An essay which assess the view that the Fall ahs completely removed all natural human knowledge of God as taught under OCR A Level RS H573/03 Developments in Christian Thought
Critically assess the view that the Fall has completely removed all natural human knowledge of God
It can be argued that the Fall has completely removed all natural
human knowledge of God as the Fall corrupted our minds which
limits our ability to know God. Augustine argues that humans are evil
and corrupt by nature due to original sin, and this intrinsic quality
passed down seminally through Adam prevents us from truly knowing
God. This view is also supported by Karl Barth, who asserts that due
to our sinful and evil nature, we must rely on God to reveal
knowledge about Himself so that we may come to know about Him.
This is convincing since if God is all powerful, He would be able to
reveal Himself to humans in ways which are easily understood to us
and can be comprehended despite our evil nature as the result of the
Fall. However, although God revealing Himself to us would be more
convincing, it could be argued that we still might not be able to
comprehend God as Aquinas states that God is transcendent and
beyond human understanding. Furthermore, different interpretations
amongst humans would lead us to different conclusions about God;
even if God revealed Himself, some people may reject that it is God
and interpret it differently. Calvin says that human sin prevents us
from knowing God despite us all having the ‘sensus divinitatus’
within us, hence I think that the Fall has completely removed all
natural human knowledge of God since our intrinsic capabilities of
possessing divine knowledge is limited due to original sin and
requires us to rely more on revealed knowledge from God, even if we
have limited scope for interpretation.
It can be argued that the Fall has not completely removed all natural
human knowledge about God since each person seems to have an idea
of what God is, from ancient civilisations up until now. Roman
thinker Cicero argues that we have a ‘divine spark’ within us – and
Calvin supports this argument by saying we have a ‘sensus
divinitatus’ (or ‘sense of the divine’). The Bible claims that we are
made in the image of God in Genesis 1:27 – hence it can be argued
that our apparent intrinsic knowledge of God as a result of being
human means we must be able to know God – the Fall couldn’t have
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