Chapter 49 Four Nine Faith

"Birth" is a limited situation, just like the orbit of a comet around the sun is also a limited situation.Under or within this limit, there will naturally be many kinds of limits, let's just talk about some big ones.Those who are biased towards the body are eating and drinking, men and women, disturbance, great tribulation, unless there is great strength, even life (including seeking a good life) is not necessary.What is biased is to know and believe. On the surface, it is not as substantive as eating and drinking men and women, but it is more powerful in the heart, because it has logic or Kant's so-called rationality as its backing.Regarding knowledge, the debate at the end of "Zhuangzi? Qiushui" "Zhuangzi and Huizi swim on Haoliang" can be proved. He said: "My son said that if you know the fish and the clouds, you already know that I know it, and if you ask me, I know it on Haoshang." This is more simple and clear, and the ignorance can only come from the knowledge.Regarding faith, we can cite the skeptical school in ancient Greece as evidence. The teacher fell into the water, and the disciple did not save him, but he was appreciated by the teacher, because he doubted whether it would be better to save it or not.However, if we go further and ask: "Are you also skeptical about skepticism?" If you also doubt it, obviously the problem is too big, which means that we are born in this world and cannot help but believe.What happened to the letter?What should I believe?The problem is obviously not simple, so I will talk about it below.

According to customary usage, there is a difference between "faith" and "belief". The meaning of faith is broad, while the meaning of belief is narrow; all beliefs are beliefs, and some beliefs cannot be called beliefs.Belief can be sporadic and small, such as the tree outside the window is a willow tree, and the bird on the tree is a sparrow.This habit is called knowledge, and it is also faith in terms of firm belief.Faith can also be not trivial, such as believing that Mount Everest is the highest, and Halley's Comet will come again in 76 years.This is also knowledge, which can also be called faith.Beliefs in beliefs mostly refer to metaphysics, such as the belief in Budi who is omniscient, omnipotent and all-good, Buddhas and Bodhisattvas, the old man under the moon who has the ability to make lovers become family members, and so on.Judging from such cases, belief is surreal, or belief without evidence, or simply superstition. Belief that the tree outside the window is a willow is not superstition, and the boundaries are clear.In fact, the problem is not so simple, such as believing that there is still tomorrow, and believing that life is better than death, can we find convincing evidence?If you really look for it and get to the bottom of it, you may eventually find that the reason such things seem certain is because the vast majority of people believe in it and never think that evidence is needed.But in order to save trouble, we have to rely on human subjectivity as the basis, saying that this kind of belief without evidence is the belief of knowledge, not the belief of ignorance; the belief of ignorance, such as God and Buddha, is faith.

The words have not been clearly stated, or there are still problems hidden in it, so it is not clear.What's the problem?A question comes from "knowledge".For example, if God says he does not know, priests and priests will not agree; if Buddha says he does not know, monks and nuns who are monks and nuns will not agree.Another problem comes from hyperreality.Sometimes this is too broad. For example, if you go to a divination booth to find a fortune-telling, it cannot be regarded as a belief.Sometimes it is too strict, such as Confucius and Mencius' belief in benevolence and moderation, and Bentham's utilitarianism (in fact, it is not as good as the translation of joyism), so they cannot be called beliefs.As a last resort, I have to start from the other side. In order to have absolute security and ultimate meaning in life, people often have to imagine a transcendent power (specific gods or abstract principles) as a backing for the soul. The dependence and worship of the backer is faith.In this way, the object of belief has such properties: it is unique and supreme, and nothing can compare with it.It is transcendent, so it does not need any reason to prove it and support it; it is powerful, so it is absolutely reliable, and can make people feel at ease; it exists in people's hearts, so different people have different shapes, or It is said that those who are honest and trustworthy, and those who believe in women.

