The difference between God from revelation and God from reason

By God from revelation I mean that believers depend for their knowledge of God's existence on disclosures about God from God Himself, like for Christians the disclosures are contained in the Bible, for Muslims the disclosures are contained in the Koran.

By God from reason I mean that adherents to God's existence depend on their faculty of reason to come to the existence of God.

Here I play the role of coming to God's existence from reason.

The big difference between the believers in God from revelation, for example, Christians, is that they have to accept mysteries of their religion.

What about me? No need to believe in mysteries, just that what I have reasoned out to be facts and truths about God.

a reply to: Pachomius
Here is another way of understanding the difference between them.
Supposing a man comes up to you, shakes you by the hand, and says "Let me introduce myself. I am..."
You have a choice. You can stop and listen to what he says, or perhaps learn about what he has said to other people.

Or you can close your eyes, refuse to touch him or listen to him, and say to yourself "I am not going to learn anything about that person by use of the senses. I am going to discover about his existence by pure reasoning alone."
Which of those two approaches is going to be the most effective way of getting to know him?

a reply to: Pachomius
The same is true for me.

I shed all the Catholic teachings and approached it from a complete new, undogmatic viewpoint.

It just didn't feel right, never did, the way it was taught to me. So instead of turning to a book, I turned to nature as I see God in there, not in a text book.

And God seems to be fair to all of it's beings. They all get born and die, it's fair. There is no help in between, only guidance. Praying to / asking God for something other than positive energy is, in my eyes, a face slap towards God.

For me God is the Energy of Life that lives in every being, even plants. Shape and timeless.

Dear Dis, my position is that in God from revelation, God wants to tell me about His existence, while in God from reason I seek to know God exists by reasoning on facts and truths.

However, I see that you describe my position in this way:
"I am not going to learn anything about that person by use of the senses. I am going to discover about his existence by pure reasoning alone."

By God from reason I do use the senses, otherwise how can I reason on anything at all, for humans like you and me, we get our knowledge of the world through our senses, and then we reason out what are facts and truths about the world.

And I also read what people who know God from revelation like from the Bible, what they know to be facts and truths, grounding themselves on Biblical texts.

So, my finding is that people who get their facts and truths from revelation, they believe in mysteries, while I by reasoning on my knowledge ultimately grounded on sense and consciousness and intelligence, I don't encounter mysteries.

And I have this definition of God:
"God is the permanent and self-existent creator and operator of man and the universe and everything transient."

What about you, what is your definition of God, as one who knows God exists, from the Bible?

originally posted by: DISRAELI
a reply to: Pachomius
Here is another way of understanding the difference between them.
Supposing a man comes up to you, shakes you by the hand, and says "Let me introduce myself. I am..."
You have a choice. You can stop and listen to what he says, or perhaps learn about what he has said to other people.

Or you can close your eyes, refuse to touch him or listen to him, and say to yourself "I am not going to learn anything about that person by use of the senses. I am going to discover about his existence by pure reasoning alone."
Which of those two approaches is going to be the most effective way of getting to know him?

a reply to: Pachomius

I know him well. His Holy Spirit in dwells me. He speaks and guides me, just as long as I dont grieve or extinguish the Holy Spirit. When I grieve the Holy spirit, he chastises me, until I return to Him.
I absolutely love the Lord

originally posted by: visitedbythem
a reply to: Pachomius

I know him well. His Holy Spirit in dwells me. He speaks and guides me, just as long as I dont grieve or extinguish the Holy Spirit. When I grieve the Holy spirit, he chastises me, until I return to Him.
I absolutely love the Lord

You are speaking as one who knows God from revelation, in your case it is the Bible.

Do you recall this text from the Apostles Creed, "I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic church"?

Yes, religion from revelation is very comforting.

a reply to: Pachomius
The Biblical name of God translates as "He who is".
I've alredy given you my more descriptive definition.

Had some difficulty trying to differentiate what your trying to present. So technically your implying that the God of the Bible scriptures, or Revelations is a sad attempt to ascertain and explain said diety, while it would pale in comparison to the actual diety itself, more or less?

Can you define God starting with his role as creator of man and everything else He has created, instead of "He who is"?

And dear Dis, if I may, please just say what you had already said earlier, so that I don't have to figure out what you did say earlier.

originally posted by: DISRAELI
a reply to: Pachomius
The Biblical name of God translates as "He who is".
I've alredy given you my more descriptive definition.

a reply to: Pachomius
You mean this? As previosuly posted.

More than a decade ago, a philospher on this site challenged Christians to supply a definition of their God, and the answer I gave is below;

+++ +++

Let's make it a really trinitarian one;

God is a Creator
God is one who Communicates
God is one who becomes Incarnate

God is a Creator

I see this view as distinct from both Monism and Dualism.

