According to N. Malcolm,1 Wittgenstein did not consider himself a religious man because by "a religious man" he meant "a saint," one who is in the world and yet does not belong to the world, who sees everything "sub specie aeternitatis." Thus, the religious man believes firmly that "nothing can happen to you in this world," except what "is God’s Will," even in the most miserable situations, like that of Job.2  At times, Wittgenstein tried to decide whether he should become a priest or a schoolmaster, the main reason for such choices being the same: "to read the Gospel with children." Later, he advised his friend M.O’C. Drury not to become a priest because a priest must preach to people and be an apologist of Christianity. This would be contrary to his confession: "If something is good, it is also divine. . . . Only the supernatural can express the Supernatural." It is interesting to note his distinction between to preach and to "read with," that is, to think and about and live in problems from the Gospel’s viewpoint. To preach, for Wittgenstein, is to bear witness. The statement "It is ‘God’s Will’ may be similar to a command like ‘Don’t complain.’"3

In short, Malcolm found the reason why Wittgenstein considered that he was not a religious man: He adopted a rigorous, critical standard of religion in general and toward the religious man in particular: "His models of truly religious men were St. Augustin, John Bunyan, St. Francis, and George Fox. In comparison with those religious figures, he would regard his own religious life as mediocre." He felt that "he did not give enough space in his life to prayer and religious reflection. His thinking was concentrated on philosophical problems."4 

Wittgenstein used the simile of the eyes and the fields that they see to describe the relationship between the thinking subject and the world (T.5.633).5  This simile can be used analogically to understand the relationship and the limits between metaphysical subjects, including religion and the natural world.

The Tractatus begins with an affirmation of the descriptive definition of the world: "The world is all that is the case,"6  (he made it clear that "the case" is not a thing, but a state of affairs); it is the fact that relates to the object (thing). This relation is simple (in affirmation or negation) or in more complex forms of logical possibilities, and expressed in language. These two fundamental elements—simple object and name—correspond in logical form. This symmetrical correspondence is described as a "picture": "We picture facts to ourselves" (T.2.1) (and T.4.01). The essence of language lies in depicting how things are and the right (or correct) proposition is "iso-morphic" and needs verification.7  The hierarchical criteria for verification stand in the following order: A state of affairs in the world provides the reality of a picture, which is represented by a name. Thus it becomes a meaningful constituent that the logical form asserts. "In a proposition a situation is, as it were, assembled by way of experiment" (T.4031). An experimental picture is equally a clear expression of language. Therefore, Wittgenstein provides a theory of the meaning of propositions. He writes: "Everything that can be put into words can be put clearly" (T.4.116b). Otherwise one should keep silent (T.7).

The limitations of the empirical reality become the limitations of the clear expression of the proposition. Beyond these limitations, there are thinking subjects, esthetical and ethical matters, and especially religion, which is our main concern here. We can see a certain affinity between Wittgenstein and Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason, since Kant mentions that "soul," "world," and "God" are rather limited conceptions belonging to "the thing-in-itself." Yet, they are the necessary ground of the phenomenal world. Likewise, Wittgenstein wrote to Ludwig von Ficher, the editor of the publishing company Der Brenner: "The main argument in this book is an ethical one. What I meant to write, then, was this: my work consists of two parts: the one presented here plus all that I have not written, and it is precisely this second part that is the important one. My book draws limits to the sphere of the ethical from the inside as it were, and I am convinced that this is the only vigorous way of drawing those limits."8 

Wittgenstein tries to draw clearly the contours of the phenomenal world and, in this respect, he is a true positivist, even though he expressed dissatisfaction with any interpretation of the Tractatus showing too little attention to the important passage on being silent. That is the very matter of human life that positivism leaves untouched: "We feel that even when all possible scientific questions have been answered, the problem of life remains completely untouched" by empirical reason.9  While a state of affairs is in the world, a matter of morals, that is, a good or bad exercise of the human will, can "alter" the world’s limitation, that is, the relationship to the world: "The world of the happy man is a different one from that of the unhappy man" (T.6.43).

