sophiaserpentia | salvation by concepts?

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salvation by concepts?

The early heresiologists complained of the Gnostics that they taught that one's salvation lies in what one knows, rather than one's faith.

In my usage here, faith is different from belief; faith is intransitive, whereas belief is transitive. Faith means maintaining hope and trust, whereas belief entails an object: one believes "something," one doesn't just generally "believe." In my opinion there is no difference between "knowing" a concept and "believing" a concept.

Christianity rooted in faith would be unitive; but Christianity rooted in belief is divisive, because words are imprecise and spiritual concepts shift around as we examine them. An emphasis on belief becomes invariably an emphasis on hairsplitting: homoousia vs. homoiousia, filioque, etc. This turns the church into a "who's-in-who's-out" game based on one's concepts, rather than a "we're-all-in-this-together" game based on recognition of each other's faith. Therefore, so far as I can tell, many Christians in practice are guilty of the exact same error of which the ancient Gnostics were accused -- seeking Christ through defining of concepts rather than through faith.

Many Christians have both faith and beliefs. But it seems to me that an abundance of faith would make emphasis on beliefs seem unnecessary; when one has strong faith, whether one is Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Pagan, or what-have-you, that one is not overly concerned with the details of what other people around them believe, and furthermore, that one generally does not feel the need to question the validity of other people's faith or beliefs. So I think emphasis on beliefs is indicative of a widespread crisis of faith.

I've argued this point before, only to have it denied and the assertion repeated by proselytizers: I would be "saved" if I only professed belief in Jesus as my Lord and Savior; nothing more is essential. But typically it is not true that this is all I need, because many of the people who have tried to proselytize me tack on a lot of concepts which they think necessarily follow. For example, they might say that if I do not oppose abortion I must not have "actually" accepted Jesus, and so on.

It frightens me to contemplate the idea of God operating that way: picking and choosing on Judgment Day among people with real faith but excluding some because they happened to believe in the wrong concepts. With so many contradictory ideas floating around, how could I ever be sure I happened to choose the right collection of concepts to be "saved" and go to heaven?

Whether or not God works that way, many people do, and they use concepts rather than faith to play "who's-in-who's-out." Mormons usually find themselves on the excluded end of this, being told they believe in the "wrong Jesus." There is no bottom to this slippery slope; emphasis on "belief in the right concepts" versus faith is inherently divisive.

It happens to Catholics too, sometimes, here's a case in point.

A Christian adoption agency that receives money from Choose Life license plate fees said it does not place children with Roman Catholic couples because their religion conflicts with the agency's "Statement of Faith."

Bethany Christian Services stated the policy in a letter to a Jackson couple this month, and another Mississippi couple said they were rejected for the same reason last year. "It has been our understanding that Catholicism does not agree with our Statement of Faith," Bethany's state director Karen Stewart wrote. "Our practice to not accept applications from Catholics was an effort to be good stewards of an adoptive applicant's time, money and emotional energy."

from Christian adoption agency snubs Catholics (thanks to burkean for the link)

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I definitley think you raise an intresting point with the "hair-splitting" issue, but isn't the direct opposite end of the spectrum also a problem, I could be wrong, but doesn't Gnosticism also state that the "initiated" of concepts get to be saved, and thus deludes itself into heresy?

There's got to be a happy medium out there somewhere in Christianity, I think.

Yes, that was another charge: that the Gnostics were elitist.

I've argued against both: I do not beleive the Gnostics believed in salvation by knowledge, nor were all of them elitist.

But, it is another accusation that was made against them. Essentially it boils down to knowing exactly who is "saved" and who is not -- seeking assurances that are not available to anyone on Earth.

If that is the case, listing the saved and the unsaved by way of initiation is another point where many modern Protestants seem to be doing exactly what the Gnostics were accused of doing. The Catholics avoid this by teaching (though somewhat quietly) that no person, only God, knows ultimately who is saved or not. (I don't know what the Orthodox think on this, but I suspect that they do not attempt to make lists of who is unsaved either.)

We avoid by making a big deal of salvation being a transitive state, much like your arguement on faith, which is why I liked it so much.

"So, does that mean you believe?"
"No, but I've got a good idea..." - Dogma

Some of my favorite lines.

