Abstract:

The main objective of this study is to analyse the influence of the principle of verification on religious language and the solutions produced for the problem of verification. What makes this subject important is the fact that, especially in logical positivism, religious assertions are claimed to have no meaning as they cannot be verified. However, ordinary language philosophy has shown that languages have many uses, and verification is not the necessary condition for an utterance to have a meaning. Therefore, the focus of this paper is on ordinary language philosophy, along with the nature of religious language. Besides, the principle of falsification is included so as to ensure a comprehensive evaluation on the subject matter. The problems of reference, meaning and truth in religious assertions are covered and the possibility of a semantic theory for religious language is discussed. Additionally, the applicability of some approaches, such as speech acts, conventionality and language games, in ordinary language philosophy to religious language is examined. Finally, objections to the approaches mentioned are evaluated, and having underlined the difficulties in establishing an efficient religious language, some proposals are put forward.

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