B. ON COGNIZANCE AND FAITH

B. 意識和信仰

I. On cognizance

I. 關於意識

2. Cognizance of God

1. 對上帝的意識

I have expanded on this description, in order to pose the following question: If everything that I said – which is necessary for the cognizance of an object – is applied to the cognizance (knowledge) of God, what will happen straight away? -An absolute failure to apply it at all, and, for the following reasons: A. Because first of all, we apply the exclusion method, that “A” is not “B”. This means that in order to know “A”, it is presupposed that there is something else nearby, which I must exclude. Therefore, we are obliged to accept that along with God, something else always co-exists. Even if that something is nothing. Be careful! We are looking at very profound notions here. Notions like ‘creation out of nothing’. It is a huge issue. When we say that God creates something from nothing, what is that ‘nothing’, if it isn’t His self? To many, (Thomas Aquinas and Karl Barth) this ‘nothing’ is a thing that God repulses. In other words, it is as though the ‘nothing’ already exists, and God then says: “No, the nothing shall not act. Let the world come into being!” The ‘nothing’ is rejected. So, you are repulsing something –in a certain sense- in order to relate God. If you do apply this method to God, you must suppose that God is that which is not God. And what is that which is not God? It is impossible to compare God to other things, because you lose the meaning of God. In order for God to be God, He must be so unique, that He does not co-exist with anything else. Hence, I cannot ‘know’ Him, by the method of excluding something else. B. The second element that we mentioned – description – which has the prerequisites of space and time (remember, I cannot relate something, without describing it within a space and time), again cannot be applied to God. We cannot describe God, because in order to describe God, we must introduce His Existence into time and space. But if you do introduce time and space, then God becomes a creation that has a beginning, just as time and space presuppose a certain beginning; hence the distance between objects, this void. We cannot say that God is describable. Even the Fathers referred to Him as “indescribable”. You cannot describe God. ‘Indescribable’ means that not only is it impossible to say anything about God, but it is also impossible to inscribe limits (boundaries) around Him. You cannot say something about God as you would say of the table, i.e., that the table has this shape. Consequently, we cannot apply this method of cognizance either. And here we also have a very delicate issue. We are accustomed – mainly from Scholastic Theology onward – to saying that we can ‘know’ God, through His attributes; for example, in every dogmatic area, we have a complete analysis of His attributes: God is Benign, Almighty, Powerful, etc. There is a grave danger here, and I had stressed it, when I said that in order to ‘know’ an object on the basis of its