Contra Descartes: The Vicious Circle of "I Think, Therefore I Am"

The 17th Century philosopher and “father” of modern philosophy in the West, René Descartes’ argument, “I think, therefore I am,” is familiar to many. It is bound up with the historic beginnings of a major turn in philosophy, a destructive but influential and pervasive departure from the more Christian and Classical philosophy which persisted for millenia. Intended as a counter to radical skepticism, it seeks to discover an incontrovertible foundation for epistemic certainty. Rather than providing an antidote to radical doubt and skepticism, however, Descartes’ argument, “I think, therefore I am” (in Latin: cogito ergo sum; in the original French: je pense, donc je suis), is instead a logical fallacy. It is circular reasoning, a petitio principii, a begging of the question, an assuming of the desired conclusion in the premise. A vicious circle, at best it is a tautology.

The initial premise, “I think,” is enthymematic (an enthymeme is “an argument in which one premise is not explicitly stated”); it tacitly asserts the desired “am.” When it states, “I think,” it is implicitly saying, “I [am] think[ing],” thus inserting being prior to proving being. To make such an argument is thus to self-destructively assert an epistemological certainty for the very being he is trying to prove, the very conclusion the argument is attempting to accomplish. In short, viciously circular, it is saying “I, therefore I.”

The statement itself can be read in more than one way. Two primary ways would be either as an ontological statement or as an epistemological one. Neither way avoids the difficulty it is entangled in. For example, reading it in an ontological key, since Descartes axiomatically presupposes being as a certainty, vis a vis “I [who am] think,” then certainty of being cannot be reached as the conclusion of the argument such that he can say, “therefore I am.” That is simply restating, or making explicit, the implicit premise as the conclusion. If, however, it is read in an epistemological key, then the circularity yet remains, for to claim “I think” is enthymematically to assert “I [am epistemologically certain I] think.” In essence still restating the implicit premise in an explicit form as the conclusion, he is stating, “I know, therefore I know,” which is facile and self-defeating since the purported enterprise of the cogito ergo sum is to discover an indubitable foundation for certain knowledge. If certain knowledge is assumed within the initial premise, then it cannot become the certain conclusion without also becoming viciously circular.

To say “I am not” is absurd. Quite simply, there is no additional act which gets added to the “I” which “proves” said “I.” The “I” is presupposed in all acts, for “I” means ‘being in the act of personal existence,’ or ‘being existing,’ and, as such, “I” is the necessary foundation of all action. As such, no additional or subsequent act “proves” the “I,” only reveals it relative to and through some particular act. To reveal, however, is not the same as to prove. Only an “I” can even attempt to prove, and so the attempt alone has already presupposed the I’s existence, thus rendering proof unpersuasive and without warrant.

The “I” reveals itself in and through its acts, rendering the acts signs of the "I." In this sense, thinking is no different from breathing or knowing or even doubting, for in each of these acts an “I” is necessarily presupposed. In this light, Descartes’ statement could equally be, “I breathe, or know, or even doubt, therefore I am,” which ends up tautologically breaking down to, “I am, therefore I am.” Instead of referring for proof to something the "I" does per accidens, which is to say one of its innumerable potential acts, the "I" instead reveals itself principally via the fundamental act of existing, and consequently by various and sundry doings. It is perhaps worth mentioning that existence does not cease with the cessation of thought, as in dream or deep sleep. In this sense, it could perhaps be said, "I am, therefore I think." In short, one does not prove an I, one is an I.

Recasting the cogito in a more explicitly epistemological light will not help, for to say the certain fact of his thinking enables him to have certain knowledge that he exists is really unremarkable since the ability to think, know, and be aware is precisely what makes self-knowledge realizable. It is epistemic certainty he is after, and as such the question can be posed: How does Descartes really know he is thinking? Is there no possible reason for skepticism? For example, philosophers such as Siddhartha Gautama and David Hume arguably find nothing persuasive in the assertion that there really is a self at all, that, “acts without an agent,” what is commonly called “I” is “nothing but a bundle of different perceptions.” In other words, thoughts do not necessarily prove a thinker, for Gautama and Hume seem to say, "There is thinking, but I am not," and so it is dubious for Descartes to certainly assert “I think” simply because thinking is present, especially when it is theoretically possible to deny substantial reality to the supposed self. Moreover, since selves can be argued on rational grounds not to exist, it may be possible to render thoughts as impersonal reactions within a fundamentally impersonal environment, therefore not proving the existence of personal being at all. Thus, Descartes has not found epistemic certainty in his assertion, “I think,” for it is entirely possible to rationally doubt that there is a thinking “I.” In assuming the "I" in the "I think" premise, it seems suspicious to find a certain "I am" in the conclusion, as if he seeded the sought outcome in his initial sowing.

