No, no, never angry. Let me hold you tight, my fledgling, my darling, my newborn one. I adore you. We will fix everything. We will make everything perfect for everyone. Somehow. You have not been an angelic success, have you? Is God giving you the power to writhe and spit with anger? Faith, in the having mode, is the possession of an answer for which one has no rational proof. It consists of formulations created by others, which one accepts because one submits to those others—usually a bureaucracy. It carries the feeling of certainty because of the real (or only imagined) power of the bureaucracy. It is the entry ticket to join a large group of people. It relieves one of the hard task of thinking for oneself and making decisions. One becomes one of the beati possidentes, the happy owners of the right faith. Faith, in the having mode, gives certainty; it claims to pronounce ultimate, unshakable knowledge, which is believable because the power of those who promulgate and protect the faith seems unshakable. Indeed, if all it requires is to surrender one’s independence, who would not choose certainty? God, originally a symbol for the highest value that we can experience within us, becomes, in the having mode, an idol. In the prophetic concept, an idol is a thing that we ourselves make and project our own powers into, thus impoverishing ourselves. We then submit to our creation and by our submission are in touch with ourselves in an alienated form. #RandolphHarris 1 of 13

While I can have the idol because it is a thing, by my submission to it, it, simultaneously, has me. Once God has become an idol, God’s alleged qualities have as little to do with my personal experience as alienated political doctrines do. The idol may be praised as Lord of Mercy, yet any cruelty may be committed in its name, just as the alienated faith in human solidarity may not even raise doubts about committing the most inhuman acts. Faith, in the having mode, is a crutch for those who want to be certain, those who want an answer to life without daring to search for it themselves. In the being mode, faith is an entirely different phenomenon. Can we live without faith? Must not the nursling have faith in its mother’s milk? Must we all not have faith in other beings, in those whom we love, and in ourselves? Can we live without faith in the validity of norms for our life? Indeed, without faith we become grim soulless mortals, sterile, hopeless, afraid to the very core of our being. Faith, in the being mode, is not, in the first place, a belief in certain ideas (although it may be that, too) but an inner orientation, an attitude. It would be better to say that one is in faith than that one has faith. (The theological distinction between faith that is belief [fides quae creditur] and faith as belief [fides qua creditur] reflects a similar distinction between the content of faith and the act of faith.) One can be in faith toward oneself and toward others, and the religious person can be in faith toward God. #RandolphHarris 2 of 13

The God of the Old Testament is, first of all, a negation of idols, of gods whom one can have. Though conceived in analogy to an Eastern king, the concept of God transcends itself from the very beginning. God must not have a name; no image must be made of God. Later on, in Jewish and Christian development, the attempt is made to achieve the complete deidolization of God, or rather to fight the danger of idolization by postulating that even God’s qualities can be stated. Or most radically in Christian mysticism—from (Pseudo) Dionysius Areopagita to the unknown author of The Cloud of Unknowing and to Master Eckart—the concept of God tends to be that of the One, the “Godhead” (the No-thing), thus joining views expressed in the Vedas and in Neoplatonic thinking. This faith in God is vouched for by inner experience of the divine qualities in oneself; it is a continuous, active process of self-creation—or, as Master Eckhart puts it, of Christ’s eternally being born within ourselves. The key to having unshakable faith is to not consider your circumstances, but consider your God. When you focus on God, you magnify God and your faith rises in your heart. That faith will keep you fully persuaded that God will make a way, even though you do not see a way. And the beauty is that God will show up and do amazing things! #RandolphHarris 3 of 13

My faith in myself, in another, in humankind, in our capacity to become fully human also implies certainty, but certainty based on my own experience and not on my submission to an authority that dictates a certain belief. It is certainty of a truth that cannot be proven by rationally compelling evidence, yet truth I am certain of because of my experiential, subjective evidence. (The Hebrew word for faith is Emunah, certainty; amen means certainly.) If I am certain of a mortal’s integrity, I could not prove one’s integrity up to one’s last day; strictly speaking, if one’s integrity remains inviolate to the time of one’s passing from this Earth, even that would not exclude an absolute standpoint that one might have done violence to it has one lived longer. My certainty rests upon experience of love and integrity. This kind of knowledge is possible only to the extent that I can drop my own id and see that other mortal in his or her suchness, recognize the structure of forces in one, see one in one’s individuality and at the same time in one’s Universal humanity. Then I know what the other can do, what one cannot do, and what one will not do. Of course, I do not mean by this that I could predict all of one’s future behavior, but only the general lines of behavior that are rooted in basic character traits, such as integrity, responsibility, and so forth. #RandolphHarris 4 of 13

