[TruthTalk] POLYANYI

[Judy Taylor]

From: "Wm. Taylor" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> I suppose you got the point of Newbigin -- He was criticizing the dualisms present in the scientific model and not edorsing them. Faith is inferior to knowledge only if there is indeed a gap between the mind (the home of faith) and the real world (the object of study, the place where certainty dwells).   jt: Newbigin must be an unbeliever also because the mind is not the home of faith. Faith resides in the heart... One may have a heart of faith or an evil heart of unbelief.   If the gap is real, then "faith" is subjective and falls under the category of private opinion, and "knowledge" is objective, falling under the heading of public truth.   jt: Would you say that Abraham was full of "private opinion" and walked in public truth?   This dualism disappears when we realize that the gap is itself an illusion of our mind, a trick played upon ourselves when we think of knowledge as a picture of reality. Faith and knowledge are compatible because both involve a participation with with reality.   jt: Whose reality would this be?   Rather than competing one against the other for fealty and affection the two integrate and work together, each bolstering the other.    jt: Faith rests in the promise of an unseen God who is Spirit. What does this have to do with "public truth" and what exactly is public truth?   judyt     In a message dated 3/25/2004 10:38:58 PM Pacific Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: Locke's famous definition, belief is 'a persuasion which falls short of knowledge.' Certainty is a matter of knowledge, not of faith. If we understand that persuasion and certainty are the same, these statements contradict.   From my point of view, the first is much closer to the truth than the latter.  I "know" this to be true because of Paul's use of the concept of faith, especially in Romans 14.    The vegetarian's teaching was wrong, hence he is the "weak brother," but he is directed by Paul not to violate his faith, inaccurate as it was.   John Smithson