A CRITICAL EVALUATION ON THE MAJOR
EPISTEMOLOGICAL THEORIES
1.
INTRODUCTION
There are so many philosophies which claim to
be the ultimate source for knowledge. Each theory has its own uniqueness in
attaining knowledge. but the problem comes when some particular theories are assuming that they
are the only way to know all the knowledge, including divine
reality. So it is essential to know the origin (existence), history (practice),
and accuracy (truthfulness) of epistemological philosophies which claims to be
the source for all the knowledge. The
intention of this paper is to look at the origin, historical development of three
main philosophies, and to have an evolution on its claim of being the only
source of all knowledge.
2.
EMPIRICISM
2.1
Defining Rationalism
Empiricism is the theory which believes that
reason is the source of knowledge.[1]
According to empiricism the knowledge comes only from sensory experience. Empiricism
argues for the role of sensory experience in the formation of ideas, tradition,
and customs. Empiricism has become fundamental part of the scientific method,
in which all the hypotheses and theories must be tested against observations of
the natural world rather than resting solely on a priori reasoning, intuition,
or revelation. As a result, empiricism has been used by natural scientists, who
say that knowledge is based on experience. [2]
According to Encyclopaedia of Britannica, empiricism is theory which believes the
entire concept originate in experience, that all the concept applicable to
things that can be experienced.[3]
The word empiricism drives from the Greek word emperia, which in Latin translated to be experientia, from which in turn we derived the word experience.[4]
2.2
Historical Development
Science and the scientific method hold a
central concept that everything must be empirically based of the evidence of
the senses. As for natural and science are concerned, they go with hypotheses
that are testable by observation and experiment. In the philosophical realm,
the empiricism holds that no knowledge to be properly assumed unless it is
derived from one’s sense based experience. This view always had been
contradicting with rationalism, which believe that knowledge can be derived
from reason alone. [5]
2.2.1 Early Time
Empiricism is hardly persistent in the
history of philosophy. It was widely
discussed in ancient times, often with considerable opposition. Plato had
actually looked down on idea of empiricism. Plato found that observation can only provide
information about a realm of appearances less important and indeed less real
that a more abstract realm that we may be able to grasp through a form of the
thinking that does not depend on experience. [6]
In the ancient world, therefore, it was
a kind of rationalism that was developed by Plato became one against which the
empiricists has to stand. There were
some three earlier bodies of thought which laid the ground for rationalism of
Plato: and they are as follow, Lonian
cosmologies of the 6th century BCE, the philosophy of Parmenides in
the 5th century BCE, and the Pythagoreans, which holds that world is
really made of number.
Sophists were the first empiricist in the
western philosophy, and they rejected the rationalist speculation about the
world and took humanity and society to be the proper objects of philosophical
inquiry. Plato’s philosophy emerged as the result of the challenge which was
posed by empiricist in order to undermine the claims of pure reason. It was believed
to be Aristotle as the founder of empiricism.