Human will is based on free action and reaction toward the mystery that is manifested, but it is not a matter of logical connection in the usual sense: The difference between good and bad exercise is in the act itself: "There must indeed be some kind of ethical reward and ethical punishment, but they must reside in the action itself" (T.6.422). The action itself is the expression of life in the present, and "eternal life belongs to those who live in the present" (T.6.4311). In this way, facing "eternal life" is not the question of "life after death;" a religious person believes that everyday life is the important business of life. One cannot express an ethical act or religious belief in "propositions" because "all propositions are equal" (T.6.4). They describe the "So-sein," not something that "should" be (ethical) or something that is "higher" (religious) (T.6.42). If these are expressed in "propositions," that is, clear sentences are necessarily "non-sense." Therefore, they are better kept in silence for two reasons: "One does not wish to talk non-sense, and one will be doing so if one talks nonsense about it."10

"Wisdom is gray. Life on the other hand and religion are full of color," which shows clearly in language.11

Language Games. A language game is a result of analogical combinations between formal systems and their operative activities like games: that every use of language has its own meaning is true, also for religious language. As a game it has its discipline and rules; language has constitutive rules (grammar). Although an operation or game has meaning only in its determined characteristics, all games are meaningful: otherwise they are not games. But in order to be meaningful, languages must be learned and operated correctly. Thus, there is no limitation on games, and there is no hope to determine a catalogue of possible languages; they are countless and indefinitely many.12  In P.I., Nr.23. Wittgenstein gave some insightful examples,13  one of which is "giving orders and obeying them." This is illustrated in a concrete action in P.I. Nr.21: First, it is important to distinguish the "command" from other reports or statements. This is an easy task, for we start not with words alone, but with a concrete situation or given context and appropriate activities: "Language is meant to serve for communication between a builder A and an assistant B. . . . B has to pass the stones, and that in the order in which A needs them" (P.I., Nr.3). It is possible to ask, "Should I obey it?" The question does not break out of the game, but belongs to its framework "on which the working of our language is based (P. I., Nr.240). Reason for or against is not only embedded in the situation, human customs and institutions (P.I., Nr.337), but is at the bottom of human life: "Giving grounds and justifying the evidence comes to an end. But the end is not certain propositions which strike us immediately as true, that is, it is not a kind of seeing on our part; it is our acting, which lies at the bottom (Grund) of the language-game."14  The last and most important part of "obeying" is beforehand, when we reach "bedrock," that is the base on which all Lebensforms are built up.15

Life-form. What is "life-form"? Wittgenstein did not give a clear-cut definition, but in different texts16  we can see that it was related to language, language-game, modified use of language as false or true, a superficial or deep dimension of certainty. Thus, it gives us rather a "stimulation" for thinking what it is about, and leads therefore to different interpretations, like "Behavior-package view," "Natural-historical understanding." "cultural-historical ways of living," or "fusion of world views."17 N. Gier understands "fusion" as integral Life-form developing and including four levels: "(1) a biological level from which (2) unique human activities such as pretending, grieving, etc., expressed in (3) various cultural styles, which in turn have their formal ground in a (4) general socio-linguistic framework (Wittgenstein’s Weltbild)."18  Although integral interpretation can give us a global view of Wittgenstein’s thought on Life-form, it is criticized as un-Wittgensteinian, for Lebensformen are connected with language games and human activities; yet they are not identified with them. On the other hand, Lebensform is not allowed to lock in certain formal issues, but is always recognized in living forms. It has its own depth and breadth of dimensions. A look at Wittgenstein’s "grammar" will enable us to understand how Lebensform can also be religious belief.

Grammar. Grammar is inseparable from language, and plays an important, continuing role in the thoughts of Wittgenstein. By grammar, he means first a logic of language (Sprachlogik), in terms of "logical form."19

Grammar is, properly speaking, a standard for the correct usage of linguistic expressions; it encloses all kinds of grammatical rules, such as rules of definition, analytical operation, and constitutive structure. Therefore, Wittgenstein speaks of "the grammar" of particular words, expressions, phrases, propositions, and even of states and processes. In Wittgenstein’s distinction between "surface" and "depth" grammar, the grammar stricto sensu, that aims merely at linguistic correction is surface grammar.20

