1. By the end of today’s lesson you will
Understand the concept of religious language as symbolic.
Know what Tillich meant by ‘God as that which concerns us ultimately’ and understand his 6 characteristics of symbol.
Understand Randall’s four ‘functions of symbols’.
Have evaluated whether symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of language.

2. Spec Check – Component 2: Philosophy Theme 4: Religious Language
AO1 – Knowledge and Understanding
AO2 – Analysis and Evaluation
D: Religious language as non-cognitive and symbolic:
Functions of symbols (John Randall); God as that which concerns us ultimately (Paul Tillich).
Challenges including whether a symbol is adequate or gives the right insights.
A consideration of how these two views (Randall/Tillich) can be used to help understand religious teachings.
Whether symbolic language can be agreed as having adequate meaning as a form of language.
How far the works of Randall and Tillich provide a suitable counter-challenge to Logical Positivism.

3. Sign or Symbol? Provide information or instructions.
Signs
Symbols
Provide information or instructions.
Points beyond itself.
Tillich’s example:
“A red light and the stopping of cars have essentially no relation to each other, at conventionally they are united as long as the convention lasts.”
There’s no connection between ‘red’ and ‘stop’, pink with purple spots could have been chosen.
Represent something else.
“It points beyond itself while participating in that to which it points” (Tillich)
Tillich’s example:
“the flag participates in the power and dignity of the nation for which it stands.”
The flag is more than a piece of cloth. It points to the nation and is part of the nation.

4. Sign or Symbol?
Which of the following are signs and which are symbols.
Bonus point if you can identify the meaning.

5. Sign

6. Sign

7. Symbol

8. Symbol

9. Sign

10. Symbol

11. Religious Symbols
Some philosophers and theologians argue that it is possible to talk about God and understand him through symbolic religious language.
Religious symbols may be pictorial, actions, words, objects.
They are a powerful way to communicate faith and beliefs.

12. Symbols Challenge
In twos/threes identify the religious symbols on your sheet.
State which religion it belongs to a explain how it participates in that which it points. What does it symbolise?
Find out about a religious symbol not mentioned on the sheet. Be prepared to feedback to the class.

13. Symbols Challenge Christian Cross Jesus’ sacrifice Atonement
Redemption
Salvation
Eternal life
God’s love for humanity

14. Symbols Challenge Sikh Khanda
Double edged sword = Divine Knowledge. Its sharp edges cleaving Truth from Falsehood.
Circle (chakar) = without a beginning or and end - perfection of God who is eternal.
Two curved swords (Kirpans) = The twin concepts of Meeri and Peeri - Temporal and Spiritual authority They emphasize the equal emphasis that a Sikh must place on spiritual aspirations as well as obligations to society.

15. Symbols Challenge Christian symbol
Agnus Dei – Latin for ‘Lamb of God’.
Jesus = sacrificial lamb taking the sins of the world.
Standing with a banner, the lamb represents the risen Christ triumphant over death.

16. Symbols Challenge Swastika Commonly used in Hinduism and Buddhism
From the Sanskrit ‘svastika’ – literally ‘it is good’.
Represents eternity (particularly of Brahman)

17. Symbols Challenge Kippah – hat worn by men/boys in Judaism
The head is the nearest part of the body to God
Reminds Jews that God is more important than them and must always be respected.

18. Symbols Challenge Believers’ Baptism (Christianity) Cleansing from sin
New life / new creation
By that baptism into his death we were buried with him, in order that, as Christ was raised from the dead by the glorious power of the Father, so also might we set out on a new life. (Romans 6:4)

19. Symbols Challenge
prayer/3057.html

20. Paul Tillich 1886-1965 Christian philosopher and theologian
Dynamics of Faith
Systematic Theology

21. Tillich - Symbol Read Tillich’s ideas on symbolic language.
Highlight / annotate

22. Explanation of the ‘Systematic Theology’ extract
When you say something about God in concrete terms, you are using physical, contingent language.
Yet what you are saying about God is likely to be metaphysical and non-contingent.
The language you use and the concrete terms you employ, points beyond the concrete concepts to a transcendent reality.

23. Tillich - Symbol
Read Tillich’s the introduction to the characteristics of symbol.
Highlight / annotate

24. Tillich - Symbol
Read the ‘Meaning of Symbol’ excerpt from Tillich’s Dynamics of Faith about the six characteristics of symbol.
Highlight / annotate
Answer the following questions:

25. Questions
What characteristics do signs and symbols have in common? Give an example.
What distinguishes a symbol from a sign? Give an example.
Give an example of how symbols “open up levels of reality which otherwise are closed to us”.
Do you agree that “there are within us dimensions of which we cannot become aware except through symbols”? Explain your answer.
Why can’t symbols be produced intentionally? Do you agree?
In what way do symbols ‘live and die’?

