One of the newfound subjects of study that I’ve grown to enjoy is philosophy. Granted, it’s a broad field. And I’ll be the first to admit that my grasp is rudimentary, to say the least. I’ve found, however, that I learn best when I write about what I’m reading or thinking through. Over the last few weeks, I’ve been working through a book called Philosophy of Religion: An Historical Introduction by Linda Trinkaus Zagzebski, as well as some anthologies of ancient writings. And I’m grateful to be able to take some classes at Lee U with Dr. Timothy Miller (a former student of Zagzebski) who is a gifted philosophy teacher.
Over the course of the next several Fridays, I’ll list some basic reflections from my readings. These in no way will be technical reviews; but, hopefully, they’ll engage the material in a critical manner, especially in a way helpful for doing better theology.
For starters, since becoming a follower of Jesus, I’ve often heard (and made) negative remarks regarding philosophy in general. Some would quote Colossians 2:8 – “See to it that nobody enslaves you with philosophy and foolish deception, which conform to human traditions and the way the world thinks and acts rather than Christ” (CEB). So, I tended to shy away from the subject, relying on poor misrepresentations of philosophy in order to refute it (what I’ve later learned to be a fallacious ‘straw man argument’). Such an approach all too often characterizes our take on that with which we aren’t familiar: learn just enough about it in order to bash it to prove a weak point to a few peers.
Yet, the text in Colossians isn’t an all-out slam on the practice of philosophy. It addresses the tendency of some to use philosophical argumentation in order to undermine faith in Jesus. In point of fact, various persons (even within the Church!) use philosophical and theological argumentation to undermine faith in Jesus. But, at the same time, there are various folks who use philosophical and theological argumentation to build up faith in Jesus. So, I’ve grown to consider the learning and practice of philosophy analogously to what Stanley Grenz and Roger Olson discuss concerning theology (in the great intro: Who Needs Theology? An Invitation to the Study of God): the matter is not whether one is a theologian. All persons are theologians. The matter is whether one does good theology (or philosophy, in this case).
So, what is the point of philosophy? Well, Zagzebski contends that philosophy serves as a “critic of all major human practices” (p.1). (This includes the practice of philosophy itself!)
And it’s interesting to note that philosophy and religion are only separated in the Western world. The East has no such separation (don’t you wonder why?). Only in the last 200-300 years did philosophy of religion emerge as a distinguished academic field. Some contend that the beginning of philosophy of religion per se is best pinpointed with the work of David Hume (1711-1776), Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831). A great resource to explore helpful write-ups about these figures (and more!) is The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (http://plato.stanford.edu/).
