Topics in Philosophy of Religion (PL 361)
Concepts of God
Dr. Bill Myers, fall, 2007
TTH 2:00-3:20, HC 004
Office: HC 222; Office phone: 226-4868; email: bmyers@bsc.edu
Office Hours: MW 12-2:00; 3:30-4:00; TTH 12:30-1:30, and by appt
Course Description:
Philosophy of religion is the activity of critically examining basic religious beliefs: that there is some sort of divine existence (God), that this being has (or has not) certain attributes (omniscience, omnipotence, omnibenevolence, etc.), that the existence of evil is consistent with this divine existence, etc. In order to engage in such a critical examination, it is essential to understand the belief, to explicate it fully, for only then is it possible to critically evaluate the reasons given for and against the belief, with a view to determining whether there is any rational justification for holding that belief (or system of beliefs) to be true or false. But, beliefs do not arise ex nihilo; that is, our individual beliefs emerge from a background and an historical context. In order to understand why a particular belief is held, it is necessary also to understand the situation that gave rise to that belief. In this course, then, we will not simply look at isolated beliefs about religion, but we will work to understand the systems that gave rise to these beliefs so that they may be evaluated on their own merits. The units in the course, then, will be few, but they will be covered in great depth.
In this particular course, we'll be examining the notion of God as it has been developed in the western tradition. We will start by critically considering the traditional God of the theologians and philosophers (the omni-God). We will then develop an alternative view (process theology) that is critical of that tradition. We will then examine what various views of God suggest about the age old problem of evil.
Texts:
Religion in the Making, Alfred North Whitehead.
The Divine Relativity, Charles Hartshorne.
Encountering Evil, Stephen T. Davis, editor, 2001.
“Hartshorne, Whitehead and the
Religious Availability of God” by William T. Myers
A packet of readings.
Grading:
Class Report: 20%
Short Paper: 20%
Discussion Questions: 15%
Term Paper: 30%
Class Participation: 15%
REQUIREMENTS:
1) Attendance and informed contribution to class discussion. This is a small, upper level class, so attendance and participation are essential for its success. I expect all of us to diligently work at reading and understanding the material. Excessive absences (more than 4) will result in the lowering of a final letter grade by one full letter. Any more absences than that will jeopardize your making a passing grade in the class.
2) Short papers. You will be required to write two (2) short papers, no less than three, not much more than five pages long. One of these papers will serve as your class report, and as such will be presented to the class. For the presentation paper, you must provide me and all of students in the class with a copy of the paper at or before the class in which it is to be read. Each paper is to be typed and double spaced. The papers should contain a significant amount of critical analysis which is focused on some claim or argument made by or relevant to the author of the material assigned. Mere exposition should be kept to a minimum, as each of us (in the best of all possible worlds) will have already read the relevant material. An acceptable alternative will be a clarification paper that sheds light on some particularly dense or puzzling passage from the reading. If the presenter wishes, the paper may be rewritten and handed in within two weeks. Please note that everyone must do either a presentation or a paper by October 9.
3) Discussion questions. Periodically, I will hand out discussion questions to accompany the readings for the following class period. They will serve mainly to focus your reading and to provide grist for our class discussion. These are informal and should amount to no more than about a page in length. They may be handwritten. I will not take them late, and they cannot be made up.
4) Term paper. At our scheduled final exam time, you will turn in a typed, double spaced, 10 (8-12) page paper. This paper should be a critical discussion of some issue relevant to the material assigned or discussed in class. I will pass out more specific information on the assignment as the semester progresses.
Course Schedule
Unit One: The Traditional God: Aquinas and the Neo-Thomists
8/30: Course introduction. The Divine Attributes.
9/4: Omnipotence
9/6: Omniscience
9/11: Omnibenevolence and evil
9/13: The metaphysical attributes.
9/18: The problem of compossibility.
9/20: Where did these come from? The Biblical record.
Unit Two: Process Theology
9/25: Whitehead's Philosophy of Religion.
9/27: Whitehead, continued.
10/2: Whitehead, continued
10/4: Whitehead, continued
10/9: A broader introduction to Whitehead's system.
10/11: Religion in
10/16: Hartshorne's Neoclassical Theism
10/23: Hartshorne, chapter 1 continued, rest of chapter
10/25: Hartshorne's Neo-Classical Theism
10/30: Hartshorne, chapter 2 continued, through page 100.
11/1: Hartshorne's Neo-Classical Theism.
11/6 Hartshorne, chapter 3 continued, and “Whitehead, Hartshorne, and the Religious Availability of God,”
Unit Three: The Problem of Evil.
11/8: Guest Speaker, Dr. Saban Ali Duzgun
11/13: Chapter One: Roth, critiques and rejoinder (Grimes)
11/15: Chapter Two: Hick, critiques and rejoinder (Reena or
11/20: Chapter Three:
11/22: Thanksgiving
11/27: Chapter Four:
11/29: Chapter Five: Phillips, critiques and rejoinder.
12/4: Davis and Adams
12/12: Final paper due in my office by 1:00 pm SHARP!
!