"But besides impairing, and almost annihilating, faith by their obscure definition, they have invented the fiction of implicit faith, with which the name decking the grossest ignorance, they delude the wretched populace to their great destruction. Nay, to state the fact more truly and plainly, this fiction not only buries true faith, but entirely destroys it. Is it faith to understand nothing, and merely submit your convictions implicitly to the Church? Faith consists not in ignorance, but in knowledge—knowledge not of God merely, but of the divine will...For that knowledge is so much superior, that the human mind must far surpass and go beyond itself in order to reach it. Not even when it has reached it does it comprehend what it feels, but persuaded of what it comprehends not, it understands more from mere certainty of persuasion than it could discern of any human matter by its own capacity... For as faith is not contented with a dubious and fickle opinion, so neither is it contented with an obscure and ill-defined conception.” John Calvin (Inst. III.ii.2,14-15)
Posted on: Fri, 14 Jun 2013 23:24:38 +0000
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