Certum est

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My learned friend has put before us a definition of faith as the conscious acceptance of a proposition grounded at least in part in emotion or an incomplete body of evidence.

While I must agree that the subset of credence which is faith is NOT conviction based on a concatenation of well-formed syllogisms, I must differ from his assumption that faith involves a decision to accept. I freely acknowledge that many in the broader fold of Christianity indeed emphasize decision, but this no more impacts the prime Christian sense of faith any more than the claim not infrequently made that one can arrive at the primes of Christian theology through reason. Both can be shown to be at the least unscriptural.

And yet it would be misrepresenting the truth to say that decision is not involved.

Many if not all of us in the Abrahamic traditions may - nay, MUST - agree that MEN are not MENS. We are admonished, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind." There are the three foci of the enneagram, emotion, physicality, and intellect - with the addition of the soul. How well we know the eternal internal war among these components of the human. "The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."

I know that Rhonda is selfserving, not of sound mind, and a menace - but I find myself drawn to her physicality, against my better judgement. I know that the route through town is the fasted way home, and I am tired and hungry - but I go through the park bevause the view and the peace refresh me. I really want to tell Mr. Duncan what I think of him and what he can do with his stinking job, but I keep my mouth shut because I have seen the unemployment figures and know the work is the most interesting I have done.

Again and again, one component of my humanity pulls against the others. Not infrequently mind, heart, body pull in three distinct directions, precluding even a coalituion government.

In such cases I - whoever EGO may be, must discern [cerno, ergo sum, vielleicht?], must choose to which pressure to yield, which pull to follow. I elect to ignore the boor Duncan, put the cover on my calculator till tomorrow, drive the winding pasth through the magnolias in the park and ignore the answering machine message from Rhonda.

It is amply demonstrated without even appealing to scripture that all three secular components war against the soul. I believe - help my unbelief. Trust, faith, belief - emotion, intellect and the body rise against Fides constantly. I am drawn to prayer - but I am tired and hungry. I long to commune with God - but Rhonda .... God will show me how I should go - but I want to calculate how long I can last between jobs.

Even ordinary secular faith - trusting I am NOT on the wrong bus - has to struggle. How much greater is the struggle for faith in the eternal! What it takes to obey: to refuse [with gratitude] the offer of transportation, to stare down one's fear of the automatic weapons, to step out into the dark unknown, powerless!

There's a decision for you [we lucked out, or were granted a miracle, but that's another story].

Free will. There is always the choice. God or Mammon, acceptance or rejection, life or death for me and my house.

So yes, Awesome, there is decision - to listen to faith, or to listen to the world, the flesh, and the devil. But you do not decide to HAVE faith. You decide - once it is vouchsafed you - whether to act on it.

First I'd like to say, you write very good. And I hesitate to reply as my writing skills aren't up to that level.
However, if in free will there is always the choice to accept a faith in a deity, why is it assumed faith is already present?
That would make choosing impossible, in essence you're saying people would have to choose to disconnect themselves from a deity.
Something which in most religions is a hefty sin. People are not free to choose in a religious world, because the choice is enforced upon them in fear of eternal pain, and suffering.

Also people who are raised in a household where the parents aren't members of a religion, how do they have faith. If no one learns a child that a god exists, the child won't fear, or even know of it.
This is the same reason why Dawkins's proposition is so effective. If you had been born in north Africa, or the middle east, you'd likely have been a Muslim.
If you're born in Italy there is a high chance of you being a Catholic. Sure one can argue that this is hypothetical, but it demonstrates how a child's environment dictates what god he, or she will adhere to.
As opposed to a universal notion of faith, given by one, or several deities.

Free will is a great value to uphold, but it is also a great lie that's being told over the ages. The only choice one can truly make using something such as free will is an early death.
And even that can be debated ad nauseam. We're driven by biology to eat, else we starve. We're driven by law to obey it, else we suffer. Some are driven by scripture because they value it.
But they uphold it not out of will, but fear for repercussions. The only choice we can make is a cost-benefit equation. "Is breaking this law more beneficial then upholding it?"

Will is circumstantial to the options we have, and how current rules dictate cost, and benefit.

I spent probably an hour and a half the other evening trying to have a theist explain where I might understand the cognitive goings-on involved in believing in the veracity of a concept while simultaneously knowing it is empirically and analytically unevidenced, or even EVIDENCED TO BE FALSE. Having never been a theist, I struggle immensely with the idea that a person can avidly and simultaneously hold two mutually-exclusive beliefs, such as the historical nature of a religious allegory and a concurrence with the theories and laws of modern physics or biology which those allegories defy.

Thought I might mention it, since it would appear to me the discourse on the nature of faith has evolved from denotations to the actual causative mechanisms.

