A Critical Assessment of Positivity Theory of Faith

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Ph. D. in Philosophy of Religion, Department of Philosophy of Religion, Faculty of Theology and Islamic Studies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

2 . Professor, Department of Philosophy of Religion, Faculty of Theology and Islamic Studies, University of Tehran, Tehran, Iran.

Abstract

This paper offers a differentiated assessment of two major challenges to positivity theories of faith: the internal critique advanced by Malcolm and Scott against desire-based (DES) accounts, and the external axiological critique concerning the value of God’s existence. I argue that these challenges operate at distinct levels and therefore do not carry equal force. Malcolm and Scott demonstrate that faith can persist in the absence of positive desire, inclination, or favorable evaluation toward its object. Their analyses of crisis, ambivalence, and sustained commitment devoid of a pro-attitude successfully undermine the posited conceptual necessity of desire for faith, exposing the limitations of linguistic and intuitive defenses of DES-positivity. By contrast, axiological anti-theistic arguments which often appeal to personal goods such as privacy or autonomy remain limited in scope. We contend that they are insufficient to outweigh the broad impersonal goods traditionally associated with theism, including cosmic justice, moral grounding, the absence of gratuitous evil, and objective meaning. We argue that such objections do not destabilize the structural core of positivity theory, but they at most render its evaluative dimension context-sensitive. The overall conclusion is therefore differentiated: while DES-positivity fails to be a necessary condition for faith, the axiological critique does not decisively refute the evaluative dimension of positivity theory. As an alternative, we advance the True Grit Theory as a structurally superior alternative. By grounding faith in practical steadfastness, resilience, and coordinated commitment under pressure, True Grit captures the action-guiding nature of faith without treating positive desire as conceptually essential. 

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References

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