The
sixth chapter of my book The Limits of Liberalism, which I am currently
revising, slightly, and updating for re-publication at the end of this year, is
titled “Limits of Liberal Views of God.” This blog post is based on parts of
that chapter.
Is
God’s Transcendence a Problem?
Among theological liberals, there has been rather strongly
stated opposition to what some label as “supernatural theism.” For example, the
noted British scholar Karen Armstrong has publicly rejected what she calls “the
God of supernatural theism.”
This
opposition is, in other words, a rejection of the transcendence of God, the
idea/belief that God is “above” and “beyond” the natural world that we humans
can know by science.
Since
there is a tendency to think that all knowledge of the physical world (nature) can
be obtained by modern scientific means, whatever is considered not a part of
nature is, therefore, supernatural.
Consequently,
belief in a “supernatural” Creator of heaven and earth, the concept of God who
is somehow not completely an integral part of the natural world, is rejected.
For modern people, for whom liberal thinkers seek to speak,
the transcendence or “otherness” of God—or the “infinite
qualitative distinction” between God and human beings that Kierkegaard
emphasized—is seen as a problem to be overcome by a newer, more enlightened,
view of God.
Is
God’s “Domestication” the Answer?
Over
the last seventy years especially, many liberal theologians and philosophers
have rejected the concept of God’s transcendence by emphasizing the complete
immanence of God.
William
C. Placher was a leading postliberal theologian in the United States. Back in
1996, he published a book titled The
Domestication of Transcendence: How Modern Thinking about God Went Wrong.
In his book, Placher (1948~2008) contended that the
shift from a transcendental theism to an immanental pantheism led to what he
calls (and titles his fifth chapter) “the domestication of God”—a pregnant
phrase that indicates a significant aspect of the limits of liberal thinking
about God.
That
is part of the reason that Scottish philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre quipped in
1966, “Theists are offering atheists less and less in which to disbelieve.”
What
about Experience of God?
In
the fall of 1957, I began my final two years of college as a transfer student
at William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri. One of my courses that fall was
Philosophy of Religion.
Professor Murray Hunt chose Philosophy of Religion as our textbook. It
was authored by the Quaker scholar D. Elton Trueblood, Professor of
Philosophy at Earlham College, and published earlier that year.
Because
of that course and Trueblood’s book, the philosophy of religion became my main
academic interest, and it remained so for decades.
Part
II, the heart of Trueblood’s book, is titled “Theistic Realism,” which,
although he doesn’t use those words, is a rebuttal/rejection of the movement
toward the domestication of God.
Trueblood begins “The
Theistic Hypothesis,” the first chapter of Part II, with these words: “God,
when carefully defined, either is or is not.” He then goes on to explain,
To say that God “is” means to give assent to the proposition that the idea of God is not merely an idea in the minds of men, but actually refers to what is objectively the case—something which was before we came to be aware of it and which now is, independent of our awareness or lack of awareness (p. 79).
Those
who have sought to domesticate God have often spoken of the “God within” human
beings. Thus, God is understood as a subjective experience of individual
persons. This stands in contrast to the theistic realism Trueblood expounds,
and his position, I believe, is far more coherent.
The
last chapter of Part II is “The Evidence of Religious Experience.” I was
studying philosophy of religion because I was preparing to become a
Christian pastor—and I was preparing for that vocation (literally) because of
what I firmly believed, and still believe, was a definite “call” by God.
My
experience was not highly ecstatic or “otherworldly.” It was much more like the
“still small voice” that the prophet Elijah heard (according to 1 Kings 19:12,
KJV). But it was unquestionably real.
Those
who wish to domesticate God would explain my, and Elijah’s, experience as only
a subjective one. But I am convinced that making everything related to God
subjective, or immanent, is one of the debilitating limits of liberalism.