Essay Fix it

Introduction

There is a story that a teacher once asked a class for a definition of faith. One of the children answered: “Faith is when you believe something which you know ain’t true.”

This account is traceable to Mark Twain, though I don’t think it was original with him. I will assume it is a product of someone’s genius and sense of humor rather than a true story.

The point is that it could be a true story. In our modern society, faith is viewed as a wispy, tenuous thing, vague and shadowy. Many people, believers and unbelievers alike, could sympathize with the schoolboy’s definition. Yet this kind of double mindedness is even more unbecoming an adult than it is a child, and even more unbecoming a believer than an unbeliever.

Over the last several years, a growing understanding has slowly dawned on me. I have come to a better conception of what faith actually is– and, almost as importantly, what it is not.

As I grew in understanding, I also became aware that many other people were in the same condition in which I had found myself. It seemed to me that the modern American has, for the most part, simply missed the point entirely.

I don’t believe it was always that way. The problem may not actually have arisen in the last two centuries; but I believe it has worsened. I am not sure of all the factors that went into shaping the misconceptions about the Christian faith. I could make certain guesses; but I am neither a historian nor a sociologist, and anyhow, that is not my purpose in writing this essay. Like a doctor trying to treat an injury, I am less concerned with how the injury was received than with how it can be healed.

Purpose of Study

It is the purpose of this study to examine literature and human experience as it relates to faith. The question I will address is: What is faith and how does it relate to the human intellect?

Part I -Endnotes

Mark 9 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1752

Matthew 5 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1655

Mark 10 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1755

Acts 18 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 2000

Acts 1 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1942

Acts 17 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1996

John 14 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1911

2 Kings The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 646

John 20 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 1928

James 2 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 2248

Psalms 14 The Life Application Study Bible, New International Standard Bible. (1984). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Corporation, .p. 912

Part II Review of the Literature

Six Impossible Things

If we look at the schoolboy above, we see a person who, at a young age, has already been torn between his faith and his reason. It is a worldview that could only be born in the absence of meaningful guidance and instruction. It is a worldview that is unacceptable to the believer and the skeptic alike.

I am reminded of this conversation from Lewis Carroll’s book Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There:

“…Now I’ll give you something to believe. I’m just one hundred and one, five months and a day.”

“I ca’n't believe that!” said Alice.

“Ca’n't you?” the Queen said in a pitying tone. “Try again: draw a long breath, and shut your eyes.”

Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said: “one ca’n't believe impossible things.”

“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast…”

Christians are taught to believe many things, which may seem to be fairy tales suitable only for the minds of children. Countless millions of Christians have felt the burden of trying to believe things, which they did not. It is probably worthwhile to remember that Lewis Carroll was not only a mathematician but also a minister.

But is this the real duty of the Christian? Believe six impossible things before breakfast?

One problem with the communication of Christian beliefs is that there is usually no proper foundation given for them. To borrow an example from mathematics: A truth that really should be a theorem is treated as an axiom. Children are fed conclusions without being given any of the subordinate truths that lead up to them; they are dropped from a helicopter onto a mountaintop without being allowed to experience the climb.

In itself, this problem might not be so tragic. What makes it much worse is that questions are not tolerated. If a child asks too many questions, or the wrong questions, or questions that adults themselves cannot answer, he may find the results unsatisfying. He may be told not to worry about it; he may find that adults nervously avoid certain topics; or he may even find himself hushed up.

The responses adults usually make have the effect of conditioning the child not to ask questions. The side effect of not asking questions is, of course, not learning.

Why am I discussing children so much? First of all, because most Christians have their beliefs communicated to them when they are children. Second, because in regard to matters of faith, many Christians never grow beyond childhood.

It seems that most people are laboring under a couple of false impressions. One is that faith is arbitrary; the other is that it works backwards.

I was talking in late 1994 with a college student named Charles, who was relating the story of some conversations he had had with disbelieving friends.

“Belief in God is completely irrational,” said one.

“Yes, I know,” he said. “I believe anyway.”

“There’s no logical basis for it at all,” was the protest.

“Yes,” said Charles. “I still believe.”

“But– why do you believe?”

“I just do,” he said.

I cannot agree with Charles; I think he is sincere but misguided. I think he is a foolish kind of hero, rushing wildly at the enemy line even though he is carrying neither weapons nor armor.

His faith is arbitrary. It is based on nothing, and he even admits it. His faith works backwards– he knows his conclusion at the very beginning. If he even attempts to justify or rationalize his belief, it is only after the fact. He spends his energy bolstering his prejudice.

A minister recently told the story of a student who went to one of his elders in the agony of a faith crisis. “Why do you believe in God?” he asked. And the answer came back: “Because I want to.” The minister who told this story seemed to approve of the answer.

But, of course, I can believe in anything that I “want to.” I can believe in the Tooth Fairy or in pink elephants if I really wish. It won’t make them real, however, and I wouldn’t expect anyone else to be convinced on the basis of my personal tastes. Such a faith is arbitrary– and it works backwards, presupposing the thing, which should really be the conclusion.

I remember reading once a discussion between an agnostic and a few other people. This person asked some honest questions. He had some difficulties with the Christian worldview in general, and picked the existence of God as a starting point. But the responses he got did not seem very well reasoned to me, and even less so to him. One respondent made light of his attempts to be rational, and said, “Choose God over logic.” But Charles answered, “Why not say, ‘Choose Hitler over logic’?”

In a sense, he was right. If your choices are made, by rejecting the powers of reason that God gave you, then anything is believable. Choose the Tooth Fairy over logic, if you want to; or choose peanut butter over logic. It’s a purely arbitrary decision; and it is backwards reasoning because you have already decided where you want to be: Just jump to a point in midair and resist any questions about how you got there.

Arbitrary faith is not accepted in any other area of life. Many people have believed there was a burglar outside the house; but unless they can say that they have heard or seen something, we regard them as just nervous people with overactive imaginations.

When a jury convenes to hear a case, why do they listen to the evidence? Surely it would be a great timesaver if all the jurors could simply believe in the guilt or innocence of the accused without having to go to all that effort. And surely millions of high school geometry students would benefit greatly if the teacher asked for the proof of a theorem and they were allowed to answer, “Well, I just believe very strongly that the angles of a triangle add up to 180 degrees; I know it in my heart.”

People with an arbitrary faith were usually influenced to think that way at a very early age. If you shape a child’s mind early enough, he will believe anything; and if he never learns to think for himself, he will continue in those beliefs forever.

Many atheists and agnostics point to the cultural aspects of religion as being proof that it is all nonsense anyway, the argument is somewhat compelling. After all, the vast majority of “religious” people believe the same things their parents taught them as children. The argument goes: If you had been raised in India, you would probably be Hindu or Buddhist; if you had been raised in Iran, you would be Muslim. You’re just a Christian because your parents were; and they, because their parents were.

This is frighteningly close to the truth. The world must contain untold millions of people (of all religions) whose faith can essentially be summed up in the phrase: “Because Mommy and Daddy said so.” Entire wars have been fought over this, and countless lives have been claimed.

There are many things in our society masquerading as faith. What many see as faith may actually be just force of habit; or patriotism; or stubbornness; or family pride; or intellectual laziness; or childishness; or gullibility, or the effects of being brainwashed. The problem is that faith is kept separate from intellect, whereas God wants every part of a Christian, including his mind.

Two Kinds of People

There is an old joke, which says that there are two kinds of people– those who divide people into two kinds and those who don’t.

For now, let’s just call these Type A and Type B. The Type A Christian is involved in a continual inward struggle with regard to his faith– a spiritual tug-of-war that is not necessarily related to the struggle between good and evil desires. The Type B Christian, on the other hand, is involved in the struggle between good and evil tendencies, but the other struggle does not exist in his life. And if he perceived it in someone else, he would probably associate it with the other (moral) struggle.

Type A is plagued by fear and doubt– especially doubt. He questions the foundation of his faith; he worries about conflicts between his faith and the other areas of his life; and he becomes frustrated by the Type B person who does not share (or understand) these concerns.

Type B is highly pragmatic. He is always conscious of the moral struggle and is always trying to improve himself and increase his faith; but this increase is measured chiefly in the moral dimension. He may think that Type A is confused– perhaps even sinful or rebellious.

In James Joyce’s fictionalized autobiography A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man Joyce comments on a fragment of scripture.

When they came to the other disciples, they saw a large crowd around them and the teachers of the law arguing with them. As soon as all the people saw Jesus, they were overwhelmed with wonder and ran to greet him.

“What are you arguing with them about?” he asked.

A man in the crowd answered, “Teacher, I brought you my son, who is possessed by a spirit that has robbed him of speech. Whenever it seizes him, it throws him to the ground. He foams at the mouth, gnashes his teeth, and becomes rigid. I asked your disciples to drive out the spirit, but they could not.”

“O unbelieving generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy to me.”

So they brought him. When the spirit saw Jesus, it immediately threw the boy into a convulsion. He fell to the ground and rolled around, foaming at the mouth.

Jesus asked the boy’s father, “How long has he been like this?”

“From childhood,” he answered. “It has often thrown him into fire or water to kill him. But if you can do anything, take pity on us and help us.”

“‘If you can’?” said Jesus. “All things are possible for him who believes.”

Immediately the boy’s father, exclaimed, “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” Mark 9:14-24

The key sentence here is the utterance of the boy’s father: “I do believe; help me overcome my unbelief!” In the King James Version, it reads: Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief!

Joyce apparently made the comment that he never understood what the man meant by saying that– why he said it in that particular way.

It seems that some people have an inner conflict between belief and doubt– a conflict that others do not have.

Thus some will feel a battle raging within, a battle in which belief and unbelief are locked in a perpetual struggle. The father in the story seems to be this type; he is torn between two worldviews. When Jesus calls on him to believe, he appeals to Jesus to help his weakness. This type of person will view doubt or unbelief as an almost palpable thing– perhaps to the same extent that belief is a thing in itself.

To show the difference in these points of view, let me make two analogies. Some people look at faith and doubt as being like light and darkness; we sometimes speak of light as “pushing back the darkness,” but we are only using a figure of speech. “Darkness” is not a real thing; it is only the absence of light. The only way of getting rid of the darkness is with more light.

But faith and doubt are more like the boundary between the land and the ocean. If you walk along the beach, where the land ends and the water begins, you would never make the mistake of thinking that the ocean was simply “the absence of land.” It is a real thing, just as real as the land. When the tides come and go, the boundary wavers back and forth; and if you are afraid of a flood, you can put out sandbags.

