SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 6 Part 1 – BURKE (DALE)

May 312010
 

In the 6th and closing round, Burke argues from reason, scripture, and history.

From reason: The Trinity doctrine, argues Burke, is inconsistent with itself. The “Athanasian” creed presents us with three, each of whom is a Lord, and yet insists that there is only one Lord. As some philosophers have pointed out, it is self-evident that if every F is a G, then there can’t be fewer Gs than Fs. So if every divine person is a god, then there can’t be fewer gods than divine persons. (Burke leaves out this: Why say that this creed presents us with three? Because each one differs from the others, having at least one feature the others lack.)

Since the Trinitarian Jesus is believed to be God, everything in Scripture which applies to God must necessarily apply to him.

Right. If the “two” are really one and the same, whatever is true of one must be true of “the other”. That is, nothing can differ from itself at any given time. Bowman does seem to identify Jesus and God, even while he thinks some things are true of one but not of the other. Point, Burke.

But note that many trinitarians to not Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BURKE – Part 3 (DALE)

May 292010
 

Were there any “biblical unitarians”, or what I call humanitarian unitarians in the early church?

Buckle your seatbelts – this post isn’t a quickie.

First, to review – in this whole debate, Burke has argued that all the NT writers were humanitarians. But if this is so, one would expect there to be a bulk of humanitarian unitarians in the times immediately after the apostles. Here, as we saw last time, Bowman pounces. All the main 2nd century theologians, he urges are confused or near trinitarians. (Last time, I explained that this is a dubious play on the word “trinitarian”. My term for them is non-Arian subordinationists.) There’s not a trace, Bowman urges, of any 1st c. humanitarians – with the exception of some off-base heretical groups, like the Ebionites.

We’re talking about mainly the 100s CE here, going into the first half of the 200s. The general picture, as I see it, is this. Early in the century, we find the “apostolic fathers” basically echoing the Bible, increasingly including the NT (the NT canon was just starting to be settled on during this century). However, some of them seem to accept some kind of pre-existence for Christ (in God’s mind? or as a divine self alongside God?), and they’re often looser, more Hellenized in their use of “god” (so even though as in the NT the Father is the God of the Jews, the creator, Jesus is more frequently than in the NT called “our God” etc.) But clearly – no equally divine triad, no tripersonal God, and in most, no clear assertion of the eternality of the Son. In the second half of the century, starting with Justin Martyr, we find people expounding  a kind of subordinationism obviously inspired by Philo of Alexandria, the Jewish Platonic theologian Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BURKE – Part 2 (DALE)

May 282010
 

As we saw last time, Burke in round 5 argues like this:

  1. 2nd c. catholic theology was predominantly subordinationist.
  2. If the apostles had taught the Trinity, this wouldn’t have been so.
  3. Therefore, the apostles did not teach the Trinity.

In a long comment (#23) Bowman objects,

For some reason… anti-Trinitarians think it is bad news for the doctrine of the Trinity if second-century and third-century church fathers were not consistently Trinitarian in their theology, but that it is not bad news for them if their particular non-Trinitarian brand of theology is completely missing from those centuries.

It is true that many of the church fathers in the second and third centuries held to some form of ontological subordinationism. However, a fair-minded reading of these church fathers shows that this was a deviation within a generally trinitarian theology. They were not Arians, and by that I mean that their theology was distinctively different from Arianism and far closer to Trinitarianism. …in general what we find are theologies that might fairly be described as defective or immature forms of Trinitarianism. None of them is anything close to a Unitarian. None of them is Arian, though as you correctly state some of them have tendencies in their theology that one could describe as leaning that direction.

…it is a history of Trinitarianism, from the moment the apostle John died right through the councils of Nicaea and Chalcedon and beyond. It is a history in which the belief that Christ had existed since before creation as God was almost universally accepted among religious groups professing to be Christian. It is a history in which almost everyone agreed that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are divine. And it is a history in which Unitarianism is glaringly absent. (emphases added)

Yes, pretty much every historically informed unitarian who comes along reads the “apostolic fathers” and the extant mid to late 2nd c. catholic theologians, and finds support there. For example: Biddle, Clarke, Christie, Norton, Lindsey, Priestley, Webster, Lamson.

