Faith and rationality are two ideologies that
exist in varying degrees of conflict or compatibility.
Rationality is based on reason or facts. Faith
is belief in inspiration, revelation, or authority.
The word faith sometimes refers to a belief
that is held with lack of reason or evidence,
a belief that is held in spite of or against
reason or evidence, or it can refer to belief
based upon a degree of evidential warrant.
Although the words faith and belief are sometimes
erroneously conflated and used as synonyms,
faith properly refers to a particular type
(or subset) of belief, as defined above.
Broadly speaking, there are two categories
of views regarding the relationship between
faith and rationality:
Rationalism holds that truth should be determined
by reason and factual analysis, rather than
faith, dogma, tradition or religious teaching.
Fideism holds that faith is necessary, and
that beliefs may be held without any evidence
or reason and even in conflict with evidence
and reason.The Catholic Church also has taught
that true faith and correct reason can and
must work together, and, viewed properly,
can never be in conflict with one another,
as both have their origin in God, as stated
in the Papal encyclical letter issued by Pope
John Paul II, Fides et Ratio ("[On] Faith
and Reason").
== Relationship between faith and reason ==
From at least the days of the Greek Philosophers,
the relationship between faith and reason
has been hotly debated. Plato argued that
knowledge is simply memory of the eternal.
Aristotle set down rules by which knowledge
could be discovered by reason.
Rationalists point out that many people hold
irrational beliefs, for many reasons. There
may be evolutionary causes for irrational
beliefs — irrational beliefs may increase
our ability to survive and reproduce. Or,
according to Pascal's Wager, it may be to
our advantage to have faith, because faith
may promise infinite rewards, while the rewards
of reason are seen by many as finite. One
more reason for irrational beliefs can perhaps
be explained by operant conditioning. For
example, in one study by B. F. Skinner in
1948, pigeons were awarded grain at regular
time intervals regardless of their behaviour.
The result was that each of pigeons developed
their own idiosyncratic response which had
become associated with the consequence of
receiving grain.Believers in faith — for
example those who believe salvation is possible
through faith alone — frequently suggest
that everyone holds beliefs arrived at by
faith, not reason. The belief that the universe
is a sensible place and that our minds allow
us to arrive at correct conclusions about
it, is a belief we hold through faith. Rationalists
contend that this is arrived at because they
have observed the world being consistent and
sensible, not because they have faith that
it is.
Beliefs held "by faith" may be seen existing
in a number of relationships to rationality:
Faith as underlying rationality: In this view,
all human knowledge and reason is seen as
dependent on faith: faith in our senses, faith
in our reason, faith in our memories, and
faith in the accounts of events we receive
from others. Accordingly, faith is seen as
essential to and inseparable from rationality.
According to René Descartes, rationality
is built first upon the realization of the
absolute truth "I think therefore I am", which
requires no faith. All other rationalizations
are built outward from this realization, and
are subject to falsification at any time with
the arrival of new evidence.
Faith as addressing issues beyond the scope
of rationality: In this view, faith is seen
as covering issues that science and rationality
are inherently incapable of addressing, but
that are nevertheless entirely real. Accordingly,
faith is seen as complementing rationality,
by providing answers to questions that would
otherwise be unanswerable.
Faith as contradicting rationality: In this
view, faith is seen as those views that one
holds despite evidence and reason to the contrary.
Accordingly, faith is seen as pernicious with
respect to rationality, as it interferes with
our ability to think, and inversely rationality
is seen as the enemy of faith by interfering
with our beliefs.
Faith and reason as essential together: This
is the Catholic view that faith without reason
leads to superstition, while reason without
faith leads to nihilism and relativism.
Faith as based on warrant: In this view some
degree of evidence provides warrant for faith.
"To explain great things by small."
== Views of the Roman Catholic Church ==
St. Thomas Aquinas, the most important doctor
of the Catholic Church, was the first to write
a full treatment of the relationship, differences,
and similarities between faith—an intellectual
assent—and reason, predominately in his
Summa Theologica, De Veritate, and Summa contra
Gentiles.The Council of Trent's catechism—the
Roman Catechism, written during the Catholic
Church's Counter-Reformation to combat Protestantism
and Martin Luther's antimetaphysical tendencies.Dei
Filius was a dogmatic constitution of the
First Vatican Council on the Roman Catholic
faith. It was adopted unanimously on 24 April
1870 and was influenced by the philosophical
conceptions of Johann Baptist Franzelin, who
had written a great deal on the topic of faith
and rationality.Because the Roman Catholic
Church does not disparage reason, but rather
affirms its veracity and utility, there have
been many Catholic scientists over the ages.
Twentieth-century Thomist philosopher Étienne
Gilson wrote about faith and reason in his
1922 book Le Thomisme. His contemporary Jacques
Maritain wrote about it in his The Degrees
of Knowledge.Fides et Ratio is an encyclical
promulgated by Pope John Paul II on 14 September
1998. It deals with the relationship between
faith and reason.
Pope Benedict XVI's 12 September 2006 Regensburg
Lecture was about faith and reason.
== Lutheran epistemology ==
Some have asserted that Martin Luther taught
that faith and reason were antithetical in
the sense that questions of faith could not
be illuminated by reason. Contemporary Lutheran
scholarship however has found a different
reality in Luther. Luther rather seeks to
separate faith and reason in order to honor
the separate spheres of knowledge that each
understand. Bernhard Lohse for example has
demonstrated in his classic work "Fides Und
Ratio" that Luther ultimately sought to put
the two together. More recently Hans-Peter
Großhans has demonstrated that Luther's work
on Bibilical Criticism stresses the need for
external coherence in right exegetical method.
