- EBIONISM
-
- Denied the deity of Christ
- Jesus was only a man
- Christ, in the form of a dove, descended on Jesus
- At the crucifixion, Christ left Jesus
- Eck, Johann
- (1486-1543)
Johann Eck
- German theologian
- against Luther
- Eckhart, Meister
- (c 1260-1328)
- German Dominican mystic
- God is not known through any of the normal means of human knowledge, but through a direct uniting with Him.
- Eddington, Arthur Stanley
- (1882-1944)
A. S. Eddington
- Science professor at Cambridge
- wrote The Nature of the Physical World.
- Edwards, Jonathan
- (1703-1758)
Jonathan Edwards
- US Congregational pastor and theologian
- third President of Princeton
- entered Yale at age 13 knowing Hebrew, Greek, and Latin
- influenced First Great Awakening
- friend of George Whitefield
- preached from manuscript
- preached "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God"
- wrote
- Religious Affections
- The Freedom of the Will
- Narrative of the Surprising Work of God
- EFFICIENT CAUSE
- An expression used by Thomas Hobbes
- EGOCENTRIC PREDICAMENT
-
- The situation you get into when you are confined to your own ideas and are incapable of knowing anything else.
- Einstein, Albert
- (1879-1955)
Albert Einstein
- professor at Zurich, Prague, Berlin and Princeton
- theory of relativity
- Elias, John
- (1774-1841)
- Welsh Calvinistic Methodist preacher.
- Eliot, John
- (1604-1690)
John Eliot
- US Anglican became Non-conformist
- missionary to Indians
- helped publish The Bay Psalm Book.
- EMERGENTISM
-
- Holds that new levels of reality are constantly evolving from matter, to life, to mind, to God.
- New realities such as mind are formed through evolution and cannot be reduced to lower levels.
- Emerson, Ralph Waldo
- (1803-1882)
Ralph Waldo Emerson
- American poet and essayist
- See entry in 1911 Encyclopedia
- Emmons, Nathaniel
- (1745-1841)
Nathaniel Emmons
- US Congregational pastored one church for 54 years
- topical sermons.
- EMOTIVISM
-
- A non-cognitivist ethics system
- See Axiological Nominalism.
- Empedocles
- (c 495-c 435 BC)
Empedocles
- Greek philosopher who lived in Sicily.
- Wrote
- On Nature
- On Purification
- Foreshadowed view of evolution
- Studied circulation of the blood and atmospheric pressure
- Founder of Italian medicine.
- EMPIRICAL POSITIVISM
-
- A form of Phenomenalism proposed by J. S. Mill which combines Hume's pure phenomenalism and the positivism of Comte.
- EMPIRICAL THEISM
-
- Also called Religious Pragmatism.
- God is limited.
- He is one of many "reals" and is known through your will to believe with superhuman consciousness.
- You are conscious of this superhuman consciousness (the "more") in the universe because it is on the other side (or subconscious side) of the subconscious side of your conscious life.
- Natural theology is inadequate; experience and faith are primary.
- It says "Religion is man's response to an undifferentiated sense of reality, to the more" (William James).
- EMPIRICISM
-
- contrasts with Rationalism by believing that you get all ideas or concepts from experience and that truth must be established by reference to experience alone.
- See
- Empiricus
-
- See Sextus Empiricus
- ENERGY
-
- See Mass-energy
- Epictetus
- (c AD 60)
Epictetus
- Greek philosopher
- intensely practical, and exhibits a high idealistic type of morality.
- See entry in 1911 Encyclopedia
- EPICUREANISM
-
- says religion and concepts of God arise through ignorance and fear.
- If there be god(s), they are far off and indifferent (Lucretius).
- Epicurus
- (341-270 BC)
Epicurus
- Good is pleasure, pain is evil.
- Uncontrolled pursuit of pleasure results not in more pleasure but in pain.
- Therefore we must live austere to avoid pain.
- Pain, fear of death, and fear of the gods were the greatest threats to man's happiness.
