{"id":9951,"date":"2012-02-10T13:33:07","date_gmt":"2012-02-10T13:33:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/02\/10\/cottingham-on-the-origin-of-the-religious-impulse\/"},"modified":"2012-02-10T13:33:07","modified_gmt":"2012-02-10T13:33:07","slug":"cottingham-on-the-origin-of-the-religious-impulse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2012\/02\/10\/cottingham-on-the-origin-of-the-religious-impulse\/","title":{"rendered":"Cottingham, Wittgenstein, and the Religious Impulse"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Cottingham, On the Meaning of Life <\/em>(Routledge 2003), p. 52:<\/span><\/p>\n

     . . . the whole of the religious impulse arises from the profound<\/span>
     sense we have of a gap between how we are and how we would wish to<\/span>
     be . . . .<\/span><\/p>\n

This is not quite right, as it seems to me, even if '"would wish to be" is read as "ought to be."   The sense of the gap  between 'is' and 'ought' is undoubtedly part of the religious impulse,  but there is more to it than this. It must be accompanied by the sense that the gaping chasm between the miserable wretches we are and what  we know we ought to be cannot be bridged by human effort, whether  individual or collective, but requires help from beyond the human-all-too-human.   Otherwise, the religious sensibility would  collapse into the ethical sensibility. There is more to religion than ethics. The irreligious can be aware of the discrepancy between what  we are and what we should be. The religious are convinced of the need for moral improvement together with a realization of their impotence in bringing it about by their own efforts.<\/span><\/p>\n

I had an undergraduate professor whose symbol for religion was:<\/span><\/p>\n

 \"Rx_symbol\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

I like that because it conveys that religion is for the sick.  And sick we are.  An awareness of our root sickness is an element in the religious sensibility.  Dubious as Wittgenstein's philosophy of religion<\/a> is, he is absolutely on target in the following observation:<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

People are religious to the extent that they believe themselves to be not so much imperfect<\/em> (unvollkommen<\/strong>), as ill<\/em> (krank<\/strong>).  Any man who is half-way decent will think himself extremely imperfect, but a religious man thinks himself wretched<\/em> (elend<\/strong>). (Culture and Value<\/em>, U. of Chicago Press, 1980, tr. Winch, p. 45e, emphasis in original)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

John Cottingham, On the Meaning of Life (Routledge 2003), p. 52:      . . . the whole of the religious impulse arises from the profound     sense we have of a gap between how we are and how we would wish to     be . . . . This is not quite right, as it seems to … Continue reading “Cottingham, Wittgenstein, and the Religious Impulse”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[139,275],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9951","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-religion","category-wittgenstein"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9951"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9951\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}