Skepticism within Religion: A Prescription for Epistemological Humility

We tend to separate religion from skepticism, and we associate science with evidence even though of religion and science, only science is open to revision. Kierkegaard remarked that there is something absurd about religious belief, and yet a religionist should believe, and even without any evidence to back up the absurd. In fact, in the early-modern period in the West, religious belief was often assumed to have a higher epistemological status than philosophy and science even though the latter two are supported by the strictures of reason and the support of empirical evidence, respectively. I submit that it is precisely to the extent that religious beliefs are held to be certain that we should be modest about them in terms of what we can know. According to Peter Adamson, religions were once very open to skepticism, whereas the Aristotelian philosophers were certain of their epistemological certainty. Considering that varied assumptions have been applied by philosophers to their craft, they should be weary of their own claims of having achieved epistemological certainty. I contend that religionists should get back to being more tolerant of, and even invite skepticism, even within their own minds. Being humbly aware of falling short, both as an individual and as a species, of grasping true religious knowledge as it is, undeluded by our own limitations (e.g., opinions), is rarely the case as religionists make declarations as if with epistemological certainty.

In a talk, Peter Adamson asked, why does God allow us to be so ignorant? Why does God make us subject to error? It must be for some reason, Descartes thought. The problem of ignorance is akin to the problem of evil. Is the former just a sub-case of the latter? They may be the same problem. I submit that even if the two problems are related or relatable as being similar, the hatred that is endemic to evil is absent from ignorance. Stated on a more secular basis, ignorance does not necessarily come with, or spring from a bad attitude.

Nevertheless, Adamson viewed ignorance in religious terms. To Augustine, ignorance is due to free-will amid original sin. Also, the limited nature of creation is why knowledge is limited, hence ignorance exists. A religious basis exists for ignorance in terms of people tending to latch on to just some knowledge. Augustine’s Free Choice of the Will does not insist on grace because Augustine had not yet encountered Palagianism. In the text, Augustine is in dialogue with Evodius, a convert to Christianity. Adam and Eve were created in a state “between wisdom and foolishness.” In our fallen state, we are “born into ignorance, difficulty, and mortality.” “Evil is turning away eternal things, . . . and instead pursuing temporal things, which are perceived by means of the body.” Also, when desires rule over the mind, “the mind is dragged by inordinate desire into ruin and poverty . . .” This characterizes infants, according to Augustine. In short, ignorance, which is synonymous with foolishness, exists due to free-will in the state of original sin. But why then are Adam and Eve ignorant? To Augustine, this is like complaining about the world because it is not as good as heaven. Descartes wrote, “it is in the nature of a finite intellect to lack understanding of many things, and it is in the nature of a created intellect to be finite.” God certainly is not obligated to do more, and we are able to obtain knowledge. According to Adamson, Stoics and neo-Platonists, including Plotinus, have contended that individual evils are part of a good whole. According to Leibniz, the best of all possible worlds reflects this philosophy. The upshot is that human ignorance is just part of the best of all possible worlds that God could create, so we should not blame God for our own ignorance. I contend that it is important even when looking at scripture in a revealed religion to keep in mind that human ignorance is not exempted on our end. Therefore, humility in making religious claims, as if declarations, could greatly reduce the typical impious air of infallibility on our end. Even if revelation does in fact come from an intelligent being that transcends the limits of human cognition, perception, and emotion, such news must travel through our fallible atmosphere before we can make sense of the distinctively religious truth.

It follows that religious accounting for human ignorance is not exhausted by one religion, or at least that in humility human epistemology should be open to alternative accounts. Even if one religion holds a monopoly on truth, the truth of this truth is not contained within our purview. Accordingly, in his talk, Peter Adamson discussed the religious account of Jainism, which is native to South Asia, with respect to ignorance. Umasvati (4^th to 5^th century), for example, author of the Tattvartha Sutra, was a Jain, so he was not a Brahmanic thinker. On the topic of the human self, Jain thought is that the Brahmanic and Buddhist philosophies are in part right and in part wrong. The Jains claim that there is an eternal, changing self. Liberation means freedom from the cycle of samsara and comes through “enlightened worldview, knowledge, and conduct,” so one is not trapped in a one-sided view. Being non-violent, Jains didn’t want to disagree too strenuously with others, but this explanation doesn’t fit with the polemics in some Jain texts. Also, the Jains criticize a person having one-sided knowledge. In addition to assertability, there is the notion of unassertability. Omniscience refers to knowledge of all substances in all their modes, past present, and future.” The path to knowledge is about elimination of karmic bondage. Growth in knowledge involves the steady falling away of one-sided thinking. Seeing the world from every perspective rather than from only one is thus to be sought.  Delusion is at the root of ignorance, and is associated with having a one-sided view; both are associated with karmic bondage, which keeps a person from liberation.

So rather than original sin from a Fall, which itself is premised on Creation, Adamson’s account of Jainism is that delusion is part of the unenlightened human condition, wherein we may tend to have one-sided views. Our knowledge and perspectives tend to be one-sided, and we are susceptible to being in bondage to them—even to being deluded that they are wholistic rather than partial. Both Augustine and Umasvati were skeptical concerning the pretensions of human knowledge. In his talk, Adamson added in Francis Bacon’s view, which is that Adam has perfectly functional cognitive faculties, whereas we, the fallen, do not. True knowledge is the province of divinity. I submit that religionists would greatly enhance their own credibility as purveyors of truth that is inherently sourced beyond our reach by humbly keeping in mind their own fallibility even and especially with regard to what is actually religious belief rather than knowledge, for if the content of religion were known, what place would faith have when the human mind enters into the religious domain?

