Freely Think and Freely Believe : A Reflection

Sylvie Queval

 

Translation Louise Thunin

 

To think and to believe are two verbs that we often consider as opposites.

To think supposes that we use our reason, our intellect. A thinker – Rodin’s sculpture, Le penseur, is the best image of that – is seen as someone questioning, reflecting, doubting, weighing arguments. In fact the verb « to think » is more or less a twin to the verb « to weigh »; in French, penser, think, and peser, ponder, have the same Latin root. Thinking involves comparing reasons for or against diverse opinions before concluding favorably about one or the other, and sometimes giving up concluding altogether, since the arguments balance one another out.

To believe, on the other hand, means agreeing to an opinion or an idea without asking for an explanation and sometimes even refusing one. A simple « I believe you » avoids debate and reflection. The believer grants authority to the person he believes, grants him his faith, grants credence.

Everything apparently concurs to demonstrate that these two mental actions, thinking and believing, are opposites. Everyday language often uses one verb for the other and many « I think thats » are only « I believe thats ». However, with a minimum of analysis, we can re-establish the difference between them.

It becomes significant to take as our byword the adverb that hitches together these two apparently contradictory verbs : « freely ».

« To think freely » is redundant, because a non-free thought would no longer be a thought. A non-free thought would be like a fixed scale whose beam leans systematically to one side. The product of a non-free thought is called a prejudice and it is against prejudice that thought works. The philosopher, Alain (1868-1951) said,  « The function of thinking cannot be delegated. » He meant that no one can think in my place. If, indeed, someone hinted to me that I should think this or that, I wouldn’t be thinking but believing.

Belief therefore appears to be a mere by-product of thought, a lazy person’s solution that dispenses with thought. Believing would save us the trouble of thinking. So what can a free belief be ? And how can free thought and free belief co-exist ?

 

Belief vs. Reason ?

 

When we read Paul’s first Epistle to the Corinthians, we are tempted to consider that faith and reason are unreconcilable. Paul’s words to this effect resound within us : «I will destroy the wisdom of the wise (…) Has God not made foolish the wisdom of the world ? » These verses have been used as a justification by all those who radically set faith against reason.  Thus, Pascal (1623-1662) states : «  It is the heart that knows God, not reason. This is faith : God can be apprehended by our hearts, not our minds. »

Two separate realms are established here, that of science, where thinking freely is a rule, and that of religion, where reason must humble itself, according to Pascal. Think or believe : we have to choose.

However, a passage in the Gospel of Mark (Mk. 12 : 28-34) opens up a way to reconciliation. A scribe asks Jesus what the greatest commandment is, and in reply, the latter quotes Deuteronomy 6 : 4-5, but with a small addition. He declares : You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart (kardia), with all your soul (psuchê) and with all your mind (dianoia) and with all your strength (ischus). » Three of these terms repeat the text of Deuteronomy, the heart designating the center of will and decision-making, the soul representing our vital energy and dynamism (force) which is strength. The interest lies in the addition of the fourth term, dianoia. This Greek word refers to reflection, called discursive thought, because its conclusions are reached after having been mediated by successive argumentation.

What Jesus presents as the first commandment is to love God intelligently, in a well-thought-out manner, using one’s reason, and not merely from a spontaneous movement of the heart.

In order to understand this call to a well-considered faith, one has to measure the distance between gullibility and credibility. Gullibility leads us to believe without thinking. It is an open door to superstition of all sorts. It swallows everything, even the most incredible. Gullibility accepts a literal reading of miracles, of a virgin who gives birth, of Jesus walking on water, multiplying bread. It doesn’t look for interpretation or meaning.

On the contrary, well-thought-out faith and a love of God guided by dianoia

seek the meaning of mythical or parabolic scripture ; they appeal to intelligence and accept only what is credible.

 

Believing is not Knowing

 

         However, rejecting a head-on opposition between faith and reason is not the same as refusing to see their differences. Going from one extreme (the radical opposition of the two terms) to another (confusing the two) will not solve anything.

Speaking of a well-thought-out faith is not the same as confusing the two separate realms of science and religion. There is a scientific use of thought which owes nothing to religion. Science seeks to know the « how » of things, it seeks the laws of the universe and how the work. Religion asks the « why » and the « what for » of things. It states values and seeks out meaning. We don’t have to prefer one to the other ; humanity needs both these fields.

Pointing out differences does not grant intelligence to one realm and leave the other in irrationality and obscurantism. What we need is to distinguish the two uses of reason, which is proper to man.

Free Faith, Free Thought

 

The intelligent faith which our magazine claims as its own is the only one that can, today (or so we believe) reply to the atheist’s objections – he who mocks silly beliefs and worse yet, scandalous ones.

Thus, belief in an omnipotent God leads directly to the concept of a cruel and unjust God, even is a sadist, to a God who abandons the weak and those of his creatures who are left to suffer the worst atrocities. In order to call oneself a Christian, is it necessary to adopt a two-thousand-year-old creed without asking in what context it was composed, in what cultural universe it appeared, and if its words still have meaning today ? We are killing Christianity if we keep it frozen in its ancient expression.

The liberty to think and to believe, that the magazine Evangile et liberté claims, stands in this right that we grant ourselves to question ancient certainties by putting them back in context and by demonstrating their relativity. Each period of time must invent its own way of expressing its faith ; one and the same conviction can be expressed in many ways. Thus, in order to say that the Gospel message did not die with Jesus, a generation used the symbolic language of the resurrection. Jesus died, but his word continues to live in the hearts of those who followed him and listened to him. The free use of our thought processes free us from the belief in a nether world and lead us to a free faith that signifies trust in the force of life.

The idea of associating thinking and believing is not new. History gives us many examples of thinkers who were also believers (Thomas of Aquinas, Averroès and others), but the risk remains the same. They spoke their faith in the language of their time, with the concepts of their time. Then their thought systems were constructed into dogma by some, who froze them as such. This threatens all thought, and we must struggle against the temptation to turn thought into stone, to turn outdated discourse into intemporal truth.

The third term of our byword, « freely », takes on its full importance here : it is in the name of freedom that we can bring together thought and faith which seemed unreconcilable.

 

 

 

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