As I understand the difference;
Monism resolves everything to one point of origin.
Dualism resolves everything to two points of origin, distinct and independent.

Creation theory falls short of being genuine Monism, because the created universe is understood as distinct from God.

Creation theory falls short of being genuine Dualism, because the created universe is understood as dependent upon God.

My private theory is that Creation teaching ought to be called "One-and-a-half-ism", but I don't suppose it will catch on.

As far as I can see, this involves the traditional teaching of "ex nihilo" ("out of nothing") Creation.

Because if God is "creating" using pre-existing raw material, then the material is not genuinely dependent upon him- this has become Dualism.

Or if God is producing the material of the universe "out of himself", then the material is not genuinely distinct- this has become Monism.

"Ex nihilo" is the only logical alternative, which is presumably why the teaching was developed in the first place.

God is one who Communicates

This assumption is built into Biblical religion.

In the first place, the Bible is believed to contain examples of communication (as reported, for example, by the prophets).

Furthermore, the Bible is believed to reflect a policy of communication.
It is said that God is using the Bible to "reveal himself", and so Biblical religion used to be described as "revealed religion".

The belief that "God is one who Communicates" links back with the belief that "God is one who Creates".

In the first place, some of the content of the communication points to God as Creator.

The proper Biblical answer to the question "Why do you believe your God made the universe?" is not really "Becasue that's the only way to account for the universe."
The truly Biblical answer is "Because he says he did, and I believe him."

But I think the very act of communication also points to God as a Creator.

Any act of communication necessarily implies a distinction between the communicator and the other party.
I've already said the Biblical understanding of Creation involves a distinction between God and the universe.

An act of communication implies the existence of a "will" in the communicator, or at least some sort of analogy of one.
But the same could be said, surely, of an act of "Creation".

Finally, a God who creates a universe thereby sets up a relationship between himself and the universe.
The effect of communication is to set up a relationship between himself and individuals (or even a group of individuals) within the same universe.

I assume that a purely monistic deity would not be communicating with, or setting up a relationship with, parts of itself.

My point is that
The idea of the God who Creates
and the idea of the God who Communicates
are very akin to one another.

The kind of God who would Create would also be the kind of God who could Communicate.

God is one who becomes Incarnate

I could hardly, really, leave this out of a definition of the Christian God.

The understanding is that the Incarnation is a more direct presence of God within the created universe.

If this is true, it's the ultimate form of Communication, as the author of Hebrews points out;
"God spoke of old to our fathers by the prophets
but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son".

But it's also the ultimate form of "establishing a relationship";

Because the doctrine of the Incarnation is that the Creator and his creation, divinity and humanity, are bound together within the person of the Son.
The bond is understood to be irrevocable.
It's impossible for a relationship to get any closer than that.

Anyone who tries to understand the church's teaching about the Incarnation will discover that it's all about finding the right "balance".

On the one hand, the distinction between the divinity and the humanity must not be exaggerated, to the point that the unity disappears.
O the other hand, the unity between them must not be exaggerated, to the point that the distinction disappears.
The correct position is somewhere halfway between the two extremes.

But this is exactly what I said, at the beginning of this piece, about Creation;
That it occupied a halfway position between Monism and Dualism.

So it seems to me that the "balancing act" which Jehovah's Witnesses love to mock, when it comes in the teaching about the Incarnation, is also inherent in the very doctrine of the Creation itself.

The kind of God who would Create is also the kind of God who could become Incarnate.


I began by naming the Christian God as
The one who Creates
The one who Communicates
The one who becomes Incarnate.

I now suggest that these three ideas are akin to one another.
They belong together, naturally.

Whether you can believe them or not, they all belong to the same kind of God.

Dear Dis, thanks for your patience with me, I am into knowing God exists by reasoning from the existence of transient entities, incidentally when I use the word revelation I am not referring to the last book of the New Testament, but I mean disclosure.

You are into knowing God from the Bible which contains a lot of revelations, you are a Christian and I observe you know a lot of what Christian theologians talk about in re God's existence.

What am I leading to?

This text in the OP:
"The big difference between the believers in God from revelation, for example, Christians, is that they have to accept mysteries of their religion.

What about me? No need to believe in mysteries, just that what I have reasoned out to be facts and truths about God."

Are you, dear Dis, doing some pastoral work, i.e. like preaching to believers of the church you are a member of - if I may assume, and you bring in the difference between Monism and Dualism in your preachment?

originally posted by: Pachomius

What about me? No need to believe in mysteries, just that what I have reasoned out to be facts and truths about God."