Moral Grounds Found Sufficient to Deny Employees Contraception Coverage: Is Morality Distinct from Religion?

In addition to religious organizations and their respective affiliates being excluded from having to include contraceptives in employee health-insurance, non-religious groups with a salient moral stance against the use of the devices are also exempt—this according to a federal judge in the United State. The moral stance need not be associated with any religion. By implication, moral principles are distinct from religious doctrines. Even though religions incorporate moral principles, the latter are based in another domain. I contend that the interlarding of the non-native fauna can dilute and even compromise a given religion, thus undercutting its viability.

On August 31, 2015, Judge Richard Leon of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ruled that employers do not have to provide medical-insurance coverage for contraceptives even though their objection is moral rather than religious. More subtle than the expanded accommodation is the decision’s demarcation of religion. By implication, religion may be overstepping when it claims the moral domain.

In the case, March for Life, “a nonprofit, nonreligious pro-life organization,” sued the government, “arguing that the government had violated equal protection principles by treating [March for Life] differently from ‘similarly situated employers.”[1] At the time, the Affordable Care Act required most employers to provide free contraception coverage—with exceptions for religious groups. March for Life would not qualify as a non-religious organization; hence the suit.

In the ruling, Leon writes, “The characteristic that warrants protection—an employment relationship based in part on a shared objection to abortifacants—is altogether separate from theism. Stated differently, what [the government] claims to be protecting is religious beliefs, when it actually is protecting a moral philosophy about the sanctity of life.”[2] In other words, an employer-organization need not be religious (e.g., theist) to have a legitimate basis to object to contraceptives.  Furthermore, the basis in moral philosophy is really what the government was actually protecting by the accommodation. By implication, religious organizations had gone too far in claiming that their basis in opposing contraception is religious in nature; the opposition to the use of contraceptives is a moral claim, which some theists had adopted. To claim the issue as religious in nature—foundationally—involves a failure to circumscribe religious issues to those that are based on a religious basis.

To be sure, the Roman Catholic doctrine of humanae vita has a theistic component in that preventing a human life means obstructing a soul made in God’s image. Hence the doctrine is referred to as the sanctity of life. Yet to say human life is sacred risks self-idolatry. In other words, if our lives are sacred, then by implication we should worship them—our own and those of other people. With such reasoning, moreover, religion as a domain could expand to take over practically all others. To be anti-war, for example, can be reckoned as being based on the sanctity of life. Such a trajectory leaves religion itself vulnerable to transgressing on the “sovereignty” of other domains.

A controversial issue that is really moral in nature is easy prey particularly for religions that have a salient moral component. Jainism, for instance, emphasizes the moral principle of non-violence. Jain monks go as far as sweeping in front of them so as not to step on gnats. The principle involved is moral in nature—the religion having incorporated it. Put another way, a person need not be a Jain (or even religious) to value non-violence. Just because the principle is associated with several religions does not mean that it is religious in nature. Treating such a principle as religious increases the difficulty in discerning what aspects of a religion are fundamentally and distinctively religious. By analogy, a person who spends more time at neighbors telling them how they should care for their gardens and lawns risks neglecting his or her own. Such a person might even have difficulty mentally distinguishing his or her own property from those of nearby neighbors. A religion too may have such entitlement to that which is not innately religious.

As another example, the Abrahamic religions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) incorporate moral principles in the Ten Commandments, which Moses delivers to the Hebrews before they entered their land promised by their god. In this case, moral principles are woven into the very fabric of the religions, yet this does not mean that the principles are religious in nature.

Making explicit the civic function of the Ten Commandments, here they are on the grounds of the Texas capitol. 

The moral principles against lying, adultery, and murder do not depend on being ensconced in a religion. The Ten Commandments served not only a religious purpose for the Hebrews, but also a civic one as well. In a theocracy, even laws oriented to maintaining order in a society are presumed to come from a divine source. This doesn’t mean that civic laws are in themselves religious in nature. Rather, such a religion extends to incorporate another domain—like the presumptuous homeowner who feels free to treat his or her neighbor’s land as if it were his or her own.

Incorporating moral or civic “land” into a religion has a serious downside in religious terms in that religionists may be tempted to devote more attention to those areas (presumed to be intrinsically religious) than to religious experience (e.g., worship) itself. Moreover, the phenomenon of religion becomes diluted. Not only can religious people have trouble identifying what is distinctly religious—that is, on religion’s native turf—the religion itself can become bloated and even compromised as it expands beyond its own domain. 

Grabbing for everything—as if a religion were not valid unless it is universal—can undermine the integrity, not to mention cohesiveness, of the religion itself. Spending a lot of time telling neighbors how to clean up their property can result in overgrown grass and parched gardens at home. Religion would be much purer, with more attention devoted to discerning its core religiousity and being “in” it, were religious leaders and clergy motivated to stick to religion’s native fauna rather than engage in empire-building. The desire to assume other domains may be from confusion about the phenomenon of religion or simply a lack of interest in it. Indeed, the habit of obfuscating the core of religiosity and other stuff—exogenous appurtenances (try these words at dinner with friends!)—can dilute a person’s interest in a religion because its native strength is being sapped or diluted.

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[1] Adam Liptak, “Judge Grants Moral Basis to Exempt Birth Control,” The New York Times, September 1, 2015.

[2] Ibid.