The father in the story was not concerned merely with increasing his faith, because his doubt was more than just the absence of faith. It was a separate entity living inside– a thing to be dealt with in its own right.

It seems clear that these two types of people exist. What is less clear is this: Which viewpoint is the more correct one?

A person’s natural prejudice causes them to believe that people whose experiences are similar to their own are the ones who are “right.” There are other possibilities, of course. It may be that each side has elements of the truth, that neither one can claim a monopoly. It may be that it is strictly a perceptual matter– a matter of individual personality or taste. It may be that it is necessary to have both types around in order to achieve some kind of balance.

The Paradox

Is it better to live a life punctuated by episodes of doubt than to live a steadfast life day to day never experiencing doubt?

To offer some support for this idea allow me to quote a few thinkers from the past:

Faith, which does not doubt is dead faith. (Miguel de Unamuno, The Agony of Christianity)

Genuine doubt is the reverse side of genuine faith. (George Buttrick)

Doubt is but another element of faith. (St. Augustine)

This leads us back to the original question: How can this be true?

Imagine a person who occasionally spends some time weightlifting. A good workout will cause him to exert himself, to strain his muscles. He will perspire; he will become fatigued; maybe he will even get winded. A few hours or a day later, he may be stiff and sore– even to the point of having difficulty moving.

Now imagine a person who not only does not lift weights, but also knows nothing of the intent or purpose of doing so; the whole experience is totally foreign to him. If he sees the other person sweating, grunting, and straining, he will feel sorry for him. When he sees him stiff and sore, he may even be alarmed. He might say to himself, “This person has a problem. All this can’t be good for his health. Look at me. I’m never tired. I never sweat that way. I’m never in pain or stiff or sore. And when he’s lifting those huge barbells, he can only lift his hands over his head ten times. The weights are obviously the problem. I’ll bet I could lift my hands over my head two hundred times. And I’ll bet that without those weights, he could be just like me.”

The first person is a Type A, and the second is a Type B. And clearly it is the first person that grows and becomes stronger. To the Type B person I am compelled to say: Do your muscles never ache? Perhaps it is because they have never been used.

A Fragile Faith

It’s probably impossible to study the gospels as a group without discussing some of the places where they conflict. There are passages that are difficult to reconcile with each other.

One is Matthew 5:32, which reads, “But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to commit adultery, and anyone who marries a woman so divorced commits adultery.”

The other is Mark 10:11-12, reading in part, “…Anyone who divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her. And if she divorces her husband and marries another man, she commits adultery.” Note that in this passage there is no mention of marital unfaithfulness as a justification for divorce.

I mentioned this to some colleagues. They had not noticed this little discrepancy before, and I gathered that they wished it had not brought it up now.

I remember wondering how a person could read the Bible for as many years as they had and never have seen the difference in those two sections of the gospels. I also got the impression that they were almost accusing me of weakening their faith by even mentioning this little item.

There are two observations I would like to make.

First of all, how does anyone read the Bible as intensively as these people had for so many years without seeing conflicts of that nature? Without even stopping to think, I could name half a dozen that bothered me much more than this one. Could it be that they were reading each little passage in isolation from all the others, much as we read a dictionary? Did they read the Bible carefully, seriously, and critically? It seems to me that they probably did not.

Secondly, it appears obvious to me that it is never wrong to place two passages from the Bible side by side and ask how they relate to each other. Of course, the answer may well be that the two passages are not related at all; but if they are, then we have nothing to fear from comparing them. If the Bible has internal consistency, then we may browse through it at will and see what we may find. If it does not, then we gain nothing by refusing to face that fact.

Let me put that second point a different way: If your faith as a Christian is upset by reading the Bible, then there is probably something wrong with your faith. Furthermore, if your faith keeps you from reading the Bible or from studying it too deeply or too seriously– again, there is a problem with your faith.

We should study the Bible with honesty and sincerity. If our study is serious enough, and we approach it with an open mind, there will be times when our faith is disturbed. I view these as growing pains.

Many people would say that if things arise which disturb your faith, you should simply put those things out of your mind– simply ignore them. The thing to do is not to ignore such things or pretend they don’t exist, but to work through them and resolve them. If the overall Christian worldview is true, then there is a valid explanation for every conflict or problem we encounter in the scripture. If that worldview is not true, then what is the purpose of ignoring facts in order to hold onto a falsehood?

But in our society, the question of truth or falsehood is sometimes forgotten. People give every reason to believe in Christianity except that it is all, true. They will talk about “what Jesus has done” for them, or “what Jesus means” to them; they will talk about fulfillment in life, about meaning and purpose; they may talk about what a great teacher Jesus was, how important his ideas were, what beautiful thoughts he expressed; they may talk about how Christianity is still relevant today and how it combines high ideals with down-to-earth practicality; what the results would be if everyone practiced the teachings of Jesus; and so on. They may give all these reasons and more for believing; but rarely will anyone suggest that you believe in Christianity because it is true.

There are many people who say they believe in Jesus because of the sense of peace that comes from knowing him.

That’s fine; but that’s not why we believe in Christianity. We believe because it’s true, not just because it works. After all, even Buddhism works.

And while many Christians would disagree, there are also millions of Buddhists that would argue the point.

If all you want is a peaceful feeling, you can get it from pretty much any religion you like.

The point of is that some people lose touch with the very idea of truth. Some people have completely abandoned the concept of the truth of Christianity– if they ever had such a concept in the first place. Some regard their religion as simply a source of comfort, and they don’t care if it is merely an enjoyable fantasy. Some regard their church as a kind of club organized for the benefit of the members– a way to make friends, to feel a sense of belonging, to socialize, to pass the time. Some regard the church as only a force for social change– an organized attempt to fight injustice, cruelty, crime, and poverty.

Some who regard Christianity as “true” will believe for purely emotional reasons. These people have become so common in our society that the average unbeliever thinks of these people when he thinks of believers.

The idea that religious belief is based purely on emotions is one that we have brought on ourselves by all our talking about Christianity without any attempt to substantiate any of it.

We need only refer to the historical events which are largely unquestioned by anyone, believer or not– and then proceed to analyze those facts to come up with a viable theory of what really happened. One can then see that the Christian worldview is reasonable, is internally self-consistent, and fits the facts as they are known.

Emotions are an effect, not a cause. They should not be used as a guide to truth, because they have proven to be an incredibly unreliable guide. Of course, if anyone believes in Jesus, he cannot help but feel some emotional response to the love of Jesus and his sacrifice. But the emotions come after that belief, not before. If the emotions are your starting point, then your beliefs are arbitrary, because your feelings are purely subjective and don’t prove anything. If you believe because of a funny feeling in the pit of your stomach– well, that could be Jesus or indigestion.

A Scientist and a Christian?

J. B. Phillips wrote an excellent little book called Your God Is Too Small, in which he talks about the false conceptions that many people hold in regard to the nature of God. In the passage quoted below, he talks about a conception of God that comes from earliest childhood and remains sadly unchallenged. Of course, there may be many misconceptions carried forward from childhood and never abandoned; but in this case, he is talking specifically about God as the “Grand Old Man”– an elderly gentleman who is rather old-fashioned and behind the times:

…a simple psychological test was recently applied to a mixed group of older adolescents. They were asked to answer, without reflection, the question: “Do you think God understands radar?” In nearly every case, the reply was “No,” followed of course by a laugh, as the conscious mind realized the absurdity of the answer. But, simple as this test was, it was quite enough to show that at the back of their minds these youngsters held an idea of God quite inadequate for modern days. Subsequent discussion showed plainly that while “they had not really thought much about it,” they had freely to admit that the idea of God, absorbed some years before, existed in quite a separate compartment from their modern experience, knowledge, and outlook.

This, then, is another symptom of our modern society. The average person’s faith is not only arbitrary and backwards, but it is compartmentalized. It is kept hidden away in a place of its own, nurtured and pampered as if it were some kind of rare orchid in a hothouse. The result is a personality that is fragmented– a faith that is not integrated into the rest of the person’s life– a never-ending double mindedness.

The Obstacle Course

Many people seem to have the idea that faith is a kind of test by God– that we have somehow been set the task of running a kind of obstacle course in which the obstacles are all intellectual in nature. This whole concept is a mistaken one.

At the heart of this concept is the idea that faith and intellect are inherently in conflict with each other. To show how this mind-faith split is perceived in everyday life and culture, let me give a few examples.

Let’s look at the so-called “Shroud of Turin”– the large linen cloth that many believe was the actual burial garment of Jesus Christ. In discussing whether it might possibly be the real thing; and it could be said, “Why God would allow a thing like that to survive through the centuries?”

This statement implies that the existence of such an artifact would lend a certain amount of physical evidence to the story of Jesus and would therefore actually negate faith– making it in some way “too easy” to believe.

When asked for a definition of faith a typical reply is, “Accepting facts which have no empirical proof.”

I want to examine two issues. The first is the question: How do non-Christians react to this way of thinking? The second (more important) question is: How does this way of thinking tie in with what the Bible has to say?

Many unbelievers are very disturbed by the arbitrary nature of the typical believer’s faith. In ordinary life, we don’t begin with a presupposition and work to support it; we usually form our opinions gradually based on thought and observation. For example, when I leave my apartment carrying an umbrella, it is because I believe it might rain; and that belief is not arbitrary, but is always founded on something. Maybe I looked at the sky; maybe I saw a weather forecast; or maybe I overheard a conversation about the weather.

On the other hand, many Christians not only cannot articulate their faith, but do not even see a need to. This is because we are taught to think in this way– perhaps not intentionally, but we are taught nevertheless.

We are taught to accept ideas without proof. This is because the people who are supposed to be providing answers to questions are either unwilling or unable to do so. If they are unwilling, that is irresponsible or even reprehensible. If they are unable, what we have is just the perpetuation of ignorance from one generation to the next. But in this case, it should always be acceptable to say the magic words “I don’t know.” What should not happen (but often does) is for the questioner to be discouraged from asking questions or to be put down with an answer equivalent to “Because I said so.”

I recall an incident from my own childhood that I will relate here. I was in a Sunday school class and one of the girls in the class asked why clouds stayed in the air and didn’t fall. The teacher smiled indulgently and said, “Because it’s God’s will.”

When I went home and complained to my mother, she defended the teacher. I think she even got a little upset with me. “Sunday school is no place for a science lesson,” she told me.

It isn’t? I disagree. If something is true, isn’t it true whether you are inside or outside a church building? And surely the answer “because it’s God’s will” is true on some level; but can’t almost anything be explained in such broad generalities? If I take my car to a mechanic and ask why it quit running, I don’t want him to say, “Because it’s God’s will.”

