Roczniki Filozoficzne

Religious experience constitutes one of the most complex problems in the theory of religious cognition. The present article aims at demonstrating the problematic character of religious experience as well as the direction of possible solutions following realistic theory of cognition.To determine the area under investigation it is necessary to distinguish (1) religious experience as a type of acquiring direct information about religious facts (experience of acts and religious states) from (2) religious experience as a cognitive phase of a complex religious experience, that is to say the second element of religious relation (the object of religion).The discussed issue concers the other sense of the term religious experience. Generally accepted ontic transcendency of the object of religious acts gives rise to the question whether the latter may constitute the object of experience or direct cognition of the actual, individual object.Discussion of several views of religious experience (F. E. D. Schleiermacher, W. James, M. Scheler, B. Lonergan, J. B. Lotz) reveals that the concept is related to more fundamental philosophical opinions and as such is differently understood in different philosophical systems. Acceptance or rejection of axiological experience as a source of cognition seems particulary important in this case.According to the realistic notion of cognition religious experience may be treated as experience of religious acts and states. Facts of religion are given in the experience, both internal (within the range of the subject; awareness of the own religious experience) and external (observation of religious behaviour of others).The second element of religious relation (object of religion) on the other hand, according to the realistic conception of cognition may be given in cognitive acts, either natural or supernatural.In the acts of natural cognition it may be given (1) postulatively as founded upon experience of man’s existential situation (limitations and frailty of human life, transcendency of the world of nature and the world of people). This is quasi religious experience whose object is man himself. A postulate of the existence of someone who would complement and justify human existence constitutes a superstructure constructed over the experience of human limitations and transcendence. This experience either prepares for or motivates the cognition of religious object. (2) Discursively (as founded upon reasoning) in philosophy as the ultimate cause of existence of non-essential beings.In the acts of supernatural cognition the object of religion is given (1) on the grounds of faith. This is in a way direct cognition since any religious act affirms God’s existence from the very beginning. It can be said that the cognition is in a way direct (in religion man is directed immediately towards God) although mediated. God is always given through manifestations, signs, various mediating factors. (2) the object of religion also may be given in mystical cognition which has the least indirect character since it constitutes strong affirmation of God’s existence and rejects mediators as much as it is possible in man’s worldly life. It approaches very closely direct cognition although actually it neer becomes one. Still the criterion of rationality and inatumess is not applicable in this case. Direct knowledge of God is possible only in the other life.

The article attempts to present W. Windelband’s philosophy of religion. First, Windelband’s understanding of Otto Liebman’s slogan „Zurück zu Kant” is discussed as well as the former’s continuaton of Kantian philosophy according to his own principle that „Kant verstehen heisst über ihn hinausgehen”. In relation to this key idea of Windelband’s philosophy the essential arguments and notions of is philosophy of value are demonstrated, including his theory of religion concerning the analysis of transcendental feeling (Gefühl), representation (Vorstellen), willing (Wollen), action (Wirken) and his assessment of religious cognition in categories of classical truth.The article is summed up by the following remarks: (1) Exposure of the inherent antinomy of religious cognition is not universally valid (allgemeingültig) since it is founded upon the notions of substance, cause and person developed within the specific, historically determined theory of rational cognition; on the other hand, the difficulty in determining the essence of the object of religious acts as seen against the opposition of Sein and Sollen seems rather interesting. (2) Critical analysis of religious consciousness tends to reveal merely the formal structure of religious consciousness and the formal aspect of the object of religious acts or what is sacred (das Heilige), while the specific character of religious consciousness and its object remains questionable in this case. (3) Windelband’s philosophy does not permit to justify the existence of normative consciousness (Normalbewusstsein) of the sacred (das Heilige) which is real and transcendental in respect to the human subject; Windelband is aware of these limitations and thus criticism of the issue by J. Hessen, M. Scheler, J. Pastuszka, K. Serini and M. Minrath seems mistaken. (4) Apart from the difference in understanding the object and tasks of philosophy, there is certain concurrence of the notion of religious fact and the value of the sacred in philosophies of religion developed by W. Windelband and Z. J. Zdybicka. Although the concurrence does not seem coincidental it remains to be decided whether two two philosophical systems notwithstanding their peculiarities may be treated as complementary.

G. Marcel's philosophy is referred to as Christian existentialism. It represents the trend of thought which claims that God as a suprapersonal reality may be the object of not only cognition, but above all experience.Marcel does not exclude mystery from the circle of existential experience and his his own analyses. This is done to escape absurd which is inevitably effected by negation of mystery and attemts to explain the world and man solely in rational terms.There are two aspects of the function of Absolute in Marcel's philosophy:(1) a „justification" of human existence considered from the viewpoint of actual human being;(2) an explanation of such purely spiritual acts as faith, hope, love and prayer.Re (1): The experience of vanishing human beings leads him to the positive metaproblemso or (the opposite of such imetaiprbblems as „not to be" or „to cease to be”. When analysing the condition of human reality he concludes that human existence demands profound justification. The Absolute is the explaining factor in the most complete sense of the term. He notices the ontic relationship and ontic dépendance of man upon God. Human existence is related to God, being an appeal-to-God.Re (2) As a representative of Christian existentialism Marcel accepts the Absolute as the justification of sense and efficiency of human activities. The first activity which allows Marcel to discover in the depth of his self („I”) something transcendental is faithfulness. He considers involvement which subsequently leads to the so-called creative faithfulness the only proper form of faithfulness. It consists in constant readiness to answer the appeal rather than in preserving the once recognized principles. Extendinding the faithfulness of others gives rise to absolute faithfulness or faith.Hope iis another activity which permits to reach the itransceodental reality. It is founded upon unconditioned trust in the Absolute Being. In its existence and nature it is explained solely by reference to the Being. Similarly to love, however it is not thereby deprived of objective reality.Love which in its essence consists in the openness to the „You" and subsequently the Absolute „You" includes three elements an appeal (apel) directed to another person, readines of answer (la disponibilité) and commitment. God is the One who first calls man to open himself to His love through faith and love. Man is to give the answer not to betray this appealing and self-giving love, to respond by complete involvement.Prayer is another activity attaining the Absolute »eality. Understood as a union it reveals close relationship to faith, hope and love.Thus when considering the problem of „non-being" G. Marcel assumes that God is the postulate justifying human existence and to some extent explaining its durability. He also tries to demonstrathe essential direction of human being towards the Transcendental Being.

The article attempts to provide such a definition of theology which wolud distinguish it from theological ontology, theological anthropology, the comparative study of religions, theology of religion or any type of rationalization of the Revelation.The outline typology of basic methods employed by theology demonstrates that essentially they are all conductive to (1) making the content of the Revelation philosophical or scientific in character; (2) philosophical or humanistic interpretation of Christian life. According to the authors such ways of pursuing teologv tend to deprive it of its methodological singularity since eventually theology is interpretation in the light of the Revelation. Thus in the second part ®f the article he tries to show that theological cognition consists in introducing the element of Revelation into the innate knowledge of the broadly understood Christian life. He discusses the departure for theological studies, the sources, objectvand aim of theological cognition as well as the very procedure of constructing theological theory. Theology is created as a superstructure of scientific and philosophical knowledge of Christian life. This superstructure includes elements of correction and complement, particularly in case of interpretations and substantiation of natural sciences in the light of the Revelation.

Ancient ethics (Socrates, Aristotle) defined moral obligation of action in terms of logic of efficient action, or praxeology: if Person P wants Goal G and Action A is the only way to achieve G, then P ought to A. Since ancient philosophers considered leading man to happiness the proper aim of ethics, they chiefly attempted to determine, within psychology of a strong philosophical bias, the nature of man’s ultimate goal. This served the purpose of defining the content of acts successfully leading to this goal, or happiness. Thus moral obligation of an act was determined objectively, or ex objecto becoming a matter of one’s perseverance in pursuing what he really wanted. Therefore it was not determined by the effectiveness alone in respect to any goal, but by the effectiveness of producing happiness, 'that is to say eudaemonopoiesis. The theory of moral obligation, or ethics was not simply praxeology, but its specialized departement, the logic of happiness, or eudaemonology.Traditional Christian ethics although liberated from eudaemonism did not eschew objective determination of moral obligation of action. Apart from values desired for themselves, it recognized volues which ought to be affirmed for themselves, such as God or man. The objective determination of what one ought to do was linked with the nature of the agent or, albeit seldom, the addressee of action. The nature of being, recognized ats actually identical with rightness also determined its axiological structure. Thus such values as freedom, life, health detęrmined ex objecto moral qualification of action which by „force of their nature” (content) either realized or frustrated these values, e.g. defence of one’s life or health care on the one hand, and killing or injuring on the other. Objective qualification of an act cannot be affected by the agent’s intentions. In particular, good intentions do not justify objectively evil actions which are undertaken as a means of accomplishing such intentions. In case of actions with twp-fold effect, e.g. whether to defend one’s life killing the aggressor or to spare the aggressor’s life losing one’s own the traditional ethics applied the principle whereby actions of evil effect (killing man) could be undertaken only when the effect was indirectly brought about by the action (result of self-defence) and it was intended by the agent indirectly rather (he killed while defending himself) than directly (he just wanted to preserve his life).OP. Knauer (claims 'that the traditional ethics had founded the objectivity of norms and moral evaluations on the erroneous indentification, of moral rightness and wrongness with physical rigthtness wrongness. It led to the explanation of the principle of double effect in terms of physical causation as well as a mistaken interpretation of the sentence „The right aim does not justify the morally wrong means”. To interpret the two properly one has to „de-moralize” physical good and evil, that is to reject the concept of bonum et malum ex objecto and to found the 'objectivity of moral obligation and action, including the norms on its, „adequacy” to the „cause” that mads the agent act rather, than on the content (object, nature) of action. Any value which constitutes a goal for the agent may be the cause. No value however may be. realized without simultaneous effecting of physical wrongness. Thous one may wonder when realization of the given value may justify the resultant physical evil. According to Knauer it is not the value accomplished by means of the action which determines its moral qualification, but the way in which the agent realizes any value. The way consists in possibly most efficient and economic action undertaken to attain the intended ^oal. This way determines the „adequacy” of action. If the action is in any way „adequate” to the intended value, then the physical wrongness effected by its accomplishment is not included in the agent’s .intentions and thereby justified. In the other case the resultant evil is objectively included in the intentions and thus remains unjustified. The objectivity both of moral obligation of action and moral rightness of action is due to its formal properties rather, than substance, while the principle of „adequacy” becomes the only norm of any moral judgement.Thus) the fundamental principle of Knauer’s ethics becomes identical with the fundamental principle of logic of efficient action, or praxeology. The critical analysis considers the difficulties of accepting the thesis o identity of ethics and praxeology. (4) There are cases of praxeological obligation which do not seem to be the cases of moral obligation (is Fischer’s obligation to move the Queen when playing with Botvinnik moral if the former wants to win the game and knows it is the on]y way to checkmate his adversary?). (2) Knauer does not seem to notice that apart from values which are desired for themselves there also are values which ought to be affirmed for themselves (person), and it is only the obligation of their affirmation of the latter that possesses the „distinctive” feature of moral obligation, nomely it is unconditioned. The obligation of affirming persons or themselves also stretches to all acts which are the only way of effective accomplishment of the obligation. Thus their effectiveness becomes per participa- tionem moral obligation. In this sense logic of efficient action, or praxeology may, or even must be included in the methodological structure of ethics.

Normative statements of ethics cannot be logically inferred from the statements about reality and thereby proved objective. The latter however may be accomplished by means of showing an efficient method of abolishing the relativity of valid moral principles in respect to their recognition by a particular social group. Thus so-called mature judgements by experts of morality should be chosen as departure, and appropriately selected by means of such logical procedures as e.g. classification. Accordingly there will remain a few principles which may be recognized as objectively valid if approved by morality experts. The condition fulfilled by the ethics of universally valid moral norms would consist in their unanimous approval by morality experts.

The article suggests the possibility of a different approach to the question of objective justification of moral principles than the one presented by N. Hörster in his paper. It has been brought about by the difficulties inherent in Hörster’s proposal. Contrary to the initial claim that it will demonstrate the efficient way of abolishing relatively of moral norms in respect to a particular social group it eventually makes their validity subject to recognition by a group of experts of morality. Thus it implies a logical error of identifying what is recognized as morally obligatory with what is morally obligatory. There is an attempt to found objectiveness of moral norms positively upon the principle that judgements of moral obligation are logical statements. To recognize them as valid one needs the self-evidence of cognitively available normative factual states rather than their logical deductibility from descriptive statements. Therefore the problem of objectivity of moral principles is reduced to the question of validity of moral experience. Besides, the author shows a parallel between the semiotic properties of normative moral judgements and judments employed by the disciplines whose logical character is recognized on the basis of these properties.

The author argues with such philosophers as F. Böckle, J. Gründel, F. Furger and F. Bednarski about their views concerning the so-called dynamic character of natural law. He demonstrates that natural law as formulated by these authors would have to be in its essence variable. When inferring this the authors must realize that they deprive the terms nature and natural law of their essential sense. Nature is understood as an aggregate of features permitting to identify the being notwithstanding its variability. Dynamics of natural law may signify that it is an essentially invariable appeal to the free subject, that is man. The subject is at the same time potential. As the ad actum being he realizes himself since accepting the appeal of natural law he liberates in himself and accomplishes what used to be merely his potentiality. Thus due to free acceptance of unvariable natural law man is abie to give the best direction to his dynamics. It is only in this sense that we can discuss the dynamic character of natural law.