Page 54 - Pure Life 30
P. 54

The Nature of Religious Language… M. Mousavi Karimi and H. Tehrani Haeri / (53

               Basically, is it possible for us,      language  of  sacred  texts,
               humans, with limited knowledge         instead  of  being  descriptive
               and linguistic abilities to speak      and factual, is mostly similar

               meaningfully,  truthfully,  and        to  the  kind  of  symbolic,
               factually about such a limitless       imaginary and vague language
               and Supreme Being?                     that is used in novels, poems
                  Literarily,  religious  sacred      and myths?
               texts have usually been amongst           The  roots  of  discussion
               the  most  important  and              about  the  nature  of  religious

               influential  books  in  humans’        language  can  be  traced  back
               cultural history. For example,         to  Plato.  (Ref:  Plato,  1892,
               the  Quran  has  always  been          Parmenides,  Section  142;
               not  only  the  criterion  of  the     Ibid, 1962)
               correct  use  of  the  rules  of          Also,  some  past  Christian
               Arabic  language,  but  also  an       and Muslim (Ref: Aquinas, 1947;
               inspiring  source  of  many            Zarkashi, 1957; Suyuti, 2008)

               literature texts throughout the        thinkers have made notes and
               world.                                 written  books  on  this  issue.
                  Accordingly, these texts have       The  topic,  however,  did  not
               been  viewed  as  inspiring            lead  to  a  heated  debate  until
               sources of many literary texts         the rise of analytic philosophy
               throughout  history.  Now,  is         in the last century as well as

               there  any  difference  between        the  spread  of  Wittgenstein’s
               the nature of the language of          ideas and the opinions of the
               Divine texts and the language          members of the Vienna Circle
               used in human literary texts?          regarding language and meaning.
               Can  one  not  assume  that  the
   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59