But the place of Aristotle in the development of empiricism remains
unclear. When Aristotle discussed about relationship between reason and sense,
he was more concerned with philosophy of mind rather than epistemology. Therefore,
it is not certain that whether or not Aristotle was an empiricist. There are clear cut evidences to say that
Epicurus was first empiricist. Epicurus was an extreme atomist, who maintained
that the sense are only source of knowledge, and also thought that sense
perception comes as the result of contact between the atoms so the soul and
bodies around us. [7] For
epicureans human concepts are memory images, the mental residues of previous
sense experience, and knowledge is as empirical as the ideas of which it is
composed. Stoicism, which is another successor of Aristotle along the side with
Epicureanism, advanced in empiricist’s account of the formation of human
concepts. According to stoics human mind remains as a clean slate at time of
birth, and the concepts about the material world will be stocked later time. Stoics
also believed that there are some concepts that are present to the minds of the
humans, and can be conceived in a non-empirical way.[8]
2.2.2 Medieval Time
In the medieval period most of the
philosophers took an empiricism position, though not in all the aspects, at
least about concept.[9]
Though the total philosophy of Aquinas
has been built on Aristotelian philosophy, the theory of knowledge is in many
ways similar to the idea of Epicurus. Aquinas always had a different view
concerning the knowledge of god; he thought that it could be obtained in other
ways and proved by logical argument. as for material knowledge is concerned,
Aquinas held that it must be derived from the sense of experience, and he gave
and account of the mechanism by which this comes about. However, Aquinas
empiricism is limited to concepts, especially in this limited sense that there
is nothing in the intellect which was not previously in the senses.[10]
Aquinas had rejected innate ideas altogether and believed both soul and body
participate in perception, and all ideas are abstracted by the intellect from
what is given to the senses. [11]
In the 13th century, scientist roger bacon emphasized on the
empirical knowledge of the natural world. The Franciscan Mominalist William of Ockham
was more systematic in describing his position on knowledge. He holds that all
knowledge of what exists in nature comes from senses, and the abstractive
knowledge of necessary truths are merely hypothetical and does not imply the
existence of anything. But his followers extended his line of reasoning towards
a radical empiricism, in which causation is merely an observed regularity in
their occurrence.[12]
2.2.3 Modern Time
In the 16th century, the logicians
attacked the unsystematic speculative phases of renaissance philosophy and the
claims of Aristotelian logic to yield substantial knowledge. In the same period
of time, the role of observation was also stressed. In early 16th
century a skeptical Christian thinker, named Pierre Gassendi advanced a
deliberate revival of the empirical doctrines of Epicurus. Francis bacon was
one of the most important defender of empiricism in 16th century. Francis
Bacon did not deny the existence of a priori knowledge, but claimed that, only
worth having knowledge is the empirical based knowledge of the natural world,
which should be pursued by systematic arrangement of the findings of
observation. In fact, bacon was the first to formulate the principles
scientific induction. Thomas Hobbes combined an extreme empiricism about
concepts with an extreme rationalism about knowledge.
Thomas considers all the knowledge to be a
priori, but ideas from senses and knowledge by reckoning. John
Locke (1632–1704), an early Enlightenment philosopher, made most elaborate and
influential presentation of empiricism. John Locke held that all knowledge
comes from sensation or from reflection. Locke often seemed not to separate
clearly the two issues of the nature of concepts and the justification of
beliefs. Later, Locke admitted that much substantial knowledge, in particular,
mathematics and morality as a priori.
Bishop George Berkeley
was a theistic idealist, who applied Locke’s empiricism about concepts to
refute Locke’s account of human knowledge of the external world. Because
Berkeley was convinced that in sense experience one is never aware of anything
but what he called ideas. Finally he drew inevitable
conclusion that physical objects are simply collections of perceived ideas. David
Hume, a Scottish skeptical philosopher, used the fully
elaborated Locke’s empiricism to argue that there can be no more to the
concepts of body, mind, and causal connection than what occurs in the
experiences from which they arise. Hume thought that only perceptions exist and
that it is impossible to form an idea of anything that is not a perception. For
Hume all necessary truth is formal or conceptual, determined by the various relations
that hold between ideas.
Lockean empiricism prevailed until the rise
of Hegelianism. The Scottish philosophers of that time did not accept the
conclusion of Hume that humans do have substantial a priori knowledge. But the
philosophy of John Stuart Mill (1806–73) is thoroughly
empiricist. He held that all knowledge worth having, including mathematics, is
empirical. All real knowledge for Mill is inductive and empirical, and
deduction is sterile. William Kingdon Clifford and Karl Pearson are the two important
mathematicians and pioneers in the philosophy of modern physics, and who defended radically empiricist philosophies of science,
anticipated the logical empiricism of the 20th century.
2.3
An Evaluation of Rationalism
2.3.1 Strength
Empiricism is very much helpful to prove a
theory. According to empiricism the real knowledge is empirical, and the
empirical knowledge is gained from experiment and observation. The same method is followed by the scientist to
prove his hypotheses or theory.so, in this way empiricism is helpful to those
who want to know that whether a theory is right.