- If the world (including man) were just chance combinations of atoms, then we would feel pain only as long as we are alive; but when we die, the atoms dispense and we cannot suffer any feelings of evil or fear.
- The gods are merely combinations of atoms, with no power to rule or punish men.
- If lightning strikes a man, it is a natural accident and not Zeus hurling a thunderbolt to punish him.
- These fears should not disturb a person's tranquility (i.e., religion and concepts of God arise through ignorance and fear).
- Episcopius, Simon
- (1583-1643)
- Dutch theologian and leader of Remonstrants (Arminian)
- banished by Synod of Dort
- wrote Institutiones Theologicae
- EPISTEMOLOGICAL REALISM
-
- The mind knows independent things not ideas alone
- knower and things known are distinct
- knower is in the world.
- view of Carnap
- EPISTEMOLOGY
-
- Greek episteme (knowledge) + logeo (to speak).
- The theory of knowledge: the study of the nature, sources, and validity of knowledge.
- It differs from logic and psychology.
- Logic is concerned with the specific and formal problem of correct reasoning, while epistemology deals with the nature of reasoning, with truth, and with the process of knowing themselves.
- Psychology is concerned with a descriptive study of behavior, phenomena, etc., while epistemology deals with our claims to knowledge, i.e., what we mean by "knowing."
- See
- Erasmus, Desiderius
- (1466-1536)
Erasmus
- Dutch
- Christian humanist of Reformation
- disagreed with Luther over freedom of the will (Erasmus was "Arminian"; Luther was "Calvinistic")
- wrote In Praise of Folly
- influential in establishing the study of Greek NT by publishing a Greek NT used by Luther.
- Attacked inconsistency and hypocrisy in the church.
- Erastus, Thomas
- (1524-1583)
- founder of Erastianism
- the state has authority over the church in all matters
- Erigena, John Scotus
- (c810-877)
Erigena
- Irish philosopher
- shifted trend from Plato to Aristotle
- Scripture is as authoritative as reason
- interpret Scripture by reason
- Erskine, Ebenezer
- (1680-1754)
Ebenezer Erskine
- saved after he was ordained
- kicked out of the Established church
- founded Scotland Secession church
- exegesis was poor
- sermon outlines were very complex
- Erskine, Henry
- (1624-1696)
- Scottish preacher
- father of Ralph and Ebenezer
- kicked out of his church for his faith
- used open-air services
- Erskine, John
- (1721-1803)
John Erskine
- leader of evangelical party of Church of Scotland
- friends with George Whitefield and Wesleys
- Erskine, Ralph
- (1685-1752)
- Church of Scotland
- younger brother to Ebenezer Erskine
- preacher with little scholarship.
- ESSENCE
-
- What a thing is.
- For Greek philosophy, it means substance (ousia), that which is not apparent but is the true reality about things. What can be conceived, what is universal.
- In Plato, it is the Form or Idea (from the Noumena).
- A similar idea is used by Santayana, Husserl, Thomas Aquinas, Kierkegaard, Sartre, and Heidegger.
- ETHICAL EGOISM
-
- Always further your own interest and ignore the interest of others unless it affects your own interest.
- ETHICAL RELATIVISM
-
- All moral beliefs are true.
- There is no universal or absolute standard of right and wrong.
- ETHICS
-
- Agapistic ethics
- Christian ethics
- Compatibilism
- Deontological ethical theory
- Descriptivist ethics
- Emotivism
- Ethical egoism
- Ethical relativism
- Existential ethics
- Imperativist ethics
- Incompatibilism
- Moral conscience, ethics based on
- Naturalistic ethics
- Non-naturalistic ethics
- Normative ethics
- Power, ethics
- Religious ethics
- Situation ethics
- Teleological ethics
- Teleological ethical theory
- Eucken, Rudolf Christoph
- (1846-1926)
R. C. Eucken
- German professor at Basel
- wrote
- The Truth of Religion
- Philosophy of Spirit
- spirit is ultimate reality but not same as Hegelian thought
- man is not only a purely physical being but also a spiritual one
- all things (even inanimate things) have a kind of spiritual life of their own
- emphasized spirit as the agent of action, rather than merely thought
- strong empirical emphasized
- EUDAEMONISM
-
- Ethical theory of Greece which said that the aim of right action is personal well-being or happiness.
