Emunah and the Philosophers

[Introduction:} "Growing up in a working-class Italian immigrant family meant that for the better part of my childhood there were only two books in our home: the annual Sears catalogue and a copy of the Bible. The catalogue didn’t do much to satisfy my intellectual curiosity, but the Bible did inspire me to think beyond my present circumstances. So, in that respect, it primed me for philosophy, which I joyfully stumbled upon when I took my first elective in university. I haven’t looked back since. But the academic philosophy I soon discovered was not particularly friendly to the reasons of the heart. When spiritual and religious questions did come up, the professor would typically frame these as matters for which philosophy should have the last word. Under such constraints, one can very well imagine how that ruling would go. That wasn’t always the case with my teachers. I was fortunate enough to take several classes with Charles Taylor. Many of the stops on his incisive, sweeping tours of the history of thought included several important religious writers and thinkers, ranging from Paul and Augustine, all the way to Alasdair MacIntyre. It took me some time to figure out why Taylor valued religious philosophy as a worthy conversation partner while many of my other professors were either indifferent (much in the way that Max Weber confessed a feeling of unmusicality with respect to religious experience) or even outright dismissive about anything related to religion. With time I realized that many modern philosophers (the general intelligentsia included) believe they know what faith  really  is about when in fact they are operating with a very distorted picture of it."