2 A Summary of Some IssuesOur question is: How does testimony produce belief?Distinguish inferential and non-inferential beliefs. Ask, Are all beliefs which are derived from testimony inferential, as in the following case?Premises: The witness seems reliable.Evidence: The statement the witness makes fits in with what I know about the case.Conclusion: Therefore, it is reasonable that I believe that statement.Perception is necessary for the formation of beliefs grounded in testimony. I must hear the testimony. A basic belief is one not based on other beliefs. The beliefs evoked by testimony need not be based on premises at all, i.e. they can be non-inferential.The epistemological question is: ‘How does testimony yield justified belief and knowledge?’ Certain conditions must be fulfilled if testimony is to provide knowledge to its hearer. If I who am testifying do not know that p [p stands for ‘any statement’], you who hear my testimony can’t come to know that p on the basis of my attesting to it. If I do not know but only pretend that I do, you cannot know what I testify to. For example, if I do not know, but only surmise, that I am getting a good return on my investment, and testify to you that I am, you, the hearer, cannot know. You may believe but the belief may turn out to be false. Whether you are justified in believing me depends on other considerations.However, even if I am not justified in believing it, my testifying to it can provide you with justification for believing it, by providing the main materials for your becoming justified in believing it. The way I attest to the proposition, together with your background justification regarding me and the circumstances, may give you justification, independent of whether I have such justification.If testimony is to be credited and provide justified belief, (1) the attester must be honest, and so fulfil the sincerity dimension, and also (2) must have sufficient knowledge or experience to form a true belief, the competence dimension. For example, say that Pete testifies on the basis of a lucky guess that Bob made a deal with Mary yesterday.What he believes is true, what he testifies to is true, but it is a lucky accident that his testimony is true. But he does not know that it is. Suppose I believe his testimony. I may or may not be justified in my belief. Whether I am must be determined by considerations about my previous contacts with Pete, and my present grounds for taking his testimony to be true, e.g. my experience of his previous reliability as a giver of testimony. There is irony in such an example. His belief is a true belief, but for him it is not justified since it is a fluke that he got it right. So since his testimony is true, and will turn out to be known as true, he may, because of that, be taken as a reliable witness, not only in this case, but in other instances. The question is whether my belief is justified as the grounds for his reliability in other cases than this one.You may be justified through my testimony even if I, in testifying, am not justified in my belief. Whether you are justified in your belief in my testimony will depend on first, the way I attest to say, Samantha being in London yesterday, and second, your background information about me and third, independent of your considerations about me, your awareness of the circumstances to which I am testifyingStatement of principles: A belief based on testimony is justified provided the believer has justification for taking the attester to be credible regarding the proposition in question.
Belief constitutes knowledge (1) provided the proposition is true, (2) provided the one testifying knows the proposition and (3) provided the one hearing and coming to believe, has good reason to believe or has no reason to doubt either the proposition or the attester’s credibility about it.2
1 Validating TestimonyChristians, like other believers, have writings they consider to be not only authentic but also authoritative. The Christian believer is interested both in the present and in the past. The writings, called ‘scripture’ have frequent references to events that happened, to people and peoples who lived in the past, what they did, what they said, what happened to them, the writings that survived them. Historical questions are often of primary importance. But their importance is to be distinguished from other kinds of importance.We rely for our knowledge of the past on the testimony of those who lived and left evidence of their living. Such sources provide testimony to persons, events, beliefs. Sometimes the evidence is in the form of writing about the events it purports to report and interpret. Such testimony is thus available for the kind of careful scrutiny the historian directs to historical sources. Such scrutiny reveals the importance of that past to the present. How is this testimony validated?The testimony of Christians has a present aspect in that the believer is now making claims about what is present. Christians testify (1) to something that has happened in the past, something that they claim is essential for their belief, (2) and claim that, fulfilling the same conditions, can also happen in the present to the hearer. Some such testimony is effective and is validated through a two stage process: The hearer believes the proposition about the experience of others. What the testator claims to have experienced, or claims other people as well have experienced, the hearer also experiences. What results, it is believed, is that the testator’s claim is justified.Reference to other peoples’ experience is indirect testimony. I can testify that since he became a believer Sam has become a better person. Statement of what has happened to the speaker is direct testimony. But it may well be evidence, and in the secondary sense of testimony it is thus also testimony. ‘John has become sober and honest after coming to believe’ is a different kind of evidence from ‘I have become sober and honest after coming to believe.’ If there were no other way of knowing either about Sam or about me, such testimony, the conditions being right. would be sufficient to provide justification for my belief.
2 Different Kinds Of Beliefs: The Book Of ActsThe book of Acts in the New Testament provides us with examples of many kinds of beliefs. We may not be aware as we read scriptural writings that understanding them demands several kinds of belief. Some of these are more easily achieved than others and some are not achievable at all by some readers. A typical Christian ‘believer’ will hold the following beliefs and so could preface each of the following propositions with the statement ‘I believe. . . .’ Those marked with an asterisk are amenable to historical assessment. As such they can be verified or falsified empiricially. The others are not amenable to such assessment. That is to say they are beyond historical confirmation.Luke wrote the book of Acts.*Acts was not the first writing Luke composed.*Luke used various sources in writing the book.*Luke’s account is in detail literally true and so trustworthy as a report of actual events. For example, Luke gives a trustworthy account of the day of Pentecost in chapter 2.Peter healed the lame man who came to the Temple by being carried, and left leaping about in his joy.Luke records amazement of the crowds at the healing of the man lame from birth.*The healing was a miracle.The crowds were amazed.Luke knew by report about the conversion of Saul on the way to Damascus.*Luke’s report of this conversion is authentic.*Saul was converted on the way to Damascus.*Luke was a companion of Paul and accompanied him on some journeys.*Paul lived two years in his own house in Rome.*Luke could have written about the last months and the death of