Some people favor the erection of a barrier between science and religion. This kind of voluntary schizophrenia is completely inappropriate. The people who have successfully sealed off the different sections of their minds have never inspired me as people of great faith; and furthermore, most people are not able to enforce that kind of divided thinking in themselves anyhow. In most people, scientific belief and religious belief are bound to collide at some point. It can be in a science class or in a Sunday school class or somewhere in between, but it will happen.

Note that in the previous paragraph, I said collide rather than conflict. Two ideas or worldviews collide when the barrier between them is removed or when they suddenly crop up in the same context for the first time. This raises questions of how the two relate to each other, if at all; but it doesn’t imply a conflict. Anyone who believes that Christianity and science are in genuine conflict has a fundamental misunderstanding of one or the other (or both).

In modern Christendom, we seem to place a value on “blind faith.” We are taught to accept things without proof; and we have the strange idea that proof somehow “denies” or “negates” faith.

But what is the stance of the Bible on this issue? I offer these three passages first of all:

“When Apollos wanted to go to Achaia, the brothers encouraged him and wrote to the disciples there to welcome him. On arriving, he was a great help to those who by grace had believed. For he vigorously refuted the Jews in public debate, proving from the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ.” Acts 18:27-28

“After his suffering, he showed himself to these men and gave many convincing proofs that he was alive.” Acts 1:3

“…He has given proof of this to all men by raising him from the dead.” Acts 17:31

Now, what is the common thread in all three of these passages I have picked out? It is the idea of proof. Apollos proved from the Scriptures that Jesus was the Christ; Jesus gave his disciples “convincing proofs” that he had been resurrected; and God “has given proof” of the identity of Jesus by raising him from the dead.

Does this sound as though the Christian of that time was called to an arbitrary faith? Does it sound as though these people believed that faith and proof were in opposition to each other? Obviously this is not the case. Of course, it may be worth pointing out that all three of these come from the book of Acts, traditionally believed to have been written by Luke, the doctor. If anyone took a rationalistic view toward faith, surely it would be a doctor.

I would like to point out that the phrases “blind faith” and “leap of faith” are commonly used in our everyday speech, but they do not appear anywhere in the Bible. Some might argue that the concepts are there even if the words are not; but in my reading of scripture, I do not find even the very concepts to be present.

So let’s look at another example. These words come from Jesus himself:

“Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves.” John 14:11

Here Jesus wants his disciples to believe in him; in the first half of the sentence, he urges them to believe on the basis of their experiences with him over the last three years. This was not a sudden, arbitrary thing. Of course, if they are not willing to believe on that basis (“because I said so”), there is a second half to that sentence: “…at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves.”

Does he say, “Believe because of the warm feeling in your gut”? Does he say, “Believe because you’re a bad person if you don’t”? No, although the disciples certainly had enough reason to trust Jesus because of their long acquaintance and their knowledge of his character. What he actually says is: “…at least believe on the evidence of the miracles.”

Does this sound like someone who is asking for blind faith? To me, it sounds like just the opposite. One reason Jesus could demand faith of his disciples was because they had seen the miracles. What about the other Biblical passages– do they seem to ask for blind faith? Do any of them imply that faith is negated or denied by proof?

I would go so far as to say that the purpose of a miracle is to provide evidence or reason for belief. Let me offer a few more examples to try to show this.

When God first approached Moses, he was shown a vision of a bush that was on fire and yet was not consumed by the fire. The purpose of this was to draw his attention and make him realize that something highly unusual was going on. This was probably an easier introduction to God than a simple unannounced voice out of thin air.

As a better example, it is recorded that Moses was given the power to perform a small number of miraculous signs in order to help his audience to believe. These clearly served the purpose of answering the obvious questions: Why should we believe you? Why should we listen to you? They served to validate the rest of his message and give an introduction that would guarantee that his audience would take him seriously.

In the second book of Kings, there is a passage that tells of King Hezekiah being seriously ill. When the prophet Isaiah received a message from God that the king would not die but would survive his illness, the king wanted proof:

And Hezekiah said unto Isaiah, What shall be the sign that the LORD will heal me, and that I shall go up into the house of the LORD the third day? And Isaiah said, This sign shalt thou have of the LORD, that the LORD will do the thing that he hath spoken: shall the shadow go forward ten degrees, or go back ten degrees? And Hezekiah answered, It is a light thing for the shadow to go down ten degrees: nay, but let the shadow return backward ten degrees. And Isaiah the prophet cried unto the LORD: and he brought the shadow ten degrees backward, by which it had gone down in the dial of Ahaz. 2 Kings 20:8-11

This is the skeptic’s dream, isn’t it? The king demands proof and he gets it. Does this sound as though God were trying capriciously to make belief difficult– as though he had set up a set of unbelievable circumstances and then demanded blind faith? Does this sound like a faith that is arbitrary or unfounded or irrational?

If faith is not in opposition to intellect… to what is it in opposition? If God does not make faith arbitrarily difficult, then where does its difficulty come from?

It is in opposition to emotion, among other things. This, of course, is the reverse of what most of non-Christians think (and many Christians). Even the things that are known by purely rational means are still subject to assault on emotional grounds. If you are on an airplane waiting to take off, no amount of intellectualizing will keep you calm if you have a deathly fear of flying. You may know very well that air travel is safer than travel by automobile; you may be acquainted with all the statistics; and you may even be familiar with the engineering details of how airplanes fly or have personal knowledge of the competence and integrity of the pilot. But if you are one of those people with an irrational fear of flying, then this all means nothing. In spite of what you know to be true, you will still have a nagging doubt, and you may have butterflies in your stomach and a racing heartbeat. But it is not your intellect that is destroying your faith; it is your emotions. In fact, your faith is based on your intellect.

If you are interested in truth, you should listen to your intellect, because that is the tool that God has given us for arriving at truth. We should first be concerned about what the facts are. And the facts, after all, have nothing to do with my feelings.

I have found that my emotions are more changeable than the weather. They depend on what I have eaten recently; how well I slept the previous night; whether I am taking medication; what the weather is like; how people treat me; and a thousand other things. But no matter how many variables contribute to my emotions, there is no guarantee that they will point me toward anything true. I don’t want to decide my view of the universe based on what the weather is like or what I had for breakfast. If I did that, I could reach a different decision every day.

But aren’t there people who actually base their faith on things just as arbitrary? As far as the bulk of humanity is concerned, don’t we tend to stay in whatever faith we were taught as a child (even if that is no faith at all) until something causes us to change our minds? Whether he is Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu, or Christian, the average person will not re-examine his beliefs to see whether they are valid until someone or something actually challenges him (and perhaps not even then).

Everyone should re-examine his belief system from time to time– even the people I agree with– perhaps especially those people. Many Christian parents are afraid to allow their children to re-examine their faith because they never did it themselves and also because they have seen that kind of re-evaluation lead to people abandoning Christianity.

But the Christian faith is not some fragile crystal sculpture that can be destroyed by a passing breeze. In some individuals it may be; but these people will in the long run benefit by having that dainty sculpture smashed and the real thing substituted in its place.

I myself used to treat the truths of Christianity as if they were something like that– something I dared not touch or pay too much attention to, for fear that it would all prove to be nonsense and my world would be turned upside down. But when I did dare to touch that structure, I found it to be more substantial than I had thought. And as I tested it more and more, I found it to be firm and unshakeable, quite stronger than my best attempts to disturb it. Far from being a fragile crystal sculpture, it turned out to be something that my strongest sledgehammer blows could not even crack.

There are many paradoxes in Christianity. We think of sorrow or regret as a bad thing; but the Bible says, “Godly sorrow brings repentance.” Similarly, in my opinion, sincere doubt leads to faith. I will say that again: Sincere doubt leads to faith. That is why Augustine could say, “Doubt is but another element of faith.” Is this so unusual? Questions, properly asked, lead to answers. To quote Jesus out of context: “Seek and you will find.”

Some will undoubtedly protest that doubt is a bad thing, that God condemns people for doubting. Well, yes and no. Certainly there is more than one kind of doubt; and as for motives and circumstances, we will leave God to judge those.

There are those who look down on others who have the occasional faith crisis– who consider these brothers and sisters to be weak or rebellious or heretical. But I ask these people to look at the apostle Thomas.

It is rather unfair that this one of the Twelve has been stuck with the name “Doubting Thomas,” since all of them doubted at one time or another. And, in fact, all of them disbelieved in the resurrection of Jesus until they saw him alive again. Thomas was merely the last one to see him face to face. In American slang, we would say he was “from Missouri”; his attitude was, quite literally, “Show me!” Here is the passage in question:

Now Thomas (called Didymus), one of the Twelve, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord!”

But he said to them, “Unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were, and put my hand into his side, I will not believe it.”

A week later his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you!” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here; see my hands. Reach out your hand and put it into my side. Stop doubting and believe.”

Thomas said to him, “My Lord and my God!” John 20:24-28

Those who are shocked at the idea of doubting– those who claim they never doubt– these should look at this apostle. Thomas doubted. Do these people claim to be greater than Thomas?

In a world where gullibility is rampant and there are alarmists on every corner, Thomas should be admired– down-to-earth and levelheaded. Thomas was martyred for the cause of Christ, spilling his blood on the soil of a foreign country. Let us not criticize him too harshly.

Why was Thomas the last apostle to see the risen Christ– last by more than a week? If a person’s faith is a house of cards, left standing only because no breeze has stirred in the room– well, I am in favor of cracking the window a little. Let a little breeze blow in. Eventually that house of cards will fall; and then it can be replaced with something sturdy.

I want us to think a minute about what happened in the town of Waco, Texas in the early 1990′s. There was a cult known as the Branch Davidians, led by a charismatic preacher who called himself David Koresh. It ended in tragedy, with large numbers of men, women, and even children burning to death in the compound in which the cultists had barricaded themselves.

Now, why did these people believe in David Koresh? Was it because of his compelling arguments, his irrefutable proofs, his airtight reasoning? Somehow, I think not. It seems to me that a cursory examination of their leader in the cold light of logic would reveal him for what he was. In my opinion, these were people whose faith was based on emotion rather than reason; and the result was death and destruction.

Not everyone who thinks that way will suffer such immediate and dire consequences. Every one of these would be better off with a reshaped world view; and I venture to say that if these people had been more like Thomas, the whole tragic incident need never have happened.

