Jerry Avins wrote:
>> Belief, IS, and MEANS choosing what you hold as true without yielding
>> to reason. That's what it means, it has no other meaning. I ...
>> That's just what you believe it means. A dictionary will enlighten you.
A. S. Hornby splits this up in two parts, which bog down to
a) confidence
b) faith
Since my German-Chinese dictionary lists a whole 6 Chinese words (which all
mean something at least slightly different), that can't be the whole story
;-). However, "belief" in the context of religion definitely is (b), faith.
Natural languages are inherently inaccurate, and words have multiple
meanings (the colloquial "I believe" is rather the contrary of the
religious "I believe", since the former expresses mild confidence, easily
overthrown by better arguments, while the latter expresses support of
dogmas).
--
Bernd Paysan
"If you want it done right, you have to do it yourself"
http://www.jwdt.com/~paysan/