MAREK PORWOLIK, Józef Maria Bocheński’s “Was ich Glaube” as a Realization of His Program of Studies on God

SUMMARY

In his book, Gottes Dasein und Wesen. Logische Studien zur Summa Theolgiae I, qq. 2-11, Józef Maria Bocheński (1902-1995) conducts a logical analysis of the questions from Aquinas’ Summa Theologiae, indicated in the title of the book, and of Immanuel Kant’s criticism of the cosmological argument. In the first chapter, Bocheński formulates and discusses his program of studies on God, which provides an ideological frame for the analyses presented in the book. One of the research areas proposed in his program is faith as a way to know God. However, in the book, Bocheński does not conduct an analysis concerning this topic. In the meantime, he wrote another book, Was ich glaube, an unfortunately as yet unpublished work. The book, considered to be Bocheński’s last, contains references to The Logic of Religion, and the analyses it presents focus on two main problems: the justification of faith and the kinds and meanings of the sentences a believer believes in. The aim of this paper is to answer the question of whether it is possible to consider Was ich glaube as a result of the above-mentioned program of studies on God in the area of knowing God through faith.