Is coming to faith by argument and thinking truly possible?

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Christphr

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Apologetics seeks to show through history and reason the truth of Christianity and defend it from objections.

Is coming to faith by argument and thinking truly possible?
 
Not for me. Emotion, instinct and “commonsense” are also needed.
 
As a nonbeliever I think someone can totally come to faith by reason.
 
Intellectually you can accept truths of the Faith, but Faith itself is a gift.
 
No, otherwise the world would all believe in the same religion.
 
Intellectual assent (believing arguments) is different than faith.
 
ratio1 said:
No, otherwise the world would all believe in the same religion.
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If everyone thought and reasoned the same from precisely the same premises, perhaps.

Are you claiming everyone does?
 
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AlNg said:
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HarryStotle:
If everyone thought and reasoned the same from precisely the same premises, perhaps.

Are you claiming everyone does?
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How would the premises differ?
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The obvious way is that not everyone will accept the premises that some might.

Isn’t this one of the things what make any argument contentious?

Are you going to contend with me on that?

If so, point demonstrated.

If not, I have a boatload of other premises I know you won’t accept since we aren’t precisely strangers on these forums.
 
Then the answer to OP is still no because everyone has different premises.
 
Solely?

I’ve never seen it.

Logic and rationale defend the faith. But the spirit draws one to it.

Radically different functions.
 
ratio1 said:
Then the answer to OP is still no because everyone has different premises.
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That doesn’t follow.

If Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life, then accepting true premises and using sound reasoning will lead anyone who does both assiduously to true beliefs, aka Jesus, the Truth and “the faith.”

The problem is that some accept false notions as true premises or don’t apply sound reasoning and logic towards deriving true conclusions from those premises.

Therefore, whether reason leads to true beliefs depends upon starting with all possible true premises AND applying sound reasoning exhaustively to arrive at all possible true beliefs.

Not everyone starts with accepting true premises and not everyone uses sound reasoning even if they do start from true premises, and not everyone pursues the “quest” to its finality.

So some, even many, wander from the path of truth.
 
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So the answer to OP should be:
Yes if one knows that one has started with true premises. Which is impossible for one to know for sure based on reasoning alone.
Hence in practice it’s still a no?
 
ratio1 said:
So the answer to OP should be:
Yes if one knows that one has started with true premises. Which is impossible for one to know for sure based on reasoning alone.
Hence in practice it’s still a no?
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The OP didn’t say anything about coming to absolute certainty about the faith or the Truth. I believe the wording was, “coming to faith.” It didn’t say anything about coming to absolute certain knowledge that your faith (trust in God) is absolutely and always warranted.

Sound and careful reasoning can get us to faith, and from there faith and reason together can get us the rest of the way.
 
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Ok I’ll try again.
Answer should be yes you can come to faith by reason alone, be it Christianity, Islam or Hinduism.
 
Well I believe in prayer. I have nothing else really to say. Prayer is powerful especially with good intention and acceptance or resignation if your prayer is refused.
 
HarryStotle said:
If not, I have a boatload of other premises I know you won’t accept since we aren’t precisely strangers on these forums.
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Yes. I hope you agree that premises should be obvious.
Now, specifically what premises do you think are obvious but others would not agree to them?
And what premises might another person postulate as obvious, but you would not agree to those?
 
The creation of the universe is history, and you cannot change history. Either, at least one God created the universe, or there is no creator god. The maybe god or probable god cannot exist, it’s yes or no.
 
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