On the rational dimension of Christian faith

The faith of a Christian - but this applies more or less to other religions as well - has three dimensions:

Rational - concerning, assumptions about ultimate Reality, to be believed on the basis of scriptural (or historical) narratives and philosophical (metaphysical) considerations; compare with axioms in eg mathematics that are assumed (in order to study their consequences), not proved;

Moral- concerning recommended or prescribed ways to live and act (or not to act, ie prohibitions);

Aesthetic- concerning rituals, liturgical forms, artistic expression or other works of art inspired by faith.

In the first dimension one strives for “truth”, in the second for “goodness”, in the third for “beauty”. (Compare with the “Socratic trinity” or “Platonic triad”, the true, the good and the beautiful). Personal religious experience (eg in the sense of William James), including mystical, is a state of mind related to all three dimensions but somehow beyond them.

Here I shall be concerned only with the first dimension, ie what - or more precisely HOW - a contemporary educated Christian believes.

The famous Zen saying:

before you study Zen, mountains are mountains and rivers are rivers; while you are studying Zen, mountains are no longer mountains and rivers are no longer rivers; but once you have had enlightenment, mountains are once again mountains and rivers again rivers

can be given a Christian meaning as:

before you study philosophy (of science and of religion), the concepts and propositions of your Christian beliefs have absolute validity; while you are studying philosophy (of science and of religion), you become critical about these concepts and propositions, they loose their validity for you; but once you have had enlightenment through philosophy (and Grace, a Christian would add), they regain their validity at a higher, more sophisticated level.

Of course, in this claim the crucial point - one might say the bone of contention - is the meaning of “higher, more sophisticated level”. This meaning has a strong subjective factor, depending on the cultural determinants, personal education and philosophical sophistication of the believer (or unbeliever).

Some of these concepts and propositions might “survive” only as symbols, metaphors, models etc, of (transcendent) Reality expressed in a form comprehensible (to humans) at times and places when and where they were written (revealed). Others have a significance of their own and are accepted by the philosophically sophisticated believer simply on their face value.

Like a piece of paper, on which I write “$100”, is only a symbol of the monetary value, whereas a banknote issued by the Reserve Bank of Australia, that also carries thisinscription, has an actual value, the face value of the note. The basic difference between the two is not visible to natural science, eg is not given by the chemical composition of the two notes. And, let me add, there would be no practical difference between the two notes fora Robinson Crusoeliving outside “civilised”society.

This interpretation of the Zen saying, applied to Christian faith, reminds one of what the French philosopher Paul Ricoeur calls the passage from First (pre-critical), to Second (post-critical), Naiveté. He calls the intermediate state of one’s mind “the desert of criticism” that an educated believer has to cross to reach the intellectually more rewarding stage of the Second Naiveté. Only a few succeed (cf What is the Second Naiveté? by Linards Jansons):

For some, there is no further stage, for having perished in the desert of criticism, faith has come to an end. For others, the response is to beat a hasty retreat out of the desert; or, having gazed upon its arid terrain from afar, guard its entrance lest any hapless sheep wander into it and join the bones of liberal scholars littering its landscape. Still others concede that the insights of criticism are very interesting at a professional level, even while nurturing the pre-critical oasis of their personal faith. Alternatively, some assert that because the things of God are inaccessible to the sinful mind, the desert is nothing but a mirage, a hazy reflection of fallen reason. Yet another reaction could be described as meta-critical, seeking to expose the inconsistencies and dead ends of the critical spirit, especially when critical methodology assumes the exalted status of a critical ideology.

Each one of these impediments to a successful crossing of the desert has probably its own psychological explanation - dependent on personal experience, education, cultural, environment,  historical background, etc - which I am not going into.

To cross the desert successfully means to decide to one’s intellectual satisfaction which of the concepts and propositions of the First Naivetésurvive only as symbols, metaphors, analogies, etc,  and which the believer accepts as valid on their face value (cf the above metaphor with the $100 notes).  What survives only as a symbol, and what the believer accepts as a value (or information) on its own, is a personal decision (where the other two dimensions of faith play a role). In particular, one should not seek confirmation (or refutation) of such decision in natural science. Those who successfully cross will still need to keep on looking back at the intellectually unsophisticated (literal?) stage of their First Naiveté, in order to keep their faith spiritually and culturally anchored. Of course, for an educated adult convert this hindsight has only an indirect significance since there are no personal recollections. Finally, the successful should be aware that theirs does not have to be the only path through the desert leading to this Second Naivetéstage of one’s mind.

The basic assumption for such success is the theist assumption (cf my "The theist-atheist encounter"), ie belief in God who communicates with His creation, including each individual person. The acceptance of this basic assumption is different from the acceptance of the social usefulness of religion, in particular Christianity, that recently even Richard Dawkins seems to admit. Similarly eg Marcelo Gleiser. However, an atheist or agnostic talking about religion is like a blind physicist talking about colour: he/she might know more about the subject matter than the average person but will neither be able to experience colour,  nor fully understand its impact on a sighted person’s perception of (physical in this case) reality.

Of course, there are “philosophically inclined” and “disinclined” individuals on both sides of the theist/atheist divide. Nevertheless, I would argue that faith in Something that transcends humanity (be it God or a psychological substitute) is needed for the proper functioning and survival of a civilisation. In the same sense that (pure) mathematics is needed for the proper “functioning” of our understanding of physics. However, personal faith on its own - as intellectually and spiritually satisfying as it might be - WITHOUT a communitarian context (ie religion, organised or not, as a social phenomenon) is as little sufficient for this proper functioning of a society, as are purely mathematical models of physical reality WITHOUT supporting observations and predictions for a proper understanding of physical reality. This - the social function of religion - is more related to the other two dimensions of faith or religion mentioned at the beginning.