So you have all the answers?
It seems every time a scientist comes up with a discovery, it only leads to more questions. The universe is unknown, dark matter, multi verses, string theory, the list of questions never shortens, it grows
Yet you understand this god you claim, though not it’s work?

Or maybe your God is no creator, doesn’t make it much more than a passenger

I understand the heart of my God, the reasoning and His objective
Maybe what you define as mystery, not a necessity for many.

So, what’s the pitch, sounds to good to be true, what are your beliefs, please share

My dad is a scientist as I have stated several times. He attended 8 colleges. He is 95, and has been featured in news paper headlines, summoned to the Whitehouse, he is also a math whiz (advanced math, Davis) and a bunch of other stuff. He found evidence of intelligent design many years ago. He is a scientist that wholeheartedly believes in God.

Also, take a look at out solar system. Look at the angle of Earth, the Moons job, the distance of Earth to the Moon and Sun, and a million other things. Someone would have to ignore a mountain of evidence to believe anything other then intelligent design.

originally posted by: Pachomius

originally posted by: visitedbythem
a reply to: Pachomius

I know him well. His Holy Spirit in dwells me. He speaks and guides me, just as long as I dont grieve or extinguish the Holy Spirit. When I grieve the Holy spirit, he chastises me, until I return to Him.
I absolutely love the Lord

You are speaking as one who knows God from revelation, in your case it is the Bible.

Do you recall this text from the Apostles Creed, "I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Holy Catholic church"?

Yes, religion from revelation is very comforting.

I have recited the Apostles Creed, but never with any mention about the Catholic church. It wasn't written by the Apostles that I know of, and none of the Apostles taught what the Catholic church teaches. I am not religious. I do attend church, and have attended many different types of Protestant churches in my life.

To me, religious means exactly what the Catholic religion, Jehovah's witnesses, Mormons, and many others do. They teach works. Thats the Opposite of my beliefs. I align with what Jesus ( Yeshua) and his disciples taught. That we are saved by faith, through the grace of God, and not by works, lest any man boast. Those who are performing works, and rituals, and all those types of things to earn eternal life, have unfortunately put themselves under the law. For those under the law, even one sin and you are a goner. Toast.

You cant put God into debt. He doesn't owe anyone anything. Those who perform works, are stating that Jesus death just isn't enough, but they are going to do something else to earn their own way. That's calling God a liar. That's an instant fail.

I know that your thread isn't about this subject, but since you brought up Catholicism, I thought Id clarify. Both my grandmothers were born Roman Catholics. One accepted Christ in her late 20s, and the other on her death bed. Both realized the paganism, and works lead to a dead end.

originally posted by: visitedbythem
I have recited the Apostles Creed, but never with any mention about the Catholic church.

Just to clarify on that point. The fuller Nicene Creed does say "catholic church", but the essential point is that the word "catholic" there does NOT mean what the modern Catholics think it does. They have hi-jacked the word and changed the meaning. It's like someone saying "you're not truly a democrat unless you belong to the Democrat party".

The word just means "universal". What Cranmer calls "the blessed company of all faithful people".

a reply to: Raggedyman

Dear Dis, please forgive me, but I am asking you:
"Are you, dear Dis, doing some pastoral work, i.e. like preaching to believers of the church you are a member of - if I may assume, and you bring in the difference between Monism and Dualism in your preachment?"

Please enlighten me.

No, I don't have all the answers, but for me God creates everything that is not God Himself. And that's not a mystery.

originally posted by: Raggedyman

originally posted by: Pachomius

What about me? No need to believe in mysteries, just that what I have reasoned out to be facts and truths about God."

So you have all the answers?
It seems every time a scientist comes up with a discovery, it only leads to more questions. The universe is unknown, dark matter, multi verses, string theory, the list of questions never shortens, it grows
Yet you understand this god you claim, though not it’s work?

Or maybe your God is no creator, doesn’t make it much more than a passenger

I understand the heart of my God, the reasoning and His objective
Maybe what you define as mystery, not a necessity for many.

So, what’s the pitch, sounds to good to be true, what are your beliefs, please share

a reply to: Pachomius
Not currently. When I was, I would confine myself to what was relevant to the topic of the day, which someobody else would choose, and easily understood within twenty minutes.
Or was that a rhetorical question? What is its purpose within the discussion?

a reply to: visitedbythem

I am sorry, dear Visit, that I gave you the idea that I mean by catholic church, the Roman Catholic Church, by catholic I mean universal: the text of the Apostles Creed I quoted must have been printed by Catholics that is why the letter c is capitalized.

a reply to: DISRAELI

You see, dear Dis, you are into what I might call deep theology, members of a church are generally lost when a preacher talks about about such, if I may, technical terms like Monism and Dualism - I guess you don't do that.