In Wittgenstein’s thought, grammar goes deeply into the essence of things and of praxis, of life. "One ought to ask, not what images are or what happens when one imagines anything, but how the world ‘imagination’ is used. This does not mean that I want to talk only about words." (P. I. Nr.370). Succinctly and "enigmatically", Wittgenstein stated that: "Essence is expressed by grammar" (P.I. Nr.371) and "Grammar tells what kind of object a thing is (theology as grammar)" (P. I., Nr.373). Grammar is related to the deeper dimensions of reality, like nature, culture, and religion. It does not belong to the isolated metaphysical level, but becomes a new mode of harmony between language-games and life-forms. It is not that important to give a theoretical justification of any reality because what really matters is how one practices and expresses it in his or her life. This is the notion of "speech-act" developed by J.L. Austin and J. Searle.21  In 1937, Wittgenstein noted: "Christianity is not a doctrine, not, I mean, a theory about what has happened and will happen to the human soul, but a description of something that actually takes place in human life. For ‘consciousness of sin’ is a real event and so are despair and salvation through faith."22 

(1) In the early period, in the world of the natural sciences surrounded with facts that corresponded to precise terms marking the limited world, his religious views reflected his gaze into the immense silence of the mystical realm. Such a view seems inconsistent with the explanation of the natural world by an empiricist. This indicates that religiosity belongs to a different Weltanschuung to which the method of verification cannot be applied. This indicates also that exact propositions cannot account for the meaning of life. In short, the theory of meaning in the Tractatus is based on the belief in the "picture-theory," that is to say it eliminates mystical language. In the second part of his work, he is led rather by his later formulation: "I have to swim so strongly against the tide." Thus, he revised or even "dismissed" the fundamental belief of the Tractatus in the optimistic goal of finding "All essential points of the final solution of the problems of philosophy."23

(2) In the later Wittgenstein, when "language-game" and "life-form" dominate his thoughts, the religious viewpoint plays an important role as a grammar which gives an authentic meaning to language and further provides the deeper dimension of life-forms. As the meaning of language exists in its utterance, the meaning of religion exists in its praxis. Wittgenstein distinguished between "faith" and "superstition." He characterized superstition as "the false belief in supernatural causal mechanisms" (TLP 5.1361). He also indicated the superstition in "scientific justifications" of religious belief, just as in B. Russell’s attempt to use pure rational arguments against religious belief.24 In this line, Wittgenstein continued to protect "religion" from pseudo-religion, exactly as in the Tractatus he defended mysticism against the clearly defined realities of the natural world. A genuine religious belief is lived out in such praxis as rituals and ethical practices which integrate a chosen life according to certain religions, and forms of commitment that come from religious experiences rather than from the doctrines themselves. In this sense, the sentence in the Tractatus: "not how the world is, is the mystical, but that it is" could be transformed into a religious point: not how religion is justified is religious, but that it is authentically living.

(3) Admittedly, Wittgenstein was not ready to answer each and every question, but he did stress that religion was a "sui generis form of life" that cannot be accounted for in a rationalistic framework. This is one reason why Wittgenstein criticized Frazer vehemently, reacting to the latter’s famous work, The Golden Bough. Wittgenstein raised the following main critiques:25

(4) The religious viewpoint cannot be decided by "pointing," nor by the description of any religious process, but by its deeper dimension: "Essence is expressed by grammar." This latter quote is followed by an important reference which deserves due attention if we want to understand what "theology" may be for Wittgenstein: "theology as grammar" (P.I. Nr.373). This enigmatic sentence might be read in the light of Wittgenstein’s comment about Luther: "Luther said that theology is the grammar of the word ‘God.’ I interpret this to mean that an investigation of the word would be a grammatical one."26  It is first the description not of the content of word "God," as in a disputation about "how many arms God had," which leads only to ridicule and blasphemous views, but of how the word has significance in our existence when we confess that "God is." "How do you know that you believe?" The answer to the question, according to Wittgenstein, needs to go deeper in lived life, in real introspection. Just like the question about love: "Do I love her, or am I only pretending to myself?" "The question of belief requests an authentic introspection, calling up of memories of imagined possible situations, and of feelings that one would have if. . ." (P.I., Nr.587). Imaginations, pictures, gestures, symbols, etc., are not merely isolated thoughts or feelings, but integral elements of one’s belief. They are cultural expressions; yet, rooted in a deeper dimension. "A man says ‘O God’ and looks up to heaven. Now, it is this which can teach us the sense of the proposition that ‘God lives on high’. We might say, very roughly of people whose nature it is to kneel down on certain occasions and fold their hands that in their language they have a personal God."27  In short, we are taught the word "God," in full grammatical description, but in examples that we collect personally or in the community. Here the question of the existence of God entails many more meanings than intellectual proofs can provide. Wittgenstein is convinced that the believer would never come to a religious belief as a result of such intellectual proofs. He can see, however, that such proofs may give people an intellectual analysis and foundations that help them live a happier life: "Perhaps one could convince someone that God exists by means of a certain kind of upbringing, by shaping his life in such and such a way."28

