Christian Theology We Cannot Adequately

Christian Theology

We cannot adequately represent the fullness of God within the confines of human language and discourse. The author is correct to assert that it is a difficult activity to address the concept of God. God is beyond the realm of human contemplation, yet, at the same time, our experiences allow us to frame God in terms of our own understanding and beliefs about the nature of things. This leads to inadvertent misrepresentations of the divine. Changes in human experience modify the misrepresentations of God; modifications improve the picture of God but can never complete capture the reality.

The languages employed by religions to speak of God are severely limited in their ability to hold and transfer the content that is necessary to represent God. This is a necessary weakness of religious discourse, since religious discourse draws its symbolic content for expression from the experiences of the humans creating that discourse. When we speak about God, we are immediately aware that any statements made are woefully inadequate as representations of deity. Language is both the vehicle that opens us up to the things of God, and simultaneously hides the complete truth about God from inspection due to its limitations.

We may even go further, Taylor asserts that for much of theology, God is the logos, and when we speak, we are relating to an aspect of God (596). The logos or word is an expression of God and contains aspects of God. The immediate conundrum may be the process by which humans are able to excise the truth of the "Logos" from the ordinary and common language that is employed to capture and express infinite concepts.

Theology, which is the study of God, is therefore delving into a mystery using tools forged by individuals who have never seen the mystery. Accurate knowledge of this mystery is unattainable via the mechanisms that are available at present. The mystery that is God must therefore provide the understanding of the mystery and this understanding requires that eternal truths and immortal concepts be transferred to mortal and frail creatures. To accomplish this transfer requires that the content of the message be altered or downgraded so that those who lack the capacity to apprehend it in its original form can comprehend it. While we may apply thought to understand what is revealed, care must be taken not to digress into the path of natural theology giving supremacy to reason at the expense of revelation (Matthews 101)

This downgrading of the content of the mystery does not influence the mystery itself. We may term the downgrading process revelation. The designed and initiation of the revelatory process is accomplished by God. In the revelatory process, some of the depth and indescribable elements of the divine are lost. They cannot be translated into human language, thought or experiences. The gulf between the human thought and the immortal God is a gaping chasm. This chasm is never quite bridged by language.