Davis and Franks make the distinction between belief in and belief that, a distinction which I hope to show is a faulty one. Here is the quote:
"First, Willimon misunderstands the relation between belief that and belief in. You can’t rightly believe in (i.e., trust, put your faith in) someone unless you believe that they exist. You have to believe certain objective truths about Jesus; otherwise you can’t be his disciple. As the writer of Hebrews says, “anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him” (Heb 11:6). So there’s at least two propositions you have to believe before you can put your trust in Christ. Indeed, it isn’t rational to give your life to someone who either isn’t really there (i.e., lacks objective existence) or is the product of your imagination (i.e., has subjective existence alone). Belief that (i.e., assent to objective truth) is a precondition for belief in."It is my view that the distinction between "belief that" and "belief in" is a faulty one that grows out of a very particular view of salvation as formulated by popular American Evangelicalism. Typical of this version of evangelicalism is the assumption that we are confronted with the truth of Christ and what he has done for us, and from the realization "that" he has done this, we are encouraged to make the move to have belief "in" this truth. We are confronted with the undeniable truth of God as Christ, and from this are expected to make the decision of how to respond to it, ideally of course, making Jesus Lord of one's life.
Is this really how the belief process works? Can there be other ways of formulating this? Is the move from "belief that" to "belief in" a necessary one?
I think not.
Book one of Augustine's Confessions begins with an interesting observation, and I quote,
"Grant me, Lord, to know and understand which is first: to call on You or to praise You? And, again, to know You or to call on You? Who can call on You, not knowing You? For he that does not know You may call on You as something other than You are. Or, is it rather that we call on You that we may know You (emphasis added)?"Augustine here I think is suggesting a reversal of the "belief that " to "belief in" paradigm. Rather than our functional "belief in" Jesus as Lord flowing from our knowledge of him as such, we first confess it to be true, praying in faith of that truth and eventually come to know the truth of it. The move is one from "belief in" to "belief that".
It seems that on an everyday level of lived reality, this is how we come to know the truth of Christ. We confess a truth in faith, regardless of our level of epistemic certainty, and through the confession of it, and living with that confession, we come to know the veracity of the claim that we confess. By living in and through the confession of faith, we are either convinced of the truth of that confession or are disappointed and must move beyond that particular confession.
Therefore, I think it is safe to say that Christian belief does not move from the "that" to the "in" as a necessary condition, but can, and in fact often does move from the practice of "belief in" to "belief that".
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ReplyDeleteWhoops.
DeleteHi Ryan,
ReplyDeleteI think that the issue at hand is not whether there is an epistemic move from "belief that" to "belief in" (or vice versa); rather, I think that the issue at hand is whether "belief in" logically requires "belief that." The issue isn't one of cognitive process, but of logical status. The cognitive process you describe (and which Augustine seems to describe in your italics) is typical of forming a hypothesis (or tentative belief) and then testing that hypothesis (tentative belief) for truth value. This is done in science, in everyday life, and in coming to faith. This is all legitimate. However, this is not the issue at hand. The issue at hand is a logical one: Does "belief in" make sense without "belief that"? William Willimon seems to think Yes, whereas Rich Davis and Paul Franks argue No.
I'm inclined to agree with Davis and Franks' view that "belief in" logically requires "belief that." That "belief in" requires "belief that" seems to be a truth of logic and a truth of experience, as I'll argue in my three points below.
1. Think of science. The thesis that no "belief that" is required in "belief in" is equivalent, logically, to saying I'll believe in a hypothesis even though I haven't any idea what the hypothesis is about (i.e., I have no relevant beliefs that...). Moreover, this logically implies that I also haven't any idea what should be tested to confirm or disconfirm the hypothesis. Surely, then, the thesis is logically incoherent, and surely, too, the practice of science contradicts the thesis. The thesis, in other words, is absurd. Thus, via the above reductio ad absurdum argument, it very much seems that to believe in a hypothesis about X logically requires a belief that X is (or at least perhaps is) the case.
2. Think of the experience of everyday life, such as, say, marriage. I believe in my wife Carla, that is, I trust her. However, and surely, this "belief in" presupposes "belief that"—for example, my belief that Carla exists. Surely, too, my belief in my wife, i.e., my trust in my wife, logically requires belief that Carla is actually my wife, that Carla is trustworthy, etc.
Continued…
3. Think of my experience of coming to faith in Christ. I remember as a 30-year-old man not being sure about God's existence and what God is like (my siblings consisted of a Bahai', a Jehovah's Witness, an agnostic/atheist, etc.). Yet I remember thinking and praying something along the following lines: "My life is a mess and I need help. God, if you're there, I will follow you." It was a tentative "belief that" or set of "beliefs that." That is, I was saying something like this: God, I will live as if you are real by obeying what little I know/believe about you—i.e., "beliefs that"—gathered from what I've sensed morally (via conscience), from what I've heard from preachers (at church and from Billy Graham on TV), and from what I've read in Scripture (as a child and as an adult). This initial set of "beliefs that" was tentative and weakly informed, but, as I adopted a heart attitude of obedience-to-God-if-God-exists and as I sought to know more truths about God—i.e., as I sought more "beliefs that" about God—my initial beliefs that eventually turned into a more fully orbed "belief in." All this to say that my faltering and feeble initial belief in God, i.e., my first trust in God-if-God-is-there, presupposed beliefs, tentatively held, that God or a God-like being exists, that this being is holy, that this being had some expectations of me, etc. (Further reading of Scriptures, study of apologetical and philosophical arguments, praying, submission, repentance—via these God subsequently transformed my mind and brought me to further propositional and personal knowledge of Him.)
ReplyDeleteTo say, then, as Willimon seems to say, that no "belief that" is required in "belief in" is false—it's logically incoherent as well as contradicted by experience. Also, as Davis and Franks go on to argue, it doesn't sit well with some of the questions Jesus asks in the gospels.
I hope that the above is helpful. I hope, too, that life with a freshly minted undergraduate degree is going well!
Best regards,
Hendrik