Knowledge, absolutely sure of its infallibility, is faith.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that true knowledge, when held with certainty, parallels the concept of faith.
In this quote, Yevgeny Zamyatin explores the relationship between knowledge and faith. He implies that when knowledge is viewed as infallible and certain, it transforms into a kind of faith, highlighting the similarities between absolute belief in facts and the trust placed in spiritual or philosophical principles. This reflection invites consideration of how humans engage with what they perceive as truth and the faith that underlies that certainty.
In practice
In a philosophical discussion about the nature of belief, someone might quote Zamyatin to illustrate how knowledge can become a belief system.
The knife is the most durable, immortal, the most genius thing that man created. The knife was the guillotine; the knife is the universal means of solving all knots; and along the blade of a knife lies the path of paradox - the single most worthy path of the fearless mind.
Accentuated plainness and accentuated vice ought to bring about harmony. Beauty lies in harmony, in style, whether it be the harmony of ugliness or beauty, vice or virtue.
The world is kept alive only by heretics: the heretic Christ, the heretic Copernicus, the heretic Tolstoy. Our symbol of faith is heresy...
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A man is like a novel: until the very last page you don't know how it will end. Otherwise it wouldn't be worth reading.
You're in a bad way! Apparently, you have developed a soul.
Industrial manβa sentient reciprocating engine having a fluctuating output, coupled to an iron wheel revolving with uniform velocity. And then we wonder why this should be the golden age of revolution and mental derangement.
All Religions. All This Singing. One Song. Peace Be With You.
That democratic socialism, the great utopia of the last few generations, is not only unachievable, but that to strive for it produces something so utterly different that few of those who wish it would be prepared to accept the consequences, many will not believe until the connection has been laid bare in all its aspects.
The chief glory of every people arises from its authors.
Astonishment is the root of philosophy.
Even if the received opinion be not only true, but the whole truth; unless it is suffered to be, and actually is, vigorously and earnestly contested, it will, by most of those who receive it, be held in the manner of a prejudice, with little comprehension or feeling of its rational grounds
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