'Scripture to which one surrenders... uncritically, leads... to indistinguishability between faith and superstition'
E. Kasemann
This is true, at least, in some cases: I open the Bible one day in a random page hoping to find an answer to an important question and happen to find a text that (apparently) answers it. Is this God answering my question or is it me trying to make sense of some words I have just read? And leaving that question aside for a moment, what kind of God will I end up believing in if it becomes a habit to open the Bible at random every time I need some answer to my questions?
Two questions worth thinking about...
13/08/2008
01/08/2008
Reasonable faith
'Reason conceives only of such an unknown within itself that it can conceive by means of itself'
Kierkegaard
I take this to mean that reason, by its own definition, can only ever be reasonable to itself; reason cannot 'transcend itself' to conceive of a superiority outside its own means. The unknown is reason's own inaccessible exteriority, the absurd, at which it must stop short. It seems that for Kierkegaard there is no reasonable basis for faith - faith is absurd. Faith is in this sense baseless, a chasm, a leap into the unknown. And this idea of faith as necessarily opposed to reason appears again and again in many Christian churches today.
Although I don't defend the view that reason can explain everything, I don't agree with this either. If God exists at all it is clear that he must be mysterious to a big extent (and probably beyond understanding). However the biblical faith seems to be based on some kind of evidence, be that the testimony of those witnesses who experienced the first things that happened when Jesus was alive, or the later experiences that the people who heard the gospel had. Paul's constant testimony to the people around him is based on the assumption that they can test whether what he is saying is true or not in their own lives, and his arguments often stand or fall depending on whether those tests hold. I think reason is involved in this process of testing and I think that still applies today.
Kierkegaard
I take this to mean that reason, by its own definition, can only ever be reasonable to itself; reason cannot 'transcend itself' to conceive of a superiority outside its own means. The unknown is reason's own inaccessible exteriority, the absurd, at which it must stop short. It seems that for Kierkegaard there is no reasonable basis for faith - faith is absurd. Faith is in this sense baseless, a chasm, a leap into the unknown. And this idea of faith as necessarily opposed to reason appears again and again in many Christian churches today.
Although I don't defend the view that reason can explain everything, I don't agree with this either. If God exists at all it is clear that he must be mysterious to a big extent (and probably beyond understanding). However the biblical faith seems to be based on some kind of evidence, be that the testimony of those witnesses who experienced the first things that happened when Jesus was alive, or the later experiences that the people who heard the gospel had. Paul's constant testimony to the people around him is based on the assumption that they can test whether what he is saying is true or not in their own lives, and his arguments often stand or fall depending on whether those tests hold. I think reason is involved in this process of testing and I think that still applies today.
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