I've never understood how people can be faithful Christians and still believe that the billions of people not in their "brand" of Christianity would be loved by God just as much as anyone else. It's always seemed much more logical to me to understand God as a benevolent being who created (and therefore loves) us ALL, where the effort to be a good person, whatever the label your religion sports, carries the most weight when it comes down to the issue of Judgement Day (or whatever).

Of course, being Lutheran and believing in the concept of grace, I've never been much concerned about the issue of Judgement Day anyway. That's kind of the whole point of the grace concept - that God loves you beyond what you could ever do to impress him though deed or belief. Hence Christ including the lepers and prostitutes and tax collectors and pharisees and farmers and fishers and gentiles and so forth all at the same table. The criteria was pretty much "Human? Oh, well, okay then, come party!" I can't imagine God doing any less.

Such people don't know what else to make of many passages in the Bible which talk about God's wrath. How are they to be reconciled with other passages which talk of God as loving and merciful? Outside of humorous references to God being bipolar, it's a serious question without an easy answer.

I reconcile them by reminding myself that the Bible was written by (fallible) humans and doing my best to follow Christ's ACTIONS rather than taking the apostles' WORDS as pre-eminent.

Err... I've always thought that 'it's a bunch of books, written and redacted by different people over time' was a pretty darned easy answer.

Even that, in itself, doesn't necessarily address the problem; they may have been written by different people over time, but they still say diffeent things about God. If you allow for the possibility that belief changes over time, then you have a solution, but Bible-centric conservative theology gets nervous about that. So you have theologians like Karl Barth argue that the text is perfect in itself, entirely removed from the context in which it was written... essentially reading the Bible as if it came out of the sky whole, just as we see it today.

Even that, in itself, doesn't necessarily address the problem; they may have been written by different people over time, but they still say diffeent things about God.

Well, of course they do. That was sort of my whole point. They were written and redacted by different people in different times; therefore it is practically a given that they could say different things about God.

If you allow for the possibility that belief changes over time, then you have a solution

It hardly has to come to that - I believe the quote below is 'You ask ten jews an opinion about pretty much anything, you'll get at least eleven different answers'. Beliefs are different from person to person even in a given time, area, and religious grouping.

Bible-centric conservative theology gets nervous about that. So you have theologians like Karl Barth argue that the text is perfect in itself, entirely removed from the context in which it was written... essentially reading the Bible as if it came out of the sky whole, just as we see it today.

I enjoy studying biblical scholarship, but I tend to give the more lunatic or idiotic versions of theology a miss. ((shrug))

Love
Sera

I believe that there is one "brand" of Christianity which more closely approximates to the original teachings of Jesus Christ--but which probably does not, by far, align precisely with them, whatever they actually were. I believe there was a guarantee given that that communion would be, to some degree--and to a sufficent one, to ensure "salvation" (whaterver that is)--guided by the "Spirit." Though I believe that the other brands of Christianity are somewhat "heretical" (a relatively unpejorative term, to me), I don't believe that has anything to do with genuine personal "salvation," which--to me, at least--has more to do with being spiritually alive in this life than with "pie in the sky after death," which is, to me--just as you say it is, for most Catholics--absolutely unpredictable. I know that a lot of what I've just said isn't preached by the Magisterium, but I think it's the ordinary way of thinking and feeling of most Catholics--even ones who, like me, DO actually believe in the supernatural aspects of the religion, such as the "Real Presence" in the Eucharist.
(And you will notice that my icon, for this, is a miniature of Blake's Dante illustration which has a pope burning in hell!)

As a Jew, it is most emphatically not my job to proselytize to others. My religion, unlike a number of others, doesn't go looking for converts. The conversion process is long and is designed to ensure that anybody who converts has a very solid grasp of both the religion and the culture.

I will answer questions and I will take some efforts to defend my religion from possible misunderstandings, but that's a far sight short of telling everyone all about it :P

Furthermore, we don't say someone must be Jewish to be holy. A non-Jew specifically only has to pay attention to seven laws, the Noahide laws, to be considered Good Folks.

I'm not saying I agree with every aspect of the interpretations of the Noahide laws - specifically, I disagree on the bit of interpretation regarding illicit relations that pertain to homosexuality - but they are in general not a bad list of laws. At times, admittedly, I think I'd want to replace one of them with Google's credo: do no evil. But I'm funny that way.

