Blind Faith or Reason

Blind Faith or Reason
By Abdullah Hashem

God has been portrayed in many religions including Christianity and Islam as a God of faith. Faith is arguably the main virtue stressed in Christianity and Islam by many Christian and Muslim scholars, writers and leaders. When something doesn’t make sense or when you do not understand God’s plan you should blindly accept because faith equals blind acceptance according to many of the teachings and writings of these religious scholars however when you examine God in the Bible and Qu’ran you will see that God does not require blind faith but rather requires faith by reason. God does not want or expect humans to believe blindly but rather he created us with reason and a mind to use it and that is why we are a special creation and unlike so many of God’s other creations. Not only did he give us a mind to reason with but he also requires us to use it. None of the prophets sent by God in the Bible or the Qu’ran were blind believers. They all spoke to God, received revelations from God and were instructed by God to commit certain acts or carry out certain missions. Not one of the prophets described in the Bible or the Qu’ran had traveled around preaching the word of God on their own or based on their own understandings of previous texts by faith alone but rather by receiving teachings from God and often challenging God on his teachings, instructions or decisions.
In Genesis 1:26 God states “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea…..and over all the earth.” A popular interpretation of this verse in Christianity is that God made man to look like him physically. Why would God need to create a creature that looked like him? God clearly hates anything that takes his place of glory and worship as he demonstrates throughout the Bible and the Qu’ran when he repeatedly destroys cities with idol worshippers and repeatedly forbids the worship of anything in his place or anything of his likeness? He is a jealous God (Exodus 20:5; Deuteronomy 4:24.) It would seem that he would not create man in his likeness for the simple fact that he would not want another God, or another creature that looked like God; that would take away God’s unique look or form. Rather it would make sense that he might create humans in his likeness by a specific trait. The important likeness that was given to humans by God was reason. These are traits of God as he has reason but having the trait of reason does not mean that a person would ultimately become God or even be like God as people reason in different ways and make different choices based on their reasoning. However having the trait of reason that God has ultimately gave humans dominion over all other creations on Earth and it makes sense why humans would have dominion over all the rest of God’s creations, because none of God’s other creations have reason. They make choices to survive and not because of any sort of reasoning.
God’s first test of Adam or instruction to Adam, his first human creation as told in the Qu’ran 2:35-2:36 and in Genesis 2:16-2:17 was not a test of Adam’s faith as Adam already knew God existed but it was a test of reason. God warned Adam in both the Qu’ran and Genesis about the consequences of eating from the forbidden tree and then he left Adam with a choice that he had to make using his reason. The choice was to disobey God and eat from the tree knowing the consequences in order to become like Gods as the serpent tells Eve in Genesis 3:5. God wanted to watch the outcome of human choice and see how humans would use their reason. It was never to test whether Adam believed in God. The consequences of this choice was now that humanity would fall to Earth and all of Adam and Eve’s descendants would have to use their reason to make the right choices and save themselves from hell. This is described in the Qu’ran in versus 2:38-2:39 where God tells Adam that humans shall dwell on Earth and whoever chooses to follow God’s ways shall see paradise and whoever doesn’t shall receive hell. It’s important to stress that God does not say he who has faith in me or believes in my existence shall enter heaven but rather he says “Whoever follows my guidance.” You can’t have faith in guidance but rather you must choose to follow God’s guidance by your reasoning and realizing that God’s guidance makes sense and is best for you. Once again it does not seem that God would want blind followers but rather those who use their reason to realize God exists.