Moreover, another elephant in Descartes’ room is that thinking is not exactly the same as knowing. Thus, if one were to hypothetically exclude knowledge of thinking from the cogito’s premise, to say in effect, “(While not knowing that) I think, therefore (I know) I am,” it is noteworthy that the "therefore" does not necessarily follow, for not all acts of thinking imply acts of true knowledge. People can think untrue thoughts. If excluding knowledge from the premise, it presumes that certain knowledge can be a consequence, product, or result of uncertain thinking, or that thought necessarily converts to certain knowledge, which has yet to be demonstrated. If he says, "I think," then thinking of what? Swans? Daffodils? Thinking itself? By thinking of thinking he is certain of being? It seems inescapable that by stating "I think," he actually means "I know I think," which again inserts epistemic certainty into the premise.

Knowledge, of course, could also be cast, more Platonically, as anamnesis, a concept which is akin to recollection, recognition, and remembering, and not so much to thinking per se. And so how thinking converts into certain knowledge again remains untouched. To say thinking proves a thinker is facile, at best, or flat out wrong if one were to agree with Gautama or Hume, as mentioned above. To say knowing proves a knower is equally facile, again if not dubious. Perhaps it would be accurate to state that “he thinks, therefore he thinks he is,” but how he actually gets to certain knowing from thinking remains undisclosed and unproven.

What is worse, he has to somehow be epistemically certain that he is thinking, which as noted above inserts the desired epistemic certainty in the premise. If the truth or falsity of any particular thought is treated as irrelevant, merely the existential fact of thinking, then it again becomes tautological. In other words, if he knows he is thinking, then he already has the certainty he seeks and thus cannot arrive at this certainty as a conclusion without falling again into viciously circular reasoning. Whether interpreting the stress as being on the ontological or the epistemological view of the cogito, both emphases necessitate an epistemic certainty in the premise in order to assert either the certain being who is thinking, or the certain knowledge that said being has. In other words, he must know that they are, in truth, thinking, and not, say, sitting, wondering, or whistling.

Existence, which is to say being, is presupposed in all acts, including acts of thinking and reasoning about existence, and thus existence (implicit in acts) cannot become a premise of its own proof. Likewise, knowledge is presupposed in all assertions, including assertions about knowledge, and so knowledge (implicit in assertions) also cannot become a premise of its own proof. On the one hand, if seeking to find certainty for existence via thinking, then one has to assume the certain existence of the thinking agent, and so one can never arrive at certain existence as a conclusion because it was already enfolded in the premise. On the other hand, if seeking to find certainty for knowledge via thinking, then one has to assume that one is certainly knowing that thinking is happening, and that a being is doing it, and so one can again never arrive at certain knowledge as a conclusion because it was already implicit in the premise. Descartes’ argument therefore fails both as ontology and epistemology due to its intrinsic, self-defeating circularity.

To conclude, the phenomenon of self-awareness of personal being is an overwhelming fact for a person, which as a fact is not proven so much as submitted to and subsequently employed in all acts, including acts of knowledge and proof. Just as one does not look into a mirror to prove one sees or has eyes, much less that one exists, likewise one does not resort to an extrinsic logical proof in order to establish certain knowledge that one exists or that one can know things with certainty. The use of knowledge in generating assertions inescapably presupposes the reality of knowledge prerequisite to asserting. Assertions thus are a consequence of knowing, and are not knowing’s ground, as a wave does not wet an ocean, nor a leaf give birth to a tree.

One must presuppose epistemic certainty as a criteria and guide in order to prove that knowledge of x or y is certain, for the persistent multiplication of ignorance does not of itself produce certain knowledge as if sui generis, for even denying certainty is a type of certainty - a certainty of uncertainty. Likewise, one must presuppose epistemic certainty if one is reasoning on its behalf, for without it there would be no reasoning; there would be no rational criteria by which Descartes could know that his epistemic certainty was in fact certain if there was no rational substructure to which he implicitly and at all points was relying upon and being guided by in his acts of reasoning. And so, in sum, Descartes failed at the start; he has not proven anything, merely fallen victim to vicious circularity.