Why? Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BOWMAN – PART 3 (DALE)

May 242010
 

As I explained in the previous installment, in round 5 Bowman is trying to show that not only does the Bible imply that all three Persons are divine, but also that they in some sense are the one God. In other words, he wants to show how the NT brings the three, as it were, within the being of the one God.

To do this, he considers a dozen triadic passages, in which the Three are all mentioned together in quick succession. Last time, I mulled over his treatment of the “Great Commission”  passage. This time, a few others, and I take a crack at another explanation of this triadic language.

First, as I look at Bowman’s interpretations, some of them strongly suggest that he thinks that asserting the divinity of each just is asserting each to be numerically identical to God. I looked into this more last time, but briefly, this won’t fly, as it’ll make the persons identical to one another. So it is not clear, even if his expositions are right, that really support an orthodox Trinity theory.

Second, I reiterate that Bowman does a good job here, assembling a dozen important passages, in which it is impossible to ignore the triadic language. Suppose the doctrine of the Trinity is just this vague claim: “there are three co-equal persons in God”. If that is true, that would explain why these three are often mentioned together, in a way which can suggest they are on an equal footing. I said last time that any unitarian is obligated to explain these triadic statements in a way which is both compatible with unitarianism, and which is independently motivated (in can’t be that the only appeal of the reading is that it saves one’s theology).

Here’s Bowman’s treatment of one such text: Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 5 – BOWMAN – PART 1(DALE)

May 192010
 

In round 5, Bowman aims to show that the “threefoldness” of God is implied by the Bible. At issue is how to explain “triadic” mentions of Father, Son, and Spirit (Or God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit, etc.). Bowman mentions his list of fifty such passages. Here he focuses on a dozen passages. But first, his recap of where he thinks the debate is so far:

In the preceding three rounds of this debate, I have argued that the person of Jesus Christ existed as God prior to the creation of the world and that the Holy Spirit is also a divine person. If my argument up to this point has been successful, I have thoroughly refuted the Biblical Unitarian position and established two key elements of the doctrine of the Trinity. Add to these two points the premises that there is only one God who existed before creation and that the Father is not the Son, the Son is not the Holy Spirit, and the Father is not the Holy Spirit, and the only theological position in the marketplace of ideas that is left is the doctrine of the Trinity. Since these are all premises that Biblical Unitarianism accepts, I have not defended them here. (emphases added)

I’m tired of pointing out the inconsistency of what Bowman is urging. I’m capable of hearing the many ways theorists smooth away apparent inconsistencies (making subtle distinctions), but other than a quick gesture (I think in Round 1), I hear none of these familiar notes from him. This is just to say – he’s a resolute positive mysterian. Briefly, Father, Son and Spirit are numerically three, as they qualitatively differ from one another. But also, Bowman seems to think, each of them is numerically the same as God. This is inconsistent, because the “is” of numerical sameness is transitive – if f = g, and g = s, then f = s (compare: the concept of “bigger than”). Also, it seems that he thinks Father and Son to the same god, and also, since this god just is a person (hence “who” above), they are the same person as each other. And, of course, also they are not. Sigh. Let’s stick with the vague “threefoldness” claim I started with.

Bowman ignores what I call Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 4 PART 3 – BURKE (DALE)

May 112010
 

In round 4, Burke urges that his views about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit provide a simpler explanation of the texts. Whereas trinitarians must argue from implications of the text,

By contrast, I argue that the Bible provides us with explicit doctrines about the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, which… I have shown to be firmly rooted in OT theology.

