Talk:Negative theology

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[edit] Sufi thought?

There seems to be no mention of Sufi thought, even though several mutasawwifin such as Niffari and other earlier individuals, as well as in later Persian and Turkish poetry. If no one has anything to say with regards to this, I might write up something and post it...Jamshyd 20:52, 17 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Buddhism and God

I find the section on Buddhism to be somewhat off-topic. The first sentence of the section does not seem to be grammatical. The rest of the section talks mainly about the Buddhist concept of soul and nirvana.

Although not born a buddhist, it is my understanding that Theravada Buddhism leaves the question of god as unanswered and irrelevant. Buddhism does not describe god by what he is not, but rather doesn't address the question at all, because it is an irrelevant distraction to ending the cycle of human suffering. So I think Theravada Buddhism could be better described as non-theistic. If there are no objections, I would like to greatly alter this section, or at least add a paragraph with the aforementioned viewpoint.--Hanuman 09:44, 24 November 2006 (UTC)

Theravada is not Buddhism, but a sectarian and commentarial school based in Abhidhamma. You are equating the two, which is an error. Buddhism is Advaita, is Emanationism/Monism, as such, talk of GOD is irrelavent, the Godhead, ie Brahman is meant, same as in Platonism and Vedanta.--Attasarana
Actually I did not mean to convey a confusion between Buddhism and Theravada Buddhism, as I have understood that there are at least 3 broad major categories of Buddhism in the world today (Mahayana, Viniyana, Tibetan), with innumerable further sub-categories. The point I was trying to make was that the article starts off with "Negative theology ... is a theology that attempts to describe God by negation, to speak of God only in terms of what may not be said about God." The section on Buddhism talks about nirvana, anatta, self/non-self, but does not address God or mention the fact that many Buddhists have no use for God - which is presumably the topic of the article. Someone reading this article might come away with the impression that Buddhists believe in God. Rather, the section on Buddhism is really just noting that "via negativa" is used in Buddhism, albeit on topics other than God. Presumably, comments made on Buddhism and Buddhists without qualification would be assumed to apply to all Buddhists - this is why I focused on Theravada Buddhism. Hanuman 04:59, 9 July 2007 (UTC)
"Buddhism is Advaita" - if by advaita you mean advaita vedanta, then this is a very controversial assertion that many scholars would disagree with. If you just mean to imply that it is non-dualistic, then that is probably less controversial, but you'd need to explain exactly what you mean by that. But the fact you are saying that Buddhism is monist or emanationist and that it accepts the brahman of advaita vedanta is at best a minority interpretation of the Pali suttas. None of the later mainstream Buddhist schools (e.g. the madhyamikas) accept this view. Although it is possible to interpret certain yogacara sutras in this fashion, this again is not a mainstream opinion. In any case, your views are at best highly controversial. Lemongoat 10:11, 17 August 2007 (UTC)Lemongoat
OK, just checked out Attasarana's webpage. He is certainly controversial and does not in any way represent orthodox interpretations of Buddhism. That is not to say that he is wrong, but his views certainly doesn't represent NPOV, and neither does the Buddhist section of this article. Lemongoat 10:17, 17 August 2007 (UTC)Lemongoat
The correct way to resolve this problem according to Wikipedia NPOV policy is to describe the mainstream interpretation of the Buddhist attitude to negative theology, and then to describe deviations from that view (such as Attasarana's), without judging which interpretation is correct. If anyone has ideas about this, they should go ahead, or I will produce something over the course of the next few weeks.Lemongoat 10:27, 17 August 2007 (UTC)Lemongoat

[edit] Not evil?

I would challenge the neutraility of the point "God is not evil" (or at least be more specific). because from the same argument, to say that He can be excluded by the human word 'Evil' limits Him to what evil means to humans. Also some (as in dystheists) believe that Gos is evil, so they would likewise characterize God as 'not good'

See Eutheism and dystheism

[edit] Request for more info on these topics:

From Imma, Feb 27, 2004: I just have a few comments that really should be edits, but for some reason I felt uncomfortable about adding chunks of information to this specific topic. Perhaps the author of the page would like to add some of this in his own words.

Anyway, I just thought it would be important to add that apophatic theology (Negative Theology) can be found in the Western ("Catholic") Church: St. Augustine of Hippo, Meister Eckhart, and The Cloud of Unknowing. I say these three because they more better known, there were a lot more apophatics. Also, Pseudo-Dionysius (from the East) influenced a lot of Western Christian thinkers and mystics during the Middle Ages and beyond. Dionysius, basically, introduced negative theology to the West.