The Hermeneutic Impossibility of Sola Scriptura

One of the key problems with sola Scriptura is its failure to be able to provide, in principle, a sustainably authoritative hermeneutic, for at no point does the fallible reader of Scripture ascend beyond fallibility. Certainty, beyond a mere willfulness, must remain elusive. To attempt to counter this problem, one of the principle supports of sola Scriptura is the doctrine of the clarity or “perspicuity” of Scripture, that, according to the Westminster Confession, states (Chapter 1:7):

All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed, for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

In other words, the essentials of salvation, such as the full divinity and humanity of Christ, the Trinity, the nature and scope of the Atonement, Justification by Faith, the relationship of Faith and Works, of Law and Grace, and all the basic doctrines necessary to salvation, are so abundantly clear from Scripture that no extraordinary means are necessary to understand them (though perhaps not to a “saving understanding,” as the section prior to that which was quoted could be said to imply). A careful look at this doctrine, however, is that it is not merely a claim about the clarity of Scripture, but about the reading and understanding of Scripture; it is about fallen man’s ability to read and understand the sacred truths of Scripture without any extraordinary support.

As will be argued, the problem with Sola Scriptura is thus not centered on the authority of the Scriptures, but the authority of any given interpretation of the Scriptures, for (1:10)

The Supreme Judge, by whom all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.

In other words, all being submitted to Scripture, no decree of council, no Church Father (“ancient writer”), no doctrine formulated by men, can have any authority, intrinsic or bestowed, but only the Holy Spirit “speaking in the Scripture,” which is inexorably to mean: as read, interpreted, and understood by fallible man. Careful observation will note that, since according to Reformed dogma all individual readers are in principle fallible, the assertion of the Bible’s unequaled authority is emptied of its force, and the Holy Spirit’s right guidance unverifiable, for fallible man cannot be removed from the interpretive equation. The question thus remains: Which fallible man is doing the examining and determining, and by what principle should he or his cohorts be trusted to be interpreting truly and on behalf of the Holy Spirit? What principle cause for trust can be given to any one his readings? In other words, by what principle ought someone believe, say, Athanasius or Augustine, Luther or Calvin, Sammy or Johnny? What guarantees their trustworthiness? Or proves their untrustworthiness? Since man is fallible, and even “the purest Churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error” (25.5), then what guarantees that the Holy Spirit is really guiding any of them aright?

One could argue that Luther and Calvin are Scriptural, but this answer brings one right back to the dilemma of, “Says who?” Who, other than fallible readers, declares that they are Scriptural? Why should one believe the report that they are Scriptural? On what basis is the appeal being made? If fallible readers state that they are Scriptural, and then points at Scripture in order to prove it, then the same holds for Arians and Unitarians, for they also argue for their position by pointing to Scripture. The appeal then collapses back onto the assertion of some fallible individual interpreter, where the individual interpreter is consequently made the arbiter of authority and of orthodoxy, the discerner of the Holy Spirit.

Other than oneself, no one else can be hermeneutically trusted, and even self is considered suspect. According to this view, the hermeneutic authority doesn't rest in the Church, and is in principle denied because Reformed thinking paradigmatically and dogmatically stands upon Scripture Alone. For example, no reference to the Church Fathers could carry any type of binding authority, and the extreme conditional acceptance of any other person's reading of Scripture is always filtered through the “isolated” and individual arbiter of truth: “Do I agree that they are Scriptural? Am I persuaded?” Thus the notion of perspicuity fails, for nothing is finally clear because no one is clearly trustable, and appeals to the Holy Spirit's infallible guiding of fallible readers does not overcome the trust problem. If one cannot trust "the Church," then certainly one cannot trust "a man," so who is left to identify the truth of Scripture with any authority? Persuasion is all that is left, and since the interpreting individual is inextricably bound up with the trust problem at all points, even if hypothetically he were correct, in principle no one could ever be sure. What is more, the historic and complex debates regarding central and essential Christian doctrines have demonstrated amply that core doctrines regarding the essentials of salvation - such as the divinity and humanity of Christ, the three co-equal Persons of the Trinity, to name only two issues - have been anything but easy to resolve.