Burke has a point here, although it can be overstated. Burke’s theology allows him to stick more closely to the words of the NT and the message as preached, e.g. in Acts. Surely, considered by itself this is an advantage. Trinitarians will argue that it is outweighed by the fact that the unitarian message leaves out other essentials, if somewhat implicit ones. Burke complains that Bowman hasn’t defined “implicit“, but this is a general philosophical issue outside the realm of the debate. Burke emphasizes that his approach is “Hebraic” whereas Bowman’s is “Hellenic”. In some sense this may be true, but I don’t think it advances the debate. It is surely possible that God providentially used Greek philosophy to help uncover the true implications of the NT. Further, both debaters are to some extent using Greek-philosophy-originated concepts and logic. Another place in which they’re talking past one another is this issue of the importance of what is and is not explicit in the NT, and specifically in the preaching of the apostles. Bowman is surely right that, e.g. Peter need not assert every element of the apostolic teaching in one sermon, and that Luke’s summary of that sermon surely wouldn’t include all of it. But Burke is right that if it is an essential part of the faith, and necessary to believe for salvation, that e.g. the Holy Spirit is a fully divine person in God distinct from the Father and Son, then we would expect this to be explicitly taught by the apostles, up front, prior to baptism. And we do not find this. But I don’t believe that Bowman has said that one must believe this to be saved. But if he affirms it, and holds that the apostles teach it, then Burke has a strong argument against him. This is surely a pressing, practical question that should be raised.

It is striking that Acts 2 does not contain Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – ROUND 4 PART 2 – BOWMAN (DALE)

May 082010
 

In part 1 I argued that Bowman attributes a non-existent fallacy to unitarians. After this faltering start, things get better. Continuing his pre-emptive rebuttal, Bowman argues that there is nothing about the roots of the Hebrew and Greek words translated “spirit” that requires them to mean a force or energy. Surely, this is correct, and his examples show this.

In the end of his pre-emptive rebuttal, Bowman attributes this argument to unitarians:

  1. The Bible contains no progressive revelation concerning God.
  2. The OT does not reveal the Holy Spirit as a distinct divine person.
  3. Therefore, the NT does not reveal the Holy Spirit as a distinct divine person.

I suspect that some current day unitarians do endorse this argument. (Does Burke?) Christians of any stripe who believe in any sort of Hell, in souls, or that the NT more clearly reveals the character of the Father, would probably reject 1. For these sorts of reasons, I reject it myself. In my view progressive revelation is different from the Islamic idea of “abrogation” (later Quranic verses contradicting and cancelling out or over-ruling earlier ones). Progressive revelation doesn’t involve contradiction of something earlier asserted, but rather clarifying something previously unclear, and contradicting things one might have inferred from what was formerly asserted. But back to Bowman.

Bowman opines that the OT unclearly hints at the Spirit being a distinct divine person, but he wants to say that this truth is only first clearly revealed in John 14-16. I think this puts him far off of patristic exegesis, btw – but maybe that’s a good thing.

The real meat of Bowman’s case is his exegesis of the books of John and Acts. His first positive argument is essentially this. Jesus promised that after leaving, he’d send “another Paraclete” Continue reading »

Scotus on Richard of St. Victor? (Dale)

Apr 172010
 
Duns Scotus manuscript pic

They call me "The More Than Subtle Doctor." You can call me Johnnie Boy.

A postscript to our Richard series: I was reading the interesting and dense The Mysteries of Christianity, by 19th c. German Catholic theologian Joseph Scheeben, on Richard of St. Victor, and he says the following in a footnote:

Scotus states decisively that Richard of St. Victor adduces rationes necessariae for the Trinity, but not evidenter necessariae, because the principles from which he argues are not evident. Cf. III Sent., d.24, q.un., no.20; I Sent., d.42, q.un., no. 4; Reportata, prol., no. 18. (p. 29, fn. 11)

I assume that Scotus’s point is the Richard’s arguments are valid, but that each has at least one unknown premise (making them not real “proofs” or demonstrations). But I lack the time and Latin ability to chase down these quotes and translate them.

Anyone else care enough about this to do it?

If you’re not a trinities contributor, this could be a guest post opportunity. The task: read the above passages, translate the relevant bits, share the translated bits and the point of them with us here.

Is Scheeben correct in saying that these objections are decisive? If you’re interested, email me.

Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate, Ch. 25 (Dale)

Apr 152010
 

At long last, we’ve reached the 25th and last chapter of book three of Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate! (Here are the other Richard-related posts here @ trinities.)

