Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 23.djvu/291

Rh THEOLOGY 273 act on man by the direct manifestation of His absolute essence, nor does man know God by immediate vision. Take away the physical and moral worlds and the written word and the Incarnate Word of God suppose, that is to say, both general and special revelation removed and an impassable chasm will separate man from God and all religion be destroyed. The revelation in nature and the reve lation through particular inspiration and intervention, however, bridge over this chasm, and consequently religion is everywhere found existing in some form. But even revelation would be useless if man had not faculties to apprehend it and to avail him self of it. The communion of man with God supposes powers of communion in man as well as in God. It can only be realized through religious faculties and processes which can be analysed and which have laws of exercise and evolution that can be traced. Further, religion has a history which shows how man has interpreted or misinterpreted the revelations made to him, what forms religion has assumed in various lands and ages, and how these forms the religions of the world have arisen and spread, developed and decayed, influenced one another and affected morality, civilization, and general history. Thus religion, from its very nature or idea, requires us to treat (1) of the object of religion (God), (2) of the subject in religion (man), and (3) of the media and process of religion, or, in other words, (a) of the modes of Divine manifestation, (6) of the powers of human apprehension of the Divine, and (c) of religion itself as a kind of psychical life. All the special theological sciences deal with some of these themes, or some portion or portions of some of these themes, in certain aspects, but the philosophy or general science of religion deals with them all in their entirety and organic connectedness, the form appropriate to philosophy to science which comprehends and thereby transcends special sciences. For the philosophy of religion, as the highest discipline of theo logy, the most natural order to be followed in the treatment of its themes is probably that which has been indicated. It is the order which has been most commonly adopted in treatises that aimed at sys tematic completeness. God, man, God s manifestation of Himself to man, man s experience of God, and the development of religions, these are the topics, and such is, in the main, the order of their discussion, usually found in philosophies of religion properly so called. This is, however, because the philosophy of religion as a distinct discipline presupposes the results of the several special theological sciences. Theology ends as it begins, in unity ; but the unity in which it ends is very different from that in which it begins. It begins with the confused unity of common knowledge, the complex and undifferentiated germ of the theological sciences ; it ends with the unity of the clearest and deepest insight, in which all distinctions are at once recognized and reconciled. This last is the unity of that ultimate stage of theological knowledge which can alone claim to be philosophical as distinguished from scientific ; and it can only be reached by those who have attained to an adequate mastery of all the sciences conversant with religion. The philo sophical student of the whole must have studied scientifically its parts, know what is to be known about them, and make use of his knowledge in his own proper labours. The student of the parts needs to know only in a general way what religion is, and must follow in his studies an order of procedure determined by his lack or limitation of knowledge. The course by which the mind traverses the partial and special sciences of religion and rises to a philosophy of religion cannot be the same as that through which it unfolds a philosophy of religion itself, exhibits and confirms a religious theory of the universe, and harmonizes and elucidates all results of theo logical research and all varieties of religious phenomena. The philosophy of religion is itself, of course, special in relation to philosophy, of which it is only a department. And there may even be a special kind or form of the philosophy of religion, if that kind or form be general enough to include a natural group of theo logical sciences and to have regard to their collective effects. A special religion may be so significant, so important, and the subject of so many theological disciplines as to render indispensable the division alike of the philosophy and of the sciences of religion into general and special. Christianity, as the most perfect form of religion, the fullest revelation of spiritual truth, the source and theme of a large group of sciences, is such a religion. Hence there may be, and should be, not only a philosophy of religion but a philosophy of Christianity, not only a generically religious but a specifically Christian theory of the universe. If the claims of Christianity be warranted, if in it religion and revelation were consummated, the philosophy of religion can only reach a satis factory conclusion when it has passed into a philosophy of Christi anity, or, in other words, attained such a comprehension of existence and life in relation to the person and work of Christ as is possible to the human spirit. The philosophy of Christianity must obviously be connected with all Christian disciplines in the same manner as the philosophy of religion is with all other theological disciplines. History The history of the philosophy of religion has, of course, been of philo- closely conjoined with the histories both of theology and of sophy of philosophy, and influenced by all the causes which have affected religion, them. In the wide sense of religious reflexion it is as old as either philosophy or theology. As a distinct department of philosophy, and the highest and most comprehensive theological science, it is of comparatively