Transcript The Eighteenth Century - The Religion of Reason, The

The Eighteenth Century –
The Religion of Reason,
The Religion of Feeling
Placher, Ch 15: “Reason & Enthusiasm”
Immanuel Kant
John Wesley
John Locke
Philip Spener
Outline of class session
I. Background considerations: actions & reactions
II. The “Religion of Reason”
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Natural Religion (vs. revealed religion)
The Enlightenment & Christian Thought
Locke & Deism
Voltaire’s grumblings….
III. The “Religion of Feeling”
A. Period of religious revival
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Emergence of Pietism in Germany
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Great Awakening in the United States
B. John Wesley and the emergence of Methodism
III. Last words by Lessing…… followed by – a hymn.
I. Background considerations
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Shift in emphasis: from God-centered to humancentered
Example: Pope’s poem, An Essay on Man, 1733.
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Placher cites five factors (rf p. 238):
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“Wars of religion” in Europe: is it worth it?
Religious division: diversity and proximity: could my religion
be the only true one?
New philosophical attitude: question everything!
Scientific progress (vs. theology) : now here’s real progress!
States, in centralizing their power, worked towards bring the
church under control: who has authority?
Man: the riddle of the world.
“Know then thyself, presume not God to scan,
The proper study of mankind is Man.
Placed on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise and rudely great:
With too much knowledge for the Sceptic side,
With too much weakness for the Stoic’s pride,
He hangs between, in doubt to act or rest;
In doubt to deem himself a God or Beast;
In doubt his mind or body to prefer;
Born to die, and reas’ning but to err;…
Alexander Pope
(1688-1744)
Created half to rise, and half to fall;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurl’d;
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world!”
- Alexander Pope, “An Essay on Man” (1733).
II. The Religion of Reason
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Emphasis on natural religion – the basic truths
about the existence of God and human
morality known to good people in all societies.
Can be known through reason.
Vs. revealed religion – the particular historical
claims and doctrines of a particular religion
(like Christianity). Known through the
authority of scripture or the church.
(Rf Placher 240).
Matthew Tindal (c.1657-1733)
"By Natural Religion, I understand the Belief of the Existence of a
God, and the Sense and Practice of those Duties which result
from the Knowledge we, by our Reason, have of him and his
Perfections; and of ourselves, and our own Imperfections; and of
the relation we stand in to him and our Fellow-Creatures; so that
the Religion of Nature takes in every thing that is founded on the
Reason and Nature of things….
Our Reason, which gives us a Demonstration of the divine
Perfections, affords us the same concerning the Nature of those
duties God requires; not only in relation to himself, but to
ourselves and one another; These we can't but see, if we look into
ourselves, consider our own Natures, and the Circumstances God
has placed us in with relation to our Fellow-Creatures, and what
conduces to our mutual Happiness: Our Senses, our Reason, the
Experiences of others as well as our own, can’t fail to give us sufficient
Information."
- Christianity as Old As The Creation (1730) (known as the Deist’s Bible).
The Enlightenment & Christianity
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The Enlightenment (1690s – 1790s) – a trans-cultural
movement (Germany, France, Britain, America):
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Belief that unassisted I, not faith or tradition, is the principal
guide for human conduct including religion and morality.
Emphasis on religious toleration
Belief in the fundamental goodness of human nature
Belief in progress, especially scientific progress
Emphasis put on the individual and autonomy (self-rule)
Motto of the Enlightenment: “Dare to Know!”
(Immanual Kant, 1784).
The motto of the Enlightenment: Think!
Immanuel Kant
(1724-1804)
“Enlightenment is man’s release from his selfincurred tutelage. Tutelage is man’s inability to
make use of his understanding without direction
from another. Self-incurred is this tutelage when its
cause lies not in lack of reason but in lack of
resolution and courage to use it without direction
from another. Sapere aude! ‘Have courage to use
your won reason!’ – that is the motto of
enlightenment….
I have placed the main point of enlightenment…
chiefly in matters of religion… because religious
incompetence is not only the most harmful but
also the most degrading of all.”
- Kant, “What is Enlightenment?” (1784)
Kant and the religion of reason
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Suspicious of superstition, claims to religious
experience; need a religion that is independent of the
historical facts about Jesus: need one that is reasonable.
Religion begins with ethics
Moral argument for the existence of God (rf Placher
251).
