Wittgensteinian Fideism?

The question mark seems to be apposite. Neither term in the title here is in common circulation, so before discussing the content of this book:

Nielsen, K., & Phillips, D. Z. (2005). Wittgensteinian Fideism? London: SCM.

I think unpacking the title might be an idea.

To start from the end, ‘fideism’. According to Penelhum, fideists argue that faith does not need the support of argument, and therefore reject the approach of philosophical defenders of faith who try to show that faith is compatible with reason, scientific knowledge, and so on. Faith, on this view, need not be rational. There are some venerable names in this tradition: Tertullian and Kierkegaard, for example, although their positions still can be defended on philosophical grounds.

In fideism, the key is a state of trust and commitment to God, not to some doctrine or argument about God. We reject, as sinful beings, signs of God’s presence revealed to us, and think that only human powers are the cure for human ills. Reason and science require detachment; faith requires a passionate involvement. Faith requires rebirth and submission; without these God remains hidden from us.

The’ Wittgensteinian’ bit of the title refers, of course, to the Twentieth Century philosopher Wittgenstein, and, more specifically here, to his idea of language games. Wittgenstein’s own relationship to faith, religion, and, more specifically in his context, Christianity, is ambiguous, but it is certainly true that some of his ideas have been incorporated into philosophy of religion and theology.

Wittgensteinian Fideisim, therefore, is the accusation that some philosophers of religion claim that faith (particularly Christian faith, but the claim is usually advanced against Judaism and Islam as well) is a particular language game and that the language game can only be understood from within the faith, that is, by someone who is a believer already. Therefore, the argument goes, these philosophers argue that religion cannot be criticised from outside the faith. Hence, if we agree that, say, Christianity is a language game, or at least that that language and meanings, actions and activities that constitute Christianity constitute a language game then was can claim that the faith is immune to criticism from without, although not from within, the language game.

These claims about some philosophers of religion were first put forward by Kai Nielson in the mid-1960s. The philosophers in his sights were Peter Winch, Norman Malcolm, and D. Z. Phillips. Eventually, Phillips replied, denying that there is or was such a thing as Wittgensteinian Fideism and that, even if it did exist, he was not such a fideist, and the argument, slowly, developed from there, culminating in the book referred to above, which has Nielson’s original 1967 paper, some of Phillips’ responses, Nielson’s responses to those, and some papers from a 2003 conference on the subject.

It is, admittedly, the sort of book that gets philosophy, and particularly, in this case, philosophy of religion, a bad name. Mostly Phillips and Nielson seem to spend their time talking past each other and accusing each other of not having read what they have written carefully enough. In short, the book can be characterised as two rather grumpy elderly men arguing about who said what about them when. External interventions in the debate do not really seem to help, either. On the whole, I did not feel that the discussion was advanced, let alone resolved, by the papers in the book.

I think the principal problem with the whole debate is that Christianity (and, I suspect, Judaism and Islam, although I do not know) is not a philosophical discussion. Of course, right back to the Patristic Fathers philosophy has been a part of the debates within and about Christianity, but that does not mean that either philosophy or the philosophical categories imported into Christian theology by engagement with philosophy, represent anything other than human ways of exploring, describing and discussing the faith.

Therefore, we can say that while Christian faith has some of the aspects of a language game in Wittgenstein’s terms, the same can be said for, say, chemistry. That does not mean that either Christianity or chemistry is immune from discussion outside those subjects, however. A physicist may comment on either, as may an ethicist or politician. What the comments amount to is not the point; with a fair amount of care and engagement with an alien subject, the external commentator can make pertinent points that require a response.

The other thing about Christianity specifically (asides about how Judaism and Islam are included are only, I fear, there for political correctness rather than the result of any engagement with those faiths) is that it completely ignores, on both sides, any encounter with God. The debate is about the existence of God, the coherence of belief in God, and so on. There is no discussion about how God might be encountered.

In Christianity, of course, the clue is in the name. Christianity is, first and foremost, about the encounter with God in the shape of His incarnate, crucified, and risen Son, Jesus. That is, Christianity is not a series of more or less coherent doctrines, debates, creeds, and activities, but ultimately about the encounter with Jesus. The encounters came first, after all. The accounts of Jesus’ life came afterward and then, as the message was carried out into the world, came the doctrines, creeds, and liturgies that have developed over the last two thousand years or so.

It is, of course, open to us as humans to accept or reject the encounter with God and Jesus. That is a slightly different debate about human freedom and will rather than fideism as such. The language game (or games) which that encounter might produce are perhaps, human constructs and are open to criticism, much like any other human construct or the idea of human constructs itself. If an individual never has the encounter then they are left with a language game to engage with or to reject. If the encounter develops a deeper faith than that in a person who never has it, then that is a matter or human experience and lack of it, not, surely, a philosophical position.