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Can a person choose whether or not to believe? Is faith forced upon a person, or is it a matter of decision?
This question is related not only to religious faith, but to faith with any content whatsoever, and it is widely discussed in the philosophy of epistemology. It is agreed upon by most opinions that when a person is faced with unequivocal evidence on a particular subject, he is forced to believe in the matter, whether he wants to or not. Even if I offered you a million dollars now, on the condition that you stop believing that Benjamin Netanyahu is the current Prime Minister of Israel, and start believing that the Prime Minister is Moshe Feiglin - you would not be able to do it. The question of choice is only related to cases where there is no unequivocal evidence, and the truth is in doubt.
In such cases, a person usually finds himself facing conflicting evidence and intuitions, some of which lead him to believe, and some of which cause him to doubt. He is unable to make himself believe in something that he does not feel at least some intuitive inclination towards; but the existence of this inclination does not necessarily tip the scales against opposing intuitions or other considerations. And of course, it is always possible to doubt the reliability of the intuitions themselves.
What to do in such a situation? Sometimes a person can choose not to decide, and leave the question in a "tie" or "needs further study". But there are questions that require a decision, and the very avoidance of a decision on them constitutes a decision in itself. In the context of religious faith, for example, a person must decide whether to observe the commandments of the religion or not. Whoever refrains from observing them out of indecision, in fact decides against the religion. And the question is therefore how to decide in such situations of doubt.
It may be possible to make a practical decision based solely on practical considerations, such as Pascal's Wager, according to which it is more worthwhile to bet on the possibility that religion is correct, since if you are right you will gain greatly, and if you are wrong you have not lost much. But this wager, besides the many doubts and arguments against it, does not concern the faith itself but only the practical behavior. The more interesting question is not how to decide at the level of practical behavior, but how to decide within the faith itself - is it possible to choose to believe in something, and as a result to actually believe in it, not just to behave as if it is true?
In my opinion, this is possible, at least in certain cases. When there is a strong enough intuition or assumption in favor of a particular belief, a person can choose to adopt that belief, even though there are doubts and questions against it that he has no answers to. He is aware that he is making a choice, and that he could have chosen differently, but this awareness does not prevent him from actually believing in that belief.
A good example of this can be brought from the field of trust between people. Suppose that Reuven's wife has recently started behaving suspiciously - she disappears from the house, returns late, talks to strange men, and so on. Reuven suspects that she is cheating on him, but she denies the accusations, and begs him to trust her and rely on her, even though, according to her, the circumstances prevent her from explaining to him what is behind her actions.
Reuven is faced with a dilemma that requires a decision. On the one hand, he has great trust in his wife, which is based on many years of acquaintance with her, and on the nature of their marital relationship. On the other hand, the circumstances are certainly suspicious. Reuven knows that his intuition, according to which it is impossible for his wife to betray him, may be wrong; many innocent men thought so, and were not aware of what was actually happening behind their backs. He has no way of proving that his wife is indeed worthy of trust. An impartial observer from the outside would certainly decide that in light of the existing evidence, the chances are that Reuven's wife is cheating on him. Nevertheless, Reuven knows that there may be another explanation for that behavior, even if he cannot think of one; he knows that in many cases things are definitely different from what they seem to the eye.
Reuven cannot remain in doubt, since the very suspicion of his wife and the doubt in her, tarnish their relationship, even if he has not decided against her. The question is whether he is able to decide in her favor and trust her, or whether this is impossible for him in light of the circumstances.
In my opinion, in some cases such a decision is definitely possible. If Reuven feels that he knows his wife well enough, and trusts her that she really loves him and will not betray him - then he is able to trust her, and decide to ignore the suspicions and doubts. He knows that he has no answers that will satisfy them, and they will not simply disappear; but he also knows that they do not constitute conclusive proof, and that there may be successful answers somewhere. Therefore, he decides to ignore them, not because of blindness or innocence, but because of his decision to prefer his intuition and trust his wife.
Such a decision is not always possible. For this, the person needs to have a strong intuition of trust towards his wife. Whoever does not have such a thing, will not be able to overcome the tendency to the other side. But when such trust exists, it still does not force the person to accept it - since there are other considerations against it - but it opens up the possibility for the person to do so. And here exactly the person can choose.
The same is true for religious faith. Whoever has strong intuitions in favor of religion, or arguments that seem convincing to him, can decide to believe in it, even though there are unanswered questions and doubts against it. He does not ignore them and bury his head in the sand, but after a thorough examination he came to the conclusion that they do not tip the scales against faith. Even if he did not find answers to them, he is able to believe that somewhere there are such answers. Therefore, he chooses to trust his intuitions, and to decide in favor of faith and religion, while ignoring the opposing arguments. This is not naivete, but a completely rational decision between two epistemic possibilities.
As in the previous example, this possibility is not available to everyone; whoever does not have strong intuitions in favor of religion, or who believes that the claims against it are too strong, will not be able to choose to believe without lying to himself. But for those who find enough basic faith in themselves, such a decision is definitely possible.