When I think of naive faith, one of the things that come to my mind is Thoreau’s story of the Canadian woodcutter. He devoted a few pages to the antics of this character, which alternately amused and baffled him. These words jumped out at me:

But the intellectual and what is called spiritual man in him were slumbering as in an infant. He had been instructed only in that innocent and ineffectual way in which the Catholic priests teach the aborigines, by which the pupil is never educated to the degree of consciousness, but only to the degree of trust and reverence, and a child is not made a man, but kept a child. (Walden, Henry David Thoreau)

His assessment is very telling. “…A child is not made a man, but kept a child.” I fear greatly that the world may be littered with Christian education programs, which may be summed up in this statement.

Some Words on Proof

Every discriminating person wants to know the truth.

There are at least three different kinds of proof. I will give them “out of order.” First, there is the scientific proof, which is the first one that some people will think of. The tools used are measurement, controlled testing environments, repeatability of observations, statistical methods, and a host of others.

But there are two catches. For one thing, we are making a set of hidden assumptions which may be valid, but which we cannot prove. For example, we assume that an experiment, which has the same result ten thousand times, will always have the same result. We assume that the “laws” of nature that we see will be the same tomorrow. We assume that these laws are uniform across the universe. None of these things can be proven. The second catch is the extreme lack of rigor in these proofs; to a mathematician, this kind of proof looks like sophisticated guesswork accompanied by hand waving.

This brings us to the second kind of proof: The mathematical proof. This is something we are all exposed to in high school geometry. It is characterized by extreme rigor; every step in reasoning must be cautious and precise and justified according to rules that are specific and fixed. This is probably the best and purest form of human reasoning, and in higher math, it becomes much more advanced and precise than we are used to in high school.

The only drawback to this kind of proof is that it only works “on paper,” in a highly abstract world of manipulated symbols. Its principles spill over into science and even into everyday life, and they are useful; but their usefulness in “real life” is limited because of the extreme complexity of the universe in which we live.

The third major kind of proof is what one writer calls the “legal-historical” proof. This is the kind of reasoning used, for example, by detectives, lawyers, judges, and historians. It is frequently confused with the scientific proof, because the methods and tools of science are sometimes used as aids. This is concerned with the gathering and analysis of physical evidence, but it is also concerned with eyewitness testimony and the reliability of those witnesses, with alibis, with circumstantial evidence, and the analysis of motives and human psychology. It is the most useful in everyday life, but by the same token, it is the most fallible and inexact.

There may be other forms of proof. When in daily life, we demand “proof” of something, it is usually proof of a very flimsy nature– a signature that could be forged, documents that could be fake, photographs or videos that could be doctored, hearsay or other testimony that could be lying or mistaken or distorted.

So if we want to “prove” the Christian faith… what kind of proof do we use? We cannot reduce it to a set of symbols, so we cannot use mathematical methods; though I have seen some feeble attempts. I know of no experiments that can be constructed, nor any instruments that we can construct to perform measurements. That leaves only the legal-historical proof, or something like it.

As far as “scientific proof” is concerned (which everyone seems to want)– well, we cannot even have a scientific proof of the existence of Abraham Lincoln, much less God. I am reminded of a quote from a novel written by Jostein Gaardner (The Solitaire Mystery)

“So you believe in God, then?”

“I haven’t said that. Actually what I did say was, God is sitting in heaven laughing at us because we don’t believe in Him.”

That’s right, I thought to myself. That is what he’d been going on about in Hamburg.

“Even though He didn’t leave his calling card behind, He did leave the world. I think that’s fair enough.” Dad said.

He sat for a while in deep thought before he went on:

“A Russian cosmonaut and a Russian brain surgeon were once discussing Christianity. The brain surgeon was Christian, but the cosmonaut wasn’t. ‘I have been in outer space many times,’ bragged the cosmonaut, ‘but I have never seen any angels.’ The brain surgeon stared in amazement, but then said, ‘And I have operated on many intelligent brains, but I have never seen a single thought.’”

So let us return to the question I asked earlier. Can we “prove” the Christian faith?

In the sense of a rigorous mathematical proof, undeniable and unassailable, the answer is no. But what most people don’t realize is that very few things in life can be proved with this level of certainty. In science, we say that things are “proved”; but really we are just piling up evidence to support our position. A mathematician would sneer at that kind of proof. And even in the realm of higher mathematics, there are even disputes as to whether certain steps in certain proofs are really valid. In fact, if we are searching for absolute certainty, I don’t know where we could begin to find it.

The Christian faith is not subject to scientific proof either.

What about proof “beyond a reasonable doubt,”? The kind of proof I mean does not have the strength of the mathematical proof or even the scientific one; but it is the kind of proof that is used by a lawyer or detective rather than a mathematician or scientist. In fact, it is nearer the kind of proof that we accept in our daily lives on a regular basis.

The natural question raised at this point would be: If that is true, then why doesn’t everyone believe? Surely if the evidence is that strong, it could just be published abroad and everyone who saw it would believe.

In an ideal world this would be the case. C.S. Lewis talks about faith being opposed not to reason but to emotion and things in us that vary from one day to another or even one moment to the next. He is saying that faith is hanging onto the truth in spite of our fear, our pride, our circumstances, or whatever.

I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it. That is not the point at which Faith comes in.

This, of course, runs counter to what many Christians would say. But any atheist worth his salt could make hamburger of their logic.

Two Faces of Doubt

There is thus a difference between what I call “sincere doubt” and “stubborn doubt.” If a person has genuine intellectual concerns about the validity of the Christian worldview, I call that sincere doubt. If he is merely seeking to justify his own behavior, or he simply enjoys playing devil’s advocate while he evades the issue– I call that stubborn doubt. This distinction explains why Tennyson (in his poem In Memoriam) could say:

There lives more faith in honest doubt,

Believe me, than in half the creeds.

When I told the story of Hezekiah and the shadow on the steps, I called it the skeptic’s dream. And yet, it could also be the skeptic’s nightmare, could it not? To the person whose fervent wish is not to believe, such a thing can only be met by horror and denial– or by a change of heart.

There is a story told in the Bible, which underscores this. In this passage from the book of Acts, Paul is speaking to a large group of strangers in Rome:

They arranged to meet Paul on a certain day, and came in even larger numbers to the place where he was staying. From morning till evening he explained and declared to them the kingdom of God and tried to convince them about Jesus from the Law of Moses and from the Prophets. Some were convinced by what he said, but others would not believe.

They disagreed among themselves and began to leave after Paul had made this final statement: “The Holy Spirit spoke the truth to your forefathers when he said through Isaiah the prophet: ‘Go to this people and say, “You will be ever hearing but never understanding; you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.” For this people’s heart has become calloused; they hardly hear with their ears, and they have closed their eyes. Otherwise they might see with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their hearts and turn, and I would heal them.’” Acts 28:23-27 (NIV)

To me, it is worth noticing that this translation says “…others would not believe”. I don’t wish to read too much into a phrase that was not originally written in English; but the rest of the passage also seems to indicate that the unbelievers’ attitude was characterized by a refusal to believe– a “will to disbelieve,” if you prefer. Paul even invokes one of the more biting quotations from the book of Isaiah, saying in its sneering tone, “…they have closed their eyes.”

Let us return to the subject of miracles. A natural question, to me, would be this: Why would God produce miracles on some occasions and not on others?

For example, Jesus did not always perform miracles. In the gospel of Matthew, the following interchange is recorded:

Then some of the Pharisees and teachers of the law said, “Master, we want to see a miraculous sign from you.”

He answered, “A wicked and adulterous generation asks for a sign! But none will be given it except the sign of the prophet Jonah….” Matt 12:39-39 (NIV)

Yet on more than one other occasion, he said that the purpose of the miracles was “so that you might believe.” Why the inconsistency?

Hezekiah asked for a miracle and got one; Herod asked (in Luke 23) and did not. The masses of the sick and blind asked for miracles and got them; the scribes and Pharisees asked and were called wicked and adulterous. Other examples could be cited. Again, why the seeming inconsistency?

One answer is that miracles are acts of God and are at his discretion, and he does not always reveal his thoughts to us. I believe, though, that we can attribute differing reactions by God to differing circumstances. It seems clear to me that in one situation, the person approaches God with an attitude of honest questioning and submissiveness, and in another situation, with insincerity and belligerence. There are factors in every situation, which we as humans are not able to examine. What is the real condition of the person’s mind and heart? Would a miracle be useful or helpful or appropriate? Would the person respond to a miracle even if one occurred?

Another answer is that miracles are by nature rarities. If they occurred as a matter of course, with frequency and regularity, they would cease to be worthy of comment and would likely be regarded as natural phenomena rather than miracles. In fact, the very existence of the universe is in itself a kind of miracle– one that is ignored on a daily basis.

I once read the autobiography of Alan Jay Lerner, an American songwriter popular a few decades ago. As I recall, his search for God occupied a single brief paragraph in the book. He asked God for a sign to show that he existed. He got nothing. Once he saw a cloud shaped roughly like a face, but nothing else.

Is this fair? I think that there is something a little wrong with the idea of a God at the mercy of the slightest whim of every human– a God who must suspend natural law on demand. In this scenario, it is the human who has become God, and God has been reduced to the role of a trained poodle in a circus.

I would also like to observe that I have known people who would reject any miracle they saw. I am reminded of a story Jesus told of the rich man and the beggar Lazarus. Here the rich man speaks from the depths of hell, and Abraham answers:

“…I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my father’s house, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.”

Abraham answered, “They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.”

“No, father Abraham,” he said, “but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.”

He said to him, “If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not listen

even if someone rises from the dead.” Luke 16:27-31

The irony here, of course, is the same as in the verse about the sign of Jonah. Jesus is making a reference to his impending resurrection. In truth, someone did rise from the dead, and there were those who disbelieved; and there still are.

What is sufficient to make a skeptic believe? What could God do that would be so spectacular that no skeptic would have a leg to stand on?

Has it been too long since the resurrection of Jesus? Would it help if there were one resurrection per century, or one per generation? What about geographical remoteness? Would it help to have one resurrection per generation per hundred square miles? Would it be enough to have a team of doctors and scientists attest to each death and resurrection, or would each skeptic have to witness the events in person?

I submit that if a person truly wishes to disbelieve, nothing God could do (short of sheer force) that would convince him otherwise. As long as humans have the choice of believing or not, there will be some who will find the option of disbelief to be more palatable, comfortable, or convenient.

The Bridge

Imagine that you are a traveler who approaches a wooden bridge across a chasm– a bridge that is either sturdy or is not. To cross that bridge will mean you will either reach safety or you will die.

