Questions for theists.

[Whateverist]

4. What reasons do you have for whatever answer you give? Biblical exegesis

5. Do you feel that these reasons, whatever they are, are good reasons, and could you elaborate upon them? For me they are good reasons. Is the Bible a good reason for an unbeliever to believe; probably not as they usually don't believe it.

So you feel that the bible is the ultimate source of truth and understanding in questions of human conduct and purpose. I appreciate that you don't turn to the bible for empirical facts but I'm curious how you come to invest so much authority in the bible.

In talking to reasonable theists I'm accustomed to learning that their base reason for believing in God stems from a feeling of God moving in their life. From the outside, I interpret this to mean that having developed a relationship to God at an early age and having grown up experiencing life always in the relationship to God, it is just inconceivable to imagine life without Him. Where those of us without God just think we sometimes have good insight and sometimes don't, a theist will think that sometimes God speaks to them and sometimes they have to go it alone. I actually think there are real advantages to conceiving of wisdom as coming from outside ones conscious self.*

The part that I have more trouble with is how the experience of God moving in ones life moves one to fixate on the bible as the correct source of information about God and His will as it applies to you. Here it does seem simply a matter of tradition. If you grew up experiencing God in your life then you probably grew up in a home where the people that encouraged your relationship to God turned to the bible for more information about that god. I suppose if you start reading the bible early on it informs the relationship you form with God to the point where the two feel inseparable.

From the outside it is the reliance on the bible which seems the most suspect. I'll grant you that I cannot disprove the existence of God and if your core hunch is that He is there, go for it. But I can't see any basis for certainty that the bible is the real deal. At best it is the source book with which you've built up your notions of the God whose presence you so strongly perceive. But I think the leap to the bible substitutes certainty for faith. I really don't think you can have both.


*[In a very real sense, we're not alone within ourselves. I don't call the other seat of consciousness within myself God, but I do recognize its existence. I think our brains, like those of most vertebrates, are split the way they are so that consciousness can attend to two things at once. The left brain, used for close attention to a chosen task is the side that gives rise to the seat of consciousness which we inhabit. The other side, is also conscious but specializes in monitoring the big picture for threats and opportunities. The two sides serve different purposes but both can 'take the steering wheel' when the need arises, but in the normal course of events the left brain runs the show in order to attend the chosen task at hand. Interestingly, 'our' side of the brain is not especially good at 'getting the big picture' or 'thinking outside the box'. When what we already know will suffice, we rule. When you need a new insight you need input from the other side. I suspect that when you commune with God, it is the right side seat of consciousness that you open yourself up to .. and that is a beneficial thing.

I'm drawing this from the ideas of Iain McGilchrist as depicted in this video http://youtu.be/dFs9WO2B8uI ]