Faith and Doubt

Faith is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian. One of the surprising aspects of Christianity is that faith is so important that it appears to outweigh other things such as ethics or knowledge. Faith seems to be so crucial that God demands it above all things; ironically it seems to be something about which we can do nothing. One either believes (so the thought goes) or does not. A person is either convinced or not. Choice does not enter into the matter.

A big part of the problem people have understanding faith is that they have misconceptions about what it is. Many people have an abstract conception of faith as assenting to a certain set of propositions. If instead we see faith through relational lenses, we find it is more adequately defined as “personal trust.”

The Bible tells us in Genesis 15 that “He [Abraham] believed Yahweh, and he [Yahweh] viewed him as righteous.” Here we have the formation of a relationship. God (Yahweh) offers Abraham a promise, and Abraham trusts it. On that basis God gives him standing. The extent of that standing can be seen in the famous “bargaining session” in Genesis 18, where God finds himself unable to hide his plans from Abraham. God sees Abraham in such a positive light that he consults him before acting, and allows Abraham to bargain for concessions about the conditions under which the plan will be executed.

There is an interesting duality between “faith” and “science” that may shed light on the nature of faith. Science in its ideal form can be defined as “Seeking knowledge through the systematic application of doubt.” The scientist crafts a hypothesis and then tests it to see if it can be refuted by experimental evidence. A hypothesis is valuable if it is both explanatory and testable. One that cannot be refuted by any conceivable experiment is considered unscientific.

Thus science proceeds toward knowledge by systematic doubting; that which survives this doubting process becomes more credible. Absolute certainty is never achieved — there is always “room for doubt” — but many minds examining a hypothesis over time will give the hypothesis more weight, assuming it is not refuted in the process. Any hypothesis can, in theory, be refuted by counterexample. A million crows may be black, but the hypothesis that all crows are black can still be refuted by a single albino crow.

Of course this idealized view of science doesn’t exactly match human reality. Often a hypothesis will be patched and re-patched until it outlives its credibility and is finally discarded. People have a conservative streak that makes it hard to throw out everything that has come before no matter how compelling the new thing may be. Nevertheless, in theory any scientific hypothesis, no matter how well established, can be overturned by a single appropriate counterexample.

Faith, on the other hand, can be defined as “Seeking knowledge through systematic application of trust.” Rather than doubting a hypothesis, faith believes it even when visible evidence does not completely support it. Augustine famously put it like this: credo ut intelligam — “I believe in order to understand.”

Of course someone can say that this is a recipe for self-delusion. The point of skepticism is to establish an objectivity that frees you from personal preference or wishful thinking. Since we are so adept at fooling ourselves, we should be wary of trust; we should question it and subject it to the stern test of reason and evidence.

Note that I am not arguing for a “two spheres” approach, one where science has its appropriate sphere, the material, and religion its appropriate sphere, the non-material or spiritual. I’m actually saying that all knowledge is based on trust. For the simple fact is that the scientific method itself trusts that reality is knowable by the skeptical method. A number of people, including Albert Einstein, have said how inexplicable it is that the world should be understandable. There is a wonderful article by Eugene Wigner called The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences (this can be found on-line through Google) that discusses this point. It begins with the following anecdote:

There is a story about two friends, who were classmates in high school, talking about their jobs. One of them became a statistician and was working on population trends. He showed a reprint to his former classmate. The reprint started, as usual, with the Gaussian distribution and the statistician explained to his former classmate the meaning of the symbols for the actual population, for the average population, and so on. His classmate was a bit incredulous and was not quite sure whether the statistician was pulling his leg. “How can you know that?” was his query. “And what is this symbol here?” “Oh,” said the statistician, “this is pi.” “What is that?” “The ratio of the circumference of the circle to its diameter.” “Well, now you are pushing your joke too far,” said the classmate, “surely the population has nothing to do with the circumference of the circle.”

The point is that our knowledge of material reality is based on the ability to create abstractions of physical reality that exist in our minds, and to create absurdly long chains of thought from these abstractions. We then find that the results correspond to physical reality with amazing accuracy. But we cannot say why this should be. We must simply trust the process. And thus we are led back to the idea that trust is at the heart of things.

If the observation that the spiritual is known by trust is true, this suggests that the spiritual realm, the realm of the personal, is more ultimate than the material, since even our material understanding must involve trust. Of course my use of the word “suggests” implies that I have not actually proved anything; I have just given a piece of evidence that may incline our thoughts in a certain direction. The “way of faith” bleeds over into “the way of doubt” and becomes a necessary aspect of the operation of the latter.

I suggest instead that the Bible gives a better, more concrete view of this process: “Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ” (Romans 10:17).

I have already mentioned my intent to see faith through relational lenses. The above formula shows how a purely relational process can lead from unbelief to belief — a process that respects and even depends on the response of the whole person who hears the word.

First, we note that this description of the way to faith is based on the word of God. Words are the currency of relationships. Relationships depend on mutual self-revelation and those revelations are generally mediated through words.

The way to faith begins with the word of God. This word is God himself. When God speaks, he speaks himself and gives himself to be known. This is an aspect of what John meant when he said, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). Notice, however, that this word is only fully spoken in Jesus the Christ, who said, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no man comes to the Father but by me” (John 14:6). If, as the book of Hebrews says, Jesus is the final full revelation of God, then the word that God speaks is a word of Good News, of promise, of forgiveness and eternal life, for the simple reason that Jesus spoke words to that effect and validated them on the Cross and through his Resurrection.

This word is a gracious word, since in speaking it God takes the initiative and invites relationship. Words truly spoken open up possibilities. Apart from the true word of God there can be no relationship with God. But because Jesus has spoken a good word of reconciliation to us while we were alienated from God, relationship with God becomes possible.

But only possible. Because “faith comes by hearing.” The word of God does not directly enable faith; it only makes hearing possible. And we note that Jesus repeatedly asked people to hear: “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

Hearing is the step of choice that makes the word audible. One notes that throughout the Bible God calls people to “hear.” The Old Testament word mostly translated “obey” actually means “hear.” God’s concern has always been that people “hear his voice.” Jeremiah 7:23, for example, says

But this command I gave them: Obey [literally “hear”] my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.

Obviously the term “hear” does not mean “hear and ignore.” God wants to speak into the lives of people for their good. Nevertheless, his word is always an offer. He does not coerce as he invites us to be one of his chosen.

In the Jeremiah passage, we are told that “… they did not listen to me or incline their ear, but stiffened their neck…” (Jeremiah 7:24). Their rejection of relationship with God is characterized as a refusal to receive his word.

In other words, the moment when a relationship with God becomes possible is the moment when one chooses to hear his word. The specific act of trust is brought about by the power of God’s word acting upon the heart of the one who has chosen to hear it.