Saturday, July 21, 2012

Glenn's Book of Quotes Number Twenty-Seven

"By doubting we are led to enquiry, and by enquiry we discern the truth." -- Peter Abelard

I distrust people who have no doubt.  If you do not doubt, you do not think, and people who do not think proceed with absolute confidence in the rightness of their motives, and absolute blindness to the consequences of their acts.  I have met people of faith for whom doubt is a sin.  Just as the unexamined life is not worth living, the unexamined faith is not worth believing in.  If you have not doubted, you have not really thought about your faith.  If you have not thought about your faith, how do you really know if it is the truth?  Do you not trust yourself?

When someone says that they know that God exists because it says so in the inerrant Bible, I back away.  When someone says that they know that God does not exist because he cannot be dreamt of in their philosophy, I pity them.
When someone says that the political philosophy they subscribe to is so certainly good that society should be re-ordered as they prescribe, I reach for my culture.

When someone says that they don't know, I'm right with them.
When someone says that they believe that they are right, but that they accept the possibility that they might be wrong, I tend to trust them.

I sing the praises of doubt. Thomas doubted, enquired, discerned the truth, and strengthened his faith.  Doubt strengthens the mind, promotes tolerance, seeks diversity, and fights fanaticism.

Question everything.

Unless, of course, I'm wrong.


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