1614.All religions have to do with the constitution...

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1. All religions have to do with the constitution of human existence.

2. This means that the "basic supposition" of all religions is that human existence is constituted somehow, while the "basic question" all religions answer is the question of how human existence is really constituted.

3. The answer that any religion gives to this basic question serves to declare--not toconstitute, but to declare--how human existence is really constituted.

4. The peculiar temptation of all religion is to pretend to a constitutive, as distinct from a declarative, role relative to the constitution of human existence.

5. The peculiar temptation of all radical criticism of religion is to miss its declarative significance while challenging its pretension to have a constitutive significance.

4 November 1989; rev. 13 April 2001