{222} (cont'd)

II

Intelligence and faith

The problem of the “relation” between intelligence and faith is usually presented in classical philosophy and theology in an apparently simple way: Is it possible for a truth to be true for reason and faith “at the same time”? Let us ignore for the present that in this formula intelligence and reason are not properly identified; to avoid lengthy discussions let us accept the terms of this formulation. It is commonly thought that the difficulty resides precisely with the “at the same time”. Of course, it is understood that this is “at the same time” for me. A difficult theorem is always a truth of reason “in itself”, but for a layman in mathematics it is a truth of simple belief. Then the above question means: How is it possible that the same truth can be for me a truth of reason and a truth of faith at the same time? Because if reason has proved the reality of God, it makes no sense {223} that this reality should be for me an object of faith, and still less of a faith whose essential characteristic is to be a free option.

Naturally, the force of this argumentation is based upon a certain notion of what reason and faith are. The point of departure is that faith consists in “believing what we have not seen”, which presupposes that “knowing is seeing”. In that case the “at the same time” of reason and faith would be the “at the same time” of not-seeing and seeing. But this is impossible. It is commonly added, that when dealing with “religious” truths, reason alone is not enough to admit them; some “moral dispositions” are also required. But what these dispositions are, and above all what their function might be with respect to the rational proofs in question, is left rather obscure. And since the sense of the “at the same time” of reason and faith depends on this, the problem has now been displaced: we had been told before that the problem consisted in something being seen and not seen “at the same time”; now we are told that the problem consists in the relation between reason and moral dispositions. Certainly, this does not help to clarify the issue. In order to reach the root of the question it will therefore be necessary to confront the two problems mentioned:

1. What is the essential difference between intelligence and faith when we are dealing with the reality of God?
2. What is the radical characteristic of the “at the same time” of intelligence and faith?


1. Difference between intelligence and faith. Let us begin by reviewing and discussing the classical theses.

A) One usually begins by saying, or rather, presupposing that “knowing is seeing”. Is this true? I refer, obviously, to intellectual knowing. Now, only a narrowly conceived notion of intelligence could have produced this type of concept and led to it being regarded as something obvious since the time of the {224} Greeks. To intellectively know, according to my way of thinking, is not formally to see, but to have in my intelligence the actuality of the real apprehended as real. It is true that it is not enough to have something actually in the intelligence, to say that we know what it is; but it is undeniable that whatever is missing to arrive at that knowledge, has to move formally in that actuality, and will have to consist in making that actuality fuller. What is essential, therefore, is this primary actualization. Its primary form is impression. And yet, sight is not the exclusive form of knowing, precisely because it is not the exclusive form of the impression of reality, nor, consequently, of intellection. Each sense, as we indicated above, presents to us not only what is real, but reality itself, in its own form. Through sight (in the simplest way we think of it) a thing itself is formally present; through hearing the thing is present in the form of “announcement”, etc. In all the senses, and especially those of orientation and equilibrium, we have reality apprehended in the form of “towards”. This propels intelligence along the road of searching, and is the commencement of reason. But to be sure, once we are propelled along the road of this “towards”, there is no guarantee that what we will find will be “seeing” the thing searched for. It is quite possible that the best of our intellection may not have this visual character. When the physics of elementary particles formulated its equations, it became manifest that particles are not classical particles or waves. Particles and waves share characteristics, and in this consists our true knowledge of them; but these particles not only have never been seen, they are not even visualizable as the physicists once thought. Man knows about elementary particles by moving in reality “as towards”, not by having it {225} before him as in the case of sight. And the reality found this way is present in a law, but it is not visual. The knowledge of elementary particles is not seeing. I have emphasized this example, so fundamental to modern science, to preclude the comment that denial of the identity between knowing and seeing refers primarily to theological issues. To know is not necessarily to see.

