Article on How God got Started - Essay Example

Your Full Your s 20 March How Did God Get Started: An Evaluative Response In his article How Did God Get Started, Colin Wells discusses the idea behind theology: the whole concept about having an all powerful, all-knowing deity. He describes the inception and evolution of the concept as well as the religious beliefs of monotheistic religions such as Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The author talks about the birth of religion, the one incident that is at the base of all major world religions: the story of Abraham and the Sacrifice.

According to Wells, the whole incident regarding God’s instruction to Abraham to sacrifice his son was a test of the latter’s faith. Hence faith, according to Wells was a Jewish invention, which later on branched in Christianity and Islam. And while all of this was happening, science and logic were advancing at an alarming rate with the ancient Greeks at the helm of the onslaught. He adds that pure reason and logic have always collided with the concept of pure, blind faith despite the attempts of scholars to “‘reconcile’ them through the ages,” he says.

So it is established, he points out, that faith and reason do not get along very well together. Moving on, he notes that surprisingly enough, the evolution and progress of faith can be charted in the rise of reason itself. He says that this theory gives psychological insights into the clash of faith with reason and vice versa. Even though faith is attributed to monotheistic religions, polytheistic religions such as Hinduism and Buddhism also use this term to define their beliefs. Hence monotheistic religions use faith in meanings different from other religions since “any religious practice implies a basic belief in one’s own objects of worship.

” He also addresses the idea that religion, or the idea thereof was conceived by the Jews and goes on to say that the ancient Hebrews did not worship a God they thought was a solely powerful being. Rather, they worshipped one out of many that they considered to be the most powerful. Also, the first commandment out of the ten handed down to Moses stated that no other deities should be worshipped, giving birth to the argument that other deities therefore existed, or at least that there were others being worshipped by people.

Religion was forced to rely on faith when the onslaught of reason and logic slashed most of its theories. Wells says that: “To put it another way, faith is the unassailable citadel to which religion withdrew after reason had overrun much of its original territory.” With the introduction of faith, all unexplainable phenomena in religion can be provided an answer for. Faith and reason go hand in hand and will do so around the globe. In conclusion, Wells states that monotheistic faith will be accompanied by reason in its spread around the world, as it is already doing so.

Despite being different and despite challenging each other, faith and reason keep each other on its toes and depend on each other for survival. . Overall, Colin has supported his arguments quite well, as he has pointed out the antagonistic relationship between blind faith and reason. His assumptions are well put, and then he forwards enough evidence to support his premise. The conclusions he comes to may be argued against by certain apologists of religion, however, the premises he states logically result in the conclusion he has drawn.

Works Cited Wells, Colin. “How did God Get Started?” Arion: A Journal of Humanities and the Classics, Volume 18. Boston University, 2010. Web. 20 Mar. 2011.