If you’re wondering what the title of this post means, it’s a pithy introduction to the skeptical bias of our Enlightenment drenched post modern secular culture. I bet you’ve never heard the phrase, “leap of doubt.” No. But if I start with “leap of . . . ” how would, oh, about 100% of people finish the phrase? Leap of . . . faith, of course! Why don’t doubts take leaps, and faiths do? Why are honest doubt and blind faith common terms in our culture? Good questions.
The answer is, because doubt is the default epistemological position in our age, and doubt is assumed to somehow be virtuous, while faith is akin to weakness. When there isn’t enough evidence or logical justification for something, then we’re told that’s where faith comes in. That is obviously not true. Faith is simply trust based on adequate evidence, and required for all human existence because our knowledge and certainty can never be absolute. This was driven home to me when I recently read a dense little book by Leslie Newbigin called, Proper Confidence: Faith, Doubt, and Certainty in Christian Discipleship, and where I first came across the seemingly counter intuitive phrases in the title.
In the book Newbigin makes the common sense assertion that faith always takes primacy over doubt because we can do absolutely nothing without faith. He identifies the cause of the current reign of skepticism, correctly, in 17th century French philosopher Renese Descartes, whose search for absolute certainty started with skepticism: We must doubt everything except the one thing we can’t doubt, our own existence. Thus, cogito ergo sum, I think therefore I am. In response to this epistemological disaster bequeathed to us by Descartes, Newbigin writes (p. 24,25):
[T]he fashion of thought which gives priority to doubt over faith in the whole adventure of knowing is absurd. Both faith and doubt are necessary elements in this adventure. One does not learn anything except by believing something, and—conversely—if one doubts everything one learns nothing. On the other hand, believing everything uncritically is the road to disaster. The faculty of doubt is essential. But . . . rational doubt always rests on faith and not vice versa. The relation between the two cannot be reversed. Knowing always begins with the opening of our minds and our senses to the great reality which is around us and which sustains us, and it always depends on this from beginning to end. The capacity to doubt, to question what seems obvious, is a necessary element in our effort to know reality as it is, but its role is derivative and secondary. Rational doubt depends on faith; rational faith does not depend on doubt.
Doubt is an inescapable and essential part of knowing, but it is not, and cannot be the default position, which as Newbigin says is absurd. Nobody actually lives this way, or could. If we doubted everything all the time we couldn’t get up in the morning! Faith, or believing things without absolute certainty or knowledge, is a requirement for daily life. In fact, we can only doubt what we first believe.
Fortunately, what we need to know to function in the real world is readily available, so having “honest faith” is rarely a leap. The cynic is the one who insists on “blind doubt” because he closes his eyes to all the reasons around him that makes his faith believable and rational. It’s no different when it comes to metaphysical issues or religion. It is the same human beings who approach the larger questions of life’s meaning, who also approach everyday life. Think about what you do every day, and what you don’t know with absolute certainty. You eat (is it safe?), go to the doctor (does he know what he’s doing?), fly on an airplane (will it crash?), drive in a car (will the other cars stay in their lanes, or stop at the red light?), and so on. Our daily lives are drenched in faith! Honest faith.
When it comes to Christianity, our faith is every bit as reasonable as is our daily faith that it takes to get along in the world. We believe that Christianity is true because there are rational, logical, historical, archaeological, psychological, etc., reasons to do so. If there were not, I would be the last person to believe it! And I hope the same would be true for you. Up to this point, no other religion (including atheism) offers anything close, and not by a million miles.
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