"Religious language and matters of fact"

Abstract

This thesis is about religious language and its relation to matters of fact. In it we examine some recent discussions in the philosophy of religion which deal largely with the language or "discourse" of religious belief, doctrine and practice. This is in accord with the mood of much modern philosophical analysis, the history of which need not he recalled here. It is by examining religious discourse that the philosopher expects to find not merely the linguistic form of religion, but what religion is "about"; what facts are asserted, what claims for truth are made, and what tests there are for distinguishing sense from nonsense.