Ought implies can: God (through reason) would not ask
us to do what we are not capable of doing
The only pure moral motivation is duty, not fear of
punishment or hope of reward
John Locke and Deism
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English philosopher –
epistemology, education, political
philosophy and religion.
Emphasis on religious toleration
(Letter on Toleration, 1689);
defended Latitudinarianism.
The Reasonableness of Christianity
(1695).
John Locke (1632-1704)
Locke finds a middle position It is obvious to any one, who reads the New Testa-ment, that the
doctrine of redemption, and conse-quently of the Gospel, is
founded upon the supposition of Adam's fall. To understand,
therefore, what we are restored to by Jesus Christ, we must consider
what the Scriptures show we lost by Adam. This I thought worthy of
a diligent and unbiased search: since I found the two extremes that men
run into on this point, either on the one hand shook the foundations
of all religion, or, on the other, made Christianity almost nothing:
for while some men would have all Adam's posterity doomed to
eternal, infinite punishment, for the transgression of Adam, whom
millions had never heard of, and no one had authorised to transact
for him, or be his representative; this seemed to others so little
consistent with the justice or goodness of the great and infinite
God, that they thought there was no redemption necessary, and
consequently, that there was none; rather than admit of it upon a
supposition so derogatory to the honour and attributes of that
infinite Being; and so made Jesus Christ nothing but the restorer and
preacher of pure natural religion; thereby doing violence to the
whole tenor of the New Testa-ment.
And, indeed, both sides will be suspected to have trespassed this way
against the written word of God, by any one, who does but take it to
be a collection of writings, designed by God, for the instruction of
the illiterate bulk of mankind, in the way to salvation; and therefore,
generally, and in necessary points, to be understood in the plain direct
meaning of the words and phrases: such as they may be supposed to have
had in the mouths of the speakers, who used them accord-ing to the
language of that time and country wherein they lived… To one that,
thus unbiassed, reads the Scriptures, what Adam fell from (is visible),
was the state of per-fect obedience, which is called justice in the
New Testament; though the word, which in the original sig-nifies
justice, be translated righteousness: and by this fall he lost paradise,
wherein was tranquillity and the tree of life; i.e. he lost bliss and
immortality.
- John Locke, The Reasonableness of Christianity.
Deism - moving beyond Locke
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A total repudiation of revealed religion; religion must
be based on religion alone.
God is the creator of the world but after that does not
intervene in the operations of the world (the universe
is like a machine)
Lord Herbert of Cherbury considered “founder” of
Deism (see his principles of natural religion on page
242 of Placher).
Also: Matthew Tindal, William Wollaston, John Toland
and Thomas Woolston; also Voltaire and Roussaeu;
Thomas Jefferson?
Paley’s Watchmaker God:
a teleological argument for the existence of God
Finding a stone vs. finding a watch: where did it come
from?
“The mechanism being observed… the inference we
think is inevitable, that the watch must have had a
maker – that there must have existed, at some time and
at some place or other, artificer or artificers who
formed it for the purpose which we find it actually to
answer, who completely comprehended its
construction and designed its use….
There cannot be design
without a designer…
Arrangement,
disposition of parts,
subserviency of
means to an end,
relation of
instruments to a use
imply the presence
of intelligence and
mind.”
- William Paley, Natural Theology
(1802).
Andrew Reed, the young watchmaker; Wood engraving, published in Harper's Weekly, October 30, 1869.
Voltaire aka Francois-Marie Arouet (1694-1778)
Entries from Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary:
“THE institution of religion exists only to keep mankind in order,
and to make men merit the goodness of God by their virtue.
Everything in a religion which does not tend towards this goal
must be considered foreign or dangerous.
Instruction, exhortation, menaces of pains to come, promises of
immortal beatitude, prayers, counsels, spiritual help are the only
means ecclesiastics may use to try to make men virtuous here
below, and happy for eternity.
All other means are repugnant to the liberty of the reason, to the
nature of the soul, to the inalterable rights of the conscience, to
the essence of religion and of the ecclesiastical ministry, to all the
rights of the sovereign.
Virtue supposes liberty, as the carrying of a burden supposes active
force. Under coercion no virtue, and without virtue no religion.
Make a slave of me, I shall be no better for it.”
- Voltaire, The Philosophical Dictionary. Entry on The Ecclesiastical
Ministry.
