Faith is said to be a strong belief in religious doctrines based on spiritual convictions or having complete confidence in something or someone. While reason is said to be an argument assertion that supports a belief especially trivial hypothesis given after conclusion. Since decades faith and reason have been regarded as rationalized sources for religious beliefs since they give out similar epistemic function. Theologians and philosophers have taken an interest in the two on how they are related. Some say that there is no inconsistency between the two, others believes that faith and reason can be in strife which is genuine over different propositions. Others have disagreed as to whether the two ought to prevail when the two conflict. Despite different thinking and reasoning of many theologians as well as philosophers, I think that faith and reason are connected. To understand the problem of faith and reason deeply is first to know the authority of faith and reason how they relate to which one can justify a religious belief. Doing this is made possible by the different basic models of interaction that give the reason that faith and reason relate.
First, there is the conflict model which states that reason and faith are the same even though they may seem different making a valid opposition which is between the fundamentalist of religion who favors faith more than reason (Rist, 2014). The fundamentalist insists that faith should come before reasoning. However, the scientist also says that one should explain why things happen for a reason. It is not that it just happened it is because something caused it to happen. Furthermore, the conflict model argues that faith and reason are the same it provides the impression that when you put your faith in something, and it works, one can prove that because of putting faith is the reason that it worked (Rist, 2014). For example, you put faith that someone you love had gone to the battle in another country that he will come home safely after the war, and after the war, he returns home safely then you can state that the faith that he would come home was the reason why he came home safely.
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Another reason that shows faith and reason is the same as that of their relationship which each is incomplete without the other. Faith and reason are described as elements in a realm with faith meant to provide an upper constitution and reason offering a lower segment. This means that reason is incomplete and inadequate when without faith. Due to this dependency between the two, it is wise to conclude that their relationship is stronger and gives a sense of compatibility. Also, another reason that shows faith and reason are compatible is that the two are more than mere harmonies. However, they are less mutually dependent. Unlike weak compatibilist where faith and reason need to intersect at a certain point or the domains overlap. Unlike the other compatibilities this compatibility the faith and reason are seen as domain elements portrayed horizontally. For example, the Pope used to vacillate between the usual and strong sense of compatibilist when he noted Fides et Ratio (Paul, 2012).
In the Bible, the reason is derived from Greek word logos from where logic came from. It is essential to believe in God by facts. According to Hebrews 11; 1-3, faith is assertion of the things we hope and for being proof of things that cannot see and also the certainty of reality. Therefore, faith and reason are working together interchangeably depending on each other hence we can say that faith and reason are similar and attuned (Rist, 2014). Furthermore, the Co-director of Fordham center on Religious and Culture insisted that faith and reason sound as if they are together. He pointed out that love and marriage measures faith. It is not much to proclaim that pairing faith and reason has become the basis of signaling all intellectual and political faultiness. Meaning that it is a reflection of our binary method of conceptualizing matters, proving that faith and reason are attuned and they work as a pair (Van Till, 2015).
In conclusion, faith as a strong belief in religious doctrines based on spiritual convictions or having complete confidence in something or someone and reason as an assertion supporting a belief especially trivial argument that is given after final admission seems to be strongly connected. Despite different thinking and reasoning of many theologians and philosophers, I think that faith and reason are connected. To understand the problem of faith and reason in deep one needs to understand first the authority of faith and reason how they relate to each other as well as which one can justify a religious belief. Faith depends on reason and reason depends on faith. Different reasons describe the situation where faith and reason are considered the same. First, faith and reason are compatible because they are harmonious. Second, the two are interdependent making them compatible entirely. More so, the model of compatibility reveals how faith and reason are compatible and depends on each other.
References
Paul, J. (2012). Fides et ratio: On the Relationship between Faith and Reason. In Washington, DC: United States Conference of Catholic Biships .
Rist, J. (2014). Faith and reason. The Cambridge Companion to Augustine , 26-39.
Van Till, H. J. (2015). When faith and reason cooperate. Intelligent design creationism and its critics: Philosophical, theological, and scientific perspectives, 147-163.