Suppose this wooden bridge is strong. One person will use his knowledge of carpentry and woodworking and engineering to make that determination and will then cross. Another person will cross because he feels lucky, or because the bridge is painted a nice color, or because of what her horoscope said, or because of hearsay, or for whatever reason.

Is it “fair” that both people reach safety? Well, I can’t comment. But if you want my honest opinion, the first person is better off than the second. I can understand and sympathize with the first person and can condone his actions.

For one thing, I believe as Galileo did that intellect is a precious God-given thing, and I do not believe that God is fully pleased when people remain childish in their beliefs– not when they have the capability and opportunity for more. (And some will have the capability but not the opportunity.) Secondly, a faith that is based on fluff is in danger of crumbling when it is tested. Most of these people survive only because their faith never is tested. Thirdly, the discriminating non-Christian will be singularly unimpressed with his encounters with the “type B” Christian; and God will not be glorified in those encounters.

Let me change the analogy– back to the way I first heard it, in fact. The point is that faith has a subjective and an objective pole. The subjective aspect in the person’s mind– whether his faith is weak or strong; the objective pole is the external reality– in this case, whether the bridge is safe.

Ultimately, weak faith in a strong bridge will save you; strong faith in a weak bridge will kill you. So it is ultimately outside of us. That is the best I can say for the “other” type of Christian.

Skepticism, Proof, and Objectivity

Most people pride themselves on being objective. At the extreme end of that spectrum are those with a scientific bent.

The human mind is a bizarre complex of prejudices, preconceptions, wishes, hopes, denials, dreams, fears, and biases. We are led astray by emotion, by ambition, by rebellion, by fatigue, by delusion, by a hundred other things.

If you have ever assisted with a psychology experiment, you may have noticed that they don’t usually tell the subjects the real thing they are looking for, because it will influence the results. The interested reader can read about the Hawthorne Effect or about the research of Elizabeth Loftus back in the 1950s. Why are half the patients in drug testing given placebos– and why do some subjects even respond to them? It is because human beings are complex organisms.

Why do scientists perform double-blind experiments, and why do they check each other’s work so closely? It is because they cannot trust even themselves.

No human being lives in an intellectual vacuum. Every person is subjected to outside influences from the earliest age, and even the people who prize rationality the most have had “pre-rational” influences. In short, everyone believes something. There is no neutral ground on which to stand and judge all viewpoints equally.

The atheist has much to gain by his atheism. By his surgical removal of God from the universe, he has freed himself to act however he chooses at any time. He has removed divine authority and evaded responsibility for all his actions. In addition, he has escaped human law; for after all, if there is no divine authority, then human law is just one human against another. It becomes a matter of not getting caught, like a sneaking criminal; or a Darwinian struggle for supremacy, like a Hitler. Is our ideology better than Hitler’s just because we won the war? Is it really not “better” at all?

The atheist is free to enjoy rebellion against the theistic authority figures of his past or his childhood. He is free to give himself airs of superiority over theists and thus pamper his own ego. He is free to pursue power, money, violence, and sex– anything at all.

A Lesson from Geometry

Most of us are first introduced to the idea of an actual “proof” in high school geometry. You might think of proof as being the heart and soul of geometry, and in a sense you would be right. But the real foundation of Euclidean geometry is the set of five postulates (or axioms) propounded by Euclid.

A “postulate” is a statement that is accepted as being true without proof; in fact, it is regarded as unprovable and even not needing proof. It is like an assumption.

Euclid was able to build his geometry on five of these; and all of his later work is derived from them. The Fifth Postulate was the black sheep of the family, not possessing the elegance and simplicity of the others, so he tried to prove it using only the other four, but to no avail.

Mathematicians were dissatisfied with this state of affairs for a great many centuries. Everyone wanted to prove the fifth postulate and thus dethrone it from its axiomatic status. It was in the nineteenth century when people started with this tactic: Replace the postulate with some form of a negation of it, and start looking for an inconsistency in the ensuing theorems.

The catch was this: No inconsistency could be found. Apparently the non-Euclidean geometries discovered by Lobachevsky and Riemann were just as good, just as valid, just as “true” as Euclidean geometry.

Suddenly geometry looks a great deal less valid than it used to. Not only can we not prove the five postulates– not even the troublesome one– we cannot even prove which geometry is the “right” one!

I am not saying that the assertions “God exists” and “God does not exist” should be treated as axioms and then used to build competing worldviews. But I am saying that some of our most cherished beliefs in the mathematical world are simply unprovable. Proof has to start with something; therefore, there will always be some things that are unprovable.

Science and Truth

Science is not truth. Science is a systematic approach to the attempt to discover truth. The universe (or reality or nature) is the thing studied; science is the study itself. Today the phrase “laws of nature” is no more common than the phrase “laws of physics”– maybe even less common; and I saw an article the other day that commented casually, “The universe moves by physics.”

The universe does not move by physics. Does he really mean to say that until the so-called laws of physics were formulated, those phenomena did not exist? I don’t believe that. I believe that gravity worked before there was a “law of gravity” formulated– in fact, before there were humans around to observe the phenomenon.

Here is the scary part: Science is a human invention.

The scientific method comes purely from human minds– the concepts of hypothesis and experiment, Occam’s Razor, the concept of parsimony, the Law of the Excluded Middle, the Law of Large Numbers, all of those things and more– people made all of it up, every bit of it. Occam’s Razor is only a rule of thumb; it emphatically cannot be proven. Yet everyone uses it.

It is a good reality check to remember that science’s “official answers” change fairly often, and they do not always converge, but sometimes reverse themselves more than once, almost as if science were subject to fashion trends. The geologists and astronomers have leapfrogged each other more than once, occasionally resulting in an embarrassing situation in which the “best figure” for the age of the universe was less than the “best figure” for the age of the Earth. There are scores of embarrassing incidents one could dig up in the history of science. It was in the late 1700′s that the most esteemed scientific body in the world denounced the ridiculous notion “that stones can fall from the sky”– never mind that people had been observing meteors for all of human history. People had also witnessed plasma discharges (or “ball lightning”) throughout history, but these didn’t “officially” exist until the mid-twentieth century. I vividly remember reading a quote from the president of the American Chemical Society in which he talks about atoms as a useful theory but reminds us that they are not really real, that their truth is “symbolic.”

Let us not forget: Science is not truth. It is only an attempt– a feeble, human attempt– to discover truth.

The Bounds of Human Knowledge

It is frightening to realize that there are limits to what we can know. It has only been a few decades since Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle was formulated, but it is firmly entrenched in modern physics.

But that is “only” science, which mathematicians know is not very rigorous in the first place. What about mathematics?

The reader, if he wishes, can read about Kurt Goedel and his Incompleteness Theorem. The math is over my head, and I have read differing accounts of what the implications are; but it seems clear to me that whether we turn to physics or math, the ghost of the unknowable haunts us.

Let’s go back to things that are a little less abstract and a little more comfortable. Never mind the abstractions. Never mind the things we can only experience indirectly. What about the things we can see and experience directly? If I point to something to demonstrate its existence, saying, “See, here is a tree”– surely that is a valid proof?

Well, yes and no. In the first place, people can always find ways of rejecting something they want to reject. I recall with amusement a conversation with an atheist friend, who told me that even if I prayed and God appeared in mid-air, he wouldn’t say, “Oh, now I believe”; he would say, “How did you do that?”

After all, if I show you a tree, you still don’t have knowledge of the tree– only of your perception of it. This is a big difference.

How many ways can the human senses be fooled? Almost without trying, I can think of these: a. Hallucination from mental illness or fatigue; b. Drug-induced hallucination; c. Optical (or other) illusions; d. Dreams; e. Hypnosis;

f. Psychological preconceptions (refer to Elizabeth Loftus); g. Natural filtering of information by the brain; h. Physical limitations of human senses; i. Sleight-of-hand, trickery, and hoax; j. Fallibility of memory; k. Incompleteness of sensory data.

Occasionally, I have had dreams in which I suspected I was dreaming. Two of these stick out in my mind because after examining my hands, my clothes, my body, and my immediate surroundings, I laughed at myself and decided I was being silly– of course it was real. A few minutes later, I woke up; but in the dream, I was not only completely lucid, but also completely certain– as certain as I am right now– that I was awake.

For all I know, I could be dreaming right now; or I could be lying on a couch in a state of hypnosis; or I could be having a delusional fantasy of sitting and typing on a computer. Do I believe any of these to be true? No; but I cannot prove it.

Human senses are fallible. I am speaking not just in the physiological sense, but also in the philosophical sense.

Suppose I look at a tree. I do not have direct knowledge of the tree itself, but only my perception of the tree– the result of my brain’s processing of the signal sent from my eyes. Suppose I then look away from the tree– now I don’t have even the perception, but only the memory of the perception! Not even a ghost, but just the shadow of a ghost.

Oh, but if I go and touch the tree, surely then… No. Tactile sense is just another sense. We cannot know the tree is there.

Socrates pursued this line of reasoning to its end, saying finally, “All I really know is that I know nothing.” In short, we do not know that the outside world, the alleged universe, is really there at all. Let the reader go and look up “solipsism” and ponder this line of thought.

The one possible exception I see is that even when all of the senses are removed, there may still be self-awareness. I believe this to be the case.

Take a person both blind and deaf as Laura Bridgman was (or Helen Keller). This person can still communicate with the outside world– if no other way, through sign language while literally holding hands with another person. But suppose we take away the other three senses also– smell, taste, and touch. Communication is impossible, along with knowledge of the outside world; but is there still “something” there? I think there is. I think that there is still a self-aware human consciousness inside that head.

This is my understanding of what Descartes meant in saying Cogito, ergo sum (“I think, therefore I am”). My inner knowledge of myself proves to me that I exist; and as far as I can tell, that self-knowledge is not tied to any of the five senses. Thus Descartes was a little less radical than Socrates, saying, “All I really know is that I exist; I am not at all sure about the universe, and certainly not about you.”

Side note: This reminds me of a funny story that is supposed to have really happened. A philosophy student stayed up all night reading Descartes, frying his brain, and then walked straight into class with no sleep. Walking right up to his professor in a daze, he said, “Sir… do I exist?” The teacher looked into the distance thoughtfully for a moment, then turned back to the student and asked: “Who wants to know?”

Another couple of centuries passed, and other philosophers came along. I am thinking of Bishop Berkely and John Locke. Berkely was the one famous for tying existence to perception, saying Esse est percepi (“To be is to be perceived”). I am vastly over-simplifying because I don’t completely understand it myself; I can recommend his Dialogue of Hylas and Philonas to the interested reader. Locke picked up the ball and as I understand it, taught that things are– well, pretty much what they seem to be. We think there’s an outside world? Well, there is. And forget about solipsism; those things that appear to have hands and arms and legs and move around as I do– guess what, they’re people, and they have consciousness just as I do.

