"Faith"

[David Sklansky]

The interesting argument has been made that God purposely allows the evidence for his existence to be somewhat flimsy. He presumably wants us to believe in him but not because there can be no doubt. Why he would need that I don't understand but that is another subject.

But I have two problems with the idea that God wants us to believe in him on the basis of the combination of flimsy evidence plus faith. One is that the evidence was not flimsy four hundred years ago. There was no way of knowing then that sciecnce would eventually explain and do things that it seemed then required a god. so it didn't take as much faith then to believe.

My second problem occurs when this faith argument extends to a specific religion. If there was only one religion it might make sense for God to want to test people's faith. Believe or not. Show some faith. But with a dozen religions out there, all requiring faith in their particular brand, how can a human being be expected to choose? At random? He can't just use faith, because that gives him no guidance. The only alternative is to look at the evidence to see which religion is most plausible. But that contradicts the idea that faith should play a major part. It (evidence) also clearly is not how most people choose a religion since the vast majority go with the one they were born into.

[Mayhap]

Ira Progroff, an American and disciple of Carl Jung, served in WWII in Germany. He learned of the book burnings there and knew that many of the books burned were bibles and other religious books. He wondered, 'what if all the religious books in the world were burned?'.
What would happen to religions? There would be no Bibles or Korans or Sutras to lean on. Well, the answer is that man would have to reach into himself and find the answers. He would have to create inspirational texts anew. He would have to become the prophet. In a sense, man would then really find God. He would find God in his own creativity.

/M

[whiskeytown]

not a chance. - History has shown that humanity everywhere has sought the supernatural - cultures cut off for hundreds of years still came up with the concept of the supernatural and created deities to worship/fear.

Man would not look inside himself to find god if all religious scriptures were burned. He would merely write/create new external ones - to suggest otherwise is to deny several thousand years of history and human behavior. Oh sure, some do what you suggest right now anyways, but to say all would....no way.

RB

[Mayhap]

[ QUOTE ]


Man would not look inside himself to find god if all religious scriptures were burned. He would merely write/create new external ones

[/ QUOTE ]

That man would write/create new external ones is what I'm postulating. And would be the dynamic for those creative acts?
Would it be an interview with his uncle Joe or Aunt Sally? Would it be listening to tree bark sing? No, it would be looking inside himself and tapping his creativity. Further, this is where man finds God.
Jung, Einstein and many others have talked about this point of view: All is mind; all is consciousness.

I believe we are in agreement. I think you just missed my point.

When you look at human history and all the creative acts on the part of individuals, you see the hand of God. When you look at human history and see all the destructive acts born of religious dogmatism, you see man mistaking his own will for God's will, hence, you see evil.

We have reached a point in human evolution where religious dogmatism must be transcended. Conflicts between various creeds must be resolved. There is a cancer in the body of humanity when it wars against itself. The healing process is unfolded through dialogue. It's exciting to see this process unfolding on the internet.

I like this forum.

/M

[FredJones888]

lI think you are right on the money. What you are describing is actually happenining to some extent without the books being taken away. People are increasingly creating their own religions. Even what is called "christianity" in today's world is really diverse. Two people could both consider themselves devout christians and yet believe things that are totally contradictory.

I think what sklansky is getting at is "why should we just rely on faith?".

I think the answer is that we shouldn't. I think that we have a logical capacity in our brains for a reason. However, most people have some natural tendency to what some would term "illogical" thought patterns. I think we also have this illogical capacity for a reason, it is not a defect, it is an intentional design feature.

AI research has shown that human brains and current computer designs have absolutely nothing in common.
By relying totally on logic for your entire existence, you are intentionally limiting yourself to being no better than a machine, and a slow machine at that ( even if you are a genius you are slower at math than a 486 processor ). Ironically, great mathematicians often are highly intuitive people; not very machine like.

So, what I'm saying is that we must use our entire brains, not just logic, and not just faith. Atheism is for the pure logic people and fundamentalism is for the pure faith people. I'm not saying I know it all, but I'm pretty sure both of those groups are wrong.

