Given God’s divine and infinite personage, character, nature or properties, and the finite qualities that we (as humans) possess, what are the philosophical dangers of assessing God (or epistemologically speaking, knowing what God is like) given our recognition that God is transcendent and not a material being as we are? Such a question is basically raising the philosophical problem of religious language. Specifically, how adequate is human language to communicate truth about God to us? The first danger we must avoid is creating God in our own image, a form of idolatry, in that our language is exactly reflecting who God is. On the other hand, the other danger we face, in trying to avoid the first one, being so careful to not bring God down to our level, we make it impossible for him to reveal himself to us and thus deny the ability we have to speak meaningfully about him. In other words, we impose on God a limitation in HIS ability to communicate since he is so “wholly other” (the Barthian understanding of God). We must avoid both errors, as God makes it clear in Scripture that he has revealed himself both in nature and in Scripture. God says he is able to make his nature and will known to us—so we cannot believe that the philosophical questions we’re asking are insurmountable without doubting what Scripture says about the matter (as well as assuming, without clear warrant, that God just cannot adequately communicate and we cannot know him adequately).
Before I provide a direct response to the problems listed above, I find it interesting and important to note two Christian doctrines that give us hope in explaining why and how it’s possible for God to speak to us adequately. First, there is the doctrine of the imago dei, the idea that we are created in God’s image. We are like him in significant ways, and for our purposes, this means that we need not be hindered by Barthian pronouncements that God is “wholly other.” A Christian cannot say that and be consistent with the biblical teachings that we are the image of God and that God himself has revealed himself to us both in nature and in the Word. Yes, God is “other”, even drastically other, but he is not wholly other. Secondly, there is the doctrine of the incarnation in which God himself takes on flesh to be one of us. The incarnation reinforces what the imago dei teaches, that though God is greatly different from us, transcendent to all created things, he is nevertheless not so different that he cannot enter into human time and space as one of us and “exegete” God for us (John 1:18).
All of this implies, contra the Barthian notion, that there is an analogy of being between God and us. Though we are different than God, we are similar in some important ways. Our being and nature is not exactly the same as God’s, but it is analogous to God’s. And this analogy of being provides the basis for meaningful God-talk and an adequate divine revelation to man. As you might know, there are three ways to construe religious language. First it might be understood univocally—i.e., our words mean exactly the same thing when predicated of God as they do when predicated of creatures. Of course, this view is impossible to reconcile with the serious differences between us and God. When I say that “God speaks,” I can’t mean exactly the same think as when I say “Nick speaks” because God has no lips and no vocal cords. Secondly, we might understand religious language equivocally such that my words have completely different meanings when applied to God. But this leads to a radical skepticism about God since I can’t have any idea what my words mean when applied to God. Thirdly, Christian theologians and philosophers have typically defended the notion that God talk is analogical—my words don’t have exactly the same meaning when applied to God, but they don’t have a completely equivocal meaning either. Rather, they have a similar, analogical meaning. So, e.g., when I say, “God speaks,” I’m not saying that God does exactly the same thing that Nick does when he speaks, but I’m saying that God does something analogous to what Nick does when he speaks. This seems to me to give us what we want and allows is to steer a middle course between idolatry and skepticism. Therefore, we can have genuine and adequate (though incomplete) knowledge of him, given the possibility of analogical God-talk. On a completely unrelated note, my reference to myself in the third person is like “The Jimmy” episode of Seinfeld. If you haven’t seen it, then I highly recommend you watch it!
I know that I have not exhaustively dealt with this subject matter in great detail, but only wished to introduce my thoughts on the limitations of our talk of God. But perhaps our starting point, ourselves and our language, might still result in an idealized humanity; however, we have no other place to start since all we have is our limitations, and is it possible that God uses such limitations to communicate to us something about himself without misrepresenting himself? Yes, he certainly can and does! If analogical language is possible (and it seems clear to me that it is), then God can reveal himself to us incompletely, partially, perhaps even vaguely, but nevertheless truthfully and adequate to our needs. We avoid an “idealized humanity” because we realize that God-talk is merely analogical, not univocal. And yes, we can know at least some of God’s essential properties or characteristics, and no, we cannot have direct experiential knowledge of God’s essence—“No man can see God and live”—that’s why we need the mediation of the incarnate Christ. He gives us an indirect glimpse at God’s essence.
I would like to conclude with a helpful list of a few highly recommended resources on the matter. Enjoy and let me know what you think.
Huffman and Johnson, eds. God Under Fire (Zondervan).
Geisler and Corduan, Philosophy of Religion, 2nd ed. (Baker).
J.I. Packer, “The Adequacy of Human Language” in Inerrancy, ed. Geisler (Zondervan).
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