In short, drawing our attention to the grammatical relevance of God, Wittgenstein is convinced that the religious view is not an isolated area like other scientific standpoints, but shows up in language-games and unites them. "Life can educate one to a belief in God. And experiences too are what bring this about."29

Does he mean to indicate a basic dilemma regarding the nature of philosophy? Some commentators believe that Wittgenstein offered an approach unheard of in the philosophical tradition: Philosophy does not have to dominate, but rather to acknowledge its adequate role, and give up any pretence. However, in doing so, Wittgenstein seeks a kind of therapy of thinking where there are misconceived, misunderstood or misconstructed thoughts. The therapy does not offer a theoretical, but rather a practical answer. Here, philosophy and theology are, quite surprisingly, linked closely together: they both are bound to life and help people to achieve a more meaningful life. "The sickness of a time is cured by a change in people’s way of life and the sickness of philosophical problems could be cured only through a changed way of thinking and of living, not through a medicine invented by an individual."30  "Once the new way of thinking has been established, the old problems vanish, indeed, they become hard to recapture."31

There are, indeed, several precious studies that compare Wittgenstein with a certain religious thinker (Augustin, Thomas, or Kierkegaard) or put Wittgenstein’s thoughts and Buddhism together.32 Fewer works emphasize the relevance of his religious thought to interreligious dialogue. The following reflections outline Wittgenstein’s contribution in this matter.

The later Wittgenstein will generously accept "language-games" and it is important to recognize the legacy of language-games and their rules. Living in the modern world, Christianity and Buddhism, like other world religions, cannot ignore the secular world and its challenges. Thus, while religion takes seriously natural sciences and profane cultures, it can learn from Wittgenstein to keep them in the right limits. Technology has power over natural forces and puts them at the service of humanity. But at the same time, technical advances may enslave human beings with materialism, secularism, consumerism, and pollution. Against a fatal confusion between scientific knowledge and spiritual wisdom, Wittgenstein reminds religious persons of their important duties to protect the sacred dimension, to avoid human alienation and to help people have happy lives. Christianity and Buddhism help each other through mutual understanding and cooperation with their spiritual tradition and wisdom. They can learn from each other to see different spiritual qualities; for instance, a Christian can learn from a Buddhist about a psychological method, and a Buddhist from a Christian about historical and sociological ways of thinking.33

(2) For the early Wittgenstein, religion belongs to the realm of mystery. This mystical element in the later Wittgenstein penetrates language-games as their depth grammar is, or involved in ethical engagements as a fundamental motivation. This reminds a religious man and woman of the important role of "mystery" in dialogue. Mystery is a creative, symbolic power in any religion. There is no ideal language that can catch the mystery totally and absolutely. Positively speaking: each religion has its own way to approach mystery; thus each is one way to learn about mystery. Consequently, religious persons experience what is not their own, but of "the other," and not an arbitrary accident. To take mystery seriously in interreligious dialogue means to be able to listen to the manifestation of mystery in the experience of one’s partners, and through their experience to find out a "co-being-state of mind" and "co-being-with" in mystery. Thus, both the prophets in the revelation religions and the sages in the wisdom religions share in the mystical dimension of the mystical religions in different ways and in various life-forms. This mystery can be called many names. For the mystics in general it is called "the totally other," as described by D. Tracy: "For the prophet, the other is acknowledged in the word of proclamation ("thus says the Lord") that disrupts the prophet’s own consciousness. . . . For many Eastern mystical traditions, this prophetic discourse on God and the self is a symptom of the deeper problem, not an expression of the solution."34

