In life’s journey, I encounter a traveler who starts the following conversation with me.
Q: Do you believe in God?
A: Yes, I do.
Q: Why do you believe in God? Have you seen him?
A: I have not physically seen him in naked eyes. But, I believe in him anyway. He lives in my heart.
Q: That is bull shit. If you have not seen him, how do you know what you believe is true? How can you trust something you have not even seen?
A: Do you always trust only things that you have physically seen? Think about it. Think deep about it, my friend. Have you ever made decisions that are based on guesses or feelings rather than facts?
Q: No. I am a logical person. I am not superstitious. I only act based on facts, logic and reason. Or, you can say I am a rational person. I don’t rely on any self-reinforcing bull shit like God. I rely on myself – my intelligence and my ability to work hard and win.
A: Then be careful, my friend, for the smoke of ration and reason is clouding your eyes. You are fooled by your own arrogance. Let me ask you something. How do you make a rational decision?
Q: Needless to say, I gather all the facts. I compare the benefits of various options and then choose the option that benefits me the most.
A: That should work relatively safely in day-to-day decisions such as what to eat and what to wear. How about those decisions that would have a more lasting impact on your life? For example, how do you choose the person you should marry?
Q: In the same way – I list out the various facts about the likely candidates and then make a rational decision that leads me to the person that would be most suitable for me. For example, although I love A, A’s personality clashes with mine. B’s personality is more compatible with mine. Although I don’t love B as much as I love A, I love B nonetheless. I would choose B.
A: Are you sure you would settle on choosing between A & B? What about there might be a C that is waiting for you around the corner? You talked effortlessly about gathering all the facts. How do you know if you have collected all the facts? Where do you draw the line? In the case of marriage, when do you say “okay, I have tried them all and I am going to make a decision whom to marry now”? In actual reality, even that rarely happens because by the time you are ready to make a choice, some of the candidates may have got married already. How do you resolve that?
Q: Well, that is the art of knowing when to make a compromise. I acknowledge rational people do not always get the best choice. But we know how to settle down on an optimal choice in a given environment. That does not discount the fact that we rely on our intelligence and reason rather than something so fanciful and intangible as God. How do you make a marriage choice? Do you just pray to God? Does your God make a mark on the person you should marry?
A: I’m glad you used the word “art”. I assume it was just a slip of the tongue so I am not going to dwell on that. What I am trying to say is that your method of choosing a spouse is not so much different from mine. You talked eloquently about making a compromise and “settling down on an optimal choice.” How do you know when is the time to call it a finish and make a deal? Mr. rational, is there a mathematical equation that you use or something?
Q: Well, I won’t say I use a mathematical equation. It’s common sense, right? You don’t need a God for that, right?
A: Common sense? I am shocked you uttered those words. Your trust in your common sense seems no more defensible than my trust in God. Are you really sure you are making the right decisions, my friend? Why did you get married at 25, not 30? Why 30 not 35? Why did you stay in this city? How did you know if a better girl would not come into your life if you moved to the other company? So, you just give up to your common sense, you pathetic? You just throw down the gloves and try to convince yourself that you are somehow “making an optimal choice”? Isn’t it upsetting to think that what you get is just “optimal” and that you may well get a better deal if you waited longer?
Q: Well, one has to know when to be content. This is a Chinese saying: “The happy ones are the ones that are content.”
A: To tell oneself to feel content is a rather irrational behavior, I have to say. According to your logic earlier, you are making rational decisions that give you the most benefits. Um, it seems a little incompatible here. You sound like a Buddhist now.
Q: I still have a hard time entrusting myself to something so intangible as God. If you believe in God, how would you do it differently?
A: I would just choose the person I love and go for it. No, I don’t need God’s approval to marry someone. That’s rather silly. We don’t do that. But I feel happy and I do not use your method to pretend that I am intelligent and rational when in fact I am just as irrational and am only basing my decisions on feelings and guesses.
Q: So, you are trying to say that both the people who believe in God and the people who do not believe are irrational?
A: There is no such thing as ration. It was invented by a bunch of Christian scholars to explain the Christian faith, got into vogue after the Reformation, and gained supremacy in the Age of Reason. All of a sudden, humans feel they are smarter than God. They feel that with reason, they can dispense with the religious faith. And this lunatic Friedrich Nietzsche even proclaimed that “God is dead!” Well, I know Nietzsche is dead. So, yes, I would say we are both irrational. But, being irrational is not necessarily a bad thing. It is natural to humans to be irrational. The world is so complicated that our brains alone will never be able to understand it fully. We are relying on guesses as we move forward.
Q: I am quite confused after I hear what you say. I don’t like the feeling.
A: Sorry I made you feel confused. But, maybe you were too confident before. In the end, I am not trying to convert you to believe in God or anything. Believing in God or not is your choice. But I know I have made you think. Having the benefit of doubt is good because you’ll never know if it is the Devil that is leading you.
Q: Now you are really scaring me. What do you mean the Devil is leading me? I have no business with Devil.
A: Oops, sorry, I am not going into that box. It’s a bit too deep in there. I am just hoping you do not so easily discount my faith in God. I hope to make you realize that you are not as rational as you think you are. Somewhere, you have a faith, too – something you just believe without going through all the logics and rational reasoning. Once you realize that, you will see that God is not that unthinkable. If you do believe in something without the support of reason, you can think why you choose one faith instead of another. Although you don’t believe in God, you do believe in something, right?
Q: Before, I would say “yes, I believe in reason.” But, now, I find that quite mind-boggling. I need to think before I can answer you.
A: You are smarter than I think, my friend. You are right, “reason” itself is nothing but a faith – a puff of smoke in the air, a gimmick that pleases the eye, a magic show that captures your imagination but is nothing but a trick. A parting shot: don’t trust too much your reason. However smart you are, it is such a heavy burden to figure out the world, a burden you cannot bear by myself. Religious faith is an indispensable part in the human existence.
