Thesis: Religious propositions are true or false if and only if the Transcendent is immanent as truth conditions!
I focus on establishing the “only if” part.
Religious propositions are truth claims about what is immanent. For instance, “God is the father almighty creator of heaven and earth” is about the whole of what is immanent while “Jesus rose from the tomb after being crucified” is about a particular event within the immanent.
Although motivated by religious concerns, philosophical characterizations of the Transcendent are claims of philosophical theology. Admittedly, attempts to characterize the Transcendent are not even true or false. But in this post, in which I am engaged in philosophical theology, I am not interested in the status of claims within philosophical theology. I want to justify the following thesis.
If there are religious truths, then the Transcendent is immanent.
Unfortunately, my thesis is a “two edged sword” with respect to establishing immanence for the Transcendent. I want to conclude that the Transcendent is immanent because there are religious truths. Sophisticated atheists will use it to proclaim that there are no religious truths because it is incoherent to hold that the Transcendent is immanent.
Religious propositions are claims about the Transcendent although using our concepts for making claims about the immanent. So, if some religious propositions are objectively true, then some claims about the Transcendent using concepts for making claims about the immanent are objectively true.
Bear with me while I work this out through a series of hypotheticals.
If some claims about the Transcendent using concepts for making claims about the immanent are objectively true, then the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions in the immanent which make those claims about it objectively true or false
If the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions in the immanent for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false, then the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions amongst things in themselves for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false.
If the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions amongst things in them for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false, then those conditions are the Transcendent as truth conditions or those conditions are not the Transcendent as truth conditions.
If those truth conditions are not the Transcendent as truth conditions, then those truth conditions are not truth conditions.
How do we get this contradictions for a reductio ad absurdum argument?
Religious claims are about the Transcendent using concepts for the immanent. If the Transcendent was not amongst things in themselves, none of the religious claims would be true or false because they would have nothing about the Transcendent to make them true or false.
So, we can conclude: Truth conditions for religious claims are the Transcendent as truth conditions in the immanent. (Recall that all truth conditions are things in themselves in the immanent.)
Now what about an atheist claim that it is oxymoron to hold that the Transcendent is immanent.
It is not incoherent to hold that the Transcendent is immanent as a thing in itself because the Transcendent does not lose its character as transcending our understanding. For things in themselves transcend our understanding for we cannot think of how they are apart from our ways of thinking.
Here we see a benefit to religion from adapting a “Kantian realism” that truth conditions are things in themselves transcending our understanding.
In the next post I wish to explore an atheistic reaction to a thesis that religious truth requires the immanence as truth conditions of the transcendent. Thesis: Religious propositions are true or false if and only if the Transcendent is immanent as truth conditions!
I focus on establishing the “only if” part.
Religious propositions are truth claims about what is immanent. For instance, “God is the father almighty creator of heaven and earth” is about the whole of what is immanent while “Jesus rose from the tomb after being crucified” is about a particular event within the immanent.
Although motivated by religious concerns, philosophical characterizations of the Transcendent are claims of philosophical theology. Admittedly, attempts to characterize the Transcendent are not even true or false. But in this post, in which I am engaged in philosophical theology, I am not interested in the status of claims within philosophical theology. I want to justify the following thesis.
If there are religious truths, then the Transcendent is immanent.
Unfortunately, my thesis is a “two edged sword” with respect to establishing immanence for the Transcendent. I want to conclude that the Transcendent is immanent because there are religious truths. Sophisticated atheists will use it to proclaim that there are no religious truths because it is incoherent to hold that the Transcendent is immanent.
Religious propositions are claims about the Transcendent although using our concepts for making claims about the immanent. So, if some religious propositions are objectively true, then some claims about the Transcendent using concepts for making claims about the immanent are objectively true.
Bear with me while I work this out through a series of hypotheticals.
If some claims about the Transcendent using concepts for making claims about the immanent are objectively true, then the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions in the immanent which make those claims about it objectively true or false
If the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions in the immanent for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false, then the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions amongst things in themselves for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false.
If the Transcendent creates and sustains conditions amongst things in them for making claims about it using concepts appropriate to the immanent true or false, then those conditions are the Transcendent as truth conditions or those conditions are not the Transcendent as truth conditions.
If those truth conditions are not the Transcendent as truth conditions, then those truth conditions are not truth conditions.
How do we get this contradictions for a reductio ad absurdum argument?
Religious claims are about the Transcendent using concepts for the immanent. If the Transcendent was not amongst things in themselves, none of the religious claims would be true or false because they would have nothing about the Transcendent to make them true or false.
So, we can conclude: Truth conditions for religious claims are the Transcendent as truth conditions in the immanent. (Recall that all truth conditions are things in themselves in the immanent.)
I had to concede, though, that the Transcendent as truth conditions does not transcend existence. Truth conditions exist. They are “in the world.”
Now what about an atheist claim that it is oxymoron to hold that the Transcendent is immanent.
It is not incoherent to hold that the Transcendent is immanent as a thing in itself because the Transcendent does not lose its character as transcending our understanding. For things in themselves transcend our understanding for we cannot think of how they are apart from our ways of thinking.
Here we see a benefit to religion from adapting a “Kantian realism” that truth conditions are things in themselves transcending our understanding.
In the next post I wish to explore an atheistic reaction to a thesis that religious truth requires the immanence as truth conditions of the transcendent.