attributes, it is necessary to draw those attributes from an experience of other objects. I am not supposed to detect them, exclusively within my object. For instance, if I say that this table is strong, and this attribute of strength exists only within my table, I am not truly specifying it. I often give my students the example of the clock. Take a clock, and show it to a native, a primitive person who has never seen a clock, and ask him to relate it to something, as soon as he sees it in motion. He will throw it down and say that it is some kind of animal. You see, it reminds him of something (else): an animal. He cannot ‘know’ it as a clock, because he has never seen a clock before. He has only seen animals, which are capable of motion. We see how his basic method of cognizance was to use familiar things, in order to recognize the new. This indicates that ‘knowing’ is always linked to a prior experience; in other words, objects are classified on the basis of existing experience. For example, I know that a clock is that thing, which has those characteristics. That is when I recognize it as a clock. If I don’t recognize it, if I have never seen a clock before, then I can’t state that it is a clock. Thus, I reach the conclusion that the attributes that I allocate to an object during the course of cognizance (knowledge) have all been taken from attributes that relate to other objects and are never unique to that, one, single object. (Imagine someone so unique from the aspect of physical anatomy that one cannot ‘know’ him by relating him to the experience one has from other people. It will be impossible for a doctor to examine him; in order for the doctor to recognize his ailment, he must be identical to other people. A doctor can never truly ‘know’ anything, if it is unique. All our knowledge is dependent precisely on the hypothesis that the objects of our knowledge resemble each other; that they have common characteristics). So, if this is true, then what can we do about God? From where can we draw the attributes of God? For instance, so that I can say that He is “benevolent”. From where did I draw this attribute of benevolence? From experience of course; I know that so-and-so is a benevolent person. I know God’s power. I draw this from the experience I have of powerful people. Thus, after this projection of my experience, I can reach God. God is thus a creation of your own imagination, your own experience. But those attributes aren’t exclusive to God; others have them also. And that is why so many people replace God with those objects. Why should I be afraid of God and not be afraid of lightning? After all, both of them are ‘powerful’. Attributes - even the most affirmative ones, such as ‘benevolent’ – are still attributes that we borrow from our knowledge and experience of other things, which God isn’t. I am characteristically underlining the notion of God as Father, which is one of the most difficult meanings, for the reason that anthropomorphism penetrates this theme very