My Thoughts About Worldviews
A worldview, in my opinion, is the way you look at the world and how you see God; a worldview is a set of beliefs that directs the way you act. To determine your worldview, you must ask yourself a few questions. Some of these questions include: Who is God? Where did I come from? Why do I exist? What is my purpose in life? Answers in Genesis defines a worldview as “the overall perspective from which one sees and interprets the world. A worldview is a collection of beliefs about life and the universe held by an individual or a group. ” To make this definition easier to understand, I’ll use an analogy. A worldview is like a pair of glasses.
If you get the right prescription, you’ll be able to see really clearly. If you get the wrong prescription, it could make your eyes worse and make everything blurry. Just like how the glasses make a big difference in your life, your worldview makes an even bigger difference. Your worldview influences the way you live and make choices. For example, the worldview can show how a teen could do their homework. If he was Christian and wanted to do everything for the glory of God, he would do his homework the best he could. If he was a Post-Modernist and wanted to please himself, he might not do his homework to do something “fun”.
Having the right worldview is very important. The Christian worldview includes monotheism which is the belief in one God. Not only do Christians believe in a personal, knowable Creator but he believes in the Trinity. The Trinity is God being in three parts: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. To most people, this is very confusing because they don’t understand how God can be three in one. In this case, Christians go to heaven not because of their works but because of God’s grace. God displayed His grace when He died on the cross for us. Christians get most of their information from the Bible.
This is the foundation for a Christian’s philosophy. Since Christians believe in God, their philosophy includes believing in the supernatural. As for the Christian view of metaphysics, one would go to John 1:1-4 for an answer: “All things were made by God. ” For their view of cosmology, they believe that there was no accident; God created the world with a purpose and it shows how great God is. Christian philosophers also believe the mind is a reflection of God, and that it is evidence of Him. Some great Christian philosophers are C. S. Lewis and Francis Schaeffer.
A Christian’s ethic is grounded in the character of God, which is known because of the Bible. This is the reason why ethics goes hand in hand with theology. Christians do not have rules that differ for each person, instead, they have moral absolutes. This is “the belief that an absolute ethical standard exists for all individuals regardless of era or culture. ” As followers of Christ, Christians have a huge responsibility: “. . . love the Lord your God with all you heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself. Jesus tells us to love our neighbor because loving your neighbor is like loving your Lord, and when we serve our neighbors, we’re serving Him. Biology, however, starts with the creation of the world in six literal days. The Bible states that “. . . God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them. ” If you kept reading, you would find that God created the world with order, design, and purpose. Michael Behe, the author of Darwin’s Black Box, came up with the phrase “irreducible complexity. ” A bacteria flagellum is irreducibly complex.
This means that if the flagellum lost one of its parts, the flagellum would not work. This denies evolution by saying that the flagellum could not have evolved because it needed every part to work. “The biblical worldview is about viewing everything-our friendships, careers, property, environment, interaction, ultimate responsibilities, even our homework-the way God views it and talks about it in Scripture. ”
Muslims believe in monotheism, just like Christians, but they believe in a different god. They believe that Allah is god and that Muhammad is his messenger. They do not think Allah is a knowable god and they do not believe in the Trinity. They do not believe in heaven but they believe in a paradise and to go there you must do a certain amount of good deeds. Also, Muslims must complete some tasks, often called pillars. These pillars include: confession, prayer, fasting, almsgiving, pilgrimage, and in some cases, jihad. Like Christians, Muslims have a book of scripture, called the Qur’an, written by Muhammad. Islam philosophy also believes in the supernatural because of Allah. Muslim philosophers, and some Christian philosophers, use the Kalam Cosmological Argument for the existence of God.
Although Muslims do believe in miracles, Muhammad never performed any. This created some doubts but they still had faith in Muhammad. Some great Islamic philosophers are Ahmad and Yusif Ali Hammuda Abdalat. Like Christians, Muslims believe in moral absolutes. However, these absolutes come from Muhammad and the Qur’an (or Hadith), rather than Allah, because Muslims believe that Allah cannot be known. To help Muslims follow moral obligations, they follow the Five Pillars. Unlike Christians, Muslims are motivated to do good because of their fear of judgement.
Another similarity with Christians and Muslims is the belief that a god created the earth with order, design, and purpose. Sometimes, there can be contradictions. Some Muslims think the earth was created in six days and others think it was eight days. Also, some think the days were ages instead of 24 hours. There is one big difference between Christians and Muslims: the fall of man. Muslims believe that man sinned but they do not believe that man was cursed. Secular Humanists believe in atheism. This means they do not believe in a god. God is not the only thing the Secular Humanists do not believe.
They do not believe in Satan, angels, or souls. They think instead of God creating us, we created Him just like we created Santa Claus. Although they do not believe in a god, they still tolerate religions. Unlike Muslims and Christians, they do not believe in an afterlife. Books that are very popular among Secular Humanists are the Human Manifestos I, II, and III. Secular Humanist philosophy does not believe in the supernatural. They only believe in things that are made out of matter; this is also called naturalism. Since Secular Humanists don’t believe in the supernatural, they deny all miracles.
Another problem for not believing in supernatural things is the mind and body problem. This is a problem because they do not believe in supernatural. Secular Humanists believe the mind is a “manifestation of the brain. ”[7]If you do not believe in the supernatural, you could not think because it is not made of matter. Some famous Secular philosophers are Corliss Lamont and Carl Sagan. The ethics of a Secular Humanist is that everyone has their own ethics. Unlike in Christianity or Islam, Humanists avoid absolutes. Everyone chooses what is right by what they think is right or whatever fits the situation. This is also called moral relativism.