Richard starts off with the point that for the Persons of the Trinity, unlike the case of any other persons, there is “individuality without plurality” – each is what it is without any plurality of any kind – and “unity without inequality” – I’m not sure what he means by this second phrase. (p. 396)

In contrast, any other person, such as you or me, can be “unequal to himself”, in that we can become greater or lesser over time. (e.g. I’m smarter and morally better now than when I was 14.) And persons like us have multiple properties (we’re not simple). (p. 396) And of a human person, say Barak Obama, we can say that “his power alone is dissimilar to itself… [since] one thing is easy for him, another is difficult and a third is impossible.” (p. 397)

Then he says, “one and the same nature… in one respect is less, in another it is greater, and [so is]… dissimilar and unequal to itself.” (p. 397) So, the same point he made about persons, can also be made about natures. Thus, Continue reading »

SCORING THE BURKE – BOWMAN DEBATE – Burke 1 (DALE)

Apr 132010
 

In round 1, Burke explains that he’s a biblical unitarian, not a “rationalist” or “universalist” unitarian. Further, he confesses that:

Jesus Christ is the Son of God, but not God himself

and

The Holy Spirit is the power of God, but not God himself.

Further,

The Bible is the inspired Word of God and the sole authoritative source of Christian doctrine and practice.

He neither affirms or denies inerrancy, though I doubt that will matter to this debate. That he really holds the Bible to be the sole source of Christian doctrine is doubtful, even though he reiterates this old Protestant slogan. I predict we’ll see him using principles justifiable only by reason, for example in interpreting the Bible. But he is asserting that councils, bishops, etc. have no underived authority, no authority that is independent of the Bible.

I will be using the words “God” and “Father” interchangeably.

This is familiar Continue reading »

Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate, Ch. 24 (Dale)

Apr 112010
 

In chapter 24, Richard says that

Certainly one and the same substance is not something greater or lesser, better or worse than itself. Therefore, [there are no inequalities among members of the Trinity] since one and the same substance is certainly in each. …for this reason any two persons [in the Trinity] will not be something greater or better than any one person alone; nor will all three taken together be more [great?] than any two or any one alone by himself… (p. 396)

I take it that in the first sentence here that by “substance” he’s referring to the divine nature, saying that it can’t be greater than itself. That’s hard to argue with. He then argues that no person can be greater than any other. There’s an assumption here that greatness is solely a function of a thing’s nature. I’m not sure why we should accept that. Why not other intrinsic properties as well? One might think, e.g. it is greater to be the Father than it is to be the Son, hence even though they share the divine nature, one might think that the Father is greater than the Son. The inference from X and Y have the same substance to X and Y are the same in greatness, seems invalid. But if we make a valid argument, by adding the premise that greatness is a function solely of essence, we have valid argument, but then, Continue reading »

Richard of St. Victor’s De Trinitate, Ch. 23 (Dale)

Apr 082010
 

Now, to resume our drawn out and often-stalled series on Richard of St. Victor, in which we blog through the entirety of book III of his De Trinitate (On the Trinity), in which he famously / notoriously argues for the Trinity from reason alone. These chapters, like many preceding ones, are too compressed, so I’ll try to unpack them for us.

In chapter 23, Richard says that between the members of the Trinity “there seems to be more identity [sameness] than equality.” (p. 395) He then cites as an example three indistinguishable golden statues. Because they’re indistinguishable, we say they are “equal”. But there are three masses of gold involved, and so there are really three things here, three statues. But the case of the Trinity is different, he urges. How? Because “whatever is in any one person of the Trinity, the smae is also completely in any other person.” Here, he implies, we do have a deeper kind of “identity” or “sameness”.

I take it that Richard’s point is that the three Persons of the Trinity don’t differ as far as their composition, because each contains one and the same divine nature, here thought of as a particular.

He then brings up a case of “three rational spirits”, three souls. Continue reading »

Christology and Heresy 5 – Monophysitism Proper (JT)

Apr 052010
 

I'm a hybrid. I'm made of lines, but I also shine (as indicated by more lines).

In the last post, I explained that Nestorians believe that a complete individual human nature is indiscernible from an individual human person.

Monophysites also take this idea very seriously. In fact, the Monophysite takes very seriously the more general claim that a complete individual nature of any kind is indiscernible from the corresponding individual that belongs to that kind (for instance, a complete individual cow-nature just is the individual cow in question). So if there are two natures in Christ, then there will be two individuals that correspond to each of those natures.

