Fear and Trembling: The Reasonableness of an Irrational Faith

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This, however, cannot happen overnight. Faith, and this is probably one of the most important points that Kierkegaard wants to put across, is a task of a lifetime. It is not enough to be born in a particular country at a particular time with a particular “national” religion. Faith needs to be lived, and we should work daily towards our conversion. As St. Paul’s puts it: “I have fought the good fight to the end, I have run the race to the finish; I have kept the faith, all there is to come for me now is the crown of uprightness which the Lord, the upright judge, will give to me on that Day…”[3]

Reading Abraham’s faith on these terms looks more reasonable than it would appear after a quick and precipitated look. As Dr. Westphal tries to point out on his talk entitled “Kierkegard on Faith and Reason”[4] is the relativity of reasonability. For human wisdom, the cross is foolish, but quoting again St. Paul: “the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength”[5]. For those who have faith, everything is possible for God, and in their eyes, it is reasonable to believe in Him, to trust in Him.

Rather than an irrational faith I think it would be more precise to talk about a “meta-rational” faith, because it transcends reason, but they are not incompatible or mutually exclusive.

As Saint Pope John Paul II points out in his highly studied Encyclical Fides et Ratio, “there is a knowledge which is peculiar to faith, surpassing the knowledge proper to human reason”[6]. That knowledge, he continues, “expresses a truth based on the very fact of God who reveals himself, a truth which is most certain, since God neither deceives nor wishes to deceive”[7]. This is very important to understand: that the truth obtained through reason and the truth obtained through faith, are “neither identical nor mutually exclusive[8]”. You could say that, in a way, they are the two sides of the same coin, for, although different and distinct with regards to the source and to the object, they both, faith and reason, pursue the same goal: to understand “the ultimate purpose of personal existence”[9], since they both “point to that “path of life”[10]. Obviously, this path of life is Jesus Christ, the Son of God who revealed us the Will of the Father. (“I am the Way, the Truth and the life[11]”).

Despite this Revelation, “…our vision of God is always fragmentary and impaired by the limits of our understanding”[12]. This is where faith comes into action. As the Pope points out, “faith alone makes it possible to penetrate the mystery in a way that allows us to understand it coherently”[13]. Only faith and reason combined would satisfy our thirst for knowledge, would bring to fruition our quest for truly knowing ourselves, God and the world. As Saint John Paul II beautifully puts it: “reason and faith cannot be separated without diminishing the capacity of men and women to know themselves, the world and God in an appropriate way”[14]

But how can be certain? Why can we rely on the knowledge that comes from Revelation? Because “It is God himself who is the guarantor of that truth…[15]”, and as we have quoted before “neither deceives nor wishes to deceive[16]”. But if we reflect, we can find this trusting in God reasonable. We all want to know. We want to be informed and we look for truth. That is why we choose to buy one newspaper instead of the other, because we do not trust what we may read there. This wish to know makes us look for the truth, and when we don’t know something ourselves, we rely on somebody else: that is why if the heater is not working we call an electrician or a plumber, for example. Using once more the words of Pope John Paul II: “…the human being-the one who seeks the truth-is also the one who lives by belief”[17].

Let us then follow the example of our father in faith by having a personal relationship with God, who will help us run the race and fight the good fight until the end if we put him first in our lives.

References

- Casey, Thomas, Philosophy of Human Person II: Important Points about Faith in Fear and Trembling, St, Patrick’s College, Maynooth, April 2016

- Gill, Jerry H., Essays On Kierkegaard (Minneapolis: Burgess Pub. Co., 1969)

- Paul II, John, Faith And Reason: Encyclical Letter of Pope John Paul II (London: Catholic Truth Society, 1998)

- The New Jerusalem Bible, Student Edition, London, 1994

- Westphal Merold, “Abraham and Sacrifice” in Neue Zeitschrift fur Systematische Theologie und Religionsphilosophie, 2008, Volume 50, pp. 318-330

- Westphal Merold, Kierkegard on Faith and Reason”, URL= https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3pOCBR5oxY> [last accessed 1st May 2016]

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