For example, if two men, say a Reformed and an Orthodox Christian, both present a reading of Scripture or some theological proposition, then a third man must ask, “Why ought, or how can, I trust either of you?” Since according to his paradigm Tradition carries no real authority, the Reformed Christian will begin pointing to Scripture, and seek to persuade based on his ability to synthesize targeted Scriptural verses, and thus appeal to the third man's feelings and intellect, so as to convince him that his reading is the right one. This situation, however, describes a closed loop between the two men and Scripture. The appeal is founded on that individual Reformed Christian's personal skill with handling Scripture, and in principle no adding to the number of fallible Reformed Christians in this scenario will help because at each point the appeal is to the persuasive skill of the person pointing to the Scripture. Since neither Church nor Tradition can in principle be trusted, nothing beyond individual persuasion and personal conviction can in principle be had. The question, “Why should I believe you?” therefore cannot be answered except by appealing to the limited and admittedly fallible skill of the Reformed expert and the impressibility of the one being persuaded. Considering how many are converted to various heretical movements, whether by intellectual, emotional, or mystical persuasion, the notion of trusting that one is in the true Church is not securely founded beyond the personal persuadedness.

The Orthodox Christian, on the other hand, appeals to something much broader than his own personal skill at reading and synthesizing Scripture. He appeals to the whole Church’s reading together with her unbroken, historic, and living Tradition. In short, the Church has a hermeneutic authority that is impossible to the Reformed Christian. The fallible man is compensated for by the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church. It is therefore the collective witness of Christ’s Orthodox Church, the pillar and ground of the truth (1 Timothy 3:15), that is the source of appeal, and so her wisdom is transpersonal and rooted in Christ Himself who founded it and promised that the gates of hell shall not prevail over it (Matthew 16:18).

If one cannot trust the Church, one cannot yet then trust the Reformed Christian, for at no point does his hermeneutic have any authority beyond his personality. If he is outside the Church (however he might conceive of it) then he is of course no Christian, but even if he is in the Church, then it makes no difference for him as regards his hermeneutic, because as a member of a fallible Church he still has no personal hermeneutic authority. His reading can never escape the gravity well of his personality. Between the two, the Reformed and the Orthodox, it is therefore the untrustworthiness of the Reformed position that ultimately defeats him. It is unsustainable to simply keep pointing to the Scripture when the finger doing the pointing appeals only to his own skill at pointing. The pointing finger becomes the elephant in the room. That is why, in order to escape the bounds of the fallible ego, the Church’s hermeneutic authority must be presupposed in all Christian inquiry and persuasion, because the Scriptures themselves demand the presence of the Church as, together, having synergistic authority. In short, the Church is an epistemic precondition of the hermeneutic act, and consequently of authoritative, orthodox theology. Without presupposing the Church as the possessor of hermeneutic authority to bindingly interpret, one inexorably falls into skepticism, for certainly no one member of the Church has that authority nor can he in principle contain an authority greater than or equal to that of the whole Body, or to that of the Scriptures themselves. This is the death knell of sola Scriptura, for if neither the Church as a contiguous whole nor the fallible individual Christian can in principle be trusted to interpret Scripture (or even infallibly identify what Scripture is) with any binding authority, then skepticism results towards all interpretations of Scripture.

It is worth stressing that in the sola Scriptura scenario it also would not matter how authoritative the Scriptures are in themselves, for their delimits and content are inaccessible to the fallibility of fallen man's hermeneutics. Man could not infallibly declare, say, that 3 John, Jude, or 1 Enoch are or are not authentic Scripture. The very removing of the deuterocanon is a perfect example of the genetic failure of sola Scriptura, for their presence or removal are now retained or carried out only on the basis of the fallible authority of fallible man to fallibly identify them as, or as not, Scripture, for certainty of inclusion or disclusion cannot in principle be had. Only an authoritative Church can in principle declare this. Thus according to the internal implications of sola Scriptura, the Scriptures are reduced to an unapproachable chain of islands impenetrably surrounded by the fog and treacherous reefs of man's fallibility. It is as if there is a loosely collected pile of rocks available, but no sure way to identify what is true gold from fake, because regarding the Scriptures no man alone can make that determination authoritatively or with any certainty, and yet sola Scriptura denies this authority also to the Church, and therefore acts as a Trojan Horse of unbelief. Unless one were to cut the very limb one is standing on, all authoritative acts of determination and interpretation of Scripture therefore presuppose and stand inside the authority of the Church, and since sola Scripturists deny this to the Church, denying what they unconsciously presuppose (for they do claim to authoritatively know the Scriptures in an orthodox manner, hence their "borrowed capital"), they self-destructively contradict themselves in laying any claim to the contents or boundaries of Scripture, and also, it might be said, contradict themselves regarding whether or not they can even be labelled "Church."