Empiricism serves as a channel that which
helps to explain the things in the way it exists. For instance, the perception
of the blind man would be different from the man who can see clearly. So, with
the help of empiricism one would be able to understand the things in the way it
is. Another advantage of empiricism is that it brings the imagination into
possibility. Though is true that we have lot of imagination, but it become impractical
if it happens to remain unreal. Empiricism, therefore, remains the only way
which brings the imagination into realm of experience.[13]
2.3.2 Weakness
Empiricism neglects the innate idea in the
human being, and assumes that human mind are empty slate at the beginning, the
information are stocked later by the experience. This is a false claim, because
the language and the grammar are not experienced by the small kids but rather
it is a natural ability of knowing things independent of experience. Empiricism
stops our access to the abstract and immutable realities, and to a great extent
it describes human as nothing other than what he experience. but in reality humans are not just what they
experience, rather a being which has different nature of knowing the things
more than what one can experience, which is what makes him unique.[14]
Empiricism claims that all knowledge comes
from experience. This extreme claim of rationalism leads to the conclusion that
there is no source other than experience through which we may gain knowledge. This
claim connote be true, because there could be some other reason why all that we
know has some dependents on experience. The proposition of mathematics is
usually a priori knowledge, not a posteriori. j.s. mill has argued that the proposition of
mathematics is merely a generalization
from experience, but this has not been generally accepted.[15]
Empiricism may argue that all knowledge that
we have will have some means of experience, and all our intellect is the result
of our experience. On the other hand, there are some other things which cannot
be gained by our sense experiences. Human sense experiences are only limited to
the particular realm, it is not capable of going beyond the realm in which we
live. This is reason why we need faith in order to understand spiritual things.
Spiritual things are basically not understood by sense experience.
3.
RATIONALISM
3.1
Defining Rationalism
Rationalism is the view which regards reason
as the chief source of knowledge. Rationalism, in other way, can be described
as a methodology or a theory which does not depend on sensory but rather on
reason for knowing the truth.[16]
Rationalism gives high regard to reason and to empirical observation. In
rationalism all the truth is deductive and a priori, which deriving logically
from a set of axioms gained by inherent knowledge. [17]
According to rationalism certain truth exists, which can directly be grasped by
intellect. In saying so, rationalist actually claims that the logic,
mathematics, ethics, and metaphysics have certain rational principles that are
fundamentally true, and denying this claim would cause one to fall into
contradiction. Rationalists are extremely confident in the reason that they
don’t consider the physical evidence as a necessary to know the truth. They,
rather, believe that there are some significant ways in which concept and
knowledge are possible independently of sense experience.[18]
Though the term rationalism is not often
used so strictly, but in continental Europe, it is generally known as the
continental rationalism. It is more
commonly used to refer to a synthesis of continental rationalism with former
rival philosophy called empiricism.[19]
In the context of ethics, rationalism relies on a natural light, and in the
theology reason replaces the supernatural revelation.[20]
3.2
History of Rationalism
It is difficult to identify the major periods
and the major figures of rationalism before the enlightenment. One of the main
reasons for this is that every philosopher has acknowledged that humans have
the ability to know information. And the second main reason was that, in
philosophical thought, knowledge and information are obtained with the use of
our rational faculties.
When we see the works of the Descartes,
Leibniz, and Spinoza, after the enlightenment, rationalism was usually
associated with the introduction of mathematical methods into philosophy. Since
it was predominant in the continental school of Europe, this was commonly
called as continental rationalism. until the later period there were no
distinction that have been drawn between
rationalist and empiricists, even it would not have been recognized by the
philosophers of that time. [21]
3.2.1 Rationalism in Ancient Time
3.2.1.1 Pythagoras
One of the best
known western philosophers for the Pythagorean Theorem was Pythagoras. He was
often revered as a great mathematician, mystic and scientist for discovering
the mathematical relationship between the length of strings on lute bear and
the pitches of the notes. It is believed that Pythagoras had caught that
rationalist’s vision of a world a governed throughout by mathematically
formulable laws.[22]
3.2.1.2 Plato
Another prominent rationalist, after
Pythagoras, was Plato. Plato was so much attached with rigorous reasoning of
geometry. He never considered the senses for acquiring knowledge. [23]
Plato also held rational insight to a very high standard. Plato taught on the
Theory of Forms which asserts that non-material abstract forms and not the
material world of change known to us through sensation possess the highest and
most fundamental kind of reality.
