how does belief in God present ?

as our cognitive faculties incline to know, understand, and communicate true belief of and from God — how is this possible if we abandon our mind's due role in faith ?

if faith is supposed to be on our limbs, what acts to put it there ? if faith is supposed to be in our heart, how do we know it to testify to it? if faith is supposed to be in our soul, how do we accept its meaning? if faith is supposed to be on our tongue, in what way do we speak it?

our faith is an expression of the entire being. any other faith, you will have to put those faculties in a box — such as your heart, your mind, and so forth.

 

the "evidentailist objection to theistic belief" (p = God exists):

1. S knows that p, if it is based on a good argument

2. there is no good argument that p

c. therefore, S does not know that p

 

"theistic evidentialism" would reject premise 2.

"fideism" rejects the argument as erroneous; belief is a pragmatic commitment of our moral faculties, beyond reason. (think of Pascal's wager)

"reformed epistemology" would deny premise 1; belief in God is a basic belief acquired by unadulterated, pure reason, as a natural machination of the mind's inner-workings.

 

our emphasis on reason as being congruent with revelation means affirming that, in some sense, reason is the epistemic ground for accepting revelation; also, inferential evidence may be epistemically required for knowledge of God.

at the same time, this acknowledgement of being able to know God non-inferentially via the inclination of our natural constitution, coupled with the notion that this natural constitution is nurtured spiritually, means that it’s possible to see Islam as embracing all three religious epistemological positions: theistic evidentialism, fideism, and reformed epistemology.

 

this being so in the sense that, although it is quite clear this position maps onto reformed epistemology in the fullest sense, it can also be seen as a weak theistic evidentialism and a weak/responsible fideism.

the evidentialism can be gleaned from the fact that there is a broad evidential scope when it comes to evidence drawn upon to know God i.e., a sign (āyāt), argument (dalīl), testimony (khabar), and spiritual inspiration or deep religious experience (ilhām).

our fideism can be gleaned from this understanding that religious knowledge grounded on a sound disposition or fiṭra (innate natural constitution), rests on religious and spiritual practice such as meditative remembrance of God, without which the mind/heart (qalb) is unable to grasp the evidence for God.

 

3 circle diagram:

theistic evidentialism — there is good reason and argument for belief in God

fideism — beyond reason, belief is a pragmatic commitment of our moral faculties

reformed epistemology — belief in God is apprehended involuntarily as a properly basic belief

 

intersecting middle = Islam