Ooh, and how about including the Christian 'neo-platonists' and Christian gnostics (a lot of them were apophatics), Taoists, and Zen Buddhists?

From Davidshq, Nov 2, 2004: It would be useful to add a discussion of the three ways, as discussed by Jean-Luc Marion in God, the Gift, and Postmodernism, chp. 1 "In the Name."

[edit] Moved to a new title

I moved this article to the new title, because (a) on Google, this title is three times more common; and (b) in my reading on philosophy this title seems to be used more often. RK 01:05, Oct 8, 2004 (UTC)

have also heard the term buddhist christianity

[edit] A little muddy?

I'm not sure "to speak of God only in terms of what may be said about God and to avoid what may not be said" means the same thing as "describing what God is not, rather than by describing what God is." In fact, in ordinary English language, I believe these two are the inverse of each other. Am I right? Can someone look closely at this entry and see if it looks like the author was clear on his topic? I'm no expert in the area so I'll avoid making the edits but there does seem to be a breakdown of logic as this is written.

You're right - it is muddy: a legacy of the merger of the two articles... Fintor 12:29, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Please comment on logical fallacy

I am not an expert on theology, but I come close to being an expert on language and logic. It would be very helpful if someone could add a section to this article commenting on the logical fallacy of negative statements. Namely, it is fallacious to claim that simply by making a so-called "negative statement", one is not actually asserting positive knowledge of the subject of the statement. Logically, asserting what God is not is identical to making statements about what God is, since in either case the speaker is asserting positive knowledge about a property pertaining to God. This fallacy renders the whole exercise of negative theology somewhat meaningless. Since the whole enterprise stems from the somehow certain knowledge that properties of God are unknowable, how is it possible, e.g., that anyone can know that "God is not multiple beings"? If one truly wanted to assert that all properties of God are unknowable, then the best one could say is "I do not know whether God has multiplicity or not." But even then we still have a bootstrapping problem, for how did Man come by the knowledge that properties of God are unknowable? Is that proposition known with certainty?

Put another way, we can regard the logical problem here as yet another case of the problem introduced by self-referentiality, such as was explored by Bertrand Russell, and later clarified with Gödel's incompleteness theorem and Turing's halting problem. In essence, axiomatic systems powerful enough to represent themselves can be either complete or consistent but not both. In this case, we may want to assert that all propositions involving God are unknowable. But that in itself is a proposition involving God! So we are asserting that God falls into the class of things for which no propositions are knowable—an inconsistency.

A comment or even a pointer to a trusted source on the logical and epistempological dilemmas arising from negative theology would be very helpful here. Please note that this point is related to the "muddiness" pointed out above.

I think it is supposed to be difficult, nigh impossible, to understand this theology logically. That's why it's mysticism. Seriously, I'm not being flippant. To someone who thinks about God in an apophatic fashion your argument would be seen as an example of the inability of human intellect to grasp at the nature of an infinite, omnipotent God.
I question your defintion of apophatic theology. (And I apologize if I'm not following all your rules--see P.S.) But my understanding of apophatic spiritual experience is this: that in the absence of something one wants one comes to better appreciate its qualities. For example--the original disciples of Jesus knew him personally, heard what he said, saw what he did. After the ascension they experienced--and suffered from--his absence. They began to remember and to meditate on what they had witnessed and came to a better understanding of what it meant. This way of knowing God developed into the early desert fathers' and mothers' experience of God--a very occasional spiritual experience followed by months and/or years of absence. But this was a positive absence--including prayer of silence that resulted in insights (into the meaning of Scripture, the meaning of life, God revealed in the natural world, personal experience, etc.) In other words, it's much simpler than your present definition).

P.S. my eyes don't allow me to read a computer screne for long and your rules are extremely long and complex. I hope you will find the way to simplify them Dslmagenta 21:48, 11 September 2007 (UTC).

In this type of theology, aknowledgement of the failure of logic to comprehend God is viewed as an apropriate mark of respect for finite, mortal being to show an infinite, transcendent divinity.
Apothatic theology deals in faith, not reason. You are correct to say that negative theology does not prove the existence of God, one way or the other. It is designed for people who have already decided to belive in God as a way of contemplating 'Him'.

At first I thought what a clever paradox until I realized you were only raising a tempest in a teapot. You may want to review Divine simplicity and the ineffable and then move this dialogue into the context of god's existence. Unless you were deliberately baiting some theologian naive or adamant enough to attempt a dialogue in this venue. 67.176.29.209 09:11, 24 June 2007 (UTC)