3.2.1.3 Aristotle
Aristotle, successor of
Plato, conceived of the work of reason in much the same way of Plato. Syllogistic
logic was the chief contribution to rationalism by Aristotle, and it was regarded
as the chief instrument of rational explanation. According to Aristotle, syllogism is a
discourse in which certain things having been supposed. Regardless of this very
general definition, Aristotle limits himself to categorical syllogisms which
consist of three categorical propositions, and it is found in his work Prior Analytics.[24]
3.2.1.4 Time after Aristotle
The three great Greek philosophers
(discussed above) have disagreed with one another on specific points, but on
other hand they all agreed that only rational thought could bring to knowledge,
which otherwise, impossible for the humans by all other means. The central
thesis of rationalism, before the time of Aquinas, was based on one thing that
humans never entirely understand a fact or event until they can bring it under
a principle that is self-evident and necessary. On this, the three great Greeks
were in accord. The western
rationalistic philosophy, after Aristotle, generally stood to draw an
application to theology, and such things are find in the works of Avicenna
(Islamic philosopher), Maimonides (theologian), and Thomas Aquinas.[25]
3.3.2
Rationalism in Modern Philosophies
3.3.2 .1 Descartes
Descartes, an original
mathematician, was the first modern rationalist whose ambition was to introduce
into philosophy the accuracy and clearness. He doubted everything in
order to arrive at something indubitable. As a result of this approach he
reached in his famous cogito ergo sum, I think, therefore
I am. Ultimately, he could not doubt himself for to doubt one’s own doubting
would be absurd. He took same self-evidence as a foundation to judge other
propositions. In doing so, actually, he hoped to produce a philosophical system
on which people could agree as completely as they do on the geometry of Euclid.
Descartes believes that the main cause of error is the impulsive desire to
believe before the mind is clear.[26]
As for Descartes, reason alone is the way by
which the knowledge of eternal truths- including the truths of mathematics,
epistemological, and metaphysical foundations of the sciences could be
attained.[27]
3.3.2.2 Benedict Spinoza
Benedict Spinoza another
rationalist who agreed with essentially Descartes that the framework of things
could be known by a priori thinking. The most undeniable to Spinoza was not the
existence of his self but that of the universe, which he called as the substance. He derived his entire system from the idea
of substance and with the aid of a few definitions and axioms. Benedict Spinoza
philosophy was one of the systematic, logic, and rational philosophy that ever
developed in in the seventeenth- century Europe. Spinoza was heavily influenced
by the great thinkers such as Descartes, Euclid, Thomas Hobbes, and Maimonides.
Spinoza has tried to answer life’s major question with his philosophy which was
constructed upon basic building blocks with an internal consistency, and in
which he proposed that god exists only philosophical.[28]
3.3.2.3 Leibniz
Leibniz was the one of
the great rationalist, who contributed more to other such as metaphysics, epistemology,
logic, mathematics, physics, jurisprudence, and the philosophy of religion.