But the Monophysite does not want to say that there are two persons in Christ, so he will insist that there is just one nature in Christ. That way, there will just be one person. But since Christ is both human and divine, this one nature must be a special hybrid of divinity and humanity.

The strongest form of Monophysitism would claim that this hybrid Christness-nature has all divine properties, and all human properties. This, however, is incoherent, for it would amount to two persons as well. After all, having all the divine properties is sufficient for membership in God’s-kind, and having all human properties is sufficient for membership in human-kind. There would, then, still be two natures, which contradicts the initial claim that there is just one (allegedly) hybrid nature. Continue reading »

Christology and Heresy 4 – Nestorianism Proper (JT)

Apr 022010
 

Don't let my flowing white locks fool you. I have sound ideas.

In the last post, I explained that an individual human nature is indiscernible from an individual human person.

The Nestorianism takes this point very seriously. As she sees it, if the Word (= the second person of the Trinity) assumes a complete individual human nature, then the Word assumes a discrete human person too, for a complete individual human nature is completely indiscernible from a discrete human person. But the Word is already a discrete person, namely a divine person, so the question is this: is the divine person identical to the assumed human person?

Continue reading »

Christology and Heresy 3 – The basic philosophical issue (JT)

Mar 302010
 

The Borden Company's KLIM (tm) powdered whole milk has everything you need for a nutritious life.

In the last post, I classified Monophysitism, Chalcedonianism, and Nestorianism. All three of these must grapple with a basic philosophical issue, namely this: a complete indvidual human nature brings along with it everything required for being a discrete human person.

Note that ‘individual human nature’ does not mean the humanity in the human in question (readers of scholastic philosophy are often tempted to think that). Rather, it means the humanity plus any individuating features, whatever they might be (a haecceity, a unique collection of accidents, or whatever). That is, an individual human nature is whatever it is that makes an individual human the particular human that it is.

For instance, if some x has a complete individual human nature, then one might say that x has the relevant kind of organic body, the ability to take in and process nutrients, grow, be sentient, think and love, and so on, and all of these things are what being a particular human consists in.

However, these also seem to be the very things that being a particular human person consists in too. After all, it is hard to imagine a human person without the relevant kind of organic body, the ability to process nutrients, be sentient, think and love, and so forth. To be all these things is just what it means to be a particular human person.

So on the face of it, it looks as if being an individual human is the very same as being an individual human person. That is, if one has a complete individual human nature, then they have everything needed to be a discrete human person too. Or, to put it another way, an individual human is completely indiscernible from the corresponding individual human person.

Christology and Heresy 2 – Monophysites, Chalcedonians, and Nestorians (JT)

Mar 272010
 

We're here to defend the faith against heresy!

The Council of Chalcedon (451 CE) condemned Monophysitism and Nestorianism. The following table helps to classify Monophysitism, Nestorianism, and Chalcedonianism.

Nestorianism: 2 natures, 2 persons
Chalcedonianism: 2 natures, 1 person
Monophysitism: 1 nature, 1 person

Continue reading »

Christology and Heresy 1 – What is Nestorianism and Monophysitism? (JT)

Mar 242010
 

If the circle and triangle overlap, that's bad. If they don't overlap, that's bad too.

These days, when analytic philosophers of theology talk about the Incarnation, they often say things like ‘if such-and-such, then such-and-such, but that would be Nestorianism’. The implication, of course, is that landing oneself in Nestorianism would be a very bad thing.

But why? Perhaps a lay person might want to avoid Nestorianism because they were told it was a ‘heresy’. But a hard-core Christian philosopher, I think, would want to be more explicit about saying just what Nestorianism is, and provide some reason for why they want to avoid it (rather than just asserting that some position is Nestorian).

Continue reading »

On “godhead” (Dale)

Mar 092010
 

In popular Christian writing, as well as in theology, I’m constantly seeing the word “godhead” being used to mean something like “the three members of the Trinity, considered as a group”. An example context would be discussion “the eternal fellowship of the Godhead”.