Voltaire on “Sect”
EVERY sect, in whatever sphere, is the rallying-point of doubt and error.
Scotist, Thomist, Realist, Nominalist, Papist, Calvinist, Molinist, Jansenist,
are only pseudonyms.
There are no sects in geometry; one does not speak of a Euclidian, an
Archimedean.
When the truth is evident, it is impossible for parties and factions to arise.
Never has there been a dispute as to whether there is daylight at noon….
You are Mohammedan, therefore there are people who are not, therefore you
might well be wrong.
What would be the true religion if Christianity did not exist? the religion in
which there were no sects; the religion in which all minds were necessarily
in agreement.
Well, to what dogma do all minds agree? to the worship of a God and to
integrity. All the philosophers of the world who have had a religion have
said in all time--" There is a God, and one must be just." There, then, is the
universal religion established in all time and throughout mankind.
The point in which they all agree is therefore true, and the systems through
which they differ are therefore false.
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Voltaire, The Philosophical Dictionary. Entry on “Sect”.
Voltaire on
the importance of religious tolerance
“WHAT is tolerance? it is the consequence of humanity. We are all
formed of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other's
folly--that is the first law of nature. It is clear that the individual who
persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same
opinion, is a monster. That admits of no difficulty. But the
government! but the magistrates! but the princes! how do they treat
those who have another worship than theirs? If they are powerful
strangers, it is certain that a prince will make an alliance with them.
Franois I., very Christian, will unite with Mussulmans against
Charles V., very Catholic. Francois I. will give money to the
Lutherans of Germany to support them in their revolt against the
emperor; but, in accordance with custom, he will start by having
Lutherans burned at home. For political reasons he pays them in
Saxony; for political reasons he burns them in Paris. But what will
happen? Persecutions make proselytes? Soon France will be full of
new Protestants. At first they will let themselves be hanged, later
they in their turn will hang. There will be civil wars, then will come
the St. Bartholomew; and this corner of the world will be worse
than all that the ancients and moderns have ever told of hell.”
- Voltaire, The Philosophical Dictionary.
II. The Religion of Feeling
A. Period of religious revival
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Emergence of Pietism in Germany
Great Awakening in the United States
B. John Wesley and the emergence of Methodism
Pietism
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Movement, originally with Lutheran tradition
in Germany led by Spener and Francke
Revolt against the dogmatic emphases in
Lutheran theology and practice; also reaction
to excessive intellectualism
Emphasized interiority and practical concerns
Focus on Bible study and spiritual growth
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Dictionary of Religion and Philosophy
Also Placher 245.
Philip Jacob Spener (1635-1705)
Importance of reading the Bible:
“Thought should be given to the more extensive use of the Word of
God among us. We know that by nature we have no good in us. If
there is to be any good in us, it must be brought about by God. To
this end the Word of God is the powerful means, since faith must be
rekindled through the gospel, and the law provides the rules for
good works and many wonderful impulses to attain them. The more
at home the Word of God is among us, the more we shall bring
about faith and its fruits.
It may appear that the Word of God has sufficiently free course
among us inasmuch as at various places (as in this city [Frankfurt am
Main]) there is daily or frequent preaching from the pulpit. When we
reflect further on the matter, however, we shall find that with respect
to this first proposal, more is needed. I do not at all disapprove of
the preaching of sermons in which a Christian congregation is
instructed by the reading and exposition of a certain text, for I
myself do this. But I find that this is not enough… (continued)
Spener continued
In the first place, we know that "all Scripture is inspired by God and
profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training
in righteousness" (2 Timothy 3:16). Accordingly all Scripture,
without exception, should be known by the congregation if we are
all to receive the necessary benefit. If we put together all the
passages of the Bible which in the course of many years are read to
a congregation in one place, they will comprise only very small part
of the Scriptures which have been given to us. The remainder is not
heard by the congregation at all, or is heard only insofar as one or
another verse is quoted or alluded to in sermons, without, however,
offering any understanding of the entire context, which is
nevertheless of the greatest importance. In the second place, the
people have little opportunity to grasp the meaning of the Scripture
except on the basis of those passages which may have been
expounded to them, and even less do they have opportunity to
become as practiced in them as edification requires. Meanwhile,
although solitary reading of the Bible at home is in itself a splendid
and praiseworthy thing, it does not accomplish enough for most
people. (continued)
Spener continued
It should therefore be considered whether the church would not be well
advised to introduce the people to Scripture in still other ways than
through the customary sermons on the appointed lessons. This might
be done, first of all, by diligent reading of the Holy Scriptures, especially
of the New Testament. It would not be difficult for every housefather
to keep a Bible or at least a New Testament handy and read from it
every day or, if they cannot read to have somebody else read.