If free will does not exist,
we live with such an infinitely-elaborate illusion of it as to make the distinction somewhat moot, I should think.

Religion is entirely a cultural artifact, Episteme explains this point quite succinctly and it requires little expansion on my part.

As for free will I am inclined to agree with Bethies observations and would extend this logic to many debates of a similar colour.

Here is a little story I once read [I am paraphrasing to convey the key point not quoting verbatim],

An Inuit elder was recieving a priest who had come to convert his people, the priest explained the existence of the one god, sin and how he must change his ways or forever burn in hell [I am sure you can imagine the victorian hellfire and brimestone tone].
Once the priest had finished the elder paused a little while and then with much care asked this question of the priest.
'So priest, you tell me that I must know and love your god, however, I have only now had you explain him to me so I must ask, what would have happened to my soul if I had carried on my current ways and you had never come to share this knowledge which you claim'.
The priest pauses and with a look of joy replies, 'why without this knowledge of god I bring you, you would have died in ignorance and been taken into heaven as an innocent' [some concept along these lines, it is many years since I attended curch or sunday school].
The elder pauses, then looking the priest in the eyes replies, 'so why did you tell me?'

I mean no disrespect when I ask this, your post betrays a certain anxiety, is not your need for religion thaty you sense as being inate and comming from within not merely emotional yearning for some solidity and certainty that the familiar dominant religion of your environment offers?

This is fantastic. Vraiment un embarras de richesses.

Where to start - All are filled with great stuff and I do not mean the gap plugger.

RedHanrahan, I will take you first.

A. That is a truly great story. While it does not accommodate all varieties of Christian theology - I doubt it would pass muster with the Conserrvative Baptists - it is a gem.

B. You say: "I mean no disrespect when I ask this, your post betrays a certain anxiety, is not your need for religion that you sense as being innate and coming from within not merely emotional yearning for some solidity and certainty that the familiar dominant religion of your environment offers?"

I mildly edited your spelling to get nasty critical lines off my screen. Whatever.

I have a history of having others misinterpret my emotive signals, and misreading the emotions of others. Do I need to explain or expatiate to denizens of Wrong Planet? Let me assure you there is no anxiety in there. There is detatched analysis, with some emotional flavor of pleasure that interaction with Awesomely Glorious has again opened up a new undertsanding of pattern and structure.

The familiar dominant religion of my region is Academic Materialistic Liberalism [or perhaps better Liberal Materialism? I am not sure, they do not name it themselves]. Operating within that I had solidity and certainty for years. It is a very clean, sharp belief system, making few demands besides laughing at the right places. Let me assure you, I had no emotional longuing for anything else, and when I slid into Christianity I went kicking and screaming. That is an exaggeration, but I give you my word I was in physical pain not even counting psychic distress for hours.

Arguably - there is evidence supporting the idea - the need for religion is innate. Something has to account for the ubiquitous though not universal drive to identify a Higher Power, and while after all this time would could appeal to spread of an innovative cultural trait I intuitively doubt that. Inheritance - whether of a cultural trait or a genetic complex - seems more probable.

But in any case, my point is rather that the faith in divinity comes from outside. Body, mind, emotions are of this universe. The soul component - like the hydrophilic end of the soap molecule - is in touch with the Outside and the locus of the faith that is my prime concern in the post.

You are next up. And yes, quite. Free will is not merely a prime of most Christian theology, it is also a very basic understanding of the deepest layers of our psyche.

Of course there is a tension - take what you want and pay for it, says God, say the proverb, and if wishes were horses beggars would ride. The freedom to will is not the control of the outcome - and how could it be with billions of saints and idiots and weirdoes and heroes and savants and swine all willing 24 hours a day [I am convinced I will in my dreams]?

And so the guy running the seminar grins energetically and explains you did not will the right way, and the one with the collar says you willed the wrong thing, and your best friend says you did not want it ENOUGH, and the woman in the next cubicle tells you there ain't no sech thing as free will or why is her hair still straight [or curly depending on where and when and who].

But free will is. THAT I believe and maintain - independent of the issue of divine entity acceptance - on the same basis as my belief in my existence. Which despite Descartes' obnoxious qualities and without reference to his thinking I consider a sure thing.

As to your other posting - sounds like a fun conversation. Was he flustered and sweating, or supercool and smiling? I dislike the ones who smile while they are expounding.. Drives me mad.

Be that as it may. I have seen reality from both sides now. Hate that song. Old favorite of my sister's. She smiles while she explains. But I am a Believer and was a materialist academic, I have always been a scientist and have begun exploring issues theological. I have never bought into any theory in its entirety or accepted anything unreservedly and unexamined.