Leibniz totally rejected the Cartesian dualism and the existence of a material
world. Leibniz has developed a view in which he says that there are infinitely
many simple substances, which he called monads. Leibniz had developed his
theory of monads in response to both Descartes and Spinoza. The theory monads
are the fundamental unit of reality, which constitutes both inanimate and
animate objects.[29]
Leibniz distinguished necessary truths from contingent truths. Leibniz also
said that if only humans knew enough, they would see that every true proposition
was necessarily true, and there are no contingent truths.[30]
3.3.2 .4 Kant
It has always been a
great question that how is it possible to have knowledge that goes beyond
experience. A new answer was given this question by Kant, a great thinker, in his Critique of Pure Reason. Kant
was one of the great modern philosophers who set the terms by which all
subsequent thinkers have had to grapple. Kant philosophy plays a great role in
the contemporary thought, metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, political
philosophy, and aesthetics. Kant’s branch epistemology was called
transcendental idealism. The fundamental problems of both rationalism and
empiricism were exposed by Kant. To the
rationalist Kant argued that pure reason fails when it goes beyond the realm of
all the possible experience, such as existence of god, free will, and the
immortality of human being soul. To the empiricists
he argued that experiences are fundamentally necessary for human knowledge,
reason is necessary for processing the experience into coherent thought. Thus
he concluded that both reason and experience are necessary for human knowledge.[31] According to Kant, the reason why the logic and
mathematics will remain valid for all experience is simply that their framework
lies within the human mind. Humans will always find things arranged in certain
patterns because it is they who have accidentally so arranged them. Kant held,
therefore, that the certainties cannot be trusted as a reflection of the world
outside the mind, because a priori insights are a reflection of the mind.[32]
3.3
An Evaluation of Rationalism
3.3.1 Strength
One of the remarkable contributions of
rationalism is an emphasize on the
inescapability of the basic laws
of thought. Without the law of Noncontradiction
there is not even the
most minimal possibility of meaning
nor any hope
for establishing truth. The principle
of noncontradiction is
absolutely essential for
distinguishing truth from falsity; without law of noncontradiction all is
equally true and
false, which is
to say nothing
can be true.
The second contribution is a concept of a
priori dimension to knowledge. This is not to say that there is an innate idea but
rather there must be at least some natural inclinations of the mind toward
truth or toward the first principles of Knowledge. Without some categories or
at least capacities of the mind to know reality nothing could ever be known,
even the very possibility of truth would be nil. This a priori contribution of
rationalism plays an essential in all realistic epistemology. The third
contribution of rationalism is its stress
on the intelligibility and know
ability of reality.
There is a correspondence between the mind and being. It is obvious that
thought relates to reality without applying thought to reality. The rationalism has rightly preserved the
truth that reality is intelligible.
3.3.2 Weakness
First, rationalism is based on and invalid
move, which is from possible to the actual. This concept leads to the
conclusion that, anything that is thinkable must be possible. This cannot
possibly be true for several reasons. The thinkable describes only the realm of
possibility and not necessarily the actual thing. So, what is not contradictory
is possibly true not what is thinkable.
Second, it is the inescapabilty or the
logical necessity. Rationalists hold that all the reality is result of logical
necessity and anything that is inescapable of reason is not true. Geisler argues,
it not right to say that something exist with logical necessity. He says that
it is a confusion of rationalist in identifying actual undeniability from
rational inescapabilty. There is no any
pure logically compelling reason or rational proof for the existence of
reality. Therefore, it turns to be a false claim that reality can be proven
rationally.
Third, the first principle of rationalism cannot
be proved rationally. Descartes put it in this way that there is a rational
intuition in the basic axioms of thought from which all other deductive demonstrations
proceed. Rationalism process commonly begins
with ideas or principles without a logically necessary basis. So now, the
rationalism itself cannot be established rationally. The result of following rationalism, since
the rationalism based on the intuitivism, could end either in mysticism or to
fideism.
Fourth, rationalism presents logical
consistency as the test of truth. One must be omniscient, according to Clark, in
order to apply the logical consistency as the test for truth. Any system of
theory can seem consistent within the own presuppositions. Even the rationalism
cannot challenge those presuppositions with pure rationalism. Therefore logic
serves as best negative test of truth.[33]
4.
FIDEISM
4.1
Definition of Fideism
Fideism is a philosophical view which minimizes the
power of reason to know religious truths, and admiring theological faith by
making it the ultimate criterion of truth. Rigorous fideists give no place to
reason in discovering or understanding fundamental doctrines of religion.[34]
In fideism the religious belief depends on faith or revelation, rather than
reason, intellect or natural theology. This position directly stands as an
opposition to deism and Evidentialism. Fideism, in Epistemology, is a theory
which maintains that faith is independents of reason. [35]
4.2
History of Fideism
Fideism was most commonly associated with four major
philosophers: Blaise Pascal, Søren Kierkegaard, William James, and Ludwig
Wittgenstein.[36] In 2nd-century, fideism was approached by
North African theologian Tertullian, the medieval English scholar William of
Ockham, the 17th-century French philosopher Pierre Bayle, and more recently in
the works of the 18th-century German philosopher Johann Georg Hamann and the
19th-century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard.
