The Research On Leibniz’s Religious Epistemology

This dissertation is on the theory of Leibniz’s religious epistemology.In fact,the proposal of this question contains a comprehensive understanding of two dimensions,which includes both the refinement of Leibniz’s philosophy of religion and theory of "religious epistemology".Meanwhile,in the contemporary international Leibniz philosophical research,it shows a commendable tendency that more and more researchers begin to put the ideas of "process" into the research and strive to interpret it into a process that involves constant changes in different stages of development.Therefore,in order to find out the ideological roots in a more detailed and accurate historical backgrounds,the first chapter of this paper traces back to the intellectual backgrounds and theoretical origins of Leibniz’s epistemology.The second chapter focuses on the foundation and main contents of Leibniz’s epistemology.Among them,the core of epistemology,knowledge,is inquired in details.More importantly,the third and the fourth chapters are the main parts of this paper.In effect,although philosophical epistemology and religious epistemology are two different theoretical perspectives,they are not independent of each other.Therefore,in Chapter 3,the "rationalist" position in philosophical epistemology is consistently embodied in Leibniz’s interpretation of religious belief and the construction of religious epistemology.To be more specific,how religious beliefs show the "possibility" in the strict meaning of knowledge will inevitably lead Leibniz to understand and elucidate the classical theological issues such as natural theology,revealed theology and the "theodicy" from his own unique point.And all of these issues undoubtedly form the main body of Leibniz’s philosophy of religion(Chapter 4).In conclusion,Leibniz’s teasing out the relationship between reason and faith,mutual infiltration and application of philosophical demonstration and theological defense reflect his promotion and innovation toward the understanding of rationalism,metaphysics,theology and cognitive paradigm(such as Evidentialism and Fundamentalism)(Chapter 5).In short,Leibniz’s theory on innate principle and ideas,universal principle,the origin of abstract ideas,the nature of the mind that as the subject of cognition,the essence of Christian faith and the “rationality” of belief are very profound and deep.Although Leibniz was criticized by many philosophers who based on different historical backgrounds and theoretical positions,his philosophical heritage still inspired many thinkers in their own theoretical construction and development(such as Kant,Husserl,Swinburne,etc.).At last,we can treat it as the echo of the traditional topic of "faith and reason" in the new era.