So I do not know what knots he got tied into, or where he was trying to go. But I find most of what I know of mainline physics, chemistry, cosmology coherent and convincing. Some reservations on things like string theory and the Big Bang, which feel to me, after all these years in academia, like shaky structures with a limited shelf life. String theory if real would be very useful to me, but so far as I hear it really is not firmed up yet.

And I find the postulated existence of an actively involved divine first cause coherent and convincing. I have found much of specifically Christian theory fits. Pretty much every popular formulation of Christian theology contains what I see as seriously shaky structures - this is why I am the universal heretic.

The two are not in conflict except where my brother and Pastor Johnny want them to be. No dinosaurs in the bible - big deal. There is nothing that rules it out. No telescope has sighted heaven - big deal. There is nothing that rules it out.

Quantum physics and linguistic taxonomy are both theism neutral sciences. A Jesuit can do either - I am sure both have seen at least ione Jesuit practitioner. A "strident atheist" off WP can do either - I know of strident atheist physicists and I have worked with [admittedly not that strident, because there are no Christians to yell at] atheist linguist. I was one.

Quantum physics and linguistic taxonomy require totally different kinds of data and process them in very different ways. Big deal.

So - Quantum physics and Christian theology require totally diffferebt kindsof dat\, deal with them differently. Big deal.

If biological evolution and string theory do not conflict, why would they conflict with Christology?

This seems more like a theological argument. I am not really that... concerned.

Episteme, saved you for last, not finding you least interesting, but arguably requiring the most thoughtful response.

Thanks for the kind words on my writing. Well read linguist, second generation academic, fomnd of the sound of my own voice. I have no problem with this sample of your writing. Clear enough statement. You should see what I am used to from advanced students.

You ask: However, if in free will there is always the choice to accept a faith in a deity, why is it assumed faith is already present?

Hokay. There are different traditional versions. A may say you cannot possibly believe unless God says you are going to believe, in which case you are forced to believe. B may say you just read the book or listen to the preacher and then decide to believe. C may say something like if you want to believe God makes it possible to believe. Most of this - a lot of standard theology, in fact - is really guesswork, extending an idea beyond where it really works, or saying sometging because it makes God seem bigger. You see it in Linguistics too - I always hated it and objected, making myself unpopular.

I belong to no church and am tied to no formalized theology. You are getting my understanding of it. Anybody thinks I am doctrrinally all wet can chime in later. Needless to say this is neither formal nor complete

The soul is linked one end to this world, on end to outside the bubble where God is based. This end interacts with body-mind-emotion. That end interfaces with God. Thereby we receive inputs from God comparable to messages from the senses. Mostly low intensity, and often we have trouble decoding just as we do with novel sensory inputs. But looking around now and looking back, a lot of thoughts, insights, feelings came out of that contact.

At a particular point in 1986 - a pile of almost unformulasted questions was on me. An impulse came in - NOT from emotion nor body nor intellect. Go read such and such a book, it said. I did. And I was flooded with impulses. My bodily sensations said STOP THIS HURTS. My mind said THIS IS LOGICAL AND CONSISTENT WITH MY EXPERIENCE BUT CONTRARY TO PREVIOUS BELIEF PATTERNS. IMPENDING SHUTDOWN. My emotions said THIS FEELS VERY RIGHT BUT IT IS SCARY AND I DO NOT WANT TO UNDO EVERYTHING AND BELIEVE. My soul said JUST LISTEN. She who was not then but now is my wife said, over the hone, over and over, I KNOW WHAT YOU ARE GOING THROUGH, IT IS GOING TO BE ALL RIGHT.

So I have free will, the power to decide which to listen to - to act on emotion, on faith, on reaction, on reason. What did I do? I said "THIS IS TOO MUCH, I AM GOING TO BED." Which I did. When I woke up none of the four was yelling, I was out of emotional and sensory overload, and there was no real conflict between my reasoning mind and my soul's received faith.

I could have decided no. Actually, I decided no several times over the years. I could decide no again tomorrow. Likely won't.

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You said: "People are not free to choose in a religious world, because the choice is enforced upon them in fear of eternal pain, and suffering."

In a society with a dogma-heavy politically active religion, or in an academic institution with a dogma-heavy politically active discipline, or in a country with a dominant dogma-heavy party, you are free to choose but there may be consequences if you are seen to choose the wrong thing. God is not into dogma - though some who follow him and many who claim to follow him are. If you vote to let the schools teach Darwinianism, if you take communion in a protestant church, if you go to a tea-party rally, if you make love to the Dean's wife, if you plagiarize a paper on gay marriage - well, I don't say those make you a good person, but the only hell that will buy you is the hell of listening to your priest or your brother or your boss or your neighbour TELLING you you are going to hell. Who elected them God so they could damn you? You are asking me? Free will - you MAY go to hell if that is what you prefer.

