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References
Ludwig Wittgenstein,Philosophical Investigations, (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1953), paragraph 23.
Wittgenstein,Philosophical Investigations, paragraph 664.
Ludwig Wittgenstein,On Certainty (New York: J & J. Harper Editions, 1969), paragraph 136.
Wittgenstein,On Certainty, paragraphs 153 and 403.
Ludwig Wittgenstein,Lectures & Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1972), p.58.
Wittgenstein,Lectures & Conversations, p.62.
Wittgenstein,Lectures & Conversations, p.56.
Wittgenstein,Lectures & Conversations, p.61.
Ludwig Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1961), paragraph 6.4312.
Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, paragraph 5.62.
Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, paragraph 5.632.
Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, paragraph 6.431.
Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, paragraph 6.45.
Wittgenstein,Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, paragraph 6.52.
Ludwig Wittgenstein,Culture and Value (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1980), p.50.
This perspective is a constant one in Wittgenstein's writing. Note, for example, his conclusion, when discussing thePhilosophical Investigations, that ‘I am not a religious man but I cannot help seeing every problem from a religious point of view.’ [Rush Rhees, ed.,Recollections of Wittgenstein (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), p.79.]
Frank B. Dilley, ‘Are Conclusive Proofs Irrelevant to Religion?’Thomist, Vol.39, 1975: pp.727–740.
Wittgenstein,Lectures & Conversations, p.57.
As Kierkegaard notes, ‘A hundred thousand individual witness, who are individual witnesses just on account of the peculiar character of their testimony (that they believed the absurd) cannoten masse become anything else, so as to make the absurd less absurd—why should they? [Søren Kierkegaard,Kierkegaard's Concluding Unscientific Postscript To The ‘Philosophical Fragments’, translated by David F. Swenson (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1944) p.190.]
Although Wittgenstein's view of religion is generally Kierkegaardian in nature, i.e., it is grounded on a form of individualism manifested in the solipsistic perspective, it may be objected that there is a crucial difference between the two in terms of rationality. Wittgenstein sees religion as neither rational nor irrational, while Kierkegaard emphasizes the wildly irrational nature of religious belief. For Kierkegaard, the central doctrine of Christianity is that at some time and in some place God became man without ceasing to be God, the word became flesh. But to believe that is to believe in a logical impossibility. ‘The eternal truth has come into time: this is the paradox’, and that is an offense to the intellect. (Postscript, p.187). This, in effect, is a description of the actual difficulties involved in religious belief, in religious faith, which necessarily includes a passionate commitment-to something that is logically contradictory. This analysis, however, is also thoroughly consistent with Wittgenstein's position that religion has nothing to do with the categories of rationality or irrationality. We clearly cannot provide evidence or give reasons for why we believe in the logically absurd, which is Wittgenstein's point. Evidence and proof are irrelevant to religious belief.
Søren Kierkegaard,Fear and Trembling and The Sickness Unto Death, translated by Walter Lourie (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1941), p.60.
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Huff, D. Wittgenstein, solipsism, and religious belief. SOPH 31, 37–52 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02772351
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02772351