Unknowable in the context of "God"

⭐ In the context of religious belief, how does the role of 'God' fundamentally differ between monotheistic and polytheistic systems?

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⭐ Core Definition: Unknowable

In philosophy, unknowability is the possibility of inherently unaccessible knowledge. It addresses the epistemology of that which cannot be known. Some related concepts include the limits of knowledge, ignorabimus, unknown unknowns, the halting problem, and chaos theory.

Nicholas Rescher provides the most recent focused scholarship for this area in Unknowability: An Inquiry into the Limits of Knowledge, where he offered three high level categories, logical unknowability, conceptual unknowability, and in-principle unknowability.

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👉 Unknowable in the context of God

In monotheistic religious belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. In polytheistic belief, a god is "a spirit or being believed to have created, or for controlling some part of the universe or life, for which such a deity is often worshipped". Belief in the existence of at least one deity, who may interact with the world, is called theism.

Conceptions of God vary considerably. Many notable theologians and philosophers have developed arguments for and against the existence of God. Atheism rejects the belief in any deity. Agnosticism is the belief that the existence of God is unknown or unknowable. Some theists view knowledge concerning God as derived from faith. God is often conceived as the greatest entity in existence. God is often believed to be the cause of all things and so is seen as the creator, sustainer, and ruler of the universe. God is often thought of as incorporeal and independent of the material creation, which was initially called pantheism, although church theologians, in attacking pantheism, described pantheism as the belief that God is the material universe itself. God is sometimes seen as omnibenevolent, while deism holds that God is not involved with humanity apart from creation.

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Unknowable in the context of Agnostic

Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, the divine, or the supernatural is either unknowable in principle or unknown in fact. It can also mean an apathy towards such religious belief and refer to personal limitations rather than a worldview. Another definition is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficient rational grounds to justify either the belief that God exists or the belief that God does not exist."

The English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley said that he originally coined the word agnostic in 1869 "to denote people who, like [himself], confess themselves to be hopelessly ignorant concerning a variety of matters [including the matter of God's existence], about which metaphysicians and theologians, both orthodox and heterodox, dogmatise with the utmost confidence." Earlier thinkers had written works that promoted agnostic points of view, such as Sanjaya Belatthiputta, a 5th-century BCE Indian philosopher who expressed agnosticism about any afterlife; and Protagoras, a 5th-century BCE Greek philosopher who expressed agnosticism about the existence of "the gods".

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LINKED FROM (PARENTS)
← God ← Agnostic ← Agnosticism ← Monotheistic God ← Nature of God
LINKS TO (CHILDREN)
Philosophy → Knowledge → Epistemology → Ignorabimus → There are unknown unknowns → Halting problem → Chaos theory → Nicholas Rescher →