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4.  But  this  still  leaves  open  the  question  of  the  mode  of  reasoning,  or  way of  taking  account  of  things  that  must  somehow  be  taken  account  of  within  which religious  utterances  are  either  true  or  false.  The  answer  to  this  question can  be  given  only  by  rightly  locating  the  religious  mode  of  reasoning,  or  way of  taking  account  of  reality,  relative  to  the  metaphysical  mode  of  reasoning, on  the  one  hand,  and  the  moral  mode  of  reasoning,  on  the  other.  (I  can't see my  way  clear  to  doing  this  rightly  here.  The  essential  point  is  that,  while the  religious  mode  of  reasoning  overlaps,  and  hence  necessarily  presupposes both  the  metaphysical  and  the  moral  modes,  religious  utterances  nevertheless are  neither  properly  metaphysical  nor  properly  moral.  This  means,  among  other things,  that  religious  utterances  as  such as distinct from the metaphysical and moral assertions they necessarily implyclaim  to  be  expressions  of  the authentic  self-understanding  whose  possibility  is  implied  both  by  a  true  meta­physics and  a  just morality. Thus,  while  they  make  or  imply  claims  about self,  others,  and  the  whole,  they  do  so  only  as  authorizing -giving  and  demanding- the  self-understanding  that  they  also  express.  So  far  as  the  reli­gious  mode  of  reasoning  as  such  is  concerned,  then,  "God"  in  its proper  theis­tic,  as  distinct  from  its  broader,  religious,  meaning  refers  to  the  universal individual  as  authorizing  a  self-understanding  of  radical  trust  and  radical loyalty.  To  affirm,  accordingly,  "I  believe  in  God,"  is  to  affirm  not  only that  one  in  fact  does  believe  in  God  but  also  that  one  in  principle  ought  to believe  in  God  even  if one  does  not  in  fact  do  so,  because  God  gives  and  de­mands  just such  faith.  By  comparison,  then,  with  the  way  in  which  metaphys­ics  takes  account  of  God,  one  could  say,  quite  understandably,  religious  ut­terances  have  to  do  with  the  meaning-of-God-for-us,  not  with  the  being-of-God­in-itself.  But  this  would  neither  imply  the  illegitimacy  in  principle  of metaphysical  talk  about  God  (on  the  ground  that  it mistakenly  tries  to  over­come  the  systematic  ambiguity  of  IIreal,.'  etc.) nor collapse  the  crucial  distinc­tion  between  what  is  believed  and  what  is  worthy  of  belief.  It would  simply make  clear  the  important  difference  between  religion  and  metaphysics.  And  so, too,  one  could  show,  with  the  no  less  important  difference  between  the  reli­gious  mode  of  reasoning  and  the  moral. 

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