This faith is based on facts; hence it is rational. However, the facts are not recognizable or provable by the method of conventional, absolute psychology; I, the alive person, am the only instrument that can register them. There is no conflict between faith in its true nature and reason in its true nature. This includes the assertion that there is no essential conflict between faith and the cognitive function of reason. Cognition in all its forms was always considered as that function of mortal’s which comes most easily into conflict with faith. This was especially so when faith was defined as a lower form of knowledge and was accepted because the divine authority guaranteed its truth. We have rejected this distortion of the meaning of faith, and in doing so have removed one of the most frequent causes for the conflicts between faith and knowledge. However, we must show beyond this the concrete relation of faith to the several forms of cognitive reason: the scientific, the historical and the philosophical. The truth of faith is different from the meaning of truth in each of these ways of knowledge. Nevertheless, it is truth they all try to reach, truth in the sense of really real received adequately by the cognitive function of the human mind. Error takes place if the mortal’s cognitive endeavor misses the really real and takes that which is only seemingly real for real; or if it hit the really real but expresses it in a distorted way. #RandolphHarris 5 of 13

Often it is difficult to say whether the real is missed or whether its expression is inadequate, because the two forms of the error are interdependent. In any case, where there is the attempt to know, there is truth or error or one of the many degrees of transition between truth and error. In faith mortal’s cognitive function is at work. Therefore, we must ask what the meaning of truth in faith is, what its criteria are, and how it is related to other forms of truth with other kinds of criteria. Science tries to describe and to explain the structures and relations in the Universe, in so far as they can be tested by experiment and calculated in quantitative terms. The truth of a scientific statement is the adequacy of the description of the structural laws which determine reality, and it is the verification of this description by experimental repetitions. Every scientific truth is preliminary and subject to changes both in grasping reality and in expressing it adequately. This element of uncertainty does not diminish the truth value of a tested and verified scientific assertion. It only prevents scientific dogmatism and absolutism. Therefore, it is a very poor method of defending the truth of faith against the truth of science, if theologians point to the preliminary character of every scientific statement in order to provide a place of retreat for the truth of faith. #RandolphHarris 6 of 13

If tomorrow scientific progress reduced the sphere of uncertainty, faith would have to continue its retreat—an undignified and unnecessary procedure, for scientific truth and the truth of faith do not belong to the same dimension of meaning. Science has no right and no power to interfere with faith and faith has no power to interfere with science. One dimension of meaning is not able to interfere wit another dimension. If this is understood, the previous conflicts between faith and science appear in a quite different light. The conflict was actually not between faith and science but between a faith and a science each of which was not aware of its own valid dimension. When the representatives of faith impeded the beginning of modern astronomy they were not aware that the Christian symbols, although using the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic astronomy, were not tied up with this astronomy. Only if the symbols of God in Heaven and mortals on Earth and demons below the Earth are taken as descriptions of places, populated by divine or demonic beings can modern astronomy conflict with the Christian faith. On the other hand, if representatives of modern physics reduce the whole of reality to the mechanical movement of the smallest particles of matter, denying the really real quality of life and mind, they express a faith, objectively as well as subjectively. Subjectively science is their ultimate concern—and they are ready to sacrifice everything, including their lives, for this ultimate. #RandolphHarris 7 of 13

Objectively, they create a monstrous symbol of this concern, namely, a Universe in which everything, including their own scientific passion, is swallowed by meaningless mechanism. In opposing tis symbol of faith Christian faith is right. Science can conflict only with science, and faith only wit faith; science which remains science cannot conflict wit faith which remains faith. This is true also of other spheres of scientific research, such as biology and psychology. The famous struggle between the theory of evolution and the theology of some Christian groups was not a struggle between science and faith, but between a science whose faith deprived mortals of their humanity and a faith whose expression was distorted by Biblical literalism. It is obvious that a theology which interprets the Biblical story of creation as a scientific description of an event which happened once upon a time interferes with the methodically controlled scientific work; and that a theory of evolution which interprets mortal’s descendance from older forms of life in a way that removes the infinite, qualitative difference between mortals and animals is faith and not science. The same consideration must be given to present and future conflicts between faith and contemporary psychology. Modern psychology is afraid of the concept of soul because it seems to establish a reality which is unapproachable by scientific methods and may interfere with their results. This fear is not unfounded; psychology should not accept any concept which is not produced by its own scientific work. #RandolphHarris 8 of 13

The function of psychology is to describe mortal’s processes as adequately as possible, and to be open to replacement of these descriptions at any time. This is true of the modern concepts of ego, id, superego, self, personality, unconsciousness, mind, as well as of traditional concepts of soul, spirit, will, and so forth. Methodological psychology is subject to scientific verification, as is every other scientific endeavor. All its concepts and definitions, even those most validated, are preliminary. When faith speaks of the ultimate dimension in which mortals live, and in which one can win our lose one’s soul, or of the ultimate meaning of one’s existence, it is not interfering at all with the scientific rejection of the concept of the soul. A psychology without soul cannot deny this nor can a psychology with soul conform it. The truth of mortal’s eternal meaning is possessed in a dimension other than the truth of adequate psychological concepts. Contemporary analytic or depth psychology has in many instances conflicted with pre-theological and theological expressions of faith. It is, however, not difficult in the statements of depth psychology to distinguish the more or less verified observations and hypotheses from assertions about mortal’s nature and destiny which are clearly expressions of faith. The naturalistic elements which Dr. Freud carried from the nineteenth into the twentieth century, his basic puritanism with respect to love, his pessimism about culture, and his reduction of religion to ideological projection are all expressions of faith and not the result of scientific analysis. #RandolphHarris 9 of 13

