Wittgenstein on Religious Belief

Wittgenstein's conception of religious belief has been both enormously influential and hotly contested, despite the fact that he published next to nothing on the philosophy of religion. In the contemporary literature, he has been variously labelled a fideist, a non-cognitivist, and a relativist of sorts. However, this Element shows that all of these readings are misguided and seriously at odds, not just with what Wittgenstein says about religious belief, but with his entire later philosophy.

This Element also argues that Wittgenstein presents us with an important 'third way' of understanding religious belief – one that does not fall into the trap of either assimilating religious beliefs to ordinary empirical or scientific beliefs or seeking to reduce them to the expression of certain attitudes. Wittgenstein's approach to religious belief is unique and deserves careful consideration.

The first part of this Element examines the various labels that have been applied to Wittgenstein's views on religion, and it demonstrates how these labels fail to capture the nuances and complexities of his position. For instance, the fideist interpretation, which holds that Wittgenstein saw religious beliefs as immune to rational scrutiny, is shown to be overly simplistic and at odds with Wittgenstein's broader philosophical outlook.

Similarly, the non-cognitivist reading, which sees Wittgenstein as denying the cognitive status of religious beliefs, is also rejected as an inadequate characterization of his position. The relativist interpretation, which suggests that Wittgenstein saw religious beliefs as inherently subjective or culture-bound, is likewise shown to be an oversimplification.

In the second part of this Element, the author presents Wittgenstein's alternative approach to religious belief, which avoids the pitfalls of these other interpretations. Wittgenstein's view, it is argued, is that religious beliefs should be understood not as empirical or scientific claims, nor as mere expressions of emotion or attitude, but as a unique form of language-use that is irreducible to other domains.

Wittgenstein's conception of religion is rooted in his broader philosophical project of investigating the various 'language-games' that make up our shared forms of life. Just as there are distinct language-games associated with science, art, and ordinary conversation, Wittgenstein saw religious belief as having its own unique 'grammar' or 'logic' that cannot be fully captured by the standards of other domains.

This 'third way' of understanding religious belief, the Element argues, allows Wittgenstein to acknowledge the cognitive and truth-oriented aspects of religious claims without reducing them to the same kind of empirical or logical verification that we might apply to scientific hypotheses. Religious beliefs, on this view, are not irrational or immune to rational scrutiny, but they operate according to a different set of rules and criteria than those associated with other forms of belief and knowledge.

The Element concludes by highlighting the significance of Wittgenstein's approach to religious belief, both for our understanding of religion itself and for the broader philosophical debates surrounding the nature of belief, language, and knowledge. Wittgenstein's unique perspective, it is claimed, offers a valuable alternative to the reductive and polarizing positions that have often dominated the philosophy of religion.

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