Faith Vs. Reason

"There are few things which you have to believe, without asking for reasons." There was clear hint of annoyance in his voice. Mr. Tripathi is our neighbour and this was the first time, we had spoken beyond formal greetings. He is a firm believer in the divine power and I made a mistake of asking some clarifications.

Actually, he started it. "You will always have limited success and happiness unless you believe in HIM" he had said.  

I could not understand. "Believe in WHOM?"

"The Divine. You can call him God, Energy, Nature or whatever."

"What should I believe?

Now he got perplexed. "What are you asking?

"I am asking what should I believe. I guess you are asking me to believe three things - One, there is some divine power over and above us. Second, it has power to help us in life. Third, if I believe in it and pray, it will grant me the wishes or protect me from evil things. Are you saying that?"

"aaaammm......yes. So what? What's the problem? Is it not good for you? Why can't you believe? Have faith and your life will be much better."

"But how can I just start having believe or faith? It is not a piece of bread, which I can lift, put into mouth and swallow. I need some basis to believe in something."

"Now, this is the problem with your generation. You want reason for everything. But remember, there are so many things, which science has not been able to explain. Tell me, why they have not been able to make life in laboratories?"

"If science has not understood few - or may be lot of - things, is it right to assign all those things to some divine power? Few centuries ago, lightening was considered to be the anger of divine. Will you believe in such thing now?

"You people just know to argue, but you will not understand what I am saying. Ok, tell me why you do not believe in God?"

"I did not say, I do not believe in God."

"You are such an impossible person. Just now you had been arguing like mad, and now you are saying, you believe in God"

"Ok, let me clarify. I am not saying I believe in God. I am also not saying I do not believe in God. I am just saying 'I do not know'. I do not have proofs either way. I do not need proofs either way. So I can't say anything definitely"

"Then you will live your life in limbo? You will not have any firm stand? You will keep moving like pendulum from one side to other? What are you saying? You must have the clarity."

"I am not in limbo. I am just open. And it does not make any difference to me, if there is divine power or not. I will be same in any case. So why should I bother?" "And even if I want to know, I will not take a stand just because I have to. Will you take a stand saying that there are only 9 planets? What if scientists discover more? What will happen to your belief?"

"Forget all this. I do not know all your logical tricks. What I know is belief is much beyond and much powerful than your reasons. Only when you drop your reasons, then the belief will rise"

"If reason is dropped, then what will be the difference between 'Belief' and 'Blind Faith'?"

"That's different" Blind faith is not same as belief."

"Ok, so what is the difference between Belief and Blind Faith?"

"I will tell you some other time. You have confused me completely with you rubbish"

"The difference is 'Reason'. Wherever there is no reason, it is blind faith."

"Ok. So tell me why you need to believe, if you have all reasons? Do you understand me? If something is proved, it is proved - and you do not need any belief. So, as per you, there is no place for belief. Am I correct?"

"Let me explain this. Let us assume that I am planning to start my own business. I know that this is the best thing to do, because my passion and strength lies in it. But, then I am told - economy is bad, you need experience, you need lot of money, you will not get partner, you will probably fail, how will you repay the loan, think about your family - and so on."

"In this situation, I need to keep alive the spark of belief in my decision. Not just because, I believe in it blindly. But because I have a bigger reason to go for it, which others are not able to see." 

"The problem with such reasons is that they are sometimes difficult to explain and express. So, externally people think that person has acted on a belief without reason. Oprah Winfrey was fired from TV channel, saying that she is not fit for TV. She kept the belief in her abilities and became legendary TV show host. The reasoning she has about herself was not blind, it was just difficult to explain. She was required to take extra efforts to believe in it, because if not nurtured constantly, beliefs of others may overpower it."

"This also applies to somebody who has genuinely experienced (may be briefly) divinity around. He / she may find it difficult to explain it, but the experience is good enough reason to believe in it. However, if somebody says he / she believes in God, without any experience, it is nothing but blind faith. It does not matter whether it is truth or not, but the belief without reason is always blind faith. Belief may be beyond generally accepted logic, but it cannot be beyond reason."