Post #81 "How Do We Know?"

How do we know? Religion says we know through Faith. Science says we can only know through Reason. Is there Reason within that which we believe through Faith? Is there a type of Faith within Reason? Is every scientific belief put to the test? In the Garden of Eden mythology from the biblical Old Testament literature, what was 'Knowing' like? In this pre-dawn of history setting, what was  Knowledge like....this Knowledge that permitted this sense of  'walking and talking with God'? Was the Knowledge here in this case, through Faith or through Reason? As religion arose through fear of the unknown, faith in a saving God would have been a process. The biblical story is intriguing because it says that before the 'Fall', Adam and Eve 'walked and talked' with God. It does not say that they worshipped or adored God as they would have through faith. It does not say that they were weighing, testing, and sifting through data to form an acceptable conclusion as through the use of reason. The story, as an early account of the history of the development of humanity, suggests another sense of knowing that preceded faith and reason. The story suggests that with this kind of knowledge, faith and reason cannot exist. What is it that the author or authors of the Genesis Garden Mythology are trying to describe? What was the knowledge alluded to and handed down to us through through stories of the gods of ancient lore? This biblical 'knowing' is depicted as taking place even before, or maybe even particularily before humanity 'separated' into male and female. (As previously noted, creation came about through processes of division.) How close did these stories come to answering our deepest questions? Were these early accounts presenting a knowledge any closer to truth than those of today's world? Have we, we of rational, mechanical thinking been moving forward or have we been moving backwards, farther and farther away from truth? How do we trust the truth of others and not ourselves as in faith? How do we know? Can we determine Reality from non-reality? Do we know what is real? Do we know the reality of 'nothingness'?

"Science cannot answer the deepest questions. As soon as you ask why there is something instead of nothing, you have gone beyond science." Allan Sandage