This means that for Luther it is more important
that the Bible be reasonable according to
the reality outside of the scriptures than
that the Bible make sense to itself, that
it has internal coherence. The right tool
for understanding the world outside of the
Bible for Luther is none other than Reason
which for Luther denoted science, philosophy,
history and empirical observation. Here a
differing picture is presented of a Luther
who deeply valued both faith and reason, and
held them in dialectical partnership. Luther's
concern thus in separating them is honoring
their different epistemological spheres.
== Reformed epistemology ==
=== Faith as underlying rationality ===
The view that faith underlies all rationality
holds that rationality is dependent on faith
for its coherence. Under this view, there
is no way to comprehensively prove that we
are actually seeing what we appear to be seeing,
that what we remember actually happened, or
that the laws of logic and mathematics are
actually real. Instead, all beliefs depend
for their coherence on faith in our senses,
memory, and reason, because the foundations
of rationalism cannot be proven by evidence
or reason. Rationally, you can not prove anything
you see is real, but you can prove that you
yourself are real, and rationalist belief
would be that you can believe that the world
is consistent until something demonstrates
inconsistency. This differs from faith based
belief, where you believe that your world
view is consistent no matter what inconsistencies
the world has with your beliefs.
=== Rationalist point of view ===
In this view, there are many beliefs that
are held by faith alone, that rational thought
would force the mind to reject. As an example,
many people believe in the Biblical story
of Noah's flood: that the entire Earth was
covered by water for forty days. But objected
that most plants cannot survive being covered
by water for that length of time, a boat of
that magnitude could not have been built by
wood, and there would be no way for two of
every animal to survive on that ship and migrate
back to their place of origin. (such as penguins),
Although Christian apologists offer answers
to these and such issues, under the premise
that such responses are insufficient, then
one must choose between accepting the story
on faith and rejecting reason, or rejecting
the story by reason and thus rejecting faith.
Within the rationalist point of view, there
remains the possibility of multiple rational
explanations. For example, considering the
biblical story of Noah's flood, one making
rational determinations about the probability
of the events does so via interpretation of
modern evidence. Two observers of the story
may provide different plausible explanations
for the life of plants, construction of the
boat, species living at the time, and migration
following the flood. Some see this as meaning
that a person is not strictly bound to choose
between faith and reason.
== Evangelical views ==
American biblical scholar Archibald Thomas
Robertson stated that the Greek word pistis
used for faith in the New Testament (over
two hundred forty times), and rendered "assurance"
in Acts 17:31 (KJV), is "an old verb to furnish,
used regularly by Demosthenes for bringing
forward evidence." Likewise Tom Price (Oxford
Centre for Christian Apologetics) affirms
that when the New Testament talks about faith
positively it only uses words derived from
the Greek root [pistis] which means "to be
persuaded."In contrast to faith meaning blind
trust, in the absence of evidence, even in
the teeth of evidence, Alister McGrath quotes
Oxford Anglican theologian W. H. Griffith-Thomas,
(1861-1924), who states faith is "not blind,
but intelligent" and "commences with the conviction
of the mind based on adequate evidence...",
which McGrath sees as "a good and reliable
definition, synthesizing the core elements
of the characteristic Christian understanding
of faith."Alvin Plantinga upholds that faith
may be the result of evidence testifying to
the reliability of the source of truth claims,
but although it may involve this, he sees
faith as being the result of hearing the truth
of the gospel with the internal persuasion
by the Holy Spirit moving and enabling him
to believe. "Christian belief is produced
in the believer by the internal instigation
of the Holy Spirit, endorsing the teachings
of Scripture, which is itself divinely inspired
by the Holy Spirit. The result of the work
of the Holy Spirit is faith."
== Jewish philosophy ==
The 14th Century Jewish philosopher Levi ben
Gerson tried to reconcile faith and reason.
He wrote, "The Torah cannot prevent us from
considering to be true that which our reason
urges us to believe." His contemporary Hasdai
ben Abraham Crescas argued the contrary view,
that reason is weak and faith strong, and
that only through faith can we discover the
fundamental truth that God is love, that through
faith alone can we endure the suffering that
is the common lot of God's chosen people.
== See also ==
== References ==
== External links ==
=== Apologetics and philosophical justifications
of faith as rational ===
FaithandReason.org—nondenominational website
advocating that faith and reason can work
together (D.L. Dykes, Jr. Foundation).
Should Faith Be Based On Reason? Jehovah's
Witnesses' view of how faith is dependent
on reason.
Faith and Reason! A coverage of the ongoing
debate that tends to show that Faith and Reason
both have their valuable places whilst suggesting
that The New Atheism has a blinkered view.
=== Neutral critiques and analysis ===
Lecture on The Rationality of Religious Belief
Contemporary Christian Philosophy, University
of Texas
Are Christian Beliefs Properly Basic? A critical
examination of Alvin Plantinga's claim that
Christian beliefs can be justified even without
any evidence for them by Keith DeRose, Professor
of Philosophy, Yale University
Folly of Faith, Folly of Reason Examination
of science fiction writer, Isaac Asimov's
view in "Reason" and discussion of faith and
reason in Asimov's cultural tradition of Judaism
=== Criticisms of the belief that faith is
rational ===
Irrational Faith importanceofphilosophy.com
Irrational Epistemology importanceofphilosophy.com
=== Historical overview ===
Faith and Reason Internet Encyclopedia of
Philosophy
