[atomiczombie]

It can also be seen that religious reason-giving is not circular in the sense that circular arguments stand on reasons which are analytically contained in the very claim that these reasons are meant to support. But this is also not the case with Paul. His claim that “. . God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do: by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and to deal with sin, he condemned sin in the flesh,” does not entail, i.e., is not part of the definition of “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

The tendency to assume that religious-reasoning is circular comes out of the mistaken notion that only non-religious reasons can legitimately support religious beliefs. This kind of mistake is often made with respect to moral reasoning as well. For example, someone who says, “I don’t get why people think they should do something just because it’s right” stands outside the moral language game and its corresponding forms of life and seeks a non-moral reason to justify moral actions and beliefs. What that person does not understand is that there is no grand, all encompassing, context-free system of reasoning that can be the ultimate ground of every context-dependent claim. Moral reasons are given for moral claims. Scientific reasons are offered as support for scientific claims. It is the same for religion. That is the way these kinds of discourse work. Religious reasons may not convince someone who stands outside the religious domain of discourse and the way of life that goes with it, but it does not stand to reason that there is, therefore, circularity or irrationality going on with respect to religious reasoning.

This is not to say that only religious reasons can support religious beliefs. Moral reasons can on occasion be used to support a religious assertion, e.g., “God does not take sides in human wars.” Moral considerations are relevant here and the implicit rules which make such considerations relevant are part of the religious context.

Systems of reasoning such as religion, morality and science do seem to over-lap in certain instances, and a great deal of confusion can arise around such an issue. One of the most obvious and concrete examples of this over-lap is the issue of Christianity and its relationship to historical knowledge.

Faith in a historical figure is at the heart of the Christian belief system. If a person does not have faith in this particular historical figure, then no matter what else that person believes, he or she is not a Christian. It is this characteristic of Christianity that points us to the question of what the role of historical knowledge is with respect to Christian faith. St. Paul wrote in Romans 8:34, “Who is to condemn? It is Christ Jesus, who died, yes, who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who indeed intercedes for us.” Once again, we are faced with the very same question with which we began: are religious claims such as those in Romans 8:34 to be believed on the basis of historical evidence, and if so, to what extent, and are they subject to degrees of probability? Historical knowledge seems to play a peculiar role in the Christian language game.

Wittgenstein was concerned enough with this issue to write:

Christianity is not based on a historical truth; rather, it offers us a (historical) narrative and says: now believe! But not, believe this narrative with the belief appropriate to a historical narrative, rather: believe, through thick and thin, which you can do only as the result of a life. Here you have a narrative, don’t take the same attitude to it as you take to other historical narratives! Make a quite different place in your life for it.

Faith does not follow from historical evidence in the sense that one amasses a certain amount of evidence and then, when the right amount is collected, the person is finally convinced. I think this is what Wittgenstein is trying to communicate here. He also says that historical plausibility is not the most important thing with respect to the New Testament:

God has four people recount the life of his incarnate Son, in each case differently and with inconsistencies –– but might we not say: It is important that this narrative should not be more than quite averagely plausible just so that this should not be taken as the essential decisive thing? So that the letter should not be believed more strongly than is proper and the spirit may receive its due. I.e. what you are supposed to see cannot be communicated even by the best and most accurate historian; and therefore a mediocre account suffices, is even to be preferred. For that too can tell you what you are supposed to be told. (Roughly in the way a mediocre stage set can be better than a sophisticated one, painted trees better than real ones, –– because these might distract attention from what matters.)

He even goes so far as to say:

Queer as it sounds: The historical accounts in the Gospels might, historically speaking, be demonstrably false and yet belief would lose nothing by this: not, however, because it concerns ‘universal truths of reason’! Rather, because historical proof (the historical proof game) is irrelevant to belief. . . A believer’s relation to these narratives is neither the relation to historical truth (probability), nor yet that to a theory consisting of ‘truths of reason’.

I do not agree with Wittgenstein that, were the Gospels demonstrated to be false, belief would lose nothing. I think the narrative has to be historical to some extent––there must be some plausibility, at least in the sense that it is plausible to conclude that something happened. However, I do think it is interesting that he makes this point because it illustrates that there is a very different relationship to the historical in the believer’s language game than in other kinds of discourse.

I do agree with Wittgenstein that the believer’s relation to Biblical narratives is neither just a relation to a historical proof nor to purely theoretical considerations that can be logically deduced. Neither of those kinds of relations can lead someone to change their whole way of life, their world view. Historical knowledge, standing on its own, is a matter of indifference. It is the same with a theory. For, even if a person could be assured of having the most accurate historical account of the life of Jesus, to believe, as St. Paul said, that “There is . . now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” is a further step from seeing such an account as simply a story of a strange religious fanatic named Jesus who lived two-thousand years ago and was killed for his controversial beliefs. This further step is the meaning which the believer assigns to the historical account; it is a contribution on the part of the believer which is not a logical inference, for a person who relied exclusively on pure reason would not come to such a conclusion. That is why, as Wittgenstein said, a “mediocre [biblical] account suffices” and is even to be preferred.

The contribution on the part of the believer is Faith. Christian Faith is as much a way of life as it is a kind of belief. Its relation to historical figures and events is that of a sort of jumping off point from which one makes a qualitative leap. This jumping off point is not the most important part, but nevertheless it is an essential part insofar as a there must be a jumping off point if there is to be any kind of leap at all.

What then should one reply to the person who says, “I just can’t believe that God exists––it just doesn’t seem probable”? What I said was: “I agree with you completely. Of course it isn’t probable.” This reply was not a refutation of her argument; it was a rejection of the kind of reason she gave for not believing. It was a way of telling her that she was confused about the kind of basis the belief in God’s existence has; that she was using irrelevant criteria as a basis upon which to make a judgment about whether God exists. The criteria that are associated with the concept of “probability” are not relevant to a belief in God’s existence. “I believe that God exists” is not exactly a judgment made on the basis of criteria. It is more like a declaration that “I accept religious criteria as having a role in my life.” Clearing away this confusion about criteria and what kind of basis is an appropriate one for belief in God clears the way for the qualitative leap of Faith.

So there is my paper. I used Christianity and the Romans text to illustrate my points because it was easy. I don't strictly speaking consider myself a Christian. If it sounds like I am defending Christianity, that wasn't my goal. I was challenging religious fundamentalist's views of science and empirical proofs and their misuse of those concepts, as much as atheist's and agnostic's empirical arguments against religious beliefs. I would say some things differently (particularly in the first paragraph, oy) if I wrote this paper today, but it does lay out some of my basic views on these matters.