Among the ways of doing theology, the negative way is often neglected. The way of "docta ignorantia" (Nicholas of Cusa) or "reductio ad mysterium" (K. Rahner) is helpful to interreligious dialogue. Christianity believes in a Trinitarian God based on the revelation of Jesus Christ who is the incarnate God. Through encounter with Him, we find the way to mystery: "To have seen me is to have seen the Father" (Jn. 14, 9). K. Rahner describes the fulfillment and emptiness of Jesus Christ as follows: "a fulfillment in which his (otherwise so empty) concept of the absolute is wholly fulfilled and his (otherwise so blind) gaze can ‘see through’ to the absolute God himself. Thus man is he who has to await God’s free epiphany in his history; Jesus Christ is this Epiphany."35

On the side of Buddhism, we elect some thoughts of the Zen-Buddhist Kyoto school. For Nishitani to understand God and Nothingness in the same mystical consideration is to search for the ground of both in the "God Head": "The true God is not the usual idea of God, but rather die Gottheit as spoken of by the mystics in West; the true God is the ‘emptiness’ of the Prajnaparamita Sustra.36  How can a human being approach the "Urgrund"? Nishida helps us to come back to the tradition of "docta ignorantia" of Nicholas Cusa who describes God as Transcendence of both Being and Nothingness. At the same time, Nishida emphansizes that "Urgrund" is "coincidentia oppositorum": "Nothingness separated from being is not true nothingness; . . . In the same way that if there is no God, there is no world, if there is no world, there is no God."37

(3) Speaking of religious experiences as mystical encounters with the "totally other" may mislead one to believe that mysticism means "unclear," or "indifferent experience." Firstly, mystical experience cannot be expressed in scientific, verifiable language, Wittgenstein proved in his Tractatu. Mystical experience does not mean totally different from "normal" religious life, as K. Rahner explained: "I mean only (most modestly and hesitatingly) that the first and original experience of the Spirit of which I seek to speak is also the innermost core of what one may call mysticism." He cited as an example that one can find God in immediately sharing himself, e.g., in giving one’s own soup to a poor man and going hungry oneself, just as those who share God’s presence in meditation, stillness, emptiness, absolute loss of self, etc. These are all experiences of the Holy Spirit signify that salvation and eternity taking place.38

Mystical experiences are also clear to consciousness. As D. T. Suzuki explained the "clarity" of Zen, "Mysticism taken as hidden is a defect. In truth it is apparent in its full grandeur, presenting itself in all clarity right before us; it is unveiled, totally unbarred."39If mystical experience is an important constituent of religious life to which we can return again and again keeping it in memory, it should be full of awareness, that is, clear to one’s own consciousness. If we cannot express it in common language, then the failure is not to be blamed on its lack of "clarity," but on the limitations of our language. Therefore, Wittgenstein proposes language-games, and believes in their effective function, but he emphasizes "praxis" when it comes to speaking about religious belief. It is important to ponder how interreligious dialogue can be integrated into interreligious cooperation? How can we build dialogue on the basis of authentic religious experience and avoid any explanation that causes misunderstanding rather than providing helpful information?

 1 See: N. Malcolm, Wittgenstein: A Religious Point of View?, ed. by P. Winch (London: Routledge, 1993). Hereafter N. Malcolm, Wittgenstein; see also: R. Rhees (ed.), Ludwig Wittgenstein, Personal Collections (Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press, 1984), p.94, Hereafter R. Rhees, L. Wittgenstein; see also: N. Malcolm, Ludwig Wittgenstein: A Memoir, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1984), Hereafter N. Malcolm, L. Wittgenstein: A Memoir.

 2 N. Malcolm, Wittgenstein, ibid., pp. 2f., "Wittgenstein once suggested that a way in which the notion of immortality can acquire a meaning is through one’s feeling that one has duties from which one cannot be released, even by death. Wittgenstein himself possessed a stern sense of duty"; N. Malcolm, L. Wittgenstein: A Memoir, p. 59. This way of seeing religiosity is found again in the Memoir of P. Engelmann, the architect who had become friend with Wittgenstein since the World War I: "The notion of a last judgment was of profound concern to him"; P. Engelmann, Letters from Wittgenstein with a Memoir (New York: Horizon, 1967), p. 77, Hereafter P. Engelmann, Letters from Wittgenstein.