These are worthwhile simplifying assumptions. There would not be much point in doing anything if we were not convinced the universe existed. And yet… do not forget Socrates. We do not know the outside world is there. We merely believe it, accepting it without proof.

The Best Minds

The best minds are divided on the subject of whether there is a God. Bertrand Russell, the mathematician and author of the Principia Mathematica, also wrote Why I Am Not a Christian.

For every brilliant mind that disbelieves, there is one that believes.

Albert Einstein, stereotypically considered one of the best minds of this century, had very complex beliefs. He was a theist who had no strong convictions about the nature of God, but little doubt that there actually was one.

“I believe in Spinoza’s God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings.” Upon being asked if he believed in God by Rabbi Herbert Goldstein of the Institutional Synagogue, New York,

April 24,1921

Let’s look at Isaac Newton for a minute. To most people, he is only a cartoon like figure sitting under an apple tree; but in reality, he was a truly great scientist, mathematician, and philosopher. He is principally famous for three things: formulating the law of gravitation, formulating the three laws of motion, and (with Leibniz) inventing differential and integral calculus.

How many millions of students have ever had trouble with calculus? I know I did. But this man didn’t; he invented it.

Any one of these achievements would have been enough to guarantee him a place among the greatest people of the last three centuries; but he was responsible for all three of them, and more besides.

But what most people do not know was that his work in science and mathematics accounted for less than half of his writings. Newton wrote more on the subject of theology than he did calculus and physics put together.

Every math student knows the term “Cartesian coordinates,” of course; but many do not know for whom they were named. It was Rene Descartes, the inventor of that coordinate system and the inventor of analytical geometry– who was also a philosopher and a Christian.

I can’t help but mention the mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal, who was also a believer. He is best known for “Pascal’s Wager” “Pascal’s Wager” is the name given to an argument due to Blaise Pascal for believing, or for at least taking steps to believe, in God. The point I am making here is that he was a brilliant man and a believer.

I can’t wrap up without mentioning Gregor Mendel, the monk who founded the science of genetics. His attitude was that he was uncovering the mechanisms by which God had designed life, and his belief in God was an integral part of his science.

Of course, the skeptic and I could quote counter-examples back and forth at each other all day. But that is just my point. No one can ever say, “Scientists don’t believe in God”; because even today, when it has become unfashionable, there are many who do.

The Threefold Journey

There is an unusual phenomenon which I have seen happen. I don’t know whether it is my imagination or a real thing, since I have never heard anyone else make reference to it.

Many people who were taught (at any early age) to believe in God will reach a point in their lives when they reject that belief. I almost think I can see a certain personality type that does it.

Let me use myself as an example, although I never really embraced atheism. By the time I was in college, my faith was basically just a matter of being socially acceptable in some circles and a matter of courtesy to my parents. When I was around my parents or other people who expected it of me, I would slip into that mode of thinking; but it was not a genuine part of my daily life or my overall worldview. It was what some people call “functional atheism.”

I think my first major step off that path was taken when I was nineteen, as a result of my abovementioned conversation with Dr. Cross. At the time, it was certainly no dramatic thing; since I didn’t believe the things he was telling me. But now, I think that was a major point in my spiritual evolution.

At any rate, you see that there are three phases that my life has been divided into– symbolically, let me call them the Hill, the Valley, and the Mountain. I will try to generalize these to go beyond my own experience.

The first stage is naive belief in God. At first it is more or less on a level with belief in Santa Claus, then it becomes a matter of habit or sociology or whatever.

The second is an iconoclastic phase– a “growing up” and moving into a larger world that mostly disbelieves in God. This may happen through books long before you leave your parents to go to college. This stage is typified by a kind of cynicism and arrogance; and there is a tendency to feel oneself rather superior to the narrow-minded believers, to feel a kind of disdain or frustration or scorn.

The third phase is like a re-awakening, in which one perceives that the first transition was not from naiveté into enlightenment, but rather from one kind of naiveté into another– a mere swapping of superstitions. This is a shocking jolt into reality– a reality that transcends both the former stages. This was a time of numbness and disorientation for me. I had always known that I was “supposed to” believe in God (whatever that means); but as an adult, it had never occurred to me that God might be “really real.” Thus I was baptized at age twenty-two and my life w A more dramatic example is C. S. Lewis. He is so well known as a Christian writer today that many people (whether Christian or not) simply don’t realize that he was once an atheist. You can read it in many biographies, including his book Surprised by Joy.

Another example is Joy Davidman whom he married. Raised by Jewish parents, she was taught to believe in God; but she was a precocious child with a frightening intellect, and she announced her atheism at the age of eight. She outgrew it, and speaks of it in the book And God Came Near.

as never the same again.

I don’t think I have proved– not even to myself– that this phenomenon is a real one. But it seems to me that there is such a path; and perhaps some of my readers are on it. If so, I can assure you that the Mountain is higher than the Hill; but there is never a sense of having “arrived.” In fact, if one ever thinks he has arrived, that should be a warning signal that he is growing complacent.

Do I still have “doubts”? Yes, absolutely. More than one kind, but having once gotten “the big picture,” having once reached the point where my thinking was clear enough to make a lifelong commitment– well, I will not break that commitment.

C. S. Lewis was plagued by doubt. If there was any phase of his life that was free of doubt, it was the first one, the Santa Claus phase– certainly not the last. And certainly not the middle, either, because he tells the story of sitting by the fireplace with a fellow atheist discussing Fraser’s Golden Bough and being shaken and disoriented by something the other man said.

There is a kind of irony here. The book of Revelation condemns those who “are neither hot nor cold.” This always confused me; but I have observed that in many cases the ones who seem to be far from God are, in the long run, closer than those who are always jostling God’s elbows.

Look at the book of Job. God put Job in his place, to be sure. But I think it’s clear that it was Job himself, and not his companions, who was more pleasing to God– not the simpering ninnies who surrounded him, but Job, who lost his patience, stood up and shook his fist at God.

I also think that Lewis even as an atheist may have been on better terms with God than the “functional atheist” who sits in his pew every Sunday and barely leaves a warm spot when he has gone.

I have also heard the saying that there are none so zealous as converts. And everyone who has passed through the Valley is in a sense a convert, however he may have been indoctrinated as a child. Surely it was true of Lewis and Davidman, now both blazing stars in the firmament of Christendom.

Do I still listen to the arguments of atheists? Yes, I do. It would be unfair if I did not, and it would cause my mind (and my spirit) to grow fat and lazy. But it has been years since I have heard anything new.

Do I promise that the Mountain is easier to live on than the Hill or the Valley? I make no such promise. Truth is all that matters, not our own comfort. In fact, the Mountain may be the most difficult place to be of them all; but the ultimate reward is transcendent.

THE FAITH OF JESUS

What is the “Faith of Jesus”? “Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Revelation 14:12. “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 2:5.

Is the “faith of Jesus” part of your home life? Perhaps you have not given much thought to this aspect of the gospel message. Many, even among ministers, readily acknowledge that their understanding of this subject is rather limited, and yet, it is of equal importance to the commandments of God.

Look at the experience of Jesus. He knew that it was entirely possible for Him to yield to temptation. He knew that His life of continual obedience would be possible only if He continued to yield to His Father’s will. Such was His understanding of the theological facts; but what was His faith? This was His faith: “I have set the Lord always before me: because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” Psalms 16:8. Jesus lived by every word that proceeded out of the mouth of God. He put His faith in God’s word expecting the Word to accomplish what it said. And according to His faith it was unto Him; He was never moved. A correct understanding of theological facts is important but, “This is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith.” 1 John 5:4. Jesus had faith in the written Word declaring with David, “I have inclined my heart to perform Thy statutes always, even unto the end.” Psalms 119:112. “Constantly the words were on His lips, ‘I will not fail nor be discouraged’.” Signs of the Times, June 16, 1898. God’s word has creative power, and Jesus’ faith in the Word caused it to be true in His life. That Word also says, “O bless our God…which holdeth our soul in life, and suffereth not our feet to be moved.” Psalms 66:8,9. Jesus believed that His soul would be held in life and according to His faith it was unto Him.

Are you living by the faith of the Son of God? Paul testified, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God…”. Galatians 2:20. Believe the promise found in 1 Corinthians 10:13: “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.” Since I first believed, He has been faithful and has kept me from being overcome by temptations to besetting sins, and “Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ…” Philippians 1:6. By saying this, one is not saying that he is sinless. In spite of my sinfulness God has been faithful; and as He has promised, He has been providing a way of escape with every temptation.

If one casts away his faith and yields to a temptation to sin, what hope has he? The inspired Word says, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” Ezekiel 18:20. “…for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” Genesis 2:17. We must never forget this fact, Jesus does exercise infinite pity toward those who fall into sin but the question is, how does one know whether or not he will respond to God’s infinite pity? Cain did not, Saul did not, and the list could go on. And yet, on the other hand, David did, Moses did, and this list could go on as well. The point is, we have no way of knowing how we will respond to God’s mercy if we should return to our sins. Thus the only thing for certain is that if we sin we shall surely die. We cannot say, “Oh, if I sin again I will just simply repent.” We may not be able to repent. The experiences recorded in the Bible about the sin and repentance of David and Moses are there to encourage those who have fallen into sin. This is evidence that God will forgive the repentant sinner. For those who are standing, these experiences should serve as beacons of warning; we must not fail as they did.

When one testifies to be experiencing continual victory over temptations to sin, he is not claiming to be perfect. When we stand the test of God in the refining, purifying process; when the furnace fire consumes the dross and the true gold of a purified character appears, we may still say with Paul, “Not as though I have already attained, either were already perfect: but I follow after…This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press towards the mark of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:12-14. And yet, because we accept the faith of Jesus, it is the privilege of each to be able to say, “And the Lord shall deliver me from every evil work, and will preserve me unto His heavenly kingdom: to Whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.” 2 Timothy 4:18. He may boldly say, “I am dead to the world; the life I now live is by faith in the Son of God! My life is hid with Christ in God, and when He who is my life shall appear, then shall I also appear with Him in glory.” Talk and act as if your faith was invincible.

God told Abraham that he would be a father of a great multitude. Abraham had no children at this time and yet, by faith he knew that this would be true. Even though he was childless, he had confidence to use his new name–Abraham, which means “father of a great multitude”. His circumstances did not prevent him from declaring “those things that be not as though they were.” Faith in the word of God was his evidence that he had a son and that he was indeed the father of a great multitude.

“Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of My righteousness.” Isaiah 41:10. Jesus has promised to uphold you; therefore, believe that you will be upheld. He will fulfill this promise to you as verily as He fulfilled His promise to Abraham. You must believe in His promise and declare your confidence in Him, believing that He will continue to give you uninterrupted victory over all the power of the enemy forever. Just as Abraham’s faith in the promise of God was imputed to him for righteousness, so will righteousness be imputed to you for your faith in the exceeding great and precious promises of God. To say that you do not know whether or not you will continue being upheld tomorrow or six months from now would be the same as Abraham saying that he did not know for sure whether he would be a father of a great multitude. However, “He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness.” Romans 4:20-22.

It is through faith that you know something is true even though you have not yet seen it. To be justified means to be given the righteous life of Christ. His life is everlasting. His life never sins. Even though you have not yet lived tomorrow, it is through faith that you know that, through the Holy Spirit, His everlasting, victorious life will be abiding in you tomorrow and forever. “…He shall give you another Comforter, that He may abide with you forever.” John 14:16. It is this faith in His word that allows the grace of God to cause this to be true. “According to your faith be it unto you.” Matthew 9:29.

“And I will betroth thee unto Me forever; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in righteousness, and in judgment, and lovingkindness, and in mercies. I will even betroth thee unto Me in faithfulness: and thou shalt know YAH.” Hosea 2:19,20. When one marries, he intellectually knows that it is physically possible for him to go back to his old girlfriends. However, in the wedding ceremony he still publicly declares that he will be faithful “until death do us part.” If he told his bride that he could not say or know for sure that he would still be abiding faithfully with her tomorrow or six months from now, she would have reason for concern. However, in his marriage vow he confidently declares that he will always remain faithful to her. Jesus has made a vow to us: “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.” Hebrews 13:5. And because “Thy vows are upon me, O God: I will render praises unto Thee. For Thou hast delivered my soul from death: wilt not Thou deliver my feet from falling, that I may walk before God in the light of the living?” Psalms 56:12,13. Because of His vows or promises to us, we can, with assurance, declare with David, “I will dwell in the house of YAH forever.” Psalms 23:6. “What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.” Matthew 19:6.

This is the faith of our fathers. Can we, upon whom the ends of the world are come, afford to have less faith than they? “Here is the patience of the saints: here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Revelation 14:12.

Fides et Ratio, One or Both?

The Middle Ages saw a period in time that was deeply rooted in Christianity. Almost every aspect of life was monitered and ruled by the Church. This period in time also saw the emergence of men beginning to question whether the existence of God can be proved by faith , reason, or as Thomas Aquinas insists, by both faith and reason. There were differing opinions of this matter in both scholarly and religious circles. Faith is what all believers must have within them, it is a crucial part of man’s relationship with God. On the other hand, reason is a part of science and some believed that matters of The Divine should not be subjected to reason; there should not be a justification for God.

Thomas Aquinas was a teacher of the Dominican Order and he taught that most matters of The Divine can be proved by natural human reason, while “Others were strictly ‘of faith’ in that they could be grasped only through divine revelation.” This was a new view on the faith and reason argument contradictory to both Abelard with his belief that faith should be based on human reason, and the Bernard of Clairvaux who argued that one should only need faith.

Aquinas, in the Summa Theologiae, stated that, “Man should not seek to know what is above reason.” His argument was, in very simple terms, that men need reason to understand all of God’s truths. Yet there are certain truths that are beyond reason which men can only understand through Divine Revelation, or faith. And sometimes there might be certain aspects of faith that one day reason might have been able to prove but only a few men would know and understand this, so it is necessary that all men know this through Divine Revelation and faith.

In a personal point of view, I see this interpretation the same way that I see all explanantions of religious beliefs. Religion, in my definition, is a simple way to attain the answers to the mystery in life. It holds all of the ‘truths’ about who made the us, what happens to us after we die. It is a way to give people a purpose and sense of something in their life when there might otherwise be nothing. It is also a way of keeping society in safe behavioral limits by supplying mankind with a code of laws and punishments. How very coincidental it is that God and religion supply all of these things that are so necessary to human society. Of course as time went on these simple religious ideas and laws grew into a very complicated and contradictory system that may be seen as void of any holiness.

It seems very easy to just make explanations as Aquinas does about why things are as they are. He was able to use reason to prove certain Divine Truths, but not all, and when he found he could not prove with reason he uses faith as the answer. How is it philosophically reasonable that reason may be applied to certain aspects but not all? Maybe it is easy for a believer to accept this, but using this ‘reason’ may be a bit more difficult in proving anything to a non-believer. But of course the non-believer was a very rare site, if not non-existant in the Middle Ages to even contradict or question Aquinas’ theologic ideas. “Aquinas was convinced that reason and faith could not really conflict with one another. He wrote, ‘Christian theology isues from the light of faith, philosophy from the natural light of reason. Philosophical truths cannot be opposed to the truths of faith’.” Where is the reason for this? Reason is associated with fact and it is evident that Aquinas does not have a strong concept of either reason or fact.

Aquinas also used his Reason to explain “Whether matrimony is of natural law”. In this he states that matrimony may not be viewed as natural because it is not neccesary in the wild, but in the case of humans it is required for the good of the offspring. He argues that children need parents with a strong bond. “We derive three things from our parents, namely existence, nourishment, and education.” Marriage was also neccesary in, “…the mutual services which married persons render one another in household matters.” And because nature finds it that man should live together in communities that they should also be together as man and wife for reasons of subsistance. When looking upon modern society these reasonings, except for that fact that men need to live in societies, can be easily disproved. As fifty percent of America’s once married population can tell you, marriage is not at all neccesary in the development of a child although it may be beneficial. Marriage is a concept that did not exist at the beginning of mankind. Christian law made marriage neccesary for the survival and even birth of any children.

Aquinas wrote,”The existence of God can be proved in five ways.” These five ways all illustrated the need for a higher being by philosophical means. First was the argument of motion, that all things in motion must be moved by another. Second is “from the formality of efficient causation.”, where there must be a cause to make an effect. Third is the existence of all things and they must have been put into existence by a higher existence. The fourth is the “cause of their being, goodness, and every other perfection…”. And the fifth is the need for an intelligent “governance of the world”. All of these proofs of God’s existence are basically the same in that they are all, essentially, examples of cause and effect. This cause and effect does not neccesarily prove there is a God but it does lead one to wonder what may be the highest cause, and for this there is no proof.

In the question of faith and reason it is ridiculous to claim that God or any matter of the Divine may be proven by reason. And although I agree with the Bernard of Clairvaux on this one matter I agree for a different reason. He leaves the only answer to be faith. I do not think there is any true way to prove religious matters. Though it may be easy at times to disprove them with the use of reason, it becomes difficult to do so with faith. It is impossible to use faith and reason in conjunction with eachother. Faith is a belief in something that does not have reason, so therefore if something can be proved with philosophical reasoning there would be no reason to have faith except for in the case where reason does not answer the question. This reasoning equation, in the end, does not add up.

The Real Problem

Reinsmith introduces the nature of the conflict and difficulty between religious and critical thought, and then supports his own thesis with only one example: meditation, or in his preferred words, “mental culture.” But the process of meditation which he describes in good detail would have merit even if there were no god, immaterial soul, or “Ultimate Truth” in the usual sense. It is a behavior that can be participated in without even regarding it as “religious”, and being only a behavior rather than a claim or belief, it is not the central thesis of any world religion. Consequently, it is a bad example. Although Reinsmith’s exposition and analysis of the process is wonderfully informative and valuable, it does not directly deal with the problem which is elaborated in his introduction.

In simplistic terms for the sake of example, the core thesis of the Buddhist religion is the belief that all is suffering, our immaterial souls are trapped forever in an illusion, and the only way to escape the illusion of suffering is through a particular path to enlightenment, which varies with each sect of Buddhism, but which usually involves not just meditation but adherence to various behaviors and attitudes (largely of a moral nature). In comparison, the core thesis of the Christian religion is the belief that we all have immortal souls which are damned by the sin of Adam and we will be condemned not merely to misery and sin in this world, but to an eternity of it in an afterlife, and the only way to escape this damnation is through believing that Jesus was the son of God and washed away our sin by dying on the cross. Beyond that, Christian sects vary with respect to the exact entry requirements for heaven (including specific moral standards which must be lived up to) but they all tend to agree that true and heartfelt belief in this central thesis will not only lead to a life of happiness and goodness in this world, but to an eternity of it in some kind of afterlife.

To deny either of these claims is to deny the whole validity of these respective religions. Indeed, even to suggest that these claims are irrelevant or of merely secondary importance is to deny the whole validity of these religions, since everything they teach only makes sense in reference to these ultimate claims about the true nature of human existence. To the extent that anything they teach does make sense without these claims, it can already be found adequately defended by secular rather than religious thought, which disagreeably renders all religions as superfluous and unnecessary. This is the cause of all real controversy between critical thought and religion.

Reinsmith writes that without applying critical thought to religion there is “only self-deception and self-imposed ignorance” and “religious growth will founder in illusion and superstition.” Lacking qualification, these statements appear to assert that the central tenets of Buddhism and Christianity as given above are merely superstitious, illusory, or otherwise the products of self-deception and ignorance. Although Reinsmith may not have meant that, by failing to address the real issues of religious thought he fails to address his own central question adequately. Focusing our attention on a behavior such as meditation misses the real problem: whether religious life and critical thought need each other.

Where the Plot Went Astray

The mistake which may have led Reinsmith’s otherwise superb paper to miss the mark lies within the answer he gives to this problem: “religion needs critical thought not merely as a debunking device, but as a cleansing tool to maintain clarity and to root out false views.” The problem is that these two things are exactly the same activity, and thus both are equally adversarial: “a cleansing tool” which “maintains clarity” and roots out “false views” is by definition a “debunking device.” By erroneously assuming that these are not the same activities, Reinsmith sends himself on a tangent. However interesting that tangent is, it has less to do with the problem he set out to explore. This is not to say that Reinsmith has not done us a service by making this statement. If we take it as a definition, it is an excellent clarification of what critical thought actually involves. The basic idea that its purpose is to get at the truth by eliminating error can, as Reinsmith noticed, be misplaced with the idea that its purpose is merely to refute. However, few honest critical thinkers make this mistake. Rather, such a mistake in identifying the purpose of critical thought actually seems most common to people who are not practiced critical thinkers.

