The Agnostic and Christ continued available evidences, who is inter ested in both truth-value as well as truth-limitation of a n y claim, agnosticism seems to be a sensible position. On the basis of a careful survey of the world as it is, it is difficult to accept any one dogmatic truth-claim. One may have a pref erence for this or that ideology as a world-hypothesis, but since any one of these world-viewpoints could be defended with equal consistency, providing one is prepared to meet its basic premise, one still does not get beyond the agnostic implica tions. “ Irrespective of my personal preference, the ultimate remains an enigma, a mystery, and rational integrity as well as humility com pel me to admit this limitation.” Isn’t this the dominant view of many educated people who prefer to retain an objective attitude to the various claims?
ling necessity, because not holding them would put some men into a position where they would have to deny their intellectual integrity? Can these be held with as much consistency as the claims of the agnostic? Can man ever escape agnostic uncertainty without ap pealing to fanaticism, irrationalism or just blind dogmatism? The care ful thinker realizes from the start that uncritical dogmatic claims are self-defeating, in that some criteria has to be used in choosing between conflicting claims of this nature. We are part of an empirical age. Man has learned that the only de pendable knowledge is that which comes from experience. Before this was realized, man wasted many centuries in rationalistic specula tions, both philosophical and theo logical, without any evidence of advance. What empirical starting- point can we find (something ex periential with all mankind) in our attempt to escape agnosticism? Many centuries ago, one of the first moderns, St. Augustine, look ing deep into the soul of man, gave us a formula: Our Hearts Are Restless . .. Now, we may be agnostic as to the meaning of the starry skies above us or the moral law within us or as to the secrets hidden in the atom, but we cannot ignore the basic empirical fact that man’s heart is universally restless and seeking fulfillment. In men of all convictions, including skeptics and atheists, we find this same unreal ized potential as a genuine experi ence. It separates man radically from the placid animal. It raises in him questions concerning the infi nite and the eternal, which is a standing miracle if man we r e solely the product of biological evolution. Man’s potential inner scope is tremendous, ranging all the way from heaven to hell. Many of us have direct knowledge of this, hav ing tasted of both of these states. This capacity for restlessness, for freedom, for the ideal, for self- knowledge, for the spiritual, is so
striking, that even many evolution ary naturalists are forced to adopt some view of a miraculous ‘emerg ence.’ The more man probes into him self, only to discover his basic isolation, the more acute his exis tential predicament may become. In modem man, the desire to escape frustration, fear and despair, has increased with the increasing complexities of life. Certainly, all naturalistic explanations, derived from a behavioristic psychology, deal only with superficial aspects of the problem. What is the reason for, and origin of, man’s unlimited inner potential, so strikingly differ ent from nature’s basic self-suffi ciency? For Thou modest us for Thyself If man’s inner need is unbound ed, if it is beyond measure, if it is infinite, then it also has an infinite source. Finite dissatisfactions are well known to all and can be sati ated. But the basic hunger, being in itself infinite, cannot be satisfied by any finite means, as we know from bitter experience. And here we may have the gist of the basic tragedy of man: born with an in finite capacity and need, his main attempts are directed toward satis fying them by finite means, lead ing only to greater dissatisfactions and despair. For if infinite God made us for Himself, then all our attempts to solve our basic need by naturalistic means are bound to fail. Man can solve his inner search only by returning to the Infinite. For Thou Madest us for Thyself and Our Heart is Restless, until it Repose in Thee For Augustine this was not a theory, a hypothesis or a poetic idea, it was a fact of experience. With keen psychological insight he analyzes man’s predicament bom out of conflict and despair. His was the tragedy of a soul raised out of the s l oughs of sensuality and brought face to face into a mystic union with God. Like St. Paul, he had been exposed to the very ex tremes of the human capacity and TH E K IN G 'S BU SINESS
Now many, if not most, careful thinkers may rest their case at this point, admitting that they do not know and n e v e r have known ‘truth.’ The moment, however, they go a step further and deduce from their initial agnostic premise the conclusion ‘truth is unknowable,’ they leave agnosticism and enter the realm of the dogmatic skeptic. The genuine agnostic would have to express his viewpoint in the form of an alternative proposition, or in terms of what is known as the ‘Law of Excluded Middle’ : “ Either truth is unknowable, or it is knowable.” The fact that his experience has not given him any true knowledge does not mean that true knowledge is necessarily unknowable, if the agnostic formula is to be retained. To avoid dogmatism, at least the potential for true knowledge has to be left open. Having presented thus far the agnostic alternative: “ I do not know whether truth is knowable or unknowable,” let us turn now to positive c l a ims concerning the knowability of truth. Quite apart from the hypothetical world-view points which are matters of prefer ence and do not solve man’s basic uncertainty, what are the truth- claims held to because of compel- 36
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