4 THE CONCEPTS OF GOD MONOTHEISM AND DEISM

-4 THE CONCEPTS OF GOD (MONOTHEISM AND DEISM)

�There is a close relationship between the caharacter of a religion and its conception of God. �Religions basically differ in terms of their different conception of deity. �Religions can be roughly divided into theistic religions and non-theistic religions. �In non-theistic religions, the source or ground of being is conceived in non-personal terms such as the ultimate or the absolute.

�Theistic religions differ from non-theistic religions in that they attribute personal properties such conciousness, knowledge, goodness and will to God is a person. �Apart from this general distinction, philosophically speaking, one can classify the conceptions of God as follows: theism (or monotheism), deism, pantheism and panentheism.

THEISM �Theism argues that God is necessary, eternal, omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent and free creator of the world. �God not only creates the world but also maintains its existence and interferes the course of the nature or history in terms of divine actions such as revealing or performing miracles. �For theism again God is transcendent. There is an essential ontological between God as the creator and the world as the created.

DEISM �Like theism, deism also accepts the existence of God as the creator. �What distinguishes deism from theism is that, unlike the latter, the former does not accept God’s intervention in history and nature in terms of revelation and miracles. �Thus, deists generally refuses to accept miracles, revelation and prophecy. �Deism claims that one can get the necessary religious knowledge by (unaided) reason alone. Such knowledge involves our knowledge of the existence and nature of God, of moral knowledge of right and wrong etc.

DEISM �In contrast to theism, deism defends «the natural religion» versus «the revealed religion» or «historical religion» �For deists religious knowledge gained on the ground of reason provides a better account od Divine justice as its equally open to every rational being. �However, the basic tenets of deism remain controversial. Given the fact that human reason is not always an infallible source of knowledge, it may need guidance. Theism therefore can be better alternative if it can show that revelation helps us to develop our understanding with respect to religion and morality.