Faith

Biblical Faith (from the Greek, πίστις or pistis) refers to trust, and if applied refers to applying a confidence in what is already known about God, to a situation where every detail is not laid out in full.

The verb for the word "faith" in Greek is πιστεύω (pisteuo), which is translated most often as "believe" in English. Having faith, believing, trusting, or having confidence are all things that imply much more than a simple head knowledge about something, and more specifically God himself. For example, it is possible to acknowledge God's existence and know it as a fact deduced from logical arguments, and yet still not make God a practical faith, belief, trust, or confidence in your life.

Often times the example of a chair is given to illustrate the practicality of biblical faith. When you sit down in a chair (and perhaps you are now, while reading this article), do you generally worry whether that chair will hold you up? Usually, one will never think about the chair, and take it for granted. Another way to think of that same illustration is a person who sits on the edge of their seat, because they are nervous about the chair. They are not sitting back and resting in the chair, but tensed and ready just in case it turns out that the chair becomes untrustworthy and falls over.

This is what it means to have biblical faith in God. It means a knowledge of God and who he is in his character and actions, and practically resting in that knowledge from day to day.

Faith and Knowledge

In the modern secular mindset and even in some evangelical circles, the ideas of faith and knowledge cannot coexist. In other words, many believe that faith is antithetical to knowledge and even science. Really, this is a misconception which comes from an ignorance of both what true biblical faith is (as described in brief above) and what knowledge really is (from a philosophical point of view). According to Dr. Dallas Willard (a Christian philosopher), faith is not opposed to knowledge because "faith is a kind of knowledge."

In the bible, faith is never offered in opposition to knowledge, but it is in opposition to sight ("for we walk by faith, not by sight" — 2 Corinthians 5:7). In the modern context, sight, or the use of the five senses, is almost always used as a limiter for the extent of knowledge. This is unfortunate, however, because there are practical things that people interact with all the time that cannot be sensed. For example, friendship, love, truth, beauty, and even knowledge itself are all things, which in essence, cannot be observed with the senses. These are all things that we have some sort of knowledge about, and yet they cannot be empirically tested, if "empirical" means the five senses.

Biblical examples

A classic statement of faith in the Bible was by the Roman centurion of Matthew 8:5-10, who expressed his confidence that Jesus could cure his servant from a distance without even seeing him. Jesus repeatedly emphasized the importance and value of faith to his disciples.

Perhaps the greatest description of faith is that of the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter 11. It states: "Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."

Paul indicated that faith itself is a gift of the Holy Spirit. 1 Corinthians 12:8-9 For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another faith by the same Spirit; to another the gifts of healing by the same Spirit

As discussed above, a potential reference to faith is Genesis 22 where God tested Abraham by commanding him to sacrifice his only son Isaac. As Abraham prepared to do what God commanded -he was stopped. Genesis 22:12 "Do not lay a hand on the boy," he said. "Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son."

Martin Luther on Faith

Luther in his Table Talk papers writes this thought provoking and rather difficult passage on faith:

"This is the acme of faith, to believe that God, who saves so few and condemns so many, is merciful; that he is just who, at his own pleasure, has made us necessarily doomed to damnation, so that he seems to delight in the torture of the wretched and is more deserving of hate than of love. If by any effort of reason I could conceive how God, who shows so much anger and harshness, could be merciful and just, there would be no need of faith."

Other Definitions and Religions

The literary critic Harold Bloom distinguishes Christianity from the other two dominant monotheistic religions in his book Agon by contrasting them with Gnosticism:

"Gnosticism polemically is decidedly not a faith, whether in the Christian sense, pisits, a believing that something was, is, and will be so; or in the Hebraic sense, emunah, a trusting in the Covenant. If religion is a binding, then Gnosticism is an unbinding, but not for the sake of things or persons merely as they are. Gnostic freedom is a freedom for knowledge, knowledge of what in the self, not in the psyche or soul, is Godlike, and knowledge of God beyond the cosmos. But also it is a freedom to be known, to be known by God, by what is alien to everything created, by what is alien to and beyond the stars and the cosmic system and our earth."

Faith is emphasized in Christianity but is unrecognized by the worldview of philosophical skepticism.

• In Biblical Judaism, faith is specifically understood as the continued obedience of the Jews to the commandments of God (Jehovah) found and repeatedly renewed in his Covenants. Thus, faith is tied to the context of God's Covenant with his chosen people, Israel. In practice, this means that Jews are expected to be faithful to God by following the 613 Mitzvoth, and honoring the holidays of the Jewish calendar, among other practices. [1]

External links

• Holding, James Patrick, Fallacious Faith
• Finding Faith in Christ, video at JesusChrist.lds.org