Donovan – Overview Philosophy A2

Donovan’s Argument - Overview Question: Does ‘experience of God’ give us ‘knowledge of God’? Argument 1 : Some know God by ‘intuition’ [Owen] But : ‘feeling certain’ is not the same as ‘being right’ Argument 2: God can be known by ‘encounter’ [Buber] But: encounter may be untrustworthy 1: the sense of encounter may be mistaken 2: ‘experience of’ depends on ‘knowledge about’ 3: ‘experience of’ is not the same as ‘knowledge about’ Conclusion: ‘experience of God’ is not ‘knowledge of God’ Religious Experience is still of philosophical interest

Key ideas, words, phrases 1. Give a definition/explanation of each of these pairs as Donovan uses them Experience of God – Knowledge of God Feeling Certain – Being Right Experience of – Knowledge about 2. Explain what Donovan means by, or how he uses these words Intuition Knowledge Encounter

Donovan Throughout the passage, Donovan raises the question whether we can know God by experience. On one hand he argues for knowing God through intuition On the other hand, he puts forward several arguments against being able to know God through experience.

• He states that we must take seriously knowledge arising from inner conviction. • The intuition of God’s reality underlines all Christian experience. • The idea that we know God intuitively fits in with the Biblical picture. • Enables an account to be given of the human account of God – faith. • It is God using his creation to reveal himself. • If a religion like Christianity is true, it is very likely that there are situations in which people are directly aware of God’s reality and activity, within the experiences and situations of life.

• Buber argues that relationships with God are I-You relationships, direct, reciprocal, person-to-person. Just like you do not make friends on empirical facts but something different and intuitive. • Personal encounters can’t be put into words. This inexpressibility at the heart of an interpersonal relationship supports the view that God is to be known. • Religious knowing is not just a possession of facts or information, it is an experience of total involvement.

• It is inappropriate to try and force a direct encounter with God into the mould of scientific information or knowledge about expecting them to provide accurate descriptions or meet objective tests. • Criticism do nothing at all to show that awareness of God is illusory. • No justification for taking such an all or nothing approach view of religious experience.  • It is a risky business claiming to know something with no proof. • A person could be confused by ignorance or blinded by prejudice. • The total weakness of relying on belief of knowledge. • Cannot check the reality against our feelings – psychological and rational certainty. • ‘If you only have intuitive feeling of certainty to go on, how do you know you are having that feeling, perhaps your memory of ‘the intuitive feel’ is letting you down’.

• A person may only have reliable intuitions in some situations • A person may only have reliable intuitions in some situations. • The feeling of certainty does not make one right. • Russel uses the example of love, deception is constantly practiced. • Does not seem sufficient enough to accept intuition, non- inferential knowledge in such everyday areas as sense perception, or awareness of other minds. • Idea of knowing purely by intuition seems to become less plausible the more the …… • Just because we have some acceptable means of knowing by intuition, does not follow that there is an intuitive ‘way of knowing’ open to be used in other cases as well.  •‘Sense of encounter’ may be mistaken, as Russel said, our apparent intuitions about other people can be wildly astray.

•Relatively normal situations shown in plays or on TV remind us of how easily a genuine I-You relationship can turn out to be something different – misinterpretation. •Having ‘experience of’ presupposes having ‘knowledge about’. •Unless the believer is in a position to supplement the experience with a good deal of already available knowledge about God. Without knowledge about what is being experienced, experience ‘of’ points no more towards God than towards any other possible reason.

•Just because you have experience of something for yourselves, what does first hand experience supply that second hand experience does not have? •One must have prior knowledge otherwise first hand knowledge means nothing. •Trying to treat religious knowledge as a form of knowledge.