God talk

  We cannot escape innate ideas in some form or how it has influenced Christian theology.   Herman Bavinck the Master Theologian here looks at Luther, Calvin and the Reformers.   Something he hasn’t said, and I think ought to have been said is; How much did the Reformers depend on Augustine?   Gunton reminds us that Augustine did bring some (unintentionally) baggage from Manicheism and Plato.   So then do some doctrines of creation and election needs to be revisited   I took this photo and zoomed in a little. I got a paint effect Luther didn’t have much time for innate ideas as Bavinck writes: “In Lutheran theology the wholesome and true element inherent in the theory of innate ideas could not come into its own. Natural theology, both “implanted” and “acquired,” was not well received there. By virtue of Luther's rejection of the scholastic doctrine that “what pertains to nature has remained unimpaired,” Luther allowed himself to be driven to an oppo...

The use of Plato is nothing new in the world of philosophy and theology. However Bavinck was correct to follow this stream through what Christians have said.  I really like the picture here: There is a Creator! Innate ideas is nothing new.   Although Plato possibly formalised this in his Meno and other places, it is something worth thinking about.   Philosophy and theology are not the same discipline but there is overlap between the two. However, Theology is about the study of God whereas philosophy Is the ‘love of wisdom’.   If the love of wisdom is philosophy, then obviously parts of the Bible such as proverbs and Ecclesiastes would fall under this category.   For Christians the beginning of wisdom is the Fear of the Lord.   It is a good thing for us to see what Bavinck has found out for us: ·         Justin Martyr ·         Clement of Alexandria ·      ...

  Last time we looked at how God reveals himself.   Bavinck moves on and then talks about the incomprehensibility of God in Christian Theology.   However, I have touched on this is past blogs and may return to it later.   Today I want to focus on epistemology in relation to the Divine (epistemology= the study of knowledge).   This is a very important topic and although I am not an expert it is the grammar of all sciences.    I took this photo when the fog was on the move.   Whatever science we look at there has to be foundations on how we perceive the real world and so forth.   Yet for all intents and purposes various scientific branches (by the way science comes from Scientia which means knowledge) will have their own game rules.   I sometimes heard Colin Gunton at KCL university mention Coleridge and I used to wonder why.   After all Coleridge was a poet.   For me Poets strung words together to give beautiful messages but w...