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You say again - and this is complex:

Also people who are raised ... where the parents aren't members of a religion, how do they have faith. If no one learns a child that a god exists, the child won't fear, or even know of it.... If you had been born in north Africa, or the middle east, you'd likely have been a Muslim...If you're born in Italy there is a high chance of you being a Catholic.

I was raised with a second generation seriously atheist father and a mother who maintained she wass Christian but never visibly acted on it nor explained it nor spoke of what it had to do with her or us or anything, She made us go to church for a while, which I at least did not understand, and gave me no clues. I was not without religion though, from books and my environment I learned Academic Liberal Atheism. And yes, that is a religion, with a belief system and formulaic speech and ritual actions, demanding loyalty and assent to dogma.

AND yet here I am. If the soul has one end in what we may call heaven, we are not limited by our terrestrial environment. You can live in Nepal and watch the evening news from New York.

As for the maybe Muslim Maybe Catholic Maybe Buddhist point - not all theologies agree, but C S Lewis concurs with me on this. God is one. God makes himself available. So you wear your beard like a Sikh or you bow towards Mecca like a Muslim or you cross yourself like a Catholic or none of the above. If the soul has one end in heaven, and if you listen to it, and if you seek to know and understand the divine entity whatever practices you practice ands whatever name you use, God WILL let you know who and what he is sdo you can make an informed choice, heaven = being with God or hell = staying as far away from that swine God as possible.

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In the end - I will not quote you at this point - you go off on there is no free will because it is all about the consrquences. The proverb says, I restate, TAKE what you want, and pay for it, says God.

You ARE free to will = want = desire, you are free to choose = decide. You do NOT control the outcome.

I choose to levitate to the dark side of the moon [love that album, but it is hard]. NOTHING stops me from wanting or deciding it. Nothing happens - that is not what will is about.

I choose to drive my 18-wheeler through the gate, over the Secret Service and impact Mr. Obama. NOTHING stops me from wanting or deciding it. If the truck starts, and there are no roadblocks, and I have momentum to smash the gate, and my aim is right, maybe I will even accomplish my goal. It is not as hard as levitating to the moon. But there WILL be consequences. Pay for it, says God. There is no such thing as a free lunch - that is not what will is about.

It is up to us to examine the facts, check the odds, count the cost, and decide go / no go. Then, decide - take what you want, says God.

LOL. Glorious is NOT amused.

\
A. I am not arguing.

B. I did not read anyone else's inputs as arguing, which is why I huzzahed at the chance to have a real discussion.

C. If you do not feel like talking about theology, I don't feel like talking economics or lit crit. No cause for ... concern.

I think "seems more like a theological argument" had been placed there as a distraction out of concern over the fact is was/is not!


I would say the "choice" there amounts to having an option to place (or to develop, to have and to hold) "faith in a deity" if or when we might ever so choose, and our inherent need to actually do that, once recognized, known and acknowledged, here underlies all.

@ Philologos

Points taken, my appologies if my grammar and spelling fail to confoem, I am self educated for the most part and use NZ english which is closer to UK english than US english, we use the letter 'u' in words like armour or labour etc..

I take your point, as an agnostic I do not deny the desire to answer the so called 'mysteries' and do not deny this seemingly native urge. However I think the form of solution one opts for tends to be culturally based and driven for the most part or perhaps it would be better to say defined for the most part by the balance of and intensity of emotional and intellectual factors.

My appologies too if my interpretation of your clinical observation of your own reasoning process was wrong, perhaps it says more about my own neurosis'

peace j

redhanrahan -

I am 15 m,inutes away from heading off to sleep, but did not want to leave you unresponded.

Not to worry about spelling or style. I have taught American undergraduates fot years - nuff said. My brother in law - a former English teacher - is one of the world's most hopeless spellers. For that matter, I have dealt with Kiwi talk, mostly in Britain but also through the auspices of Flight of the Conchords.

I would say that there is undeniably a cultural flavoring which comes up in various ways - theologically comparable churches in Toronto and Rome are quite different. But if I and a pile of past and present others correctly identify a divine entity who crosses ethnic boundaries, then the Sikh and the Suffi will be drawn through different woods by different paths to the same point. If you look, you will see that certain texts from Baptists, from Lutherans, from Hassidim, from Russian Orthodox, from the Church of the East, from Sufis, from Zen Buddhists - and I do not doubt from others I have not looked at - are describing much the same things and enunciating much the same principles.

As to misreading in emotion - not to worry happens all the time and I do it to others as much as they do it to me.

Good night - actually, more likely afternoon by you.