26. Tillich - Symbol
Tillich’s 6 characteristics of symbol – learning wheel

27. Characteristic 6 – Symbols grow and die
The Greek word for fish (ICHTUS), works nicely as an acrostic for "Jesus Christ, God's Son, Saviour"
The fish would not be an obvious Christian symbol to persecutors
Jesus' ministry is associated with fish: he chose several fishermen to be his disciples and declared he would make them "fishers of men."

28. Characteristic 6 – Symbols grow and die
It's a vagina and represents fertility!
One of the names given to the pre-Jesus Jesus Fish is the vesica pisces (vessel of the fish), and it was used as a symbol of every female fertility god ever, from Atargatis (the Syrian fertility goddess), Aphrodite/Venus (the goddess of love and sex) to the pagan Great Mother goddess, where it symbolized her life-giving vulva.
Basically, whenever you encountered an image of fish in the pre- Christian world, it was probably a metaphor for ‘lady parts’.

29. Characteristic 6 – Symbols grow and die

30. John Randall 1899-1980 American philosopher
Friend and colleague of Tillich – although there are substantial differences between their views.
Ideas on symbols found in ‘The Role of Knowledge in Western Religion’  

31. Randall on Religion
Religion, for Randall, is not essentially knowledge at all. Its aims and functions are not to furnish people with truth.
“Religious beliefs, though far indeed from being “meaningless”, do not possess what is ordinarily meant by cognitive value.’
Religion expresses whatever people have felt deeply.

32. Randall on Symbol
“We can assume that all religious beliefs without exception are ‘mythology’. That is, they are all religious ‘symbols’.”
“If such symbols can be said to possess any kind of ‘truth’, they certainly do not possess the literal truth of the factual statements of the descriptive sciences or of common sense…”
All ideas of God, like all other religious beliefs, are without exception religious symbols. They are employed in religious experience and serve to carry on the religious life.
Like Tillich, Randall distinguishes between signs symbols. But, for Randall, a symbol is in no sense representative; it does not stand for or take the place of anything other than itself.
Rather, it does something in its own right; it provokes a characteristic response in people.
What do the religious symbols do? …

33. Randall: The Four Functions of Symbols
Symbols provoke in people an emotional response and stimulate appropriate human activities. They produce results in conduct.
Symbols provoke a response from the community, a shared response accompanied by cooperative activity.
Non cognitive symbols are able to communicate,- qualitative or ‘shared’ experience which is difficult to express in words.
Religious symbols ‘disclose’ or ‘reveal’ something about the world in which they function. They convey ‘insight’ or ‘vision’ rather than ‘knowledge’.

34. Randall on Symbol To summarise …
 Symbols express value rather than impart knowledge.

35. Symbols as an aid to understand religious teaching
How can the views of Tillich and Randall on symbols be used to help understand religious teaching?
THINK – List your ideas independently.
PAIR – Discuss your ideas with your partner. Add to your list.
SHARE – Class feedback
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36. AO2 – Evaluation Skills
“Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
Evaluate this view.
Add the points from the following slides (if not already mentioned).
For the ‘agree’ points consider what problems of religious language are resolved.
For the ‘disagree’ points, consider what problems of religious language remain.

37. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
AGREE
You can use the views of Tillich and Randall
E.g. Symbols DO communicate meaning even if non-cognitive (Randall)

38. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
AGREE
A picture speaks a thousand words.
Symbols ‘open up levels of reality’ otherwise closed to us.

39. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
AGREE
Many symbols are universal and obvious.
E.g. heart = love, crown = majesty.

40. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
AGREE
They transcend facts, describing God in a non-cognitive (non factual) way.
Don Culpitt saw religious language as a way of expressing inner feelings.

41. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
AGREE/DISAGREE
Randall’s 4 functions could be used to argue on either side of the debate. How?

42. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
DISAGREE
They can become the focus of worship themselves.
People may worship a statue / relic rather than God (towards which it points).

43. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
DISAGREE
They can be misinterpreted, trivialised or their original meaning can be lost.
E.g. the swastika, an early Hindu symbol representing eternity is now commonly associated with Nazism, particularly in Western cultures.
The inverted cross is now commonly associated with Satanism. However, it’s origins are in Christianity representing the martyrdom of St Peter.

44. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
DISAGREE
They can become outdated.
Sallie McFague, (in Metaphorical Theology: Models of God in Religious Language), claims are anachronistic because of their patriarchal roots.
E.g. symbols like ‘Father’ ‘King’.
Belonging to a period other than that in which it exists; old fashioned

45. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
DISAGREE
Paul Edwards argued that symbols are inadequate as they are meaningless.
Symbols don’t pass on any factual information (they’re non- cognitive), thus have no purpose.

46. “Symbolic language has adequate meaning as a form of religious language.”
DISAGREE
The symbol might not be appropriate.
God is ‘mysterious’, so how can the symbol give an adequate insight into the ‘ultimate reality’.