Why should there be such an illusory one?Generally speaking, there is nothing to do but not reconciled to being helpless, so I have to draw cakes to satisfy my hunger.Human life, ruled by destiny, is weak, limited, and pitiful.But the heart is higher than the sky, willing, or unfaithful, wise, capable, although knowledge is boundless, and the body cannot last forever, but the fantasy can see everything clearly, and life has great value, and it does not rot with grass and trees.Unfortunately, this willingness or self-confidence cannot be corroborated or guaranteed in reality, so what should I do?There are two ways of retreating or advancing.Retiring is not seeking, that is, knowing that life is just such a thing, having the courage to face reality, breaking the can and breaking it.Ancient Taoists such as Zhuangzi said, "Know what you can't do, and be at peace with your fate." Liezi said, "When you are born, you will be Yao and Shun, if you die, your bones will rot, if you are born, you will be concurrently sealed, and if you die, your bones will rot", which can be counted as this way.This attitude of breaking the jar seems easy but it is actually difficult, because the fact is that you are living, and you have to treat it as nothing to be alive.That’s why almost all people go for a path, looking for reasons and backers. If they fail in reality, they go to the back of reality and try to find it (from imagination). In order to be able to be satisfied.This contentment can also be analyzed. There are mainly three states of mind, one is omniscience, the other is eternal existence, and the other is the meaning of all activities.Let me know first.To live, especially to live smoothly, depends on knowledge, so it can also be said to be innate, and there is no one who is not willing to seek knowledge.Know that there are close ones, such as eggs, and there are distant ones, such as celestial bodies outside the Milky Way.Zhuangzi once lamented that "knowledge is boundless", and it is even more so in modern times. The more we know, the more we suffer from the fact that we still don't know some important things.For example, what is going on in the big environment we were born in, whether we have life, whether life is worthwhile, etc., we still don’t know until now. "I don't know what I don't know" is the view of Confucius.Or ideally, as for ordinary people, it is difficult to be contented like this, because it is an unbearable regret to live a lifetime without knowing even some important things about life.As a last resort, I had no choice but to resort to assumptions, such as God is willing to do this, and then I firmly believe that I can calm down.Let alone eternal life.People have life, so they enjoy life and cherish life.Unfortunately, life is bound to die, this is a great pity, how to deal with it?Zhuangzi let it be, so when his wife died, he should sing "singing with drums and basins".Yang Wangsun of the Western Han Dynasty can also be counted as this way, and he was buried naked in order to speed up his death.As for ordinary people, it is difficult to see it this way.It's no wonder that the nerd's broken books were burned, and the beauty's hairpin was robbed, and he was so distressed, let alone life?So find a remedy.One kind of remedy is the idea of ​​the heavens, which is to pass on the seed and have children.His appearance and personality resembled his own, and after a hundred years, he would still have the "three years without changing his father's way", which seemed to be reassuring.But that is indirect after all, it is not as good as being able to live forever.Taoism, Ge Hong's alchemy is for this.It's a pity that Ge Hong, up to the Taoists of Baiyun Temple, have not been able to live forever.Therefore, we have to make concessions to the destiny or nature. When the critical moment comes, we have no choice but to be ruthless, abandon our body, and think of individual methods in order to perpetuate.In this method, there are two kinds of small concessions and large concessions: the small one is to save the body and the gods, and the big one is to save the body and the name.Where does God, or the soul, reside?Catholicism and Christianity are ascension to heaven, sitting next to God.Buddhism (especially Pure Land Buddhism) is to enjoy the world of ultimate bliss, because according to the "Amitabha Sutra", there are flowers and jewels everywhere.There are layman's books below it, which can be represented by a class of books, which are symmetrical to the yang world, and there is also the underworld, although there are Yama and imps, which are difficult to deal with, but there are also wine shops where you can buy wine and drink, and there are many beauties. Still romantic.Besides, the big retreat is to use various immortal methods to save fame, which has been discussed in the previous topic, so I won't repeat it here.Finally, the third mentality, all activities are not in vain, but meaningful, or valuable.It's not as clear as seeking eternal life, or actually flickering in the unconscious.But it is not impossible to infer it.Activities vary.It can be divided into big and small, such as martyrdom is big, visiting friends is small, and it can also be divided into busy and idle, such as repairing bridges and roads is busy, composing poems and singing music is free.Regardless of whether you are busy or busy, as far as the activists are concerned, it can be heavy because they think it should be like this, and it can be light because they feel it is delicious. There is a reason for this should, this taste, and this reason is also belief, even if I may not feel it. .

