“The fact that many people in the Western world go through their whole lives without witnessing a miraculous healing or other intervention of the supernatural is perhaps more a testimony to what the Western worldview will allow a person to see or experience than a testimony to the illusionary nature of the supernatural.” — deSilva, Introduction to the New Testament, p. 372
Previous to this quotation, taken from a long sidebar in a Foundations in the New Testament textbook, the commentator points out that Western scientific methodology is “a child of the Enlightenment,” whose rigorous intellectual and scientific approach to all fields of study has a “dogmatic antisupernatural bias.”
Our Western worldview — the way we think, communicate, study — has its foundations in the revival of ancient Greek and Roman philosophy during the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment produced the scientific method, and out of that grew all the advances in technology that we take for granted today.
The problem is, the scientific method has become essentially the religion of modern society. Empirical reasoning is expected of everyone everywhere at all times. And it has been force-applied to subjects that are not empirical in nature: history, psychology, music, and theology for example. The methodology simply doesn’t match the subject matter.
Post-Enlightenment theologians have nonetheless made a valiant attempt to translate the faith into terms the culture can understand. They have stressed logic and reason in approaching the things of God. The teachings of Calvin in particular are rigorously logical and intellectual, no wonder considering his training as a lawyer. Centuries’ worth of sermons from Reformed theologians are brilliant monuments of intellectual achievement. The problem is you can’t prove the existence of God or the object of any faith using the scientific method. It’s like trying to measure an earthquake with a thermometer.
We in the 21st century are like the people in Jesus’ hometown who had too much in the way of factual information about Jesus and couldn’t see the forest for the trees: “When the Sabbath came, he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were amazed. ”Where did this man get these things?” they asked. “What’s this wisdom that has been given him, that he even does miracles! Isn’t this the carpenter? Isn’t this Mary’s son and the brother of James, Joseph, Judas and Simon? Aren’t his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him.
Jesus said to them, “Only in his hometown, among his relatives and in his own house is a prophet without honor.” He could not do any miracles there, except lay his hands on a few sick people and heal them. And he was amazed at their lack of faith.”
There are times when intellectual knowledge gets in the way of faith. There are times when familiarity breeds contempt. There are times when we need to stop worshipping our mental capacities and see them for what they are: tiny and insignificant in the context of the universe, a mere wisp on the wind that disappears in the blink of an eye.
I think there is something within human beings that craves more than just what can be observed and experimented on. I think this is a large part of what the Emerging Church is trying to get at. It comes as no surprise to me that recent years have seen a resurgence in interest in the mystical, in primitive religions, and (within the Christian faith) in sacramental worship and experiences such as Taize. All of these things deal with the supernatural, and all these things open the door to the supernatural.
The supernatural is real, and miracles do happen — every day. Careful, though — the supernatural world is not a playground any more than the natural world is. Take the Bible with you as a road map and guide when you go. But don’t miss the journey.
[...] hywshannon: [...]
There are times when intellectual knowledge gets in the way of faith. There are times when familiarity breeds contempt. There are times when we need to stop worshipping our mental capacities and see them for what they are: tiny and insignificant in the context of the universe, a mere wisp on the wind that disappears in the blink of an eye.
That paragraph, and in particular the first sentence, is perhaps one of the most frightening things I’ve ever seen someone write.
Interesting. Why?
‘There are times when intellectual knowledge gets in the way of faith’.
Er…you don’t see anything wrong here? This is the kind of thinking that leads to cults and people desiring the apocalypse.
Or did you only mean your variety of faith?
Wrong? No. Needing further explanation, perhaps. I think some people think more highly of reason than they do God. And I think faith in God, and the ability to accept the supernatural, is impossible by reason alone. I think maybe that’s why the people who watched Jesus grow up found it so hard to accept His miracles — they thought they “knew” Him. Knowing God takes more than just reason… the same way knowing another person takes more than just reason.