There is no reason to deny to a scholar who deals with mortals and their predicament the right to introduce elements of faith. However, if one attacks other forms of faith in the name of scientific psychology, as Dr. Freud and many of his followers do, he is confusing dimensions. In this case those who represent another kind of faith are justified in resisting these attacks. It is not always easy to distinguish the elements of faith from the elements of scientific hypothesis in a psychological assertion, but it is possible and often necessary. The distinction between the truth and the truth of science leads to a warning, directed to theologians, not to use recent scientific discoveries to confirm the truth of faith. Microphysics have undercut some scientific hypotheses concerning the calculability of the Universe. The theory of quantum and the principle of indeterminacy have had this effect. Immediately religious writers use these insights for the confirmation of their own idea of human freedom, divine creativity, and miracles. However, there is no justification for such a procedure at all, neither from the point of view of physical theories referred to have no direct relation to the infinitely complex phenomenon of human freedom, and the emission of power in quantums has no direct relation to the meaning of miracles. Theology, in using physical theories in this way, confuses the dimensions of science with the dimensions of faith. The truth of faith cannot be confirmed by latest physical or biological or psychological discoveries—as it cannot be denied by them. #RandolphHarris 10 of 13

We have forgotten the gracious hands of which preserved us in peace and multiplied and enriched and strengthened us; and we have vainly imagined, in the deceitfulness of our hearts, that all these blessings were produced by some superior wisdom and virtue of our own. “And all these blessings shall come upon you and overtake you if you heed the voice of the Lord your God,” reports Deuteronomy 28.2. Psychoanalysis was brought into being by the failure of will. It is not surprising the Dr. Freud, observing in his Victorian culture how regularly will was used in the service of repression, should have developed psychoanalysis as an antiwill system. In Dr. Freud, the phenomenon of will is crushed in the dialectic of instinct on one side and authority, in the form of the superego, on the other. Dr. Freuds observation that will is under three masters, id, superego, and external World, leaves will lost—or, if not actually lost, powerless under its masters. Needing very much to succeed in the World, our friend Victorian Grayson had an active conscience; but World, id and sugerego—if one accepts this formulation—were hopelessly grinding her motto “where there’s a will, there’s a way” into pathetic mockery and extorting a painful price in her masochistic guilt. #RandolphHarris 11 of 13

Dr. Freud saw will as an implement in the service of repression, no longer a beneficial moving force. Seeking the force and the motive of human acidity, he looked instead into the vicissitudes of instincts, the fate of the repressed libido, and so on. Object-choice, in the Freudian system, is not choice in a real sense, but a function of the transposition of the historical vicissitudes. Indeed, Dr. Freud sees will as the devil of the whole system, in that will has the negative function of setting resistance and repression into motion. Or, if the term devil begs the question, we can use a sophisticated name for it, which we can call counterphobic maneuver. This marks the moment when the unconscious became heir to the power of will. What are the sources of this destruction of will in Dr. Freud’s theory? One source is obvious: Dr. Freud’s accurate clinical observation. A second source is cultural; Dr. Freud’s theory was consistent with and an expression of the alienation it descried. It must not be forgotten that Dr. Freud spoke out of and reflected an objectivistic, alienated, market-place culture. As I have indicated elsewhere, the very overemphasis on will power in Victorian times was part and parcel of the compartmentalization that foreshadowed the culture’s collapse, which indeed occurred in 1914. The overemphasis on will power was parallel to the increasingly rigid pattern of will of the compulsive neurotic before his whole system breaks down. The alienation of Victorian mortals from themselves, under the rubric of will, is expressed in Dr. Freud’s system under the rubric of the opposite pole, namely wish.  #RandolphHarris 12 of 13

A third reason is that Dr. Freud needed to replace will because of the requirements of his scientific model, his aim and desire being to make a deterministic science based on the image of nineteenth century natural science. He thus needed a quantitative, cause-and-effect system: he speaks of his mechanism as hydraulics, and in his last book, libido is given the analogy of an electro-magnetic charge. A forth reason for Dr. Freud’s seeking to destroy will was exactly why we are now interested in rediscovering it on a more profound basis: namely, to deepen human experience, to place these phenomena on a level which would reflect more adequately a dignity and respect for human life. For, contrary to its intention, Victorian will power, by implying that every person is a master of his or her fate and could decide the whole course of his life by a resolution on New Year’s Eve or on a chance whim in a Saturday or Sunday-morning church service, actually belittles life, robbed it of dignity, and cheapened human experience. That some of these aspects of Dr. Freud, like the last two, are contradictory, should not daunt us; one of the marks of his greatness was that he could live with such contradiction. He might well have countered such a charge with the lines of Walt Whitman, “I contradict myself? Very well, I contradict myself.” Do not feel bad if you are not where you want to be at this moment. “Sometimes it was harder to change the past than it was the future,” reports Kate Atkinson. #RandolphHarris 13 of 13