The Thoughts of Ryan-C

For the first section of this essay, I will critique Calvin’s conception of faith from the viewpoint of Paul Tillich. One of the main problems Tillich would find in Calvin’s faith is that it is concrete and assured. In his book Dynamics of Faith, Tillich states that “doubt is a necessary element” of faith. Faith must be a risk if it is the state of being ultimately concerned; if there is no risk involved then the concern must not be ultimate. Since we (finite) do not have an immediate awareness of God (infinite) there is a degree of risk that has to come into play with faith. If finitum non posit capax infinitum, the finite cannot contain the infinite, is the case, then a full logical conception of God cannot be attained and thus doubt must exist. This makes sense because unlike Calvin, Tillich’s faith is based on rationality and not revelation, thus it rests solely on the individual to decide what is of ultimate concern. In Dynamics of Faith, Tillich states, “our oscillating will cannot produce the certainty which belongs to faith.” In our own human ability we cannot produce a certainty about our faith, and while Calvin would agree with this, he would argue that true faith itself in not in our ability to create. Thus, for Tillich, the risk of faith ultimately leads to a doubt of faith, but doubt isn’t a problem because it shows the intensity and seriousness of faith. If we don’t have doubt, then our concerns are not ultimate and since faith is ultimate concern, the gravity of one’s faith is infinite. We must also have doubt, because we may be putting our faith in something that may not be ultimate; our faith may be idolatrous. All of this leads to another dynamic of faith; courage. Since faith contains doubt and is a rational choice, the individual must have courage to make such a decision about his ultimate concern. If courage is not present then faith can easily be overcome by doubt.

It is also important to consider Tillich’s views on truth and faith when comparing him with Calvin. Calvin believed that the object of faith was ultimately believed to be true by the believer, which would make itself apparent in his definition of faith that includes an element of confidence. If one places his/her faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that Gospel needs to be a transcendent truth and he/she needs to believe it is true. Tillich would not agree with this point. In his conception of faith, truth does not necessarily play a role because belief in something being true is different from ultimate concern. There are subjective and objective truths when looking at faith . Subjectively, faith can be considered true if it has a sufficient ultimate concern. Objectively, faith can be understood to be true if its concern is really for that which is ultimate.

For Calvin, faith comes from an illumination of the Holy Spirit. In his theological structure, man is totally depraved and cannot have true faith in Christ because his sin nature will oppress it. Tillich does not subscribe to this system of thought and since his conception of faith is not just a Christian faith, Calvin’s idea of man’s fallen state does not inhibit Tillich’s act of faith. Thus, faith becomes a rational choice to place ultimate concern on that which the individual believes deserves such concern. Tillich writes, “A faith which destroys reason destroys itself and the humanity of man. For only a being who has the structure of reason is able to be ultimately concerned, to distinguish the ultimate and preliminary concerns.” He is clearly in opposition to Calvin here. His focus is so strong on human ability and will that it excludes all possibilities of outside intervention. It seems as though he would say that Calvin’s conception of faith isn’t faith at all because it requires revelation that trumps human reason.
For Tillich, the concept of ultimate concern is more important than the content of ultimate concern. He argues that this is what allows us to relate to those of other religions. Where a Jew might say that a Muslim does not have faith, he is wrong. The Muslim has faith; he just has different content than the Jew. Calvin would most likely agree that both men have faith, but not necessarily true faith. Here we are introduced to the concept of idolatrous faith. For Calvin, idolatrous faith is any faith that puts anything that is not God in the place of God, whereas Tillich would say that idolatrous faith is a faith that places finite things in the place of the infinite. It appears as though, Calvin would agree with Tillich on this, but Tillich might not necessarily agree with Calvin. This is where we are once again confronted with the vague content of Tillich’s faith that rests on man’s conception of what is ultimate.

Having this overview of how Tillich would most likely critique Calvin’s notion of faith, I must now choose a side; I cannot be “agnostic” about it. Faith is either based on rationality or revelation at its core. Working from my previous critique, I would have to side with Calvin concerning the issue of faith. First off, my initial reasons for rejecting Tillich’s conception of faith is his intense vagueness. For Tillich, faith relies heavily on human reason and it’s ability to distinguish what is ultimate and what is infinite. There is no true object of faith, other than the “ultimate,” which must be determined by finite beings. For this to be the case, he must presuppose that human reason is capable of making such distinctions without outside help. This presupposition seems to contradict itself and subsequently I would reject it. As previously stated, Tillich said that the finite cannot know the infinite, but Tillich later argues that we can use our reason to distinguish between the infinite and finite. I would agree that we can distinguish between the concepts of infinite and finite, but that does not give us an object that is infinite. It only allows us to understand that something infinite is something without a beginning and an end. It seems as though Tillich contradicts himself in this line of thinking. We may place things in the position of the ultimate, but within our finitude we cannot solely use reason to determine what is ultimate. Calvin, on the other hand gives a concrete object of faith, Christ. Tillich’s faith has the ability to lead individuals into a strange form of relativism that should cause reasons for doubt (oddly enough that fits right in line with Tillich’s beliefs).

Another large problem within Tillich’s idea of faith is the lack of actual truth and knowledge that comes into play. Since he creates a framework that allows for anything that is infinite and ultimate to be the object of faith, he fails to make any truth claims or statements concerning the ultimate questions of life. What is faith if it is merely a projection of our own conceptions of the ultimate as our ultimate concern? Now I know why Tillich was referred to as a Christian Atheist. His faith has no goal or end in mind. On the other hand, Calvin clearly lays out what the object and goal of his faith is. In his Institutes of the Christian Religion Calvin cites Augustine in saying, “that we must know our destination and the way to it. Then, immediately after, he infers that the way that is most fortified against all errors is he who was both God and man: namely as God he is the destination to which we move; as man, the path by which we go. Both are found in Christ alone.” With Christ as the object and knowing him as the goal of faith, Calvin gives his followers something to look to and strive to have. Tillich on the other hand, seems to give his readers the ability to place their ultimate concern on an object of their choice, whether it is Calvin’s God or something that Tillich would refer to as God. But since Tillich rejected the normal theistic conception of God and chose to refer to God as the Ground of Being or the Being-Itself , his ideas lead to an uninvolved, disinterested deity that wouldn’t care if we had faith in him (or her/it) or not.

Within Tillich’s framework, his conception of doubt as being an element of faith definitely makes sense in its own right. That being acknowledged, the highly uncertain nature of Tillich’s faith doesn’t seem very appealing to me. If your ultimate concern (and subsequently your existential hope) is constantly being doubted in order to be equated to a more intense faith, what is the point? If the content of your faith isn’t necessarily important, but rather how your faith works, as a concept is what is of value, then I really don’t see how this can be of any worth. As previously stated, the goal of the faith seems relatively non-existent for Tillich. So why does he even bother? This leads into one of the main reasons why Calvin’s faith trumps Tillich’s in my mind: assurance. Assurance is at the heart of the Biblical conception of faith. The entire book of 1 John is about assurance in one’s faith and one of the most quoted passages from scripture about faith says that “faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.” If we take the revelation of Scripture into account concerning our knowledge of the person and character of God, and if individuals include elements of their relationship with him in faith, then certainty appears to be a logical stance to take. Calvin is sure to point out that doubt and struggle may come into one’s life of faith, but that it is due to our sin nature. Ultimately these elements of doubt and unassuredness will be overcome by the person’s faith, because for Calvin, true faith never dies. The individual’s progressive sanctification will ultimately lead them to a place of certainty in their faith.