Throughout the Bible and the Qu’ran God gives us signs of his existence and his creation. He does this so that we may read his messages or texts and come to the conclusion that God exists through using our reason. Then and only then can we truly appreciate God’s might and glory. Blind faith does not give God the satisfaction or credit he deserves. A person who blindly believes in God without any reason believes because he was told to believe and might live his life according to God’s laws but will never truly appreciate God fully unless he uses his reason to reach God. That is why God has hidden many scientific facts throughout the Qu’ran and the Bible. In Job 26:7 for example when Job is talking about God he says “He hangeth the earth upon nothing.” As everyone knows now the Earth is not attached or held up by anything. It floats freely in space rotating around the sun however back when the Bible was written this knowledge obviously didn’t exist. I think this was a perfect way to show how God intends for us to find him by reason. An individual through using his reason might come to the conclusion that because this scientific fact was available in the Bible way before we discovered it as a fact there must be a God and the Bible is proof of it. The same type of scientific proof or signs are revealed in the Qu’ran for example in the Quran 10:61 “Not even an atom's weight eludes your Lord, either on earth or in heaven. Nor is there anything smaller than that, or larger, which is not in a Clear Book.” This verse talks about Atoms and smaller particles than atoms which are believed now to be protons and neurons which compromise the Atom. The Atom and its smaller particles were not discovered until this last century. A person who believes blindly will not care so much about these signs as he believes anyway just because he was told to unlike a person who uses his reason to seek these signs and then is mind blown and truly appreciates God’s might and wisdom. He sees that not only is God real but he also sees proof of God’s ability. It gets a person who uses reason to think about how complicated the structure of matter is and how God created it all and designed it all. You may seek a complete list of these scientific proofs of the Qu’ran and the Bible by reading the E-Text of the book Miracles of the Qu’ran by Harun Yahya at http://harunyahya.com/miracles_of_the_quran_01.php and by reading Science and the Bible by Henry Madison Morris.
If God expected or required humans to accept him by faith blindly surely he would punish those who would challenge his existence or his messages. However this does not happen when God is challenged numerous times throughout the Bible and the Qu’ran. A perfect example of this is in Genesis 18:25 where God decides to destroy Sodom and Abraham challenges God saying “That be far from thee to do after this manner, slay the righteous with the wicked…Shall not the judge of all the earth do right?” Why does Abraham challenge God? Abraham comes to the conclusion through reason that a just God would never destroy an entire city, giving the righteous and the wicked the same punishment. If God has prophets so that they may guide humanity and be an example to humanity for what is right then why would God allow Abraham to challenge him and why would this part of the story be included in the Bible so that humanity may see Abraham challenging God? If Abraham believed blindly in God he would not have asked or challenged God because he would just know that God is right. However blind faith is not enough for Abraham and he uses his reason and challenges God. What’s more striking about this story is that God does not get angry at Abraham for this challenge. He accepts it and even negotiates with Abraham. He does not see Abraham’s question or challenge as a sign of Abraham losing faith in God but rather as an opportunity for him to engage Abraham in a negotiation on the outcome of Sodom. God didn’t have to accept Abraham’s challenge or even negotiate with him but it seems like God took the opportunity to negotiate with Abraham and get him using his reason even more and thinking about the situation.
God accepts Mohammed’s challenge in Islam in Mohammed’s ascension to heaven as alluded to in the Qu’ran 17:1. Mohammed ascends to heaven where God tells him to tell his people to pray fifty times a day. Mohammed leaves God’s presence and encounters Moses who asks Mohammed about what God instructed him to do. Moses then tells Mohammed that fifty prayers a day is too much and his people would never be able to complete it. Mohammed to returns to God several time each time reducing the number of daily prayers more and more until he reaches five. God never gets angry at Mohammed for challenging his commands but rather just as he did with Abraham accepts Mohammed’s challenge and negotiates with him repeatedly. Through the above two stories and there are many others throughout the Bible and Qu’ran, it seems like God will give out harsh commands or come to harsh decisions to get us to think and use our reason. If God is all mighty and all knowing he obviously knew that Abraham and Mohammed were going to challenge him so if he wanted us to accept faith blindly and never challenge it or use our reason to come to conclusions why would he have picked those two prophets to be examples for humanity? Why would he emphasize these stories in the Bible and Qu’ran? The only answer is to show humans that it is ok to challenge and it is a good thing to use reason to come to conclusions and seek truths. Reason is the only thing that will keep a person from knowing total and complete truth. People can join any religion, cult, belief or organization even though it might not be truth by blind faith but with reason a person will know and discover eventually the truth.
As said in the Matthew 7:7 “Seek and ye shall find” and in the Quran 33:29 "But if you are seeking God and His messenger, and the abode of the Hereafter, then God has prepared for the righteous among you a great recompense." As just shown God says seek and you will find me or seek me and ye shall be rewarded. How may one seek God? How may one seek anything? Not by blind faith but rather you seek anything by reasoning things out. Reasoning is the virtue that should be stressed in Christianity and Islam rather than just faith. If you have reason behind your faith, your faith will be strong, if you don’t have any reason behind your faith, your faith will collapse.