I’m certainly not promoting anti-intellectualism, if that’s what you’re getting at. Far from it. Engaging the mind with God’s word protects people from heresies within the church as well as cults without, and that was the meaning of my last paragraph: “take the Bible with you as a roadmap and guide.”
So what variety of faith do you follow?
I don’t; I’m an atheist (or secular humanist if you want a more comprehensive answer).
I’m quite glad that some people think more highly of reason than they do of the idea of God. A better creed than the one you replied might be ‘intellectual knowledge should always come before faith’.
“Intellectual knowledge should always come before faith”… I think I could buy that about 95% of the time, yeah. I’ve heard of a few people who came to faith without thinking about it but those are rare cases.
As an educator I value good solid use of the mind, and I’m opposed to any religion that encourages people to turn their brains off and follow blindly. I’d even agree that reason should be higher than the idea of God, just not greater than the reality of God.
Where I find the purely intellectual lacking is in the areas of intuition, miracles (quiet ones that is, not the showy nonsense on TV) or in talking about sources of things like mystery, awe, wonder, or joy. There’s knowledge beyond what the intellect knows.
How do you know?
That’s a deep question! Without digging into Descartes, who was brilliant, tho in the end even what he taught needs to be taken on faith… I can only speak from my own experience which is not unique though the way I describe it may be a little off the beaten path.
Knowledge-beyond-intellect is rooted in what I call for lack of a better term “intuition.” By that I mean a flash of insight that arrives in the mind fully-formed and with a certainty of truthfulness that is… a little unsettling. I think others have called it “inspiration”. It’s something one could not have deduced logically but which, once received, can be tested and verified by the usual intellectual processes of investigation and observation.
Here’s a quotation from Einstein that expresses the concept better than I can. He’s talking about physics but the same is true of theology: “The supreme task of the physicist is to arrive at those universal elementary laws from which the cosmos can be built up by pure deduction. There is no logical path to these laws; only intuition, resting on sympathetic understanding of experience, can reach them. In this methodological uncertainty, one might suppose that there were any number of possible systems of theoretical physics all equally well justified; and this opinion is no doubt correct, theoretically. But the development of physics has shown that at any given moment, out of all conceivable constructions, a single one has always proved itself decidedly superior to all the rest.”
Does this make any sense?
No, it doesn’t. I don’t see how intuition is any more ‘beyond intellect’ than any other type of knowledge. The fact that intuitions can have a ‘certainty of truthfulness’ says nothing about their source, and I’ve had many, many intuitions that I was absolutely certain of at first, but which later proved to be wrong.
The only reason an intuition feels like a flash of knowledge from some mysterious source is that you’re not consciously aware of yourself coming to a conclusion. Whereas normally you step throug a chain of reasoning consciously to work out a problem, with a ‘flash of intution/inspiration’ the answer seems to pop fully formed into your head. This doesn’t mean that it actually does come fully-formed from nowhere, just that you’re not aware that you’ve been thinking it through for a while.
I don’t see how what you’re talking about constitutes ‘knowledge beyond intellect’.
I don’t see how intuition is any more ‘beyond intellect’ than any other type of knowledge.
Because it bypasses rational processes. Compared to ‘proofs’ in geometry for example, intuition is knowledge that bypasses the need for step-by-step reasoning and proceeds immediately to a conclusion… from which one can then work backwards with reason to see how the thing actually works. Faith is one more step beyond intuition but on the same wavelength.
The only reason an intuition feels like a flash of knowledge from some mysterious source is that you’re not consciously aware of yourself coming to a conclusion.
That’s one possible explanation. Are you willing to consider others?
During my travels today I heard the following statements (one from a believer and one from an atheist) :
“There is no such thing as coincidence.”
“Faith and reason are the shoes on your feet. You can travel further with both than you can with just one.”
Thoughts?
I’d be more inclined to say that reason is a running shoe while faith is a lead weight – you *could* walk with both on, but if you really want to get going you’ll have to ditch one.
Guess which?
