The Nature of Faith

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What is faith?
Faith has generally been

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associated with belief in a
religion and it's specific

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tenants, or articles of faith.
We are educated within our

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religion of choice about the
basic beliefs, that underlie,

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that religion, and we are asked
to accept them on faith.

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In some cases, these articles of
Faith are due to negotiated

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agreements among Church Elders,
at some point in the distant

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past.
And in some cases, these beliefs

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are fully contradicted by
knowledge that has subsequently

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come to light as Humanity grows
and advances in its

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understanding.
It is, for this reason,

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primarily that science has
rejected the common idea of

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faith faith.
However, is not the affirmation

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of beliefs, tenants or dogmas
associated.

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With a specific religious
background in its deepest and

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truest sense, Faith represents a
form of non mental, knowing that

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nevertheless is felt as true and
self-evident.

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For those who are immersed in
the mental Consciousness, the

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idea that there can be a form of
knowledge that is not directly

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available to the mind or that
relies on an instrument of

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knowing other than the mind is
inconceivable.

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Yet, if we examine closely, we
can see that the range of mental

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understanding is limited within
a specific upper and lower

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field.
Below the mental level of

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understanding knowing takes the
form of a subconscious or even

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unconscious habit, which we call
Instinct.

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Instinct does not rely on the
mind and is evident throughout

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the Animal Kingdom in some
cases.

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This instinct is very precise
and detailed and it's working

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just as there is a form of
knowing below the mental field.

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There are also forms of knowing
above the I filled the evolution

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of Consciousness is not
completed and man, therefore is

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what funeral been do?
Calls a transitional being Faith

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them from this standpoint is not
a dogmatic belief in a system of

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ideas.
But rather the confirmation of a

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knowledge obtained through a
different instrument of knowing

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than the mind the rightness and
truth of the faith is something

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more akin to intuition and to
mental logic, Faith, gives the

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individual the courage to
continue even when faced with

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the contradictory view of the
mind, or the vital being SRI

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aurobindo writes, quote Faith
does not depend upon experience.

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It is something that is there
before experienced when one

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starts the yoga, it is not
usually on the strength of

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experience, but on the strength
of faith, it is.

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So not only in yoga and the
spiritual life, but in ordinary

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life, also, all men of action,
discoverers inventors, creators

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of Acknowledge proceed by faith
and until the proof is made, or

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the thing done, they go on.
In spite of disappointment,

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failure, disproof, denial,
because of something in them

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that tells them that this is the
truth.

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The thing that must be followed,
and done ramakrishna even went

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so far as to say when asked,
whether Blind Faith was not

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wrong.
The Blind Faith was the only

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kind to have for Faith as either
blind.

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Or it is not Faith, but
something else reasoned.

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Inference, proved conviction
where a certain knowledge.

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Faith is the souls witness to
something, not yet, manifested

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achieved or realized, but which
yet the nowhere within us even

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in the absence of all
indications feels to be true or

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sir pleat supremely worth
following or achieving. this

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thing within us can last even
when there is no fixed belief,

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in the mind, even when the vital
struggles in Revolt and refuses,

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Who is there that practices the
yoga and has not his periods

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long periods of disappointment
and failure and disbelief and

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darkness.
But there is something that

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sustains him and even goes on in
spite of himself.

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Because it feels that what it
followed after was yet true and

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it more than feels, it knows.
The fundamental Faith In Yoga.

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Is this inherent in the soul
that the Divine exists?

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And the Divine is the one thing
to be followed after.

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Nothing else in life is worth
having in comparison with that.

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So long as a man has that Faith,
he is marked for the spiritual

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life and I will say that even if
his nature is full of obstacles

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and crammed, with denials and
difficulties, and even if he has

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many years of struggle, he is
marked out for success in the

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spiritual life.
And quote, reference SRI

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aurobindo, and the mother
growing within the psychology of

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inner development.
Chapter 3 growth of

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Consciousness basic requisites
Pages 41 to 42,