 3 "Just think, Drury, what it would mean to have to preach a sermon every week; you couldn’t do it. I would be afraid that you would try and give some sort of philosophical justification for Christian beliefs, as if some sort of proof was needed… The Symbolisms of Catholicism are wonderful beyond words. But any attempt to make it into a philosophical system is offensive." R. Rhees, L. Wittgenstein, aaO. p. 123; see also: B. McGuinness, Wittgenstein, A Life: Young Ludwig (1889-1921) (Berkeley : University of California Press, 1988), p. 274.

 4 N. Malcolm, Wittgenstein, aaO. p.22. In the Vermischte Bemerkungen of 1946, we can find interesting notes on religion, for examples, "Religion is, as it were, the calm bottom of the sea at its deepest point, which remains calm however high the waves on the surface may be," or: "‘I never believed in God before’ – that I understand. But not ‘I never really believed in Him before,’" L. Wittgenstein, Vermischte Bemerkungen, hg. v. G. H. von Wright (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1977) p. 3; Ludwig Wittgenstein, Culture and Value = Vermischte Bemerkungen, eng. tr. by P. Winch (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1980), Hereafter L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value.

 5 L. Wittgenstein, Tractatus Logico-Philosophicu: Logisch-Philosophische Abhandlung (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1971), eng. tr. by D. F. Pears & B. F. McGuiness (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1961), Hereafter as T. and the number original given by Wittgenstein. B. Russell wrote to Lady Ottoline Morell about his meeting with Wittgenstein in the Hague in 1919 and spoke enthusiastically about Tractatus: "I leave here today, after a fortnight’s stay, during a week of which Wittgenstein was here, and we discussed his book every day. I came to think even better of it than I had done; I feel sure it is a really great book, though I do not feel sure it is right. . . . I had felt in his book a flavor of mysticism, but was astonished when I found that he has become a complete mystic." L. Wittgenstein, Letters to Russell, Keynes, and Moore, ed. by G. H. von Wright (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1974), p. 82.

 6 L. Wittgenstein, T.1 Die Welt ist alles, was der Fall ist and the conclusion of the Tractatus is the well-known catch-phrase: "What we cannot speak about we must pass over in silence." English translation, aaO., p. 151.

 7 W.D. Hudson discovers origins of the picture theory, according to the record of conversation between Wittgenstein and G. H. von Wright, in theory "principles of mechanics" of Heinrich Hertz: "Hertz restricted the application of the theory to the language of mechanics, whereas Wittgenstein applied it to language as a whole". W. D. Hudson, Wittgenstein and Religious Belief (London: The McMillan Press, 1975), pp. 17f. Hereafter W. D. Hudson, Wittgenstein and Religious Belief.

 8 P. Engelmann, Letters from Wittgenstein, aaO. p. 143; see also: M. K. Munitz, Contemporary Analytic Philosophy (New York: MacMillan, 1981), pp. 69-220.

 9 See: W. D. Hudson, Wittgenstein and Religious Belief, aaO. pp.87f., P. Engelmann pointed out in his memory the clear contrast between positivism and Wittgenstein: "Positivism holds—and this is its essence—that what can speak about is all that matters in life. Whereas Wittgenstein passionately believes that all that really matters in human life is precisely what, in his view, we must be silent about," P. Engelmann, Letters from Wittgenstein, aaO. p.97.

 10 W. D. Hudson, Wittgenstein and Religious Belief, aaO. p.85; see also: E. Zemach, "Wittgenstein’s Philosophy of the Mystical," in I. M. Copi & R. W. Beard (eds.), Essays on Wittgenstein’s Tractatus (New York : The MacMillan, 1966), pp. 359-375. E. Zemach interpreted the philosophy of the mystical in "God," "God Head," "Ethics," "Goad Life" and "Aesthetics." There are some important passages, f.e. interpretations of T.6.3631-6.374. "The world is given me. . . . The world which is independent of our will. . . . The "alien will" is just what is independent of my will, the factual character of reality. God, Fate, and World (qua the totality of facts) are synonyms" (p.361). Or the result of discussion on "God head" is: "Wittgenstein recognizes two transcendental theories: logic and ethic. . . .For logic, the sense of the world is its inalterable form: God. For ethics, it is the willing subject" (p.369).

