Religion; the Binary of Belief and Practice: A Reading of the Late Wittgenstein’s Religious Life

Document Type : علمی پژوهشی

Authors

• Valiyollah Nasiri ¹
• masoomeh taheri sudejani ²

¹ Assistant Professor and Faculty Member of the Department of Religions and Comparative Mysticism, Shahrekord University, Iran, Shahrekord

² professor

10.22067/epk.2022.75429.1106

Abstract

Wittgenstein’s narrative of religion, faith, and its relation to practice has led to one of the important approaches in the contemporary philosophy of religion, influencing many researches in the humanities and social sciences; Thus, Wittgenstein’s view in this regard deserves more careful consideration, reassessment, and preparation for application in society. The present research method is descriptive and a kind of content analysis. This article describes and analyzes the truth and nature of faith and its relation to practice based on Wittgenstein’s later works, including Philosophical Investigations, Culture and Value, and Lectures on Religious Belief. It is inferred from Wittgenstein's scattered works and lectures on religion that he was concerned both in thought and in practice with the relationship between faith and action, albeit in his own way. The use theory of meaning, which is the basis of his later thought, has been brought up for this purpose. Using his own terms “use theory of meaning” and the metaphor of “language games” and “the form of life”, Wittgenstein explains that religion is an interconnected system composed of faith and practice, and that the two are concomitant and cannot be separated.

Keywords

• Wittgenstein
• faith
• practice
• religion
• language game

Main Subjects

• Islamic Philosophy and Kalam

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