Thus, with the foregoing in mind, it is noteworthy that regarding the Orthodox position on Councils, it is not a Council qua Council that is authoritative in the Church, but the Church itself speaking in, or as, a council. There have been false councils, and so the appeal to a Council's decision is not to the Council per se, but to the voice of the Holy Spirit rooted infallibly in the ontology of the Church, within which the Council was made to happen, and through which He spoke. It is therefore the Church considered mystically, since as Bride she is ontologically rooted in Christ Himself and thus cannot be a merely human institution, that must and does have the hermeneutic authority to rightly divide Scripture. Thus the appeal of the Orthodox Christian is to the very Bride of Christ and so to Christ Himself. As His Bride she is the proper identifier and interpreter of Scripture, and speaking as the Body, whether through Councils or approved Fathers of the Church, she defeats the individualistic appeals of the Reformed communities who paradigmatically stand in constant judgment of the Church, Christ's Bride, and so outside of her. Since to stand in judgment of something is to stand outside of it, the Reformed communities are in very principle outside the Church considered as such, placing themselves outside of her, for she is ever put in the dock.

An authoritative text requires an authoritative mechanism of transmission in order to be delivered with any certainty. This step is missing in the doctrine of sola Scriptura. Sola Scriptura simply posits a perfect text, but hermeneutically speaking it is rendered impossible to approach authoritatively, for one can never really trust, in a philosophical sense, that one either has the proper text or that one has the right reading of it. The text becomes isolated behind a wall of untouchable perfection - for everything else is reduced to human opinion. The problem with this is that the claim that it is a perfect and authoritative text ends up becoming mere opinion, for there is no personal or ecclesial authority lending anything to the claim that Scripture is authoritative. Yes, the text is perfect and authoritative, but without the Church one cannot claim its perfection with any certain authority. There might be any number of Christians who share that opinion, but the fact that, according to sola Scriptura, authority is not implicitly granted to the Church therefore renders the claim’s ascendency beyond opinion impossible in very principle, no matter how many people may agree with the opinion that it is perfect and authoritative.

The Church, however, being the pillar and ground of the truth (1Timothy 3:15), is the authoritative delivery mechanism for the Scriptures, bringing them to the people of God. The impossibility of the contrary leaves no real option, for otherwise the text of Scripture is doomed to all manner of division and heresy as there is only vying opinions about a so-called infallible text. But who gives the authoritative text? God, yes. But who does God give it to? The Church. And the Church receives it and passes it down, which is to say “traditions” it. Without the Church’s authority, what comprises the right interpretation of Scripture is constantly and irresolvably open to debate, division, and subdivision. God, however, does not deposit His Scripture in an unworthy vessel. Just as Christ is a “scandal of particularity,” so the Church is a grace-protected extension of this “scandal,” one which extends itself through history via disciplic apostolic succession, which is to say an unbroken organic continuity of Orthodox Christians throughout history. If Christians can affirm that Christ really did die and rise again, that He created the world out of nothing, then it is no stretch to affirm the historical reality of the unbroken and historically contiguous Orthodox Church.

-Fr. Joshua Schooping

Faith in the Unseen: Atheism and Special Pleading

Common among many atheist arguments is the presupposition that the act of “faith” is something that, if done, is done instead of relying on evidence, perhaps even in opposition to relying on evidence. According to this view, faith is something exclusively reserved for religion, and science is proffered as an alternative to faith, relying as it does on empiricism, which is to say reliance on direct, testable observation. Of course, the very notion of relying on evidence implies that one is performing an act of faith in evidence, for faith, coming from the Greek term pistis (πίστις), means to trust in or to rely on, to have conviction of the truth of something, from peithō (πείθω), which means to be persuaded, as in by argument or demonstration, and not only as regards transcendental matters but mundane also.