profusely. We teach our children from their early years to refer to God as ‘our Father’, but in what sense? It is on the basis of the children’s experience of their father at home. They bestow their father certain attributes, for instance: that he is stronger than them; that he can do things that they can’t; that he protects them, etc.. So, with all of these amassed together, the child forms an idea of God, the way that we have given it to the child. The child embraces it, and then what happens? When puberty arrives, and freedom starts to set in, and the child wants to rid itself of the guardianship of the father in the house, that is when the crisis of its faith in God appears, because all this patronizing that the youth wants to shake off, is entangled in its conscience along with God, and the revolution - the reaction against authority in general - leads the youth towards a revolution against God. And this is the precise moment that the crisis of atheism appears; whether one views it at a personal level, or at a level of civilization’s history. In cultural eras, where we find exactly this emphasis on freedom that opposes authority, that is when the idea of God is discarded. Why? Because we came to ‘know’ God; we related Him, on the basis of experiences and attributes that we acquired from our family. It is therefore impossible, if you correctly preserve the idea of God and wish to relate God ( because this is what it’s all about), to avoid all those dangers and not give God any attributes that can be found in other objects. And that is why this route that I described ( which reaches the point of using familiar objects ) if applied to God, will have ugly consequences. The cognizance of God is very often confused with the results that this cognizance offers. Do you know how many people lose their faith in God, because He doesn’t answer their prayers? Just as I choose to reject this table if it is of no use to me and I ignore it altogether, thus, in the same way, if God is a useless object, I choose to ignore Him. And the word ‘ignore’ does not simply imply that He doesn’t exist, but that He doesn’t exist for me; it is I who do not know Him; it is I who ignores Him. There is such a thing as a conscious ignorance – a willed ignorance. You can see what kind of danger the cognizance of God – gnosiology – contains, when it is based on the attributes of God. It can lead to an outright atheism, because by definition, God cannot be fitted into these molds, neither can He become an object of exploitation. If this were the case, then at any given moment, just as I push a button to start up a machine, I could likewise push the prayer button and wait for the answer to come. This would be an objectification of God, and what is worse, it is the demoting of God, down to the status of an object. Thus, we cannot speak of God’s attributes and then attain cognizance based on these attributes, because that would be dangerous. And of course we cannot also resort to any categorizing that includes