The idiom or proverb "Seeing is believing" reminds us of St. Thomas' doubt about the resurrected Jesus, whereupon the latter says that "Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed" (John 20:29). I personally do not understand in what way a blind believing can be a blessing for anybody, but such belief is the supporting pillar of the whole edifice of Christianity. If you cannot believe immaculate conception, incarnate word, resurrection etc. because you don't see how such things are possible, you have the choice between believing without seeing and not believing. Indeed, Christianity is a pure religion in the sense that it relies 100% on "belief". It begins with believing that Joseph's son is God's son and at the same time God Himself.
Of course, believing has an immense power. As Jesus said, "if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you" (Matthew 17:20f). Not to such a degree, but history is replete with miraculous achievements which could be reached only by faith. Such 'miracles' are plain facts while the question is still to be answered whether divine intervention or human potential is the real force behind them.
Once we accept someone or something as an absolute authority, it is easier to believe in it and to do what is dictated by this authority, believing it to be the absolute truth. By the same token, it is a harder way of arriving at truth to begin with not believing the words of an authoritative source and trying to understand them with our own reason and experience, and then to believe.
For example, the phrase every Buddhist knows, "form is exactly emptiness, emptiness exactly form," should not be accepted as truth (Buddha warned against it) as long as we do not understand the meaning with our own efforts. Maybe some lucky humans have understood this in a state of contemplative intuition, while it is a basic fact of all existence for a quantum physicist.
My humble view is that we should not even believe what we see with our own eyes, given the limitedness and conditionedness of our sense organs adapted to surviving in our given environments. From seeing, we can have only outlook, not insight. Insight is the tool we normal humans have to reach the depth of hidden truths of life. If we are equipped with insightful intuition and intuitive insight, we do not have to be quantum physicists to crack the shell of the formula "form is emptiness and emptiness is form." How? -- meditate!
Of course, believing has an immense power. As Jesus said, "if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you" (Matthew 17:20f). Not to such a degree, but history is replete with miraculous achievements which could be reached only by faith. Such 'miracles' are plain facts while the question is still to be answered whether divine intervention or human potential is the real force behind them.
Once we accept someone or something as an absolute authority, it is easier to believe in it and to do what is dictated by this authority, believing it to be the absolute truth. By the same token, it is a harder way of arriving at truth to begin with not believing the words of an authoritative source and trying to understand them with our own reason and experience, and then to believe.
For example, the phrase every Buddhist knows, "form is exactly emptiness, emptiness exactly form," should not be accepted as truth (Buddha warned against it) as long as we do not understand the meaning with our own efforts. Maybe some lucky humans have understood this in a state of contemplative intuition, while it is a basic fact of all existence for a quantum physicist.
My humble view is that we should not even believe what we see with our own eyes, given the limitedness and conditionedness of our sense organs adapted to surviving in our given environments. From seeing, we can have only outlook, not insight. Insight is the tool we normal humans have to reach the depth of hidden truths of life. If we are equipped with insightful intuition and intuitive insight, we do not have to be quantum physicists to crack the shell of the formula "form is emptiness and emptiness is form." How? -- meditate!
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