B) But neither is it the case that faith is “believing what is not seen”. If one thinks that knowing is seing, it follows that whatever is not-seen is excluded from intellective knowing and is placed in the category of the irrational: such is blind faith. However, this is not true. Is it true that in faith nothing is seen? Here it is usual to take “seeing” for the presence of what is made known in the intelligence. Then we will have to affirm that in faith something is seen, in the sense that something pertaining to what is believed is actually present in the intelligence. And this is because reality can be present in many ways, as many as the senses, which man possesses. Let us reiterate: by hearing, a thing itself is not formally present as we usually think it is by sight. But, how can we possibly say that in the sound, which is heard there is nothing present belonging to the thing that sounds? The thing itself is not formally present; but it is a fact that sound is formally and intrinsically remitting to the thing itself, because it is “its” announcement. The announcement is always “of” a thing. This “of” is not an extraneous relation between what is heard and the thing, but a formal moment of sound itself. Therefore, this “of” is the “announced” presence of the thing. The remitting presence, as poor it may seem, is a true presence. The presumed poverty of hearing is fed by our apprehension of the physical world. And yet, as soon as we enter the domain of personal realities, hearing suddenly acquires an enormous volume, up to {226} the point where one could very well think that this volume is greater than the one from sight. The same could be said about the sense of touch: merely being touched by something real is already a presence. Certainly, it is not present to us in the same manner as is the real; but it is the presence of what I usually call “naked reality”. And this moment of “nakedness” formally belongs to the tactile; it is presence and “nothing else”, but presence. This “nothing else” is precisely the nakedness, as an intrinsic and formal moment of the tactile. In addition, the real, as we have said repeatedly, can be present to us in the form of “towards”. Please allow me to insist: it is not the question of a presence “towards the real”, but rather “reality as towards”. In the “towards” resides the directional presence of reality. And we would have to say something similarly appropriate for the remaining senses. But that is not the point. The only thing relevant here is that the real is present to us not only in a visual form, but also in forms that are not visual, and perhaps not even visualizable. However, in all of them the real is categorically present for us. Furthermore, these diverse forms of presence are not simply juxtaposed, but possess a primary unity. They constitute unitarially and a radice that which we call “the presence of reality for us”. And this is true above all with respect to pure sensing. The many forms of sensing do not exist, each in and by itself, in order to later constitute a synthesis; on the contrary, their diversity is the analytical differentiation of sensing: “the many” senses are the analyzers of “the one” sensing. And since it is always the case of intellective sensings, it follows that the structure of the presence of the real in sensing is eo ipso the structure of intellection in its diverse aspects or types. Intellection as such is “at one and the same time” the apprehension of the real in all its forms. In their primary unity, {227} these modalities carry sentient intelligence over different roads. The “towards” of the notification carries intelligence “towards” the sonorous thing, towards the announced. The “towards” of “nakedness” carries intelligence to probing the type of thing it is, etc. This is true even with respect to sight: the “towards” takes us from the eidos to the intellection of the thing’s internal structure.

This is why we must distinguish and refer to the different types of intellection: there is an auditive intellection, a tactile intellection, a directional intellection, etc. These are not metaphorical expressions; or rather, not more metaphorical than those terms that have their origin in vision and with which it has been common to express and conceptualize intellection: intuition, evidence, etc. This has been taken as the structure of human intelligence, though it is nothing more than the structure of visual intellection. For this reason I have attempted the elaboration of a theory of sentient intelligence as such in all its aspects and modes. In this task, the only essential thing was to reach this full concept of intelligence.

With this concept we now have the instrument, so to speak, which forces us to better conceptualize the presence of the real in man. It is not necessarily a presence either visual nor visualizable; but it is always a real presence, and therefore a mode of intellection, however poor in many of its aspects, but still a true intellection. What is not visual is not necessarily irrational. This is the case with faith in God. God is not present to us like a thing that might be visual or visualizable; but this does not mean that He may not be intellectively present to us in any form whatsoever. And in this sense, faith is never absolutely blind. It always involves some presence of the real in notification, nakedness, and direction. {228} Therefore, it always involves an intellective moment.

Let us conclude by saying that knowing is not seeing, and believing does not consist in being blind. From this discussion we recognize not only the inadequacy of the classical formula of faith with respect to intelligence and faith, but something positive and much more important, to wit, that it is necessary to begin by attending to the manner in which God is present to us. And this manner is what becomes decisive in our problem, because upon it depends the difference between intelligence and faith, as human attitudes concerning reality.