- Eutyches
- (c 375-454)
Eutyches
- Archimandrite of a monastery in Constantinople
- condemned by Synod of Constantinople in 448
- supported by Robber Synod of Ephesus in 449
- condemned by Council of Chalcedon in 451
- EUTYCHIANISM
-
- The two natures of Christ were fused into a third nature which was neither human nor divine
- Some said that the human nature was absorbed into the divine
- EVANGELICALISM
-
- Stresses supernaturalism, theism, and personal regeneration.
- The Bible is the supreme authority as the verbally inspired Word of God.
- Certain doctrines, e.g., the virgin birth and the divinity of Jesus, are the necessary conditions of orthodox belief.
- Evans, Christmas
- (1766-1838)
Christmas Evans
- Welsh Baptist preacher
- born on Christmas day
- saved at age 17
- learned to read same year
- beat up by former companions for becoming a Christian and thus lost an eye
- known for great revival preaching and soul-winning in South Wales.
- Evans, Evan Herber
- (1835-1896)
- Welsh Congregational pastored one church for 30 years
- primary topic was the inspiration and inerrancy of the Bible
- Evans, William
-
- US Presbyterian taught Bible at Moody Bible Institute
- dean of Bible Institute of Los Angeles.
- EVENT
-
- See Christ event
- EVIL
-
- See Theodicy
- EXCLUDED MIDDLE LAW
- (1870-1950)
- Any entity is either some particular kind of thing or it is not.
- A rose is a flower or it is not a flower.
- EXISTENCE
-
- The assertion that a thing is, not what it is as a concept of essence.
- For existentialists, existence is mere consciousness and precedes essence. It is like a man who finds himself existing and then by a deliberate choice and act becomes essence.
- See
- EXISTENTIAL ETHICS
-
- Consciousness transcends and gives meaning to the world of which it is conscious.
- Consciousness is nothingness, thus it is undetermined (free to choose).
- It arises in the act of intending (giving meaning to the world).
- Moral decisions are similar to the creative decisions of artists in concrete situations.
- In moral decisions, freedom is exercised.
- One becomes being-for-itself.
- Responsibility is absolute.
- Man has no excuse.
- You can't say: "God willed that I do this thing" or "Because of my genes, parents, background, environment, etc. I did this thing."
- EXISTENTIAL PHILOSOPHY
-
- favored by European philosophers.
- Contrasts with Analytic Philosophy favored by English-speaking philosophers.
- Rejects rational, purely logical or linguistic analysis in favor of the analysis of experience.
- Concerned with the components of the human situation.
- Does not like to express his ideas in intellectual, traditional and/or historic approaches.
- Generally uses literary or theological expressions.
- Logic is dialectical rather than traditional or mathematical.
- EXISTENTIALISM, RELIGIOUS
-
- God is a dimension of quality of existence (or being, reality, etc.).
- "The ultimate of the act of faith and the ultimate that is meant in the act of faith are one and the same" (Tillich).
- God is your participation in the ground or depth of your own being.
- Faith is not a kind of knowledge.
- Knowing is confined to science.
- "Faith is the total and centered act (commitment) of the personal self" (Tillich).
- Except for assertions like "God is Being Itself," all assertions about God are symbolic, including the assertion "God is dead."
- Statements about God are about your experience and relation to existence (or being).
- For example, "God exists" means "I experience a depth in my being when I respond to reality with ultimate concern" (Tillich).
- It says "Religion is man's response to ultimate concerns in terms of the ultimate" (Tillich).
- EXPERIMENTALISM
-
- Also called Instrumentalism.
- Knowledge is a collection of experiences.
- Stresses the experimental method as the method of inquiry.
- Held by John Dewey.
- See Pragmatism
- EXTRINSIC VALUE
-
- see Instrumental Value.