Critical vs. Creative Thought

All critical thought is by nature adversarial. A “positive” role belongs instead to creative thought. While the role of creative thought is to create ideas and possibilities, the role of critical thought is to debunk them, and it is only by these two processes working together that we arrive at knowledge and truth. Critical thought can be viewed in much the same way as natural selection: it does in a sense “create” by eliminating the “weak” and leaving the “strong”. Thus, critical thought’s role as a debunking device is essential and indispensable, and it must play a part in every act of knowing. But it does not eliminate ideas and possibilities until none are left. Nihilism is as irrational as blind faith, and as self limiting as naivety. Rather, critical thought eliminates until all that remains is the consistent, the probable, the tenable, the reliable, the useful–in other words, knowledge.

Reinsmith writes that “critical thought must not see itself perpetually at odds with religion or spiritual practice; rather it must get to know and value its place within that domain.” This cannot be true, because critical thought is perpetually at odds with everything, even ordinary and mundane thoughts and ideas, and critical thinkers not only accept this, but cherish the fact. This is not to say that we disbelieve everything; rather, it is to say that any honest critical thinker occasionally attacks everything with critical thought, even what they take for granted or believe to be certain or irrefutable. Needless to say, much of what we believe survives the assaults of critical thought by virtue of its being most probably true, but we nevertheless sick the dogs of critical thought upon even these beliefs, and rightly consider it a virtue to do so. We never know when we might uncover a mistake or an unwarranted assumption, or when new information may change what we now think to be true. But critical thinkers know that this is the only way to learn.

The Role of Critical Thought in Religion

So far I think Reinsmith would be in complete agreement. Yet he still tells us that critical thought must find its “place” within the “domain” of religious thought. Before asking what “place” that could be (or why it would be any different from its place in all other endeavors), we must first ask what the “domain” of religion actually is. Reinsmith makes a solid attempt at doing this, and rightly comes to the conclusion that what makes something uniquely “religious” is human religious or spiritual experience, not the institutions of religion (ideological or physical). This is because the most important institutions of religion are based on spiritual experiences, both in the sense of having originated with them and in the sense of being proven or justified by them. In contrast, those institutions which do not have any similar and certain foundations in religious experience belong more properly in the cultural or social domain, and are called “religious” merely because they are associated with those aspects which are genuinely religious in nature and origin.

However, religious experience is something most if not all of us can agree is a fact: it unquestionably exists, regardless of whether we agree with the conclusions people draw from it. Reinsmith gives us one example of a religious experience in the form and process of a particular kind of meditation, but he applies critical thought only to the activity and not to the conclusions people draw from it. Yet this is what religion is ultimately all about. While it is based on religious experience, only when certain conclusions are arrived at and acted upon does a religion exist- and only then does critical thought really have something to question. Reinsmith reveals where he missed this point when he writes in his conclusion that “the modern critical thinker must first admit to the possibility of a spiritual dimension to human existence, the denial of which in the working lives of academics and intellectuals is one of the great biases and blocks of the 20th century.”

The mistake here is assuming that “the possibility of a spiritual dimension to human existence” is what academics do in fact deny, but this is rarely, or at least not generally the case. What academics most frequently and ardently deny are the conclusions people draw from their spiritual experiences, and any examination of religious debates will reveal this fact. Few people of note question the existence of spiritual experiences, and as spiritual experiences constitute a “spiritual dimension to human existence” it should be clear that Reinsmith is attacking a phantom. In contrast, what permits Reinsmith to identify critical thought as “adversarial” to religion is the application of critical thought to the conclusions drawn from spiritual experience, such as the core tenets of Buddhism and Christianity summarized above, and this is where the real problem lies.

The Nature of the Spiritual as Psychological

Reinsmith contributes an excellent, lucid, and enlightening analysis of a particular behavior which is often regarded as religious, but could without contradiction be classified as psychological (quite unlike the central claims of most world religions). This is where critical thought must begin in this domain: we must recognize that experiences which we classify as spiritual or religious exist as a subset of ordinary psychological experiences, and not as something separate and different from them. This is not because we are obliged to assume that there is nothing supernatural or special which corresponds to spiritual experiences. Rather, it is because before we can make any such conclusion at all we are obliged to see that there is no inherent way to distinguish ordinary psychological events from spiritual events. Because they originate within the same domain (i.e. our mental life), the possibility always remains that they are merely different aspects of the same thing, and thus may not correspond to anything outside of our own, private mental existence. In particular, spiritual experiences may represent glimpses of ourselves more than of anything beyond us or common to others, and this and other possibilities must be eliminated before we can assume it is ever the reverse.

Applying Critical Thought to Religion

I will first use Reinsmith’s own example to show how critical thought must be applied to religious claims, in order to better expose the difference between his point and mine. He gives us an adequate example of a religious claim derived from spiritual experience in the words of Walpola Rahula, where the many things that meditation can accomplish are listed as “cleansing the mind of impurities and disturbances” of various kinds. While Reinsmith shows us how critical thought can be employed in the process of reaching these goals of meditation, a claim which is not very controversial, he misses the real controversy which lies between religious and critical thought: in this case, whether these things can actually be accomplished by meditation at all. A comparable example in another religious tradition might be explaining how critical thought can be used to find eternal truths in biblical scripture, while ignoring the more important question as to whether what one finds through this process is actually true (or eternal), or even whether the bible is the proper place to be looking for such things.

Walpola Rahula is cited as first stating that meditation can cleanse the mind of “lustful desires, hatred, ill will, worries and restlessness.” This is a straightforward empirical claim, open to scientific investigation. In fact, I happen to believe this claim is well supported by the evidence, and therefore most likely true (I doubt many would contest it). This is also true for the rest of Rahula’s claims with the exception of the last two: that through meditation one can obtain “the highest wisdom which sees the nature of things as they are, and realizes the Ultimate Truth.” First, I am extremely skeptical that meditation of this kind can produce any special faculty of perception with regard to “things” other than through reexamining our otherwise ordinary perceptions of them. At the very least, it begs the question as to how such a claim is capable of being tested (and thus known to be true). Second, the very concept of “Ultimate Truth” begs a definition. It is not clear how we could know that meditation would lead to more certain truth than other forms of cognition, or what exactly would make that truth “Ultimate.”

A solution to these problems can be found in the understanding of spiritual experience as a psychological phenomenon. If seeing “the nature of things as they are” is merely seeing the nature of our perceptions as they are (where “perceptions” includes emotions, memories, and thoughts, about both things and ourselves), then this becomes a testable claim, and it would entail no contradiction to classify this as a purely psychological phenomenon. Likewise, if seeing the “Ultimate Truth” means nothing more than seeing the truth about our own perceptions of ourselves (and of other things), then this, too, appears less “mystical” in nature and can safely be folded under the purview of psychology. If, however, there is anything more implied in either of these claims, they must be defined in such a way that they can be tested before they can have any intelligible meaning, and then they must actually be tested before we can regard them as true or false. While it is easy to see how this might be done in Reinsmith’s example, it is much harder to see this in more controversial, and arguably more important, religious claims (such as the core tenets of Buddhism and Christianity summarized above). Nevertheless, at least in the example provided by Reinsmith, what is ordinarily given special status as a “spiritual” rather than an ordinarily psychological experience can be shown to be psychological and not peculiarly spiritual at all–unless we wish to define “spiritual experience” as a particular kind of psychological experience, which is what I propose.

A Definition of Spiritual Experience

Religious claims often seem to be believed in more for their personal worth in answering what Reinsmith identifies as our “need for an ultimate meaning to life” than for their logical or empirical merit. While most attempts to define “spiritual experience” rely on complex lists of the qualities of the experiences themselves, I am skeptical that any such list is capable of serving as a sine qua non for “spiritual experience”. Rather, the one thing which appears definitive of a spiritual experience is whether it is interpreted or can be interpreted in such a way as to be relevant in some sense to an “ultimate meaning to life.” This means that the test for a truly spiritual belief is whether it accomplishes the goal of answering our need for meaning (and how well it does so), and this matters more than whether that belief is consistent, proven, or true.

This would explain Reinsmith’s observation that “holders of firm religious beliefs do not merely resist attempts at critique, they are often impervious to them”. This kind of behavior, which seems inexplicably irrational, is revealed to be quite explicable (though perhaps still irrational) when we recognize that the religiously devout are often interested in things more important to them than the truth (such as an ultimate meaning to life). Since the personal, emotional benefits provided by spiritual beliefs do not depend on those beliefs being true, their truth becomes (in practice) irrelevant. Thus, while Buddhism and Christianity each provide a supernatural explanation for our ills, and an equally supernatural solution, within all this lies a purely practical belief system which not only provides an ultimate meaning to life, but attempts to produce a greater balance of peace and happiness by providing both a moral standard and a reason to live up to it. But all of these benefits are gained merely by the claims being believed, and not by their actually being true, which is quite unlike scientific claims or technological inventions, where benefits are usually gained only when we believe in theories which are true (and definite hazards are often created by believing in false ones). I am not even arguing here that all religious claims are false. Everything I have said so far would apply to all religions regardless of whether the claims of any religion were true or false.

Justified Faith

Ignorance or “Thus Saith The Lord”

Authority, as much as any man assumes, implies that a faction or consortium of individuals possess specific claims that foster a particular truth. These claims are then imposed upon a much larger group who either acquiesces because of insufficient knowledge of the subject or firmly believe that such a certainty is tangible. Many of us never challenge authority throughout our lives, those of us who do find that our attempts to refine or redefine an institution is generally inadequate due to that group’s prestige, financial support, or a variety of other factors that perpetuate their power. If any institution is guilty of subjective despotism then it is Christianity, which presents an irreconcilable contrariety of doctrines and beliefs. Each individual denomination fosters the opinion that theirs is a direct revelation from God, rather than an orchestration of human invention. Such claims foster an egocentric spiritually that either inadvertently or deliberately rejects other opposing groups as inherently misguided or heretical. Ironically, the “misguided” group who is defamed is guilty of the same behavior and, in reaction, decries that former group’s objection by assailing their misguidance. This polemic exchange is recognizable to those who isolate themselves from Christianity. Some are inclined to dismiss the contrariety as a meaningless dispute with very little in the way that would elicit our attention. Others feel obliged to decry such contrariety, criticizing this lack of congruity as an indication of its human origin rather than its divine. Still others see all religion as a subversive agent which counterfeits life; these feel it a divine obligation to disclose the deception and manipulation that has caused religion to persevere. Whatever the cause, it is in the interest of all of these groups to comprehend and provide coherency to the issue of truth.