NOTE: I start out talking about Life of Pi, but I am actually talking about God. If you are not that into literature please still read to the end because I'm going somewhere with this.
Last night I wrote my can lit exam and part of it required us to write a 4 paragraph response on Life of Pi. I wrote about a conversation which took place near the end of the book between Pi and the two Japanese men. They wanted to know which of the two stories he told was true, but, instead of answering, he asked them which was the better story. They both agreed that the better story was the one with Richard Parker, the tiger, and he responded "and so it goes with God." This is really interesting because, at the very beginning, the story says that it will "make you believe in God," but it never once tries to prove that God exists just as it never tries to prove that one story or the other is true.
In fact, Pi is not concerned with reason, logic, or truth at all. He is concerned with faith. He notices faith in his Hindu, Muslim, Christian, and Atheist friends but criticizes Agnostics for their "dry yeastless factuality." Two things are shown in this book to encourage faith in both the story with Richard Parker and in God. The first is that their beauty is shown. The beauty of the story with Richard Parker in it can be seen in that the two men choose it as the better story. The beauty of God is show in the beginning section of the novel where Pi explains his reasons for choosing each of the three religions he supports and describes the aspects that he finds beautiful about each religion and each God. The second thing that Pi does to encourage faith is that he shows the usefulness of Richard Parker and of God. It is his fear of Richard Parker which motivates him to act towards survival and it is belief in good gods that gives him hope. Both the usefulness and the beauty of God and Richard Parker are highlighted in Pi's admission of love for them. In one of the other books that we studied this semester in my Canadian literature class (my favourite novel ever, A Complicated Kindness) it was suggested that it is ok to believe a beautiful lie if it helps you survive. By showing the usefulness and beauty of God and Richard Parker, but not proving their truth, I feel like Pi is suggesting close to the same thing. The difference is that he seems to think it doesn't even matter what is true and what is a lie, only what is beautiful.
This brings me to God. I know a lot of people, including myself, who have (for the most part) come to understand what Christians believe, why, and how it is beautiful, but still struggle with believing it. This may sound strange. If you understand it, and it seems beautiful, than why not believe? For most of the people I know in this place there are still a few things we don't understand or a few things that don't seem beautiful, so that could be part of it. However, I feel like there is something else. I go to university, so most of the people I know are obsessed with finding out what is true. The problem is that the more and more you study the more and more you realise it is almost impossible to know anything for sure.
Everything is way more complicated than we tend to initially think it is, that is what university has taught me. It is possible to see the other side of almost every argument if you think about things deeply enough and that doesn't even touch on the subject of epistemology.The only thing I know for sure is that I exist in some way shape or form. I think therefore I am, but I could be the dream of a brain in a jar. I can tell by my actions and my level of confidence in those actions what I believe, but believing something does not equate knowing it and there are things that I hesitantly think and things I am pretty darn sure about, so I can't help but wonder how confidant I have to be before it counts as a belief. Is it ok if I say this makes sense to me, seems beautiful to me, and I have committed to living my life this way unless I ever find out that I am wrong and I could definitely be wrong? Does that count as confidence and is it a good enough reason to believe something? Does it even matter what is true, and if it does how can we ever confidently believe we have found truth if we never know for sure?
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