A certain problem thus immediately arises for the atheist, a problem which ought to be raised, because to restrict faith to such a narrow, religious range of meaning is to stack the deck against religion in order to isolate acts of faith from acts of reason, and through the fallacy of special pleading exclude the many acts of faith that atheists commit each day. For example, an atheist will say that it is not “true” that God exists, but within that statement is presupposed some notion of truth.

Now, truth is invisible. Truth cannot be seen or heard, but must be abstracted from what is seen and heard. One may see many true things, but the things themselves are not truth. Truth is being claimed about some aspect of those things, but the truth itself is not those things. And yet, atheists typically affirm that they believe in truth.

Likewise, logic is unseen. One can see evidence for it in various types of statements, but logic itself is not empirical, and transcends the instances in which it is discerned. What is more, concepts are not empirical, one may see ink on a page, but the word written there is only mentally perceived, and certainly the concept which is expressed by the word is in itself non-empirical. And yet, atheists purport to rely on logic.

Again, love is concealed from the naked eye. One may observe many acts of love, but love itself remains hidden from view. For example, a mother may provide her child some hot chocolate on a cold winter day, and through this act one might perceive that there is love present. On another cold day, a person could order a hot chocolate from a coffee shop, and perceive in this act no love is present. Of course, the situation could be reversed and the mom be said to have no love, and the barista to be most loving. The point at hand, however, is that love is not an identity with the act of giving hot chocolate. The love itself is invisible, and the mere act of giving a drink is insufficient to determine whether or not love is there. And yet, atheists will often extol the real value of love, basing claims of accusation against religionists on a perceived lack of love.

What is more, peace is invisible. Peace is not simply the visible act of not fighting, or the visible act of sitting still. Even if one were to identify an act of peace, one must yet have an abstract criteria which transcends the act and which enables the act to be described as peaceful. One does not “see” peace, one perceives the invisible peace via empirical percepts.

Yet again, gravity itself is invisible. People see things fall all the time, but seeing something fall is not seeing gravity itself. One can test for the effects gravity may have on an object, but gravity itself is out of empirical view. In fact, many scientific realities are not directly verifiable empirically, only the effects they have on the things that are being measured.

In sum, there are many invisible, non-empirical “things” that most atheists would grant are in some sense real, especially in cases such as gravity. The question remains, how does this relate to faith, especially to “religious” faith?

St. Paul describes the nature of faith: “Now faith is the substance [ὑπόστασις, hypostasis] of things hoped for, the evidence [ἔλεγχος, elegchos] of things not seen. … By faith we understand [νοέω, noeō] that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which appear [φαίνω, phainō]” (Hebrews 11:1, 3).

In other words, faith is the intellectual substance or substructure of what is not immediately present to the senses. Faith is that act which perceives what is only mediately present through phenomena (φαίνω, phainō). Faith is the organ, so to speak, by which one understands (νοέω, noeō) and interacts with that which undergirds phenomena, what ties together the disparate experiences of the senses into a rational construct or hypostasis. Faith is the mind’s noetic substantiation of invisible, non-empirical realities, including such things as truth, logic, love, and gravity. For example, love produces many effects, but the effects of love cannot be a mere identity with love, otherwise a hateful barista’s giving of a hot chocolate would be indistinguishable from the act of love of the tender mother giving her child the same type of drink on a wintry day. Faith is thus the mind’s transempirical perception of such things as love, and also the means by which one performs empirical acts of love.

Moreover, St. Paul does not describe faith as: “faith is in the substance of things hoped for.” Neither does he define faith as: “faith is… in the evidence of things not seen.” Rather, faith is itself the substance and evidence or proof of things distant and invisible, i.e. that which is not known by the senses but discerned by the mind. Faith is thus something much more substantial and epistemological, for it is that by which we understand (νοέω, noeō) the invisible things or causes in which phenomena are rooted. In other words, an object’s visible falling is rooted in the invisible thing or force called gravity, and faith is the operation of the human mind by which one can perceive or understand that gravitational force which gives rise to the empirical falling.

Since gravity itself is not sensed, only its effects on various objects, faith is the epistemological process by which we connect the effects on those various objects to the source of those effects, i.e. gravity. In short, even though gravity is invisible, we have faith that there is such a thing called gravity because we understand the evidence, i.e. its effects, and perceive these effects as unified in a thing called gravity. Likewise, we have faith that our mother loves us because the various actions she performs visibly can be hypostatically unified in what is understood as love.

