• Soylent
    188
    [definition] Divine hiddenness is an attribute of God whereby some or most people have not been made aware of the true nature of God (e.g., God’s existence).

    [challenge/Atheistic position] Divine hiddenness poses a theological problem if nonresistant nonbelievers exist (i.e., God cannot justify remaining hidden to those that are receptive to the possibility).

    [Theistic response] Receptiveness is not the sole criterion for a relationship with God. One must work (i.e., have faith) to uncover the mystery and remove the hiddenness of the Divine. If nonresistant nonbelievers exist, it’s because they have not prepared themselves adequately for a relationship with God.

    In defense of the argument an analogy is made between the relationship of a non-cognitive infant towards her parents and the relationship between nonresistant nonbelievers and God. There is an interesting tangential discussion about the meaningfulness of the baby/parent relationship. From the infant’s perspective, the relationship is trivial (i.e., meaningless). I take that to mean that the baby has a dependency on the parents for basic needs, but beyond the satisfaction of those needs, the relationship itself has no value. Since the baby has not developed sufficient cognitive capacity, the baby cannot reflect on the relationship and decide that, absent the pragmatic value (i.e., food, shelter and safety), the relationship has meaning.

    Like all/most analogies, this one falls short. The problem I have with the analogy is the reliance on the non-cognitive claim. The analogy only works if it’s conceded that babies are non-cognitive. This concession is made by way of a false dichotomy: babies are either cognitive or non-cognitive. Babies probably aren’t cognitive, so, the analogy reasons, they must be non-cognitive. I see no reason to call them non-cognitive. Babies are in a cognitively developmental state (i.e., they are pre-cognitive). Babies are developing the neural pathways and mental processes that produce cognition and consciousness. A fundamental aspect of that development is familial, or otherwise human relationships. A myriad of studies have shown that specific interactions produce incredible physiological responses in newborn babies (e.g., putting twins together in a single bed improves medical prognoses and "kangaroo care"). While these are not demonstrative of full meaningfulness in relationships, they hint that babies have the cognitive framework for meaningful relationships from birth (or even pre-birth).

    Another analogy that might be useful for the Divine hiddenness argument is the relationship between a pet and a human. The relationship has, no doubt, many benefits for a human and a human values the relationship in a meaningful way, but the pet may not have a meaningful relationship. It might be a one-way meaningful relationship. However, this analogy falls short as well, because the animals we keep as pets and often feel a kinship with display some cognitive capacities. While it is likely true that pet owners exaggerate the cognitive content and anthropomorphize animal behaviour, nonetheless, we simply do not know the cognitive capacity of other animals. A meaningful relationship in this case can be saved, or at least minimally assumed, by virtue of the quasi-cognitive state of the pet.

    To get a true relationship with one-way value, we have to be very careful not to pick an organism with some of the developmental precursors or tendencies attributed with cognition. Here I’m even reluctant to say plants cannot have meaningful relationships (plant cognition and consciousness is an emerging idea). We may be limited to non-living objects. It doesn’t serve the theistic position to suggest that the relationship between a nonresistant nonbeliever and God is analogous to a relationship between a human and a rock. Nonresistant nonbelievers are certainly not as spiritually bereft as a rock is cognitively bereft.

    Underlying all of this, is a value theory of relationships. If the baby has a relationship of dependency on the parent, it’s not clear in what way the relationship fails to be meaningful to the baby. It might be argued that the source of the need fulfillment is arbitrary, and, a wet nurse for instance, can occupy that role. If the relationship is based on an arbitrary role, then the relationship to the person fulfilling that role is meaningless. This prima facie suggests, that meaningful relationships have to be meaningful intrinsically (i.e., it has to be directed at the person rather than the role). This is where my romance dies. I don’t think we value specific relationships intrinsically.

    We get betrayed by our naïve psychology regarding the value of relationships. Humans have a hardwired and basic need for relationships (i.e., Maslow’s hierarchy of needs) and we interpret the intrinsic value of relationships in general as intrinsic value for specific relationships. Meaningful relationships are judged according to the satisfaction of needs. Basic meaningful relationships (e.g., newborn/parent) are ones that fulfill fundamental needs (i.e., food, shelter and safety) and robustness of meaning is gained as we move up the hierarchy of needs. A relationship that satisfies more or greater needs is judged as more meaningful than one that satisfies fewer or lesser needs. The value we place on specific needs is personal and subjective, for instance, one person might forego safety in a relationship (i.e., abuse) for the satisfaction of religious affiliation, while another may not.

    Divine hiddenness on the grounds that a nonresistant nonbeliever cannot have a meaningful relationship with God suggests that God satisfies no needs for the nonresistant nonbeliever.
  • Cavacava
    2.4k
    Child developmental psychologist Alison Gopnik: "The Philosophical Baby: What Children’s Minds Tell Us About Truth, Love, and the Meaning of Life"

    "It’s possible that babies literally don’t see a difference between their own pain and the pain of others. Maybe babies want to end all suffering, no matter where it happens to be located. For them, pain is pain and joy is joy. Moral thinkers from Buddha to David Hume to Martin Buber have suggested that erasing the boundaries between yourself and others in this way can underpin morality. We know that children’s conception of a continuous separate self develops slowly in the first five years."

    Babies demonstrate instinctual empathy, among other things. If there is a god, I think he is found in our relationship with others, in a congregation of believers who emphatically respond to the call of the spirit of god that arises in the spirit of a congregation.
  • BC
    13.1k
    Does the spirit of a congregation create the spirit of god, or is it "the call of the spirit of god" that arises?

