上帝是不可透知的God Is Incomprehensible

作者:  R.C. Sproul  譯者: Maria Marta

https://www.ligonier.org/blog/god-incomprehensible/

https://plus.google.com/u/1/106695469993489516884/posts/bokgmE5zRj2

關於上帝我們可以知道些什麽？這是最基本的神學問題，因為關於上帝我們所知道的事，和我們是否知道有關上帝的任何事，取決於我們研究的範圍和內容。在此我們必須考量歷史上最偉大的神學家的教導，他們都確信「上帝的不可透知性」（incomprehensibility）。他們使用「不可透知」一詞，並非指某些我們根本無從理解或知道的事。從神學上講，說上帝是不可透知的，並非說上帝是全然不可知的。也就是說，我們當中沒有一個人能透徹理解上帝。

不可透知與宗教改革的關鍵原則有關-----有限的不能掌握(或包容)無限的。人類是有限的受造物，所以我們的思想總是從有限的角度思考。我們在一個有限的平面上生存、活動、存在，而上帝在無限中生存、活動、存在。我們有限的理解不可能包含無限的主題，因此上帝是不可透知的。這種觀念代表一種約束和平衡，目的是提醒我們，免得我們認為我們已經完全獲得和精通與上帝有關的事的所有細節。我們的有限總是限制我們對上帝的理解。

誤解上帝不可透知的教義，我們很容易陷入兩個嚴重的錯誤。第一個錯誤：既然上帝是不可透知的，祂必定是全然不可知的，而我們說有關祂的任何事都是胡言亂語。但基督教肯定上帝的理性的同時也肯定上帝的不可透知性。在明白上帝方面我們的頭腦思維太有限，因此我們需要上帝的啟示。但祂的啟示是可理解的，而不是非理性的。祂的啟示既不是胡言亂語，也不是廢話。不可透知的上帝精確地啟示祂自己。

這裏我們間接提到上帝既隱藏又啟示的宗教改革原則。上帝有一個神秘的維度是我們不知道的。然而，我們並沒有被留在黑暗當中，摸索著尋找一個隱藏的上帝。上帝也啟示祂自己，這是基督教信仰的基礎。基督教是啟示性的宗教。造物主上帝在自然界威嚴壯麗的戲劇中顯明祂自己。這就是我們所謂的「自然啟示」。上帝也用言語啟示祂自己。上帝已說話，在聖經裏我們有祂成文的道。我們這裏談論的是特殊的啟示-----上帝賜給我們的信息，光憑我們自己的力量，我們永遠無法明白。

上帝依然是不可透知的，祂在啟示祂自己的時候，沒有將需要了解的，關於祂的一切都啟示出來。「隱祕的事是屬耶和華我們神的，唯有明顯的事是永遠屬我們和我們子孫的，好叫我們遵行這律法上的一切話。」（申廿九29）  這顯然不是指我們對上帝一無所知，又或者我們對上帝有圓滿的認識；相反，我們有一種關於上帝的應用知識------對我們的人生極有幫助和至關重要。

這就帶出一個問題，即我們如何能有意義地談論不可透知的上帝。 神學家們都有一種在兩端擺動的不良傾向。 懷疑論一端，我們上面思考到的，他們假設我們關於上帝的語言是毫無意義的，沒有與祂相關的參照點。 另一端是泛神論的一種形式，它錯誤地假定我們已經掌握或囊括上帝。當我們明白我們關於上帝的語言是建立在類比的基礎上時，我們就會避開這些錯誤。我們可以說上帝是什麽樣的，但我們一將對上帝的描述等同於祂的本質，我們就會犯錯誤，認為有限的能包容無限的。

我們從歷史上看到上述兩個錯誤在新教自由主義（Protestant liberalism）和新正統（Neoorthodoxy）內搖擺。十九世紀的自由主義神學將上帝等同於歷史長流和自然界。 它提倡泛神論（Pantheism），即上帝存在於自然界一切事物之中，上帝就是一切。 在這樣的背景下，新正統反對將上帝與創造聯系起來，並尋求恢復上帝的超然性。帶著滿腔熱忱，新正統神學家稱上帝為「全然他者」 (wholly other)。這個觀念是有問題的。 假如上帝是「全然他者」，你如何知道祂的一切？假如上帝與我們截然不同，祂如何啟示祂自己呢？祂會使用什麽渠道呢？祂會透過日落啟示祂自己嗎？祂會借著拿撒勒人耶穌啟示祂自己嗎？ 假如祂是有別於人類的全然他者，那麽上帝和人類之間的溝通以什麽作共同的基礎？ 假如上帝與我們有天淵之別，祂就無法與我們說話。