 11 L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, aaO. P. 62, see also: L. Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, tr. by G. E. M. Anscombe (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1958), Hereafter L. Wittgenstein, P.I.

 12 See: D. Z. Phillips, Wittgenstein and Religion (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1993), esp. Religious Beliefs and Language-Games, pp. 56-78; Searle on Language-Games and Religion, pp. 22-32; see also: Lars Haikola, Religion as Language-Game: A Critical Study with Special Regard to D. Z. Phillips (Lund: Gleerup, 1971).

 13 "But how many kinds of sentence are there? Say assertion, question, and command?—There are countless kinds: countless different kinds of use of what we call "symbols, "words," and "sentence." And this multiplicity is not something fixed, given once for all, but new types of language, new language-games, as we many say, come into existence, and others become obsolete and get forgotten", P.I., Nr.23, p. 11.

  14 L. Wittgenstein, On Certainty, ed. by G. E. M. Anscombe & C. H. von Wright, tr. by D. Paul & G. E. M. Anscombe (New York: Harper & Row, 1969), Nr. 204, cited number is given originally. Hereafter L. Wittgenstein, On Certainty.

 15 See: G.D. Convey, Wittgenstein on Foundations, (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1989), esp. pp. 9-30; N. Malcom, Knowledge and Certainty: Essays and Lectures (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall, 1963), p. 93; see also: J. Whittaker, "Language-Games and Forms of Life Unconfused", in Philosophical Investigations 1(1978) pp. 42ff

 16 Five times in "P.I.: Nr. 19, 23, 174, 226, 241); once in "On Certainty" Nr. 358~359 and once in the Lecture on Religious Belief , p. 58.

 17 See: J. F. M. Hunter, Understanding Wittgenstein: Studies of Philosophical Investigations, (Edinburg: University Press, 1985; see also: J. Shekelton, "Rules and Lebensformen", in Midwest Studies in Philosophy 1(1976) pp. 125-132; see further: P. Winch, The Idea of a Social Science and Its Relation to Philosophy (Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1977).

 18 N. Gier, "Wittgenstein and Form of Life", in Philosophy of the Social Sciences 10(1980) p. 245.

 19 T.3.325 : "Um diese Irrtümern zu entgehen, müssen wir eine Zeichensprache verwenden, welche sie ausschliesst, indem sie nicht das gleiche Zeichen in verschiedenen Symbolen, und Zeichen welche auf verschiedene Art bezeichnen, nicht äusserlich auf die gleich Art verwendet. Eine Zeichensprache also, die der logischen Grammatik – der logischen Syntax – gehorcht"; P. I. Nr.90 : "We feel as if we had to penetrate phenomena: our investigations however, is directed not toward phenomena, but, as one might say, towards the ‘possibilities’ of phenomena. . . . Our investigation is therefore a grammatical one"; P. I. Nr.92: "This finds expression in questions as to the essence of language, of propositions, of thoughts. . . . ‘The essence is hidden from us.’"

 20 P. I. Nr.664: "In the use of words one might distinguish ‘surface grammar’ from ‘depth grammar’ . . . And now compare the depth grammar, say of the word ‘to mean’, with what its surface grammar would lead us to suspect. No wonder we find it difficult to know our way about"; see also: A. Keightley, Wittgenstein, Grammar and God (London: Epworth Press, 1976), especially chapter two about "Grammar and the Scene of Religious Belief", pp. 41-60.

 21 See: J. L. Austin, How to do things with – Words (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1962); see also: J. Searle, Speech Acts (London, 1969); see further: K. O. Apel, Transformation der Philosophie, Bd. I (Frankfurt a. M.: Suhrkamp, 1976), pp. 352-65; K. O. Apel, "Normatively Grounding ‘Critical Theory’ through Recourse to the Lifeworld?" in A. Honneth, a.o. (eds.), Philosophical Interventions in the Unfinished Project of Enlightenment (Cambridge a.O.: The MIT Press, 1992), p. 158f.