place and time, because we already said that time and space came into being during Creation and are therefore not applicable to God. So, the question is raised: “How then can I relate God?” Is there anything to be found in experience that could show me the way? Is it possible to relate something, without going into all this procedure of objectification, of exclusion, of attributes and of utilization? Can I relate something, without doing all this? If I can, then there is a chance that I can also relate God. If I can’t, then one of the following two is happening: either I cannot relate God at all, and consequently I cannot say that I ‘know’ God, or, I withdraw from this attempt to express Him on the basis of experience, i.e., “I know God, but I cannot express it, I cannot give a meaning to it. Therefore I cannot apply gnosiology; I cannot say anything about God”. These two forms of response to the question posed, have already been expressed, repeated and are still heard in our times. The one reply takes on the name of negation, which signifies that you cannot say anything about God – there is absolute silence; we may have cognizance perhaps, but without any possibility of actually putting cognizance into words. The other reply is a form of mysticism that allows a phrasing of cognizance of God, provided that we are referring to emotions and experiences which, in an extreme form of mysticism, obliterate the distinction between the one who knows (the recognizer) and the one who is known (the recognized). This is why religions applied these two Gnosiologies to a broad extent, and created a certain confusion to us Orthodox; because Negation was developed by the Greek Fathers in a certain way, while mysticism was also present. This combination of mysticism and negation became the subject of a special expounding, and especially in our times, by a renowned Russian theologian, Vladimir Lossky, who wrote “The Mystic Theology of the Eastern Church”, that caused some confusion. So, the problem indeed arose: if this is the way, if this is gnosiology, i.e., through a negation that claims I do not know God at all, the question eventually remains: “What can I say affirmatively about God, and how can I form an affirmative Gnosiology and not just a negative one? It is easy to say “I can’t say anything about God”. It is easy to say what God is not. But, when we reach the point of asking: “What affirmative thing can I say about God?”, the problem is, not to fall into the trap and say things that I have borrowed from prior experience of other things, because those other things cannot be placed on the same level as God, otherwise they become anthropomorphic projections. I must therefore say something about God, which, however, must not be derived from the method that I use in order to ‘know’ things. Negation made its appearance in history as a problem of contrast between God and the world. In order to know God, you must go beyond the world; you must leave the world behind. This is a method