The creative role of doubt in religion

This essay contains four arguments in defense of the creative role of doubt in religion. Within a specified framework or context it is argued that: 1) creative doubt is a means of constructively acknowledging human finitude, 2) creative doubt can play a role in keeping one's fundamental beliefs alive and vital, 3) creative doubt, by continually challenging the full adequacy of religious symbols, serves as a check against the idolatrous worship of one's own religious language, and 4) the avoidance of doubt may reflect a relinquishing of freedom and a dehumanizing quest for certainty.