[Scotch78]

[ QUOTE ]
Ira Progroff, an American and disciple of Carl Jung, served in WWII in Germany. He learned of the book burnings there and knew that many of the books burned were bibles and other religious books. He wondered, 'what if all the religious books in the world were burned?'.
What would happen to religions? There would be no Bibles or Korans or Sutras to lean on. Well, the answer is that man would have to reach into himself and find the answers. He would have to create inspirational texts anew. He would have to become the prophet. In a sense, man would then really find God. He would find God in his own creativity.

[/ QUOTE ]

Do you remember what text/essay this originally appeared in? I'd be interested to read his full thoughts on the matter.

Scott

[RJT]

I agree that the test of one’s faith seems to be much harder in post Age of Enlightenment.

I don’t really believe that God condemns those who have never heard of Him or Jesus (referencing your other post, regarding the Jesus question.). I don’t even believe that God tests the unbeliever so much as the believer. And I certainly don’t believe that God condemns true believer in one religion and rejects those who believe another. Contrary to what most think (and I could be wrong here, but fairly sure I am correct) most Christian Faiths no longer believe that you ain’t getting to heaven if you have never heard of Jesus.

I have greater admiration for those who have searched various religions and then find belief in a chosen one. Not to discount the true believer born into his/her religion. One problem I have in the test of my faith is much of the baggage carried by being born and educated in it. How much of my belief is tradition and how much is true belief? There was a post in your other thread asking how shaken you would be if probability didn’t really exist. This hit me pretty hard after I thought about it. It seems that I would be more shaken by that than by your question if Jesus wasn’t God. That really got me thinking how little faith I might really have. Well, at least, let me put it this way: It was a barometer of my faith. And was I wasn’t too pleased with my personal barometric pressure.

Personally, I took the route (when I began my adult discernment of my faith) of reading philosophers. That left me well short of any real answers. Then I went to the Bible and much of the history of the Christian Faith. Read a bit of the more esoteric writings, etc. Eventually, one simply has to take a “leap of faith” or not.

I never delved into other religions - I figure if Christianity isn’t it, then I’ll pass on the others. Right now I would say I am tight/passive striving to achieve tight/aggressive status in my faith.


On a lighter note. Is it a coincidence that Hunter S. Thompson just died and you seem to be having a question of God’s existence? Perhaps he is trying to tell you something. Or did he just will you his stash?

[andyfox]

You might be right that one should at least entertain the possibility of god's existence, but the evidence for the creation of God by man, rather than the other way around, is devastatingly overwhelming, the large number of religions being part of that evidence. Faith is merely a way for the particular religion's apologists to explain away
the flimsiness of their case.

Wouldn't God know that his most intelligent creation would eventually figure out that he was a crock?

[PoBoy321]

[ QUOTE ]
But I have two problems with the idea that God wants us to believe in him on the basis of the combination of flimsy evidence plus faith.

[/ QUOTE ]

This is a flawed assumption. If you assume that God wants us to find him, rather than simply believe in him, then this problem should become clearer.

Your first point about the necessity of faith four hundred years ago because of a lack of science, doesn't mean that the presence of science today necessarily destroys the notion of faith. There are still many events in which faith that a higher power exists is almost necessary. For example, a few billion years ago, the Earth was nothing but trace elements. Out of those trace elements, life emerged. Science has proven that this happened, but that does not mean that this explains HOW it happened. I'm certainly not trying to make an argument for creationism, but it's like finding a turtle on top of a fence post. You see the turtle on top of the fence post. It obviously didn't get up there itself, but you have no evidence that anyone picked it up and put it there. Stil, you assume that there was some force that put it there.

A terrific analogy that I think would help clear up your second problem is that religions are all trying to climb the same mountain and starting from different base camps. If you assume that religions are just different ways of achieving the same goal, it should be obvious that different religions are not in opposition of each other, but rather parallel to each other, so picking a particular religion is merely a matter of preference (at least from God's viewpoint).

[David Sklansky]

A terrific analogy that I think would help clear up your second problem is that religions are all trying to climb the same mountain and starting from different base camps. If you assume that religions are just different ways of achieving the same goal, it should be obvious that different religions are not in opposition of each other, but rather parallel to each other, so picking a particular religion is merely a matter of preference (at least from God's viewpoint)."

That's a nice answer. But Felson wouldn't like it. Which is all that really matters to me.