This essay was full of great insights! At the start of my journey toward truth, I came to realize that many people would rather have confidence than truth. Confidence is much like hypocrisy, in that it is what vice pays to virtue. The hypocrite acknowledges the value of virtue by seeking its appearance, without its essence.
I tend to see my faith more as means of giving me the correct set of questions, rather than a correct set of answers. Although, I find some very compelling answers in it as well.
> If I had to pick one out of “truth” and “goodness,” I’d pick the latter. But I find that reaching for the good inevitably pulls the truth back in
This really resonated with me. I don’t know enough to say confidently, but it sounds similar to what I’ve heard from (Neo)Platonists about the Platonic transcendentals, ie truth, beauty, and goodness are unified in the Good.
I’m uncomfortable with taking this literally/metaphysically, though I admit it might be because I haven’t really understood the idea. But at a personal (mystical) level, I’ve had similar experiences of one of these qualities pulling another back in
>I used to think I wasn’t spiritual at all, but now I think it’s just that any spirituality that asks me to start with “take these things on faith” or “don’t worry about whether this is really true” is going to lose me.<
You do take something on faith, though; you take it on faith that right and wrong are valid concepts with real meaning to them, not mere figments of our imagination. If I pose to you that this is false, that morality is a fiction, and that the actions of a remorseless child murderer are no more or less right or wrong than anything you've done in your life, you cannot refute my claim. The best that you can do is to continue living *as if* morality is a real thing, without worrying too much about "whether this is really true."
So I don't think it's accurate to say you cannot take things on faith or live without worrying about whether something is really true. Human beings must do these things by the nature of our existence; we cannot not do them. It would be more accurate to say that you are stingy with your faith and reserve it only for yourself, refusing to offer it up to anyone or anything else; thus the common criticism that rather than truly pursuing truth to the exclusion of all else (which would require one to abandon all pretenses regarding right and wrong), you have merely set yourself up as God, claiming yourself as the source of truth rather than any external source.
A thought-provoking challenge! Thank you for that.
I am, certainly, stingy with my faith. Specifically, I am stingy with it because I find it to be morally suspect. If one must do something potentially bad, then it makes sense to try to limit the extent of it.
However, I don’t think it makes sense to accuse me of setting myself up as God, just because I try to follow my own best, if imperfect, judgment. As I note in my piece, everyone has to do this to some extent. Indeed, I would claim that we all do it to the same extent. We all have no choice but to choose what path to follow at any given moment. Accepting the command of some other person or framework is still, ultimately, choosing for yourself, because you choose to accept the command.
I certainly would not set up my own best judgment as the true standard that everyone else has to follow. Indeed, I must concede that my working model supposes that there is some standard beyond myself that I am trying to satisfy; thus far, I do indeed employ a sort of limited faith that nevertheless permits itself to be questioned. I find limited faith to be less morally suspect than anything bigger.
>Accepting the command of some other person or framework is still, ultimately, choosing for yourself, because you choose to accept the command.<
Quite true. To me, the distinction that makes all the difference is here; the difference between truly treating oneself as God vs accepting that truth lies both outside of oneself and beyond our limited capabilities of perception, and that the best we humans can do is to try our best to approximate it, knowing full well that we will often fall short.
>Indeed, I must concede that my working model supposes that there is some standard beyond myself that I am trying to satisfy; thus far, I do indeed employ a sort of limited faith that nevertheless permits itself to be questioned.<
Yes, because we can never arrive at a full understanding of the truth with our current limitations, we always remain open to re-interpretation when and if new information becomes available or circumstances change. However, the core tenet of faith--that there is *a truth*, singular, that we are always aiming towards, even if our understanding of it is never complete--always remains unchanged underneath.
This essay was full of great insights! At the start of my journey toward truth, I came to realize that many people would rather have confidence than truth. Confidence is much like hypocrisy, in that it is what vice pays to virtue. The hypocrite acknowledges the value of virtue by seeking its appearance, without its essence.
I tend to see my faith more as means of giving me the correct set of questions, rather than a correct set of answers. Although, I find some very compelling answers in it as well.
> If I had to pick one out of “truth” and “goodness,” I’d pick the latter. But I find that reaching for the good inevitably pulls the truth back in
This really resonated with me. I don’t know enough to say confidently, but it sounds similar to what I’ve heard from (Neo)Platonists about the Platonic transcendentals, ie truth, beauty, and goodness are unified in the Good.
I’m uncomfortable with taking this literally/metaphysically, though I admit it might be because I haven’t really understood the idea. But at a personal (mystical) level, I’ve had similar experiences of one of these qualities pulling another back in
>I used to think I wasn’t spiritual at all, but now I think it’s just that any spirituality that asks me to start with “take these things on faith” or “don’t worry about whether this is really true” is going to lose me.<
You do take something on faith, though; you take it on faith that right and wrong are valid concepts with real meaning to them, not mere figments of our imagination. If I pose to you that this is false, that morality is a fiction, and that the actions of a remorseless child murderer are no more or less right or wrong than anything you've done in your life, you cannot refute my claim. The best that you can do is to continue living *as if* morality is a real thing, without worrying too much about "whether this is really true."
So I don't think it's accurate to say you cannot take things on faith or live without worrying about whether something is really true. Human beings must do these things by the nature of our existence; we cannot not do them. It would be more accurate to say that you are stingy with your faith and reserve it only for yourself, refusing to offer it up to anyone or anything else; thus the common criticism that rather than truly pursuing truth to the exclusion of all else (which would require one to abandon all pretenses regarding right and wrong), you have merely set yourself up as God, claiming yourself as the source of truth rather than any external source.
A thought-provoking challenge! Thank you for that.
I am, certainly, stingy with my faith. Specifically, I am stingy with it because I find it to be morally suspect. If one must do something potentially bad, then it makes sense to try to limit the extent of it.
However, I don’t think it makes sense to accuse me of setting myself up as God, just because I try to follow my own best, if imperfect, judgment. As I note in my piece, everyone has to do this to some extent. Indeed, I would claim that we all do it to the same extent. We all have no choice but to choose what path to follow at any given moment. Accepting the command of some other person or framework is still, ultimately, choosing for yourself, because you choose to accept the command.
I certainly would not set up my own best judgment as the true standard that everyone else has to follow. Indeed, I must concede that my working model supposes that there is some standard beyond myself that I am trying to satisfy; thus far, I do indeed employ a sort of limited faith that nevertheless permits itself to be questioned. I find limited faith to be less morally suspect than anything bigger.
>Accepting the command of some other person or framework is still, ultimately, choosing for yourself, because you choose to accept the command.<
Quite true. To me, the distinction that makes all the difference is here; the difference between truly treating oneself as God vs accepting that truth lies both outside of oneself and beyond our limited capabilities of perception, and that the best we humans can do is to try our best to approximate it, knowing full well that we will often fall short.
>Indeed, I must concede that my working model supposes that there is some standard beyond myself that I am trying to satisfy; thus far, I do indeed employ a sort of limited faith that nevertheless permits itself to be questioned.<
Yes, because we can never arrive at a full understanding of the truth with our current limitations, we always remain open to re-interpretation when and if new information becomes available or circumstances change. However, the core tenet of faith--that there is *a truth*, singular, that we are always aiming towards, even if our understanding of it is never complete--always remains unchanged underneath.