The principle of divine accommodation posits that revelation is accommodated to human cognitive capacities. It is regularly cited throughout the history of theology as an exegetical tool, as a doctrinal rationale, or as a condition for theological knowledge in general. This article proposes that divine accommodation invites an engagement with cognitive science, since findings in cognitive science illuminate the human cognitive capacities to which theological knowledge is accommodated. This article aims to demonstrate the fruitfulness of such an engagement by considering how theological concepts might be accommodated to accounts of human conceptualisation emerging from cognitive science. In particular, a case study considers the ‘conceptualisation hypothesis’ from ‘embodied cognition’, an emerging paradigm in cognitive science. This hypothesis suggests that human concepts are ‘grounded’ in sensorimotor states. If this scientifically‐motivated theory applies to all human concepts, it poses a potential theological dilemma: namely, if God‐concepts are grounded in sensorimotor states they prima facie risk being idolatrous, whereas if they are not so grounded, they may be un‐conceptualisable by humans. I suggest that one way to address this dilemma is to draw upon Athanasius’ insight that the incarnation plays a crucial role in accommodating human understanding. By examining the incarnation as an accommodation to human capacities uncovered by cognitive scientists, we gain a more comprehensive account of the epistemological reason for the incarnation. This account offers new lines of thinking about debates on the doctrine of the incarnation, such as the possibility of multiple incarnations.

中文翻译：

---

容纳有思想的思想家

神性适应的原理假定启示被适应于人类的认知能力。在整个神学历史中，它经常被作为训ege工具，教义依据或作为一般神学知识的条件而被引用。本文认为，神的适应促使人们参与认知科学，因为认知科学的发现阐明了人类对神学知识的认知能力。本文旨在通过考虑如何将神学概念用于认知科学提出的人类概念化来证明这种参与的成果。尤其是，一个案例研究考虑了来自“体现的认知”的“概念化假设”，这是认知科学中的一种新兴范式。该假设表明，人类概念在感觉运动状态中“扎根”。如果这种以科学为动机的理论适用于所有人类概念，那么就构成了潜在的神学困境：即，如果神的概念以感觉运动状态为基础，那么它们就会成为现实。表面存在的风险是偶像崇拜，而如果不是这样，他们可能是人类无法想象的。我建议解决这一难题的一种方法是借鉴亚撒纳修斯的见解，即化身在适应人类理解方面起着至关重要的作用。通过检查化身作为认知科学家发现的对人类能力的适应，我们获得了关于化身的认识论原因的更全面说明。该论述为有关化身学说的辩论提供了新的思路，例如多重化身的可能性。