Then a second thing would be desirable in order to encourage people to
read privately, namely, that where the practice can be introduced the
books of the Bible be read one after another, at specified times in the
public service, without further comment (unless one wished to add brief
summaries). This would be intended for the edification of all, but
especially of those that cannot read at all, or cannot read easily or well
or of those who do not own a copy of the Bible.
-From the Pia Desidera:
The Great Awakening in the U.S.
• Trans-colonial movement, 1730s-1770s
• New form of preaching: passionate!
• Cross-denominational movement
• Role of the itinerant minister
• The psychology of conversion
• Schismatic effect on some churches
George Whitefield (1714-1770)
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English (Anglican) minister who
had great success in America
As a student at Oxford was
caught up in the Wesleyan
(Methodist) movement
Itinerant minister in the U.S.;
converted thousands.
Hearing Whitefield….
“Now it pleased God to send Mr. Whitefield into this land; and my hearing of his
preaching at Philadelphia, like one of the Old apostles, and many thousands
flocking to hear him preach the Gospel; and great numbers were converted to
Christ; I felt the Spirit of God drawing me by conviction; I longed to see and
hear him, and wished he would come this way.. [Then I saw Mr. Whitefield]: he
Lookt [sic] almost angelical; a young, Slim, slender, youth before some thousands
of people with a bold undaunted Countenance, and my hearing how God was
with him every where as he came along it Solemnized my mind; and put me into
a trembling fear before he began to preach; for he looked as if he was Cloathed
with authority from the Great God;.. And my hearing him preach, gave me a
heart wound; By Gods blessing: my old Foundation was broken up, and I saw
that my righteousness would not save me; then I was convinced of the doctrine
of Election: and went right to quarreling with God about it; because that all I
could do would not save me; and he had decreed from Eternity who should be
saved and who not.”
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From Nathan Cole’s account of Thursday, October 23, 1740.
Even Benjamin Franklin was moved!
John Wesley: a heart strangely warmed
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John Wesley (1703-1791) – founder
of the Methodists.
Traveled from England to the state of
Georgia in the U.S. in 1735
Felt that the Church of England
lacked vitality
Emphasis on Christian perfection
(246)
Reported to have rode 8,000 miles a
year on horseback, preaching
At the time of his death, there were
300 Methodist preachers in England,
200 in the U.S.
John Wesley
Scripture as the Way to Salvation (1765)
"Ye are saved through faith." Ephesians 2:8
1. Nothing can be more intricate, complex, and hard to be understood, than religion,
as it has been often described. And this is not only true concerning the religion
of the Heathens, even many of the wisest of them, but concerning the religion
of those also who were, in some sense, Christians; yea, and men of great name
in the Christian world; men who seemed to be pillars thereof. Yet how easy to
be understood, how plain and simple a thing, is the genuine religion of Jesus
Christ; provided only that we take it in its native form, just as it is described in
the oracles of God! It is exactly suited, by the wise Creator and Governor of
the world, to the weak understanding and narrow capacity of man in his present
state. How observable is this, both with regard to the end it proposes, and the
means to attain that end! The end is, in one word, salvation; the means to attain
it, faith.
2. It is easily discerned, that these two little words, I mean faith and salvation,
include the substance of all the Bible, the marrow, as it were, of the whole
Scripture. So much the more should we take all possible care to avoid all mistake
concerning them, and to form a true and accurate judgement concerning both
the one and the other.
Wesley on justification and sanctification
“Justification is another word for pardon. It is the forgiveness of all our sins;
and, what is necessarily implied therein, our acceptance with God. The price
whereby this hath been procured for us (commonly termed "the meritorious
cause of our justification"), is the blood and righteousness of Christ; or, to
express it a little more clearly, all that Christ hath done and suffered for us, till
He "poured out His soul for the transgressors." The immediate effects of
justification are, the peace of God, a "peace that passeth all understanding,"
and a "rejoicing in hope of the glory of God" "with joy unspeakable and full
of glory."
