By Allen Koop (Visiting Professor of History)
January 13, 2005
I believe I know what I'm going to say today, but I'm not sure. But, after thinking it over, now I know. Those two sentences give a preview of what I'm going to say about faith and skepticism, what they have to say to each other. I'll probably talk more about faith, which lasts longer, even eternally, while skepticism needs to be relatively brief, leading to faith of one kind or another.
In the context of this worship service I'll speak of faith and skepticism, not in terms of schools of philosophy but in a religious context, and in that sense I understand faith and skepticism to be about believing and doubting, and now that I've changed our topic nouns into participles, I'll go all the way to verbs: to believe and to doubt. This takes me to one of my losing linguistic/cultural crusades, the struggle against those who insist on changing transitive verbs into intransitive verbs. Every time a well-meaning waitress brings me my meal and then pleasantly enjoins me to "enjoy!", I'm tempted to respond in a professorial curmudgeonly way, "Enjoy is a transitive verb; it requires an object. You can't say just "enjoy", you need to say "enjoy something". Similarly, relevant to our topic, you can't say "just believe" or "just doubt". You must believe something, or must doubt something. Although these two terms have an aura of uncertainty about them, they are really all about certainty.
Faith is not what little girl said one day in Sunday School, "Faith is believing something you know isn't true." The scriptural concept of faith is, as the author of Hebrews writes, "Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the certainty of things not seen." Faith, in Biblical terms, is all about evidence and conviction. It is about the link between the past and the future. And it has an element of personal commitment, either to the chair in which you intend to sit, the spouse to whom you are married, the God who calls you to faith.
The message about Jesus was always tied to evidence. The early Christians realized the message that Jesus died to forgive sins and rose from the dead to assure eternal life to those who believed was, admittedly, an unusual message, easily doubted. So that is why the early Christians, knowing that doubt could lead to belief or to denial, presented corroborating evidence: Paul linking the resurrection to many eyewitnesses, and later telling King Agrippa that "these things were not done in a corner", Peter reminding his readers that "We did not follow cleverly devised myths when we made known to you the power and coming or our Lord Jesus Christ."
Skepticism, doubt, or not believing, is more like an interval than a state of being, which faith can be. This assertion may not win instant assent in an academic environment that applauds permanent doubt as a necessary part of intellectual investigation. In our seemingly rational post-Enlightenment world, there are those who claim the ability and even responsibility to doubt all things, always to be skeptical, to maintain skepticism as a world view. But I maintain that is an impossible position, at least in terms of religious belief or doubt. To doubt something requires you to be certain of something else, to have faith in something else. So doubt must always lead to the denial or reaffirmation of the assertion –or person-- doubted. In other words, skepticism needs to lead forward to new faith or back to an old faith. While I believe one can live a life of faith, I don't believe one can make a career out of skepticism. I don't think you can hold it long enough even to write a paper from a position of skepticism. Or I should say that my faith in that statement comes from the evidence of seeing many students try.
In most of my history courses I require my students to write a summary final paper from a particular ideological/philosophic perspective. Usually each term a student will say he wants to try a paper from the position of skepticism. I usually say, "Well I'm skeptical of your ability to do that, but give it a try." The thoughtful students come back in a few days, saying they can't be skeptical about everything. (Some try anyway to make a case for skepticism, but to discuss those essays would lead me into the uncomfortable subject of grade inflation.) In other words, the only reason you can doubt something is because you are certain of something else, at least at that time. We can change that in which we believe, but we cannot live forever in skepticism. To be skeptical about something is to believe in something else. Religious skepticism stems from religious belief. The secular skeptic is really a believer in the religion of secularism.
We live in an age and intellectual climate that prides itself on skepticism, not being credulous, not being gullible, on being able to see through things.
But, there needs to be a limit on seeing through things. CS Lewis wrote that the whole point of seeing through something is to see something else. The point of seeing through a window is to see the garden beyond. If you claim to see through everything, everything is transparent, and therefore invisible, so if you claim to see through everything you'll see nothing.
Faith does have an element of uncertainty, but that comes from our inability to understand or apprehend completely the object of our faith, in this context, God.
People often talk of strong and weak faith, or, strong or weak doubt. But the real issue is not the strength of faith, but the strength of the object of faith. My first rock climbing experience was as a foolish 12 year old with strong faith in a very weak clothesline. Much better my later attempts even with weak faith in a strong climbing rope.
As a Christian endeavoring to have others share and enjoy the faith in Jesus that I feel blessed to have, I've come to think that much of the so-called skeptical intellectual opposition to Christian faith is not as much intellectual as it is merely willful. At least that was and is the source of many of my doubts. For example, I find that my so-called doubts about some parts of the Scripture stem not so much from my not understanding what is written as my not liking it, my realizing that if what the Bible says is true I need to stop doing or thinking something that I know is wrong but still want to do, or I should do something I know is right and don't want to do. Skepticism can be a comfortable place to hang out. But not forever.
But doubt is always part of faith, or at least way to it. One of the most compelling statements in the Bible about faith, one with which even the most faithful can identify is the cry of the man whose child Jesus healed, "Lord I believe, help my unbelief."
How often I have said that. But then I remember a wise man once telling me to doubt my doubts. Jesus and Thomas illustrate the best use of skepticism and faith, as in a few paragraphs in the gospel of John we see the greatest transition from doubt to faith. Thomas, known as the greatest doubter, was transformed into the greatest believer, as the gospel narrative portrays the one who doubted, presented with the evidence, then offering the greatest of all professions of faith. Thomas said he would not believe without evidence. Jesus showed himself to Thomas and said, "Do not doubt, but believe," Thomas answered him, "My Lord and my God."
Thomas was led to doubt his doubts, and then believed.
Something that's happened to me many times.
[quotation from S. Vanauken A Severe Mercy, pp. 98-99]
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