that we find in neo-Platonism: the principle of “beyond the essence”. With Dionysios Areopagitis, this method took on the form of using expressions with the prefix “hyper” (=super, beyond). For example, whatever affirmative thing we say about this world, we should use the prefix “hyper” when we refer to God. We refer to God as ‘benevolent’, but, because this expression is taken from the experience we have of people, this could result in anthropomorphism. In order therefore to avoid anthropomorphism, we say that God is hyper-benevolent. ‘Hyper-benevolent’ does not imply (in this usage) that He is exceedingly benevolent, which is a superficiality of ‘benevolent’; it implies rather a surpassing. It is the same as when we say that God is not ‘essence’, but ‘hyper-essence’ (Greek: yper-ousios) : beyond the essence. This is why the terminology of Negational Theology – which commences from Dionysios Areopagitis – refers to God as ‘hyper-god’; he means to stress that all the categorizing that we use from our experience of the world, contains the danger of anthropomorphism. That is why we go beyond; and the term ‘hyper’ is precisely that which implies ‘beyond’.

在此我擴展了以上的分析，以便提出以下的問題： 如果以上一切我所說的關於一個物體的認識所必須的程序， 皆被應用於上帝身上，那將會如何呢？ 以上所說的是絕對不能用於上帝的，因為以下的理由： A. 首先，因為我們應用着排斥的方法，「A 不是 B」。這意味著， 為了能知道「A」，在 A 的附近必須先有其他的某些東西，以便我將其排除。 因此，我們则被迫承認， 在上帝的身邊，總是有某個其他的東西存在着。即使那個東西只是無。小心！這可是個非常深奥的概念， 比如說， 從無創世。這是一個很大的問題。當我們說， 上帝是從無創作出世界的時候，那個「無」到底是甚麼，如果它不是上帝他自己的話？對很多人來說（例如，Thomas Aquinas 以及  Karl Barth）， 這個無 是上帝所推斥的。換句話說，這好像是， 「無」已經存在，但上帝然後說：「不，無將不可有 （不可動：act）。讓世界出現吧！」「無」於是 被拒絕了。因此，在某個意義上，為了要聯繫到上帝，你则在推斥某件東西。如果你將這種方法應用到上帝的身上，你则是認為， 上帝就是， 不是上帝的那個東西。但是，不是上帝的東西是甚麼？於此，將上帝比較於其他的事物是不可能的，因為你會因此失去上帝的意義。為了能使上帝是上帝，他一定得是獨一無二的，並不與任何其他的東西共存。所以，我們不能以排除它物的方式來知道上帝。 B. 我們所提及過的， 以空間和時間為先決條件的第二個元素， 也就是描寫 （記住，我若不能在空間和時間之中描寫一件東西的話，我就不能聯繫到它） ，也不能被應用於上帝身上。 我們不能够描寫上帝，因為， 為了能描寫上帝，我們必須在時間和空間中表示他的存在。但是， 如果你需要用到時間和空間的話，上帝则會成為一個有開始的東西，正如時間和空間必須先假定着某個起點；因此才會有物體之間的距離，這個「無」。我們不能說上帝是可以描述的。即使教父們也說上帝是「不可形容的」。你不能描寫上帝。 「不可形容的」不僅僅意味著， 我們在關於上帝之身，是甚麼也不能說的； 但也表示着， 我們是不可能在上帝的周圍制作界限（邊界）的。你不能好像在講到桌子一般地來講上帝之事，比如說，桌子有這種形狀。所以，我們也不能在上帝身上應用這種意識的方法。 在這裡我們有一個非常細致的問題。我們已經習慣地 （主要是從經院神學 [Scholastic Theology] 之後） 說， 我們能夠透過上帝的性質來認識它；例如，在每個教義學的區域内，我們皆有一種完全的對於上帝之性質的分析：上帝是仁慈的，全能的，威強的，等等。 但是在這裡有一種嚴重的危險 -- 我已經強調過這點 -- 當我說， 為了要以其性質來認識一個物體，我們必须從對其他物體的體驗中取得這些性質的知識。我是不應該只在在我面前的物體之中發現它們的。例如，如果我說這張桌子是堅強的，而堅強的這種性質僅僅存在於我的桌子之中，那我就不是真正地在指明它。 我經常跟我的學生講時鐘的這個例子。如果你把一個時鐘拿给一個從來沒有看過時鐘的原始人看，然後當這個時鐘開始運作之時再請他將其與某些其他的東西相聯繫一下，他會將這個時鐘扔下並說它是某種動物。你可以明白，這個時鐘對他提醒了一些其他的東西：一隻動物。他不能够知道它是一個時鐘，因為他從來沒有看見過時鐘。 在能够自我運作的東西的世界中，他僅僅看到過動物。我們由此可見，他的認識東西的基本方法是，使用已熟悉的事物來認知新的事物。這表示着， 認知總是與一些先前的體驗聯繫着的；換句話說，我們是在已有的經驗的基礎上分類事物的。 例如，我知道時鐘是個有那些特點的東西。這是當我認識出它是時鐘的那個時候。如果我不能認出它是時鐘，如果我以前没有看見過時鐘，我就不能夠聲明它是一個時鐘。因此，我可以作出這個結論， 當我在我的意識的過程中， 為一個物體分配某些性質的時候， 這些性質是從與其他物體有關的性質中取出的，而不是只是這個物體所獨有的性質。 （想像一個從人體學的方面看來是如此獨特的人， 以致我們不能將他與已體驗過的其他人相聯繫上，以便能了解他。醫生將没有檢查他的能力；為了能使醫生認出他的疾病，他必須與其他人相同。一名醫生絕不能真正地了解任何一個獨一無二的東西。我們所有的知識皆是依賴着我們所知的物體乃是彼此互相類似的以及擁有共同的特點的。） 那麼，如果這是真的，我們關於上帝能夠做些甚麼？我們從哪裡能够取出上帝的性質？例如，如果我要說他是「慈善的」話。 從哪裡我可取得到慈善這種性質？