Are You Doubting Enough?

Everyone doubts. Everyone trusts. Nobody trusts perfectly or doubts perfectly in everything and at all times and in all ways. So, you could always doubt more or get better at it. The question would be, then, should you?

To answer that we should probably discuss why you should do anything at all. Some say that everything that we should do is really only pragmatic--that it serves a practical purpose. Some say that what we should do are the higher things--striving for virtues. Others say that there is still another more external and unchanging standard--this is what you ought to do. So, if those are our options (if there is another then let me know) then which one would motivate us to doubt more and even better?

Pragmatism would only promote doubting and skepticism when it called for it. We would need to look at it on a case-by-case basis. So, three would not be a need to increase. Skepticism can only be seen as a virtue when it is freeing you from some untoward behavior or social ills. However, to be totally skeptical in all things can never be a virtuous goal mainly because it would keep you from all other virtuous goals which require trust. Even pragmatism requires a very great deal of trust. An objective ought would actually require that we only doubt when it is necessary in order to understand better what it is that we must do in light of this standard. We should doubt only to find out what it is that we should not doubt--the ultimate objective ought.

As we can see from a short assessment, there is never a reason to doubt perfectly all the time, in every way and in everything. Doubt is merely a tool to be used and never something to aspire to. It is not the ultimate goal of the pragmatist, the nobleman nor the believer in objective standards. So, being skeptical should not be anyone's goal. In fact, as French philosopher Blaise Pascal said, 

"What then is man to do in this state of affairs? Is he to doubt everything, to doubt whether he is awake, whether he is being pinched or burned? Is he to doubt whether he is doubting, to doubt whether he exists? 

No one can go that far, and I maintain that a perfectly genuine sceptic has never existed."

Pensees ( Blaise Pascal, Penguin Classics; Rev Ed edition, Translated by A. Krailsheimer)

What Is The Perfect Law of Liberty? (James 1:25)

James 1:18-27

New English Translation (NET)

"18 By his sovereign plan he gave us birth through the message of truth, that we would be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

19 Understand this, my dear brothers and sisters! Let every person be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger. 20 For human anger does not accomplish God’s righteousness. 21 So put away all filth and evil excess and humbly welcome the message implanted within you, which is able to save your souls. 22 But be sure you live out the message and do not merely listen to it and so deceive yourselves. 23 For if someone merely listens to the message and does not live it out, he is like someone who gazes at his own face in a mirror. 24 For he gazes at himself and then goes out and immediately forgets what sort of person he was. 25 But the one who peers into the perfect law of liberty and fixes his attention there, and does not become a forgetful listener but one who lives it out—he will be blessed in what he does. 26 If someone thinks he is religious yet does not bridle his tongue, and so deceives his heart, his religion is futile. 27 Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their misfortune and to keep oneself unstained by the world."

James uses three different words to essentially refer to the same thing in this passage. We will look at each usage to see what they mean separately as well as together to discover what it is that James means by "the perfect law of liberty". The three usages are (1) the message of truth, (2) the perfect law of liberty, and (3) pure and undefiled religion.

Let's first look at the "message of truth". In verse 18 James says that the message (some translations: the word) is how we were given birth. For James, the half-brother of Jesus, birth here would be referring to re-birth--being born again. Then, in v. 21 he calls it that message "implanted within you" and "which is able to save your souls." The message that births you, then, is also the one that saves your soul. Not only that, but it is also implanted in you. This message both saves and regenerates and after that it indwells you. This must mean nothing less than the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Yet, it also means more than that. We see in Jeremiah that the law of the new covenant will be written on the hearts of those men and women belonging to that covenant. 

Now, we will look at the law of liberty. Along with the "message of truth" James declares that we must live out the "perfect law of liberty" and not just take it in by the ear. You can quickly see that James merely continues his argument of the importance of being doers of the message by saying that we must also be doers of this law without making a new argument at all. Either the law of liberty exists in the message of truth or the message exists in the law. It should be clear that the message is not perfectly identical to the law but that the portion of each which involves application or (more likely) imperatives is the same. So then, he is referring to taking the same action in either case. That is, those things that we should do which are in the message are the same as the things that we should do which are in the law. So, the law of liberty and the message of truth both contain the same instructions for right conduct.

Lastly, we have pure religion. Just as in the law example of the mirror, here we have a person perceiving of themselves and then not living out a life in concord with that image. And we also have the idea of deceiving oneself both here and in the first section of the 'implanted word'. We can even see what I think is the same idea in v 24 where the man looks in the mirror and immediately forgets what sort of man he is. That man is not forgetful, but rather self-deceived! (There is also likely a tie to the double-minded man earlier in the chapter; cf. Moo.) So, once again James gives us a standard that is being heard or seen and then the absence or lack of living that standard out. That standard is, of course, God's standard of righteousness (see v. 20). Interestingly, here James gives us actual samples of that righteous conduct: "to care for orphans and widows in their misfortune and to keep oneself unstained by the world." So, James warns that religious claims do not make you a righteous dude if you are simply going to the temple--pagan or Jewish--but rather it is the implanted word with the law of liberty working out good for those around you. So, once again the aspect of all three that should be obeyed are the same commands and should be plainly taken as referring to the same thing. 

Putting it plainly, then the law of our true religion is found in the message of Jesus. I think it is safe to say that James here is saying that the person who lays claim to the fulfillment of all religion (which we know today as Christianity) and received the gospel, law and teaching of Jesus Christ is only fooling themselves if they are not living out the Law of Christ. As Paul said in Galatians 6:7 "Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows."