Also, I recently engaged in a similar conversation about reference between Muslims and Christians with Feser's articles as supporting references, and I was literally told (by someone clearly totally confused by the distinction being made):

"You are confused, but your pride won't let you find clarity. In the privacy of your room, get on your knees and say out loud: Jesus is my Lord and Savior."

I think the debate over whether Christians and Muslims worship the same God is very difficult and ultimately of little consequence. Your interlocutor is an example of that tendency; a lot of Protestants seem to worry that if you admit that someone else worships the same God, then you are admitting that they are doing what is sufficient for salvation.

I like Bill Vallicella's commentary on the topic. I don't think the question has an easy resolution. Bill even doubts that Christians and Jews worship the same God, on the basis that Judaism might preclude the Trinity. I don't think that's defensible.

I imagine a conversation between a Jew and Christian in the first millenia might go something like this:

Christian: The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob has revealed himself in the person of Jesus Christ.
Jew: I do not think that is the case; God could not be human, so I do not see how that is possible.

They might each characterize their dispute as one over the nature of the God of Abraham. It would seem odd if either accused the other of disbelieving in his God, which each believes to be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

It's much less obvious to me that sharing classical theism is sufficient for commonality of reference. Sometimes it seems to be. Suppose Christianity and classical theism are both true, and an argument like Aquinas's First Way is sound. Then, perhaps, Aristotle would have contemplated the Christian God, for his argument is substantially similar to Aquinas's, and he learned of the Unmoved Mover's existence through that argument. The Christian, then, acknowledges that Aristotle's argument succeeds, and that there would be a problem for Christianity if the Unmoved Mover exists but isn't the God of Christianity. That Aristotle may have thought some things about the Unmoved Mover that Christianity denies doesn't undermine this.

Greg wrote:

But if reference entails existence, that doesn't seem obvious and unimpeachable at all.

I agree. Suppose I belong to a religion that claims to worship the present King of France (as the true incarnation of God the Son, for example). Vallicella's A and B together would entail that, since there is no such entity, we can't really be worshipping what we say we're worshipping. That may be true in an objective sense (i.e. it's not the case that a relation of "worshipping" obtains between us and a real object), but it's certainly not true according to our subjective intentions. My suspicion is that there's an equivocation on "reference" here and that the implication fails for "subjective" reference based on intention (and intension).

It seems to me, that is, that A is "unimpeachable" only with regard to what I've called subjective reference, but B holds only for objective (what you call "successful") reference. I think that's equivalent to what you're suggesting.

And in that case, of course, A and B together don't imply ~C, so there's no apory.

Last edited by Scott (1/09/2016 7:01 pm)

Greg wrote:

It's much less obvious to me that sharing classical theism is sufficient for commonality of reference. Sometimes it seems to be. Suppose Christianity and classical theism are both true, and an argument like Aquinas's First Way is sound. Then, perhaps, Aristotle would have contemplated the Christian God, for his argument is substantially similar to Aquinas's, and he learned of the Unmoved Mover's existence through that argument. The Christian, then, acknowledges that Aristotle's argument succeeds, and that there would be a problem for Christianity if the Unmoved Mover exists but isn't the God of Christianity. That Aristotle may have thought some things about the Unmoved Mover that Christianity denies doesn't undermine this.

 
In my view, classical theism, if it means anything (and I strongly believe it does), then it should serve as the basis to clarify whether a certain religion or spiritual system refers to this or that kind of g/God.. Therefore I would dispute any doubts that classical theism is sufficient to commonality of reference.

edit: Classical theism as a philosophical system is like a tool of general linguistic analysis. All people have a language. However, "dog", if the word exists in those languages, doesn't necessarily refer to the same thing, and if the languages have a word for dog, the word doesn't necessarily look or sound the same. But all languages can refer to a dog. Whether a particular word in a particular language refers or doesn't to a dog can be figured out by means of general linguistic analysis. Similarly, classical theism has a concept of God and means of analysing whether a certain spiritual philosopher/theologian is referring to it or not. Not all Christians do and not all Muslims do. It's highly dubious to say Christianity does but Islam does not, as if there were one single, presumably Catholic, Christianity. What about the Orthodox and Protestants? What about the oldest Christian nations, namely Ethiopia and Armenia? Catholic (or any other) theology does not translate straightforwardly into classical theism and classical theism does not translate straightforwardly into Christianity. Professor Feser occasionally drops the distinction between them, but the distinction matters. /edit

Towards the beginning of his longest post on the subject, professor Feser distinguishes God-of-the-philosophers (as best defined in the philosophy of classical theism, we all agree I assume) from Christian God, but later in the same blogpost he names Christianity where classical theism would be more appropriate. He contrasts Christianity and Islam sharply, wishing to prove Christianity right and Islam wrong (this is most evident in the "canine theology" piece, where all other religions miss a leg in comparison with Christianity).

My point is, if God-of-the-philosophers is a thing - a thing more relevant to socio-political considerations for the State than Christianity - then canine theology is not a thing and there should have been no blog post about it.

As much as I respect professor Feser's philosophical analysis of religions and ideologies, I have little respect for his politics and economics. And in this case even his philosophical analysis is limping a leg. I will probably say more about it in a month.

Last edited by seigneur (1/17/2016 2:38 pm)

Alexander wrote:

I don't read Feser as trying to prove Christianity right and Islam wrong. Obviously, he does think Christianity is right, and Islam is wrong, but I don't think you would need to accept such a view to agree with much of what he says in the posts (I think it's perfectly compatible with a neutral position toward both).

His posts are neutral, if you ignore much (even most) what he writes. In several paragraphs, he writes "Christianity" or even "Catholicism" where "classical theism" would be more appropriate and more balanced.. And he writes "Islam" instead of "Wahhabi/fundamentalist Salafi". I must assume that he either means what he writes or he is occasionally overlooking important distinctions on a host of delicate and nuanced topics, so that he ends up presenting a pro-Catholic spin where it's inappropriate.

Christianity is definitely more than Catholicism and classical theism is emphatically not peculiar to Christian doctrines and violence/injustice is not somehow more inherent to Islam than to Christianity, yet several of his passages seem to be repeatedly asserting the contrary on all these points. For example he says that crusades were essentially a defensive affair. In reality, the fourth crusade sacked Constantinople and went no further (meaning, the slogan of defence of Holy Land was empty propaganda). Constantinople never properly recovered from the crusade, Muslims eventually conquered it and stood soon enough at Vienna. So there.

I am unwilling to read professor Feser by way of misrepresentation. I will assume he meant what he wrote. What he wrote weakens my trust for the way he sees politics. He writes about liberalism, Christianity, and Islam as political forces. While I agree with much that he writes about the nature of liberalism, as soon as he mentions some names of supposed liberals, I am at loss. In what way is Sam Harris, a very loud proponent of G. W. Bush's crusade (G. W. Bush's own term), a liberal? Probably Feser labels Harris liberal because Harris is atheist (even though he isn't, he is a sneaky advocate of vulgarized/de-spiritualized/profaned Buddhist doctrine of emptiness), but how is atheism sufficient or inherent to liberalism? Etc.