4.2.1 Tertullian
Tertullian was a Roman early Christian, who was
frequently credited with early Fideist tendencies by virtue of his statement
"the Son of God died.[37]The statement Credo quia absurdum
(I believe because it is absurd) was often attributed to Tertullian, but this
appears to be a misquotation from Tertullian's De Carne Christi, which means On the Flesh of Christ. When
Tertullian says the Son of God died, actually he meant that it is by all means
to be believed, because it is absurd. This,
however, is not a statement of a Fideist position, because Tertullian was
critiquing intellectual arrogance and the misuse of philosophy, but he remained
committed to reason and its usefulness in defending the faith.[38]
4.2.2 Blaise Pascal
Blaise Pascal formed a kind of fideism
which was commonly known as Pascal’s wager. Blaise Pascal was basically a
catholic mathematician and writer, whose thought, has found much interest in
recent years. Pascal, in his Pensées discusses about the dynamic of human mind.
Pascal has noted that some are intuitive, while others are more
mathematical. Thus, Pascal concludes
that both ways are important, because some people go with precession, while
others go with comprehension. He, therefore, urges that a sensitivity and
respect for the people who thinks differently.[39]
Pascal was bit different in his
approach towards the atheist. Blaise Pascal, in the conversation with atheists,
invites the atheist considering faith to see faith in God as a cost-free choice
that carries a potential reward. In his approach, Pascal never attempted to
argue that God indeed exists, only that it might be valuable to assume that it
is true. The main problem with Pascal's Wager is that it does not lead one to a
specific God. Leading the people to the Christian was not the indentation of Pascal
in the first place. This idea was very clearly expressed in his Pensées (thoughts) that since Christian
believe in a religion which they cannot explain, at any reason; nobody can
blame Christians for not being able to give reasons for their belief. To Pascal,
the various proposed proofs for the existence of God are irrelevant. Pascal
thinks that even if the proofs are valid, the very purpose unto which it was
presented would be impossible, rather it would led to deism instead of leading
someone to the god of Christian.[40]
4.2.3 Hamann
Johann Georg Hamann is the father of modern irrationalism, who argues that everything people do is ultimately based on faith. Human’s idea solely built of
the work of David Hume. He always had maintained that without faith in the
existence of external, human affairs could not continue; and all reasoning from this faith is fundamental to the human condition.[41] Thus, Hamann reached to a conclusion
that all attempts to base belief in God by using Reason are vain. He, at the
same time, attacks systems of Spinoza which confine the infinite majesty of God
into a finite human creation.[42]
4.2.4 Søren Kierkegaard
Kierkegaard was an existentialist, who
believed that God's existence cannot be certainly known, and that the decision
to accept faith is neither founded on, nor needs, rational justification[43]
Kierkegaard had looked into the problem of faith differently, particularly by focusing
on the story of Abraham's willingness to sacrifice Isaac. When it comes to believe in the incarnation of Jesus,
he asks us to take a leap of faith. Kierkegaard affirms
that, since incarnation implies that an eternal being would become a simple
human, to believe in God made flesh was to believe in the absolute paradox. Soren
suggest, since reason cannot possibly comprehend
such a phenomenon, one can only believe in it by taking a leap of faith.[44]
4.2.5 James
The concept of the Will to Believe was
introduced by an American Pragmatist and psychologist William James. In his
earlier theories of truth, James argued that some religious questions can only
be answered by believing in the first place: one cannot know if religious
doctrines are true unless one believes them in the first place.[45]James argued, under the established
set of conditions called genuine option,
it is reasonable to believe in
the absence of proof. As for James,
the religious belief may not be more
rational than Atheism or Agnosticism, but it is not irrational.[46]
4.2.6 Wittgenstein
The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein
was generally considered be a Fideist despite of having no systematic writing
about religion. It is believed of Wittgenstein that he has done so many
lectures on the topic religion. The position of Wittgenstein was taken from
some of his students' notes which were collected and published. It is a thought
which describes religion as a form of life attracted Wittgenstein to a great