Also, as in the previous example, the choice to remain in doubt constitutes a decision in itself; whoever doubts the existence of God or the truth of religion, has in fact decided not to believe in them. Unlike the performance of practical commandments, which can also be done on the side of doubt and gambling, it is impossible to reach devotion and a real connection with God as long as one doubts His existence. Only one who believes in Him with all his heart can reach this, and for this a decision to believe is required (unless the person is so convinced of his faith that it is forced upon him and he has no possibility to believe otherwise).
There is an important article called "The Will to Believe," written by William James, which explains in what way it would be justified and rational to believe by choice, even without absolute proof. Here are some interesting quote from his words there:
"Skepticism is not avoidance of choice; it is a choice of risk of a certain kind. Better risk loss of truth than chance of error - that is the exact position of the faith-rejecter. He is actively betting just as much as the believer; he is betting on all the other horses except the faith hypothesis, just as the believer is betting on the faith hypothesis against all the other horses. He who tells us to stick to skepticism until "sufficient evidence" for religion be found, is like one who tells us, in the face of the faith hypothesis, that it is better to yield to our fear that it may be error than to our hope that it may be true. It is not intellect against all the emotions, then; it is intellect with one emotion laying down its law. And what, forsooth [in truth], is this emotion that claims to be superior wisdom? Is fear of duping so very much wiser than hope of being wise?"
"“It is as if a man should hesitate indefinitely to ask a certain woman to marry him because he was not perfectly sure that she would prove an angel after he brought her home. Would he not cut himself off from that particular angel-possibility as decisively as if he went and married some one else? Scepticism, then, is not avoidance of option; it is option of a certain particular kind of risk. Better risk loss of truth than chance of error,-that is your faith-vetoer's exact position. He is actively playing his stake as much as the believer is; he is backing the field against the religious hypothesis, just as the believer is backing the religious hypothesis against the field.”
For some reason, the opinion prevails that in order to believe in something, absolute proofs are needed, and wherever there is doubt, one must be skeptical and not believe wholeheartedly. Of course, this is a complete mistake; if there were absolute proofs available, it would not be possible to talk about faith, but about knowledge. The role of faith is to lead a person out of the circle of light of knowledge, and to chart his way even in the darkness and fog of doubts. It does not justify the doubts, but places against their "maybe not?", the "definitely yes!". Both doubt and faith express a certain state of mind, and the former has no priority over the latter. The skeptical person is no more sober or rational than the believer; the believer is no less aware than him of the questions and difficulties. But just as the skeptic chose not to decide (or decided in favor of doubt), the believer chose to decide. He ignores the difficulties of skepticism, just as the skeptic ignores the answers of faith. If asked "Where do you take your certainty from?", he will answer: "From the same place from which you take your skepticism".
And here we come to a point that may seem paradoxical at first glance, but in light of the above, the depth in it becomes clear. The religious person is usually used to dealing with the evil inclination, which draws him to sin and commit transgressions; he overcomes it with the help of faith. But what happens when the faith itself is under attack? What happens when doubts and difficulties threaten to undermine it? Such a situation is similar to AIDS, which attacks the immune system itself, which is supposed to protect the body from diseases. If faith is undermined, how can it protect itself?
And the answer is, that just as the believer believes that God created the evil inclination of transgressions, in order to test him - so he can believe that God deliberately created difficulties and arguments against faith, in order to put it itself to the test. Difficulties in faith are not a mistake of the Creator, who did not create a proven and reasoned religion without any doubt, but they themselves are part of the believer's test, and of the test that checks whether he will overcome them or not. And like any test of the evil inclination, these can also be very difficult and painful, what Rabbi Nachman of Breslav calls "the empty space", of questions that by definition have no excuses. And with all this, the believer has the ability to jump over this space, and believe that this is just another test from God. He can choose to stick to the faith, despite all these difficulties.
This sounds paradoxical, since if the faith itself is in doubt, what can one rely on to determine that the doubt itself is nothing but a test from God? But as we have seen above, all that is needed is a strong enough intuitive inclination in favor of faith, and it allows to overcome all the difficulties. Also in the example of Reuven and his wife, Reuven can say to himself that his wife is behaving in such a way precisely in order to test whether he really trusts her wholeheartedly, even though she is trying to make him doubt her. So also one who believes in God, can certainly draw for himself a reality in which God puts the faith itself to the test, and accept to stand in this test.
And if you say: If so, you have given an opening for every person to believe in the most bizarre and delusional things, and to ignore every logical argument against them, claiming that these are nothing but the temptations of Satan and the evil inclination?
The answer is that no one needs me, or anyone else, to determine for him what to believe in. Whoever finds in himself a strong faith in a particular subject, and decides to stick to it, probably does not think that it is bizarre and delusional, even if others call it so - and whoever thinks that it is bizarre and delusional, probably will not believe in it anyway. It is impossible to set rules for faith, to force them on people and to determine for them what they are allowed to believe in and what not. It is possible to talk to people and try to convince them, but unlike what certain people might want, it is impossible to take control of their faith and thought. What can be done is to present the person with the different possibilities, and to trust him to decide between them in a wise and responsible manner. And that is what I tried to do in this article.
Translated from מיסטריום