 22 L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, p. 28; see: P. R. Shields, Logic and Sin in the Writings of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Chicago : The University of Chicago Press, 1993), esp. chap. 3 "The Fearful Judge", pp. 31-51, Hereafter P. R. Shields, Logic and Sin.

 23 See: W. Hudson, Wittgenstein and Religious Belief, aaO. p.13. in his preface to Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein wrote (dated 1945) "It suddenly seemed to me that I should publish those old thoughts and the new ones together: that the latter could be seen in the right light only by contrast with and against the background of my old way of thinking" (P.I., X).

 24 See: L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, p. 72: "Religious faith and superstition are quite different. One of them results from fear and is a sort of false science. The other is a trusting"; see also: L. Wittgenstein, "Lectures & Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief", ed. by C. Barrett (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1966). P. 58f: "We come to an island and we find beliefs there, and certain beliefs we are inclined to call religious. . . . They have sentences, and there are also religious statements. These statements would not just differ in respect to what they are about. . . .You may say they reason wrongly. . . . Whether a thing is a blunder or not—it is a blunder in a particular system. Just as something is a blunder in a particular game and not in another."

 25 L. Wittgenstein, " Remarks on Franzer’s ‘The Golden Bough’, in: J. Klagge & A. Nordmann (eds.), Philosophical Occasions (German–English parallel texts where appropriate) (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1993), pp. 118-133.

 26 A. Ambrose (ed.), Wittgenstein’s Lectures Cambridge 1932-1935 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1979), p. 32.

 27 Unpublished Nachlass, dated 1932-33, quoted in F. Kerr, Theology after Wittgenstein (Oxford: Blackwell, 1986), p. 150.

 28 L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, p. 85.

 29 Ibid., p. 86.

 30 L. Wittgenstein, Remarks on the Foundations of Mathematics, ed. by G. H. von Wright, R. Rhees & G. E. M. Anscombe (Oxford: Blackwell, 1978), part II, p. 23.

 31 L. Wittgenstein, Culture and Value, p. 48, see: F. Kerr, Theology after Wittgenstein, pp. 168-190.

 32 See: M. F. Burnyeat, "Wittgenstein and Augustin ‘De magistro’ ", in Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 61(1987) pp. 1-24; P. Bearsley, "Augustin and Wittgenstein on Language", in Philosophy 58 (1983), pp. 229-236; A. Kenny, The Legacy of Wittgenstein (Oxford: Blackwell, 1984), esp. pp. 61-77; W. H. Bruening, "Aquinas and Wittgenstein on God-talk," in Sophia (Australia) 16 (1977) 1-7; R.B. Goodman, "How a thing is said and heard: Wittgenstein and Kierkegaard," in History of Philosophy Quarterly 3 (1986)335-53; D.Z. Phillips, Wittgenstein and Religion, "On Wanting to Compare Wittgenstein and Zen", pp. 193-200; J.V. Canfield, "Wittgenstein and Zen", in Philosophy 50 (1975), 383-408.

 33See: A. Pieris, An Asian Theology of Liberation (New York: Oribs, 1988), pp. 75-81; see also: A. Pieris, Feuer und Wasser: Frau, Gesellschaft, Spiritualität in Buddhismus und Christentum (Freiburg u.a.: Herder, 1994), esp. pp.115-124; pp. 199-266.

 34 D. Tracy, Dialogue with the Other: The Inter-religious Dialogue (Michigan: Eerdmans, 1990), pp. 21f.

 35 K. Rahner, Theological Investigations, vol. I (London: Darton, 1961), p. 187.

 36 Keiji Nishitani, "Harmony as Guide", p. 5, cited after H. Waldenfels, Absolute Nothingness. Foundations for a Buddhist-Christian Dialogue (New York: Paulist, 1980) p. 138.

 37 Kitaro Nishida, "Intelligibility and the Philosophy of Nothingness", cited after H. Waldenfels, Absolute Nothingness, ibid., p. 41.

 38 K.P. Fischer, Der Mensch als Geheimnis (Freiburg : Herder, 1974), p. 406.

 39 Cited after H. Waldenfels, Absolute Nothingness, ibid., p. 126.