通過類比我們與上帝有關聯，明白這一點有助我們解決問題。 人與上帝之間有一接觸點。 聖經告訴我們，我們照著上帝的形象被造（創一26-28）。人類在某種意義上像上帝。 這使交流成為可能。 上帝在創造中設立了這種溝通能力。 我們不是上帝，但我們像祂，因為我們承載祂的形像，並且按照祂的樣式受造。 因此，上帝可以向我們啟示祂自己，不是用祂的語言，而用我們的語言。祂可以跟我們說話。祂可以用我們能夠理解----不是透徹的，而是真實與有意義的方式與我們交流。假如果你排除類比，你將以懷疑告終。

本文原刊於雜誌。

God Is Incomprehensible

FROM R.C. Sproul

What can we know about God? That’s the most basic question of theology, for what we can know about God and whether we can know anything about Him at all determine the scope and content of our study. Here we must consider the teaching of the greatest theologians in history, all of whom have affirmed the “incomprehensibility of God.” By using the term incomprehensible, they are not referring to something we are unable to comprehend or know at all. Theologically speaking, to say God is incomprehensible is not to say that God is utterly unknowable. It is to say that none of us can comprehend God exhaustively.

Incomprehensibility is related to a key tenet of the Protestant Reformation—the finite cannot contain (or grasp) the infinite. Human beings are finite creatures, so our minds always work from a finite perspective. We live, move, and have our being on a finite plane, but God lives, moves, and has His being in infinity. Our finite understanding cannot contain an infinite subject; thus, God is incomprehensible. This concept represents a check and balance to warn us lest we think we have captured altogether and mastered in every detail the things of God. Our finitude always limits our understanding of God.

If we misunderstand the doctrine of God’s incomprehensibility, we can easily slide into two serious errors. The first error says that since God is incomprehensible, He must be utterly unknowable, and anything we say about God is gibberish. But Christianity affirms the rationality of God alongside the incomprehensibility of God. Our minds can go only so far in understanding God, and to know God we need His revelation. But that revelation is intelligible, not irrational. It is not gibberish. It is not nonsense. The incomprehensible God has revealed Himself truly.

Here we allude to the Reformational principle that God is both hidden and revealed. There is a mysterious dimension of God that we do not know. However, we aren’t left in darkness, groping around for a hidden God. God has also revealed Himself, and that is basic to the Christian faith. Christianity is a revealed religion. God the Creator has revealed Himself manifestly in the glorious theater of nature. This is what we call “natural revelation.” God has also revealed Himself verbally. He has spoken, and we have His Word inscripturated in the Bible. Here we’re talking about special revelation—information God gives us that we could never figure out on our own.

God remains incomprehensible because He reveals Himself without revealing everything there is to know about Him. “The secret things belong to the Lord our God, but the things that are revealed belong to us and to our children forever” (Deut. 29:29). It’s not as if we have no knowledge of God or as if we have consummate knowledge of God; rather, we have a working knowledge of God that is useful and crucial for our lives.

This raises the question as to how we can meaningfully speak about the incomprehensible God. Theologians have an unfortunate tendency to swing between two poles. The pole of skepticism, which we considered above, assumes that our language about God is utterly meaningless and has no reference point with regard to Him. The other pole is a form of pantheism that falsely assumes we have captured or contained God. We steer clear of these errors when we understand that our language about God is built upon analogy. We can say what God is like, but as soon as we equate whatever it is that we use to describe God with His essence, we have committed the error of thinking that the finite has contained the infinite.

Historically, we see the vacillating between the two aforementioned errors in Protestant liberalism and Neoorthodoxy. Nineteenth-century liberal theology identified God with the flow of history and with nature. It promoted a pantheism in which everything was God and God was everything. Against that backdrop, Neoorthodoxy objected to identifying God with creation, and it sought to restore God’s transcendence. In their zeal, Neoorthodox theologians spoke of God as “wholly other.” That idea is problematic. If God is wholly other, how do you know anything about Him? If God is utterly dissimilar from us, how could He reveal Himself? What means could He use? Could He reveal Himself through a sunset? Could He reveal Himself through Jesus of Nazareth? If He were wholly other from human beings, what common basis for communication between God and mankind could there ever be? If God is utterly dissimilar from us, there is no way for Him to speak to us.

Understanding that we relate to the Lord by way of analogy solves the problem. There is a point of contact between man and God. The Bible tells us that we are created in the image of God (Gen. 1:26-28). In some sense, human beings are like God. That makes it possible for communication to occur. God has built this capacity for communication into creation. We are not God, but we are like Him because we bear His image and are made in His likeness. Therefore, God can reveal Himself to us, not in His language, but in our language. He can talk to us. He can communicate to us in a manner that we can understand—not exhaustively, but truly and meaningfully. If you get rid of analogy, you end in skepticism.

This post was originally published in Tabletalk magazine.