Even those who may agree with our conclusions on faith and reason might justifiably argue about the viability of the truths of faith for expression in any human language. The assumption here is that the human language is designed to talk about the things of this world and not about another world we are not conscious of. There is a philosophical reason behind this assumption that is very well expressed by the philosophers of science known as the Logical Positivists. According to the spirit of the empirical sciences, of the method of which they were devotees, the Logical Positivists decreed that anything that could not be verified by the empirical methods was meaningless and therefore outside the purview of genuine knowledge. Consequently, they dismissed not only Theology but also Metaphysics from the body of knowledge available to mankind and restricted meaningful use of language to the empirical sciences alone. This they did thinking that they could derive their conclusions from "The Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus" of Ludwig Wittgenstein who later repudiated not only the Logical Positivists but also his own "Tractatus"! Wittgenstein's later thinking is found mainly in his "Philosophical Investigations" posthumously published in which he defends the meaning of words in their use and qualifies Theology as 'grammar' The grammar we are used to is called the surface grammar, whereas Wittgenstein's grammar is called the 'depth grammar'. This grammar goes into the life forms of the community that uses a language to bring out its meaning. What theology can, therefore, do is to scan through the life forms of the believing communities in order to bring out meaning of the language they use that is called its grammar. No one would be able to stand up against this method of Wittgenstein alleging meaningless use of language even in Theology if it is done properly eschewing many of the traditional flights of fancy in the use of Philosophical and Theological languages.
The reason for our confidence in this method is mainly due to the concept of "language games' proposed by Wittgenstein for meaningful uses of language. His earlier insistence on the picture theory of language for any meaningful use of language, propounded in his "Tractatus", was substituted by his concept of 'language games' rooted in the forms of life of various human communities. It is to be noted here that since language use is considered as a form of activity enmeshed with the particular ambiance of life of the users of that language, it is not a theory like the picture theory of language. Thus the scientific communities are able to use language meaningfully because they are able to play language games appropriate to the sciences concerned. Similarly, the believing communities may use language meaningfully when they play the language games appropriate to their faith. As an example of a language game, Wittgenstein gave the instances of children learning a language as containing all the elements of a language game. Thus theological language should be seen as the grammar of God-talk just as scientific language is the grammar of the observable (in its fullest meaning) empirical world we live in. If someone were to fancy that this kind of division of knowledge is without any common ground, his or her apprehension is purely based on a single type of knowledge as paradigmatic to all kinds of knowledge. This is clearly unacceptable since language is itself multifarious and cannot be reduced to any single paradigm underlying all uses of language. The human factor alone is the sole common element in all kinds of uses of language, which stands as the rock-bottom ground for the justification of various kinds of uses of language. We shall try to give a few hints in developing a proper language of Theology, thwarting thereby allegations of meaningless use of language, under the unassailable shield of Wittgenstein's impeccable logic. This shall be done in our next two Posts about how our ordinary language is used in God-talk meaningfully avoiding the pitfalls we are tempted to indulge in!
The reason for our confidence in this method is mainly due to the concept of "language games' proposed by Wittgenstein for meaningful uses of language. His earlier insistence on the picture theory of language for any meaningful use of language, propounded in his "Tractatus", was substituted by his concept of 'language games' rooted in the forms of life of various human communities. It is to be noted here that since language use is considered as a form of activity enmeshed with the particular ambiance of life of the users of that language, it is not a theory like the picture theory of language. Thus the scientific communities are able to use language meaningfully because they are able to play language games appropriate to the sciences concerned. Similarly, the believing communities may use language meaningfully when they play the language games appropriate to their faith. As an example of a language game, Wittgenstein gave the instances of children learning a language as containing all the elements of a language game. Thus theological language should be seen as the grammar of God-talk just as scientific language is the grammar of the observable (in its fullest meaning) empirical world we live in. If someone were to fancy that this kind of division of knowledge is without any common ground, his or her apprehension is purely based on a single type of knowledge as paradigmatic to all kinds of knowledge. This is clearly unacceptable since language is itself multifarious and cannot be reduced to any single paradigm underlying all uses of language. The human factor alone is the sole common element in all kinds of uses of language, which stands as the rock-bottom ground for the justification of various kinds of uses of language. We shall try to give a few hints in developing a proper language of Theology, thwarting thereby allegations of meaningless use of language, under the unassailable shield of Wittgenstein's impeccable logic. This shall be done in our next two Posts about how our ordinary language is used in God-talk meaningfully avoiding the pitfalls we are tempted to indulge in!
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