((looks up the Noahide laws))

Ayup. I'd be in trouble. :)

((chuckles))

*nodnod*
Yeah, the way some of them are parsed annoys me, as such. And I'm Jewish.
(You ask ten jews an opinion about pretty much anything, you'll get at least eleven different answers)

For myself, which is hardly speaking for Judaism, I don't consider most stripes of paganism to be idolatry as they are worship of divine through symbols, but recognize that the sybols are not themselves the divine. I do not consider homosexuality to count as an illicit relation either. Frankly, true blasphemy is rare and generally frowned upon. Courts are around to enforce fair laws. I doubt you steal, I doubt you murder.

So tell me, how often do you carve meat off the live cow? :-)

Well, my concept of God is extraordinarily different from that depicted in the Torah, but that probably manages to still pass. However, being in a romantic & sexual relationship with my wife and with my girlfriend probably falls under the 'illicit relations' clause pretty well. I'm not sure how I feel about courts of law, but by many peoples' definition, I have 'stolen' quite unrepentantly, through file sharing on the internet. I've heard various interpretations on what constitutes 'true' blasphemy, at least a few of which would apply to me. It's true, though, that I don't murder, and I don't eat live meat... or any other meat, for all that. :)

Love
Sera

My wife and my girlfriends agree with your wife and girlfriend ;-)

File sharing is one of those incredibly thorny bits. I do know there are many Jewish lawyers hotly debating the point, sometimes against themselves. Nu, we make good lawyers.

My God is a vengeful one. No arguments. That said, He can be a forgiving one when his bipolar mood suits him :-) I have no idea if He uses Napster, but I don't view it as impossible. I don't agree with all of His decisions, but I give him this: he is not a "Do as I say, not as I do" kinda God.

I suspect yer good people. I make my choices about the people I meet - that's my job, not God's. If He wants me to decide differently, He can bloody well clal me and say so. He hasn't yet, so I must be doing something right.

Free will is a very good thing.

My wife and my girlfriends agree with your wife and girlfriend ;-)

Your wife and girlfriends are smart. :)

I have no idea if He uses Napster, but I don't view it as impossible.

((giggle)) That is an extremely whimsical idea. It made me grin.

I suspect yer good people.

I get a good feeling about you, too. :)

Thanks. :)

Love
Sera

Good post--James shows Abraham as the example of faith. Of course, there was never a question of belief with Abraham, because God spoke directly to him. There was never an obstacle to that specific belief in God's existence.

The issue was one of trust--God made a promise to make Abraham a father of nations, and Abraham demonstrated his faith in God's promise (the promise, not the existence) by willing to kill his only son on God's command, even though it seemed prima facie that such an action would prevent the actualization of that promise.

I have no obstacle to believing in my wife's existence. I may have trouble convincing you of her existence, but epistemologically I rest comfortably in that knowledge. My trust in her that she will not leave me for another man or woman is a faith born not from an intellectual assessment of the situation, but rather from an emotional attachment to my wife as a person--a personal relationship with my wife.

Sometimes I see discussions about belief in God's existence as ludicrous as if somebody asked me "what if I could prove your wife didn't exist, would you still have faith that she wouldn't leave you?" That is, people have not grasped the difference between belief (or knowledge) and faith.

I think that it's, most likely, inevitable. Anytime you choose to believe in a monotheistic religion, you will, by necessity impose your beliefs on the world.

If you believe that the one and only God is all merciful and accepts, and ultimately rewards, all those who act right and punishes all those who a wicked and that you should not interfere in this process then you will be content to leave your life according to the rules you believe.

The problem, I think, is not so much with the first or second belief as with the third. Choosing not to interfere is difficult, and it becomes more so as you have more power. The non-cynic in me says that a priest attempts to interfere in politics because he knows his religion has many believers and he thinks that they give him the power, and his faith the duty, to steer society onto a path that will save more people from divine punishment. The temptation to help your fellow man is strong, and when it comes to helping them change their beliefs to match your own, because yours are correct and theirs are not, you begin to tread a long and dark path.

Faith and caring may lead to more religious conflicts than power and politics.

I think any monotheistic religion will always devolve into a question of "What do you believe?"

Your posts, it seems to me, would make a good leaflet to be handed out to foaming at the mouth fundies preaching with bullhorns.

Handing it to them would be a waste of paper. I'm more interested in handing it to people standing near them who might look as though they are actually listening.

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salvation by concepts?

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