recent origin, and, indeed, younger than many a living individual ; but even in this latter sense the whole histories both of philosophy and of theology have been needed as the preparation and foundation for it. It could only appear in its alone adequate form when both philosophy and theology were highly developed, when both had freed themselves from the yoke of all authority save that of truth and reason, when both had discovered their appropriate methods, when they could so combine as to do no violence to the proper nature of either a kind of combination most difficult to accomplish. But this, as might easily be shown, was not before philosophy and theology became at once critical and speculative, or, in other words, before that great revolution of thought with which the names of Kant, Hegel, and Schleiermacher are so gloriously associated. Only in the present century have philosophy and theology reached the stage in which they can unite and produce a philosophy of religion. And within the century many philosophies of religion have made their appear ance, especially in Germany. Indeed, all the more eminent philo sophers of Germany have fully recognized that a philosophy of religion is a most essential department of philosophy. That not a few of the so-called philosophies of religion produced have been very defective and erroneous is only what was to be expected. The worth of a man s philosophy of religion cannot be greater than the worth of his philosophy and theology in general. It is impossible that the philosophy of religion of an Hegelian and a Neokantist can accord, very possible that both may be far remote from the truth. If empiricism, positivism, or materialism be true philosophy, or if authority be the foundation of religion and the standard of theo logy, a philosophy of religion must be illegitimate and superfluous. When religion is assumed to consist merely of beliefs, emotions, and actions which have no objective grounds, no real and rational basis, its development can only be an object of history and of psychological analysis, and there can be no philosophy of religion, but simply a science of religions, which, seeing that it deals entirely with certain forms of mental disease and delusion, must be deemed merely a department of mental pathology. A philo sophy essentially religious must combine with a theology essentially rational in order to yield what deserves to be called a philosophy of religion. If religion be the living apprehension and enjoyment of the truth which philosophy has for its mission to seek to com prehend, then, but only then, must a philosophy of religion be necessary alike to philosophy and religion. 1 We now pass to special theological disciplines which can at the Special utmost merely become sciences as distinguished from philosophy, theo- They all deal with religion, each of them treating of some particular logical portion or aspect of it ; and the order and mode in which they do sciences: so determines their relations to one another and the order of their succession. If we would rise, for example, through study of the parts or phases of religion in a sure and natural manner to a knowledge of it as a whole, we must necessarily begin with what of it is nearest and most accessible to us. But what is so is its history. In its historical manifestation it is a phenomenon which Historical; no one can refuse to acknowledge. The history itself, however, is not only a most extensive but a very complex phenomenon. It is external and internal, corporeal and spiritual, a history of outward events and actions, institutions and rites, and also of ideas, con victions, and affections. What is external is nearer and more accessible to us than what is internal, and it is through the former that we must penetrate into the latter. They cannot be quite separated, for the external is only intelligible through the inter nal, and the internal only attainable and verifiable through the external ; but they can be so far differentiated, and there is a history mainly of what is external in religion and another mainly of what is internal. The ordinary history of religion is mainly concerned with tracing the growth of religion in its most apparent form and institutional character. It may be divided into three great sections the ethnic, Biblical, and ecclesiastical, the history of the heathen religions, the history of the Jewish religion and of the rise of Christianity, and the history of the Christian church. i There is a laborious and impartial history of the philosophy of religion by Bernhard Piinjer, Geschichte der c/irist lichen Religionsphilosophie, 2 vols., 1880- 83. Of this valuable work an English translation is soon to appear. Some chapters of the history have been ably written by 0. Pfleiderer in his Religions- philosophie auf geschichtl icher Grundlage, 1884, a first volume of a translation of which has been published. For a list of works on the philosophy of religion the last edition of Hagenbach may be consnlted. Here the following only can be mentioned : Hegel, Philosophic der Religion, 2 vols., 1832 ; Krause, Die absolute Religionsphilosophie, 2 vols., 1835 ; Ohlert, Religionsphilosophie in ihrer Ueberein- stimmung mit Vernunft, Geschichte, und Offenbarung, 1835 ; Billroth, Vorlesungen iiber Religionsphilosophie, 1837 ; Steffens, Christliche Religionsphilosophie, 2 vols., 1839 ; Taute, Religionsphilosophie, com Standpunkte der Philosophie Herbarts, 2 parts, 1840-S2 ; Rothe. Theologische Ethik, 3 vols., 1845 ; AVeisse, Philosophische Dogmatik oder Philosophie des Christmthums, 3 vols., 1855-62 ; Apelt, Religions philosophie, 1860; Stb ckl, Lehrbuch der Religionsphilosophie, 2ded., 1878 ; Lotze, Grundztige der Religionsphilosophie, 1882; Von Hartmann, Religion des Geistes, 1883; Teichmuller, Religionsphilosophie, 1886; llorell, Philosophy of Religion, 1849 ; Caird, Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion, 1876; Morris, Philosophy and Christianity. 1883. XXHL 35