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From: mrh@cybvax0.UUCP (Mike Huybensz)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: How do you know
Message-ID: <198@cybvax0.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 29-Oct-84 13:07:41 EST
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Posted: Mon Oct 29 13:07:41 1984
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> Charley Wingate    umcp-cs!manGoe
> We are left with the possibility of knowing God in the way that we know
> our parents, the form expressed in French by the verb "connaitre": knowing
> God as a person.  The theologians claim that this is in fact the way that
> we can know God, and it becomes clearer when we rephrase the initial
> quotation as "Be still, and RECOGNIZE that I am God."  We know God not
> by historical facts, not by scientific observation and deduction, but by
> recognizing him in his traces in the world, and sometimes face to face.

Ah.  Finally we're getting "knowing god" pinned down.  Thanks for the
clarification, Charley.

Now, let's talk about this sense of knowing.  What is it worth?  There are two
major ways that this knowledge may be worth nothing.  The first if it is
unjustifiably specific, and the second if the subject is ficticious.  For
example, I may know that someone hates me, when in actuality he doesn't care.
That may be like "god hates sinners" when in actuality god may not care.
Or I may know the character of Hawkeye Pierce very well: yet he is just a
character in a TV show, in some ways quite dissimilar from the actor, the
writers, etc.

So what good is that "knowing"?  Everybody "knows" differently.  There is
no way to tie the knowing to reality (as there would be with a parent)
because your ideas are entirely subjective (wheras with a parent, someone
else can hear what the parent says to you or about you, or knows if your
parent is dead, etc.)  It seems obvious to me that the method of "knowing
god" is at best a misnomer, and might be a poor strategy for one's life.
-- 

Mike Huybensz				...mit-eddie!cybvax0!mrh