degree.[47] According to Wittgensteinian Fideism, religion is a self-contained, and primarily expressive, enterprise, governed by its own internal logic or grammar. Wittgensteinian pointed out that
religion is logically cut off
from other aspects of life; that religious beliefs can be understood only by religious believers; and that religion
cannot be criticized.[48]
4.2.7 Presuppositional
Apologetics
Presuppositionalism is a Christian
system of apologetics which attempts to distinguish itself from fideism. Presuppositionalism
could be seen as being more closely allied with foundationalism than fideism,
though it has sometimes been critical of both. One the other hand, it associated
mainly with Calvinist Protestantism.[49] Presuppositional Apologists believe that all thought must begin
with the proposition that the revelation
in the Bible is self-evident and
not to be proved or demonstrated.[50]Transcendental Argument for God's
existence was mostly used by the presuppositional apologist against a
non-believer who rejects the notion that the truth about God. On the other hand, Cornelius Van Til takes a
different position that all people actually believe in God whether they admit
or deny it.[51]
4.2.8 Protestantism
Fideism was most deeply rooted in the
time of Lutheran tradition. Even the key aspect of fideism can be traced back
to Martin Luther himself. Though it cannot be said that Luther as a Fideist,
yet the key element of fideism can be found there in the views of germen
reformers.[52] Martin Luther considered reason as
the greatest enemy that faith has. However, Luther agreed that, faith in
Christ, reason can be used in its proper realm. In his writings, concerning
reason, Luther puts it in this way that before faith and the knowledge of God
reason is darkness in divine matters, but through faith it is turned into a
light in the believer and serves piety as an excellent instrument. Reason
receives life from faith; it is killed by it and brought back to life. However,
this perspective of Luther did not last long, because, Apologetics became the
main intellectual activity of orthodox Lutherans and reformed, and the situation
that caused grave crises for those churches was the Enlightenment.[53]
4.3
An Evaluation of Fideism
4.3.1 Strength
Fideism holds that it impossible to know the
existence of the transcendental God of Christianity with rationality and
logical necessity. This approach holds a real significant value, because god is
more that mathematical and reason. Another significant thing about fideism is
that it disregards the role of evidence and reason for one’s commitment to god.
According to fideism the belief in god must be god himself.in fideism faith
stands more reasonable than intellect and reason. Faith in God is not an act of
acknowledgement; rather it is the commitment of whole person.[54]
Fideism considers the limitation of human reason and knowledge. Fideism, in one
sense, criticise the construction of systematic view of reality which is
presented in Christian philosophy, apologetics and theology.[55]
4.3.2 Weakness
Fideism has failed to understand the
different between epistemology and ontology. it is possible for any Fideist to
believe that there is a god, but he is
not aware that how he came to that assumption about god. when we consider faith
alone to be the criteria to believe in god, then, faith in god turns to be
relative; each person can be sure about what he believes is true. Fideists,
therefore, are right about what they believe about god but wrong about reason
why they believe. Fideism has a great confusion in understanding believe in and
believe that. Fideism believes that belief in god must be personal and
existential and not based on abstract and intellectual. It is impossible for
any man to have credible believe in god unless one has some way first to
believe that there is a god. Thus, fideism has become incapable of
understanding the important of reason and evidence for someone to believe in
god.[56]
5.
CONCLUSION
These three, in epistemology, were the main
philosophies which made great impact in the history. The proponents of these
philosophies were really great people ever live in human history. These philosophies played a great role in
forming a different frame work in the human mind with which theologians could
explain the ultimate reality. A clear study on these philosophies let us to the
conclusion that there is no theory with which a man can achieve the knowledge
of ultimate reality. All these philosophies have miserably failed to prove its
claim, and remained as unqualified theories for knowing all the truth or
realities. But on the other hand, all these philosophies are capable of knowing
some truth, sometime even closer to the realties when they all put together as
one approach.
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