    It seems to me that god, goodness, fellowship, fulfillment, meaning, validation, comfort, and all that good stuff is created and/or found in life lived together. We have to go out and seek others; work, play, sing, laugh, eat, play together. We have to open up to each other (incrementally). We need to accept each other. Church isn't the only place this happens, and honest church people know that sometimes this does not happen in church at all--anywhere but. Bars, workplaces, ball parks, trains, back yards, kitchens, beaches, barracks and battlefields, hospitals, prisons -- really, there is no place "life together" can not happen.

    That said, often enough we are isolated, alone, lonely, longing, sad, self-contained, closed off. That's a big piece of our problem as humans.
  • Cavacava
    2.4k
    BC, I agree with what you have said. The question:

    "Does the spirit of a congregation create the spirit of god, or is it "the call of the spirit of god" that arises?"

    I think there has to be a call, a gift of faith, and it is not something everyone gets or chooses even if they do get it. It seems that man needs a universal to explain our curious circumstance, however you want to frame it. It also seems to me to be more likely that the realization of a spirit may be possible in our relationship with others.

    Even those individuals who proceed on their own, must be first called and then be willing to take great risks. Hermits, mystics, and others who look for a direct connection have to empty themselves of their self, all desire and reason, until they become an empty vessel, capable of receiving god, and acting as his instrument willingly and ecstatically. Many of these persons go nuts at least from our viewpoint.

    Some mythological narratives appeal and carry more meaning about life/death for many then the narratives of the rational enlightenment.
  • YIOSTHEOY
    76
    this latter post is strictly a question of Protestant mysticism and as such not really worthy of response. Mysticism is mysticism. It woos people with awe and wonder and it fills the collection plate on Sundays.
  • YIOSTHEOY
    76
    see supra re Protestant mysticism.
  • YIOSTHEOY
    76
    , a very thoughtful discourse and very well done. I will reply to you on behalf of the Philosophy God, since this is a Philosophy forum, and not Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Protestant, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Confucian, Jain, Taoist, Shinto, or Zen.

    I love my cat and he loves me. I therefore want my cat to be the happiest cat in the world. If he did not love me and/or I did not love him then I would not care.

    If I had 7 billion cats such as is the current population of people on the Earth then I would think it would be difficult to love any one of them more than the others because all cats are beautiful and amusing and delightful and they keep you company when no other humans will or can.

    Furthermore, if I also had several billion galaxies to my credit, each one with several billions of cats in it, then it would be especially hard to find a way to love them all carte blanche.

    Ergo I cannot believe that the Philosophy God's love for humankind is carte blanche. There must be something that the Philosophy God wants out of us in exchange for His/Her/It's love.

    I will presume therefore that the Philosophy God wants virtuous and ethical behavior out of us. Because He/She/It is Itself virtuous and ethical by definition of the various philosophers who are romantics and who thusly believe in a Philosophy God. Thus likes are attracted to each other, and the Philosophy God would be attracted to me and to my virtuous and ethical works.

    Essentially this is what Matthew Chapter 25 in the Greek New Testament also tells us. So at least the late St. Matthew formerly known as Levi the tax collector agrees with me on this:

    http://biblehub.com/ylt/matthew/25.htm

    I normally use YLT when I quote the Bible in English because I have found that it follows the original Greek fairly closely. I have also found that the KJV is the worst of the various English translations. The Catholic Douay-Rheims is somewhere between YLT and KJV in terms of accuracy.

    In the meantime, while we are developing our own personal philosophies and performing our own good works, it would seem that the Philosophy God remains a recluse from us for whatever reasons, one of which is obviously so as to free us from any fear and compulsion from doing that which we would do in the absence of the Philosophy God Himself/Herself/Itself.

    Is that enough of an explanation for you, or do you need more?
  • Wayfarer
    20.6k
    One must work (i.e., have faith) to uncover the mystery and remove the hiddenness of the Divine. — Soylent

    Work is not faith. You can say you have to have faith to do the work, but from the viewpoint of praxis, 'work' is 'performing the service' or 'turning up for practice' - it's not a matter of having beliefs in something.

    Take sitting meditation. This is stressed in Buddhism in particular, no more so than in Soto Zen. Their teaching is: sit just to sit, not to gain something, not to have some experience of higher states or whatever. Now it does take a kind of faith to do that - otherwise, why bother? - but it is said again and again, don't expect any outcome. So what kind of faith expects no outcome? Pure faith, which is the faith that seeks nothing, which is not motivated by gain. That faith does not constitute an explanation or a rationale, it is a willingness just to see things as they are. Faith that expects nothing is a real faith.

    So through that does the Divine become less hidden? Certainly not, but one learns by what the Catholic contemplatives called the 'consolations'. Things happen, and they are, in philosophical terminology, apodictic. One cannot doubt them any more than one can doubt indigestion. An upwelling of uncaused joy, an unexpected sense of gratitude. They come, and they go - the wind blows where it lists. But one certainly develops a sense of that dimension in life.

    Anyway, the whole point of the Divine hiddenness, is that it is penetrated by the practice of un-knowing, which is what meditation is. Actually, that's not right - you don't penetrate it, it penetrates you; when you sit, you relinquish control, all you do is sit and watch your breath. That is learning to listen. Life goes on, with all its dramas, but through that, you realise you are starting to develop a relationship; which is why you keep turning up for practice.
bold
italic
underline
strike
code
quote
ulist
image
url
mention
reveal
youtube
tweet
Add a Comment

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum!

Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.