C) In the course of this study we have already discussed the manner in which God is present to us; but it is convenient to review it now, even if succintly. God is not a reality, which is present to us as a thing is present to our sight, nor is intellection of Him of the type, which belongs to any reality we find in our life, i.e., in the construction of my being out of the substantive, of my I. And yet, there is a certain presence of God in reality and with it there is a certain type of intellection of Him in human life.

a) Man is an essence open to things as real in the construction of his own I. In this construction, the real is a power, a power of the real. And this power holds us and sustains us constitutively religated. This power of the real, therefore, is immediately present to us in religation.

b) But this power of the real presents to us the constitutive enigma of everything real. Every real thing is, actually, ambivalent. On the one hand it is its “own” reality, but on the other, its reality manifests to us that it is in some way “more than what it is” itself. This is the constitutive enigma of every real thing. And this enigma is also immediately present. In religation to the power of the real, the formally enigmatic {229} character of the real qua real is immediately present to us.

c) Whence we obtain the particular type of intellection due to this presence. In the enigma we are not “in front of” that in which the enigma is rooted, as we would be if we were in front of a thing we can see. Rather, in the immediate presence of the enigma we are thrown “towards” its root in things themselves. This is reality “as towards”, and therefore, an intellection “as towards”. Indeed, there is an authentic presence of this root, but only “as towards”. Conversely, though only “as towards”, it is still a concise presence and therefore strictly speaking an intellection. It is a directional intellection because it is reality as directionally present. Reality is not presenting to us the merely intellectual problem of “resolving” an enigma, but is taking us to it. In the enigma we are not simply “directed” towards its root, but we are physically “hurled” after it.

d) In this intellection man, I say, is hurled “towards”. And the terminal point of a “towards” is always a somewhat difficult problem. Actually, the “towards” throws us towards a terminus, which is not determined by the “towards” itself. Furthermore, it is a terminus, which is not of itself univocally determinable. Indeed the “towards” is an intellection, which is not only undetermined, but with a wide range open to many possibilities. Moreover, man does not determine the terminus of the “towards” arbitrarily, but with respect to a particular foundation. To pin down the terminus, the intelligence needs to perform several acts; they can be encompassed under the general category of “proof”, “demonstration”, etc. The terminology is indifferent to us. And the case is the same whether we are dealing with the enigma of reality, a problem in theoretical physics, in biology or in history. The only thing that will vary is the fundamentation as a function of the nature of that, which forces us to it. In the case of the enigma of reality, the {230} immediate presence of this enigma has hurled us towards its fundament “in” things themselves. This fundamentation is, therefore, a “proof” of the terminus of the “towards” as the root of the enigma, and therefore, in a certain way, of its “solution”: God. The immediate presence of the enigma of reality in religation to the power of the real is a directional presence of the reality of “something”, which intelligence proves to be God. It is not a visual intellection of God because God is not only not “seen”, but is not even “visualizable”. But yet, it is a strict directional intellection of Him. God is present in the real only directionally; but directionally He is indeed really present in the real. Man does not immediately know that what is directionally present is God. That is why he has to prove it; and by the same token, the proof is not so much that there is a God, but that something among what is, is really God.

But, let us reiterate, we are dealing with a directional presence in the power of the real, to which we are constitutively and undeniably religated. Because of this, what the intelligence proves is the reality of God as fundament of our religation in the construction of the I belonging to each. And this is what is essential in the question we have been debating: the difference between intelligence and faith. Everything we have just mentioned in the foregoing two pages is a succinct repetition of ideas previously developed; it is a repetition intended only to orient and provide the exact profile to this problem. Therefore, let us say that the problem of the difference between intelligence and faith is a problem situated entirely within the nature of the terminus to which our proof has led us: God as fundament of our relatively absolute being.

D) Indeed, the terminus to which the proof leads is {231} God. But to God, not as a reality, which is the object of investigation, but a reality as fundament of the power of the real in religation. As we earlier pointed out, reality-object is not the same as reality-fundament. The reality-object “is in front” of me, and its presence exhausts itself in its own affirmation, so to speak, as being what it is in and by itself. On the other hand, a reality-fundament is certainly a reality in and by itself (if not, it would not be fundament), though its presence is not one of affirming itself through what it is, but in being my fundament, it is in me fundamenting myself. As fundament, a reality-fundament is happening in me, something quite different than the presence of a merely being in and by itself. It “is not in front” of me, but “happens in” me, is happening in me. It is present and religating me in the power of the real. The formal terminus of the proof of God’s existence is God as fundament of the power of the real in religation, i.e., as reality, which is happening in me. But then, the proof has two facets. On one hand, it is a proof of God as reality-fundament. But on the other, it is a proof that He is reality-fundament, i.e., that this reality, by being fundament, is happening in my own life’s happening, as an ultimate reality, possibilitating, and impelling. This produces a twofold attitude in man. On one side it is the attitude of knowing about the reality of God; on the other, it is an attitude that can be the acceptance of that divine occurrence, an acceptance, which is the essence of surrender. And since all surrender is radically faith, i.e., surrender to the personal reality of God qua true, it follows that the proof of the reality of God as reality-fundament places the problem of “intelligence and faith” not outside intelligence, i.e., as if it were a {232} problem “intelligence vs. no-intelligence”, but inside intelligence itself; it becomes the problem of “knowledge and surrender”. Once the question is posed in this manner, it becomes clear that, on one hand, knowledge and faith are essentially different even though we may have demonstrative knowledge, but on the other, they are essentially connected to each other even without any demonstrations. Let us explain this.

