Don't get me wrong. There definitely are occasions for not to do so.
If your feelings tell you you are really the opposite gender of your body, don't trust them.
If your feelings tell you God has already damned you, don't trust those feelings either. There is even a prooftext for this one, and it can mutatis mutandis be somewhat applied to the former as well. Here, four verses from I John 3:
19 In this we know that we are of the truth: and in his sight shall persuade our hearts. 20 For if our heart reprehend us, God is greater than our heart,* and knoweth all things 1 Dearly beloved, if our heart do not reprehend us, we have confidence towards God: 22 And whatsoever we shall ask, we shall receive of him: because we keep his commandments, and do those things which are pleasing in his sight
But we are not dealing with the feelings of young Francis of Sales, tempted to combine doctrinal Calvinism with personal despair (i e considering himself as one of the predestined vessels of wrath), where I John 3 is a medicine against this kind of Calvinist doctrine. No, we are dealing with a very different text, used to or misused to enforce a certain type of Calvinist morality, that of not relying on feelings. I think you have heard of Jeremias 17:
9 The heart is perverse above all things, and unsearchable, who can know it?
King James has:
The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?
First, the Hebrew vers 9 starts with Strong 6121. aqob - the meanings given together suggest more of "has its snags" than "is a liar" ... the heart indeed is booby-trapped. But it is not in and of itself a trap.
Second, the word that King James translates as "desperately wicked" is Strong 605. anash "to be weak, sick" ... I don't cease to breathe with my bronchae, just because I have bronchitis.
Third, apart from searching the Bible (which for a specific personal concern can be as booby-trapped as searching one's feelings), the cure seems to be mainly trusting other Christians, a community, or one considered as more mature in it. But verse 5 says:
5 Thus saith the Lord: Cursed be the man that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart departeth from the Lord.
So, the proposed cure is actually condemned in the chapter. At least as much as trusting one's feelings is.
Fourth, "heart" does not suggest simply feelings in Hebrew:
How the Bible Mistranslates "Heart"
@_magnify
https://youtube.com/shorts/S2G-4qxY-Ds
Fifth, to once again tie in with what seems to oppose trusting the community or a more mature Christian, the very next verse of Jeremias 17 says:
10 I am the Lord who search the heart and prove the reins: who give to every one according to his way, and according to the fruit of his devices.
For someone whose devices are bad, trusting the community is no shield. But the community, not being God, is also not capable of analysing someone's heart better than he can himself or she can herself.
Hans Georg Lundahl
Nanterre
Sts Cyril and Method
7.VII.2023
Sanctorum Episcoporum et Confessorum Cyrilli et Methodii fratrum, quorum natalis respective agitur sextodecimo Kalendas Martii et octavo Idus Aprilis.
* I thought the famous Muslim saying was a very abridged quote from here. Good illustration of the difference between Bible and Quran. God is greater = obvious, who would doubt it (barring atheism or other mental problems)? God is greater than our heart = a neat reminder, a believer can actually be tempted to take the voice of his heart as the voice of God when it isn't. But the Arab translation seems, according to google translate, to be, not "allah akbar min qulubina" but "allah aeazam min qulubina" ... wonder if this is a direct quote from the Arabic text of I John 3? Google translate actually works by matching texts that exist in different languages ... anyway, the translations for the lone word "aeazum" include "greatest" and "greater" and "uttermost" and "utmost" ... in fact, there is one more passage in the Bible where you find "God is greater" - Eliud is saying "God is greater than man" in Job 33. And when God finally comes around to settle things, His first words to Job are about Eliud - freely translatable as "do you even know this oaf?"
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