“Prolegomena”: Why I don’t “just believe”

I want to know what I believe. And just as importantly, I want to know why I believe it

It sounds so simple. Shouldn’t I just be able to look inside myself and know what I believe about the universe, how or by whom it was made, and my place in it?

I don’t believe it is that simple.

Some people may be able to point to a creed or other statement of beliefs and say, that is what I believe, no more, no less. I haven’t found a creed yet that I can recite and know that I believe or even understand every word. I find myself reading along with something like the Nicene Creed in church and saying, “What does this mean, ‘God from God, true light from true light?’” How can I say I believe it if I don’t even understand it?

Others may be able to point to the Bible or other holy book and say, “It says it, I believe it, that settles it.” However, if one notes that there are over 45,000 Christian denominations in the world, ranging from very conservative to very progressive and probably some other theological and political dimensions that don’t even fit on that scale, it becomes clear that not everyone reads or interprets the Bible in the same way.

If someone says they live “Biblically,” I would still need to ask for a summary of what they think the Bible is saying to them, so I can distinguish their belief system from others.

Snake-handling is just as Biblical as soup kitchens, but I wouldn’t say those two things are in the same theological ballpark.

I wish I could “just believe”

I wish I could, in Jesus’ words from Mark 5:35 (KJV), “Be not afraid, only believe.” But determining my beliefs, trusting them, and acting on them is not as easy as “just believing.” At least not for me.

When I examine myself, I see that I am a mixture of so many things that I have experienced. My beliefs are the sum total of those experiences. I already believe so much. All my fears, my hopes, my loves, and my values are assumptions to either overcome or affirm.

There’s no way I could say that I approach the Christian tradition with anything close to objectivity. I have been a Christian all my life. I grew up in it, was surrounded by it, and even when I fought for my own independence and authenticity, my faith was what I fought against. Jesus was always there, even when I avoided him.

I was maybe a blank slate for a few hours after I was born, but soon after that, my indoctrination in the ways of Jesus began. My folks have always been big believers in the wisdom of Proverbs 22:6, which says, “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.”

The foundation of my beliefs lies in I was taught about life, the universe, and everything as a child by Christian parents, preachers, and teachers. The fact that there is a God who created the universe and rules over it, the fact that Jesus died for my sins, the idea that we will live forever after we die—these have been the basis of my reality since I was a toddler.

I was afraid of Hell before I was afraid of the dark.

Layers upon layers of influence

Then, added onto that initial sedimentary layer of belief are the influences of the friends I listened to, the enemies who criticized me, and well-meaning strangers who tried to save me. These influences took me in lots of different directions, many of them departures from the tidy theology of my childhood.

Then there are the books, movies, TV shows, music, and other cultural influences I have consumed over the course of my lifetime, especially those that truly moved my heart and mind, or challenged my assumptions in a convincing way.

And all of these influences are mixed up into my own personal amalgam of assumptions, convictions, and personal rules. My own unwritten creed, if you will.

Some ideas I cherish out of love, some ideas hold tight to me out of fear. Some ideas I push away, although a few of them come crawling back. Some ideas I repeatedly challenge, in a kind of internal shouting match with the voices from my youth who keep trying to tell me what to do.

And some concepts are so solid, so meaningful, so fulfilling, that I rely on them daily, as I lean on the God of my understanding to carry me—sometimes drag me—through each day.

My foundational assumptions affect everything, from my big-picture view of the universe to the way I interact with a stranger I meet on the street. These beliefs are behind what I think is possible and what I think is necessary.

• Do I think it is possible for a universe to be created without a divine creator?

• Are the creatures that the creator made all sacred and made in the image of God?

• Am I expected to love others as I love myself?

• Do I believe some part of human beings lives on after death?

• Do I believe that this earth is sacred and good, or a quick and disposable stop on the way to Heaven?

The answers to all of these questions determine how I live my life on a day-to-day basis—what I do, what I think is right and wrong, how I vote, how I spend money, how I spend my time, and so on.

I need to know myself

As a relatively intelligent and reasonable person, it feels necessary for me to interrogate these ideas that I carry around with me, to ask where they come from and why I believe them, and if those reasons to believe are sound. 

I want to know that my reasons to believe are not just connections to my family tradition and/or the American Christian (and even more specifically middle-class, White, Evangelical, Holiness) culture at large. Or to resign myself to this fact if it is true.

I want to know if there is compelling evidence out there—either material or spiritual—that is irresistible enough to prove to me that I have to believe.

I want to know if my beliefs are just a leap of faith, just something I HOPE for, because I am moved to believe even when the evidence isn’t exactly tangible.

I want to know my reasons in a detailed enough way that I can put them down in words, like a personal creed—a written one—which I can stand behind and point to when people ask why I believe the things I do.

I want to be able to say “This is why I’m a Christian.”

As I look for these answers, it is frustrating, that I can’t just throw out everything I’ve learned in the past and begin the inquiry fresh. I am always going to start with presuppositions.

I need to know my prolegomena

In theology, there is a term, “prolegomena,” which in the original Greek means, “that which is said beforehand.” Ideas, even very basic ones, tend to have some kind of prolegomena—something that one has to know, or understand, or believe, for the idea to make sense.

If one is going to build a boat, one would do very well to understand how water and displacement work if they want that vessel to float.

If one is going to build a rocket, one has to understand gravity, to know what one is working against to escape.

Through this work, I am trying to dig down to my own prolegomena—the foundation of basic assumptions on which my beliefs are constructed—and test if they are metaphorically solid rock or sinking sand.

Once I have dug down to something solid, then I can use that base layer as my stepping off point, to move outward into what I believe now, and how my faith is evolving as I move forward.

In the meantime, I will do the best I can with what I know so far, and keep my eyes open to new information. My life is not a tabula rasa, but, invoking the scientific method, I can think of it as a hypothesis about the existence of God and the role of Christ. My work is to prove or disprove its likelihood.

If what I believe is proven to be untrue, I have an intellectual responsibility to change my belief, based on that new information. If a belief is shown to be likely, I have a responsibility to seriously consider it as potentially true.

And thus, through fits and starts, I hope to get ever closer to the truth.