Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

FAITH AND THE HISTORICAL JESUS §6.3
able that the account of a miracle is an untrue account than that the miracle recounted
actually took place. 10 That was precisely why the claim to miracle became
more problem than proof. The older defence that the biblical miracles
belonged to a unique period was no longer sufficient to protect them from critical
questioning.
All this created a crisis for faith. But why? Because it challenged the certainty
of faith. The safe alternative for Lessing was the certainty provided by the
'necessary truths of reason'. The Liberal flight from history was also a search for
an 'invulnerable area' for faith. Bultmann similarly posed the certainty of faith in
antithesis to the uncertainty of historical knowledge. 11 But a crucial question was
too little asked: whether we should expect certainty in matters of faith, whether
an invulnerable 'certainty' is the appropriate language for faith, whether faith is
an 'absolute'. It was the Enlightenment assumption that necessary truths of reason
are like mathematical axioms, and that what is in view is the certain QED of
mathematical proof, which has skewed the whole discussion. But faith moves in
a totally different realm from mathematics. The language of faith uses words like
'confidence' and 'assurance' rather than 'certainty' . 12 Faith deals in trust, 13 not in
mathematical calculations, nor in a 'science' which methodically doubts everything
which can be doubted. 14 Nor is it to be defined simply as 'assent to propositions
as true' (Newman). Walking 'by faith' is different from walking 'by sight'
(2 Cor. 5.7). 15 Faith is commitment, not just conviction.
10. See, e.g., E. and M. Keller, Miracles in Dispute: A Continuing Debate (London:
SCM, 1969) ch. 5 ('David Hume and Sound Judgment: A Wise Man Proportions His Belief to
the Evidence'), discussing Hume's Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding Section X. One
need only consider the typical reaction by most today, including most Christians, to claims of
miraculous healings by 'televangelists' or miraculous phenomena linked to statues of the Virgin
Mary or of Hindu gods, to see the force of Hume's argument.
11. Keck, Future 55-56, 57-58.
12. Theissen begins his 'attempt to leap across Lessing's yawning gulf by asserting:
'Faith is absolute certainty' ('Historical Scepticism' 147). It is interesting to note that the word
'certainty' is used only once in NRSV NT (Acts 2.36) where it translates the Greek adverb
asphalös. The term itself has the basic connotation of 'security' (asphaleia, Acts 5.23; 1 Thess.
5.3; asphalös, Mark 14.44; Acts 16.23), 'reliable' (asphales, Luke 1.4; Acts 21.34; 22.30;
25.26; Phil. 3.1; Heb. 6.19).
13. This is the term ('trust') which Keck prefers in his reworking of the issues {Future
68-83), though his further outworking of the theme in terms of 'trusting Jesus' as a figure in the
past (177-83) is more problematic as either implying an exemplarist Christology ('the trusted
person a model for his own life') or as presupposing the resurrection (184-89).
14. Echoing Gadamer, Truth 238-39. Cf. the profound illustration of faith which Paul
finds in Abraham (Rom. 4.16-21).
15. Unfortunately the 'definition of faith' in Heb. 11.1 is much disputed as to its meaning
and does not bring added clarity to the issue; see, e.g., the recent discussions in H. W. Attridge,
Hebrews (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1989) 307-10; W. L. Lane, Hebrews (WBC 47;
104