible. Ultimately we all have different ideas, experiences and contexts in our heads and so you could say that there is therefore always a disconnect between what people mean and how what they say is received (as evidenced on board Ship!).
However, in practice, I think human beings are pretty good at managing to grasp the underlying meaning behind language (if I say the sky is blue people know what I mean they don't expect the sky to be a specific Pantone colour). Otherwise pretty much human society would be impossible (as would any kind of meaningful conversation on board Ship).
Therefore if God chooses to reveal himself in language (i.e. a language we can understand) we can still have a meaningful discussion about what God is like. If God is love we have lots of other language and experience to help us understand what love is so this is a meaningful thing that we can know about God. We also have the revelation of the character of God in the behaviour of Jesus (though this is only available to us through the medium of language as we weren't there).
Also I guess this is why dialogue is important so we can gain insight from other viewpoints. That's why I like these boards.

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

Is this another instance where someone publishes a book with a cool slightly polemic sounding title, containing information that every first year Theology student has known for a long time?

Posted by SvitlanaV2 (# 16967) on :

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
Is this another instance where someone publishes a book with a cool slightly polemic sounding title, containing information that every first year Theology student has known for a long time?

I've got the book on my shelf, but haven't read it yet. However, I believe it's aimed at the intelligent general reader, not at official students of Theology.

Anyway, the cynic in me says that theologians need to make a living, so it doesn't matter how inadequate their (or anyone's) pronouncements on God may be; we will still have more and more books on the subject.

Posted by Lietuvos Sv. Kazimieras (# 11274) on :

As the character, Jane, on the romcom series "Coupling" once offered, "Well, He's good, isn't he?" (Of course, in the same episode she also advised, "God is just a made-up person".)

Posted by Galilit (# 16470) on :

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
Is this another instance where someone publishes a book with a cool slightly polemic sounding title, containing information that every first year Theology student has known for a long time?

I read it ages ago and that would be my opinion.
She did give a lovely History of It All including Denis the Stylite which was nice though.

Posted by quetzalcoatl (# 16740) on :

One interesting tactic is to make guesses about God. This is fun, and you can always justify them with some more guesses, then you have a whole career mapped out, possibly.

[ 08. November 2013, 14:06: Message edited by: quetzalcoatl ]

Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :

I rather like the phrase 'God is Love, and where true love is, God himself is there'.

now define true love....

Posted by TheAlethiophile (# 16870) on :

IMHO, I think we can talk about God, but we must recognise that words will simply fall short. That doesn't mean we can't (or shouldn't) make a meaningful effort.

In other words, it is not untruthful to make statements like "God is love", "God is just" or "God is almighty" - it's just that we acknowledge that they aren't necessarily the whole picture.

Posted by rolyn (# 16840) on :

What can we say about God ?

Christ knows . [Razz]

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Frankenstein:
"Errm" is probably as good an answer as any.

quote:
Originally posted by LeRoc:
Is this another instance where someone publishes a book with a cool slightly polemic sounding title, containing information that every first year Theology student has known for a long time?

I don't think so. What you describe is usually the M.O. of ivory tower nobodies who want to have 15 minutes of fame before they die. Armstrong has been publishing thoughtful but accessible books about religion for decades.

Posted by LeRoc (# 3216) on :

quote:
mousethief: I don't think so. What you describe is usually the M.O. of ivory tower nobodies who want to have 15 minutes of fame before they die. Armstrong has been publishing thoughtful but accessible books about religion for decades.

Ok, I was just asking. I hadn't heard of Karen Armstrong.

Posted by The Undercover Christian (# 17875) on :

In the words of Adrian Plass, 'God is nice and he likes us.'

Posted by Galloping Granny (# 13814) on :

God is a mystery, but many people have glimpses that together give us clues as to God's nature

GG

Posted by EtymologicalEvangelical (# 15091) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Frankenstein
As I understand her, she says that however we attempt to describe God, whatever we say, is flawed because all language restricts, and God cannot be restricted in any way.

But it is simply not true to say that "all language restricts".

For example, how does the verb 'exist' restrict? It only restricts God from not existing! And non-existence is the greatest restriction of them all.

But if all language does restrict, then the very claim that "all language restricts" is also restrictive (it being composed of mere words), and therefore how much validity does it have? Therefore the discussion introduced by the OP becomes self-refuting.

Posted by Horseman Bree (# 5290) on :

Aslan was thought to be good but not SAFE. Would that do?

Posted by Kwesi (# 10274) on :

I suppose you can say whatever you like about God. In a Christian context, of course, any proposition would have to be compatible with his revelation in Jesus Christ. (That is not to deny there is wide spectrum of opinion as to what that revelation was).

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

Rowan Williams is talking about language and God in his Gifford lectures at the moment. One of the things he's trying to argue is that language about God is language pushing beyond its own limits. The process of making sense of the world in language eventually rests upon something that language cannot make sense of, but which it has to keep pointing towards.

I think 'language restricts' is an odd metaphor. The problem isn't verbal - as if we can have an unmediated awareness of God that gets spoiled by talking about it. Rather, it's that we can't have a direct comprehension of God as finite beings, and therefore our language about God can only refer to God indirectly. So for instance, when we say God is love, we're not making a direct statement about God. What we're doing is that we can, with some difficulty, come to some way of talking sense about love, and we can see that love points us towards God.

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