PERSONAL DEITY
Sir-In his letter discussing the Thomist synthesis of faith and reason Mr. J. Malton Murray invites us to give over reason as well as faith. He says, "Gf we begin to think of a personal Deity we become consciously embroiled and, befogged with our \own personalities," etc., and he asks us, "to accept the idea of an impersonal source of supernatural inspiration." We attribute personality to God for this reason. We are persons (rational beings). We did not make our‘selves. We were made. We are effects. We had a cause. This cause could not be mud and slime evolving, for "nothing can give what it has not: got"-a critically important truth of reason though it sounds simple. The cause of men must be a Being who is rational either in the same way as we are or in a more excellent way. There are powerful reasons for holding that God is rational in a more excellent way, but you ¢an’t give them in two or three sentences. In any case, He is personal. As for the inspira-tion--you can no more get supernatural, inspiration from an impersonal source than you can get rational conversation out of a brick wall or rational philosophy from an _ old-fashioned "Rationalist.’? None of them can give what thev haven’4
got.
CHARLES
LANGTON
(Auckland)
More letters Policies Haliabdate will be found on page 17
LETTERS (Cont'd)
(continued from page 5)
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 451, 13 February 1948, Page 5
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235PERSONAL DEITY New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 451, 13 February 1948, Page 5
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