And at the same time that we are justified, yea, in that very moment,
sanctification begins. In that instant we are born again, born from above,
born of the Spirit: there is a real as well as a relative change. We are inwardly
renewed by the power of God. We feel "the love of God shed abroad in our
heart by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us"; producing love to all
mankind, and more especially to the children of God; expelling the love of
the world, the love of pleasure, of ease, of honour, of money, together with
pride, anger, self-will, and every other evil temper; in a word, changing the
earthly, sensual, devilish mind, into "the mind which was in Christ Jesus."
Source: “The Scripture Way of Salvation.”
Wesley’s response to predestination
Do election and reprobation agree with the truth and sincerity of God? But do they not agree
least of all with the scriptural account of his love and goodness: that attribute which God
peculiarly claims wherein he glories above all the rest? It is not written, "God is justice," or
"God is truth" (although he is just and true in all his ways). But it is written, "God is love"
[1 Jn. 4:8] (love in the abstract, without bounds), and "there is no end of his goodness" [cf.
Ps. 52:1]. His love extends even to those who neither love nor fear him. He is good, even to
the evil and the unthankful; yea, without any exception or limitation, to all the children of
men. For "the Lord is loving" (or good) "unto every man, and his mercy is over all his
works" [Ps. 145:9, B.C.P.].
But how is God good or loving to a "reprobate," or one that is not "elected" You may choose
either term, for if none but the unconditionally elect are saved, it comes precisely to the
same thing. You cannot say, he is an object of the love or goodness of God, with regard to
his external state, which he created (says Mr. Calvin plainly and fairly).. "to live a reproach
and die everlastingly.” Surely, no one can dream that the goodness of God is at all
concerned with this man's eternal state. "However, God is good to him in this world."
What? When by reason of God's unchangeable decree, it had been good for this man never
to have been born, when his very birth was a curse, not a blessing? "Well, but he now enjoys
many of the gifts of God, both gifts of nature and of providence. He has food and
raiment, and comforts of various kinds. And are not all these great blessings?" No, not to
him. At the price he is to pay for them, every one of these also is a curse. Every one of
these comforts is, by an eternal decree, to cost him a thousand pangs in hell. For every
moment's pleasure which he now enjoys, he is to suffer the torment of more than a
thousand years; for the smoke of that pit which is preparing for him ascendeth up for ever
and ever. God knew this would be the fruit of whatever he should enjoy, before the vapour
of life fled away….
Wesley, “Predestination Calmly Considered” (1773).
Wesley’s response to predestination II
LIII. We come next to his justice. Now, if man be capable of choosing good or evil,
then is he a proper object of the justice of God, acquitting or condemning,
rewarding or punishing. But otherwise he is not. A mere machine is not capable
of being either acquitted or condemned. Justice cannot punish a stone for falling
to the ground; nor (on your scheme) a man for falling into sin. For he can no
more help it than the stone, if he be (in your sense) "foreordained to this
condemnation." Why does this man sin? "He cannot cease from sin." Why can't
he cease from sin? "Because he has no saving grace." Why has he no saving
grace? "Because God, of his own good pleasure, hath eternally decreed not to
give it him." Is he then under an unavoidable necessity of sinning? "Yes, as much
as a stone is of falling. He never had any more power to cease from evil than a
stone has to hang in the air." And shall this man, for not doing what he never
could do, and for doing what he never could avoid, be sentenced to depart into
everlasting fire, prepared for the evil and his angels [cf. Mt. 25:41]? "Yes, because
it is the sovereign will of God." Then you have either found a new God, or made
one! This is not the God of the Christians. Our God is just all his ways; he
repeath not where he hath not strewed. He requireth only according to what he
hath given; and where he hath given little, little is required.
Source: “Predestination Calmly Considered.”
Gotthold Lessing gets the last word
“The worth of a man does not consist in the truth he
possesses, or thinks he possesses, but in the pains he
has taken to attain that truth…. If God held all truth in
his right hand and in his left the everlasting striving
after truth… and said to me, ‘Choose.,’ with humility I
would pick on the left hand and say, ‘Father grant me
that. Absolute truth is for thee alone.’”
- Lessing. Quoted by Placher, 250.
Hymn: “Thou hidden God of love.”
http://www.hymnsite.com/lection/cpe16.htm