This is a stub.
How do Christians know things?
1. Reason. People contrast this with revelation, but I am thinking at a more personal level, so I include the Bible here. We use reason to understand that the Bible is trustworthy. The Bible is revelation, but it is not a revelation to me, but to a prophet or apostle. For me, it is evidence.
2. Direct revelation. I don’t hear directly from God, but some people say they do.
3. Authority. Most people take their beliefs from someone they trust. This is often scoffed at, but it is actually quite sensible. Most people don’t know how to use even what limited Reason they have.
4. Tradition. Believing what people have always believed, and what people around them believe— not authorities, but sort of an authority-as-group.
This is actually the same as “How Do People Know Things”. I was at a Federalist Society covid-19 conference this morning, and the panelists were talking about how to inform governors of smart covid-19 policies. Governors want to know, but they can’t reason very well and instead rely on experts and people with experience—Authority and Tradition. In a novel situation, though, expertise and experience are useless. The doctors and bureaucrats just can’t think about a novel situation; their brains are petrified. So how can scholars–who have flexible minds— get through to the governor? They can’t, so we get truly stupid policies.