Interesting it’s the atheist’s words you’re taking issue with. Any thoughts on the other quotation?
BTW just wanted to say that I’m not the type to bash people upside the head with the Bible. You’re welcome to hang out, look around, jump in where you like. I expect my visitors here to be courteous to others, including those with dissenting opinions. It goes without saying I hope you’ll discover something of the faith too, because I like sharing a good thing, but it’s not a requirement for participation.
Peace,
Peg
‘There’s no such thing as coincidence’ is one of those quotes that sounds deep but isn’t. It’s also impossible to prove, but overall I’m banking on there being such a thing as coincidence.
Something being impossible to prove doesn’t necessarily make it untrue. If someone says “I love you” for example… it’s impossible to prove but can still be very true, and evidence for it can be gathered with the passage of time.
The key phrase being ‘evidence for it can be gathered with the assage of time’.
Can you do the same for the idea that there are no coincidences?
Actually I’m not 100% convinced there are no such thing as coincidences. The other day my classmate and I were wearing the same exact sweater which is interesting considering our differences in tastes. I wouldn’t claim any causality for it tho, I think it was just pure coincidence.
I would probably go along with saying “there are no coincidences where anything of significance is involved”.
Everyday example: My car is significant (to me anyway). Its existence was caused at least in part by Detroit. Rust is also significant, caused by (among other things) road salt and rainwater. Both these things combined to cause me to purchase a different car, which in turn was an event of significance to at least one lending institution and an insurance company and the people who work there. Ripples come in — car, rust, next car, I need to work more — ripples go out — bank, bankers, insurance, agents, and eventually food on the tables of strangers. I don’t see any coincidences here, everything can be explained in terms of causality. I can’t think of anything significant in life that doesn’t have a cause.
In some people’s views, everything that happens for a reason; but here ‘reason’ means ‘a physical chain of events’. If you hit one snooker ball into another, the second will move at just such an angle and just such a speed for a very definite reason.
That doesn’t mean that something doesn’t happen coincidentally. By ‘coincidentally’ I mean ‘without some sort of higher purpose or cause’; if I was to meet someone in odd circumstances and fall in love with them tomorrow, I wouldn’t assume that I was put into those circumstances just to meet that person and fall in love; I would see it as a lucky coincidence, not as something that was ’set up’ for a higher purpose. That’s what I mean by coincidence.
By ‘coincidentally’ I mean ‘without some sort of higher purpose or cause’; if I was to meet someone in odd circumstances and fall in love with them tomorrow, I wouldn’t assume that I was put into those circumstances just to meet that person and fall in love; I would see it as a lucky coincidence, not as something that was ’set up’ for a higher purpose. That’s what I mean by coincidence.
Interesting. Even without a higher power I woudn’t take something like what you describe as coincidence. (Fun, yes! Coincidence, no.) If one were to take a detailed, bird’s-eye look at the historical lives of both people, combined with their respective psychologies, sociologies, and motivated abilities, the trajectories that caused the first meeting would become almost inevitable. Perhaps not in that exact spot or moment, but inevitable at some point. And the falling-in-love part can be explained by the sciences of biology and chemistry.
As a believer I would be more likely to say “God made us for each other” rather than “God brought us together” but that’s beside the point of the argument. I think. At the same time I wouldn’t deny God had a hand in the meeting, because I believe He works through the everyday in ways we don’t even comprehend, and towards goals that we don’t see.
Well, that’s where our opinions differ. I’m with you as far as the meeting being almost inevitable, in that if you could know every factor involved you could probably say with a good degree of accuracy whether those two people will meet and fall in love, but obviously I don’t add God to the equation.
I can understand where you’re coming from and the thought process certainly makes sense.
I find determinism rather depressing though. There are lots of philosophers and even Christian theologians — ancient and modern — that buy into determinism, but I don’t. I think there’s got to be something more to human life than just a tabula rasa and a bunch of environmental influences. If there isn’t, then what is there in life that has any meaning? Why is life a good thing?