The above analysis can also be summed up in common words, yes, so we must have faith, it means that the spirit will be settled, and life will be prosperous.But people have different personalities, different experiences (more importantly, education background), so their beliefs will naturally not be the same.What to believe in, there are so many things, it's hard to say.Here I just want to summarize it into two types according to the different nature of belief.First, the belief is not clear.It seems that I don't have any beliefs; in other words, I accept a little bit of what I hear, and my mind becomes a mixed bag.From the past to the present, most of the common people in my cause have taken this road. Some temples in the countryside can illustrate this situation. They not only support Confucius and Mencius, but also support the Taishang Laojun and Guanyin Bodhisattva.Does this count as lack of faith?From the standpoint of believers, it can also be said that there is no faith.I don't think so, because there are two situations without belief, and it is difficult to do it.One is the so-called "I don't know, I don't know, follow the emperor's rule."This is the road envisaged by Lao Tzu "empty the heart and fill the belly".Empty one's mind, one's achievement may not only be less thinking and few desires, but ignorance and desirelessness, which is easier said than done.The other kind of unbelief comes from extensive and far-reaching speculation. This is because of the pursuit, but finally can't understand why, so we have to rest in doubt for a while. , rather than saying that we have no faith, we say that we also have faith, but it is not clear enough.The most explicit is the second, religion.Whether you believe in God, Buddha, or Bodhisattva, the object of faith is clear (not visible, audible, or palpable, but sincerity leads to spirituality), and it is strengthened by organization and etiquette, so it seems to be effective.One has to seek something in life, so, according to the principle that a cat that catches mice is a good cat, since it works, it is of great use.The third is the traditional so-called "Tao", the way of "hearing the Tao in the morning, you can die in the evening".This Tao is the ideal of scholars who are accustomed to speculative thinking. It can be biased towards knowledge, such as "the destiny is called nature", or it can be biased towards practice, such as "fear the destiny".Scholars respect ghosts and gods and stay away from them. They think and do something, and hope to be at ease, so they have to ask for help from Taoism, or establish their own Taoism.Tao is a theoretical system for the understanding of heaven and man, with this system.If you seek knowledge, you will get the answer, and if you do it, you will have the basis.Naturally, people's hearts are different, just like their faces, so different people have different ways.But it can also be divided into two categories.One category can be represented by "the destiny is called nature, and the will is called Tao", which is based on the principle of heaven to determine human behavior. Confucianism, especially Song Rucheng and Zhu, all followed this path.The other type is not asking about the sky, but only about people, such as the British Miller who believed in Benthamism, and countless people who believed in this doctrine and that doctrine, thinking that once the medicine is taken according to the prescription, the whirling world can become a paradise. This is the way to go.

Faith has good and bad issues, and judgments seem to still have to be based on humanism.For example, we believe in God and believe that God is all good, so we feel at ease with ourselves because we believe in God’s protection, and we always say it is good to others because we believe in God’s benevolence and always respond to the world with benevolence.On the contrary, because of believing in God, we think that we are the only one who is right, and then go crazy. Therefore, in order to save the soul, we will not hesitate to burn to death with fire, so it is difficult for us to follow suit.Can you also comment on whether it is right or wrong?If right or wrong refers to whether there are facts to prove it, then it is difficult to say, because beliefs come from hopes and assumptions, and seeking to be proved by facts is close to deliberately embarrassing.

From the above analysis, we can see that belief, although it is difficult to obtain facts as evidence, is of great use.Useful, just as we have for many daily-use things, of course it is better to have it.Unfortunately it is not easy to have it.I remember that Bacon in England once said that a great philosophy should start with doubt and end with faith.It starts with doubt, it starts with reason, can it end with faith?In my opinion, there are two possibilities: impossible and possible.Impossible, because rationality is consistent, that is, any stage of speculation requires facts as evidence, or conforms to the laws of reasoning.For example, if you believe in God, you will ask, where is the highest?If, as "Genesis" says, everything is made by him, who made him?Rationally, this kind of question can be asked, but as a result of asking, it is very difficult to get a letter.Another possible way is to divide and conquer. For example, go to the lecture hall and reason with reason. When you go to church, you will temporarily avoid reason and only treat God with reverence.From a rational point of view, such an inconsistent approach may seem unreasonable, but human beings are not made of pure reason, so many wise people are still happy to take this path.

Seeing with the eyes of materialism, those who start with doubts, move forward with rationality, and fail to finally believe are suffering because they cannot get the final sustenance of their hearts.On the other hand, this means that people should have faith.What should I believe?It's hard to say exactly.It can be generally said that it is best not to be too far from rationality but also in line with moral principles.Rationality and superstition are opposite, so if you are not far from rationality, you should be less superstitious.For example, it is better to believe in Da, or in nature, or in creation, or in God, than in Erlang Shen.If you still feel that God and the like are too far away from reason, then you might as well imitate the spirit of Zen, scold the Buddha and the ancestors and instead seek the original heart, that is to say, not relying on God but relying on Tao.There is no such thing as a high-level theory of humbleness. For example, the Tao of "destiny is called nature, and willfulness is called Tao" can be barely counted, right?As for virtue, as I have said many times before, its essence is to benefit life, including life outside oneself, so "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth" cannot be counted, let alone adding insult to injury.At last.In general, the great difficulty in faith is that it is difficult to reconcile with reason, and we cannot part with both.As far as a certain person is concerned, some beliefs have the upper hand. For example, some old ladies recite Namo Amitabha devoutly without asking whether there really is a paradise. It should be said that they have obtained blessings because of their beliefs.On the other hand, rationality has the upper hand, such as returning from God’s exhaustion and wanting to live in Taoism. At this time, rationality makes trouble again, asking, what is the basis for such Taoism to be valuable?Obviously, the deepest root could not be found, so it seemed that the firm belief was shaken again.The result of wavering, if magnified, will inevitably lead to a loss of life.There is an old saying that "the one who sees deep fish is unknown", and I think this is exactly the case in matters of belief.