In this sense, faith is understood as the normal process of understanding from sensory experience that which is not itself reducible to sensory experience, and as such bears a resemblance to the cognitive process of abstraction, though in the case of faith it also includes that by which one can perform acts of or from that noetically perceived hypostasis, for example acts of love. It is also that by which we can receive these realities through their effects, as in, say, receiving acts of love as acts of love. Faith is, as such, not only that by which we understand these things, but also that by which we connect with, enact, and receive them. In other words, we can measure gravity, share love, live in peace, receive justice, know truth, give mercy, and celebrate beauty, when none of these things are in themselves strictly reducible to the empirical; and the means by which we engage with these invisible realities is embedded in the epistemological process termed faith. Despite being manifest through evidence, they transcend the evidence, and so it is said that we have faith in something, say love, and then point to the visible evidences of it.

Just as a hand is what enables us to grasp a ball, faith is what enables us to noetically “grasp” love, truth, logic, peace, etc. Moreover, just as one sees by means of eyes, it is likewise by means of faith that one perceives love, truth, logic, peace, etc. On the basis of its perception, faith is what opens the possibility of giving and receiving love, having the perception and conviction of truth, using and assessing logic, seeking and pursuing peace, etc. Just as the eye enables the mind to perceive physical forms or objects, so faith enables the mind to "see" or perceive the aforementioned noetic forms or “objects.” Faith is, in this sense, the eye of the mind; it is, as it were, the life or activity of the soul.

And so, when an atheist says they don’t rely on faith, or believe in invisible realities, but only empirical data, we can point out that this is untrue. Simply believing that there is some truth is itself the evidence in their belief in the invisible reality called truth, and their reliance on (i.e. faith in) it in acts of reliance on (i.e. acts of faith in) empirical data. Of course, God is truth, and insofar as an atheist relies on truth, he relies on God. Likewise, God is love, and insofar as an atheist advocates love, he advocates God. God is also pure being, and insofar as an atheist believes things have being, he is pointing to the hypostatic reality of God. God, although He is much more, is also the principle of order, the Logos, and so as much as an atheist declares order in the universe, he declares the principle of order, which is God. The atheist is unable to work out the balance of all these attributes or unify them in the single concept called God, mostly because of an excessive reliance on the empirical and a deep misunderstanding of the God concept, and also because of bad behavior by religionists. Nonetheless, the atheist performs acts of faith in non-empirical realities, and must in order to function as a human being, for faith is among the most typical of human activities. Only through the fallacy of special pleading can he deny this.

The Orthodox Teaching on the Sinlessness of Mary

The Orthodox Church teaches that the Theotokos was sinless in the sense of having never personally sinned. She was sinless by grace, needing the Savior, whereas Christ was sinless by nature, being the Savior.

How can this be?

The notion of the Fall means that we are born needing the Savior, and not as a consequence of anything we have personally done. We sin because we are Fallen; we are not Fallen because we sin. Our condition of being Fallen precedes our personal acts of sin. Thus, even though we may have never personally sinned, we are still constitutionally Fallen, which is to say the principle of sin and death is still operational within us even if we have not sinned personally.

Scripturally, this can be explained by what happened to the prophet Jeremiah: "Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you (from qadash, meaning sanctified, hallowed, made holy); I appointed you a prophet to the nations" (Jeremiah 1:5).

In other words, if Jeremiah can be sanctified by God from the womb, then it is not impossible for the Theotokos to likewise be sanctified from the womb. This is not quite the same as the Roman Catholic doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which the Orthodox Church does not affirm, but is instead the Biblical doctrine that one can be sanctified from the womb, prior to any personal act of sin, being made holy by a special act of the Lord on some person's behalf, preserved from acts of sin by grace and so set apart for some unique or special work on His behalf.

This does not mean that Jeremiah was sinless by nature, but by grace, and so he still required the Savior because his constitutional position, so to speak, was that of being one among the Fallen, despite being sanctified from the womb. Likewise, the Theotokos was one among the Fallen, though without ever having personally sinned in any way, set apart and sanctified in a way surpassing even that of the prophet Jeremiah, for she bore in her person the very Word of God.