Secular Humanists use reason to determine what is right or wrong. As for Secular Humanists, they believe in Neo-Darwinism. This is “the theory that new species were made from natural selection acting over vast periods of time on chance genetic mutations in reproductively isolated populations. ”[8] They also believe in spontaneous generation and the big bang theory. Both of these ideas talk about how everything was made randomly without a god. Secular Humanists have six “planks” they hold their biology on: spontaneous generation, natural selection, struggle for existence, beneficial mutations, adaptations, and the fossil record.
Marxists and Leninists, like Secular Humanists, are called scientific atheists. Unlike the secular humanists, they do not tolerate religion, they hate it and want to get rid of it! Karl Marx said that we created religion in order to worship ourselves. He said this but he also believes that we are gods so we should take reality and use to our liking. Like Secular Humanists, Marxists-Leninists do not believe in an afterlife. They believe the book related to Marxism-Leninism is the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Marxist-Leninist philosophy isn’t called naturalism or supernaturalism.
It is called Dialectical Materialism. There is no god in this philosophy but they call many Christian attributes, dialectical matter. This means that something begins with a thesis. Eventually, an antithesis is made and then the thesis and antithesis combine and make a synthesis. This process repeats many times. For a Marxist-Leninist, their epistemology has faith in science. Their view of metaphysics is that the earth is all that exists and the only thing that will exist. As for the mind/body problem, Marxists and Leninists think the mind is a reflection of matter and then it is translated into thought. Some famous Marxist-Leninist philosophers are Frederick Engels and Vladimir Lenin. Marxists-Leninists have a different kind of morality: proletariat morality. This is “the ethical belief that whatever advances the proletariat and the cause of communism is morally good and whatever hinders the proletariat or communism is morally evil. ”
This is pretty much saying that people who are trying to get rid of the class system are good, and whoever is trying to interfere is evil. Marxists-Leninists also believe that morality is constantly changing. Lastly, Marxists-Leninists want a classless society, also called utilitarianism. They believe that if we have a classless society, we will all be considered moral. Like Secular Humanists, Marxists-Leninists believe in spontaneous generation but, contrary to Darwinism, they believe in punctuated evolution. This is “the theory of evolution that proposes that evolutionary changes occur over a relatively quick period of time, followed by periods of little to no evolutionary change. ”
Cosmic Humanism is a little different than the worldviews we have talked about so far. Cosmic Humanists are not monotheists or atheists; they believe in pantheism. This means they believe everything is God (eg. nature and humans). Also, they do believe in an afterlife but they believe in reincarnation. Not only do you live after you are dead but you have had previous lives. For Cosmic Humanism, there is no book like other worldviews. In my opinion, I think they just look at movies. Cosmic Humanist philosophy is also different from previous philosophies. They believe everything is supernatural (non-naturalism). They also embrace Zen Buddhism. This is the belief that you can become enlightened through meditation and self-contemplation.
A Cosmic Humanist’s ontology is, in a way, like a Marxist or a Secular Humanist. A Marxist/Secular Humanist believes everything is material and a Cosmic Humanist believes everything is spiritual. As for their view of epistemology, they believe we need to get in touch with our higher self. Since we are all gods, Cosmic Humanists believe in truth relativity. This means, truth is whatever each person thinks it is. A couple of Cosmic Humanist philosophers are Joseph Campbell and Neale Donald Walsch. Out of all the ethical systems, the Cosmic Humanist’s is the easiest to understand.
Since everyone is God, we all do good all the time. Everyone does what they feel is right so you can’t judge. This is another example of moral relativism. As for their system of justice, they believe in karma. They think that if you do good, good things will come but if you do bad, you will be punished for it. Cosmic Humanists believe in something very different. This is called cosmic evolution. Cosmic evolution is the idea that “all humanity is going toward a new age of higher consciousness. ”All Cosmic Humanists are trying to get into an age of higher consciousness and become gods.
Also, they believe in the idea that all living things make up one, complex living organism ( The Gaia Hypothesis). Postmodernists are also atheists. Not only are they atheists but they believe in something called the “Death of God” theology. This is “a movement that was essentially promoting the idea that religion did not need to invoke ‘God’ in the area of theology. ” Something that is different from the other worldviews is that Postmodernists like to be ambiguous. They also believe there are no universal truths (relativism) so they, like Secular Humanism, tolerate religion (pluralism).
Finally, Postmodernists have a “trend” called emergent churches. It is a church that is incorporating Postmodernism into a Christian’s theology. Post-Modernists’ philosophy is called Anti-Realism. This means reality is anything a human can think up. Since a human can think up reality, a human can also have their own truth (subjective truth), and when they read something, it can mean whatever they want it to mean (deconstruction). Because a human can have their own truth and reality, there is no metaphysics, ontology, cosmology, or epistemology. Strangely, there are still influential philosophers.
A couple of them are Jean-Francois Lyotard and Jacques Derrida. As for Postmodernists, they follow cultural relativism. Cultural relativism is “the belief that truth and morals are relative to one’s culture. ”Although they believe that Postmodernism is the best worldview, they still call it relative. Community morals are determined by coercion and consensus. Like Marxists-Leninists, Postmodernists think morality evolves with society. Lastly, Post-Modernists affirms in punctuated evolution. They believe in evolution because they like the idea that man is insignificant and because they like the thought of chance.
