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97-Year-Old Philosopher Ponders the Meaning of Life: "What Is the Point of It All?" | Open Culture. (Hat tip, Rus Bowden.)
" I think it’s important to figure out why it is then that people are afraid of death. Why am I concerned about it?
Maybe there are things — I think there are lots of things — that can't be figured out, if by that you mean explaining them in terms of reason and logic.That, for me, is where faith comes in — going with your deep-down sense of things and playing a hunch. I have had one experience that greatly strengthened my faith, which is not to say that there was anything "feel good" about it.
There was a line in a show whereby an angel explain that she has no faith, because as an angel who is privy to it all, faith is not needed. This line of thinking creates a faith puzzle. Do religious experiences strengthen faith? Do they, rather, shore up faith? And/or do they alternatively lessen doubt, which allows faith to take pre-eminence in a belief system?
ReplyDeleteI like to differentiate between faith and belief. Belief tends to become, as you say, a system — a rational construct. Faith is more alive than that, something you cary around with you, that is a part of you. Or so has been my experience.
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