Irony Becomes Her

Faith and Knowledge

"Paul, a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ for the faith of God's elect and the knowledge of the truth that leads to godliness--a faith and knowledge resting on the hope of eternal life, which God, who does not lie, promised before the beginning of time..."

Opening a letter to Titus, Paul invokes faith and knowledge in the same breath. Much as intellectuals would stress truth and experientialists would stress faith, they both factor equally in this apostle's summary statement of salvation. Isn't this the way the Bible is? Profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness; living and active; law that gives freedom; it simply cannot be confined to a narrow usage or understanding.

When I learned about the discipline of epistemology in my Intro to Philosophy class, I thought, "Duh. Of course I know how we know stuff. We just know stuff! We see it, we read it, we believe it--we know it!"

Little did I know that this was the pivot around which my whole faith and life's direction would turn. How do I know God? How do I know what he's like and who I am in relation to him? The Bible, in its very breadth, can provide a very confusing picture of a God who loves unconditionally and wipes out whole nations in wrath. If he could be described in a perfectly comprehensible way, he wouldn't be the infinite being he must be in order for me to believe his authority. So how am I to know him? Spiritual experience? Scientific experimentation? Blind faith?

Jesus said to Thomas, "Because you have seen me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed."

Faith cannot be removed even from the most austere conception of "knowledge of the truth." We must believe in something implicitly, whether it be our own sensory perceptions, spiritual vision, or some sort of Platonic ideal, if we are to know anything. The perfect mathematical system, I believe Euclid said, would have one postulate; the rest would be derived from it. This would be difficult, but more difficult would be imagining a system without a single tenet taken for granted! The only imagination capable of it would have to be capable of independent creative force in itself.

Looking at the world, the only option for me is to believe in the existence of a person who embodies in himself the Platonic ideal, the source of spiritual vision, and the enabling force of sensory perceptions and every other physical phenomenon. Importantly, this is a person and not some kind of non-sentient force; otherwise it would be lacking in the very infinitude it requires. Saying that he cannot be a person disables him and pulls him out of the position we just identified.

What would knowledge of that kind of Being be like? As far as I can tell, it would be broad and sometimes seemingly contradictory. It would be difficult for minds of a lesser order to grasp, but precisely the kind of knowlege conducive to implicit faith.

Circular reasoning? Yes. Do we have any other kind?

There we have it: the mysteries of the universe solved in a single blog post!

posted by Lynn @ 7:31 AM