Historically, this usage puzzles me. You never see this usage in ancient, medieval, or early modern material.In fact, I’m not sure I’ve seen it in anything before 1980 – anyone out there have a counterexample?

head of a god statueHere’s what our friend the Oxford English Dictionary says about “godhead”:

1. The character or quality of being God or a god; divine nature or essence; deity.

b. As a title: Divine personality. Obs.

2. a. the Godhead: the Supreme Being; the Deity; = GOD n. 5. (Also rarely without article.)

b. A deity or divinity. = GOD n. 1. Now rare.   (Oxford English Dictionary online, “godhead”)

Basically, the OED acknowledges two usages of “godhead’ – (1) that which makes God divine – his quality of divinity, and (2) God. (2) is a natural extension of (1) – it’s a case of using a word for a part/aspect/component of the thing to stand for the whole thing – here, God. Note: the OED is out of date; it lacks the usage I noted at the start of this post. The new usage implies a divine community; the old (2) doesn’t – it is like referring to God using a sort of euphemistic title such as “Providence” or “Heaven”. Note that a “Godhead” in the recent usage is never a “him” but always a “they” or an “it” – this is the whole point of the new usage.

My hypothesis is this: Continue reading »

More on Loyola’s “white is black” passage (Dale)

Mar 012010
 

It seems I touched a nerve, judging by the word count so far (here, and here). First, let me make clear that I have no interest in mocking Catholic doctrine. I’m a non-catholic (and so non-Catholic) Christian, and am in sympathy with the Catholic tradition in many ways. I’m going to avoid some well-worn Catholic-Protestant battle areas here, and try to stick to what I think is so interesting and yet so wrong-headed about Loyola’s implicit mysterianism. Ed is concerned to rebut claims by “skeptics” that Loyola here issues a “jarring call to irrationalist dogmatism”, but to me that is a red herring.

Ed thinks I’m misreading the controversial passage. I don’t think he’s made his case, and I also think he’s also missing the epistemic point I was making.

  • By “tradition” I meant whatever beliefs the Hierarchical Church asserts to be mandatory for Catholics. I’m well aware that Catholics don’t consider all widespread Christian, even Catholic traditions mandatory.
  • Loyola’s discussion is not merely about the infallibility of the Church’s judgement or pronouncements. It does assume that, but the notorious passage occurs as a rule for the proper formation of beliefs. So Loyola is on the topic of individual epistemology – he’s giving a rule which in his view will lead us only to correct beliefs. So in my view Ed is mistaken when he asserts that “What is at issue [in the black is white passage] is the epistemological status of the Church’s pronouncements themselves.”
  • Is Loyola’s claim hyperbole? Continue reading »

Quote: Loyola – tradition trumps sense perception (Dale)

Feb 242010
 
St. Loyola

(click for image credit)

St. Ignatius Loyola (1495-1556) founded the Jesuit order and authored a famous book of Spiritual Exercises. There, in a list of rules for correct belief, we have this:

Thirteenth Rule. To be right in everything, we ought always to hold that the white which I see, is black, if the Hierarchical Church so decides it, believing that between Christ our Lord, the Bridegroom, and the Church, His Bride, there is the same Spirit which governs and directs us for the salvation of our souls. Because by the same Spirit and our Lord Who gave the ten Commandments, our holy Mother the Church is directed and governed. (emphasis added)

What occasioned this rule was likely the objection, common among 16th-19th c. Protestants, to the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, to the effect that we are more sure, on the basis of sense perception, that the consecrated wafer is just a wafer, than we are (based on Church testimony) that it is really the body of Jesus. God wants us, they would urge, to trust the senses he gave us, and believable miracle-claims let us do this.

I don’t see this sort of objection nowadays. I’m not sure why it went out of style.  In any case, Loyola’s answer is clear - tradition ought to trump even a clear, close-up sensory perception. One would think, then, that it would also trump a strong intuition of falsehood – as when a set of claims appears self-inconsistent.

But even Loyola’s sense claim seems unreasonable. Suppose, contrary to fact, that Mother Church had long, strongly asserted that uneaten, consecrated wafers never rot. Then, you’re cleaning up the church, and find a wafer than you remember the priest dropping during Mass some months ago. It is rotten – covered with bread mold. You can feel, smell, and see the rot. Surely, you can (and will) reasonably believe that the wafer is rotten.

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