a) Knowledge and faith are essentially different. The matter is clear in cases where the truth in question is the result of great faith and limited knowledge. This is the case of the mysteries of Christianity, which cannot be demonstrated. It is not necessary to insist on this point. But what concerns me is that there are truths, like the existence of God, of which we can have great knowledge, yet, this knowledge by itself is not faith. On such cases knowledge and faith are not only different, but perfectly separable. This is so because knowledge of some reality, even when rigorously conclusive and evident as a mathematical theorem, does not entail a surrender, a faith. And this is not because (as usually claimed), if we know something precisely it is not necessary to have faith in it, i.e., because such knowledge leaves no place for doubt; rather, it is because knowing and surrendering are two irreducibly different attitudes. The matter is clear when dealing with a reality-object. The reality-object can only allow for knowing, not because faith is not needed in this case, but because of the characteristics of that which is known, i.e., to be a reality-object formally excludes being the object of surrender. Theology and classical philosophy have considered God as reality-object; from this stems the impossibility of having faith in a God whose existence has been demonstrated. But that entire approach is mistaken: God is reality-fundament. {233} And when dealing with this type of reality, to know it is happening in me does not automatically entail a surrender to God, regardless how conclusive, evident, and convincing the proof. And this is because the fact that God may be happening in me is, ultimately, God’s business, not mine. God happens in me, whether I know it or not, whether I wish it or not. In order for this to be my business something more is needed: it is necessary that I make it mine. And this making it my business is the acceptance, the surrender. This is what I expressed further above when referring to the access of man to God as something different than the access of God to man. The surrender consists in my incorporating formally, and reduplicatingly into my happening, as something brought about by me, the happening through which God happens in me. That God occurs in me is a function of God in life. But the surrender to God is to make life into a function of God. And under these conditions, knowledge and faith are not only different, but separable. Man can very well know by demonstration the existence of God and His foundational characteristics, and yet have an attitude other than surrender. Man, for example, can demonstrate and admit the existence of God conclusively, and then disregard it, dealing with God as he would with any other object in the universe. He may even reject His intervention in life and rebel against it. Between both extremes there is a complete gamut of intermediate attitudes, despite the presence in all of them of an admittedly conclusive demonstration. None of them is surrender and therefore none is faith. In those cases, the lack of faith does not stem from the presence of a demonstrative knowledge, which makes faith impossible because it is useless, i.e., because a proof is already in hand, but because it is demonstrative knowledge without surrender.

{234} There are cases of a type where knowledge is insufficient in itself, but in which, nonetheless, the surrender is total. This is what occurs, as I mentioned above, either when dealing with truths, which exceed the natural capacities of intelligence, as the truths of Christianity, or dealing with the existence of God, when no proof of His existence has been found. But in all these cases there is some intellection of the reality to which man surrenders, at least an intellection of the auditive type, as announcement.

Regardless of the perspective one may choose to approach this question, there is a knowledge (demonstrative or not) and in addition a surrender, or an absence of surrender. In other words, there is knowledge without faith, or knowledge and faith. Therefore, there is an irreducible distinction between the two terms. Because of this, I consider it a serious error to say, “if there is proof, no faith is possible, and if there is faith, the proof is not possible without faith ceasing to exist". Both affirmations are false. No knowledge, demonstrative or otherwise, entails surrender within itself: there is faith in addition to knowledge. On the other hand, any surrender presupposes knowledge (demonstrative or not): there is knowledge in addition to faith. Returning to the usual formulation, the fact of the matter is that the problem of reason and faith is not a problem between two criteria of knowing, but a problem between two attitudes, knowing and surrendering in the face of the same one reality-fundament, the personal reality of God qua true.

In summary, when dealing with a reality-fundament, knowledge and faith are essentially different not only when it is the case of non-demonstrable truths, but even when dealing with truths rigorously demonstrated.