HKB
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Often appears with: prayer and worship · justice as a virtue · will, choice, and freedom · virtue and vice · the problem of evil and theodicy · the nature and attributes of God · spiritual religion · sin, guilt, and repentance · scripture and its interpretation · religion and morality · providence and divine governance · problem of evil
Usually: argument (6) · crisis of belief (2) · injustice endured (2) · exhortation (2) · skepticism (2) · detachment (1) · indignation (1) · lament (1) · praise (1)
“The evidence rather shews, that in all he did and wrote, Muhammad was actuated by a sincere desire” Muhammad (Al-Qur'an content traditionally attributed; Rodwell as translator), The Koran (Al-Qur'an) · insight
“The effect being certain, the cause that shall produce it is certain also; and if the effect comes about it will be by virtue of a proportionate cause.” Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, Freiherr von, Theodicy · precept
The text argues that Muhammad’s message comes from sincere conviction rather than fraud, then shifts into Quranic themes: judgment, unity of God, disbelief’s consequences, and exhortations to faith and righteousness.
And they said, "Shall we believe on two men like ourselves, whose people are our slaves?" And they treated them both as impostors; wherefore they became of the destroyed. And we gave Moses the Book for Israel's guidance. And we appointed the Son of Mary, and His mother for a sign; and we prepared an abode for both in a lofty spot,8 quiet, and watered with springs. "O ye apostles! eat of things that are good: and …
Hume adds that religion and morality are falsely used to attack free will, but he insists that his account of necessity is compatible with religion and beneficial to morality, since laws rely on motives influencing minds.
of this kind, and dare venture to affirm, that the doctrine of necessity, according to my explication of it, is not only innocent, but even advantageous to religion and morality. I define necessity two ways, conformable to the two definitions of cause, of which it makes an essential part. I place it either in the constant union and conjunction of like objects, or in the inference of the mind from the one to the othe…
He argues that miracles, vows and prayers, and good or bad actions still matter because they were already represented in God’s choice of the best possible world as ideal causes or conditions.
would happen freely, ordered all other things on that basis beforehand, or (what is the same) he chose that possible world in [153] which everything was ordered in this fashion. 55. This consideration demolishes at the same time what the ancients called the 'Lazy Sophism' ([Greek: logos argos]) which ended in a decision to do nothing: for (people would say) if what I ask is to happen it will happen even though I sho…
Coleridge argues that people experience difficulties reconciling being under nature’s law with feeling moral obligation, and that some resolve the conflict by sacrificing spiritual religion to accepted metaphysics.
fully explained in the course of the Work. My present object is merely to show the necessity of some system in relation to these subjects different from the received one. It may perhaps be thought, that the language used above is too strong and too positive. But I venture to ask every candid man, at least every one who has not committed himself by writing and publishing on the subject, whether in considering the gre…
Boethius argues that if future events are fixed by providence, rewards and punishments become unjust, virtue and vice lose meaning, human wickedness follows from God, and prayer cannot mediate any change.
'"Whate'er I say Shall either come to pass--or not." In that case, too, in what would Divine providence surpass human opinion if it holds for uncertain things the occurrence of which is uncertain, even as men do? But if at that perfectly sure Fountain-head of all things no shadow of uncertainty can possibly be found, then the occurrence of those things which He has surely foreknown as coming is certain. Wherefore th…
The passage reconciles providence with human freedom: although events occur as if necessary from God’s foreknowledge, in themselves they remain free, so punishment and reward remain just and prayers are effective.
fact of their existence they do not lose their proper nature, in virtue of which before they happened it was really possible that they might not have come to pass. 'What difference, then, does the denial of necessity make, since, through their being conditioned by Divine knowledge, they come to pass as if they were in all respects under the compulsion of necessity? This difference, surely, which we saw in the case o…