SECTION III: How do I know?

The German philosopher, Ludwig Feuerbach, develops a humanist account of religion. On this view, religion is best understood not in the supernatural terms of beings distinct and removed from us, but as an expression of certain of humanity's most important features. God is an idealization of the things that we hold sacred - goodness, wisdom, love, and the very form of our subjective being. Feuerbach's account suggests a form of religious belief that is both epistemically and pragmatically rational.

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"Quod supra nos nihil ad nos: a God who inspires us with no human emotions, who does not reflect our own emotions, in a word, who is not a man – such a God is nothing to us, has no interest for us, does not concern us."

An etching of Feuerbach, from the 19th Century German magazine, Die Gartenlaube

Go on to Nietzsche.

Go back to the Kierkegaard.