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Tuesday, June 27, 2023

Do passages like Hebrews 11:1 support a view of faith that has little or no concern for evidence?

Stephen Woodford, who operates the Rationality Rules YouTube channel, recently posted a video about the alleged irrationality of theism. It's been getting a lot of attention, including some responses from Christians. I'm not going to interact with all of it. What I want to focus on is a segment about faith, which promotes a popular misinterpretation of Hebrews 11:1. That verse is often cited to support the idea that Christian faith has little or no concern for evidence, that it involves a blind leap in the dark, and so on. A couple of other passages, John 20:29 and 2 Corinthians 5:7, sometimes get interpreted in a similar manner.

That kind of objection to Christianity isn't new. Celsus brought up a form of it in the second century. He commented, for example, that "some [Christians] do not even want to give or to receive a reason for what they believe, and use such expressions as 'Do not ask questions; just believe', and 'Thy faith will save thee'." (in Origen, Against Celsus, 1:9) See my post here that discusses Celsus' comments and Origen's response. Some ancient Christians would advocate that sort of view of faith from time to time. You seem to get it occasionally from John Chrysostom, for example, though he shows more concern for evidence and makes some good comments on the value of apologetics elsewhere (e.g., what I quote at the end of the post here). Although the concept of a faith that has little or no concern for evidence is sometimes found in ancient Christian sources, the earliest view, the one advocated by the most significant sources (the central figures of the Bible), and one that's often been reiterated by other Christians since then is that faith is more intellectual.

Notice a common thread in the three Biblical passages mentioned in the opening paragraph of this post, John 20:29, 2 Corinthians 5:7, and Hebrews 11:1. They all refer to sight. And the critics who appeal to those passages in support of a less intellectual view of faith seem to be equating sight with evidence. But sight and evidence are different things. They shouldn't be equated.

And the context of all three passages is supportive of having evidence for your faith, including both evidence that involves sight and evidence that doesn't (John's eyewitness testimony, the testimony of resurrection witnesses, the evidence of prophecy fulfillment, the evidence of apostolic miracles, etc.). The fact that Thomas shouldn't have required the additional evidence he demanded doesn't prove that he shouldn't have wanted any evidence or that providing evidence is never appropriate or needed. The fact that Hebrews 11 refers to trusting God for what we can't see doesn't prove that we trust him without evidence. The passage is addressing one aspect of faith, trusting God for parts of life we can't see, primarily the future. The passage isn't addressing faith as a whole. And even that one aspect of faith involves evidence, though we can't see the future and some other parts of life (e.g., God's creation of the universe referred to in verse 3). As Psalm 19 and Romans 1 illustrate, Jews and Christians believed they had evidence for God's creation of the universe, even though they didn't see him doing the creating. Hebrews 11 concludes by referring to how "all these, having gained approval through their faith, did not receive what was promised" (verse 39). The chapter is addressing ongoing faith in these people's lives, not just one occasion of faith. So, the faith they had later in life occurred after the evidence they received earlier. The chapter refers to various evidential categories, such as "prophets" (verse 32) and prophecies that were fulfilled (verses 7, 11-12, 27-30). The author repeatedly refers to how the individuals involved witnessed prophecy fulfillment, so he isn't saying that these individuals had no evidence. Rather, the point is that their faith was partly about a future they hadn't yet experienced. Think of verse 29. They had faith while passing through the Red Sea. The faith coexisted with the evidence surrounding them, the parted waters. They hadn't yet completed the crossing of the sea. Some degree of faith about an unseen future was involved, but there was simultaneously some miraculous evidence they had already experienced and were in the process of experiencing further. Would the women who received evidence by means of a resurrection (verse 35) have thought that they had no evidence for their faith? Or consider the opening verses of Hebrews 2, which refer to "hearing", not just sight, and refer to "confirmation" and "testifying" through the evidence of miracles. Again, lack of sight isn't equivalent to lack of evidence, and anybody who wants to equate the two should be asked to demonstrate that the two are equivalent.

For more about the intellectual and apologetic nature of the Bible and Christian faith, see here. For some examples of the concern the earliest Christians had for apologetics, see pages 36-42 and 279-84 in our e-book The End Of Infidelity.

"we alone afford proof of what we assert" (Justin Martyr, First Apology, 20)

"I laughed in condemning him, because he called himself a teacher yet did not know how to confirm what he taught." (Rhodo, in Eusebius, Church History, 5:13:7)

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