當然， 是從體驗中；我知道某某人是一個慈善的人。我知道上帝的能力。我是從對有強大能力的人的體驗中取得到這個知識的。所以，在我將我的這個體驗向前推測之後，我则能夠理解到上帝。上帝因此是你自己的想像， 你自己的經驗， 所創造出的。但是這些性質不是只限於上帝的；其他的人或東西也可持有它們。這就是為甚麼很多人以這些人物來替換上帝。我為甚麼應該害怕上帝而不害怕雷電呢？畢竟，這兩個都是很強有力的。 性質 -- 即使是最正性的，如慈善 -- 仍然是我們從我們對於其他事物的知識和體驗中所借出的，而上帝不是這些其他事物。 我特别地在強調着上帝為天父的這個概念，而這個概念则是最難了解的意思中的其中一個， 因為擬人化論 (anthropomorphism) 在此非常風行。我們自從我們的小孩的早期開始就教他們認上帝為「我們的父親 」，但是這是個甚麼意思呢？這是建立在小孩們對他們在家之父親的體驗的基礎上。 他們給予他們的父親一些性質，例如：他比他們強壯；他能夠做出他們所不能夠做的事情；他可以保護他們， 等等。所以，當這些全部收集在一起的時候，小孩子們即形成了一個關於上帝的概念，就如我們將其給予了小孩子們似地。小孩子們接受了它，然後又怎麼樣呢？當青春期到達之時，並且一個孩子開始向往自由，他则想把父親這個監護人擺脫掉； 在這個時候， 他對上帝的信心便開始動搖了，因為那年青人所想振動脫離掉的大人保護，是在他的良心中與上帝一起糾纏住的，而且，他的這個革命行為 -- 以及他對一般有權威的人之叛逆 -- 则引導着他對上帝也叛逆。 這就是無神論可能出現的時候，不論是在個人的生命中，或是在國家的歷史中。當我們在文化裡發現了反對有權威者性的對自由的強調，這就是上帝的這個概念將被抛棄的時候了。為甚麼呢？因為我們是在從我們的家庭中所獲得到的經驗和性質的基礎上來 知道上帝並且與他建立起聯繫的。因此，如果你想正確地保持着上帝的這個概念並且希望與他聯繫上（這就是我們所想要的全部 ），你则不可能迴避這些危險以及不給予上帝那些能夠在其他事物中所被發現的性質。 這就是為甚麼如果我們將我所描寫過的方法（利用已熟悉的物體）適用於上帝，我們將會有醜陋的後果。我們經常將對上帝的意識與這個意識所提供的結果搞混在一起。你知道多少人因為上帝没有回答他們的禱告而對他失去信心？ 就好像我因為這張桌子對我沒有甚麼用處而決定拒絕它以及不理它，所以，同樣地，如果上帝是一個無用的東西，我就會不理他。而「不理」 這個字不只是意味著他是不存在的，但更意味着他對我來說是不存在的；是我不認識他的；是我不理他的。這世界中有「存心忽略」這回事 -- 故意的忽略。你如此可見， 對上帝的意識 -- gnosiology -- 若是以上帝的性質為基礎的話，將包含着甚麼樣的危險。它可導致為徹底的無神論，因為上帝是绝不能够適於這些性質的模子的，他也绝不能够成為我們所利用的一個物體。因為如果他是這種東西的話，我则可在任何時刻，正如我按一個按鈕以便起動一台機器一樣，我也能按這個禱告的按鈕然後再等侯上帝的回答。這將會是上帝的「物體化」 (objectification) ， 並且更壞的，它將使上帝降級到一個物體的狀況。 所以，我們不能够講上帝的性質， 然後再以這些性質為依據以便獲得對上帝的意識，因為那會是非常危險的。 當然我們也不能利用任何包括時間和地方的類目來認識上帝，因為我們已經說過，時間 和空間是在創世期間所出生的， 因而不適於上帝。所以，我們的問題则是：「我得如何才能夠與上帝聯繫上？」在我們的經驗中，可有任何東西能為我指出方向？ 我們是不是可能不用「物體化」， 排除， 性質， 實用等等這些方式，來與某某東西建立起聯繫？我是不是能夠不做這些，而仍然與東西聯繫上？如果我能夠的話，我则有能夠聯繫到上帝的機會。如果我不能夠的話，则下列的兩個中有一個會發生：或者呢，我完全不能够與上帝聯繫上，以至我绝不能够說， 我 「知道」上帝，或者呢，我不再嘗試着在體驗的基礎上來表達上帝，即，「我認識上帝，但是我不能够表達它，我不能够給與它一個意思。因此我不能够應用知識學 （gnosiology） ；我不能够說任何有關上帝的事」。 這兩種對這個問題的答覆，已經被重複地表達過了，並且我們今天仍然可以聽到。其一是否定性的，表示着， 在有關上帝之事的方面，你是甚麼也不能够說的 -- 只有保持絕對的沉默；我們也許對上帝可能有某種意識，但是我們是绝不可能將其由文字表達出的。另外的那個答覆则是一種神秘主義，它允許我們在關於上帝的方面表達某某意識， 如果我們只是在提及到我們的情感和經歷而已； 而在某些極端性質的神秘主義中，這些情感和經歷將除去知者（認識者）和被知者（被認識者）之間的差別。這就是為甚麼宗教們廣闊地應用過這兩種知識學，並且為我們東正教制造了一些混亂；因為， 否定的方式是由希臘教父們在某種形式上所開發出的，而神秘主義也是存在的。 這種神秘主義和否定方式的结合成為了一個特別需要解釋的主題，尤其是透過一位在我們的時代中非常有名的俄國神學家，Vladimir Lossky ； 他寫過「東正教的神秘神學」，這曾導致了一些混亂。 所以，這個問題確實會出現：如果這就是我們所尋找的方式，如果這就是知識學，也就是，利用聲稱我完全不能够認識上帝的否定性的方式，我们则必須問：「我關於上帝到底能够說些甚麼肯定性的東西，並且，我是否能够做出一個肯定性的知識學， 而不僅僅是否定性的？」要說「我不能夠說任何有關上帝的事」， 那是很容易的。要說上帝不是些甚麼，　那是很容易的。但是，如果我們想問：「我關於上帝能够說些甚麼肯定性的東西？」，問題则成為，如何可以不陷入圈套而說些從先前的事物體驗中所借出的東西，因為那些其他事物不能放于與上帝同樣的水平上，要不然，它們就成為擬人式的推測。所以，在關於上帝時，我必須說一些不是起源於我用以知道其它事物的方式的東西。 否定式是以上帝和世界之間之對照的問題的身份在歷史中出現的。為了能認識上帝，你必須走出世界；你必須將世界遺留在後。這是我們在新柏拉圖學派主義中所發現到的一種方法：「在精素本質 （essence）之外」的這個原則。與 Dionysios Areopagitis 一起，這種方法所使用的形式是運用「hyper　（超出）」這個字首。例如，每一件我們關於這個世界所說的肯定性的事情，當我們提到上帝的時候，　我們则該使用「hyper」這個字首。我們說上帝是「慈善 的」，但是，因為這種說法是從我們與他人的體驗中所取出的，他將導致於擬人化。為了避免擬人化，我們說上帝是超级　（hyper）慈善的。「超级慈善 」 在這裡不是意味著他是非常慈善的，那只是表面性的慈善；「超级慈善 」在此是意味著，超越性的慈善。這跟當我們說上帝不是精素 　（essence），而是精素之上（希臘语：yper-ousios：在要素之外）的之時，　是同樣的。 這就是為甚麼在（從 Dionysios Areopagitis 所開始的）否定式神學　（Negational Theology）的術語中上帝是稱為「超级神」(hyper-god)的；它是想強調着，我們在我們對世界的體驗中所使用的分類 形式　(cateogorization)，皆包含着擬人化的危險。那就是為甚麼我們要超出；而 hyper 這個字首则就是意味著 「超出」。